Painting: The New Aerobics

Well, this has been some kind of week! This was the first time I've worn my hair all down rather than in a pony tail since Monday (except for sleeping or showering of course)! That's somewhat unusual for me even when the weather is hot, as it's been here this week, because if I wear a ponytail all day it gives me a headache. But I decided to put off my new jogging routine (OK, I admit that I've actually only gone out to jog once...but I fully intend to do it regularly...I promise!) and tried out a new aerobics routine: painting every wall in sight for at least two hours every day. I have to say, if sweat is a gauge of how effective an exercise routine is, painting comes close to beating jogging. Every day this week except Monday and Wednesday I have painted at least during Tyler's nap time, and some days after the boys went to bed for the night as well. I did both of those on Tuesday which explains why no painting got done on Wednesday. I could hardly move on Wednesday! I was somewhat sore but mostly I was just exhausted! I felt sort of drugged from lack of rest. And I had that headache from the ponytail thing going on. Sadly I didn't figure out till Wednesday night that it was the ponytail causing the headache. I had already put my hair up that morning thinking I would paint later but the headache wouldn't go away by that point and with being so tired I figured I should take the day off. My solution on Thursday was to wear a lower ponytail. For some reason it puts more pressure on my head when I wear one near the crown of my head or right on the back of my head for a long time. If I just pull it into a low ponytail though it doesn't bother me. Anyway it seemed very striking to me for some reason that I hadn't worn my hair down except to sleep and shower for nearly five days in a row.

I have to say though, you know how when you start a new exercise routine and you are really sore but you tell yourself, OK I need to just go and do this again and it won't be as bad but then you find that in fact it can get worse? Well I went through that this week. I learned in fact what it would be like if I took a part-time job as a painter. Every day (except Wednesday) after I finished my morning housework, I would prepare whatever room I would be painting in so that when Tyler went down for his nap, everything would be in place and I could just pour the paint out and get started. Then that's what I would do. I would paint until I either finished whatever I had decided to do for that day or when Tyler woke up, whichever came first. He generally naps for 2 to 2 1/2 hours so that's a good amount of time painting for someone who usually spends those hours of nap time sitting in front of the computer or on the couch with a book. On Thursday, I painted three walls during nap time and by the time I was done and had cleaned my tools and myself (I'm a messy painter) I couldn't even walk at a normal pace. I was groaning every time I went to sit or stand. I have never needed a hot tub more in my life. I was actually afraid that I wouldn't be able to do anything again on Friday. We took that evening off of painting just in case. On Friday, however, I got up feeling pretty good, walked with my mom early that morning and by nap time, felt good enough to give the walls in my bedroom another go. And what do you know? That whole thing where if you start a new exercise routine and just persevere eventually you'll get to where you don't want to die when it's over turns out to actually be true. Friday evening I was fine and in fact good to go with painting some more. (Until I accidentally stepped in the paint pan and was sent to the shower by my long-suffering husband who finished it up for me. Don't worry we were almost done anyway. :)) Today I was again just fine except for some soreness in my shoulders from all the unaccustomed lifting of my arms and the whole painting motion.

So you would think that with all this work I've been putting in that I would have dropped some weight. I mean, hey, if you could have seen me some of those days, wearing my sports bra and a pair of shorts, dripping sweat off my arms and face, you would be convinced I'd lost a good five pounds of water weight. But you would be wrong. All I have to say is I better have been building extra muscle and that's why I haven't lost any weight from this. I had never really produced enough sweat to have it drip in my eyes and actually burn until this week. That's not very fun. I probably should have invested in a sweat band. Or at least worn a shirt so I could have had something handy to mop myself up with. But in the afternoons when the only person who would see me was Jake, and it was hot in the upstairs of our house with the windows open to let the paint fumes ventilate, I wasn't about the subject myself to another layer of clothes that were technically unnecessary.

But all my sweat did pay off, even if it wasn't in lost pounds. Because now we have a wonderfully, completely painted staircase and playroom and a completely painted bedroom! The staircase is wonderful because now we don't have to see the horrible smudges and finger prints. The scribbles from the dreaded toddler are now nicely covered. And we now feel like we are in someone else's house when we go into our bedroom. My hope is to get my bathroom painted tomorrow. Bathrooms are never as big of a deal because there is actually very little uninterrupted wall space with the toilets and baths and sinks taking up so much of it. We have paint for Tyler's bedroom but that will have to wait for a good Saturday to get that done. Painting the bedroom of a person who naps is not an easy prospect. It will get done eventually but it's not a huge priority for me.