when tomboys become mothers

I am not ashamed to admit that I am relatively ambivalent to minor injuries. The only time I've visibly flinched or even let out a small cry of alarm is when I've seen the Little Miss' head come within millimeters of a hard corner. But if I were to react to every time she caught a toe and tripped on the sidewalk or wasn't paying attention and walked into the wall (clearly we share some genes here) then I'd be a blubbering ball of anxiety.

Personally, I don't believe in getting worked up over every bump and bruise. I don't believe in scooping the child up and coddling her over every slight discomfort. It seems cold, I'm sure, when she nearly bites it and I simply tell her to "dust it off," but my child - the ultimate bad ass of toddler bad-asses - gets up and dusts herself off.

Also, I don't remember NOT having skinned knees for longer than four minutes as a child. So as terrible as this may sound, I want her to fall and get bruises and scrapes. I think it's a part of growing up.

Today, however, was the first time (that I am aware of) that I could see and feel the judgment of my non-reaction to my child's injury. We were at Panera getting items for our weekly carbfest. My girl was confused and upset that we weren't staying there to eat and as I held her hand and tried to guide her towards the door, she yanked her arm away from me and in doing so, fell backwards into a cabinet. As her back hit the door it made an awfully loud noise and two ladies jerked there heads to see what had happened. The looks on their faces were something like this:

"look of disapproval" emoticon

As my child sits there and wails, I tell her she's fine. Probably not the best way to react in public but truthfully, she was fine. But these ladies just stared in disgust and one cried out, "What happened?!" I looked at her and said flatly, "I was holding her hand and she yanked away from me." Still, they continued to stare at me as if I had just thrown my child against a wall. As I took her out to the parking lot and calmly explained to her that she got hurt because she didn't hold my hand when I needed her to, and that we couldn't stay because Daddy needed us to bring home his carby goodness, my eyes darted around warily, watching for a cop car to show up and start questioning me about beating my child. Seriously, the way those women looked at me, I thought surely they were about to dial 911.

Now, even when she is having one of her less pleasant toddler moments...

... they are soon balanced out by her doing/saying/looking heart-breakingly sweet:

I am not a perfect mother. Obviously, this blog is more of a self-obsessed fitness diary than an ode to family life, so I don't focus a whole lot on everything parenthood-related when I write. But I LOVE my kid. And just the notion that someone would think for a second that I would hurt her on purpose makes me sick.

So do me a favor, rubber-necking busybodies: Say something to the parent smoking in the car with kids in the back seat. Give dirty looks to the person who yells at her kid, "I TOLD you to SHUT UP." Go bother the person who lets their kids run circles around the restaurant whenever they go out to eat.

It's because I love my kid that I don't protect her from every boo-boo or plead with baby talk to get her to cooperate when she's feeling a bit TOO independent.

I don't know what you think, but I'd say the outcome is good so far.

Anyone ever give you crap for your parenting practices?

How do you (or would you, if kids are in your future) teach your kids to be tough and strong?

Vacuuming, soup, and other thrilling topics.

It's a sleepy-feeling kind of day. One of those days when from sunrise to sundown, the amount of light coming in through the window doesn't change at all and the sky remains the same shade of gray. Just look at it outside- it looks like nap time.

The plus side to a cool, rainy day that also happens to be a day off from spinning or running is that our furry carpet will finally get some love in the form of a vigorous vacuuming. And the sofa, which smells like a third, very large and stinky dog, needs to get Arm & Hammered to death. About three times a year my dogs shed everywhere, making this place look, feel and smell like it belongs to an animal horder. I might need to take a trip to the money trap that is Target to arm myself against the funk and dander.

For today's workout, I have GOT to get back to doing yoga. Naturally, I can not commence with my sun salutations until I clean the house (nothing like down-dogging in a pile of dog fur) but I think just about every part of my body will benefit from a solid hour of yoga today. I used to do it on a weekly basis in conjunction with running and climbing, and while I'm faster now than I was then - a few years ago - I feel like parts of me are not as strong. Since I can't always make it to the gym to throw weights around, I want to re-commit to weekly yoga sessions.

In addition to strength, I've been focusing on food a lot this week. It seems that I'm always just slightly hungry, which is annoying considering I need energy to keep up with my mini training partner, not to mention running and work. Protein has been my major focus (because lord knows I eat enough carbs). Truth be told, I just barely get the amount of protein I'm supposed to. I tend to follow the 3:1:1 carbs to fat to protein ratio. Based on a 2000 calorie diet, this means I should try to get 400 calories' worth - 100g - of protein a day. I think I barely get 50g. So I'm pretty much grabbing for protein wherever I can find it: lean meats, Greek yogurt, nuts, whey powder... anything.

Since I'm not always putting together Top Chef-worthy meals, I keep my cupboard and freezer stocked with quick, easy items that can be thrown together for quick, tasty meals.

Pasta + soup + frozen brocolli + frozen turkey meatballs. Boil low 'til pasta is cooked and you get...

Soupy, pasta-y, brocolli nomz. You can use a bowl though, if all of yours aren't in the dishwasher, like mine were.

I was full from that meal for a whopping 43 minutes!

Of course, the pot didn't last long, which just gives me another reason to raid Target. When you can put together a meal that is literally $0.67 a serving, you just can't go wrong.

What's your favorite strength or X-training routine? Do you do videos at home or do you just wing it? I actually like a yoga DVD from time to time- it's nice to let someone else tell me what to do.

Do you have a go-to easy meal? I'm a big soup fan, but once it's consistently in the 80's and 90's I start making a lot of chicken salad (recipe tomorrow) because I don't want to turn on the oven or burners!