Zumba Fitness World Party

 Every year I create Amazon wishlists for my parents to give them an idea of what they can buy for Liam and I.  I always suck at finding anything outside of books to really get me, but this year I was perusing the Kinect workout games because as much as I love love love my Zumba Fitness Core, I was starting to wear out all of the workouts and all of the music, and was in desperate need of something to change it up.  I was finding myself going back to old standards like Hip Hop Abs, which as much as I love just doesn't quite give you the cardio that you get from Zumba.  Needless to say when I came across Zumba World Party I HAD to get it!  I was so excited I could barely wait until Christmas to try it out.  The first day it came I was prepared to start my workout and was pumped up and for some reason I couldn't get it to pull up on the XBox.  I was devastated.  I wasted almost 40 minutes trying to get it to work before I gave up and decided in disgruntlement to do a different workout.  It took some fidgeting in the daylight but finally it worked like nothing had been wrong the night before.

Since I finally have started the world party workouts I have to say that it is an increased tempo and much more intense in a good way.  The makers decided to pick shorter songs to give you more of a chance to try out more kinds of dance and target more body parts in a single workout.  I think it was genius.  I did a short 20 minute medium intensity workout tonight and it had me pretty worn out by the end of it.   It is kind of daunting when you are used to only 4 or 5 songs and instead you get 7 or 8, but they are shorter and staggered more with intensity.  I love the fact that dance is used from all over the world.  My only real complaint is that in all of the other Zumba Fitness workouts you had very clear visual clues and in this one they are harder to recognize against the background when you are in mid dance.  Also the screen set up on World is a little different from the previous Zumba workouts so it has just been taking a little bit of getting used to.  The instructors are much more realistic looking and have better hair movement like you would see in a unreal game engine for PC games (oops I may have just geeked some of you out sorry).  Also the Zumba streak indicator gives you the number of Zumba streaks in points reminiscent of how many hits you got in an action or first person shooter console game so it gives it added video game feel.

This is the only Zumba Workout game thus far that does give you the added option to World Travel mode and go through 7 destinations around the world and focus on the dance styles for those locations instead.  This is an amazing added dimension on top of the other great qualities of class picking by length and intensity as well as customizing your own class, doing a song at a time, learning the steps and even the zumba world edition found on all Zumba games that allow you to live connect with a current ongoing Zumba class that is being broadcast. 

Overall I give this workout 5 stars.  Someone on my IG (InstaGram) just recently wrote a testimonial about losing 70 pounds on this workout alone.  I use it predominantly for cardio and because I thoroughly enjoy it which makes me look forward to working out.  The music is the best yet and reaches many different cultures.  I love the diversity and learning dances from around the world!  It will be quite some time before I wear this one out.  I highly recommend it to anyone that enjoys or would like to look into working out at home! 
*This workout is also available for Wii

Here is the official website for Zumba Fitness: Zumba World Party

Here is my review for Zumba Fitness Core: Zumba Fitness Core


My song for today :)

Insanity Cardio Abs Review & Cookie Failure

First I will start with the Abs Review.

Having taken a break from Insanity for awhile after it kicked my butt a few times (Insanity Plyometrics Review), I wanted to start back in to things a little slower, so I chose a 20 minute workout.  This happened to the be the Cardio Abs workout.  Having done a couple of the Insanity workouts before I was mentally prepared.

I'm not going to say that it was a bad workout, because it definitely did work my abs.  I felt that it was a little weak in comparison to the other things that I have come to expect from Insanity.  My Belly Pilates totally kicked that workouts butt!  See Belly Pilates Review

The workout starts with a warmup as they all do with Shaun T.  The most intense part would be the jump leg curl ins, which is very high impact on the body if you have back or knee issues, but you can definitely feel it.  About 3/4s of the exercise is spent on the mat.  I am not saying that this is a bad way to work your core, because I think you can reach your core splendidly this way.  I am not really sure how you can call it cardio given the slow pace and a lot of movements involving planking.  Once the mat came out I didn't feel like my heart rate really stayed up.

Overall I call this a nice, slower paced workout in terms of insanity.  It is definitely a core workout, but I would hesitate to classify it as full cardio.  There is some cardio in it, especially in the beginning.  If you haev never tried Insanity before, I would suggest it as a nice "easing into it" exercise, as the fit test can make you feel like you suck and shouldn't even start, and the Plyometrics leaves you in so much pain you never want to go back. 

*As I could not find any actual Shaun T previews, here is an exercise class a workout facility doing the workout, if you want to get a feel for what the workout is. 

COOKIE FAILURE
Now back to the failed cookies.  If you read my blog last night about Liam's being fully potty trained, he still does want his cookie now and again after he goes potty and washes hands.  not always, but when he does there better be a cookie, needless to say we ran out of cookies this morning and he was LESS than impressed.  So I figured we could just makes some (did I mention that we need to go grocery shopping).  My recipe ended up with so much improvisation that it was a big mess.  However after tweaking with ingredients and adding some more stuff (mostly flour) I was able to make the second batch that came out of the oven more than a big mess, and actually suitable for the cookie container on the window sill.  I can show you the photos, but I won't give you the actual recipe because it did NOT work for me.  here are the 3 main reasons why it did NOT work. 

1. When making cookies you should ALWAYS use unsalted butter.  I only had 3 TBsp left and substituted margarine the rest of the way and this made the cookies not stick together as well and greasy
2. I know when I move I will find a thousand containers of baking soda as I see it all the time.  However some magical entity steals my baking soda when I go to make cookies which left me instead with 2 separate containers of baking powder.  this usually makes your cookies not rise as well and they stay flat and spread out.
3. I was trying to half a recipe that I was only half following anyway...  So it was a mess I can admit I had a cooking failure today haha

Needless to say I did get a GOOD dozen chocolate chip heath cookies that are a little flatter than they should be and also a big spread out cookie sheet of cookie mess, all tasted amazing, and I am saving and eating off of the scraped off flat spread out greasy cookie mess because I suck at presentation anyway and taste is definitely high for this mess :)

*Even though i am the improvisation queen, some things CANNOT be improvised, and when you improvise TOO much you end up with something else ENTIRELY :)  Have a great Saturday night.

Cookie Dough

Failed batch

Better Batch :)

Insanity Plyometrics Review

This evening I finally broke down and tried out Insanity.  I decided to do the first workout DVD which was the Plyometrics cardio circuit workout.  I am not a fan of intense workouts but I wanted to give it a try.  The DVD first starts out with a pretty fast paced warm up.  I was already feeling it in my calves before the warm up portion was even over.  The disc then goes into a stretching before the circuit begins using a lot of yoga based stretches.  The circuit starts out at about a jog pace and begins to speed up immensely right away.  After each circuit (about 5 minutes to get through the circuit) and then there is aw ater break.  It is a definite good exercise, and I can admit that I didn't make it through the entire 40 minutes.  I stopped at about the 25 minute mark.  I didn't want to be unable to walk tomorrow or in too much pain to ever do the workout again.  I can definitely see that it works and is a good workout if you are serious about getting into shape and losing weight.  It gets you sweating and working out you entire body.  I will have to check out some of the other discs and let you know what my take is on it.  So far I am already sore and will be hating life in the morning.  If you are serious about getting into shape I would definitely check this out.  It usually runs for a bit more than $100 but Amazon is selling used copies starting at $44.

 Here is a preview of what you are in for :)

Here are some good reference websites to check out if you are interested

Insanity Workout Program

Beach Body Insanity Site

Insanity for Sale on Amazon

Belly Pilates

Belly Pilates with Rania Review

I bought the DVD Belly Pilates with Rania a few years ago.  I have done it many times in the past but I am always in so much pain from sore muscles afterwards that I am no good at sticking with it.  Let me give you some background on the video:  Belly Pilates is a workout designed by revered Belly Dance fitness instructor Rania Bossonis and created in 2008.  In it she combines Belly Dancing & Pilates to do a lot of flowy and isometric moves.  Rania has many other Belly Dance inspired workouts that I will check out in the future to include Belly Abs, Belly Yoga, Belly Dance Fitness, & Belly Dance Fat Burning.  You can buy it on Amazon new for about $7 or used for less than $2.  It is a great workout to get many muscles in the legs, shoulders and abs.  I would suggest a lot of stretching afterwards.

Mychal and I have been working out in the evenings at home and we take turns deciding what we do.  So I challenged him to my belly pilates DVD.  Let's just say that I don't think he was expecting it to be as hard core as it was, and I spent more time giggling at his groans of movements than working out.  He claims to already be sore and is dreading how he will feel when he wakes up in the morning.

If you want to check out any samples of these video just look up Rania & Belly and all kinds of workout videos associated with her come up int he results.  I perused through a few but couldn't find one from Belly Pilates, it seems to be one of her first videos created and she seems to have gotten better production and helpers in the background since she first started.  I would definitely recommend Belly Pilates, as it is only about a half hour workout and then you are done.  It looks like the rest of her videos would be great as well.  Enjoy toning those abs, and feeling the burn in the morning :)