I'm usually pretty good at motivating myself to exercise. But not always. Give me someone barking orders, though, and I'm sure to deliver. Like the other day, when my family went to a local community college to fly a kite, throw a football and play in the nice Florida weather. Since my kids gave a whole five minutes to kite-flying and football-throwing, we ended up strolling near a baseball diamond, surrounded by metal bleachers. "Do 25 stadiums," my husband coached. Stadiums involve running up and down the steps continuously (they're famous here in Gainesville, where college students and locals head to the University of Florida football stadium and crank them out in the name of fitness). I hadn't planned on exercising on our little outing, but this was a challenge I could not let pass me by.

I did the stadiums, all 25 of them. I counted something like 15 steps in all, so with one rotation up and down, I tackled 30 steps. In all, my legs powered up and down 750 steps. Mission accomplished. I was motivated.

Next, my littlest guy and I ran some bases. We ran two home runs, actually, and while we I didn't have the time for a full-out workout (the purpose of the trip was family time, after all), I do plan to return for some solo home-run fun. And some more stadiums. And some jogging around the nearby track too.