Adriana Kraft

When it's time to heat things up...

baby boomers

Stay Sexy ~ What’s YOUR word?

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This morning I’ve been re-reading blogs on a list I keep for inspiration for this weekly column on staying vibrant, healthy, exciting and sexy across the life style. I needed that, because with the holidays and a horrific case of bronchitis hubs came down with Christmas day, my usually faithful routine flew out the window. I wasn’t finding the motivation inside myself to conquer it, so I turned to my virtual support network.

Here’s the article I re-read, by Molly Alexander Darden:

How One Word Drove Me to Cross the Bridge From Old Age to Youthful Vitality

And here’s my favorite quote:

“I committed to do whatever it took to feel vital again.”

What she stumbled upon was the one activity that could entice her to put in the necessary hard work – the sport she used to do that gave her the feeling she remembered and wanted back. For her, it was water skiing.

Did I mention she’s at least seventy? It’s clear she has resources – once she identified what activity would inspire her to shed those pounds and get in shape, she was able to hire a specialized coach to see her through the process. But that’s not what I took from her blog, and it’s not what you need, either.

What she focused on was the remembered feeling of excitement, achievement, and vitality. Those feelings are stored in our very bones and muscles, and those memory traces can propel us towards our goal.

So here’s another quote – and my New Years wish for you, as you enter 2014:

“I love being able to tell people what I’m doing now, instead of what I used to do.”

And yes, I did my workout between reading the article and writing this column. Go, me!

Have fun, and Stay Sexy!

Stay Sexy ~ It’s Hard Work

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I have a vivid memory of our now-grown son running up to me after his first day of kindergarten, beaming as he shared his important news: “Guess what, Mom? Hard work pays off!”

Here’s a fact baby boomers need to know if you want to stay sexy through these next decades: It takes a lot of work. Couch potatoes aren’t sexy, pretty much, and the time-worn phrase use it or lose it applies, too.

So here we go – what does the hard work consist of, and how do we keep it going?

1)    Move your body

The direct payoff of aerobic exercise and strength training for our sex lives is well documented. We’ll look better, feel better, have more muscle tone, develop more stamina, have better orgasms…the list goes on. If you’re not used to moving, you can start small – and it never pays to set expectations too high, in the beginning. That’s a set-up for failure and disappointment. Find something that works for you (we like Xbox 360 Kinect Dance Central and Extreme Makeover, as well as dance classes), something you like, something you can see yourself maintaining over the long haul, and above all, just start. Any day you do something is a day you’re not a couch potato. At our house? Forty minutes a day, almost every day. Hard work.

2)    Eat well

Yes, to stay sexy, we have to be careful about what we eat. Pay attention to what foods – and how much – you need for a healthy, balanced lifestyle, as opposed to a quick-fix diet. Because my husband is a cardiac patient, we’ve developed a repertoire of delicious, satisfying heart-healthy main meals from which we rarely stray. Whole grains instead of refined flours. Fruits for dessert instead rich baked goods. A baked apple, with cinnamon, four or five pecans, and just the tiniest touch of butter, instead of apple pie, and pour a little 1%, almond, or soy milk over it instead of ice cream or whipped cream. There are lots of resources out on the web (see item #4 below) to help with staying both delicious and healthy in our eating habits. Yes, this takes discipline.

3)    Be sexual every day

With your partner, if you have one, but fly solo if you’re alone. Guys may adapt to this more easily than women, since guys typically have an average of eleven daily erections during waking hours. But many sources recommend an orgasm a day for overall health, and even short of orgasm, keeping that cock or pussy active and well-rehearsed will pay off in greater sexual stamina, increased ability to achieve and maintain arousal, increased comfort with penetration and overall ability to enjoy sex.

Kegels are a good place to start, for both men and women. Exercises that help sustain blood flow for the penis, and toys or play that keeps a vagina stretched and ready to receive are additional options.

And if you have a partner, sharing a little TLC, cock-training, cuddle time, adult film watching or reading out loud from your favorite erotic romance can keep those endorphins flowing and improve your overall connectedness and well being, even if it doesn’t always lead to intercourse or orgasm.

4)    Exercise your Brain

We all know that the brain is the most important sex organ – to establish and maintain arousal as our bodies change, we’ll want to keep our brains as primed as possible! I’m not just talking crossword puzzles and Sudoku here (though I do lots of both). Keep learning things, keep finding new and stimulating topics that spark your interest. One of our favorite coffee hangouts has the motto “life is short – stay awake for it.” Works for us!

5)    Learn how to talk to yourself

It’s all about motivation – we all have those days when we just don’t feel like putting in the hard work. It’s okay to skip a day once in a while, but it’s crucial to pick it back up once we’ve taken that break and keep it going. Learn what your prime motivating factors are and practice using them: what threat or reward is most likely to get you up off that couch and following your regimen again? I have several – here are a couple of them. It took me years to get rid of those love handles that used to hang over the waistband of my jeans, and I don’t want them back. Yes, that’s vanity – whatever works! I also have the specter of dementia and Alzheimer’s disease hanging over me on both sides of my gene pool, and there are certainly mornings where that fear alone drives me to get back at it. When the going gets tough, know what kind of pep talk to give yourself.

6)    Build a support network and use it

Keeping up with all these practices is very hard work. Sometimes self-talk alone still isn’t enough to keep us going or to re-start the engines. We need buddies – cheerleaders, even, who can encourage us, teach us, and light the way. People in your support network don’t have to be privy to your deepest sexual secrets – they might not even know staying sexy is an important goal for you. But maintaining sexual health is so integrally connected to all other aspects of a healthy lifestyle that anything your friends can contribute to keeping you on track will spill over into the rest of it. Cheerleaders, workout buddies, mentors, fellow travelers – we all feel better and live better when we’re connected to others in these ways.

Share what you’re learning

For my husband and me, writing this column and writing our erotic romance novels have both contributed beyond measure to keeping us vibrant, healthy, excited and sexy. For one thing, hardly a day goes by that we’re not talking or learning about something sexual. What works for you? What have we left out that you would never do without? How do you re-boot yourself when it starts to feel too hard? We’d love to include reader comments and ideas in future columns, so drop us a comment or an email.

Have fun – and Stay Sexy!

Stay Sexy: The sexiest thing you can ever do…

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…is get your heart rate up there!

Okay, so you already know being sexy probably has to involve our hearts – we want to be sexy with the person we give our heart to, right? And after all, this week is Valentine’s Day, so talking about our hearts is a natural.

But here’s the thing: elevating our heart rate into that aerobic target zone, even a little bit, does something magical for both our bodies and our brains. Turns out it helps us be both more desirable and more interested in being sexy!

Body-wise, it helps us burn fat (and, if you saw our Stay Sexy column last week, you know having sex burns as many calories as lots of other forms of exercise). Plus, there’s more, according to the Mayo Clinic. It makes our metabolism more efficient. It’ll improve our stamina, in case we’re aiming for a marathon session. It reduces pain – maybe that’s why my migraine episodes decreased as my workouts increased. I’ll take it! It revs up our immune system, reducing our likelihood of getting sick. And, naturally, it’s good for our hearts. It strengthens the heart muscles and helps clear out our arteries by boosting our HDL cholesterol (the good kind).

Did that list sound sexy? Not so much, by itself – but even just sticking with what it does for the body, I’ll look better, feel better and live longer, and that’s sexy.

The brain magic is even more impressive – and less well known. According to Dr. John Ratey, in Spark, spending time in our target heart rate zone decreases depression, reduces anxiety, relieves stress, decreases dementia in later life, and even increases our brain capacity. Personally, I think that’s very sexy – I’ll be happier, more relaxed, smarter, and possibly even more inventive!

I hope this list of benefits has piqued your curiosity – I’d love to answer questions about how all this works (see, I told you it makes us smarter 🙂 ). Stay tuned – in future Stay Sexy columns, we’ll be sharing more personally about the impact this information has had for both my husband and myself.

In the meantime – Happy Valentine’s Day, have fun, and stay sexy!

Nina Hartley Changed My Life #AVN Expo

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Wow. We did it – hubs and I, who co-write Erotic Romance for Two, Three, or More, sprang for the cost of the tickets and went to yesterday’s Adult Entertainment Expo, part of the AVN Awards celebration this week in Las Vegas.

If there was one person I wanted to meet (and never dreamed I could), it was Nina Hartley. We started watching her videos more years ago than probably she or we would like to confess, though it’s clear we do share baby boomer status with her.

As fans of our Swinging Games series can probably guess, we accessed adult videos (and yes, they were video cassettes) to spice up our own sex life, a daunting challenge with young kids still in the house and the inevitable effects of aging starting to settle in.

We were in the right place at the right time. Nina’s part of a new lifestyle website (more on that in an upcoming blog) – we had no clue, but were just browsing booths and saw her pic. I asked the staff person if she would be there – YES! In ten minutes! You can believe we waited for her – and I was first in line.

What I said:

“Nina, you changed my life.”

What we talked about:

I was astounded. After I told her how much we’ve loved her films, she started talking about how our bodies change as we age, and how important it is to believe in ourselves inside, remember what it felt like to be twenty nine, and enjoy our bodies as much now as we did then. More, in fact – she shared that, and I totally agree. I am having more fun in my body than when I was twenty nine, for certain!

What I wish I’d said:

That she was at the center of a profound series of changes in my life, and I am grateful beyond words. Of the videos we started watching, hers were the most engaging – it’s no surprise I like a storyline, which so many of hers deliver, and I loved watching her body and her sensuality. Naked Hollywood was my favorite series, and we bought them all.

We definitely benefitted from a jump-start to our libidos. That led us, somewhat later, to try our hand at writing the kinds of stories we liked to watch – so Nina, if you’re reading this, I don’t think we’d be a published erotic romance author, if it wasn’t for your adult films.

Good luck at tonight’s Awards Ceremony!!

Winner and New Release!

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Drum roll, please!  The Random Number Generator has spoken, and our Winner in the Angels and Demons BlogHop is…

#29, Tyggy! I’ll be sending you your copy of Colors of the Night – hope you enjoy it. It should be right up your alley, judging from your comment 🙂

And a drum roll too for the grand prize winners:

Stephanie, Winner #1291, who won a Kindle Fire, and
Drake, Winner # 4695, who won an Amazon $60 Gift Card

It was a fabulous hop and I loved all your comments – hmm, hadn’t thought about an Angel’s extra added attraction of feathers, you were all very creative!

Our newest book was just released Sunday at Extasy Books! No angels or demons in this one (but you can bet we’re cooking some up for later) – just a happily married pair of baby boomers with an empty nest, trying to spice up their sex life. They’ve been doing great so far with exciting adventures in the swing lifestyle. Here’s the  cover, blurb and an excerpt:

The sought-after Unicorn, so elusive in the Swing Lifestyle. Now that Sarah Creston has materialized in Jen and Brett Andrews’ bed, what’s next?

BLURB

It all seemed so simple: Sarah Creston would move in for the summer, Brett and Jen Andrews could revel in their new threesome, and everyone else would understand. But now Donna and Ryan – their best friends and lovers – won’t speak to them, and Jen seems so infatuated with Sarah that even Brett is worried about the consequences.

Battered from the double whammy of her husband’s death and caring for her aging parents, Sarah Creston thrills to Jen and Brett’s exquisite care and ravishing sex. Now that she’s had her first taste of a woman, will she be satisfied – or will she want more?  Everything hinges on what Sarah wants.

 

EXCERPT

Feeling like a human sponge, Sarah sighed. Her eyelids fluttered open and shut as she tried to survey the scene around her, but all five senses were on overload.

“This is beyond my wildest imagination,” she mumbled to no one in particular.

Completely nude, she lay on her back atop Carl and Alice’s massage table. Her naked partners had already rubbed down every square inch of her backside—every square inch before turning her over to tend to her front. Sarah laced the fingers of her right hand through Jen’s hair as her lover suckled a breast as if it were their very first time. Similarly, Brett continued tonguing her other breast.

“We’re pleased that you’re pleased,” Carl said, bending over to kiss Sarah’s forehead without interrupting his steady massage of her temples.

“You’re amazing,” she whispered, puckering her lips while reaching up to pull his lips closer to hers. She sighed again as his lips covered hers for another soul searching kiss. Both he and his wife had proven to be incredible kissers. She could hardly wait to see what else they might be incredible at doing to her—or with her.

“Ah,” Sarah moaned. Her hips tensed.

Smiling, Carl broke their kiss and continued massaging her brow, giving her ample opportunity to appreciate Alice’s warm breath flowing over her pussy.

“Relax,” Alice cooed, blowing on her again.

Sarah did her best to soften her muscles, to sink deeper into the massage table and trust her body to her lovers.

 

Don’t Waste Your Money!

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Cruising the web last week to update buy links and review links for my back list, I ran across a reader’s review for the first book in our Swinging Games series at Extasy Books, Anticipation. Let me say first that, like most authors, I’ve developed a tough skin for negative reviews of our work. I’m not writing this blog to refute a negative review – everything this reader wrote is, in fact, true about this book. Here’s her one-star review:

 This is a short story about meeting another couple that they never actually meet. I read it in about 15 minutes. Don’t waste your money.

My husband and I write erotic romance together, mostly ménage, and mostly with heroines who are bisexual. We started writing our Swinging Games series about three years ago because we were fascinated by the Swing Lifestyle and thought it would be a fun device to deliver a wide range of ménage and other hot sex scenes for our readers. We created our lead characters – a Baby Boomer couple whose kids are grown. Brett and Jen Andrews have decided to try swinging to spice up their sex life, and because Jen has newly realized she’s bisexual.

Anticipation is a 5,000 word short story that sets the stage for the series. It drops in on our couple just before their first lifestyle encounter. We get to experience with them the delicious buildup of fantasies, expectations and sexual tension – not to mention the tantalizing impact of those fantasies when Jen and Brett make love, just the two of them.

So, if you only want to spend money on actual ménage, absolutely, don’t waste your money on this one – plunge right in anywhere in the series and taste the decadence with Jen and Brett in any number of swinging adventures. By now they’ve been active for three years, and six more books have followed Anticipation.

  

  

We’re excited to announce that Book Eight, Pushing the Limits, is scheduled for release this coming Sunday, January 15, at Extasy Books. Here’s a blurb and a link to an EXCERPT:

BLURB: Swinging Games Pushing the Limit

Their new Unicorn Sarah Creston may be out of town, but that doesn’t stop Jen and Brett Andrews from burning up the wires with some scorching three-way phone sex. While they’re waiting for Sarah, Ryan eagerly pursues Brett for some hot male action, followed by a house party that challenges Jen and Brett’s stereotypes. Sarah finally arrives, exhausted and drained from weeks spent helping her aging parents. Jen and Brett provide total tender care for three days – but when Jen invites Sarah to move in for the whole summer, Brett asks himself, what’s the limit?