Friday's Fitness Wrapup

I almost forgot to report how this week went. I haven't weighed myself, but I did put on a pair of shorts that used to be snug and they weren't, so that's always nice. I made it to the gym three times this week. I hope to make it three times next week at least. I made plans to meet a friend (Heather) to work out on Monday and I'll probably go run on the treadmill Tuesday and do yoga Wednesday and Friday. If I can make it all those days it will be great. The yoga is awesome. I'm horrible at it and it sucks while I'm doing it, but afterward I feel fantastic. I still need to do a better job with my diet, but one thing at a time right? I'll check back next week. Hopefully I would have met my fitness goal for the week and lost a pound or two.

Finding my mojo

You've heard me talk about diet and exercise before. Well, it's something I seem to be really struggling with lately. While I never have loved to exercise I was committed and consistent in doing it. Lately though, I can't seem to get my butt in gear. I don't seem to be very motivated. I've also noticed that I've been eating things that I had sworn off. Maybe this is just a phase and I need to power through it. But, I know for me I need some accountability in my life so I'm going to start reporting here weekly as sort of a fitness wrap up, call it fitness Friday. I hope you will join me in encouraging each other to maintain a healthy lifestyle. I'd really like to lose 15 lbs by Sept 1st, but I can tell you that I'm going to have to change the way I'm doing things. I'm going to have to recommit to keeping a food journal, doing regular exercise, drinking my water and seeking support and encouragement from others. I know that my life has been beyond crazy stressful lately, but I can't let that be an excuse to backslide. I have to get a handle on this and continue to make my health a priority.
Today I'm meeting up with my friend, Heather. It's so nice to have someone to workout with. It helps keep me motivated and helps to have someone encouraging me.
What did you move to lose today?

My gift to me

So, 2009 is fast approaching and I've been thinking a lot about my health and continuing my weight loss. So, I started a weight loss blog to chronicle my journey. I call it Me...only thinner. I know, that's incredibly original...but you know it does say it all. I'm still me fat or thin...except you know, I'm trying to be thinner and healthier. I've got a clear plan, but I thought it would be helpful for me to have a record to reference and to keep myself focused. I hope to lose 25 lbs by the summer (June) and to maintain a healthy weight for the rest of my life.

Breaking Through!

I wrote a few weeks back about my falling short of my weight loss goal and how I needed to get back to the basics and buckle down. Well...finally after almost 10 weeks of struggling to break through my palteau, I've finally lost 5 lbs. I feel energized! Now I'm only 28 lbs away from my goal. I can see the light! I doubt I'll be there by the new year, but maybe I'll be closer still. I've tried really hard to drink more water and snack much less...it's a struggle every day, but I'm trying to stay the course. I still go to the gym every day that I'm not working. I've even came up with a solution on the days that I can't go...I'm breaking out the old dvd exercise programs and giving them a go. I have the whole Leslie Sansom series, I really like her style. I feel like I can finally start seriously thinking about what tatoo I want to get when I reach my goal and where I want to put it.

Checking in with myself

I'm going to put it all out there to give myself a swift kick in the ass! My birthday is just under a month away and I had really wanted to be at the goal weight I had set for myself or at least close...as of today I have 33lbs to go. So, I have to be honest and admit that I haven't been as faithful as I should be. I've had some stress as of late and I've dealt with it by falling into old patterns of behavior. I haven't been doing my online food journal, instead I've been relying on my mental journal. Not good, as I know I end up eating more than I should. So, tomorrow it's back to basics. Water, journaling and no grazing! I'm going to have to up my workouts too since as I've become more conditioned I'm not getting the calorie burn I used to. Part of my membership allows for 2 hours of childcare and I'm going to use that. I'm going to take my classes as usual and then go upstairs and either walk/run on the track, treadmill or do the elliptical machine. Perhaps for Christmas I will ask dh for some sessions with a personal trainer. In the meantime, I know I can do better and I will. I've worked too hard to fail now by falling into old habits. I can do this! I will do this!
I'm suppose to be training for a 5K in December so I will ask dh to load up the mp3 player for me and get moving...run, baby run!

Under construction

I decided to change up my blog a bit. I have really contemplated switching to wordpress or typepad, but I'm going to see if I can figure out how to get closer to what I want using blogger for now. It's a lot of work, especially if you're severely technology challenged like I am. I have several more tweaks I need to make to it, but I had to take a break for now since my eyes were beginning to cross.
Along the same vain...I'm also under construction. I joined a real gym today. By real I mean as opposed to the community weight room that I belong to that I find very difficult to go to since there is no childcare or classes. After much research and several club tours I decided on the YMCA. It just seemed to make the most sense even though I have to admit I was swayed by the glitz and glamor of Lifetime Fitness. But, in the end I was still my pragmatic self and it just didn't make sense to drive further and pay twice as much for what boiled down to a nice restaurant and coffee bar that I probably wouldn't have ever used. Anyway, I had lots of errands to run today so I didn't go work out, but I'm going tomorrow to take a Muscle building class. I'm really excited and S. gets to go too since he's officially a teen and they're allowed to work out there after attending a class. So...I'm on my way. Hopefully by the time summer is in full swing I will be in the grove working out and approaching my next weight loss milestone. Wish me luck!

The downside of skinny

Ok...skinny might be too strong of a word, but the downside of weight loss is that it's costing me a ton! I've given away 7 large green trashbags of too big clothes. I've been haunting thrift stores trying to keep from being naked. Now I've noticed that my sewing patterns are all too big. I've spent a fortune on these. Sure I can buy more. Of course I can...but you see my point. Being skinny is so expensive,lol. Alright, secretly (not so secretly) I'm thrilled to have this problem. When I think of the health implications of being overweight it's worth every penny I might spend clothing my thinner healthy body.
Now for the fun challenge. If you know me at all you'd know I'm frugal...frugal to the core. I can't see going out and buying a whole new collection of patterns to fit before I reach my goal weight, but I would like to use some of the ones I have. So I broke out Power Sewing and Sewing for Plus Sizes, read up on grading techniques and that's my next sewing challenge to myself. I think it'll teach me a lot about fitting and it'll save me on patternease since I won't be "drafting" a pattern from the ground up. I think this could be fun! I'll let you know how it goes and maybe post a picture or two.

After all, tomorrow is another day

Ok...tomorrow came and went and I wasn't anymore committed, but I am now. Something happened that really hit home. This is my first year in the JLR and my advisor dropped dead this weekend. She was probably in her early 40's, single, appeared healthy and she had a massive heart attack and died alone. Nobody knew until she didn't show up for a meeting at work. I was the first in the JLR to find out since we were planning to carpool and she didn't email like she said she would, because you know...she was dead. I'm still in shocked...I didn't know her all that well, but she was super sweet and made a point to really welcome me to the JLR. Anyways, my point is life is short and fleeting...I don't want to spend it overweight and unhealthy.

Sparkteam

So on my continued effort to get my ass in shape, LOL. I joined a sparkteam and i also dusted off my pda to track my food. Apparently journaling is a key since it makes you mroe aware of your caloric intake.
So...I'll blog later about how it's going. I weighed in today...it wasn't pretty, but hey, it's only down from here right?

From Couch to 5k

The podcast way. I've had an IPOD for a couple of years, a gift from A. that I hardly ever used. It's a neat toy though and I'm going to try and use it more, so combined w/my never ending quest to get in shape I've downloaded this podcast to help me become a runner...we'll see. I'm starting Jan 9th along with this program I signed up for called Weighdown. It's christian based...which in its self is somewhat strange, but hey I've tried every other way to lose, why not God? So, I'm currently trying to figure out how to download all the episodes. I've emailed the podcast guy and hopefully I'll figure out how to do it. Ahhhh...technology!