Fired up!!!

The last few days have been amazing. I've been within my goals and my workouts have been so much fun. I've really been enjoying the Push Circuits for CLX and I'm getting better and better at Fire 30 each time. I really brought the intensity to Saturday's workout. My 4 year old son danced around and even tried some of the moves while I was doing the exercise. He's been really interested in "mommy's exercises" and he wanted to exercise with me. He ended up hanging onto me for some of the combo routines, which made it more challenging, which I was okay with so I allowed it. We actually made it into sort of a game. He was fascinated by the Fire Drills, and was disappointed when the next day I did the Stretch 10 and there weren't any. He also encourages me to do another exercise (sort of like he's my little personal trainer) and the time with him is great. We're still working on the when he goes off to play with his toys, to respect mommy's exercise space. But it's a great experience all the same. I tell him how much I love it when he exercises with me, and he gets so excited when it's a move he can do. I wish I would have been able to get it on video.

I did the TurboFire: 45EZ. It was my first time doing it, so that's always a bit awkward, but I still got a good workout in which always feels really good. I've just had so much energy lately, and I've really enjoyed being in closer contact with my friends. My best friend and MOH, Sarah is one of my new accountability buddies, she's been doing the Tubo Jam videos, which I will be trying myself here in the near future. My friend Ben just started P90X today, so I checked in with him to see how his workout went. I always get really excited when my friends and I are working to better health and we keep in touch and support each other. I also have my accountability buddy on myfitnesspal.com, who has also just become a beach body coach. She has been just awesome with the support and also sharing about her eating and exercise. She is also doing Turbo Jam.

My eating was pretty good. I'm really excited about dinner. We had cucumber and egg sandwiches with were fantastic. I made a dressing to spread a little on the bread and to use for the cucumber and grape tomatoes on the side. It turned out pretty awesome, although I think I'm going to go with maybe juice from only half a lime instead of a whole, and then use either red wine or balsamic vinegar instead of apple cider vinegar. Perhaps also had a bit of fresh ground black pepper. But here's the recipe:

4 Tbs kraft reduced fat mayo with olive oil
juice from 1/2 lime or 2 Tbs lime juice (or to preference)
1 Tbs red wine or balsamic vinegar, or whatever you prefer
1 to 2 Tbs cilantro, chopped
habanero sauce to taste, non vinegar based (I used Melinda's Chipotle & XXXtra hot), you could also use chili sauce like Sriracha.

Mix in a small ramekin or mug or small prep bowl until smooth.

Makes 2 servings.

I took a little of it and spread it onto two Orowheat sandwich thins, with one egg over medium and thinly sliced cucumber.

I then served on the side about 1 half sliced cucumber (per plate) and some grape tomatoes. The remaining dressing was divided among the two plates and drizzled on top of the veggies. It was such a satisfying meal, and really versatile. Also it only took me about 10 to 20 mins to make, was super easy and looked like it was more complicated than it really was. Ah, I love that.

"Enjoy the process"

The last few days I've taken a hiatus  from my exercise schedule. With the side effects I was experiencing I felt that it was better to not push myself too much. It was the muscle weakness in my legs was the worse. Just going of the stairs (which I do everyday, multiple times a day) would cause my muscles to nearly reach fatigue (like as though I was doing squats or lunges with added weight). There was no reason that my body should have felt that way pre workout.

My doctor was right though. On Thursday he said I should notice a vast difference by the next day with the adjustment we made to my dose, and I did. I wasn't back to 100% yet, but my mind was clearer and the weakness was still there, but not as bad. I still took the day off from working out. I have not, however, taken any breaks in tracking my food intake and watching what I eat. We have been vegetarian for about 2 weeks now, and it's going very well. I started a post on vegetarianism, but I have yet to complete it. It is working with  making get towards my goals easier, and there are very good reasons as to why that is, but I will talk about that later. I mostly wanted to give a quick update to stay on track. I will be getting in Burn circuit 3, my C25K workout from yesterday where I will walk for 27 mins and run for 3. I will also do the CLX recharge and then Ab Burner as I can do a better job with my form and getting the most out of it than with the Extreme Abs. That will cover cardio, strength, and flexibility and abs for the day and I will feel a bit caught up. I have ran into set backs the past through weeks, but I am making it through and staying consistent. The results are definitely showing too.

Upon my last C25K workout, I ran into through with running the full 2 mins. I was thinking that perhaps I should break it up into 4 intervals instead of doing 3, but I will try to continue with 3 for the next two workouts to see if it was simply the muscle weakness that was causing the trouble as it really felt like it shouldn't have been that hard.

I am very excited about my progress, but so far the scale is still showing previously conquered territory. I am getting a bit anxious about when I get down to 231 and below 230, I've never been able to maintain lower than 232 or so. That's usually the point where my tendency to self sabotage kicks in and I end up losing steam. That was one reason for this blog, to help me when it gets hard to stay on track. To motivate myself to stay consistent and to find my way around any road blocks that I come across. To build accountability. I have gotten behind on the Chinese thing, but I was excited when I was watching Reno 911, the episode where Junior accidentally gets married to the mail order bride from China, and I understood some of the stuff that the Chinese woman was saying, when the previous time I saw it, it was just gibberish. Woohoo!!

I've also been thinking of trying to take up knitting again. Specifically learning to knit lace. I've been drooling over arm warmers and fingerless gloves on Etsy.com and since money is sort of a tight resource, I was noting that I could probably make some of them fairly easily from old shirts and such, and/or learn to knit them. Maybe I could try to sell a few, for really just the cost of the materials to support the hobby.

Until Later.

Day 25

Day 14

Today was a momentous day actually. At first glance, it starts like any other. I got up, went to work, ate my usual oatmeal for breakfast, I drink my coffee, I track my calories, my life and existence as i know it now. The days count down to my wedding, 4 months and two days, so much to do. But life goes on in the midst of it all. I go to work, I sleep, I take care of and play with my lovely son.

I wonder everyday, every workout, when will I finally have melted enough layers to see myself. Today, I look in the mirror and notice something, my face is thinner, it's small, and perhaps only I notice it, but the way my hair lays, the way underneath my chin looks, there's less there. It feels like it's been so long that I've been doing this and it has and it hasn't. This bout is only a couple weeks, but then I realize that it shouldn't be looked at as "only" two weeks. It should be something to be celebrated.

So Today is August 1st!

1. it has been 2 weeks, 14 entire days of watching my food intake/calories!

2.. I have been exercising regularly for 2 weeks!

3. I completed the 1st week of  the ChaLean Extreme TurboFire Hybrid Schedule. 1 week down, 19 to go!

Every day it gets easier. It wasn't all that long ago that I was wondering how in the world I ever maintained a lower weight, how I didn't weigh 200 to 300lbs in high school. How did I eat less food? It would seem nearly impossible to stay under 1700 or 1500 cals. But it's getting easier and easier, especially the days I exercise, naturally.

Today may have started like every other, and it's ended similar to the days in the last two weeks, but it's not like every other. It's been a day to actually notice where I am going. I still can't even imagine the results, what it would look like or feel like, but I know that it will be unbelievable when I try on my dress and it fits.

Today is also day one for starting to give up meat, for at least the next four months. I slightly failed today in that I had forgotten a lunch and had a weight watchers smart ones meal in the freezer at work. It had a little bit of turkey sausage in it, so I was a little bit unsuccessful in having a meatless day, but it was the only slip up.

DAY 14!!!

TurboLean!!!

So I got my hands on TurboFire, and I am going to try it out with the ChaLean Extreme TurboFire Hybrid schedule. I also scheduled in all of my Aggressive C25K workouts as well as my first running 5k, which will be the Montster Mash on Sunday October 30th. (You can click on either of these pics for more information on the program accordingly).

I'm pretty excited about trying out my new schedule tonight doing the TurboFire Stretch 40 and then it's C25K: walk 27mins and run for 3. I will  be dividing up into 3 intervals, walk for 9 mins and then run for 1. I'm also getting really psyched up to be starting to make the switch to vegetarian. I've been working on a shopping list so we can be well organized for it. I will be posting the entire hybrid schedule with my notes on my Calandar page, but here's what the first month looks like:

Weekend Update 1: here's to the first of many.

...and then this was dessert!

Friday night's dinner

It's always a challenge to keep track on the weekends. I didn't keep track on Saturday, which was a caloric bust, but I alright today and Friday was very good. I totally "vegged out". We ate a lot but it was fruits and vegetables. It was so good! We devoured the vegetables, and I got the smaller tray since it had the smaller amount of dip. Carson is way too in love with ranch, so we stopped buying it ages ago. If we had gotten the tray with the larger container, we would have eaten all the dip, so this was definitely the better option. I want to get into making my own hummus and dips that are lower calories and will be good with vegetables...especially when we end up going to raw foods in a few months.

Also on Friday I did ChaLean extreme, and then 10 mins walking. I was supposed to do 30, but I decided instead to work on my kitchen, which I got a lot done and burned even more calories. I'm really kicking ass on getting my kitchen in order.

On August 1st, we'll making a change to our eating plan. We are going to go vegetarian, for at least a few months. Carson has been considering it for a permanent life change, but we'll see how that goes after the wedding. So we'll be vegetarian in August and September, and then we'll go Vegan in October and Raw foods in November. Course, thanksgiving will be a challenge. I was afraid to do this at first, but now I'm excited. It feels like a fresh start. We both have had troubles learning to be healthy Omnivores, so starting over with being an Herbivor for awhile at least will help up prepare our bodies and minds for whatever way we go with our food journey in December.

For the next week I will be creating a plan for the grocery list, especially our evening meals and how we will prepare the foods to make it easier to put together the meals. The change will be hardest on Miles, so I'm not sure how to address that. I may just keep meat around for him so  he can get the fats and proteins that he needs. I'll have to do more research into it as far as kids go.

All and all I am happy with the last week and weekend. I didn't get all the workouts done that I had scheduled, but I got over 300 exercise minutes, burned over 2000 calories and was under on my calories nearly everyday of this week. I have to take it one day at a time and one week at a time.

Here are the results for Friday and today, as I said, I didn't track on Saturday.

Day5

Day 7