It's Monday!! A new week!! =)

Happy Monday everybody!!!!!

I had a really really great weekend. Saturday I had my cheat meal (I was politely informed by Snowda that it is a meal, not a day. I was disappointed for about a minute).  I spent the day with a friend of mine. He is my ex-boyfriend, but I still consider him to be one of my closest friends and he is very supportive of what I am doing. We went to breakfast at Stagecoach in Elk Grove. One of my favorite places and breakfast is my favorite meal.  The menu for this place is ridiculous. 4 egg omelets. It doesn't even mention a smaller one. I waivered back and forth between chicken fried steak and eggs and an omelet. I finally decided I would not be able to even put a dent in the chicken fried steak and would feel bad not being able to eat it, so I had a bacon, avocado and cheese omelet.  When the waitress arrived I asked her if I could have a smaller omelet and she said they could do a 2 egg omelet. I was happy and ordered that. It came with potatoes and toast.  Normally, I would be able to clean my plate like there was no tomorrow. Not this time. I had half my potatoes, a little over half of the omelet and my toast. I was so very full that I wasn't hungry for the rest of the day. 

After breakfast we went to target and to best buy. He was looking for a new computer, then we saw "Promisedland" with Matt Damon. It was a movie about fracking. I suggest looking it up. Very serious business.  The movie was alright. It was a little uneventful and the ending was not great. It was a good story though, I will give it that. 

After the movie we went back to my house and watched the Baltimore/Denver game. After he left I went to dinner with my grandma.  We had Mexican, and again, I barely touched my plate. I was so proud of myself. I was able to stay under 500 calories for dinner and that made me happy.

I finally made it home to stay and read while I waited for my little girl to get home. I had missed her greatly. She went to San Francisco with my parents and brother and my brothers girlfriend.

Yesterday, aside from working out, was a lazy day. I did good on my eating and just hung around the house.  It was probably one of the best weekends I've had in a long time.

Also, on another note, I was feeling bloated and fat Friday night and Saturday morning, so before I got in the shower I weighed myself, thinking, I bet i've gained weight back. I found I had lost another 2.5 lbs, making, so far, my grand total 10lbs lost! I was so happy. I put on a pair of jeans I bought around Christmas, that were a little snug, leaving a muffin top, if I wore them. This time, they not only fit without a muffin top, but they were even a little loose!! I was ecstatic. 

My official weigh in day is tomorrow though, so I am not sure if I was able to keep off those extra two pounds or not. We will know tomorrow! My fingers are crossed!!!!

Panic Attack or Low Blood Sugar? Who knows...

So I had to take a day off of blogging. Wednesday was a bad day for me. I started out good, as I had said in my previous blog, but as the day progressed I became more and more frustrated and upset. Along with that I had a panic attack, or maybe it was low blood sugar. My dad says sometimes it feels like the same thing. I had to take a step back and take a look at what I was eating for the day.  Although I am supposed to take in about 1440 calories, I've mentioned before I've been having a hard time meeting that goal.  I noticed that my biggest meal tends to be dinner, so I try to save my calories for it. So I guess I am not eating enough during the day. Yesterday I did my best to even it out but went over my daily intake by 40 calories. I was a little bit disappointed.

Wednesday I was so stressed, I even had a beer. A Corona Extra to be exact. I still managed to keep under my calorie intake, but it totally messed up my plans of working out.  I laid down with my baby, my head hit the pillow and next thing I knew it was 11:00. I will not be doing that again. The beer gave me just the right amound of relaxation, but it screwed me all up when it came to workouts.

I have been spending my lunches at work writing my current novel. (Story, book, whatever you want to call it.) As I do this, I picture the characters and i've noticed that I try to make all the girl characters out to be how I want to look, at least by body type. I always change the haircolor, eyes, etc. All in all I want to be healthy, but I can't help but think that I might be disappointed if I never have the ideal body I see in my head.  Any ideas on how to overcome that and just be happy no matter what?

Along with Snowda and Trish, I am going to make the weight loss jars so I can see the progress. Because I felt guilty about the beer I decided to weigh myself (bad idea I know. I am really trying to keep it at once a week) and instead of gaining a pound or two like I thought, I had actually lost 3 more from the two days before when I did my weekly weigh in. I am not sure if that is going to stick, but I was happy and relieved to see that I had not gained anything. 

On another note, I am noticing that my pants are fitting looser. I can't wait until I am down one full size. It will be a reason to celebrate!

So glad it is Friday. I am ready for my weekend. I may be blessed with one full day of relaxation. My parents and brother are going to San Francisco tomorrow and may take my little one.  I will do my workout early, then spend the day watching movies, writing and reading.

I hope everyone has a great weekend!

Tough tests

So today I was in a wonderful mood, happy, carefree, then someone went and deflated it, making me irritable and frustrated. Whenever I feel like that I really really want to eat. I even debated on having my snack early, because I was so very upset. I am an emotional eater, like my friend Trish, we eat when we're happy, sad, upset, frustrated, etc. It was so hard for me to not rush into our office kitchen and find the nearest sweet to eat. I did really good though. I stopped for a second and thought about where I want to be and decided it wasn't worth it. An hour or so later, I had my snack, which is the usual, cottage cheese and blueberries (I think next week I am going to have yogurt, granola and strawberries, its super yummy).  It was a really good snack and held me over til lunch.

When I pulled out my lunch, which is 1/2 a can of canned chicken with 1/2 tbs of mayo and 5 club crackers and applesauce, I realized that I had not brought applesauce, we were out of it and for the life of me I couldn't figure out what was missing this morning. So I ate my afternoon snack with my lunch, which is "ants on a log" and I am crossing my fingers that the 3 bottles of water on my desk will hold me over til dinner.

I am having a serious problem of not meeting my calorie intake for the day.  From my understanding, you should come as close to the calorie limit as possible. My limit happens to be 1440. I have noticed, since Monday, I am falling 300-400 calories under. I find myself searching my house for a snack to have, or something extra to add to dinner, just so I can be just a little closer to it. I am happy though that I am still on track.

Last night was my rest night for exercise. I thought about writing some more or editing my book for Amazon, but I decided to stay up and watch a movie, while chatting with a friend and reading a little bit. I am still so sore from my workouts, but I am going to work my ass off tonight though.

Have a great one and stay tuned for more tomorrow!

Weight Lost, Ideas and a Bit of Discouragement

Well, first things first, I weighed myself this morning and I am sooo happy to say, I have lost 5 lbs!!! I am so excited to see progress on the scale.

I had a few ideas to motivate me to exercise (in general, longer and more often) and to try to stay more full in between meals. I have a huge problem with reading. I love getting lost in a book and tend to not put it down until I have finished it. Its like my mind won't allow me to focus on anything else. So, as an incentive to exercise, I am only allowing myself to read while I do cardio (I ride an aerodyne bike for 20-40 minutes, depending on what else I do for exercise, at a moderate to fast pace).  Aside from motivating me to exercise, this also helps me to continue on the bike longer than I normally would. I love music when I work out, but it doesn't hold my attention and I get bored, so reading is really helping. Also, the bike is really loud, so I can't hear the TV without waking up every other occupant in the house.

I also have been focusing on chewing my food more thoroughly and slowing down on eating. I am finding that I tend to just eat as fast as I could, and then I don't even really taste it. I think that if I slow down, I'll not only feel full quicker, but hopefully will stay fuller longer, because I'm finding I am starving by the time dinner comes, and I'm getting more hungry in between meals. I'm eating things that should keep me full, so I don't know what is going on. Metabolism speeding up maybe?

Lastly, there is always a point in my diet/lifestyle change/etc where I start to get super discouraged because I am not physically seeing a difference, you know, in a mirror. I didn't expect to see a difference with only 5lbs lost, and I am feeling a difference, just from that little bit, but I really want to see something. This feeling usually comes early for me in the process and this is the point where I say F**K it and binge. I am not going to do that, however, because I have a lot of good support this time.  It is hard for me because I'm visual. Seeing the scale change is awesome and I'm hoping that once I've lost about 20lbs I'll see a difference.  I think I read it takes about 10 weeks to physically see the difference. I hope so.

I started doing Yoga last night. I decided I will alternate yoga with other strength building exercises. I like that it helps to stretch out my sore muscles but also builds strength and muscle. I think my next goal, after getting some yoga poses down, is to try Pilates. If you haven't tried either, you should. Yoga was super relaxing, and a long time ago, prior to my baby being born, I did Pilates and it felt great.

Well, I'm off to write some more on the current book I'm writing: "A Girls Guide to Surviving a Zombie Apocalypse, or Some Other Disaster" (I'll probably change the title because it is going in a different way then I originally thought)

I hope you have a great day, eat well, have fun exercising and do something great for your body.

A little sore....and car sick

Good Morning and Happy Monday!!!

I had a great weekend. I finished a book (reading, not writing, I write as well, even have one published), I stayed under my calories both days and got in a majorly great workout yesterday.  I was finally able to do a complete workout...then I had an impromptu dance party with my little one. We danced and jumped around vigorously for over an hour, non-stop.  She even wore out before I did. =)

I decided to start reading a new book this morning, while my dad drove us in to work.  Needless to say, I didn't get too far before I started feeling nauseous.  It did help take away any morning hunger I may have felt between my breakfast and my morning snack, which I just ate (a half cup of 1% fat cottage cheese and about 10 blueberries). 

I am continuing on my good eating. I'm very proud of myself.  Even on my cheat day, which was Saturday, I only went over my daily calorie limit by 49 calories.  Really, the only thing I "cheated" when it came to eating were the cookies my mom made.  They were soooo very good. I only had 2 though.

Tonights plan is to work out again, but this time after my child is asleep. Hopefully I'm going to get some yoga in as well. I'm very sore from the 50 rep challenge that I did, Mountain Climbers are a b**ch and so are push-ups. 

I was getting a headache the first few days of doing it. Not sure if it was from a small lack of caffiene or if it was from less sugar, or if it was just from that time of the month, but it has finally subsided as well.  So I'm starting this week off right, happy and healthy.

The dirty that is my mom...

This will be a short blog, because I am doing this from my phone. I promise to write a more thorough one tonight after my mini me goes to bed. I'm doing good for a Saturday, even with my mom making these chocolate crackle cookies, pictured below.

So I have had one. She really is supportive of me doing this, but at the same time she can't help but bake.

I am proud to say I gave in and weighed myself out of curiosity. I have lost 3.7lbs. I'm ecstatic, even if it may have been water weight.

I decided to post a before photo for you, pictured below, before the cookies

That is me now. My goal, as I have said, is to be 60lbs down by July 23rd 2013. Keeping my fingers crossed.

Ugh, 2 Days, No Full Workout!

So, it is day 3.  I've had a few ups and a few downs. Well, one down really. I'll start with the ups: I managed to stay under my calorie intake yesterday by 49 calories. I was very happy about that. All three of my meals were healthy, another good thing.  Just because I was under the calorie limit, does not mean that I had to eat healthy, but this is what I had: for breakfast I had 2 slices of whole wheat toast and as a snack I had a carrot.  For lunch I had tuna with 5 crackers and applesauce. My next snack was an orange. For dinner, I had turkey tacos. I stopped eating by 6:15, which was another accomplishment. I tend to go for dessert at about 7:00.  My breakfast, lunch and snacks are the same for today, minus the orange.  I kept the applesauce for my snack instead.

Now the down: I fell asleep at 8:00, while waiting for my little girl to go to sleep. I was exhausted from not sleeping the night before and from being sick. I had a pretty bad headache and so I decided to close my eyes for just a minute. Next thing I knew, it was 10:10 p.m, head ache still there. Then I must have went back to sleep pretty quick because the next time I woke up, it was 2:00 a.m. Because of this, I did not get my workout in.  The night before I didn't manage a full workout, so now I am two days behind.

Is the above an excuse for not working out? I don't know. I do know that I fell asleep unintentionally. I can say, however, that I sometimes just go to bed when my child goes to bed, because sleep sounds really good over working out. That was not my intention last night. I really do like working out, and I sleep better after it. I was really hoping to get one in.  The good thing is that my cough has finally died down and is very minimal, and I am not exhausted, so far, because of the 10 hours of sleep.

My goal tonight is to do a full workout. My weekend goal? To continue to eat healthy and get in another 2 workouts.  Weekends are the hardest for me because I tend to eat when I'm bored. I need to condition myself into knowing when my body is hungry and when it is just out of boredom that I'm seeking food.

For now, that is all. =) Enjoy the rest of your day!