Sunday, September 30, 2012

Sunday Funday

Good morning my lovelies! Long time, no posts. My apologies for the lack of posts. Life was put on hold this week as I moved schools. Did I ever mention how OVER packing and moving I am? Hopefully I am now permanently set for a while. I love my new-ish school (I completed my final internship there and was able to teach as long term sub) and I love my classroom. It's purple. Perfect, right?

While all this was going on, once again, my healthy eating went on the back burner. I find it interesting  when my brain goes on overload and cannot possibly absorb any more information that the one thing I put on auto-pilot is my health. It doesn't feel like survival to me. With all of the moving I have done and lack of eating (because I ate poorly, but did overload at meals) I managed to maintain my weight for the week. Thank the stars that I did or I would have cried! There were plenty times this week where I just wanted to let the tears flow with all that's been going on concerning work.

A work friend re-inspired me to get back on track this week. She messaged me to tell me of her 10lb weight loss. I am so proud of her! At her suggestion, I bought a brand new prettified Tervis tumbler that will be used just for my lunch-time shakes. I will no longer make the shakes at school because the last time I did it, the entire staff dining turned their heads to look at me while I ran the blender. Instead, I will make two shakes in the morning so I have one for breakfast and one to bring to lunch. It will go in my pretty tumbler. I even bought fun colored straws to coordinate with. So now I don't have the excuse that I am too embarrassed to make my shake at school.

Goal setting is something that I truly believe in. If you do not have a goal to meet then what is the point of doing something? I have a goal to lose weight and to become healthy. That's a HUGE undertaking. I have to find some checkpoint to reach during this journey. I have finally found it. My hubs and I will celebrate our 1st wedding anniversary this December. We were not able to have the wedding that we had planned on and we didn't have a honeymoon either. The joy of being young and broke. Yeah right...

I told my hubs that I wanted to spend a weekend in St. Augustine for our anniversary and he agreed. Then he thought, and thought and thought some more and decided that was too far to travel with our cars not being what they used to. I drive a 96 Nissan- poor old dear. So now we are going to spend a weekend at Disney World since it is much closer.

Here's the deal: I don't want to be extremely fat on my wedding anniversary. I want to look pretty, enjoy the rides at Disney without my fat hips squishing in the seats and worrying about belts not buckling. I want to eat at Cinderella's castle without feeling like shlub. So my checkpoint goal is 20 lbs by Dec. 15th. That's about 12 weeks. I. CAN. DO. THIS. And my co-workers who are reading this - please help me! Slap my hand away from the bad food. I also don't want you to think that I am not being a team player because I am not joining in the food fun, it's just I need to do this. I can't be who I am anymore physically.

Wow. Long post. I really need to stop having all this time between posts because there is just too much to get caught up on! Thanks my lovelies for stopping by my corner of the web. Enjoy your Sunday!

Thursday, September 20, 2012

Lame

Good evening lovelies! Perhaps everyone had a great Thursday and didn't turn out as lame as me. I am lame. No other word for my lack of weight loss progress than that. I've been doing Monavie for one week and I lost .2lbs. It's my fault. Any regular meal I had was not very balanced. I'm pretty sure if you were to balance my meals on a scale the healthy food portion would be skyrocketing into the air from the force of the unhealthy portion slamming onto scale.

I got my act together today and stayed on the course. Thanks to my bestie's sister, I now have the free and amazing MyFitnessPal app on my iPhone to track my exercise and calorie intake. The app pretty much has every food listed which means I don't have to enter the nutritional information on everything I eat. That gets old fast. What is also neat about the app is a little feature that tells you how much you would weigh in 5 weeks if you kept up your current day's calorie intake. Talk about motivator. If  you see that in only 5 weeks you lost 2 pounds then you know you need to get your butt exercising and keep your lips shut.

Part of my "unbalanced" diet was due to stress/depression. Food makes it easy to handle because I feel in control of what I put in my mouth. I know that the piece of chocolate will taste good. I'll dig into that last bite of the chip dip because it will make my stress disappear for a nano second. Do I feel stress free now? That's a big FAT nope. I feel more stressed because once again I let myself down.

My shining light this week was last night's walk. Dad and I took, what is now becoming, our usual 2.8 mile walk last night in only 40 minutes. For that walk I decided when I felt like I was at a  good pace I would jog in intervals. It felt great not to hold back and truly see how far I could run. I would test myself, telling myself, "Only have to make it to this mailbox," or "Just three more houses down." When we reached my parents' apartment complex I jogged most of it back to their place. I felt awesome! My mom thought I was going to die because I turned red all over my body. If I did die it would have been fine because finally I did something I told myself I would do. There was no talking myself out of it.

I just have to frame that moment and relive it every time I want to stray away from my shakes. When that piece of pizza looks good I can just remind myself by telling my brain, "Hey, psst, you there. Remember that jog you promised yourself you would take? Remember that and keep your promise to only drinking those shakes. You've got this."

Maybe if I say it to myself in a British accent, like Becky from Glee, I'll feel more inclined to follow my own advice. Just a thought.


Saturday, September 15, 2012

Day 3 Struggle

Hello lovelies! Um, where did Saturday go? I know I caught up on a lot of sleep, but from 2:00 p.m. on today has just flown by. Hopefully tomorrow is just a slow, lazy day. I'm not ready to go back to work on Monday and walk into an empty classroom. Here's to finding out where I'll be teaching or what grade I'll be teaching by Monday or Tuesday. The wait is killing me.


It is Day 3 of my Monavie RVL life style change. It's been going  pretty well minus the cupcake from yesterday's class party and the s'more I had today with my parents. I'm not going to lie, it's been a struggle though. I find myself constantly going to the fridge to find something to eat when I'm bored. When I do that, I look at my mini blender and remind myself that I spent money on my shakes, they are good for me, and I have to break this habit of going to food for any kind of comfort.

Today was supposed to be a walking day with my dad, but we got rained out. I was looking forward to that too. We're set for tomorrow though. The rain better stay away because it's messing with my exercise. I could get off my lazy butt and do my Walk Away the Pounds dvd, but outside is so much better.

Also, I have to start running. Love my dad and all, but there are times when I get fast enough at the end of my walk and I just want to break out in a run. I feel bad leaving him behind, but at the same time I don't want to ignore that urge to run. Perhaps I could jog for a bit and then walk in place until he catches up? This is why I have problems working out with a buddy. I love having a buddy because it keeps me motivated and accountable, but my buddy and I are never on the same pace. I've gone through 3 buddies too.  We'll see how it goes.

Tomorrow the hubs and I are having a date day that includes lunch, Home Depot and the bookstore. I know, we're an exciting couple. I have to be a good girl and eat sensible food at lunch and make sure I only sip on my shake for dinner. Perhaps I'll try a pumpkin flavored recipe I found. Variety is the spice of life!  It's also easier to sip dinner than eat it when reading a new romance novel because ya'll know that is what I'm purchasing from the bookstore.

So now the question is hunky special ops character or hunky highlander character? Or maybe I'll just go for the book Men in Kilts and get some laughs in with my romance. Hmm...


Thursday, September 13, 2012

First Day of Monavie RVL

Hello lovelies! It's Friday Evenand thank GOD! It's been a tough couple of weeks in the life of this teacher. My grade level didn't have enough students enrolled and so it was that my class was chosen to be split. Right now I am a duck without a pond, but hopefully I'll find out what my future has in store for me sometime next week. I'm just a sad sack because I already love my students so much. It is hard letting them go. I know they will be just fine with the other teachers I have the pleasure of teaching with.

Though the last couple of days have been hard I have had one thing to look forward to - my shakes. My entire system was delivered yesterday. I couldn't wait to get going. Last night I measured my shake mix for lunch, and got my two vitamins and my snack bar all ready for this morning. This morning I actually look forward to breakfast. It's one of the most important meals of the day and I am usually notorious for skipping it.

I used my amazing personal blender and whipped up my breakfast shake. The longer you blend it, the thicker it gets. By the time I was finished, my shake was almost chocolate mousse consistency. Yum! It was easy to stay on the plan today because I was at school for 12 hours. Tomorrow will be easy too. What's going to be my main problem is the weekend when I have all this time on my hands. I can do it though!

My only complaint is that I am hungry right now. I could eat some veggies, but I have been too lazy to actually go grocery shopping. Perhaps this weekend I will fix my lack of veggies issue. I also know that I will get used to eating regular portions again. The hunger won't last too long.

I'm looking forward to actually seeing the scale read lower numbers. With this program and the walking I'm doing with my dad, I'm bound to see some kind of positive results! I better see something or I'll have an upset doctor come October when I gotfor my annual check up.

For record's sake, I'm starting the program today at 246.6 pounds. Let's see what next Thursday has to bring!

Have a great Friday!

Saturday, September 8, 2012

Pumpkin Spiced Latte Saturday

Good morning my lovelies! What a beautiful morning it has been in sunny Florida. This morning I was able to sleep in until 7:30 and woke up to the natural light in my bedroom. It's always ten times better to   wake up that way than by an alarm; even if my alarm is the sound of cute chirping crickets. 

More than likely I could have slept in longer but I was too excited because I knew that I had a date with Starbucks. It is officially Pumpkin Spiced Latte season (and the yummy Salted Caramel Frappucino to go with it)! This my new way appreciate fall. My internal clock still is on Jersey time when it comes to the seasons. September hits and I expect cool weather, shorter days, and the smells of an approaching Fall. Since that is quite impossible to achieve in Florida it's Pumpkin Spiced Lattes and ice cold a/c for me. Add a little Bath and Body Works fall scented hand soaps and room fragrance and I'm good to go!

This Saturday has me feeling quite crafty. I'm debating on whether or not I want to organize my bathroom, office, or create a Halloween-themed door wreath. I'm just not sure yet. Hopefully inspiration strikes soon. 

In the health part of my life I am proud to say that I walked 4.5 miles this week with my dad. That's two times this week. I'm shooting for three times next week. And I am going to purchase the first month of the Monavie RVL program. I. AM. SO. EXCITED. When I went to Walmart with the hubs this morning I found the little Hamilton Beach personal blender that I'm going to take every where with me. It's sitting on my counter right now begging to be used to get this girl back on the proper nutrition track. 
See! It's just waiting there to be used. 


I'll have to weigh myself again when I start this. The scale and I didn't have a date this morning because I completely forgot when I jumped out of the bed. Really, I was that excited to get my Starbucks and change my car's oil. I'm strange, I know. 

I'm looking forward to a great weekend! I know it's going to be awesome because my first high school friend, Shauna, had her baby boy yesterday morning. You know the weekend is going to be great when a sweet bundle of joy is entered into the world. Congratulations to Shauna, Ryan and their daughter.  Love all of you! 

Ta-ta my lovelies and have a tremendous weekend!

Monday, September 3, 2012

Ready to Rock n' Roll

Happy Labor Day to all my lovelies! I'm making this a nice relaxing Labor Day with no cook-outs or any other commitments. It's been nice so far.

Today I had the chance to learn more about Monavie RVL. After talking with J (the distributor who was kind enough to meet me), I am ready to take on the 90 Day challenge and get healthy through food again. I've tried everything - journals, Weight Watchers, soup, Slim Fast- but I feel confident in this product. After trying the samples I know that I can get healthy again and learn how to properly control my eating habits. I sampled three snack bars and two flavors of shakes. I only had small portions of the snack bars, and half of each flavor of shake and I got stuffed. I am still full! In about another hour I'm going to have the rest of a snack bar and I'm sure I'll still be full.

Please don't think I'm going to try to sell this to you, my awesome readers, I'm just really excited about this product. When I'm excited about something I gush about it. I hope reading this blog continues to inspire you to take charge of your health in what way works beset for you. For me, I have to have a strict diet and this is it.

So what have I been doing this weekend? It's been a pretty busy one. On Saturday I went out to dinner with 5 of my favorite people. Six years later, and I'm still close with my high school friends. They truly turned into the family that I needed since I had to leave the rest of my relative 10 years ago when I moved to FL. Life would have been boring without them. I was out until 1 a.m. because I did not want the fun to end and then realized Sunday morning I can't do that anymore. Haha. Staying out was so worth it though.

Yesterday I went to MOSI to check out the Mummies of the World exhibit. AMAZING!!!! The oldest mummy there was a child that passed away 6,500 years ago! And get this, it was a mummy from South America. Apparently it predates Egyptian mummification by 1,000 years. To me, it was astonishing that I could clearly see that this tiny mummy was a baby. I could still see it's hair (scientists couldn't determine if it was a boy or a girl). The next strange thing occurred when I looked at a female mummy who died 1,000 years ago in Peru. She was buried with two babies. One was in her arms and the other under her head. I felt sorrow for the death of those so young, but I felt connected. This woman passed away 1,000 years ago, but her hair was perfectly braided like a braid I wore over this summer. I got goosebumps. I was blown away by what I saw and I'm happy that I took the time to visit the exhibit. How many chances to do you have to learn about your past by getting up close and personal with people who died thousands of years ago?

Yesterday ended on a great note as well. My father and I began our walking. We walked 2 miles yesterday. I have a difficult time connecting with my father. I love him like crazy, just sometimes it feels awkward between the two of us. Walking together will be a great bonding experience.

And finally, my NARS gift set arrived in the mail. Ever since I learned about their popular blush, Orgasm, I've wanted to try it. And yes I still giggle whenever I say its name out loud. Well that beautiful blush is $28 a pop. I instead found Super Orgasm on Amazon in a gift set with the blush, lip gloss and nail polish for $31. I am in love! I haven't tried the nail polish yet, but it can't disappoint, especially since my Essie Matte About You topcoat arrived.

Look at my pretties!


Enjoy the rest of your Labor Day weekend. Don't party too hard today or work will be awful tomorrow. Just a friendly bit of advice. :-)

Saturday, September 1, 2012

It's Labor Day Weekend Y'all!

Happy Labor Day Weekend! Woohoo! 3 days off. It will be my second 4 day work week as well since Isaac came to visit last weekend and closed schools down. There will be no cook-outs for me, though. Especially after getting on the scale this morning.

I gained 2.8 pounds. Ugh. I expected the weight gain though.

Since school has started I have been on a better eating schedule. You can't munch when you are teaching. There's one little set back though. Once I get home from school I am so hungry that I will eat anything and everything in front of me. Yes, I know this is not ideal or healthy. And then I fall asleep because I am beat from the day's work. I have to pull up my big  girl britches already and get over that.

Next paycheck I am going to order Monavie RVL. I need food rehab. I cannot trust myself with food portions right now and need to be reminded of that. A friend of mine is having success with it and that encourages me. She is also a very smart lady who I trust because I do not go into a food program like this without some research and thoughts from those wiser than me in the area of nutrition. So I'm a wee bit excited about it.

This Sunday I am going to start walking with my dad. He has gained some weight back during his unemployment (there should be a new job on the way late September) so I told him he needs to look sharp for his first day. Since I did not sign up for the Pilates classes at school - more to THAT story later- I can walk with my dad every evening after school. Having my dad as a walking partner will be great. I am glad that we live so close to each other.

Enjoy your Labor Day all of my hard working lovelies! Enjoy any cook-outs, but remember not to go overboard. You'll work clothes will regret it Tuesday morning.