Let's Do This!

Alright, so it's Memorial Day.. which means it Monday.. which means it's the start of me and my BFF's weight loss challenge.. which means 8 have to step on a scale to see what my weight is.. ugh!  So here's the number:

244.6 lbs

I'm relieved that I didn't hit the 250 mark, which was where I'd started last year.. but I'm disgusted that I let my eating get THIS out of control.. :(

But it all stops today.. for now, I plan to count everything that goes into my mouth.. I don't care if it's a diet coke, I'm still tracking it.. I'm going to join WW online (hopefully) next Friday.. I'm not doing WW meetings, as I don't have time to go to meetings that are around me.. I realize that's an excuse, but I can't take off work for them, and I'd rather go to the gym than a meeting I'm not comfortable in..

So, here's to losing 64 lbs! May you go away somewhat quickly and permanently! Lol

Weigh In #1

Okay, so I was kinda expecting a gain.. but I was pleasantly surprised that it wasn't a big one..

225.6 lbs (+1.2 lbs)

I can live with gaining a pound during this week of transition.. But no more! I will not let myself "get away with" gaining anymore.. I can't help but think that even gaining/losing the same 1-2 lbs is just as bad as gaining and losing the same 10-20 lbs, health wise.. And I really don't want to hurt my body than I already have in the past (by losing and gaining and gaining)..

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Good to know I am not the only one who thought that dress was crazy.. While it is adorable, I'm half tempted to go bitch out the boutique who has it up in their display.. eh, whatever, I'm sure some mom will do it for me.. lol

I'm off to have weigh in #2, at my Weight Watchers meeting.. :)

Biggest Loser: Couples and Wrap-Up

So just want to start off with a big THANK YOU to all of you who gave me all the well wishes recently.. you all are great, and I appreciate all of you so much!  :)

so thank you so much!!

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Today is the season 11 premier of Biggest Loser.. and while I don't watch all the seasons, I think this season looks intriguing with the 2 unknown trainers.. so I'm starting to watch it.. and be inspired by it, hopefully..  I love Allison Sweeney, I love Bob (and even Jillian too), and I love to watch these people put their crap behind them and change their lives..  Again, I think I'm liking the purple team and the light blue team.. lol

Hannah    &     Olivia

Marci    &    Courtney

After seeing the pink team, though, I may add them.. It's weird, because one girl's name is Sarah.. and pink is my favorite color.. Who knows.. lol

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Today was interesting.. to say the least, I had a big meltdown.. and I think most of it was because my small bedroom was in TOTAL chaos since before Christmas!  I mean, I cleaned out my closet, got rid of a broken plastic 3-drawer thing, got rid of cardboard boxes I was "saving", my donation box is huge and overflowing (that's going away tomorrow on my way to work), I still have my tree up (it's going to storage on Friday, hopefully), and my other Christmas stuff sitting inside my closet.. I mean, seriously, my room was a MESS!  So, after taking a small nap to gear myself up, I cleaned it all up.. I took the plastic thing and the boxes outside (to await our next recycling day in 8 days).. I cleaned up the donation box and put it against a recently cleaned up wall.. cleaned my desk, put up clothes, and I feel SO MUCH BETTER!!

I can't believe it got that bad.. I mean, I know I don't have a lot of time, but seriously if mom's can do daily life and weight loss, I can find some time SOMEWHERE to clean up my little room.. ugh!  

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So obviously I didn't make it to the gym.. unfortunately.. BUT I am working tomorrow and I will be going straight to the gym after work.. TONIGHT, I plan to workout as soon as Biggest Loser is over.. and I may do some stuff during commercials.. :)   I will beat this crap that comes into my life.. I won't let it get me down, I won't gain weight because of it! 

I Just Had to Post This..

Okay, so I finally got this done, and I was shocked!!  I've lost over 4 inches in my waist and 4 inches in my hips.. holy cow!!  My question is how I GAINED 2.75 inches in my bust?!  With the size that it was in the beginning, this is NOT a good thing.. lol.. I don't want my boobs to get bigger!  Honest!!  Oh, and I don't have my BF% on here because I can't get my scale to change settings to get it accurately.. grr!

Drumroll, please...

With no further ado, or blathering on and on (hehe), I am so excited about my weight this morning..

I weighed in at:

227.0 lbs!!

OH YEAH!!

I'm definitely super happy about this weight loss, which is a 2.6 lb loss.. say bye-bye to water weight.. but hey, I don't care if it was hair product, it was there last Friday, and it ain't no more!!

Thank you so much to all the wonderful people who left me amazing comments about keepin on keepin on..:)

I really wish I wasn't up this early though.. lol.. I'm thinkin I'm off to bed again.. hehe.. only for an hour or so.. because now that I know I've lost, I'm so going to get my nails done, because they need it SO bad.. AND I am putting my Christmas tree up tomorrow!!  I'm so excited!!  Can't wait to post pics and show you all!! :)

Happy Friday!!

Well, SHIT!!

Okay, so while my weigh-in isn't til tomorrow morning, I peeked a little.. and was SHOCKED!  I knew going into this weigh-in that I would have a gain.. but I figured it'd be a pound, maybe two.. wasn't counting on 5!!  Hence the title.. I want to cry so bad, as this puts me right at the 230's, and I REALLY don't want to go back there..

I should have known when my pants barely fit today that I was going to have a bad weigh-in.. So I've decided to make some drastic changes in my diet (because I seem to respond to drastic measures).. ugh!  So the plan is to go online and look up some point values for foods I eat a lot of.. and if I don't know the point value of it BEFORE I eat it, it won't go into my damn mouth.. 

Aka, no fast food.. no junk.. fruits, veggies, grains.. vitamins, and lots of water.. stuff like that.. the normal stuff.. but I can't seem to figure this whole 220's plateau I've been on for the past few weeks.. I feel like I'm self-sabotaging my diet, which is a strong possibility.. :(

WHAT THE HELL IS GOING ON WITH ME!!  AHHHH!!  I want to be thin again.. I want to be hot again.. I want to cry right now, though.. Off to bed I go.. hoping I can dream off 5 lbs..

Holy Moly, I've Hit 30..

No, I didn't just gain 3 years..

Or lose 4.3 lbs.. although that'd be nice too..

I GAINED 3 FOLLOWERS!!

In like a 12 hour period!  :D

Holy Moly!  I love followers.. I love comments.. so this recent "development" makes my day SO much better.. so to all of you, you know who you are... THANK YOU FOR FOLLOWING!  :)

On a bad note, my mom came home from work last night with a fever (not normal for her getting sick) and body aches.. :(    Thankfully she had the flu shot a few weeks ago, but still, I'm wondering all sorts of things.. Am I gonna catch it?  Is my DAD?  Holy moly, that is SO NOT what we need right now.. money-wise.. Not sure if I've ever talked about my kitties, which is strange, but we have 9.. and no we don't live in filth.. my mom is OCD about cleaning.... Honestly.. 

So I have to pick up the slack.. And if it happened to be any other day but today, I really wouldn't worry about it.. HOWEVER, I have a VERY FULL schedule on Wednesdays.. Plus I picked up a 12 hour shift after my normal shift tonight.. So no workout for me today.. 

Birthday Weekend.. Overview and Wrap-up (Part 1)

Well well well.. I have no idea what to do first, catch up on 5 days worth of blog entries (and I will read every one of them) or write my own entry to gab about my past 5 days activities.. guess I obviously decided, huh.. lol

Well, most of y'all know that I turned 27 today (technically at 10:57am.. lol).. and I took the whole weekend off work to make sure I brought it in with a bang!  Well, now that the weekend is almost over, I gotta fill y'all in.. I just gotta.. ;)

I'll start with the beginning of my 5 day (unintentional) hiatus.. Wednesday

So, in order to not have a totally crappy paycheck next Friday, I switched days with someone so I would work Wednesday at my over-nighter.. and boy did she make it the worst 24 hours ever (well, I guess not ever since they usually all are with her, sadly enough).. woman accused me of eating a whole bag of spearmint candies (WTF?!), told me not to screw up her cupboards (as they'd just been rearranged, partially by me, recently), and that I text too fast (she usually doesn't care) and the "clicking" is getting on her nerves.. OMG, I'm glad I am not a violent person..

On a brighter note, my mom text me that my dress for Friday night had came into the mail!  YAY!!  I was really worried (with my luck) that it would get here on Saturday or something.. lol.. so she sent me a text to see if it looked like I thought it would, and it looked so much better!  Here's the pic she sent me.. :)

So Thursday, I was so excited to get home, for more than one reason, and wanted to try my dress on.. This dress is labeled as a 1X (which is supposed to be a 16/18, which is my current size in most labels).. and it even has a stretch back.. and it didn't fit.. thank goodness it came with a swatch of fabric (not sure why, but hey, i'm sure not complaining.. lol), because I used it to make the dress a little bigger.. and it worked!!  I had to work at 1:30, so I went and was glad that he's one of my great clients.. he's so sweet, his girlfriend is AWESOME (more about her in tomorrow's post) and has the cutest puppy that is spoiled rotten.. lol

After that, I did some stuff and finished working on the dress.. Had to work Friday with my guy client and got off at 2pm, then went to Hobby Lobby and Micheal's.. didn't leave the Clarksville/Jeffersonville area until 3:30.. WTF?!  Where did the time go??  lol.. so I went home as fast as I (legally) could, and got ready for my Friday night dinner/dancing with my girl Cassie.. and boy did the night just kinda go to pot..  I have never eaten at The Cheesecake Factory, but I knew that it wouldn't be easy on my diet, so I made sure to take it easy the whole day up to dinner, so I wouldn't have to "miss out" on anything..

Would you believe, after driving all the way up to Greenwood (1 hour away from my friends house), there was a 40 minute wait and we couldn't wait that long?!  We chose to get the cheesecake to go, and then went to eat somewhere else.. Can you figure out where?  lol

 

Yep, we went to McDonald's in all our prom-worthy glory.. :)   and I enjoyed my McRib and medium fries.. and the White Chocolate Raspberry Cheesecake, of course.. So we made it to her sis's house and mine in good time, and finally (after a little "stalling") got to 4th Street Live in Louisville, KY around 10:15pm.. And some of my sorority girls, including Katie from Finding the Thin Within, came and helped me celebrate.. :)

While we did have some bumps in the night.. like how we had to leave.. it was quite enjoyable.. and anyone wanting to see more pics can go to my FB photo album and have a look-see.. :) 

Decided to make this a two-post entry, as I didn't expect it to get so long.. Hope your eyes aren't burning from reading all this.. :(

Game Day..

well, technically night, but who cares.. lol

So I'm sitting here, after getting back from work, in my colts gear (colts shirt, colts pj pants, colts slippers.. hehe) reading up on other blogs.. and my girl Katie's blog, Finding the Thin Within, hit me really hard today.. in a good way.. she was talking about her challenges, and how she never goes into a challenge halfway.. she either does it or doesn't.. there is not in between with her.. and as most of you who follow my blog, I am definitely living in the halfway.. or at least I am on some things..

Yeah, I am doing my diet, whole-heartedly.. yeah, I'm finally getting to exercising on a normal basis.. but it wasn't always that way.. I am definitely an "out of sight, out of mind" kind of person.. If it isn't in my face 24/7, it won't cross my mind until I RANDOMLY think about it.. :(

So I am planning to take some initiative and put all my challenges in front of my face.. Anyone remember my "racing platform" I made a few months ago?  Well, it's finally got my "before" pic on it.. and that's about it..  But not for long.. I am the only one who can make the changes in my life that I want.. so thanks, Katie, for unintentionally kicking me in the ass.. ;)

Be sure to check out my new tab, "My Year-Long Challenge".. This year should be a doozy..

Fitting into "something" again..

I was going through the blogs I follow, and Syl @ Live, Smile, Run made me think of something.. We all have that "thing" that we use as a goal point.. some people have exact weights to get to, some people have a size pant/shirt/bra that they want to fit into, and some people (like me) have a specific pant/shirt/bra they want to GET BACK INTO.. here is what I want to fit back into sometime soon..

These pants are what (in the back of my head) drive me to continue on this sometimes crazy journey.. The back story (what, I gotta explain, don't I?!  lol) is really short, but totally important in my memory.. In 2003, I did my first (and only) successful attempt at the Adkins diet.. I can tell you the month/year of this because my brother graduated from high school in late May 2003.. and boy did I look HOT!!  This was the time when I got down to my smallest (178 lbs.).. My brother then went into the Army Reserves and a few months later (October 2003) we went to Myrtle Beach to see him graduate from boot camp!  :)

I was so excited because I was actually able to go and see the beach again.. It was wonderful!  Plus, shopping on the Army base!  Anyone who is a Armed Forces girl/guy will know how awesome the shopping centers on bases are.. it's like discount shopping with designer labels.. haha.. so I got these jeans there for like $25.. And they fit, for like 2 more months.. and they haven't fit since..

I will fit into these jeans again.. and others like them of course.. So congrats, Syl, for fitting into your "something".. hopefully I will be joining you in putting up current pics of me in my old pants.. :)

Fantastic Sunday..

Alriiiiiiiiighty then.. so if you have been reading for a bit, you'll remember me saying something about if I go to any fast food restaurant, I will get the kids meal.. well, I ended up going to McDonald's for my dad and was so hungry.. but I stuck to my promise (to you and myself) and got a cheeseburger happy meal.. 

Last time I got a happy meal, they came in the crappy bags.. I was excited to see that they were back to the boxes.. :)  And I couldn't wait to see how tiny the new fry holders were.. and was greatly disappointed.. my friend Cassie got one of the cute mini-fry boxes.. I got a crappy paper wrapper.. :(  But I had no idea they still gave you cookies!  lol.. so sad to get excited over a Happy Meal, right?!  

On to my reason for blogging today.. I went to the gym today (after a 2 day hiatus due to work) and ran another mile.. it was somewhat harder for some reason (maybe bc I wasn't talking to my friend Renee this time), but I beat my last time.. by 45 SECONDS!!  If ya look to the right of this post, you'll see a little section that I decided to put up dedicated to "beating" my mileage time.. I figured I'd try to get to a 10-minute mile before I up my mileage.. But I am super excited that I pushed myself to do better.. It is so worth it.. :)

Oh!  To anyone who has been counting the days (like I have.. lol), it is officially ONE WEEK til I turn 27 years old.. And I plan to make this week a life-altering one.. which will be the start of a life-changing year (it technically started when I started this diet, but I want it to officially start on my b-day).. so check back tomorrow afternoon to see pics of what my first "official" change turns out to be.. ;)

Later taters!  hehe

Dun Dun Duuuun..

It's Friday.. and I almost forgot to weigh myself before going to work.. but without further procrastination, my weight this week is:

224.6 lbs

That's a loss of 3.6 lbs!!  Holy cow!  I definitely wasn't expecting that.. I was thinking maybe a pound, at the most 2.. I'm very encouraged by this though.. It means that I can keep truckin, without having to be on the Adkins diet forever.. I'm definitely dissapointed in myself though for not waking up this morning and getting to the gym to try to get a better time on my mile.. Well, there's always Sunday, right? :)

Hope you lovely readers and bloggers have a great weekend.. I'm off to work..

Oops and Thanks!

I'm not sure how I did this, but in my excitement for Monday, I TOTALLY forgot to weigh in this morning.. UGH!  I was so looking forward to seeing how many lbs I've lost since last Monday.. I've noticed things fitting looser, so I weighed myself when I got home from work tonight.. and I was ECSTATIC!!

Tonight I weighed in at 222.8 lbs!! 

That means I've passed the 25 lb mark 

and gotten to 27.5 lbs!! 

I can't wait to see what it is tomorrow morning.. maybe I'll somehow magically lose those 2.5 lbs that are keeping me from 30 lbs.. here's hoping.. lol.. so I didn't get to do my Shred tonight, but I did do 20 minutes of activity.. I hope to wake up early tomorrow and enjoy this wonderful weather for a nice walk/jog.. Gotta start with baby steps, I guess..

I can't wait to get under the 220 mark.. I don't know how long it's been since I've actually seen that number.. and that makes me sad.. because I haven't been happy with how I look for SO long, and I realize that whatever my motivation is (which I'm still not sure what it was in the beginning), I need to bottle it because it's keeping me from just giving up.. I think it's majorly because of you all.. so THANK YOU!  Thank you for keeping me accountable to someone other than myself.. Thank you for supporting me, no matter how.. Thank you for reading!

Dining Out..

Okay, so I know that as a society we LOVE to multi-task.. anything we can do at the same time as something else, I know I'm so going to do it.. lol.. and fast food is a big issue in society, and not just to our kids.. I LOVE me some McDonald's french fries and Arby's jamocha shakes.. and I for all those who are just tuning in, I've been on the Adkins Diet since July 23rd.. and it's been interesting to find foods on the run that I can eat on this diet.. 

So I decided to help out other people who are interested in what foods are worth going through the drive thru for..  Every week, on Sunday, I will be posting a new "fast food" item that SHOULD be carb-friendly.. I'm gonna call it "Out of the House Sundays" I will tell you all I wish I'd known before I bought it (if it was worth the money, waste of carbs/worth the carbs, etc).. I hope this helps at least ONE person.. :)  I'm going to do one for last Sunday, because I just ate a bite of the WORST thing ever.. lol

KFC'S DOUBLE DOWN SANDWICH

This is KFC's newest edition to their menu.. It basically is a chicken sandwich (classic or grilled style), but instead of a bun, it's got the chicken breasts on either side of the bacon, swiss cheese and, depending on the kind of chicken you get, a sauce.. 

Calories (for the grilled one I got): 460

Fat: 23 grams

Price: $4.99

I got the grilled chicken one, and didn't get the honey mustard sauce on it.. I was planning to use ranch dressing or mayo and dip it, but I forgot.. So I tried it as it came (minus the sauce, of course) and it was SO GROSS!!!  It is so not worth the $5.. you're better off getting a 2 pc meal from KFC instead..  It's good for carb-watchers because it only has 4 carbs, but doing this diet shouldn't mean I can't have good tasting food..

Really Quick Weigh In..

Woke up late and keep finding all these awesome things that are making me wanna just sit here and read.. I won an award, I now have 15 followers (AMAZING to me!) and Katie tagged me in a game that I can't wait to play.. once I get done with work..

But the quick weigh-in.. I am now at 227.2!! I'm officially at 23.0 lbs lost!  I'm so exstatic!!  My scrubs don't fit properly anymore, so I knew it was a good number this week.. :)

More later about my crappy day yesterday in an entry later today..

Happy Friday all! 

This is it for today.. I promise.. haha

Okay, so I had to blog a little about the day as a whole.. I actually got myself out of my house and to the gym to do the 50 minute Zumba class.. and was surprised that I wasn't hurting too bad at the end.. and of course, when I got home my mom (who has had a new gastric bypass done a few months ago) wanted me to go walking with her.. 

So we did two laps around the lake down the street from our house.. and when we got home, I wanted to just plop on the floor and lay there.. lol.. my deal was if I went with her walking, she'd step on my back to pop it.. and I got my back popped.. THANK GOODNESS!! The Zumba workout and the walk were both done on an empty stomach, which is something I'm definitely working on.. with my current medications, my appetite is somewhat suppressed.. and I have to remember to eat every 4 hours or so.. a few days last week I noticed it was 10pm and realized I hadn't eaten since noon.. :(

But I ate these cute little chicken chunks that are NOT BREADED!!!  Even have a cute little name.. Skinny Chix.. lol.. I had like 6 pcs of that and was pleasantly surprised by their good flavor.. Found them at Wal-Mart, for anyone who is interested.. now I'm gonna go shower and crash into my bed.. to wake up and do it all again tomorrow.. well, maybe not ALL of that.. 

Blog Hop Time

It's time for another blog hop!  I participated last week and got a lot of traffic from it.. so I'm back for more.. :)

1st of September...

So it's the beginning of a new month.. Where did August go?  I can't believe in a little over 2 months I'll be 27.. So scary.. and so exciting to see what my FAB body will look like by then.. I was looking around my house and saw a picture from 2 Christmas' ago..  I was HUGE!!  And this past Christmas was not too much better.. I want to be slimmer by Christmas, if not be totally done "dieting"..  So crazy to even be thinking about Christmas but it's getting closer and closer.. holy cow!

So today is the "1st day of the rest of my life".. lol.. that might not be quite true, but it feels a little like it.. today actually is the 1st day of the 30 Day Shred.. and I got done with my first workout about 30 minutes ago.. and while I wanted to die right afterwards, and started sweating about 5 minutes into it, I feel really good about it.. and any anger I have towards Jillian Michaels I get to take out on her with boxing moves.. I punch her in the face.. lmao

Can't wait to read other people's blogs to see how well everyone is doing on their journey with this program.. :)   Thinking I may take a short nap, and I also plan to do Zumba tonight too, so I'm hoping my legs won't feel like rubber by then.. ;)

It's the 1st of September!!

and for any of you who have been reading this, you know that today is the day that the 30 Day Shred starts.. yikes!  Well, my plan was to wake up at 4:30 am and work out, shower and go to work.. And I prolly could have done that but I had the worst night sleep last night (prolly in anticipation for this to start).. So I figured I'd post my measurements and pics this morning and just make sure to do the first workout when I get home from work.. Oh boy..

My beginning measurements are as follows:

Arms: 14"

Chest: 40"

Waist: 39"

Hips: 49"

Thighs: 28"

Okay, I was shocked when I saw that my waist and my chest are basically the same amount.. not cool.. I thought I had a defined waist, and I actually do, but my waist isn't ANYWHERE near my belly button.. lol.. which is where I did the measurement so I'd be able to do it accurately in the future..  And for the gross pics..

Yeah, I'm kinda disgusted with how chunky I got... which is prolly why there are no pics of me from my chest down in the past few years.. gotta love denial, right?!  Well, it's off to work for me!  Have a good Wednesday, everyone!

OH MY GOSH!!!!

Can ya tell I had a good day?!  lol.. I honestly, really truly, had an AWESOME day, actually!  I don't even know where to start, but I figure the beginning of the day is prolly the best.. ;)

So I woke up today thinking that tomorrow started the 30 Day Shred on Syl's blog.. and I honestly am still kinda scared out of my mind about it.. but I made my mind up that I was gonna do it, and I'm sticking to it, dag nab it!!  So I went to work, all normal and stuff, and eventually went home (after some detours to the craft store and Petsmart to see the kitties I can't take home with me).. And found myself TRYING to talk myself into ditching my workout.. the key word there is trying.. I wasn't successful!  YAY!!

Was feeling quite tired (woke up really early, after going to bed late), so I let myself take an hour nap.. and couldn't sleep.. so I just lay there for a while, and then got dressed for the gym and left before I could say something to stay at home.. lol.. I belong to my local YMCA, and for those who have NO IDEA where my town is, or what it's called for that matter, the fact that we even HAVE a YMCA is a miracle..  We have that and a Wal-Mart (which we say that's why we are considered a city instead of a town.. hehe)..

From past posts, you know that I LOVE Zumba classes.. and while I don't go as often as I'd like to, I go as much as I can but they only have classes at night on Mondays and Wednesdays.. :(     So today, Tuesday, they had a class called TurboKick.. and that last part is right, as in it KICKS YOUR BOOTY!!  I had to use my inhaler towards the end, which is saying a lot.. I'm feelin kinda wore out, but I know I'll keep doing it.. :)

Oh, and I found an iPod Podcast for a Couch to 5k program called 5k 101.. I have to use podcasts because I have an iPod Classic.. which is NOT an iPod that has App capabilities.. :(   So I did that after sweating my butt off during TurboKick.. I had to use my inhaler again, but I made it through.. and then high tailed my butt out before I passed out.. that's another blog all together.. lol

My OMG moment happened when I got home.. I've gotten kinda compulsive about weighing myself, which I've got to stop, and weighed myself after I got home.. I'VE REACHED THE 20 LB MARK!!  One day after my girl Katie got to her 20 lb mark, I reached mine!!  I'm exstatic.. nothing can burst this bubble.. or so I thought.. My sorority sisters father just passed away from cancer.. so I am sad for her.. but there's still that lingering happiness in the back of my mind that is making me wanna do a little dance..

So I'm gonna dance a little and try not to cry for my sorority sister..