Happy Memorial day today!

I haven't tracked all weekend so today is the day to get back on it! Other goals: bake a pan of chicken, drink 4 waters. We are going to the zoo so it would be good to take a lunch. I hope everyone has a great day today!!

Disappointment

I disappointed my daughter today and I am really sad. She told me she was disappointed. At first I had anger, then excuses and finally I got real and was disappointed in myself. I'm sorry Mallory!
This is what happened, we went to lunch today and I drank two Pepsi's. The part that disappointed her is that soda is very bad for my gout because of the high fructose corn syrup. I know that is something I should stay away from for the rest of my life. And who needs it. I don't know why I drank it today. Yesterday, I limped all over and had to take an anti-inflamatory it was so bad. So, I am walking fine today and what did I do? Something that is so sure to have my foot inflamed again. What a sickness this is.

Goals: four bottles of water
exercise

Molly's Challenge Update

Wow you guys. I started writing this post and it was really negative - all about what I didn't right this week. So I deleted that crap because half the battle is attitude. I am going to positive. I weighed myself this morning (didn't have time yesterday - woke up late). I'm at 164.0 today, down 2.8 from Monday.

Here's what I did right this week:
- went to yoga twice and pilates twice
- drank 4 bottles of water yesterday

Here's what was out of my control:
- my job ended
- my aunt flo came to visit (lol, "aunt flo" who comes up with stuff?)
- and I have some sort of stomach bug thing happening which has mad the last day and a half a little unpleasant.

Goals for today:
- Drink 4 bottles of water
- track calories

Ok People, How'd We Do Today??

Tuesday's successes

It is 8:16 pm and i have been off work for 20 minutes. Did excellent with my water today. My calories were right on. No exercise and spent from 4:00 until a little bit ago on the computer. Now, got to get some exercise. I am am anxious for summer . . .

just checking

Monday

I really didn't want to cook dinner tonight and Subways was sounded appealing, but I knew if I got off today then I wouldn't get through the week.  So...I cooked a dinner which turned out pretty good.  I did have ice cream today though.  I went to the gym and did body flow and did good on my water.

Orange Sweat

Well, I gave into my cheetoes craving and it was disgusting. I ate almost an entire bag of cheetos in a bout an hour and a half last night. It was in total secrecy of course - I hid them under my bed until everyone was asleep. Cuz that's healthy. I ate them while I was watching tv and then reading my book. I got about half way through the bag and started feeling gross, but I kept on going. It wasn't until I fell asleep while reading that I quit eating them. So, this morning in yoga I was sweating pretty good because yoga is hard and I'm still really new to it. And all I could picture was bright orange goo coming out all of my pores. Nice, eh?

So, goals for the remainder of today:
drink at least 3 bottles of water (I'm about finished with the first one)
do cardio after work

Oh yeah, and at least partially due to the cheetoes incident my weight was up 1.8 from Friday to 166.8. Awesome.

Day 4 of my challenge

Today is the fourth day of my challenge and I have exercised on three of the days. I have also not eaten any ice cream (I don't remember the last time I went four days without eating ice cream)! Things are looking good for me. I do need to drink some more water though. I usually don't have a problem at all drinking water but since I've been in Denver my water drinking is pretty much non existent. Today it will get better.

No weigh in again for me, but I think I'm up a couple pounds. It's just the way I feel. Happy Monday to everyone!

Sunday

I have been thinking  A LOT about what I would do for this challenge.  Meanwhile as I was thinking and pondering about this sacrifice...I went to my WW meeting.  I was .4 lbs lighter than the previous 1 1/2 week earlier.  That puts me at 188.8 lbs.  This is why...we went to Denny's one night and Old Chicago's another night when we celebrated that we got our condo.  I made good choices at Denny's(well besides the sausage).  But, Old Chicago's was not a good choice AT ALL.  I did exercise really well last week though.  I went to the gym 4 days!  The other thing I didn't do was track my food like I should.  Geesh, I didn't want to know the damage Old Chicago's did to me.  Therefore, my challenge is going to be tracking everything I eat and only dining out once a week.  When we do eat out it is only Subway.

I really don't want to switch to diet soda.  So I limit myself to 2 small pepsi's a week.  That works pretty good for me.

I am going to have to post everyday how I did because dining out is going to be a tough one for me.
Cassa

Challenge Day Two - Sunday

How did you do today?

Challenge Awesomeness - Day 1

I didn't wanna do it, however, I did it and it wasn't as bad as I expected! Whooo hooo Day One of tracking completed. I also tracked my water and I have only had 8 cups so I am going to drink up another water bottle and feel good about my day. I also did my exercise as today is exercise day.

My Challenge

Hi girls! Things have been crazy and busy here, but I'll post about that stuff at a later time.

Anyway, I am in for the challenge! Mine is going to be to drink at least 3 bottles of water every day, give up Diet Coke (or at most have 12 oz a day), and to exercise 2-3 times per week. If I can, I'm also going to try to track, but it's not part of my official challenge b/c since Aaron is out of town, I'm eating with parents a lot more and it's so hard to track when you're not the one cooking or you're eating out (from restaurants that don't offer nutrition facts).

So I've already started giving up soda (which, Cassa, I would totally switch to diet if I were you, the calories and sugar in regular are off the charts. Mallory - you should post that email you sent me about the sugar cubes!). Wednesday I had a 20 oz diet coke, yesterday 10 oz, and today I haven't had any. Yahoo! This is a major accomplishment for me since I was practically bathing in it before ;)

And my MIL is going to come over and watch the kids twice a week so I can go to the gym - yahoo! So I did that this week and went for a walk with Molly today as well. So, even though Aaron is gone, I'm hoping that I'll be able to keep up my gym time at least twice a week.

I hope you guys are doing well!

Struggling

So, I have been in Denver since Tuesday and the whole being healthy thing is not going well. I didn't weigh myself this morning because there is no scale in my hotel room. The hotel has a "fitness room" which includes exactly one stationary bike. There is a nice trail right outside the hotel that I have jogged/walked on a couple times.

For my challenge I am not going to eat ice cream for the next three weeks (this is my main challenge goal). I like Molly's challenge so I'm am going to exercise (cardio) 5 days a week. Normally I can find time to exercise but this next three weeks is going to be pretty busy for me so it will definitely be a challenge. I am participating in the challenge but don't think I will be able to get together with everyone. The weekend of the 12th is the first weekend I will be working (baking at Einstein Bros. Bagels and we are scheduled to open on June 8). I'll probably be working Saturday because I have to ask for Sunday off to get a wedding cake done and deliver it to Aspen. So, whatever you do, have fun and I wish I could join you!

Hope everyone enjoys their weekend!

Let the Challenge Begin!!!

Ok party people, the challenge (whatever that is for you) begins today. Obviously, you don't have to participate, but the more people doing it the more fun it is!! So here's the deal:

Three weeks of doing whatever it is you've challenged yourself to do, whether that's weight loss, tracking calories, exercising, drinking water or anything you want to work on.

The weekend of June 12 we'll get together and do something fun as a reward for making it through our challenges. Right now we're thinking hiking, but any suggestions are welcome. Mallory is in Denver, so it'll probably need to be something where we meet her half way.

My personal challenge is to exercise 5 days a week: 3 cardio workouts and 2 pilates workouts. I'll do cardio Mon. and Wed. at the gym since I'm already there for work and Saturday I'll do something else if I don't feel like going out there. Hopefully we'll start playing tennis again on Wednesdays and I can do that. Pilates I have to do at the gym. So, that's my challenge - what's yours?

Molly's Friday

Well, this week I've been sort of half-heartedly trying to eat healthy. And I guess most of my choices have been healthy choices, it's just the serving sizes I'm having trouble with. I know that if I start tracking my calories again on Livestrong it will help. The problem is, I'm feeling very unmotivated to track. I know that once I get into the swing of it again it'll be fine, it's just getting started. Same with the exercise. Anyway, I did manage to lose a bit of weight. I'm down .8 from Monday to 165.2

My goals today:

drink 4 bottles of water

wooo hooo it's Finally Friday!

So I am pretty excited. I weighed myself this morning and my weight was down from 231.something on monday to 225.2 today. That's a 6 pound loss! I have been really having a hard time when Justin is home, we have had several discussions in the past about how I need him to support me and he has days where he is really good about it but other days where he isn't. So we're having a hard time. Another thing is I think I need to plan what we are going to eat at nights if I am going to do better. So today's goals:

Track,
Drink 4 bottles of water
Plan some healthy meals and go to the grocery store.

Thanks for the invitation

Hi. Goodness I don't even know where to begin. My name is Cassa Fox. I've been married for 2 years and have a 19 month old boy and an 8 year old step son. We've lived in Grand Junction for a year and we love it here. So...how I got here. Lori is such an intuitive person that one day she asked how I was doing and I couldn't control the tears. It was a really bad day. First, I had a conversation with my mom about my weight the night before and it wasn't great. She was trying to be supportive, but she can be very overbearing about it. I was feeling very obese (I hate that word) and discouraged about how I got here. Second, my husband and I would like to have another baby and I found out I had to go back on birth control for 3 months to regulate my cycles. After getting over all of that anxiety I looked at the 3 months as a great time to get my body back on track. I joined weight watchers and the journey started...again. I've always had problems with my weight. I feel like I have to exercise every day and when I eat junk it takes forever to get it off. But, sometimes I like junk. Sometimes I like a Blizzard and other treats. I exercise regularly at Crossroads so I got that one down. It's just the eating for me. I'm an emotional eater. Weight Watchers is helping. When I started there 3 weeks ago I weighed 190 lbs. The following week I lost 1.4 lbs. I am supposed to weigh in today but I can't get there so I will go on Saturday. My other weakness is that I really like Pepsi. I used to drink a 32 oz. every day. Now I've cut it down to 2 small ones during the week.

I'm really excited about this blog and to have a place to talk about my weight woes. I'm up for a challenge too! My goals today: I am sitting around waiting for Fedex because we bought a condo and we have to fill out all the paperwork today so I won't make it to the gym. But, I want to make sure I drink my water today.

Wednesday!!!!!

It's really not that exciting, but you know, whatever.

My goals for today are to drink 3 bottles of water and make healthy choices all day long.

And the challenge: My challenge is to work out 5 days a week: 3 cardio workouts: Monday, Wednesday and Saturday and two pilates workouts Tuesday and Thursday. And I'm going to start tracking my calories again, although that's not really part of the challenge. But it's something I know is helpful and if I'm going to do all this exercising I really need to keep my eating under control. When should we start the challenge? Today? Tomorrow? Friday? If we go through June 11 (that's a friday) that'll be at least 3 solid weeks of challenge. Then we can have our hiking trip or whatever we decide to do the weekend of June 12 so that Mallory doesn't have to worry about her new work schedule. What do you guys think?

Molly's Tuesday

I didn't make it to the gym this morning. Boring story about not sleeping well and anxiety. And I think the birds of the neighborhood were having a sing-off at the crack of dawn. Obnoxious! Anyway, I dealt with some stuff this morning and I'm actually excited to go workout after I'm done with work. I plan to do at least 30 minutes of cardio, maybe some weights. I'm still intimidated by the weight machines, which I should really just get over. I'm just finishing my second bottle of water for the day and am going to try to get through 2 more. And I'm still pondering the challenge.

Mallory's Tuesday

I just can't seem to get back in the swing of things. I weighed myself this morning and I was up 9 pounds from last friday. I have done pretty good so far today. One water down and three to go! Today is also my exercise day so I need to go get that done soon. I hope everyone has a great day.

Unbalanced

This is how I've felt lately - unbalanced. I feel like I"m stretched so thin that if I'm doing good eating/exercising, my house is a wreck. If I'm taking the kids to do lots of fun summery, enriching things, my house is dirty, I'm getting all the stuff done for work that I need to, and I don't have time to do all my food prep/cleanup and exercising. Sigh. There just isn't enough time during the day.

Anyway, I haven't been tracking consistently and Fri and Sat both weren't great eating days. Aaron left on Sun for 3 weeks so we went out a lot. Yesterday wasn't great either. I always have the hardest time when I'm at my parents' house, even if for a little bit.

I think a challenge is a good idea - I also need motivation, as well as more hours in the day. Think that'll happen? A friend of mine is doing a "biggest Loser" style competition where they each put in $10 bucks, weigh in at the beginning and end of the month, and whoever loses the most, wins all the money. I'm not saying to do something exactly like that, but it's an option.

My friend Cassa is going to be joining us on the blog but I'll let her introduce herself. Maybe if we can do a quick introduction of ourselves, that'd be nice.

I am trying to be positive about Aaron being gone for 3 weeks, but it's hard. It makes working out a lot harder, eating well harder (since my parents want us to come over), and I'm an emotional eater, especially at night :( I'm working on that. So, I'm going to try to get some workouts in in other ways - I'm going to get Brielle a special bike helmet today so I can take them out more in the bike trailer.

Tammi's Monday

So, I weighed 145 this morning. It's up since the last time I weighed in. It wasn't a good weekend all around for me and being healthy. I didn't get my water in. I ate whatever I wanted. And I didn't really exercise (although I was pretty active).

It's not looking like my next two weeks are going to be very promising either. I'm going over to Denver for training. I will be living out of a hotel and eating restaurant food for almost two weeks straight. I know I need to make the right choices, it's just sometimes so hard when you are eating out. I also know I need to get my exercise in. I'm hoping the hotel I'm at has a fitness room and I will make time to exercise.

It's all about choices and I can choose to be unhealthy or I can choose to be healthy. It's my decision.

Mallory's Monday

Ok so here's what happened. I went to bed late last night. At 3:30 I woke up to Samantha having a huge fever. I am totally paranoid about her having another seizure, so I gave her ibuprofen and stayed awake with her until her fever went down. So I was up until 4:45 then my alarm went off at 5:30 and I hit snooze until 5:45 then I got up and waited for Marcus to bring Audrey. At 6:45 I called and sent them a text to see if they were bringing her. While waiting for an answer I became rediculously angry and began eating potato chips. I knew while I was doing it I would regret it. I told myself to stop but I couldn't seem to make myself. Then after a bad weekend of eating and the chips I just couldn't weigh myself. Sigh.

Molly's Monday Weigh-In

166.0, down 1.8 from Friday. I was actually down below 166 a little on Sunday morning, but that's life. The weekend as ok as far as eating goes. Saturday was a little rough, but I drank a ton of water. Yesterday I did pretty good with the eating, but didn't drink much water.

I was thinking maybe we need a challenge. Maybe everyone could set a goal for a certain date and then we could all get together and do something together if we reach that goal? I just know that I need some motivation. Any ideas?

And as far as the background goes I think I'll put it back on the lemons and limes. I'm already sick of the ivy (it's starting to remind me of the cupcakes) and it's not really relevant to what we're doing here.

Ha ha ha ha

Sorry about the background. This is especially for you MOLLY AND LORI

Please feel free to change it!!

Mallory's Friday

Today's weight was 222.8 the same. Ok so I have decided I am officially stuck. I need to exercise more and eat better to get me over my plateau. It would also help if I drank my water every day. I really would like to start moving down again so I have been reading a few tips for beating a plateau. Ug, now I have to go deal with a crying baby.

Molly's Friday

It's been a weird week. But, as of Wednesday, I'm officially back on the weightloss bandwagon. My weight today is 167.8, which is up 3 pounds from a few weeks ago. I know I put on weight the last few weeks - I'm actually really surprised it's not more. But, it is what it is and now it's time to do what I have to do to get rid of it and take care of myself. I did pilates yesterday and went for a nice walk. I'm going to yoga in about 10 minutes. My other goals for today are to drink 3 bottles of water and make smart choices. Hope everyone is having a great day!

a little sad

Today's weigh in is good. It's 143.6 which is the same as it was a week ago. Like Mallory said, I'm okay with my weight staying the same for a little bit, I just don't want to see it go up. I've been super good about drinking my water and pretty good about exercising.

Eating is going alright. I haven't been eating the cookies or candy (can't seem to give up the ice cream yet) that are lying around until today. I found out today that we are putting my dog down tomorrow which of course makes me very sad. Just after I found this out I turned and had a cookie. The good thing is that I did realize what I was doing and I only had one. I had some M & M's too though. It's not big a deal to eat just one cookie and I'm proud of myself that I kept it in check.

Hope everyone has a nice Mother's Day!

Friday again

Well, it's Friday again :) I'm hoping that means I'll see my hubby tomorrow! lol He's been working A LOT.

This morning I was 151.8 which is exactly 5 lbs down from Monday, but I'm sure that was a lot of water weight. Still, I'm super happy with it. Tonight I'm going out with some friends for dinner, so I hope that I can keep my calories in check but also cleanse the sodium out of my system before Monday... we'll see.

Goals today:

track

4 bottles of water

low on calories throughout the day so that dinner won't be too bad, hopefully

I'm back/Friday Weigh In

So, here I am. It's been a couple of weeks since I have posted anything. I haven't been eating horrible or great but I have been overeating some and I haven't been drinking my water very well. So I was really worried about this morning's weigh in. It wasn't too bad. 222.8 which is exactly what I was April 13th. So overall I am up 7.8 pounds from my lowest weight, and down 27 from my starting weight. I feel like I am spinning my wheels but at least I haven't gained more. I am ok with staying the same for awhile as long as I keep going and don't gain.

I hate roosters

Thanks, Lori, for asking us to say what's helpful and important to us in our weightloss journey. I needed to remind myself. The single most important thing for me is remembering that this is a lifestyle change. It's a DECISION that I make everyday to be healthy. (Some days that's harder than others)

Here are some things that have helped me be successful:

- tracking my calories. I use livestrong.com and it works pretty well, particulary if I track everything that goes into my mouth throughout the day and not just at the end of the day. It's really easy to forget stuff and it's amazing how quickly the forgotten calories can add up.

- drinking water. I try to drink three 32 oz. bottles of water a day. Seriously drinking water is huge.

- Also for me, staying positive is really important. Part of this is exercise. My attitude toward life is sooo much better when I'm exercising regularly. Endorphins are *awesome*! And part of it is knowing that even if I don't do everything exactly right (and when does everything go exactly right?) there's always tomorrow. I get to start over everyday. There's no sense is kicking myself for eating something I maybe shouldn't have if I've already done it. What's done is done. And if you keep trying everyday and tracking your calories and realizing what you're putting into your body you're going to want to make healthy choices.

- Lastly, planning ahead. I don't really cook much ahead of time like Lori does, but knowing what I'm going to cook and making sure I have the stuff on hand ahead of time is very helpful. Stops me from changing the plan from homemade chicken tostadas to Wendy's because I'm missing an ingredient.

What I eat:

- Fruit. I generally eat about 3 servings of fruit a day. I also eat veggies, but I'm not as good at getting a lot of servings of those. I try for at least 1-2 a day.

- Low-fat cottage cheese. Love this stuff, especially with fresh fruit.

- Eggs. Great source of protein and they are delicious with salsa and cheese. I know egg whites are the better choice, but I usually just eat the yoke because egg whites gross me out.

- half of a whole wheat english muffin with 2 tablespoons of crunchy peanut butter. Sure peanut butter isn't the best thing for you, but if you just have the 1 serving, it's also not the worst. And I am unwilling to give it up, so that's that.

- lots of chicken and lean hamburger. And fish. prepared in all different ways. cookinglight.com is a great resource for low-cal, healthy recipes.

So my goals for today are:

-go to pilates (check)
-drink 3 bottles of water
-make healthy choices

I will not be doing our Friday weigh in, but I will do the Monday weigh-in. Hope to see you all there!

Hi!

Hey girls! This post has a few different reasons.

1. I invited someone else to the blog. I am sending her the web address and she's gonna see if she wants to do it or not. Hopefully she will :)

2. I think it'd be helpful for my friend, plus all of us, if we would each take a minute to post two things - the things that have helped us be successful, and the foods that we normally eat.

3. I thought I'd do a mid-week weigh in/goals for today.

Ok, so here's what helps me be successful:

- tracking my calories! It's sooo easy for me to overeat if I don't keep track of them throughout the day.

- drinking lots of water

- eating a lot of fiber. I know that if I eat something with a lot of fiber, then drink a bottle of water, then I'm a lot more full and fuller for longer as well.

- making stuff ahead of time. Having a pot of green chili that I can warm up and put over egg whites, or chicken made ahead of time, etc. I try to cook a lot of stuff all at once and then I don't have as much prep throughout the day.

- talking about it - my weight, my workouts, how I'm eating, etc. Mallory and I do this a lot and I know that I do better when I'm able to talk about it. Weird, maybe. But I'm ok with being weird.

- MEASURE EVERYTHING. Everything. Everything. I had my mom buy me a food scale for Christmas, and I use it ALL the time.

Here's what I eat - a LOT!

- egg whites. I normally eat these for breakfast and most the time for lunch too, if I don't have chicken cooked already. They're super easy and pretty cheap. Right now I'm into putting green chile on them (scrambled) and sometimes eating them with a corn tortilla (which has a TON fewer calories than flour tortillas!).

- parmesan chicken. That is a loose term for my chicken, but I use a thin chicken breast (or fillet it or pound it), coat it in egg whites, then in PLAIN breadcrumbs and cook in the oven at 350 for 45 mins or so. I normally put pizza sauce on top (spicier than normal tomato sauce, but I do both).

- chicken tacos. Cook the chicken however you like (w/o adding more calories anyway) and add into a corn tortilla, no-fat sour cream, and green chile. Yum! And you don't even need cheese, which is a huge calorie hog and also expensive.

That's what I eat like 75% of the time. Maybe I'll do another post soon with the other stuff.

Ok, onto my mid-week update.

I was at 152 this morning, which is great. I must be getting some salt out of my system b/c it's 4.8 lbs from Monday. Yeeeaaah, I only wish that happened every week.

My goals today:

track my calories

4 bottles of water

try either to not eat much at the church thing tonight or not eat at all... I haven't decided yet.

I wish I could exercise tonight but not only do I have a church thing, but I managed to re-hurt my back yesterday. Wooo - I'm awesome, I know. You don't have to tell me.... ok, I'm retarded. And my back sucks. And now I feel old. :( boo.

Ok, your turn!

~Lori

Time to Get Moving Again

I had a interesting conversation with my mom a little bit ago. She's been in Florida for the past week visiting her sister and she called to see how things are going. This is how the interesting part of the conversation went:

Mom: how are doing?
Me: Ok expect I'm eating a lot.
mom: Why are you eating a lot?
Me: because I like to eat when I'm sad.
Mom: oh.
Me: and then I get fat. And then I'm sad that I'm fat. And then I'm sad and fat. So I eat some more.

And while I was aware of this pattern and had actually thought about it quite a bit, saying it out loud sort of woke me up. So, I'm going to try to get back on the wagon. The next few days will be tricky. My Gram's funeral is Friday morning, so we have family and stress and family stress. But I'm going to at least focus on drinking all of my water (don't remember the last time I actually did that) and get a couple of workouts in. Besides I know that nothing helps me more when I'm down than exercise. So tonightt after work I'm going to do some cardio and tomorrow morning is pilates, which I haven't been to in weeks. My friend Kara saves me a spot on Thursdays, which is good motivation to get up and go.

Chirp... chirp

It's been awhile quiet around here lately! I'm definitely at fault too, so I thought I'd post.

I did really well yesterday, drank a lot of water, exercised, even told my parents I wasn't feeling good and just ate an orange while everyone else was eating pizza last night for dinner. Then I came home and made a healthy one for me. Anyway, this morning I was 153.6 which is much better than yesterday and hopefully I'm off to a good start again. I don't mind this weight - I'm actually on the low side of my bmi, although I would prefer to be lower- but I just hate bouncing back and forth within 10 lbs! Arrr. Anyway, I feel better about the whole thing, and that's really the point, right? Ok, I'm rambling.

Goals:

4 bottles of water

lots of protein

track calories

exercise

get the stuff done that I need to for our church activity on Wed - you guys can come if you want - we're having a taco bar, yummm