Tuning Up in June

I've been floundering all year. Looking for ways to lose weight, exercise consistently, eat right, etc. It just hasn't been happening...all I know is I truly want to do right but "something" hasn't clicked for me and I haven't done it.

I am determined that June is gonna be my month. I am on medication to help my thyroid levels. I am taking a vitamin D supplement to help my levels on that too. Medically speaking there is no reason I can't get my act together so now it's time to get busy with the weight loss. The year is half over and I don't want to waste the whole year, continuing to gain weight.

Cue, The Shrinking Jeans ladies!! They always know when to start a new challenge and get my booty moving again! So I'm participating in the June Tune Up with the Sisterhood and I'm gonna give this body a tune up! And with all good challenges they are even offering ways to get my exercise in with 3 exercises to do most every day of the month!

This particular challenge is a partners challenge...meaning we team up with someone and we tackle this booger together! My partner is Jen and I'm so excited to be doing this with her! We have been chatting a lot and are becoming great friends but we both need to lose some weight and stop making excuses! Together we are gonna tackle this challenge with all the gusto we can muster...

Our team name is the Kick A$$ WIPs (cuz we are both a Work in Progress). I even have goals for this challenge....GO ME!!

1) EXERCISE EVERY DAY!! Between the June Tone Up, and the beginning of the Komen 3 Day training

and using the Wii and XBox I think I have this one under control.

2) NO SODAS!! 'nuff said...

3) TRACK MY FOOD EVERY DAY, EVERY BITE!! I've been pretty hit and miss with this and I'm sure it has hurt me. I'm on MyFitnessPal with an app on my phone so really I should not have any excuses!

4) EAT A SALAD EVERY DAY!! I'm not a big veggie eater so salads are about the only veggies I normally eat but they have been sporatic. This must change....(I had a salad for dinner!! And WATER!)

That takes care of my goals for the month...as Jen said it's only 30 days! I can do it!! I can't wait to see the changes that happen in these 30 days!

btw, my starting weight for this challenge: 207
Not something I'm proud of but honestly I'm not shocked. More like pissed!!

A Month Later...

It's been a whole month since I have taken the time to write on this blog. I can't say that I haven't had anything to say...just haven't had time or inclination to sit down and actually write. So I'm going to try to catch you up on my life with some handy, dandy bullet points. They always go fast and are easy to tackle, especially since I don't seem to be able to write in a cohesive fashion this will handle my ramblings quiet nicely!




*I have been weighing in with the Sisterhood
but haven't really been putting much into my weight loss efforts. It has shown - I'm pretty much the same weight that I was 5 weeks ago. Not cool but I'm not sweating it anymore.


*I have been working out with the #Ironsisters
and am ready for the 3rd workout in Stage 2. It's hard and is hurting my knees. I'm hopeful that I can continue doing it.

*I went to the doctor nearly 2 weeks ago and got a bunch of blood work done. I haven't been myself; cranky, tired, gaining weight even when eating right, tired, cranky....you get the point. I had an extremely LOW thyroid and my Vitamin D levels were at 25 and should be a minimum of 60. So he has put me on a high dose of thyroid medicine and 10,000 units of VitaminD3 a day. He also told me to spend time outside in the sun without sunblock for at least 30 minutes a day. I'm getting better at this but I still need to work on it. Sometimes it doesn't seem there is 30 minutes in a day to go outside!

*My triglycerides are a bit high also, but he said not to worry about that right now. He thinks they will even out once the thyroid gets regulated. I figure if I start eating better food that will help both the triglycerides and the weight!

*Jen and I have been chatting quite a bit and we have come up with a plan to set up some goals for the month of May to help us get focused and make sure we make it to where we want to go. Our goals are both pretty much the same:
4 solid workouts every week
morning stretches
tracking everything, every day
(this one is mine) writing out daily to do list - what do I need to do this day and in what priority?

*I am not going to weigh in for the entire month of May. I have been gaining weight over the past few months and it has done nothing but discourage me and depress me. I need to get my hormones fixed up before I worry about my weight. I have weighed in for so long on Wednesdays that I may need a reminder to STAY AWAY FROM THE SCALE!! k?

*We have been homeschooling pretty consistently over the past 7 weeks and I feel like we are finally getting somewhere. I am planning for us to take a couple of weeks off in June but pick back up and school for a few hours a day throughout the summer. It gets too freaking hot here to do much outside and we can only swim so much in the summer! :) This should get us ready for 3rd grade curriculum by the end of summer even though we have taken so much time off. (This is another reason I haven't had much time lately!! It takes time to homeschool, even if it's only one student!)

*I love to read but lately reading has taken a backseat to other things I want to do. I was able to buy a Kindle at the beginning of April and I have downloaded A LOT of books for free but it seems there is never enough time in the day to actually read them. BUT...I am reading Jane Eyre and Jen and I are going to have a kind of "online book club". I have only read 3 chapters so far but I now understand why it is a classic. I'm liking it....can't wait to get further into it!

*I am walking 60 miles in 3 days the first weekend of November to help fight breast cancer. This disease affects families everyday! Me walking 60 miles and raising $2300 is just a small way I can help! Fundraising and training walks are starting up in earnest. I truly would appreciate your support as I work to find a cure!
You can donate here

It could be your mom, sister, best friend or yourself you save simply by donating a few dollars you know that you will be doing your part in finding a cure!

Shrinkvivor and Thankfulness Day 2

Today I am thankful that my self-worth is not wrapped up in the number on the scale any longer!

Granted I'm not happy about this number but I'm not surprised that the number went up this week. If you read my confession yesterday you noticed that I'm not concerning myself with stressing out about much of anything till after this weekend. So... When the scale went up a tad bit I just took it in stride.

Life will get back to normal after this weekend when I am done walking my 60 miles!

As for the mini-challenge I bombed Monday night....with Having some tootsie rolls.

This weeks challenge is to de-stress before getting out of bed! Perfect time for me...I need this so much!

We also counting minutes again for exercise! Watch out y'all! I'm walking 60 miles this weekend and that's gonna take awhile! Lol!

Confession of a Walker

I'm a bad girl --- Over at the 'hood they are doing a weekly meal plan and encouraging us to do the same and post it. I have FOREVER been meaning to do this BUT....when it comes to actually doing it, it never gets done! They asked if I would do it if there was peer pressure. I said I could be coerced to do it with enough peer pressure, but STILL I haven't done it! I am a slacker when it comes to meal planning but I have been preparing healthy meals with salads this week for dinner....that's good, right? As most of you know (if you've been reading my post lately) I am participating in the Komen 3 Day Walk for the Cure in November. This will be the first year for me to participate in the walk and I'm not planning on it being my last either! As I've been training for the walk we have been sweating it out in the hot Texas summer and walking early in the morning to avoid heat stroke! This weekend was actually a bit chilly and when we first started walking I wished I would have thought to bring a long sleeve shirt or a jacket but by the time we were done walking it was quiet comfortable! This week we are back in the heat of summer breaking our hottest summer on record record with 70 days of 100 degree or more! Yes, welcome to fall summer! While most of the country is already breaking out the sweat pants we are still wearing shorts and running our air conditioners 24 hrs a day! So, you might ask what does this have to do with my confession? Well it has to do with I'm tired of this freaking heat!! I thought it was going to be cooler so I could start enjoying my training walks but instead it was so stinking hot this morning at 9:45 when I walked that we had to walk in a shady area of town just so we wouldn't melt in the heat! So if you are already enjoying those nice cool fall temperatures PLEASE send me some cooler weather, k? I finally fixed my blister problems! YAY!! There is a podiatrist that offers his services to the Komen 3 Day walkers free of charge every other weekend at one of the local running stores. Every time he has been there I have been busy but this week I decided I would go no matter what was going on. I am soooooo glad I did! I have an incredibly high arch in both my feet and because of this I put a lot of pressure on the balls of my feet (like 100 pounds each foot!) . and when I walk more than an average days worth of walking I am putting too much pressure on the balls my feet, and end up getting blisters. He cut a hole in my insole of both of my new shoes and "just like magic" NO PAIN! I walked 11.25 miles on Sunday WITHOUT BLISTERS!! It was heavenly!! I'm so glad I took the time to go down and talk to him! Moral to this story....take advantage of the professionals!! Yesterday I started a 24 Day Challenge with the product Advocare. I'm also participating in a fitness class kind of like a bootcamp that meets Monday, Wednesday, Friday for 4 weeks. Yesterday was our first class and ohmygoodness my back and arms HURT! I can only imagine what the other women who have NOT been working out at all are feeling today! I'm hoping that this will boost my metabolism and I will be able to break through my plateau again! I've been working on losing the same 5 pounds all year and it has gotten very frustrating. One of the first things they told me to cut out was SODA! Duh, that one is pretty much a no-brainer but what have I been craving ever since I was told NOT to have it? You guessed it, SODA! When I first started losing weight back in March of 2009 that was the first thing I cut out and I was able to lose 5 pounds in one week. I'm not counting on losing that much this time since soda is not an every day occurance in my life any more (more like a 2 or 3 time a week occurance) but I am counting on it adding up in my weekly weight loss. I'm kind of looking forward to getting on the scale tomorrow morning...I want to see what I have lost this week, if anything! I have been VERY alert and attentive to what I have been eating yesterday and today so I'm sure that will help greatly. My Marine leaves for bootcamp on Monday morning. We will take him to the recruiters office Sunday afternoon and then I won't see my baby for 13 LONG weeks! That Other Kid and I have done school for 2 days in a row! and they have been productive days! Whooohooo! It's been challenging since My Marine has been home and a constant distraction but it has happened! That Other Kid told me he loves math, spelling and history today! I must be doing something right, huh?!! Well that's enough confession for today.... Please help me in raising money for the Komen 3 Day Walk for the Cure!! It's easy and TAX DEDUCTIBLE!! Donate here and I will love you FOREVER!!

Thinking Out Loud

Bare with me as I think out loud for a few minutes, will you. My thoughts have been pretty scattered lately, so this may not make a bit of sense. It may not make sense cuz I'm writing it from my phone too, but that's besides the point, right?

My Marine leaves on a plane for a bit of a vacation on Sunday which kind of freaks me out! You do realize that Sunday is 9/11, right? He will come home Thursday night late then I will take him to the recruiters office on that Sunday afternoon. He leaves for bootcamp Monday morning early and will be gone for the next 13 weeks. It's gonna be a long fall for this momma! But according to the calendar he will come home in time for That Other Kids birthday and Christmas so we have that to look forward to.

I bought new shoes this past weekend for my Komen 3 Day training walks and gave them a bit if a test today by walking with a friend! We had a nice walk and the shoes felt pretty good. The real test will come this weekend when I have to walk a total of 25 miles over the two days!

Y'all know that I homeschool, right? Well I do, in case you didn't! We are moving along with school doing a combination of 1st and 2nd grade although it has been sporadic and slow moving but we just finished going through the entire Hooked on Phonics program. He finished the last chapter book of the program this afternoon and declared "I never want to read another chapter book!" I thought it was kind of amusing because just a couple of says ago he was reading a chapter book in his own! So far he is loving Story of the World history and of course math! We are also listening to some of the Maestro Classics and he seems to be enjoying them which is nice since I really like them! He just finished going through all the lower case cursive letters and is ready to start connecting them to make words. After he does this for a while we will move on to capital letters. He is such a perfectionist that he gets frustrated if his letter doesn't look just like the book's letter so I have to work on making sure he isn't constantly erasing!

I want to leave you with a thought that christieo mentioned in a post yesterday that really hit home with me. She was talking about how there is nothing wrong with being average. It is actually AWESOME! It made me really think because lately I haven't felt all that special but after reading her post I started feeling like I was really pretty special. I am doing something that many people find unfeasible....I am preparing to walk 20 miles for 3 days in a row all in an effort to bring breast cancer to an end! That is just something this "average" mom is doing this fall but in reality it is AWESOME!

You are awesome too!