Blessed Art

I'm getting into craftwork again! I'd forgotten how much I enjoy it and how therapeutic it can be! ;) This is a gift I made for my bff's birthday, whichbis today. I got the inspiration for it on the way home from church this morning (what? You think I procrastinate!?!?!) and this verse is super special for us because my sweet BFF is pregnant with her first child! Hope you like it! I know she did! I had to "bling" it up a little bit cause she loves her some bling! ;)

It's kinda hard to tell in this pic, but the plaque is not black-- the color is actually "oiled bronze" which goes so well with the burnt paper the verse is printed on. I also used Mod Podge, hot glue, jute twine, sandpaper to distress the wood after painting, a clear acrylic sealer spray and of course a bling-y pearl, lace, and feather rose. :)

NSV's...my own list

So, here's a list of things I'm thankful for  - things that I owe purely to my newfound commitment to fitness!

• went down a pants size
• lost 25+ lbs
• playing with my son is a lot more fun for both of us!
• when I started out a few weeks ago it took more than twenty minutes for me to walk ONE mile.  Now I'm at just under 17 minutes for walking one mile.
• I'm running at an avg speed of 4.5 on the treadmill
• people are noticing that I'm losing weight
• clothes fit much better (didn't realize how freaking tight they were till they started fitting RIGHT!)
• I actually feel worse when I DON'T exercise

And, things I need to work on:

• staying committed to healthy eating ALL day
• exercising in the morning vs. evening - it helps me drink much more water throughout the day!
• my posture (see previous post)
• walking more at work instead of being so chained to my desk ---makes me wish I could afford one of these:

A LifeSpan treadmill desk.  I want one!  But seriously, why did they have to put an old guy on there?  Don't they know that hot, fit working moms want them too?? ;-)

So that's it for the Saturday list.  Now on to my favorite grocery store for healthy food choices for the rest of the week!!

PS - we are working on something REALLY big that's got my creative juices flowing!!  So be ready for an AWESOME DIY/shabby chic kinda post coming up soon!!

Modified Couch-to-5K (& one more treat!)

This week has been a CRAZY week!  Started the week with Mother's Day, which was emotional in all sorts of ways for me, I wound up getting sick Monday, and the rest of the week I've pretty much been catching up.  My exercise program has begun to fit into a nice routine, and the couple of days I missed the exercise, I REALLY missed it! ;-)

I've been walking on the treadmill since I saw my doctor last Friday.  He believes that my headaches after exercising are caused by some muscular issues - mainly poor posture, but also enlarged trapezoid muscles in my shoulders.  The poor posture is mostly my fault, but if you've seen my maternal grandmother's family, it may very well be a bit genetic too.  So I've been VERY careful to keep better posture this week (including my neck) and it's seemed to help.

The enlarged trapezoid muscles are due mainly to my size - hopefully as I watch my posture and become more fit that will be corrected. ;-)

The trapezoid muscles can be enlarged in obese men & women, resulting in muscle strain during seemingly "normal" activities.

Given my history of having headaches after exercising, I decided that I would just walk on the treadmill for a while instead of doing the more intense boot-camp type workouts.  So, Saturday night, I got on my -determined to just keep moving - after all some movement is better than none, right?

Well it is INCREDIBLY boring to be working out for a stinkin' hour doing nothing but walking!!  So, I decided in the midst of my walk that I'd still do my couch-to-5K program --- I would just modify it!  So here's my Couch-to-5K modified program:

Week One: 3 miles (or one hour), running as fast as possible while retaining good form for 1:00 every 15minutes.
Week Two: run every 10 minutes for 1minute
Week three: run every 10 minutes for 1m30s
Week four: run every 10 minutes for 2 minutes.

I'm not sure how I will do on this "program".  My main concern is that I maintain good form while running so that I don't wind up hurting myself.  I will push myself to do more, but I will not push myself to the point of injury!

So, It's after midnight! I will update some non-scale victories in the next day or two...stay tuned!!

BTW - here is my boy and his very first science fair project!!

Bugg and Body update :-)

So I went to the doctor Friday for the first time since I had my meltdown at the end of February and started on this new journey of fitness, and found out that since February 22, I have lost exactly 25 lbs and my BMI has dropped by 5 points! :-)  I think it could have been more, but the last few weeks I've not been as active as I'd have like (due to migraines and travel), but i will take 25 lbs anytime!

My bodybugg usage has gotten better.  Basically, I just had to accept that there were certain things that I'd have to do to make sure my bodybugg and iPhone were useful - namely, reconnecting anytime I wanted an accurate read-out.  I suppose this is to be expected for most techies out there, but this instant-gratification girl had to learn that the hard way.

I absolutely LOVE that I have a pretty accurate of my calorie burn.  For example, yesterday, after walking/running 3 miles on the treadmill, I burned nearly 500 calories MORE than my goal AND walked over 1,000 steps over my step goal, too!  Love that part.  Here's a screen pic of my bodybugg dashboard for iPhone:

I'm still using sparkpeople.com to track my food/calorie intake, though.  Mainly because Bodybugg's food tracker leaves quite a bit to be desired.  So on bodybuggs' dashboard, I should be able to see my calorie deficit (my calorie burn minus my calorie intake - you always want a deficit to loose weight), but I don't because I use sparkpeople.com to track my food.  Then I just try to make sure my calorie burn is MORE than my calorie intake by just checking between to the two apps.  Who knows, maybe they'll improve the app for food tracking, but for right now it kinda sucks. :-/

In other news - Happy Mother's Day!!  Hope all the mothers/grandmothers/godmothers out there have a beautiful day!

Here's a little bit of inspiration for you before I sign out:

Buggin'......

Sooooo.....guess who just got a new bodybuggsp?  Me, me, me!!  Today's the first day I wore my new bodybugg (the sp is attached to the name because it supposedly links to your smartphone, but I have to say, I am NOT impressed with the linking...more about that in a bit). 

Once I got the bodybugg armband adjusted right so it didn't hurt my arm or cut off circulation, it was acutally so comfortable that I forgot it was there!  Now, today I did NOT do any additional exercise (except walk to work, but I've been doing that for a while) because I thought it would be cool to see how many calories I burn just being me.  Unfortunately just being me today consisted of being chained to my desk working on resident correspondence and such, so I've been thinking all day that my calorie burn is going to be depressingly low.

Well, not so!! :-)  I burned over 2500 calories today just being me.  I can't wait till next week when I start my new (again) exercise schedule and really watch those calories climb up!! 

So, for my review of the bodybuggsp:

While I'm happy with the way it works when you upload the info via USB at your computer, the main reason I wanted the bodybuggsp was because you can link/sync it to your iphone, iPod or droid and get pretty much real-time calorie burn info.  Not so.  It worked for all of 13 minutes synced with my iPhone.  Then, I'd try to link the bluetooth with my iPhone, sync with the bodybugg program and it would go off. 

I'm hoping beyond hope that now that I've done the initial upload via USB that somehow, magically, the uploads via bluetooth to my iPhone will now work.  I have a feeling from all the negative app reviews though, that it won't be doing that.

I'll let you all know how it's doing within the next week.

Now, for some kind of good news....I don't know exactly how much weight I've lost, but it's somewhere around the 20-25 lb mark.  I've gone down a pants size!!

Hope y'all have a GREAT weekend!!

Common - it's a good thing. ;-)

I ran across something just now that I thought might help a lot of people (like me) going through weight loss struggles.  I've posted songs from Mandisa before here on my li'l blog, so hopefully you guys are a *little* familiar with her. ;-) 

For those who aren't - Mandisa auditioned years ago on American Idol and wowed the judges at her audition with her vocals.  Problem was, after she got her "golden ticket", Simon (you know, dear old Simon) said some pretty hurtful things about her size.  She didn't even know he'd said them until AFTER her AI journey was nearly over and she was watching episodes with her family! 

Anyway, she turned that hurt into inspiration, so to speak, and today, she just posted some awesome news on her official FB page: http://www.facebook.com/#!/mandisaofficial

I share with you guys things that help me see that I'm not alone.  And Mandisa's journey has soooo inspired me!  It's because of her that I've stumbled across some major tools for my wieght loss journey: Lisa TerKeurst's Made to Crave, and Beth Moore's Praying God's Word. 

There is a verse that I found through the Mandisa/Lisa/Beth's guidance, that really hit home:

NO temptaion has taken you except what is common to man.  God is faithful, who will not allow you to be tempted above what you are able, but will with the temptation also make the way of excape, that you may be able to endure it.  I Cor 10:13

Check out that first line: "No temptation has taken you, except what is common to man."  The worst lie the enemy could ever feed us (and sadly, the most effective) is that we are alone in what we're going through.  Can I just tell you, that YOU ARE NOT ALONE?  The creator of the universe - who cares so much about each of us individually that he individually numbered each individual hair on our head - promised YOU that what you're going through someone else is going through.  That temptation you're facing - someone else is facing.  That battle you're fighting -  someone else is fighting.  YOU ARE NOT ALONE. 

We may never meet each other on this side of Heaven, but we can rest assured that we have a fellowship of believers who are right there with us - walking the same path we're walking - united in our goal.

God bless you on your journey - whatever that journey may be.  Here's a last little bit of inspiration for the journey ahead:

Moving Day!

It has been so crazy lately!!  My Dad wound up having a heart attack a couple weeks ago - in the recovery room after a heart cath - so I was with him for about 4 days in the hospital.  Since then, work has been crazy, church life busy, and this weekend, it looks like my dear, sweet husband and I get to move an entire house almost by ourselves!  We are moving from the house we've lived in for 4 years to an apartment closer to the church, and 5 of the helpers we had lined up wound up having other plans, so thank God one of the youth staff will be able to help us Saturday with moving some things.  We haven't made a big deal about moving because people talk so much, but I will be REALLY glad when this is over!! 

Somehow, I've managed to pretty much stay on my healthier-lifestyle-diet.  I've had exactly two Mountain Dews since 2/21/12 - one because I was about to fall asleep while driving back to Savannah from Valdosta and the other was flat-out because I was stressed out and caved. 

However, in spite of all that, I've managed to lose a whopping 16 lbs in the first month of my new lifestyle.  Not too shabby!  ;-)  I am very excited about settling into our 'new' place and getting back to a routine that includes exercising and actually cooking instead of grabbing fast food so I don't have to wash more dishes before moving day! 

Hope you all have a great spring!!