Checking in

I accidentally deleted my post from my forum goofing around but knew I moved it here so it's all good. I'm loving my uke having so much fun! The rest of my life is crazy. My family has been driving me crazy. I've been having some major problems in my life and everyone has advice to give me. Today my sister was joining in on the pick on Kristi wagon and we got into a fight. My life is so full of stress it is hard to keep on track. Once the holiday is over I'm going to refocus on ME!

Post From Today's Forum

I just had such a great night! I didn't get to bring my healthy food but I did get rid of an unhealthy gift given to me, peppermint bark, yummy. I did enjoy some of course, but there was a pound of it! The whole pound was 2240 calories worth of sugar! Luckily we were meeting to jam on some ukuleles and our hands are too busy to eat with, lol. This group of people are so much fun, it was such a great experience. This was hard for me to do and I even thought about turning around and going home a few times on the way there. I don't know these people and I'm going to have to play and sing with them? Nerve racking for me, I've always had stage fright. Once I was there it was great they made me feel very welcome. Lots of positive energy!! They totally pumped me up, I'm going to start playing with them every month. Going out of my comfort zone has made me feel like an improved person, like I've grown, awwww. Seriously I can't believe I was playing for people I don't even know. Most of my friends don't even know that I'm playing. Now I'm so excited and feel so good again. I guess my point is it's the uncomfortable things in life that are so rewarding once they are done. I wanted to start this up again because winter was getting me in such a funk as well as other life events. It might have just given me the boost I needed. :)

Things Are Paying Off

It takes a long time for me to notice change in myself but I'm seeing it now. I feel strong and like I'm not going to stop until I'm in the best shape of my life. The other day someone asked me if I was taking anything, like diet pills, I took it as a compliment. Adding more whole foods to my diet has helped. I think I'm going to save my bread and pasta for cheat meals. I'm going to make it through the holidays while losing weight!

My Life Has Changed Forever

To My Clean Eating Team-

This is it I'm going to do this full force. My teammates are so awesome and I love having this group to support me on the way. I've been out of shape for a long time. Going back and forth from healthy to unhealthy, exercise and no exercise. Around 7 years ago I found something I loved Karate, I lost around 20lbs and felt great. Life got crazy and my classes were moved far away, unfortunatly I stoped. Then I crept back up and down on the scale over and over. Now I back, in full force I found something else I'm in love with...running. I started in April and I keep getting stronger and faster! It's so great to have something that all I need is myself and my shoes. Because of running I have been focused on getting in better shape with the new modavation of getting lighter, stronger and faster. I'm not stopping until I reach my goal of 130, 30 more pounds.

This time exercise has been easy for me. When I haven't been injured I work out 4-5 times a week. Using a combination of run/walking 3.5 miles 3 times a week, strength training 3-4 times a week, and 45 minute cardio intervals 3-4 times a week. I set calorie burn goals every week on my heart rate monitor watch, right now I'm going for 6000 calories a week. This does mean double cardio on some days. Once the new year comes I'm going to slow things down a bit, a goal of 3000 calories or so . I've been working a long time and don't want my body to adapt to working that hard all the time. I guess we will se when I get there. :)

My diet is improving as well. I still watch my calories and measure food I prepare. Now I'm trying to clean up more, eating less bread, and pasta, eating more fruit and veggies. I eat a ton of lean protein that has never been an issue. ;) If I do eat breads and pasta I make sure it's whole grain. No WHITE grains!

Weekly Update

Things have been slow at work so I've had a lot of extra time to workout. I'm going to start posting totals when I can.

Here are this weeks totals

time: 8 hours, 9 minutes
calories burned: 7080
pounds lost: 1

Past weeks-
9/27
time: 7 hours, 15 minutes
calories burned: 5038
pounds lost: 1.5

9/20
time: 4 hours, 32 minutes
calories burned: 3516

Time to get back to it...AGAIN

So I've been slacking which is what I tend to go back and forth to. Over last weekend I ran my first race, a 5k. It went well, I finished. Now that I did that I want to keep going and get stronger and faster. To do that I need to train regularly and star eating a lot better. Training hasn't been to bad I've been running 2-3 times a week, but haven't been strength training at all. Back to the gym! I ran this morning but not as much as I should have, only a mile and a half. At least I did something, I guess. I'm going to work up to running 5 miles a run, but my first goal is to run the whole 3 miles first. Maybe strength training will help me more than I think, too.
My other big focus needs to be food. I like crap food, it sucks. I am logging my food intake and watching amounts of macro nutrients I'm eating. I try to eat 50% carbs, 30% protein, and 20% fat and stay around 1600 calories a day, but may add or decrease. I always feel better when I do this so why is it so hard to follow?

I'm Signed Up

Yesterday I joined the local gym. It is very basic no classes or anything. I just need more equipment and that is what I get at the gym. I went yesterday and today (after my morning run) I do both strength and cardio when I go. The most important is my strength training, so days I don't have time I'll just do that.

I've been doing well with eating too, so far. The last month (or so) I've been putting all my food into the computer and watching how many (and of what) calories I eat. Since reading BFFM I am never hungry and almost can't finish my food sometimes. Today is a high calorie day where I eat maintenance amount of calories I shoot for 2000 but eat more like 1900. This is new for me and is very hard to wrap my head around, but I'll give it a try, It makes sense. By eating a maintenance day every fourth day it keeps your body guessing and your metabolism up.

Joining a Gym

I don't know if I should join a gym or not. I think I would really like to, because I don't have a ton of equipment. I have my treadmill and my bowflex as well as free weights, but I can't get a full workout with this stuff very easy. I also would like to mix up my cardio running is great but I want to do something everyday and I don't want to over do running and hurt myself. I think I will take a look at Cardinal fitness because it's cheep and there is one here and by work.

This past weekend I didn't do any exercise. Today I ran and tomorrow I strength train. So I'll have more on that when I do something. :)

Getting it All Together

My running took over my general health/workout blog so I'm starting a new one. I've been exercising for about 7 or 8 weeks now and things are going pretty well. I have lost about 15 lbs and have gone down 2 sizes! So this is the place I can put all my info on exercise and food or whatever.

Running has been a great thing for me I have kept a blog just on running http://workitout-kf.blogspot.com/. I plan on running my first race this September. I want to take it slow so I don't get injured, so I should be good to run a 5k in a decent time by then.

I've also been strength training but very inconsistently. Now that I'm trying to get it all organized, I'm more accountable for all exercise. My new plan is to do strength training 3 days a week and running four days. Each having there own days, alternating strength, run, strength, run..... I think these changes will make it easier to fit exercise into my mornings.

My food intake has also been a focus of mine for a few weeks. I log all my food I eat for the day onto a program I have called "Weight by Date Pro." There I can track and plan meals as well as exercise and daily activity. Then it calculates your calorie deficit so you know if you are eating the correct amount of food in the right portions. I love having tools!