Milestones

This evening has turned out pretty well for me, I hit one million steps tonight.

I'm very proud and making goals for next year. I'll tell you about them on the second!

Until next week, keep working toward your goals!

The Best Laid Plans...

Music Man and I had planned to go to the gym this morning. Then we didn't go to bed until 1 am. I'm not naming names of who kept us up so late, but two of the three people at my end of the house kept the one who showered at 10:45 up until 1 am. And she is pretty certain it would have been later if she hadn't stepped in and started doing things so she could go to bed already.

We need to start going though because of Music Man's diabetes. Which isn't as much of an issue if he's working out or able to take his medication. However, the state of California, decided they couldn't prove he was a a US citizen so, they changed his medical insurance to emergency only. Which given his numbers earlier this week, it kind of has been now that I think about it.

Fortunately, we've been conserving his pills and he only takes them when his numbers get exceptionally high. Which one day was over 300, that seemed a good time to take one.

The other thing we can do to help lower his glucose is for him to drink a glass of wine. That also works on occasion.

The gym seemed to be the best option for him though. Hopefully tonight we get to bed early enough that we can get up and head that way.

Getting Better

When I was a kid I loved the movie Sgt. Peppers Lonely Hearts Club Band. Specifically the song about "It's getting better all the time".

That said, I actually feel much better than I did a few weeks ago. Or I did until we slept with the window open last night. Not sure if we're going to do that again tonight.

On another note, I'm down 2.2 pounds since I last weighed in, so that was good. I haven't been walking much though so it's cause of being sick and not eating.

I need to update my step count but it's going to be low, that much I know. I haven't been walking as much since I did get sick.

Here's hoping the holidays don't do too much damage to your healthy lifestyle!

Have a great week!

Illness

I've been sick. What started as a cold, became an upper respiratory infection, centered in my sinuses. It was pleasant. I've been coughing. I've been sneezing. I've been exhausted. I'm finally starting to feel better. Or at least human.

That said, I haven't been walking as much as I need to, though my year total is still over 900,000 steps. I'm pretty sure I'm going to hit one million steps and I'm excited about it.

Since my last doctor's appointment in September I've lost 14 pounds. Not a ton but a start. Not sure how it will work now that I'm starting to get better, but hopefully I'll be able to keep it up.

Well, here's to feeling better and hopefully being able to exercise!

Have a great week!

Progress

Some days it's easy to feel like I'm getting no where on my weight loss journey.

1.) My weight was up a bit from a couple of weeks ago today.

2.) I haven't been eating as healthy as I should.

3.) I haven't been drinking enough water.

4.) I haven't been meeting my step goal.

Then tonight I was attempting to update my sidebar and I realized something amazing, I was able to see how much I've been walking. I've tracking my daily step count all year. Some days it's better than other days but in January I didn't even walk 40,000 steps. In September I managed to walk 110,811 steps. And I was feeling like I hadn't done that well in September. Nothing like a little calendar to make you feel better about yourself! And wow in August I nearly hit 118,000!

So what if my weight is up a couple of pounds! I know I need to be better about food and drinking enough water, but apparently, even when I'm not meeting my step goal, I am still moving more now than I was at the beginning of the year, and that is the best feeling in the world to me!

Oh Yeah, I Have a Weight Loss Blog

So, I haven't forgotten about this blog. I've just been unbelievably distracted.

That said, my weight is up, but so is my step count. Aren't hormones are wonderful thing?

I'll update my sidebar later this week, I'm about ready for bed but I really wanted to cross everything off my task list for the day. :)

Okay, have a great week!

Shoulder Injuries and Down 4.6 Pounds

So I haven't been back to the gym since I had to use the treadmill and that guy mentioned he'd noticed us working so hard. I have been walking though. In fact, I have the sunburn to prove it. :)

I guess my mom was right and I do need sunblock at 1 in the afternoon.

Music Man and I went to have the blood work done that our doctor ordered. It's part of our initial health screening for our insurance but oh man do I hate having my blood drawn. I know, most people do, but I sat at a Naval Air Station for 45 minutes one day while the phlebotomist trying to draw my blood. It was not a fun day. I haven't been crazy about it since. Urine sample? No problem. Blood? Let me cut my own arm off and give it to you that way.

At least it's done. For now. I'm sure there'll be something that requires another draw before long.

I weighed in this morning, I am down 4.6 pounds. Yay me!

I have got to find some healthy dinner ideas. I do miss the recipes from Weight Watchers meetings.

I've looked on their site, which I'm sad to say is seriously not helpful. I guess I'll go back to ysing their cookbooks and magazines.

Okay, off to get something accomplished before anymore of the day is gone!

Have a great week!

The Gym

I've been to the gym 3 times in the past week. So I was a lot surprised this morning when my scale said I'd gained six pounds. Not sure what is going on there. I'll have to keep track of my food this week and see if I can figure out what happened.

Oh and I hurt my left shoulder. I wasn't able to any strength training yesterday so I used the treadmill and plan to do so again today. Ouch. Not sure what I did there either.

Something interesting did happen at the gym yesterday though.

I was on the treadmill and this guy walked by the front and over to the side. I took out my ear bud and he said something along the lines of, I just wanted to say, I've seen you guys in here a couple of times and I'm proud of you guys for coming and working so hard. You guys are doing great. If you guys have questions or need a workout partner, let me know. Then he shook my hand. He did the same thing to Music Man.

When we left, I talked to Music Man about it. I'd never had anyone do that but apparently it happens in gyms. If you start going regularly and working hard, the regulars notice and frequently comment on it.

It made me think of this sign in our gym:

It reads: Keep Grinding someone you don't even know is rooting for you while someone you know isn't.

It was a great feeling and made me feel inspired to keep going even when I didn't want to.

Off to the gym with me! Have a great week!

Did Not Want to Get Out of Bed

Once in a while, I fight restless legs syndrome. It's actually really painful. What happens is my legs feel like they have to move. There is no other option. If I don't move them the urge continues until they move really without my doing anything. It's not fun.

That's what happened last night. My legs were horribly restless. It was nearly 3 in the morning before they settled down enough I could get some sleep. Which really sucked cause when the alarm went off at 7 I could barely move.

I got up to use the restroom just before 8 and realized the time. When I came back to bed, Music Man asked me if was ready to get up and go to the gym. I said something along the lines of, "Sure". I think I was still asleep.

I drug my sleepy butt up, went to the gym, went to the grocery store and was still back home in time for Miss Goofy to go to work at 10:30.

That said, I need a nap.

I did finish putting together my fitness journal but it's hot so I have the house closed up, the lights off, which means it's dark in my bedroom and I can't take pictures right now. You might be asking why I don't turn on the light and take the pictures. To those who ask, I say, "Cause it's hot!" Then I probably call you something naughty and go back to pretending it's not nearly 80 in my bedroom.

So, that's why I'm cranky today, just in case you're wondering.

Go for a walk, but wait till it's not 100.

Hormones

I had planned to show my fitness journal this week. Then I remembered I don't have it in a binder yet. So I'm working on stuff without one for now. As soon as I get a binder I'll take pictures and post them.

In the meantime, my hormones have me bloated and I've gained back another pound. Sort of annoying but also something I can work on.

I've changed my step goal a little too. My Fitbit has a feature where it will remind you to walk for 250 steps. So I have mine set to nag me from ten in the morning until four in the afternoon. Oh and I have an alarm set for every hour in there so I check my step count, make a note of it, then I do 500 steps. I was able to meet the challenge for today. We'll see how it goes for the rest of the week.

I have a doctor's appointment on Thursday for my yearly physical. We'll see how that goes. I'm gonna guess they say I need to lose weight.

Have a great week! Go take a walk, the weather is gorgeous.

Itchy Fever

I have had sensitive skin my entire life. I have known I have sensitive skin my entire life. I have fought sensitive skin my entire life. (I swear I have a point.) My mother used to buy baby laundry detergent for me. That's how bad it was.

I finally found a detergent (that's wasn't designed for infants) that doesn't bother my skin. I've used it fairly religiously most of my adult life. It's the only one that doesn't irritate my skin and make me break out in a rash.

When I was in Oklahoma, I could use another brand but I had to be careful. The water there was different. It's something about the water and the soap that gets to me.

Recently, I was shopping at my local discount mart and they didn't have the laundry detergent I normally buy. I was very low on detergent and really needed to get some.  So, the brand I buy but with an additional ingredient was available. I thought to myself, "It's been years. I'm sure it will be fine. You need detergent, this is the same brand. Just get it."

I should have ignored that voice and bought it somewhere else. Or gone back on another day.

It started off simply enough. I felt a little itchy. I live in a very dry climate so that's not unusual. I really need to drink more water and figured it was just dry skin. After a couple of days, I started seeing a rash. Just on my arms at first. Then my legs, my chest, a little on my stomach. Oh and my back. It's been awful.

I realized what had happened and quit using that soap. I've switched back to my regular one. I'm still a little itchy at times though, cause the thing is, once I've broken out, it takes a while to get it out of my system. So here's hoping drinking a ton of water helps cause sweating from a workout, makes the itch neigh on unbearable. Even after I shower.

All of that to say, I gained another .8 of a pound and I haven't been walking or wearing my Fitbit, cause it sits right on a particularly itchy spot and irritates it even more.

So, I'm updating my step count, but it's not going to be very high and that's the reason why. I'm hoping this week to be able to walk more. We'll see.

Have a great week and drink plenty of water!

Well, This Week Sucked

Not only did I gain an eighth of a pound, I had a low step count for the past week. Which really sucked cause it was beyond my control.

Last Tuesday I took as my rest day so I only got 2736 steps. Then Thursday I was out of town for Music Man's doctor's appointment and got only 2073 steps. Okay, no problem I knew I could come back strong. Friday I had a great day with 4959 steps only to wake up on Saturday morning unable to put weight on my left heel. So I took it really easy on Saturday. Sunday it was still tender but not like it had been so I felt like I could do more.

Oh and yesterday morning, I woke up to find the bargain laundry soap I bought makes me break out. So, I'm itchy today and really just want it to stop, which means I'm not getting 4500 steps today mainly cause I don't want to get sweaty. It makes the itching worse.

I also need to be drinking way more water. That would actually probably help with the itching.

Okay, I'm off to drink some water and put on more Benadryl cream and hope the itching stops soon.

Have a great week!

Upping My Step Count

I'm upping my step count to 4500 steps a day today. That's going to hurt, just FYI. I'm pretty confident it's going to hurt cause it already does.

I did lose 2 pounds this week though so I'm pretty happy about that.

This is a terrible picture of my new Fitbit Alta. I love it. It shows me the time, my step count, active minutes, distance walked, calories burned, the battery level, and what time I have my alarm set for. I love the alarm. It doesn't make noise it vibrates. That is a nice feature if your husband wants to get up at 5 and you think he's insane and plan to sleep till noon. Or vice versa.  You know, whatever works.

I had been using a Fitbit One. I loved my One. It was awesome. I had noticed though that I would be way more tired than my step count would indicate. After actually counting steps and comparing my count with my One, I had no option but to conclude it wasn't accurate anymore.

Which is kind of funny cause it was consistently 25% off. Which I guess is sort of accurate but I didn't want to add 25% to my total everyday. So, we got a new tracker for me. It seems to be much more accurate.

Music Man watched me walk from our SUV to the house today and noticed my body is moving differently. He said my butt is getting more toned, which made my giggle cause it means I am quite literally walking my ass off, as well as my posture is improving. That's partly all the walking but also me being very conscious of my posture the last few weeks. Kind of nice to have it noticed.

Speaking of Music Man, he rubbed my hamstrings and calves for a bit this afternoon. Heaven! Oh it felt so wonderful. After it quite hurting, that is.

My legs get exceptionally tight and just touching them can be quite painful. They've been like that since I was about 8 years old and I was roller skating for hours a day. Having him massage those tight muscles hurt so bad at first. Then it felt so good. I actually cried while he was doing it. Not from the pain but a deeper emotional release. So glad he did it. I can feel them tightening up again and know I'm going to have to ask him to do it again this evening.

A friend of mine, okay technically she was my sister's best friend in junior high and into high school, I'm going to call her The Sweetheart, cause she's such a sweetie, did a 5K run over the weekend. It was a black-light run, so it took place at night. They have different zones and they douse you in black-light powder, then they have black-lights all over the place. The whole thing is for charity and it looks like so much fun.

She mentioned another one was coming up in August. I asked her to send me information on it and she did first thing the next morning. So now I have a goal. I'm going to do this 5K in August. I'm hoping to get some friends and family to do it with me, I'll do it alone if I have to. I've never done anything like this before but I know I can do this. And I am looking forward to it.

Okay, here is this week's inspiration:

It reads: SORE. THE MOST SATISFYING PAIN.

My feet really hurt today so I'm using this to keep me going and to meet my step goal for the day.

Oh and this week's inspiration is not from the wall at my gym but from Pinterest. There are a lot of inspirational quotes on there. I've saved a bunch of them but thought this one was most appropriate for me today.

Have a great week and go do something!

Changing Things Up

I've changed my update day for this blog to Mondays. The reason is both simple and convoluted. I change my step count goal for the week on Mondays. I change it on Mondays cause that's the first day in my weekly planner. Since I change my step count on Mondays, I thought it would be easier to have my weekly weigh-in on the same day. So I changed my weigh in day.

Then I remembered I update my blog on Fridays. Rather than go through the hassle of trying to remember to change my step count on Fridays and do a weigh in, I decided it was easier to change the day I update my blog.

We'll see how that works.

Inspiration for this week:

It reads: Turn a setback into a comeback.

Go for a walk!

Where Do I Begin?

Part of this week I've been super active, part of it I've been super lazy.

Today Music Man had an MRI for his knee. That was a fun trip.

I managed to lose 2.5 lbs since my last weigh in, so that made me happy.

That said, so far this year I have walked over 300,000 steps. I'm sure a lot of people have walked way more steps than that.  But for me, that's huge. I'm quite proud of myself.

So I have been upping my step count on Mondays, cause that's when my planner starts a new week. I'm thinking maybe I should go back to upping it on Fridays cause that's my weigh-in day.

I know I had something to write about but for the life of me I can't remember.

Oh, don't put your Fitbit on a fan. Trust me, you'll get a crazy high step count and have a really difficult time fixing it. And you'll feel completely inadequate.

Inspiration for the week:

It reads: Complaining won't burn calories.

Go for a walk, enjoy the feel of your muscles working.

Out of Town

Music Man took me out of town for my birthday. We had a lovely time, even went and played mini golf on my birthday.

We also drove around a lot. Looked around the Ventura area, and found some really cool stuff.

We stayed in Camarillo which was really nice. It's slightly further inland than Ventura, though still near the beach and we had overcast conditions all three days we were there. It was heavenly to me.

I've been working to meet my step count everyday this week, only missing on Monday.

I decided that I had been trying to increase my count too quickly so this week I've set my goal as 3500 steps a day.

Monday I only had 2286 but I was busy studying for my test most of the day, so I think I did good on that one even though I missed my goal.

This week's inspiration:

It reads: The most critical decision is made when you feel like giving up.

I'm not giving up.

I Hurt My Toes

Oww! My poor little toes got horrible blisters the first day I wore my new shoes. So my step count has suffered.

I've also come to the conclusion, after having several people nag me about it. that my goals were a bit too lofty. So, I'm modifying my goals.

I'm going to try and get 3500 steps a day for next week. The following week, I'll up it to 4000. Building slowly will hopefully help me reach my goals but also keep me from injuring myself like I have a tendency to do.

On the plus side, Miss Goofy has been inspired and gone to the gym 3 of the last 4 nights this week. Go Miss Goofy!

Music Man keeps kicking my ass on step count even with a bad knee. I think I'll hide his Fitbit watch.

I did manage to lose 1.2 pounds since I last weighed in. Which is awesome, but I forgot to weigh in this morning, so I'll have to fix that another day.

I'll update my step count chart and then start it again in May.

Have a great week and here's your inspiration for the week:

It reads: Sore? Tired? Out of breath? Sweaty? Good...It's Working. I love that.

Step Count

For most of the past week, I've met my step count. The 12th I just hurt too bad to make my count.

I weighed in this morning, I'd lost .7 pounds. Not a great number but it's going the right direction so I won't complain.

This week, I'll be upping my step count to 7000 steps by the 21st.

This week's inspiration:

It reads: When you feel like quitting: think about why you started.

I'm using this as my background on my desktop. So far, it's kept me moving this week. We'll see how I feel about it at 7000 steps.

Have a great week!

I Went to the Gym!

Two nights ago Music Man and I agreed we needed to try to get to the gym yesterday. I really didn't want to go when the alarm went off at 7. I got up, used the restroom, and came back to the bedroom. Looking at the clock, it seemed so early. Surely I could go back to bed for a little bit and go to the gym later in the day. When I realized that's my usual self-talk and that I don't go to the gym when I do that, I did the adult thing. I decided to let Music Man make the decision.

Way to pass the buck, huh?

So I got back in bed, snuggled up, and asked if he wanted to go to the gym this morning. I know it surprised him when I asked.  I told myself I had two reasons for asking. 1) I didn't know how bad his knee was hurting, and 2) we've both had a cold and if he wasn't feeling up to it, I wasn't going by myself.

He opened his eyes in surprise and asked, "You wanna go to the gym?" Not really by this point, but yeah, I did. So we got up. He used the restroom, we changed the sheets on our bed, grabbed a banana each, and headed out. 

He wanted me to try the elliptical. I have short legs, short arms, and a short stride. I do not like the elliptical. So I went to the treadmill instead. I did 5.8 laps, which is very close to a mile and a half. 1.45 miles to be exact. I also got through my entire workout playlist. That felt good. My playlist is only 43 minutes, so I'm going to need to add to it, but I got through it. 

And we didn't stop for Jack-in-the-Box or McDonald's on the way home. So, double good for us. 

I did pull something in my heel, so we'll see how I do tomorrow, but man have I accomplished stuff today. And I feel like I can keeping doing it.

Anyway, here is a picture of the treadmill when I finished: 

I know it says I only did 39 minutes 30 seconds, but I also was on the elliptical for a couple of minutes and I walked around before getting on the treadmill. 

Oh, and today's motivation from the gym wall:

It reads:

First they'll ask you why you're doing it. Later, they'll ask you how you did it. 

I changed the text color to red instead of the orange in the picture and I added the bold to make the emphasis show up a bit more.

And finally, on the sidebar, I've got a daily step count for the month of April. (Please note I had a nasty cold for the first few days of the month.) I'll be updating that probably on update date. I'm going to keep track of my weekly step counts, my monthly step counts, and yearly step counts. Should make for a fun year.

Now, go do something! 

EDIT: I changed the text color from red to orange cause the red didn't look right when I posted this and I'm too lazy to go back in and change the part of the post about it.