Redesign Coming

Ok so I'm pretty sure that I have no readers at the moment but if I do welcome to my humble site. I obvioulsy have fallen off the blogging wagon but I'm going to try and get back on because I need some motivation/something to keep me accountable. I'll let you know what's going on with my life and how the fitness level is doing. Lots has happened in the last 6 months so stayed tuned!

Memorial Day

Happy Memorial Day everyone......Watching "Taking Chance" this movie makes me cry I see everytime it. Keep all the troops in your thoughts!

143

Woo hoo I'm 143. I haven't been here for a long time and it feels really good! I will give a longer updated post tomorrow I'm just too tired. Almost 2 hours in the gym will do that to you.

One Pound Again

Well damn I gained a pound again this week.........That really sucks I'm really not ok with that......So way to end the Spring Shape Up Challenge gaining I think probably 2 pounds from where I started. What the hell is my problem for real? It doesn't make me feel any better considering the bf told me in 3 weeks he's lost 9.5 pounds. Ugh this challenge is not working out for me at all! I have to start working out more and eating less two things I hate.

I did go snowboarding for the first time yesterday though and it was super fun. I'm definitely a fan now. I'm going to be one of those girls that goes all the time and becomes a snow bunny haha. Good thing I have big thighs to control the snowboard because I think I picked it up pretty fast which I was pretty proud of myself.

So on top of gaining weight I found these pictures of Kim Kardashian. Ugh this isn't making my Monday very amazing right now. One day I will look like this though!

Pictures

Here's some pics of random things just for fun.

A night out on the town in Rome!

The Colloseum

St. Peter's Basilica

Vatican Museum

Carnival Party with co-worker

UGH the eternal struggle

Well I think between my post last week and this week I had gained a pound to 145 then lost it again to 144 on Wednesday and now I'm back to 145. I think my body is trying to tell me that it really likes to be at this weight but I really don't like to be here! If I could just get rid of my love handles..... I have decided that when I get back to North Dakota this fall I'm going to run a half-marathon in September. I think that would be a good goal to work towards all summer and stuff. I'm really not seeing so many results right now before I go to Greece but I'm still hopeful that I can kick it in the ass before then. I totally have to beat my boyfriend with our bet. haha Oh and he said he would buy me a new swimming suit woot woot so I need to find one....hmmmm

On a better note it's actually sunny here today and kind of nice weather. That doesn't really happen ever here. Or now that it's sunny it will probably snow tonight that seems to be how it always works here. I like to say that the weather has PMS because it's seriously changes like every 5 hours. It's annoying more than anything and kind of depressing. I'm SO looking forward to summer.

Week 14--145 AGAIN

Well the last week has been good other than the fact that I absolutely know I need to not drink and eat whatever I want and did it anyways. This my friends leads to me gaining a pound since last Wednesday. I'm disappointed because I just haven't been able to get myself on track and I know this is what I say all the time. I have excuses for everything. "Well it's just this one time" or "It's a party so I have to eat and drink something" or "I just feel like partying tonight." All of this is not helping me get to where I want to be in time to go to Greece and I will be so disappointed if I don't lose any weight and am exactly the same.

To make it more inviting to workout me and my boyfriend have a bet to see who can lose the most percentage of body weight by the time our vacation rolls around on April 30. He's already lost like 3 pounds and I gained one so things are not looking so good. If I lose the bet I have to carry the backpack with all the stuff in it during the day for our entire vacation. That would really blow so I'm trying to keep that motivating me. I don't know what I get if I win though. There is a really nice necklace from Tiffany's that I've been eyeing haha. Don't get too excited it's only like $150 which is pretty reasonable for Tiffany's. They are totally worth the money too because they make some high quality stuff.

I got the book "The Eat-Clean Diet Recharged" by Tosca Reno and I'm trying to attempt to start it now. It seems like there is a lot of good info in it and all the people in one of my favorite mags "Oxygen" swear by it so it can't be that bad right? I'll have to see how it goes.

Spring Shape Up Week 5 (I think?)

So instead of rewriting everything here's basically my email that I sent for this week's Spring Shape Up. Also after I worked out I got on the scale and it said I had lost 2 pounds. Woo even though it's only water weight I like that it lies to me for a little bit anyways :)


I've been doing much better this week than the past couple of weeks. I've been trying to push myself a lot more and have actually been accomplishing it for the most part.

My goals from last week were:
Find healthy food that I like (my taste buds don't seem to enjoy any kind of food lately healthy or not)
Lose one pound
Go to the gym 4-5 times
No drinking!

The taste buds seem to be coming back although the food here is just still gross. I'm debating about buying a blender to make smoothies for meals. I think it would be a good change.
I actually did lose one pound so I'm pretty proud of that I have been trying to cut back on my food and eating healthier snacks. I went to the gym 4 times in the past week and one walk for 3 miles outside. I will admit I had two small glasses of wine Thursday and two beers Saturday. Giving up alcohol is hard! I think it's smarter for me to just drink a lot less of it instead of totally banishing it completely. I was trying to drink a soda or water in between them too and it seemed to really help.

Goals for next week:
Go to the gym 3-4 times
Run outside 2-3 times
Change up my workouts a little and create some new routines instead of the same things everytime
Blog more--I've been really bad at it lately
Buy new running shoes

Just as an extra incentive for my vacation to Greece my boyfriend and I are challenging each other to see by the time it comes around to see who can lose the most percentage of body weight (like they do on the Biggest Loser) and then whoever wins will get some kind of prize but we haven't come up with that yet. It's a really good thing for my boyfriend and gives me some motivation because I don't want to lose. I have realized that since I've been trying to be serious about weight loss for the past 3 months I've only lost 5 lbs. That really is disappointing me but I'm trying to get serious about it again and kick it in the butt. I say that a lot in these emails and also to myself but I want it to finally be true. I expect too much too fast and get down when it doesn't happen. I know I can say that I've ever been horribly overweight but I'm just not happy with myself and want to make a change. The only question I have for you is how did you keep yourself motivated when you were losing weight? Even a trip to Greece doesn't seem to be motivating me but perhaps a new swimming suit would................

Week 13

Well ok sorry everyone for completely vanishing from my blog for the last 3 weeks. They been busy and I've been all over the place literally and figuratively. I've gone through have pneumonia to going to Rome all in a span of 2 weeks so I pretty much didn't do much as far as healthy eating or working out. I'm officially back into the swing of things now and I've been trying to push myself even though I really don't feel like doing anything lately. That actually has been pretty much applicable to all areas of my life. I just feel kind of blah. I really have been thinking about it and thinking that my sluggishness and such has been caused probably by a poor diet and lack of exercise so I'm working on it. My vacation is in two months so I need to kick it in the butt now!

Speaking of my boyfriend and I are going to try and have a friendly competition of who can lose the most percentage of body weight by the time we leave for our vacation. Kind of like The Biggest Loser style. Not sure what all the conditions will be but I will definitely let you all know.

I will try and post some pics soon of Rome. The food wasn't very good and the best was super fattening at the Hard Rock Cafe but I was starving!

Oh my weight for today was 144. I think when the scale was saying crazy things like 141 and stuff I think it was just off or I've gained a couple pounds. Not sure but still trying to use the same scale consistently anyways which everyone thinks I'm crazy for but whatever! Also I bought a body fat caliper to measure my body fat percentage. I think it said I was like 26% or something I'm not sure I need to do a better test instead of just messing around with it. It also helped when I was looking at the women's chart and not the men's. Ha oh well anyways until next time........

Week 10

Well holy crap I just realized that I've had this blog for 10 weeks already and that means I should be doing really good at losing weight right? Definitely not. I've been getting very discouraged about the fact that I've at the most lost 5 pounds in over two months. It is not very encouraging but I'm really trying to work on it.

My biggest problem I think is self sabotage. I will workout good for a little while and then totally just stop because I'm tired or lazy. Same thing with my eating. I'll eat good for a little bit and then binge on Taco Bell and pizza (case in point, Sunday). I also suck at having self control when it comes to drinking. I've been really bad about that lately as well. I feel like I'm grasping at straws to try anything to keep my motivated and on the right path but I feel like I'm not really finding it anywhere or in anything. I also need to keep doing things consistently and I think I would be doing so much better than what I have been in the last month or so. It's coming down to crunch time about my vacation so I either need to really focus now or I'll never get to where or what I want to be.

Bored on a Friday night

So I'm sitting here Skyping with the bf all sweaty and smelly from the gym. What an exciting life I lead since it's a Friday night. Go me for going to the gym even though I did not feel like it and not going out and boozing it up. I could really go for some pizza or chips right now though good thing neither of those are in my room haha. This is really just a random post because I felt like it.

One thing that has been bothering me is my lack of motivation lately. How do I keep it up because I feel like nothing I'm doing is really making that big of a difference. It's so depressing. I need to have friends that drag me to the gym like I did tonight. It helped. Thanks Julie!

P.S. I started the Two Hundred Sit Ups and One Hundred Pushups program tonight.......Hopefully I can actually stick with something.

Body Envy

Lauren Conrad looks amazing........maybe I will look like this too......one can only dream. And also no I don't know why she has 24 written on her, I can't remember where I stole this picture from sorry!

Weigh In Wednesday

So I swear unless the scale in the gym changed drastically from Monday night I've lost like 2.5 pounds to be at 141.5 pounds. That's just crazy I mean seriously. Probably all just water weight and I didn't eat very good today so damn.

So my big problem I have decided is consistency. Please anyone let me know how to stay consistent with my workouts I feel like everytime I go to the gym I just do random things and it doesn't add up to anything that creates results. I think a big issue too is that I just need to drastically reduce calories as well. UGH trying to lose weight just really sucks. I know that I'm worth it though. I deserve to look amazing on my vacation and I'm not going to do that by avoiding the gym like I did tonight and eating chocolate instead. Damn it............

I will go tomorrow though. I'm trying to slowly get back into running because I've been out of it for so long. 20 minutes on the treadmill felt like torture on Tuesday though so I think the key is for me to run outside. It keeps it a little more interesting right? Too bad the air is so polluted that it's like smoking a pack a day even though I don't. I will probably leave Kosovo with a black lung but all in the name of running outside right?

I'm seriously considering buying a Bodybugg or something like it because it is so hard for me to judge the amount of calories I'm eating and burning in a day. It would definitely help with weight loss for sure. $150 though.............why can't I just naturally be skinny and in shape. My genetics suck I'll blame it on that and not the beer I drink.

Short term goals for next week for the Spring Shape Up Challenge:
Lose 1 pound
Drink 2 liters of water per day
Continue with my food journaling (this was a random thing I started in the last week and it seems to be helping a lot)
Resist the urge to eat all the chocolate in my room
Do cardio 4-5 times, weight training 2-3
Find something that is going to keep me motivated to lose weight.

Food Journal

I have been journaling all my food intake since Friday. It has been extremely interesting to see what I eat everyday and how much! I know I am a lot more conscious of what I'm eating because I have to write it all down. I was really bad this weekend and didn't want to write it all down but it was like I was playing a mental game with myself. I mean why not write it down? I already know what I ate, it's like if I actually wrote it down it would become real. Very strange.

Tomorrow is Weigh In Wednesday for the Spring Shape Up Challenge. I'm really hoping that I'm down a pound. I guess I'll find out when I drag myself to the gym in the morning to weigh myself.

Week 9

So I have decided that I've given up on my scale that I bought about two months ago because the thing is completely cracked out. It's crazy. I am officially using one at the gym and it is telling me I weigh slightly less than I thought so I am totally ok with that. I weighed in at 144 today. That makes me excited. I have been eating and drinking like a mad woman lately so any kind of loss is ok. So just so we all know, I'm officially using a different scale but it seemed like it was pretty comparable. Of course it would only be me that has scale drama going on every Monday morning.

I went to Skopje, Macedonia again yesterday and I had McDonald's. I just had to because it's delicious and AMERICAN. I miss all the good ol' American foods. That could explain why I'm a chubby girl now working on losing all that good American food. Totally not the point though because I got McDonald's and didn't have to wear my uniform. Life was good.

I must confess on Saturday night I drank entirely too much too much. I'm so proud of myself because I've been keeping a food journal and I wrote down what I remember drinking and it was WAY too much. I've been trying to not fall into the temptation to drink but it is so hard. I've been reading a lot on different blogs about drinking and weight loss and I've gotten some really good ideas. Two ideas I really liked (which maybe seem obvious but not for me) sip your drinks very slowly and the other is order drinks you really don't like very much so you drink it a lot slower and a lot less of it. I will have to try that. If I start drinking beer that's totally the end of it.

Spring Shape Up Challenge

Last week I joined Theodora, from Losing Weight in the City, for her Spring Shape Up Challenge. I've been looking for something to motivate me to keep working out and I really hope that this is something that will keep me going. It's nice because we have short- and long-term goals so it gives you more than one thing to work one.

My short term goals from last week:

• Lose one pound Probably a fail but scale is such a wack job I'm not sure but based on how much I ate........I'm thinking FAIL
• Drink more water I think I actually did pretty good on this one. I'm working on getting used to trying to drink 1.5 L bottles of water versus the 0.5 ones........

My long term goals:

• Lose 8-10 lbs total. I've been trying to focus on losing 1 lb a week but I would be ok with more. However it seems that 1/2 a pound has been more realistic which leads me to my next goal.
• Eat healthier and watch my portion sizes. I've been pretty bad at that lately but Army food is not always the greatest (especially here).
• Workout at least 5 days/week. Just trying to be more consistent.

My goals for week 2:

• Lose one pound
• Do some form of cardio at least 4 times in the next week
• Begin the 200 sit up challenge
• Blog more!

The challenge ends March 21st. Two months to get rid of some of this weight for the last time. I'm so tired of being like this. I think that one of my only hopes may be to stop eating and exercise 24/7. I kid I kid............kinda..........Ha! Actually I just need to give up one of my biggest loves, ALCOHOL. It's a killer so I really have to buckle down til Rome so I can wear some of the pants that are coming to me in the mail!

Week 8

rytOk so this week's post is a little late. I possibly may have gotten down to 144.4 pounds this week or it could be that my scale is crazy and just tells me whatever number I want to see. Seriously I think it could be possessed by the devil because it has drastic changes in the numbers everytime I get on. I try and weigh myself in the exact same spot at the same time and it still doesn't matter. Sometimes in a span of 10 seconds it says I've lost like 8 pounds. Really scale don't give me false hope like that. It's not nice to toy with the emotions of a chubby girl!

Last week, I was suffering and still kind of am now, from a UTI. Wow what a fun experience I can't tell you how much I've enjoyed. Not only that but it kind of threw off my workout routine for like a week. Well that's pretty awesome if I do say so myself because not working out for a week is really going to get me looking good for Greece, much less Rome, that is in the nearer distance (three weeks to be exact). I have been an online shopping fiend and buying clothes in sizes in hopes that I will soon wear. My whole problem with weight loss is I honestly haven't been seeing a difference in anything at all and it's so depressing to me that it makes me want to just continue eating as much pizza as I can possibly stuff in my body instead of eating vegetables and going to the gym. Am I the only one that thinks this? It seems like some people's blogs I look at, they have no issues fighting the temptations of everything around them and then go and run 8 miles. I can't do anything of that EVER. I feel like a chubby girl that's just hopeless at this but I really am trying so hard but nothing helps. I think that part of my problem could be the food I eat but don't really realize that I'm eating. Unless I run 20 miles a day I probably couldn't work off the amount of calories I've eaten in chocolate in the last week. This is a new week though and since the gym will finally be open again tomorrow you can best believe I will try my hardest to get my butt in the gym where it belongs.

Some random pics

I figured I would post some random pics on here because I never do so here you go.

During the DANCON march (25.2km!!) Through the mountains which is way worse than it sounds!

Not the greatest pic of my ever but look mom I'm a girl! Who knew under this beautiful uniform I wear everyday?

Me and the boyfriend :) Aren't we cute?

So this is not a lot of pics but my internet is SO slow it took like five minutes to upload these!

Bad Week

So I'm not really sure why but I've been starving all week long and stuffing my face with pretty much anything within my reach. Currently it's dried banana chips. So good but not the most healthy thing I could eat either. I look at a lot of fitness and health blogs and everyone is always posting pictures of their food. It's always so good and healthy looking. I have issues with that because I live in Kosovo and eat military food everyday. Especially lately it has sucked a lot. There is really not a lot of variety in food. The salad selection is exactly the same everyday and it's nauseating. There is VERY limited healthy food that you can buy in any store. Forget low-fat, low-cal because it just doesn't exist here. You can't even really order food online anywhere normal. I have to resort to having people send me stuff but that's not really cheap or convienent so what is a girl to do? All I really want to do is eat a big Snickers bar right now. Damn my life.

P.S. I quit French class......it wasn't a beginner's class it was like intermediate and it made me feel extremely stupid. I know I'm not but the teacher was not good at all and very difficult to learn from. I hate quitting things because it makes me feel like a failure but hey I am going to be the most in shape female at this base one day. Haha that makes me laugh a little!

Week 7

Ok so edit from last week I think the scale was really saying 145.6 almost all week so that sucks. Today I weighed in at 145.2 so that's almost 1/2 a pound. Which isn't great but isn't a gain so that's good! I had three days last week with 2 workouts in each day so I was pretty proud of myself. I went on the bike for a half hour today because I was short on time. I have to lay off strenuous exercise for the next few days because I have an infection and was told by the doctor to not do too much exercising while on these antibiotics. That's great since I ate like a whole bag of M&M's tonight.......Oh crap

Sundays

I love Sundays because I don't have to work but then that means I pretty much stay in bed all day long. This also creates a lack of motivation for me to do anything other than nothing. So I did not go to the gym I chose to eat two small pizzas instead. I may have also drank a little too much jungle juice at a party last night. I did work out twice yesterday though so I think that counts for something. I have actually worked out three times this week, twice a day and pretty hard too so I don't feel AS bad about it. Tomorrow is another day though. I don't think my P90X routine is liking it as much though. This is already my second day of not doing it but I will just pick up where I left off tomorrow.

Weigh in is tomorrow I hope it says I weigh a pound less tomorrow but I probably won't be that lucky. I'm crossing my fingers!

2x Workouts

So I've started working out twice a day. Obviously this isn't going to happen everyday but I'm hoping that it jump starts my metabolism. I started doing P90X yesterday and I did it today too. I can definitely feel it in all parts of my body but I like when I hurt because it makes me know that I've actually done a hard workout.

In other news I ran again tonight! Pretty much the first time in 2 months and it was awesome. I only ran 1.5 miles but I felt strong and it was very relaxing. My knee didn't give me any problems which I've been really nervous about. I've been having nightmares about the fact that I might still be having problems and not be able to run. I have big dreams of POSSIBLY running a half marathon this fall or next January possibly. It depends on what my military plans have in store for me I think. I'm not going to be pushing myself very hard for a little bit just to be safe. I can tell that my legs seem to be getting stronger probably from how much I've been using them on the bike. Maybe I'll even get some definition on them soon. One can only hope right?

Also I think my weigh in on Monday may have been a little off I think it was closer to 145.6 than 145.0 but hey that's still an entire pound from last week so woo hoo!

New Weigh In

Ok so I haven't re-weighed myself because I frankly haven't had any time. Today has been really long moving lots of furniture in my office and then my coworkers decided to have a little party with wine and champagne. I had one small glass of each so not too bad. Didn't quite make it to the gym because of all this but I'm thinking I will go tomorrow morning then do my weigh in again tomorrow morning and see what it says. Also no I haven't quite started on my inspiration board because of my lack of time lately but I will start it soon I promise! I start French lessons tomorrow night so it probably won't be tomorrow. Hopefully I learn something from these classes but my pronunciation is terrible. I'll let you know all about it.

Week 6

So I weighed in this week at 145? I think??? My scale is crazy and likes to change numbers depending on where it is sitting. I just consistantly weigh myself at the same spot but I wasn't really too sure about the 145 this morning. Will redo later tonight. Stay tuned!

Inspiration Board

So I've been seeing on some different fitness blogs that some of them have made inspiration boards.




Kinda like this one Gina from The Fitnessista made.


I've kind of been thinking about doing something like that to look and and focus on. I think I feel an art project coming on.......

In other notes my working out has been kind of sporatic due to a fantastic cold thing I managed to pick up this week. It's definitely made me drained. I did have a really great workout at the gym on the bike last night though. It always makes me happy when I leave the gym drenched in sweat. Today I took the day off because I worked kinda late then had a girl's night in with a movie and pizza. A vegetable pizza with some cheetos....oops and some vanilla ice cream....double oops. However most of the week I have been pretty good with eating lots of vegetables. I find that I crave vegetables more and more now. Except salads because I can't stand the salad options that we have here. They are so gross! Well here's to a good workout tomorrow.

"How ironic that all that comfort food ended up making me feel uncomfortable."


I think this quote kinda sums up my life.

Week 5

Hello everyone. So this is already 5 weeks of having this blog. I'm surprised I haven't gotten bored of it and completely given up. That's what I usually do, I'm not very good at committing to things, hence the reason weight loss for me sucks. Anyways I'm very happy to say that I lost 0.8 lbs since last week coming to 146.4 lbs. Yes I know it's not an incredibly high number but it's not a gain so that's always a good thing. Slowly but surely I think I will get this weight loss thing down. Don't let anyone fool you, it is a constant struggle and never easy. I just counted off the time until I will be spending my time in Greece and it is 17 weeks until I leave. If I can even lose 1 pound every week that would basically bring me to my goal. I think I am going to keep this in mind mind. 1 pound every week should be doable. It's not like I'm trying to lose half my body weight or anything. Just some.

On a different note, today was day 1 of starting P90X Lean. It's supposed to help you build more lean muscle and not as many heavy, bulky bodybuilding ones. I hope that it jump starts my metobolism because I seem just like I'm forever going to be stuck between 5 pounds up or down of 145. The exercises were hard. The first one was called "Core Synergystics." I didn't really feel like I worked my core as much as other things. I find that I have a hard time engaging my abs and core when I'm doing things like that. My shoulders felt like they got more of a workout and my back is kind of sore. Obviously I wasn't doing everything completely correct I guess but what do they expect on your first day. I also got a really bad charlie horse or something in my shoulder doing something and I almost quit because I was in so much pain. It did end up going away but I think I'm going to skip my extra workout I was planning on doing tonight and give my shoulder a rest. It's such a pain sometimes (haha funny pun!).

I'm also trying some other new things like planning my workouts one week at a time in advance and writing them in my planner. I'm also trying to work on writing down everything I eat in a day. I keep trying to do this and I usually fail by about supper time. I've heard this is a really good way to keep yourself aware of what you're eating throughout the day. I know I'm a mindless eater especially being in my room filled with junk. It just tastes so good but is it really going to make me look good is the question. Usually it's no but I still struggle with it.

I will try and put some more pictures up on here as well. Lately I've been doing this from work so I can't put any pictures up. I'm also very lazy and hate downloading pictures onto my computer. Why you ask? I have no idea it's not like it's hard but check out the last time my Facebook page has gotten any new pictures put on it. I know I need motivation in almost every aspect of my life right now. Hopefully I'll find some!

Obsessed or Just Trying to Be Motivated?

So lately all I think about is working out and trying to lose weight. My weight doesn't seem to be moving down much lately......Well for the last month I've maybe lost 2 lbs. That's like almost not even worth it. I'm trying to not that get me down because I really really REALLY want to be at my goal weight (or very close) by the time I get to Greece at the beginning of May. I need to hit the gym tonight and spend some good quality time there, I just need to get motivated but I will get there eventually. The chart on my wall that I track my workouts is seeing a lot more zeros than numbers so I really need to work on that. Here's to having a better week especially since the holidays are officially over!