Falling Weight Ahead

I knew that I had a bad weekend, and hadn't been doing a lot of healthy things for myself. So I was prepared when I got on the scale this morning at it read: 13 pounds to lose. I wasn't happy about it, but I was okay with it. Now I just need to get back on track. I am committed to limiting my calories, working out a ton, and getting these last thirteen pounds off of my body. I am going to Kickboxing and BodyPower this evening; that will be a great start to the week. Unfortunately, I am dog-sitting this week, which never helps me plan my meals, or assures my healthy eating habits. Also, I am going to the State Fair on Tuesday and have promised myself a corn dog. But one corn dog won't derail my work. It's four weeks of chaos that does that!

Jen's Wedding Weekend

I took Friday off and had a three day weekend because of Jen and Don's wedding. We had a great time and it was a wonderful wedding. Unfortunately I did nothing healthy for myself with those three days off. Friday I actually was feeling back to normal after my cold and I did make it to the gym for an hour. I used the elliptical machine for 30 minutes and then lifted weights for 30 minutes. But Friday night at the Rehearsal Dinner I ate a lot of chips and gaucamole and cake and M&Ms. I had once had hopes of getting up early on Saturday day morning to workout, but that didn't happen. We had to be in Omaha by 10am to get our hairs done, and after that, even though there was lots of downtime, working out was out of the question. Like I said, the wedding was wonderful and I probably burned some calories during the three-hour dance session I participated in. I didn't get to each much food during the event, but I made up for it with several glasses of wine. I didn't sleep well in the hotel this morning and woke up feeling like crap. I ate some pasteries and other bad-for-me foods this morning at brunch and then felt ill the rest of the day. I never made it to workout today either. But I did end the weekend with a healthy Sub sandwich.

I managed to eat very well last week and got my weight down to the 8 or 9 pound mark as of Friday morning. We'll see where I am tomorrow. I am going to get serious about this final weight loss. I need to buy new Fall clothes (at least a pair of jeans) and I would really like it to be in a smaller size. Currently nothing smaller fits, but my own jeans are too stretched out and large to keep up without a belt.

As exhausting as it was, I am so happy to have celebrated with Jen and Don. I hope they have a long and healthy life together. And as soon as Jen gets back from her Honeymoon I hope that she can get back to working out and inspiring me to work harder.

Finally It has Happened to Me

I had planned on going to Kickboxing this evening; at least attempting to get back at it after the cold-debacle. But then Erin wanted to go to Spinning class. Well, I should rephrase that: Erin had planned on working out anyway, but didn't have her MP3 player, so I suggested we go to Spinning instead. My goal was to raise and push back my seat so that my leg would be able to stretch out better. It worked... for thirty minutes, then the pain started up again. But the best part was that I actually got a great workout. I was breathing heavily, I was sweating, my legs were burning. It was excellent. I think I have figured out the tension mechanism. The teacher was really good too. Although Erin hated her (she yelled some) but that's just the push I need. Sure I hated it when she was telling me to pedal faster, but I did and my legs will thank her for it. Even though my knee hurt I made myself use heavy weight for squats. I mean if it is going to hurt anyway, I might as well be working my quads more. And I did lunges on the step. I'm going to have great legs just in time for pants and long underwear weather!

Is Anybody There?

So it has been two weeks since anyone has even commented on my blog. I understand that Jen is super busy planning her wedding so she is excused. But where is everybody else. Does anyone even read this blog anymore. And if not, what do I keep writing it for? I guess myself. And that will have to be good enough. I do love to be able to look back a year from today and see how far I have come (or not come for that matter).

Today I wore my heels for Jen's wedding most of the day (well maybe six hours) because I have been trying to break them in. I feel like I got quite a workout. Not only were my calves being worked all day, it seemed like walking in general was so much more difficult. I think I might have just found a super-fashionable leg-sculpting exercise. I took the evening off from working out. I had to go to my mom's house and I ended up staying there for a while. I didn't have my running shoes with me so I couldn't even take Hannah for a walk. That's okay. I think my body needs one more day to recover from this illness.

Catch-22

I had great intentions of eating healthy all weekend and working out tons, and then I woke up Friday with a cold. The cold did not get any better all weekend. And being sick makes me not want to work out and only want to eat comfort food: like McDonald's, cookies and chocolate. I woke up feeling slightly better this morning so I went to work (like I really had a choice) and made it through the day. However, when it came time to go to Kickboxing tonight I knew that I wouldn't be able to make it. So I took a nap in my car for that hour, so I could make it to BodyPower. I had saved up enough energy to make it through that class while keeping my weights high. But it was a lot more difficult than normal. As soon as I am feeling better I am going to attempt going up to a large during the warm up. If I can add just a little weight to that, I might be able to build all those muscles a little faster. I ate fairly healthy today, making sure that I understood that I could not eat Macaroni and Cheese, and perhaps I would feel better if I just ate some real nutrients. I just want to feel better. It's a catch-22 because if I felt better I could eat better and workout more, and if I ate better and worked out more I would probably not feel so crappy.

Guess Who's Back

That might be an exaggeration, but I got Jennifer to go to BodyPower with me this morning. I am sure that it has been at least a month since she has gone (my half birthday?). You know she does have a wedding to get ready for. Since Jennifer went to lift weights with me again, I thought I'd put the special weight lifting image on the blog today. Speaking of weddings, Jen's is just one week away. And I have to say: I am impressed with the status of my shoulders. However, as I try on the dress for her wedding, I realize that my shoulders don't show as much as my biceps and triceps, which I am not as impressed with. And even though I will never have nice legs, the heels I have chosen to wear will accentuate the small calf muscle that I have developed.

This morning my scale played a trick on me. I awoke about 8:20 and weighed myself, same as yesterday. Then I read a book for a while, took some medicine, laid in bed (remember I have a cold) and then before I got dressed to go to the gym, I weighed myself again (remember I have an obsession) and it spiked four pounds. Four. Pounds. My only guess is that is the phloem that has been produced by my head. I'm going to pretend it did happen, and worry about what the scale says tomorrow. I ate alright today, nothing super healthy, but not a ton of crap either. Now I am in this waiting pattern to beat this cold and get out there and work out again.

The Power of Erin and my Corolla

Remember less than 24 hours ago when I updated my blog with how healthy I had eaten on Thursday and how I had hoped to get up early and workout on Friday. Oh how things change. Yesterday was a long day at work. First my boss called in sick, which left some of us to work several hours alone during the day (nobody's favorite way to spend the day). My new leaf of eating healthy had left me starving by 7:00, so when Erin suggested we go get Margaritas after work, it was impossible to say no. She claims she doesn't want to be blamed for it, but it was all her fault. She has to know I have no willpower.

Then this morning I woke up with a cold. My head feels like it is going to explode. My eyes are burning and my ears are plugged. It's hard to work all day like this, although not impossible (someone should inform my boss). So I didn't get up and work out. For lunch I really needed a soda -- if Tylenol Cold and Sinus doesn't fix you, Diet Pepsi will! So instead of heading home to eat something healthy I went to Subway. The parking lot was so full I couldn't even get in the driveway. I was in no mood to put up with congestion and long lines. Next thing I know my car is taking me to McDonald's. It seemed to think that French fries would perk up the rest of my day. It was right; it knows me so well. Tomorrow I will start eating better. I promise!

Turning Corners

The most stressful part of my nine pound weight gain was that I didn't eat anything super-un-healthy. I just didn't watch was I was eating. I did make a cake and cookies once, but I shared them with a lot of people. I did celebrate Jen's Bachelorette Party with a lot of eating and drinking, but that was only one night. Besides that I ate as usual. And I worked out a little less. But it scares me that I can gain weight that fast without even trying. I like to think I could eat chips and cookies for every meal if I wanted to gain four pounds a week. Mathematically speaking, in order to gain four pounds, I would have to eat an extra 2000 calories a day (more than twice what I am "allowed" to eat.) I don't know, maybe that's possible with cake around my house. But doubtful.

But enough about that. I got back on track last night with Kickboxing and BodyPower. Kickboxing was hard and intense, and I sweat a lot. I went high on all my weights in BodyPower and even considered adding a little to my chest, back and shoulders. I think that adding smalls to the bars and taking them off at break time is the way to go. I had plans to eat out with Jennifer and we tried to keep it (relatively) healthy. I even took Hannah on a short walk while I was waiting for Jennifer to come to my mom's side of town (did I mention that I was dog-sitting). I had hoped to wake up early this morning and take her for a long walk again, but we slept in instead. I have eaten healthy today again and will again for dinner. I feel like I have turned a corner and am back on track. Now I just need to get back into some sort of running routine and figure out this thing with my knee.

Large Gains

I am a slacker. A blogging slacker, a healthy eating slacker and a workout slacker. It has been two and a half weeks since my Challenge with Curtis ended (remember I was down to three pounds). I am now back up to twelve. That is a nine pound gain in just two weeks. Over four pounds a week. If I continue at this rate I will be able to erase all the hard work that I have done over the last two years by the time Jennifer's wedding comes around. It must stop here. It's not that I haven't been working out. I just haven't been doing a lot of intense work, nor have I been getting my seven to eight hours of exercise in. I have had to work a few strange shifts and missed a BodyPower or two. But for the most part I have just been a slacker. I haven't worried about what I was eating and therefore let myself put whatever I wanted into my mouth. I have made six new recipes in the last two weeks (yay for my other goals!) but they haven't been healthy. The worst is my self-esteem. I can't believe that I have let this happen. I feel like my clothes aren't fitting the way they should and I feel like I can never buy new pants because I can never get to the next lower size. I have to take control.

Monday I tried Spinning again. Sure it worked my legs, but I wasn't sweating and I didn't really feel winded. I might try it one more time and take my heart rate monitor along. I know I don't have to be exhausted to get a good workout, but I just don't feel like I am working hard at all. Also, it really bothered my knee. I had to go light on squat-weights during BodyPower and it was difficult to do lunges. It appears to be fine 24 hours later (which makes me wonder if it is a muscle I am working or a ligament I am hurting). So when I do spinning I want to make sure I don't have to lift weights afterward. Sunday morning class here I come! I also want to try some position changes (like raising my seat) to see if that helps. Tonight I am going to Kickboxing again. That will be a great jump start to re-rev my metabolism.

I know those nine pounds are just temporary pounds. They're like a check engine light warning me to take action. But I can't put it off. I need to get back on track. And that means blogging more too!

Disappointments All Around

• Erin texted to say that she wouldn't be meeting me at spinning. Hey, she wasn't feeling well, so I don't blame her. Still a disappointment.
• I made myself go to the class anyway, ALONE.
• There was a note on the door of the gym that Spinning class is cancelled today. So I went with the backup plan: kickboxing.
• Steven announced that Mary was going to be late again, and he would warm us up.
• He did a bunch of stupid things that none of us were used to.
• And he corrected our form... on the warm up. How can I be toe tapping wrong?
• Mary still wasn't there after 15 minutes.
• Steven pretended to do Kickboxing, but he has the wrong music and the wrong moves and it was worthless.
• Mary still wasn't there after 20 minutes.
• Steven makes us go into the gym and run laps.
• For a long time.
• Mary still isn't there after 30 minutes.
• Steven (who teaches butts and guts) has us do these ass-toners on the exercise ball. It burns a lot. Wait, maybe that isn't a disappointment!
• Mary still isn't there after 35 minutes.
• Steven doesn't know what else to do with us. So we all agree to go do our own cardio on the machines.
• I do 15 minutes of biking on my own. I am sweating, but only because Goodyear has no air-conditioning.
• I go back in at 6:15 to set up for Body Power and Mary still isn't there. I contemplate leaving, because I don't want to waste another hour of my life.
• Finally Mary walks in at the last second. Relief all around. I push myself extra hard in BodyPower because I am not worn out from the first class, and because I will not be able to make it on Wednesday. I do all of my maximum weights and lunges on the bench! Only a disappointment to my muscles.
• All while Jennifer and Hannah are shopping and eating at La Paz without me. What I sacrifice for fitness!

No Time to Blog

I have been busy this weekend and have neglected my blog and pretty much all aspirations of working out. I have Friday off from work, and met Brandy at 7:30am to run. I hadn't done any real running since our Columbus race almost two weeks ago. My goal was to do four miles with her. But the humidity and my exhaustion was too much. I had to take just a couple walk breaks and we ended up quitting around 3.3 miles. Next week we'll try for more; if she'll keep running with me that is. Then I spent all day Friday in Omaha helping Jen make Wedding mints. There was a lot of snacking and mint tasting. We ate an unhealthy Mexican dinner and indulged in candy at a movie later. Not good.

Saturday and Sunday I worked. Both days I had high hopes of working out. I meant to ride my bike to work on Saturday, but I realized that I needed to run some "work-errands" and would need my car to get from location to location. Then I was to tired when I got off of work to actually go to the gym as I had planned. I took a nap from 7:00-8:00 and then went to bed at 11:00. Sunday morning I told myself that I would get up early and go for a run. I did get up, but just as I was about to head out the door, it started pouring rain. I didn't really want to go anyway. I stayed home and read a book instead. I ate really poorly all weekend too. What is wrong with me?

Now it's Monday and I am starting fresh. I am about to go to the grocery store and get some healthy things to cook this week. I have today off and took a four-day vacation later this week. I should be able to get back on track with my eating and my working out. I'm trying spinning again tonight followed by my all-time favorite: BodyPower. I am taking Tuesday evening off to have a little dinner party (and celebrate summer). Wednesday I have go to a Saltdogs game for work, so I will be missing all classes. I will try to make it to the gym in the afternoon, when I don't have to work. Then my four day vacation starts. Besides a lot of indulging at Jen's bachelorette party on Saturday, I am going to keep on track. I think I noticed that my pants were feeling tight yesterday. I can't let that go on!

Wait, I Love KickBoxing

I went back to kickboxing last night, after two weeks off, and was pleasantly reminded as to how much I love it. First, our instructor Mary was about 7 minutes late. So the instructor before her, Steven (you may remember him from Butts and Guts and Zumba) decided that we would teach class as a step-class. This made me a little nervous, but a little excited to test my step ability without committing to a real class. Luckily, Mary showed up before we got very far, and shortly after I remembered how much I disliked Steven. Then since Mary was late, she spent the next 40 minutes kicking our behinds. It was great. And as I was watching myself in the mirror, I realized just how good my shoulders look and I owe it all to Kickboxing. Now I am torn. Because I love kickboxing and all the calories it burns and all the good things it does for my arms. But I would like those same things to happen to my legs. So I am going to let myself take Spinning once a week and Kickboxing once a week and hope that I can learn to make myself sweat enough on a bike. On the other hand, Spinning is offered at other times. I could make myself go at 8:00 on Saturday morning or Sundays at 11:00. Yeah, I should work on adding more classes, not compromising the ones that I already take.

29 Things I Wonder

1) Will turning 30 be harder or easier than turning 25?
2) When will I start loving running and not just love the feeling of accomplishment?
3) Does Mary notice that I haven't been to kickboxing in two weeks now?
4) If I can take sick-leave to go to the doctor and better myself, why can't I use it to go to the gym and better myself.
5) What is it about Margaritas that make them so much better than all other drinks.
6) Will I always have someone around to catch me when I fall in the bathroom of the blood bank and slice my head open?
7) Why do I care if I wear a size 10; isn't that an arbitrary number created by the fashion industry?
8) Where did my summer go?
9) Is there a surgery you can do to shrink your feet?
10) Will I ever get tired of watching Sex and the City?
11) How many miles have I run over the course of this blog? And how far would that get me? Omaha? Denver? California?
12) If I never get married and am "alone" for the rest of my life, will I be okay with that?
13) What do I want to be when I grow up?
14) Why does Brandy like to run with me? Don't I slow her down too much?
15) When will my calves will look as good as the rest of me?
16) If I get a knee replacement will I still be able to run?
17) Why can't I get out of bed in the morning to workout?
18) Could I if someone was paying me money?
19) For that matter, why can't I get out of bed in the morning to go to work?
20) Is thirty really the new 20? And would I even want to be twenty years old again?
21) Will I ever be able to run a nine-minute mile?
22) How can I love my job and hate it at the same time?
23) Where is Jennifer? She was supposed to pick me up 10 minutes ago.
24) If two roads diverged in a yellow wood, would I take the road less traveled by? And would that make all the difference?
25) Do I really want to pay money to run more races? I can run for free. But I don't.
26) Exactly how many calories are in a Margarita anyway?
27) How did I let this blog get so boring? Is this is a good step back to fun?
28) Will I be in the best shape of my life when I turn 30 years old?
29) Why this?

Something New

I feel like I am in a rut. And at the same time I am not training for any races and therefore have no point of my exercise. I am close enough to my weight loss goal that I don't feel the need to work on that intensely. So what is left? I absolutely want to work on toning up my leg muscles. So I have decided that I need to quit doing all the kickboxing, which I am bored with anyway, and do more work on my legs. For that reason, I finally took a Spinning class again. Well, I should say the real reason I took it was because Erin agreed to take it with me. I am too scared to try new things like that alone. And sure it wasn't completely new to me, but I have never taken the evening class before and haven't taken Spinning in a long time. It was pretty good. I am thinking of doing it once a week and kickboxing once a week. Or maybe I should try some other classes all together. Or go back to step-climbing. Or quit the gym and start mountain climbing. But back to spinning...
Here are the pros:
1) It worked my legs.
2) I wasn't as tired so when it was time for BodyPower I had the energy to keep my weights high.
3) That in turn may have been a better workout for my upperbody because I used high weights, and can continue to increase my upperbody weights.
4) There were several people in the evening class that I know from BodyPower.
5) They are nice.

Here are the cons:
1) It is not nearly as intense as Kickboxing.
2) Therefore I don't burn as many calories.
3) It hurts my knee.
4) I don't want to not be able to walk someday.

What Ann Said

Yesterday morning I went to BodyPower as I always do when I have a free Saturday. Again there weren't very many of us there: just me and Natalie, and Ann of course. This makes me nervous because I worry they will cancel the class if more people don't start coming. And also Ann feels like she can talk to me about my life and such. This is fine when it's the three of us, but then she uses this knowledge to think that we're good friends when Wednesday comes around and there are a lot of people. No matter, I am just thankful for the Saturday morning class and the ability to get three weight-lifting sessions in per week, or in the case of this week, a chance to make up for one of the evening sessions that I was not able to attend because of my crappy work schedule. It was a great Saturday morning class even though Ann decided to skip shoulders and do two tracks of abs instead. Her and Natalie thought that this was a great idea because they just can't get their abs flat. Well, me either, so I kinda figure what's the point. What I can do is have rock-hard awesome shoulders so let's work on that. But whatever. I really do like Ann. She somewhere in the 30s, maybe even 40 and tells stories like: I sat out on my deck last night with my husband and drank beer while watching my daughter catch fireflies. Whereas the other instructors have stories like: I sat out at the Brassrail last night and drank beer while I watched my friend get so plastered he beat someone up. I think that you know what I mean. Anyway, to the point of my story. Yesterday during the warm up she paid me one of the nicest compliments. Honestly, I don't take compliments well; I don't know how to respond. So the fact that I was busy working out meant that all I had to do was smile and say thanks. She said: Karrie, I have known you a long time (she really has... probably 5 years of BodyPumping) and you look great. You were beautiful then, and you're beautiful now, but you look perfectly fit and healthy. And that was it.

Not this Challenge

Jennifer finds it amusing that I have never been in a weight-loss challenge that I have lost and therefore refuses to ever play with me again. But today, I lost a challenge. Curtis didn't get to his goal weight either, so perhaps you would consider that a tie, or a draw, or just not winning rather than a loss. But I loss to myself. I was so close. I had planned on eating really light and heathy yesterday to see if I could drop those last three pounds. But a co-worker of mine invited me to dinner at a Veg-Mex Bistro. We were carpooling to a teen event in the evening and I didn't want to say no. And remember, I do want to try new restaurants, but honestly, the idea of a vegetarian Mexican place was scary at first. I got the veggie nachos, which of course had chips and cheese but lots of black beans and corn and salsa and squash. Seeing as it was my only real meal of the day, I was doing swell. Then my boss (the head of Youth Services) invited us out for a drink after the concert. I couldn't say no to the two rounds of drinks she was buying. It's like a job-requirement. Luckily (?) the scale was at that same 3 pounds this morning. So I decided to stop eating and see if it would budge. Even a pound. By 3 o'clock, after working out this morning, and not eating since those nachos at 5:00 yesterday, the scale was still at 3 pounds. It's just not gonna happen. Not today. I will be a winner soon though. Maybe next weekend! And I am going to know that I did it the right way, and continued to go out with friends and eat real food and live a normal life!