peace + love + cupcakes

My goals for April were:

Lose 8 pounds: actual pounds lost were 2.2
Workout at least 1000 minutes: actual minutes were 485
Walk at least 50 miles: actual miles were 6.2 miles
Workout at least 21 days: actual days were 12

I didn’t work out the first part of April. I feel like I have gotten my groove back in the latter part of the month. I’ve been getting bored of the treadmill so I’ve been doing the Boot Camp Challenge app and cardio DVDs at home. Having the variety in my exercises has helped me remain motivated. But I need to get back on the treadmill to get ready for Bay 2 Breakers which is on May 20th.

I tracked both calories and points this month and i wasn’t very successful. To be honest, when I was tracking points I would worry about the calories and vice versa. I wasn’t giving my full to either method. I lost the majority of the weight following Weight Watchers so I am going to go back on it full time. I am even contemplating going to a meeting here and there to get more tips and information about Points+. I’ve been looking at the website and it’s somewhat confusing sometimes. I think it helps to have an actual person answer questions and explain things rather than a website.

After thinking about it for the past couple of days, I decided on my goals for the month of May:

Lose 8 pounds. I really wanted to be at a 100 pound loss by Bay 2 Breakers and right now I know that I will have to work so hard to get there as I need to lose 8 pounds in 19 days. I won’t be giving up. It is doable as I lost 11 pounds in December.
Track my food & activity points on Weight Watchers app. If I bite it, write it. If I nibble it, scribble it. To get an accurate picture of my eating habits and exercise, I need to be diligent in tracking.
My weekly activity points (AP) goal will be to earn 40 AP’s weekly. I was looking at MFP profile and when I filled it out it recommended I burn 2,880 calories a week for a projected loss of 2 pounds per week. On the Points+ plan, 80 calories equal 1 AP so 2,880 calories equals 36 AP’s. I am going to push myself to earn 40 APs per week. In my past workouts, this is how the APs break down:

45 minutes of low impact aerobics = 6 AP
26 minutes of boot camp (calisthenics; moderate effort) = 4 AP
50 minutes on the treadmill > 3.0 MPH & < 5.0 MPH = 7 AP
40 minutes of kickboxing (basically Turbo Jam) = 14 AP

I am ready to kick some ass this month.

Weekly Weigh In

One of the things I need to stop doing is weighing myself daily. It does nothing for my mental health. I’m becoming a bit obsessed with the number on the scale and it’s not healthy way to be. I came to this realization on Friday after seeing the scale jump up & down every day. When I weighed myself this morning, I didn’t know what to expect. Seeing a .7 pound gain pissed me off. Granted it isn’t much but gaining a pound last week just keeps me further of reaching my goal of 100 pound loss by May 20th which is Bay 2 Breakers.

I worked out three days last week and since I was counting Points I stayed within them. Only one day (Friday) did I go over them and it wasn’t due to a binge. I had (huge ass) Blue Moon beer which I have not had beer in a really long time. Looking at my Points tracker I realize that on three days I didn’t reach my daily points total. Could I not be eating enough?

Tracking has become more of a nuisance than becoming a tool to help me lose weight. Going back and forth between counting calories and points it’s not helping me. When I am supposed to be counting points I can’t help but think of the calories and vice versa. I need to pick one method and stick to it. Weight Watchers has helped me lose 90+ pounds so I am going to continue with it. Counting calories helped with overeating but I think (at least I hope) that I am getting a handle on it.

Weekly goals -

Re-read WW material and treat it as if I was a new user. It has worked for me when I follow it properly. Seems pretty silly for me to stop doing something that’s working for me.
Drink 120oz of water daily. Last week I drank 120oz 5 out of the 7 days so to me that’s a win especially since prior to this week I would be lucky to drink 40 oz.
Work out 5 days this week.
Try out a new recipe.
Do not weigh myself until next Monday.

I started my morning making the Meta-D drink. Oh my gosh! It was somewhat nasty but tolerable. I drank it all at once because the smell of the apple cider vinegar can be a bit obnoxious. The acidity of it reminded me of some kombucha I’ve tried. I will drink it all this week and see if I notice a difference in my energy levels.

Yesterday I posted that I needed to work on de-cluttering my life & I started with my room. I am happy to say that it now under control and it felt very cleansing to do so.

Hard Work & Dedication

Yup, I am being cheesy & quoting Dolvett from the Biggest Loser. Last Monday I said that I would track every nibble & bite both on MyFitnessPal & Weight Watchers. I struggle portion control and I had hoped that tracking my food intake this way it would help me stay on track.

It was tedious at times but I am so worth the effort. I found that by tracking calories as well as points, I was making healthier choices. This tracking technique paid off as I lost 3.4 pounds this week which makes for a 81.2 pound loss in the past 16 months. While I did make healthier choices, I never felt deprived during the week. I also worked out 5 days this week.

My plan for this week: repeat what I did last week. I have my first 10K race on Superbowl Sunday & I am nervous about it because my left foot has been bothering me a bit. But I got some gel insoles which I used yesterday for the first time & they seemed to have helped.

Here’s hoping for another great week!

7th day tracking my food. Tomorrow morning will be the test as to whether this tracking technique & making good choices paid off when I weigh in.

I finally made it to the gym today but was only able to do 5K.

0:51:20 || 3.1 mi || 16:36 min/mi (+138 pts)

I added chia seeds & blood oranges to water & it made for a very refreshing drink. Looks hella weird but it’s really good.

Hope everyone had a great weekend!

Fun times in the city

Today the weather was fantastic so I spent the day in SF with my mom & her best friend. We walked around the Embarcadero to AT&T Park (Giants Stadium) and we shared lots of laughs & yummy food.

If you ever come to SF & are a coffee fan, you must try Blue Bottle coffee & Pepple’s Donuts if you want a delicious vegan donut. It was my first time trying it and I am hooked. I had the salted caramel & it was perfect. We also stopped at a frozen yogurt place where they were shaving chocolate. Can you imagine how many calories are in that huge bar? For dinner, I had a brussels sprouts salad with caramelized onion, bacon, hard cooked egg and grilled chicken.

I tracked every single thing I ate and I did pretty well. I didn’t get a hard workout but we did walk a lot as my trusty Fitbit tells me. Overall it was a great day.

Tomorrow I am getting up early for a 6 mile walk. I got some gel insoles and I hope that they will help with the annoying pain I’ve been getting on my left foot.

Fifth day tracking & I promise I will only post the WW & MFT numbers until Sunday. I’ll keep tracking but won’t bore you all with the details daily :D

First time this week that I eat out & I pre-planned my meal at Panera. For 610 calories (16 PP+) it is so worth it. I think this is my go to meal at Panera: broccoli cheese soup, 1/2 BBQ chicken salad & chips.

My left knee is bothering me so I only walked 2.11 miles in 36 minutes. Tomorrow I’ll be walking 4 miles & Sunday 6 miles.

I weighed myself this morning & I was beyond pleased with the number on the scale. Official weigh in is on Monday so I better continue to do well over the weekend.

Tracking

After I finished my workout last night, I was in my car tracking it on my Runkeeper app & I realized that I use a lot of tools to help me stay on track. I decided to share them with you. I will provide a link to my profile in case you want to add me.

Runkeeper - I use this app to track all of my walks on my iPhone. When I first started working out, I downloaded the Nike+ app on my iPhone but I could never get it to calibrate correctly. I decided to try Runkeeper & I’ve been happy ever since. It can track your walks as long as it has a GPS signal & I can also do a manual entry for my treadmill workouts. It also tracks other activities such as cycling, skiing & snowboarding.

DailyMile - oh how I wish that I could sync up my Runkeeper stats to DailyMile automatically. I like the interface for DailyMile a lot better than Runkeeper so I am tracking on both. DailyMile does sync up to Nike+ & Garmin devices. I also like that I can keep track of any upcoming races on it.

Fitbit - I got mine as a Christmas gift & I am so happy with it. It tracks my daily steps, miles traveled, calories burned & even my sleep habits. Pretty cool!

Fitocracy - I got an invite to this a while back but haven’t explored it too much. For every workout you do, you get a certain number of points & achievements. It’s basically a game to improve your fitness. Right now it’s invite only so if you want a invite, let me know.

MyFitnesspal - I’ve been using it to track my workouts and meals. You can build a profile & based on what results you want it will tell you how many calories you should consume daily.

Earndit - I don’t know how I heard about this rewards site but it’s pretty cool. I have my Runkeeper, Foursquare & Fitbit tied to it. For every activity I do, I get points. Those points get me rewards such as gift cards for energy bars, discounts at TheClymb, vitamins, shoes, apparel & basically things fitness related. It’s free to join & they have weekly challenges as well.

I’m also on Twitter which I don’t use for tracking per se but I can talk to a people who have the same interest as me. And yes, I am also on Facebook. I have a love/hate relationship to this site.

Seems like a lot but it doesn’t take a lot of time & I find it useful to see how far I’ve come from when I first started losing weight & working out.

tracking

W9D2 done. I thought that it was my fastest 5K but it wasn’t. My fastest was 49:18 so it’s still really close. I felt great during my workout & really pushed myself. Third day tracking all my food on WW & MFP. I am getting into a routine so it isn’t as tedious as I thought it would be. Today I almost ate all of my points but still have about 300 calories left for the day without counting what I burned at the gym.

Walking:

0:49:22 || 3.1 mi || 15:55.5 min/mi (+145 pts)

I found a recipe for chocolate chia pudding which I am going to make tonight & have tomorrow for breakfast. I hope it tastes good.

Tracked all my food for the day. According to WW, I can still eat an additional 10 points today however I only have 3 calories left from MFP. Very interesting…