Day eleventy billion and I'm still here!

Hello, hello! I know it's been a couple days since I've updated, but rest assured that I have not completely fallen off the wagon. I haven't even fallen off at all really...the weekend, I was sort of hanging off the side of the wagon, but I haven't fallen off! Because...

CONFESSION: I've been having a love affair...*gasp* Yes! I am!

*deep breath* I've been having a not-so-secret-from-my-husband love affair with my scale.

It's been AWESOME! The less it gives me, the more I love it and I must be addicted or something because I keep coming back for more. In the mornings, before I do the morning biz-nas and even after! I go back for more after a workout and even before bed. I can't stop...

You know another thing that I can't curb? My whole needing more weight-loss tools/equipment addiction. I really can't...

YES, I totally caved and got a heart rate monitor even though I had previously told myself that I wasn't going to get one or even that I needed one. Of course I need it! How am I ever going to lose weight without it? Which is funny because I already was before I got it, but the good news is, it's actually REALLY helpful! Of course I had to get this one because it was PINK! It's so CUTE! Plus it tells me the time, the date, it records my weight (through manual input of course, I don't stand on my watch to get weighed), it records my calories in and also has a chronometer to time my workouts and to track the amount of calories burned. Of course it also has a heart rate monitor with an ECG something or other. All I know is that it keeps track of calories burned and that it's pink. 'Nuff said. Bonus, it was also featured on Dr. Phil, according to the box! I've been using it for over a week now and I was able to keep track of the calories I was burning during Zumba class, which is an AWESOME thing because I was totally over-estimating the amount of calories I was burning in that class, thereby throwing off my daily caloric intake blah blah blah. But anywho...

...the diet is still going as well. I'm trying to tell myself that I'm NOT getting tired of salad and balsamic vinaigrette, but I think the rest of me (especially my taste buds) knows I'm LYING! Every time I think of salad with balsamic, I just about gag. But mmmm...it's delicious, I love it. I'm trying different things to eat with it and so far I've been loving High Liner's Lemon and Herb Crusted Tilapia! Here's some eye candy!

Tilapi with garden salad and balsamic vinaigrette

Shrimp sauteed in pineapple juice and surprise, garden salad with balsamic vinaigrette

Chicken souvlaki with a garden salad and greek vinaigrette

The greek vinaigrette won't happen too often because I'm pretty sure it was baaaad for me!

Still going with Wii Active too! That was probably the best money I've spent throughout this whole month so far. I have been having an awesome time with it and it really gets me sweating - even though I look like a fool trying to jog on the spot and the stupid screen keeps telling me I'm going to slow even though I'm going as fast as I can! I hate to sound like an infomercial, but if you've been thinking about getting this, what're you waiting for?

Alright, gonna go see if the hubster wants to take the pooch out for a walk! And by pooch I mean the dog...not the stuff hanging over my pants...*LOL*

Day 20: Confession...

...went to cardio kickboxing...







...then I went and ate 15 chicken wings and had a strawberry dacquiri right after class.

I'm trying to feel sorry that I buckled, but they were so good, it was so worth it.

Plus they were only $0.40 per wing. I think it's common knowledge that when a delicious chicken wing is LESS than fifty cents, they're OBVIOUSLY diet chicken wings, therefore, they don't necessary count.

Hello, and welcome to my own little world right here by the river called De Nile. It's a nice little place, so happy and full of delicious food. Come on in and make yourself comfortable!

Day 17: Diet, thy enemy is the WEEKEND!

...going to a restaurant when you're on a diet is like taking a test you didn't really study for. During a test, you kind of think you know the answers and feel as if they are right there on the edge of your memory, but you can't quite grasp it and get it out there on paper. At a restaurant, the server waits while you try to get the healthy option off the tip of your tongue, but you just can't get it out because the garlic shrimp pasta just sounds so much better!

The weekend was bad. Correction: I was bad! I shouldn't blame it on the weekend, the weekend didn't do anything it doesn't normally always do. Should lay the blame where it belongs and that's all with me! I'm so weak for noodles...and popcorn...and M&M's. CONFESSION: I accidentally on purpose forgot to list the M&M's I ate at the movies on my calorie counter. No need to kick a girl when she's already down now, is there?

So thank goodness I got Saturday's Active workout in there or else I wouldn't have gotten an increase in calorie allowance. I think that's the only thing I didn't go over in (even with the M&M's that I conveniently left off). Everything else was pretty up there...and if my counter was recording SODIUM...holy crap, it would be off the chart!

So Bart and I went out to Boston Pizza for dinner (no stove, oven, sink still, there was really no other options...we'd already had lunch with family at the anniversary party!) I thought I would be a good girl and order off of their "healthy" section menu and it wasn't so bad until I saw the sodium part. 1100 g of sodium! For shrimp skewers and a salad! HOLY CRAP! It pretty much makes all the water that I forced myself to drink irrelevant! *sighs* I have no idea why I do such things to myself. Work hard at one part, only to do something else that completely obliterates even the hard part! Ay-yay-yay...

Again, I'm not going to be too hard on myself. I recognize and acknowledge that I could have done way better, but I'm also recognizing and acknowledging that I used to eat much worse. But like I said, eating the same way I used to eat will get me nowhere and lying to my calorie counter and blog is essentially like lying to myself and won't help me to get any skinnier, so YES, I ate those M&M's dammit!

So that was Saturday and I don't know if today was better or worse. Ate a poached egg and Fibre 1 cereal with soy milk for breakfast and had Grill 'Ems (with cheddar *whimpers*) and a tossed salad for lunch. Dinner I ate another one of those Lean Cuisine paninis and I.was.still.HUNGRY. Hungry like I could NOT get it off my mind. I tried to watch a movie, I tried to go on the message boards, I tried to go in my scraproom, but all I could think of was FOOD. I went back to the couch to snuggle with the husband to try to get my mind off FOOD and I turned to him and was like, "WHY DO YOU SMELL LIKE A HAMBURGER?" Turns out he was sneaking off into the kitchen to have bites of a hamurger so I wouldn't have to see him eating in front of me. I managed to last about another hour before I got up all determined like to look for my car keys. I was going to Sobey's to hunt down a Skinny Cow!

TIP: Everyone probably already knows this, but it totally bears repeating: Do NOT go into a grocery store when you're hungry. Under NO circumstances. You just have no common sense when you're hungry, you end up thinking with your stomach and not your brain and $30 later, you walk out with more than a Skinny Cow. I tried to be good and bought healthier snack foods that I could keep with me at the office, unfortunately, I wasn't thinking and pretty much bought all "healthy" junk food. It was only when I was leaving the store that it occured to me that I should have bought some fresh fruit and vegetables that I could prepare - even a freakin' BANANA would have been good to grab and eat for snacks and some fat-free yogurt since we were out at home. Instead, I have two boxes of Skinny Cow goodies (they could also change her name to Expensive B*tch...I should write that in their suggestion section on their website, it seems like a more accurate description) and a package of Cadbury Moments in Dark Chocolate. I don't even like dark chocolate, but my one health book said that if I absolutely have to have chocolate, try going dark as it's full of antioxidants, blah blah blah. Let me just say that there are only a few times that I asbolutely need chocolate, and I can guarantee you that it's not antioxidants that I'll be thinking about when I need to inhale those babies. But I'm hoping that having them around will help. *shrugs* Also came out with a box of Kashi granola bars. I'll have to write that guy in the commercial because he promised to eat the box if I didn't like it and I most certainly do NOT like it. If you want to know what it tastes like...imagine an open-faced peanut butter sandwich falling face-down on the ground. Imagine picking it up and eating the DIRT on which the sandwich fell on. That comes pretty close...lemme think, what else did I get? Oh right, they were having a 3 for $4 on Quaker Crispy Minis chips - which are delicious and chances are I could eat a whole bag before my body even recognizes it's inhaled calories. I should try to count out how many are the actual serving size that the calories are counted for, put those in a ziplock baggie and take only those. Should have thought of that this morning so I wouldn't have a whole bag sitting behind me right now...

Ah well...done is done and at least they're still healthier snacks than I normally would have chosen for myself.

So, all-in-all, bad dieter but a better week is coming. Tomorrow is Day Four of my Wii Active 30 Day Challenge and Tuesday and Wednesday are gym daaaays! It'll be a better week. Scout's honour!

WORKING OUT TO:

jump up lets (get krazy) pitbull and lil john (lyrics).mp3 - pitbul

Day 13: Note to self...

Buying books to read about getting healthy and losing weight doesn't actually make you get healthy and lose weight. Especially if you're not doing anything else...UGH!

It's only Day 13 and I'm feeling the quittin' vibes, I tell you. I am so impatient! I'm displaying signs of insanity again, people! Slap some fat, dirty common sense into me. If you're doing nothing (or pretty close to nothing) you can NOT expect fantastic results.

Okay, let's put a positive spin on this. Let's find the frickin' silver lining to this craptastic "diet" of mine. So I haven't lost weight. I can't tell you for sure because my fear of the scale actually prevented me from getting on the scale before I started. But let's say that I did and didn't lose any weight. Still choosing healthier options and getting 1 SOLID hour of cardio two times a week and doing 15 minutes of cardio twice a day for 13 days would still mean that logically, I probably haven't GAINED any weight. So maybe I'm not losing, but at least I'm not gaining is what I'm trying to say. It's not the brightest silver lining, but it's something and let's go with that. My visitor is here with her monthly gift and I'm not the most...pleasant person in normal circumstances, so imagine me now...but BONUS, I did notice that I am less of a bitch this time around than I normally am. You may not care, but my husband sure is thankful.

Anyway, considering that I feel like I'm putting some work into this, I've decided on a few things. First is this:

*wince* That was taken this morning. I had a picture of me actually standing on a scale, but that number AND the state of my feet would be a double shame. So stickin' to one shameful admission today, there is my OFFICIAL weigh-in...weigh in...weigh-in? Is that hyphenated or not?! And yes, it's a Weight Watcher's scale...I have no idea why I got it instead of the other ones...I must be a sucker for "brand" names. But this one tells me that I'm fat in MULTIPLE ways. Weight, body mass index, body fat and hydration, both in pounds and in percentage based on my height, age and gender. It scrolls through each of the readings one by one after you step on the scale...so that by the last number, you're already searching for a chocolate bar to cure the sudden onset of depression. Beside those numbers should be a little red button that says "SELF DESTRUCT" on it.

So that was decision one. I'm puttin' it out there. This is not an imaginary weight loss...weight-loss....weigh loss...wtf, why can't I tell if these are supposed to be hyphenated. Maybe I lose hyphenation knowledge with each calorie I burn...because I can't tell ya. Let's refer to it as WL. This is not imaginary WL, or a blog to poke fun at it. I'm serious and I want to be serious about this (in a still light and humorous kind of way because I'm boring when I take myself seriously). I'm putting some effort into this and I don't want it to be wasted because I'm still half-assing everything else. Sweating and gasping for air in front of other skinnier people lunging and shimmying better than me is NOT my idea of fun. I want it to mean something and I think that I undermine that with my pretty lax goals. So now that I've been into this for about two weeks and have got the hang of my original goals, I'd like to step it up a notch. Just a little bit...the commitment-phobe in me is already reeling and back-pedaling (holy hyphenated words in this entry!) So here we go, tiny goals to add to my existing goals:

1. No more alcohol. I'm no fun drunk anyways, so let's nix it. That means no more dacquiris! I wonder if that means I can have non-alcoholic ones...let's nix that too, if I'm trying to cut out juice, I doubt a dacquiri albeit non-alcohol is any better.
2. Less burgers and red meat, less deep fried garbage - just because the old goals still allowed for fast food, it doesn't mean I should still be having it so often!
3. Eat more fruits and vegetables - I feel like my food options are so few on diets and it's because I still don't eat fruits and vegetables.
4. Get some fiber. This girl REALLY needs it and apparently it's supposed to do wonders for other movements as well...let's get on that.
5. Step up my cardio. It doesn't have to be by too much right away, but I want to be doing at LEAST half an hour of cardio EVERY DAY. Start thinking about muscle toning exercise...who wants to lose weight if the extra flab is just going to end up flapping against other body parts?

So it's out there. I'm accountable. I'm doing it. I'm doing it already. I'm going to do it better. I'm going to keep at it. Get back, Day 13 laziness, I'm going to keep going!

P.S. For breakfast I had one egg cooked in my microwave egg cooker (I LOVE that thing!), forgot to eat my morning snack, hence hunger pangs close to lunch-hour. For lunch I went out with a co-worker and ordered a California salad (didn't eat the California part about the salad - artichokes and hearts of palm should just NOT be in a salad), my server gave me ranch instead of the balsamic that I asked for and by time I realized the mistake I already had ranch taste in my mouth and it was too late to stop because it was DELICIOUS! Ate only HALF the salad (to be fair, the portions were HUGE though) and for afternoon snack I had non-fat yogurt and cereal. Dinner after kickboxing consisted of CONFESSION: two Grill 'Ems (cheese-filled sausage...bad, but it was SO GOOD, argh! and a garden salad, this time with balsamic dressing).

WORKING OUT TO:

Temperature - Sean Paul

Day 12: Exceptions to the rules...

CONFESSION: I went into this evening fully intending to laugh in the face of the "diet."

There are certain things, I believe, that must relax the embarrassingly lax rules of this three-step diet...and chicken wings is one of them. Ah-ah-ah, hungry ones...not just ANY chicken wings, because that would be too easy! $0.49 chicken wings! I mean, when a big ol' chicken wing is half a dollar, you can't go wrong and therefore should not count at such a time as ridiculous as dieting.

Anywho, that's what I was telling myself the WHOLE day and all throughout Zumba class. I was shimmyin' and shakin' and thinkin' about wings! You know what? It's an awesome focus during an exercise! Because I was planning on eating wings, I was really pumping myself up! When I started feeling tired, my stomach said, "Oh no you don't...you have to give 'er even MORE because we're eating wings tonight, baby!" So push a little harder I did! I worked out MORE in anticipation of the delicious sin I was about to commit right after.

But alas, it was not meant to be. We get to the restaurant, my face all flushed with excitement (or sweat) and my breath coming in quick bursts of anxiety (or probably my lungs struggling and gasping for more air) only to be told that the server made a mistake. When she told us last week that THIS week would be the last week of wings, she was WRONG! *gasp* No wings?! I shimmied and shook every fat cell in my body just to be able to have wings and now you're telling me I CAN'T? UGH!

Everyone kind of stared at me while I had a little breakdown/temper trantrum...I think a foot was even stomped at one point. Everyone was like...why don't you just get the wings anyway, and I turned bugged out eyes at them and was like...when a chicken wing is MORE than a dollar each, OBVIOUSLY it has TONS of fat and calories in it! *mutters* morons... So obviously I couldn't have regular priced wings and instead ended up with this:

Cajun crusted salmon on a bed of rice. So even though I set out to be a very bad girl tonight, I guess I should feel kind of proud...the side choice originally offered with this dish was fries, mashed potatoes or rice and I chose rice. If you don't know how big a deal that is, consider that everyone who is close to me or knows me even a little knows that I would sell my first-born for mashed potatoes. If you don't think that's comparative since I don't have a first-born...I'd probably sell Bart to get a bowl of mashed potatoes. *LOL* Even Bart's dad knows that...during our wedding speech, he started off with how much he knows I love Bart, but he's not sure if I love mashed potatoes more...

Besides that nonexistent indiscretion, today went pretty well. I had two poached eggs on toast for breakfast, a yogurt with fresh raspberries and cereal for lunch and a 100 calorie snack bag of popcorn. Right before my break, I wrote an angry letter to our union president which in turn helped me to go a full seven minutes on the trampoline on my break. Rage is such an AWESOME motivator I tell you. I can run on rage for a long time...I remember one time, I got in a HUGE fight with my mom before going to the gym and I ran on the treadmill for like, almost an hour. I was so busy going over different scenarios in my head of what I should have said and laughing at the cool, witty comments I thought of AFTER the fact that I didn't even realize how long I was running for. I wonder who I could try to get to piss me off every single time I need to do some cardio...anywho, was a little lax on the water department and started kind of late and only ended up with three tall glasses of water at work and half of the water in my bottle at the gym. Oh one other little baddy...also had a strawberry mango dacquiri with dinner. CONFESSION: I don't even feel guilty about that. I'm such a light-weight that a sip of this and that could make me feel weak in the knees and woozy. I downed the glass I had so fast and felt NOTHING which leads me to believe their rum bottles are full of WATER. Therefore if there was no alcohol in my drink, it doesn't really count as a confessionable sin. UGH, CONFESSION: I ate a Cadbury Moments chocolate bar before I went to Zumba class...would you believe me if I said it was for energy?

Bah! I'll try to up it up tomorrow...I think I've got a visitor on the way which is probably why I've been feeling yuckier than normal...excuses, excuses...

WORKING OUT TO:

Thats What You Get - Paramore

Day 11: Reality bites...

...and when it does, I usually bite back. Unfortunately, it's on a boston cream donut *groans* This week marks the upcoming visit of an unwanted visitor...

I wouldn't say that I was off the wagon again today, moreso than I...disregarded the wagon. I saw it driving on by and waved as I chomped on a drumstick.

Long weekends are hard. They're more fun than being at work and thinking that dieting is more fun. One less day in the office means that it's harder to force myself to drink water when I'm out and about doing things than when I'm sitting at my desk feeling my rear end spreading itself out in it's own little butt-groove in my office chair. It's even harder when your husband has decided to renovate the ENTIRE kitchen and rips out not only the hardwood floor (to tile), the counters (to tile and to make room for my brand spankin' new dishwasher - he got tired of me not doing the dishes! *LOL*) and the stove/oven (we got a countertop stovetop instead and will eventually get a built-in oven one of these days, it's not rush because I've lived here for almost two years and have probably used the oven once...to make interestingly shaped cupcakes for a bachelorette party...guess what the interesting shapes were...). We've had no way to cook any meals (besides our microwave plugged into the bathroom outlet...mmm..multitasking? *barf*) so we've been going out or inviting ourselves over to our families places. Besides that little french fry debacle yesterday, I've been keeping up with everything else.

Today, Bart and I had two poached eggs each. I used my new microwave egg cookers and they are AWESOME! Totally loving on those...for now I'll pretend that zapping my eggs using micro waves in thirty seconds is not at all disturbing. Had two pieces of toast and spread my poached eggs on them, sea salt and pepper and they were gone! Those will be breakfast tomorrow! After that we got busy with the kitchen (I am an EXCELLENT supervisor, lemme tell you. I supervised the renos AND got a book read and reviewed in that time as well!) and later on we went over to my aunt and uncle's place for a BBQ and fireworks (for those not pledging allegiance to a red maple leaf on your flag, today is Victoria Day = no work on a Monday! Good ol' Victoria...I raise a chicken drumstick to you as well!) The evening meal wasn't actually all that bad though...the chicken was done up on a rotisserie on my uncle's BBQ and it was DELICIOUS and I had a whole lot of SALAD and asparagus. CONFESSION: the salad was dressed with Rene's caesar dressing...and it wasn't the light kind *winces*. Which was probably why I was able to eat so much salad in the first place.

But whatevs! First long weekend with the new "diet" or goal to a better, healthier me and it's over and done with. Choices were made and the food consumed. I will not feel bad, but I will acknowledge that it wasn't the BEST of weekends and will hold myself accountable. I will make new goals for this week and will work to do better.

Tomorrow is back to work which means that I will be better able to control my consumption and water intake. Tomorrow's goal is to eat all three meals - especially breakfast and will have two healthy snacks in the morning and the afternoon. My goal is to return to my 'as much water as I can drink' goal which is roughly around 4 tall glasses of water from 8:30 am - 4:30 pm and I will get two 15-minute activities in (my trampoline-ing on morning and afternoon breaks). Tomorrow is also Tuesday which means Zumba class so there is an hour's worth of cardio. I will TRY very hard not to succumb to too many unnecessary water breaks and will vow to shake it like a polaroid picture.

Amen!

WORKING OUT TO:

Monkey Wrench - Foo Fighters

Day 9 & 10: It all works...

Now, I can see that this looks a bit contradictory. The cashier especially thought so when I plunked it down on the counter. *LOL* It also got me thinking about some things...

First of all, lemme just say that the chocolate isn't really technically for me. CONFESSION: My craft room has about 8 bars of chocolate right now. But the thing is, most of those chocolate bars have been in there for over a week now - and I haven't touched them! Well, I've touched them..but not to eat! This Crafty Loser likes to re-wrap chocolate bars with paper and make it look all cute more than she likes to EAT them! So when I was at Chapters for the purpose of picking up this book and saw the Moments chocolates (little individually wrapped confections are my crafty weakness) I thought they'd make a good thing to try and re-package all crafty-like.

Anywho...CONFESSION: I have been very, very bad this weekend! *deep breath* I fell off the wagon. *winces* I had french fries today with my breakfast! In my defence though...we usually always go out for breakfast after church on Sundays! And I always substitute french fries for my homefries because I'm not a big fan of homefries (except for calling people homefry) and I automatically ordered the substitution when the server came around. *cringe* But I ate them too since they were already ordered and right in front of me. But to help a little, I did invite Bart to partake in the eating of the fries which almost makes it not a bad thing because I probably had about three fries before I looked down at my plate and saw that the rest of them were already devoured. Besides being a popcorn hog, my husband is also a french fry monger - and today, a very useful diet aide! Anywho, not making excuses for myself...I was baaaad!

My mom and I did flowers for a wedding this weekend and we were so behind that we were still working at 4 am Saturday morning. For me, when I get really busy or focused on something, that means everything else goes right out the window. I took a half day on Friday and as soon as I left work, there was no drinking of the water. For dinner on that night we went to McDonald's for something quick and I got water but was so intent on the bouquet-making that I didn't even touch it. Saturday morning I made the delivery an hour out of town and came back home and slept. Until about 9 pm! Hence STILL no water drinking and no eating either! Bart came home from work with a pizza and we ate in bed and I promptly fell asleep after that! I've already confessed my Sunday transgression, so all in all..not a very good weekend - especially as lax as the diet already is! And exercise? Nada! Not even a little hippity-hop on the trampoline to make up for any of bad things I ate!

I was thinking this as I was wandering down the Health & Well-Being aisle at Chapters. There are a TON of diet books and there are a TON of exercise books. They even had exercise DVD's as well and from just standing there, who the heck would be able to choose just one? And I'm thinking to myself...ALL of these probably work. I reached for the Skinny Bitch Booty Bouncin' DVD and then put it back before I remembered I already have the whole series of Hip Hop Abs DVDs at home (I am SUCH a sucker for infomercials I tell you!) I also have Core Rhythms exercise DVDs, I also have the trampoline and the weights and a membership at the gym. I'm sure they ALL work at weight loss. The only problem is I'm not DOING them.

I'm thinking that's probably the problem with a lot of people trying to lose weight and it's just easier to blame it on the method we chose to lose weight. I got Hip Hop Abs and considered it money wasted because it didn't work and told everyone that it didn't work...conveniently leaving out the part that I only did it for like, a week before quitting (okay, seriously, the guy on it IRRITATED the living daylights out of me!) So even though I kind of fell off the wagon, I'm not going to quit. I'm going to get back up and try to do better this week instead of dwelling on the stuff I (didn't) do this week - starting with my book!

Here's what this crafty loser did when she got into her craft room with one of the packages of chocolates:

You know...for emergencies...*grins*

That's it for me, off to read about how to be a skinny bitch! Will let you know how it is!

WORKING OUT TO:

Dirty Little Secret - The All-American Rejects

Day 8: Punch, Drink, Kick, Drink, Jab, Drink...

...are you seeing some sort of pattern forming? Let me tell you, that pattern right there is the only reason why I'm still ALIVE, I tell ya! I can't even believe a week went by that fast. Wasn't it only yesterday that I was punch, kick, jabbing? And all of a sudden I'm doing it again?!

Even though my burning calf muscles, thighs, abs, back, shoulders, arms, wrists, toes, nailbeds and hair follicles are telling me different, I did actually do much better this time around than last week. I think I was able to last a bit longer throughout the different combos and take less pretend water breaks (plus I think the instructor was beginning to catch on since I did it so many times last week...*LOL*) She's a tough one, she actually yelled out "COME ON! This is what you came here FOOOOR! Why did you come if you're not going to GIIIIIVE IT?! Don't you dare stop unless you actually really NEED TO!" I was too busy gasping for breath and trying to see around the black spots dancing around my field of vision to yell at her that I DID NEED TO! I'm going to keep going and not complain too much about it...but I'm just saying...if I get attacked in an alley or something, I better be able to throw down punch, hook, jab and drop kick the living daylights out of that moron without breaking a sweat. If that karate kid was able to learn how to beat people up after waxing on and waxing off, then I should be able to do it no problem...I'm just saying...

ANYWHO! That's that with the exercise part. From absolutely ZERO activity (unless you count my arm movement when I bring the food to mouth) to cardio twice in one week, I'd say I'm giving myself two thumbs up!

That towel right there has SWEAT on it. LOTS! And that water bottle is EMPTY! (2 parts pretending to need a water break and drinking the water and 1 part actually just needing to drink the water - but whatevs, the same goal is accomplished anyway! I will be very proud of the day when I'll get through class without having to feign a water break, though...)

The diet portion is going pretty well too! After that not-so-great start on Monday, yesterday went awesome! I ate my breakfast, had to force myself to eat my snack (sometimes I actually do enough work that I'll forget my break - CONFESSION: we were stuffing bills today so I was actually reading the Breaking Dawn eBook while stuffing which is the actual reason why I almost forgot to eat my snack - and I feel okay with announcing on my blog that I was reading because I was SIMULTANEOUSLY doing ACTUAL work at the same time. MULTITASKERS are AWESOME!) I totally got sidetracked, where was I? Oh right, so for lunch I wasn't so good (but didn't cheat) and ended up having a burger from Harvey's (I've been eating too many burgers lately, methinks...) but just the burger. No fries, no pop. I took the burger back to the office and ate that with my tall glass of water and my delicious salad. Ate my afternoon snack of non-fat yogurt and cereal for crunch and went to the cardio kickboxing class! Came home and ate pork souvlaki and mashed potatoes. All of these are STILL ten times better than how I used to eat before, so I'm feeling good about everything! I did go a bit lax on the water drinking today. I was only able to get in two glasses at work (even though I've already read it, Breaking Dawn is STILL such a good entertaining read!) but I made up for it at the gym during my water "breaks" and after!

So that's Day 8 and I'm feelin' GREAT! I haven't really been weighing myself (can't seem to find a scale I actually trust) so I'm going to use a different method for now. Yesterday, Bart and I were cleaning out our closets and I found a pair of jeans. These are THE TEST PAIR of jeans that I will be using. I tried to put them on last night and it fit pretty good everywhere else except for the fact that I couldn't get them done up. So every few weeks or so, I'll put on the TEST JEANS and see what's what...after I'm able to get them done up, I'll know that I'm on the right track!

I think this may be the longest I've ever stayed on any kind of diet plan...so I'm definitely going to stick with it! How're you doing?

WORKING OUT TO:

Just Like A Pill - Pink

Day 6 & 7: Where did my hip go?

...I can't find it. I think I must have dislocated it sometime yesterday while I was shakin' what my mama gave me.

Who knew that intentionally acting all loose and hippy could be so freakin' painful! *LOL* I got nothin' on Shakira, lemme tell ya, the woman must not have any bones or vertebrae or something! My hips can't possibly lie, they're dislocated.

Okay, so whining aside, the class was actually pretty AWESOME! I think I got more cardio in than I did with the kickboxing/martial arts class - or it could have been that I had a tiny bit more energy/stamina to give 'er a little more. Whatever the case, I was movin' and a-shakin' and a-shimmyin' like nobody's business! I think I must have shook too hard though because things were starting to hurt halfway through class! It's weird too...there were some moves that the instructor was wanting us to do that I found a lot harder in a class...although much easier to do in a dance club...with alcohol. Maybe next week, we can get slightly smashed first and then go to the class. I'll out-shake that instructor then! *LOL*

Anywho, Day 6 of the three-step diet was actually pretty hard for me. I think after the weekend of being slightly naughty, I was having a hard time. I ate breakfast and sensible snacks throughout the day, but I wanted MORE!

Confession: I ended up eating POTATO CHIPS! *gasp* I know...and worse than that, I ate more than what the package said to eat for 140 calories. *winces* Ah well, the extra salt helped me down more water, but of course, more salt helps my body RETAIN more water, so it pretty much cancels each other out.

I did find that I did much better yesterday (Day 7) and didn't need to snack extra. I did my breakfast (sausage breakfast sandwich), snack (one snack slice of cheese) and for lunch I had two pieces of chicken from Mary Browns and with that I ate a salad that I brought from home which was DELICIOUS! Normally when I eat Mary Browns I go for the whole shebang of chicken, TATERS and GRAVY (oh my gosh...) and a pop, but eating JUST the chicken left me feeling pretty good. So all in moderation to help me build up to being even better at choosing the right foods! Trust me, for the crap that I USED to eat, just those two pieces of chicken is already like, a breakthrough for me. *LOL* Anywho, had four glasses of water throughout the day and another bottle at the gym (again, I had to resort to my trusty "go-for-water-breaks-to-stop-the-BURNING-PAIN-in-my-muscles" technique. For those who are new to exercising, I highly recommend this method...) and of course on my breaks at work I was able to jog around on the trampoline in my co-worker's office. So all in all, I'm feeling pretty good about Day 7! I know if I can keep this up, little by little, I can get better and better!

Anywho, here's an idea of the "recipe" for the salad I had at lunch today:

Catherine's Sweet Cranberry Salad
(by sweet I mean sweet-tasting, not just me loving all over myself and naming my recipes with ego-boosting names...)

Lettuce blend with julienne carrots (this was already pre-packaged, I got it from Costco, I think)
Dried cranberries
Chopped walnuts
Light raspberry vinaigrette dressing made from extra virgin olive oil - or EVOO as Rachel Ray likes to say (Kraft)

That's it! Nothing else needed and it is soooo YUMMY! I didn't mix the salad and the dressing together. I had the dressing in a separate container and kind of just dipped my fork into the dressing before grabbing up a bunch of the salad. The dressing is flavorful enough that a little really does go a long way - and that's ALSO saying something because remember, this girl is a more is MORE kind of girl. I like EXTRA sauce on everything!

And here's another recipe that came to mind when Marti busted out with her awesome salsa! I'm not a big fan of salsa the regular ol' way (like the Old el Paso stuff in the jars *wrinkle face*) but I do like this version:

Catherine's Strawberry-Mango Salsa
I don't know why I'm calling all the recipes "Catherine's" I didn't invent them...but I figure it's half my blog, I can name them mine if I feel like it - plus these recipes do come with my form of variation...

• 1 yellow mango (the sweeter the better, I usually use the small yellow ones and not the larger red/green mangos for this recipe) diced
• Strawberries - quartered
• Scallions - chopped pretty fine, it doesn't really matter, you can chop them however you like
• Finely chopped jalapenos (I get mine in the Old el Paso jars that are already pre-sliced. I usually use about 3 - 4 of those, but you can use it to your taste...the slightly spicy with all the sweet is SO GOOD!)
• Squirt of lemon juice (don't you love how precise my recipes are?)
• Salt and pepper to taste

Just like Marti's salsa, these are awesome with pita chips or tortilla chips or with fish (I love this with tilapia).

Confession: None of those pictures are actually mine, so that's not EXACTLY what my food looks like after I've done butchering chopping them. Photos courtesy of Google Images.

Anywho, that's it for me today, it looks like I've been going on for quite a while now with this post. It must be all the extra energy that I've got now that I'm on my way to living a healthier more active life! *LOL* If you've decided to try out this three-step diet business with Marti and I, I hope things are going just as swimmingly for you! Please definitely let us know how it's going! Marti and I looooove comments. Okay fine, I guess it's not really fair for me to speak for Marti (or hide behind her) so I'll go ahead and just say it: I LOOOOOOVE COMMENTS!

WORKING OUT TO:

Hips Dont Lie - Shakira

Day 4-5: Oh the weekend...

...was HARD! Good thing that I wasn't being super strict on myself to begin with or I would have fallen off the wagon already. I would have been RUN OVER by the wagon more like it!

CONFESSION: I ate one of those small double cheeseburgers from McDonald's. Which I know according to my goals is OKAY and I shouldn't feel bad since I didn't have any fries or pop...but I ate two of them. *LOL* I don't even feel bad...they were SO GOOD!

Anywho! Besides that little bit of greasy goodness, the weekend wasn't really that bad. I might have been a little bit naughty, but it's hard when there's events! I went to my friend's bridal shower and munched on the finger foods (vegetables, dip, etc.) and was reaching for the pop bottle when I remembered that I wasn't allowed to have pop, so I finished two bottles of water while I was there. Bart dragged me off to see Star Trek (which I'll have to admit now was VERY good considering I have never seen one full Star Trek episode at ALL!) and we shared our usual bag of popcorn and instead of pop, I had a bottle of Dasani water - which should already totally show my dedication since I think Dasani is DISGUSTING! That double osmosis thing is crap, the water tastes YUCKY! I don't feel that bad about the popcorn either, because sharing popcorn with Bart is like...survival of the fittest. If you dont' eat fast enough, it'll be gone by the second time you reach for another handful! *LOL*

Sunday was a bit hard, but I think I drank enough water and managed to get full before I went crazy. Celebrating Mother's Day with two mom's at two different houses where BOTH have food is HARD! Still no pop and no french fries either so everything else was fair game! BWAHAHAHAA....but I was trying to be good and I only had dessert at one house - and even then, I shared it with Bart and I've already explained to you what that was like!

Both Saturday and Sunday I was able to get in a little bit of exercise time in intermittently. These are now my new exercise buddies:

These things are AWESOME! I am having a freaking blast with the trampoline! It's fun and easy enough that I'm starting to wonder if I'm actually getting actual exercise! *LOL* But I really am, my accelerated heart rate and tons of sweat pouring down my face tell me so, so there! *sticks tongue out* I think I was a little over-zealous the first time I hopped on the trampoline with my new weights. I got all into the jogging with the arm movements that I accidentally smacked myself in the face with one of the weights...

So that was my first weekend right there, hopefully it will keep progressing better and better. I've sat with three people who ate french fries RIGHT IN FRONT of me and I didn't buckle once! The way that fast food and greasy fries had been making me feel before I started my diet has me feeling like I'm missing NOTHING by cutting them out of my diet. So already I really am noticing a difference after the first week! Bart and I eat out so many times that it had gotten to the point where RIGHT after we would finish eating - or sometimes even during - I'd start feeling REALLY bad and my stomach would be all rebelling and having a temper tantrum and the whole nine yards. I'll just leave it at that it wasn't a very pretty picture and I won't go into it more than that...but ever since I've cut out the grease and Bart and I have been trying to eat more home-cooked meals, I've been feeling pretty fantastic and not so tired! Am I sounding a little like an infomercial?

It's snack time for me, so I'm gonna skidaddle! Quaker Oatmeal to Go has got me ALL over it!

Have an awesome day, everyone!

P.S. So whatcha think about the new background?! *LOL* It's a little ironic, no? We LOVE IT!

WORKING OUT TO:

Hollaback Girl - Gwen Stefani