I'm going to track what I eat and see just how much I put into my body and how many calories I don't burn.
What sparked this you may ask? Well, I was cleaning my room a bit and found two Walmart gift cards. Each had $10 on it. Now if you know me, I never go to Walmart. It's not that I have anything against it, I'd just rather go to the target that's two minutes from it. This target is kept much cleaner, it's less crowded, and the I know the isles like the back of my hand. So instead of fighting the madness that is my local Walmart (trust me, parking is TERRIBLE as is just getting into and maneuvering through the store) I went online. I had been hearing about this video, 30 day shred with Jillian Michaels for a while now. It was almost like free money (I've had these giftcards since AT LEAST Christmas, maybe even Christmas of 2007) I figured why not. I bought that and another Jillian Michaels one, No More Trouble Zones. I paid less than $5 out of my pocket for those with shipping.
This then sparked a memory of the time I had picked up one of The Hungry Girl books, 200 under 200...or something like that at Barnes and Nobles. I didn't buy it (just for the simple fact that I knew I could find it online cheaper- and I was right). Basically, it's a collection of 200 recipes under 200 calories. I went on Amazon, and then Ebay, and found it a lot cheaper than Barnes and Noble. That's probably going to be my bible for a little bit. Something else that's going to be helpful, the Omron HBF-306C Fat Loss Monitor. On payday, I'm going to buy this baby:
Image from Amazon.com
It'll calculate my fat for me and show me how much fat I'm burning as opposed to me just seeing if the numbers on the scale are dropping. They say muscle weighs more than fat, so I think it'll help keep me motivated if I see the body fat percentage drop even if the numbers on the scale remains the same.
I'm going to take before pictures tonight, because I know I'll look essentially the same come Monday of next week, and I don't know if I'll have time next week.
The plan of attack - Use one of the 800 binders I have just laying around as my weight loss binder. Yes, I'm anal like that. I'm gonna make the cover all pretty probably (gotta throw in a little craftiness you know?) and keep my food diary, fitness diary, maybe a few notes in there, and some favorite low fat/low calorie recipes. That way I'll know where everything is.
Exercise plan - Hopefully, I'll do 30 day Shred every day (it's only 20 minutes) go to the gym Tuesdays and Thursdays and do the treadmill and some weights. And then do No More Trouble Zones Monday Wednesday and Fridays. Sort of confusing I know. I'll probably have to change it up a little so it works for me. But that's what I'm going to start with.
I know this is extremely long, but one more thing before I go. During my search for printable fitness logs and calorie logs, I came across this awesome site, http://sparkpeople.com . I signed up with a fake email address at first, just to get access to the logs, however once I saw all of the stuff they had, I went back right away and signed up with my real email and user name. It has this whole thing that sets you up with a goal (or you can choose to not set one). You can either do how much weight you want to lose by a certain date, or chose a date and see how much weight you should/could lose by then. I chose a date right around when the boys coming home so that I can work my butt off to reach that goal. I've only received one email from them so far, so they apparently aren't all about sending you 900 emails either. I haven't had the time to sit down and completely explore the site, but I have seen some of it. You get to virtually spin a wheel every day that you log in. Most days you'll only see points on the wheel, but some days there will be little prizes like a water bottle or a t-shirt. I have no idea what the accumulation of points does... I think it shows up as different trophies? I'm probably wrong though.
They also have message boards and groups to join. I'm in the dog lovers group, one of the 20 something groups, and a few others. I haven't posted to the message board or any of the groups yet. One thing that I didn't like, but was able to easily (really easily) rectify was that the default setting for the message boards is that the newest posting was on top. I looked around for just a minute and found the little link/setting thing to change that. There's lots of healthy recipes on there as well as other little helpful odds and ends. I'm very excited to start really using the site and seeing what else it has to offer. I guess I better enjoy eating whatever I want and how much I want while I can!
Next post I'll share my goals!
