200+ (Week 38) Sizzlin' Through Summer

armyrangermom

Thanks for the welcome! This site is awesome. I only walked 3 times last week for almost 3 miles. This week I would like to do 5 days. It's challenging enough because I need to get up at 5:30 to do this, but I'm also going to be out of town Thursday and Friday. Thanks again. I appreciate the support. This time seems different.

justahorsen

Mind if you have another newcomer? I have been going up and down with the same .6 lbs for a couple of weeks, but today decided to "take the bull by the horns". My son-in-law (Neil) left for Iraq yesterday (2nd tour) so I started the "nervous" eating with all the worrying I'll be doing for the next year, and of course, the sympathy eating for my daughter and her "alone-ness". See the pattern???
I really want to find a exercise or two that I can sub for the eating....any suggestions for quick/easy short burst workouts that I can do anywhere...work, or home? I sometimes now will just squat a little and do "punches" (like on the 30 day shred) to speed up the heart rate and help me avoid the vending machines.....and I don't care if I look "goofy" standing in my office throwing punches for 30 seconds to a minute if it works....So does anyone have anything else I can try? ooohh and I work in an office in a factory so I wear jeans and blouses to work so I don't have to worry about exercising in skirts.

armyrangermom

My oldest son left for Afghanistan last Monday, his second tour too. His girlfriend is also going through the alone-ness. However, she was the one to inspire me. She just lost 22 pounds and looks awesome. Where is your son-in-law stationed?

I'm just going to walk for a couple weeks. I'm lucky that I have a park on the way to work that has a 2.75 path. I would like to work up to a 5K. The local running club here has a Women's Walk/Run 10-week training program that starts tomorrow. I'm looking forward to going to the open house and seeing what it involves.

sobriety_16

hey everyone im Julie.

pennylbunch

Hey guys, Julie (above) is my niece, she's a great person and a wonderful mother to her baby Wesley! Welcome Julie!

Julie cooked dinner for me tonight and the entire meal was under 400 calories, don't remember exactly how much, but its in my food list. It was good too! amazing to find that you can eat healthy, and loose weight and it can TASTE good too! And here I thought I would be eating salads for the rest of my life! We left Julie's after eating and walked off the calories at Walmart checking out calories on everything we passed and laughed at each other alot. It was fun, I had a great time, picked up some low cal snacks and got a chance to plan a few meals for next week!

It's great to have someone you know do this with you!

KendalBeee

hm....trying to get my pictures up here but its late and I'm not thinking straight...here's the link to my sparkler/flashlight pics :bigsmile: :bigsmile: :bigsmile: :bigsmile: :bigsmile:


http://www.flickr.com/photos/47290679@N05/

pinbotchick

Welcome to Julie and Justahorsen (*imagine flowers*) I can't get smileys to work from the iPhone.

Kendal - I'm almost tempted to get out of bed to see the pics but good sense says stay in bed and try to go back to sleep. I'll look tomorrow.

Why have I been up since 3 am??? Must be the rain storm. At least DH got 3 loads of laundry done today. Have I told you about the washer trouble? It went on the fritz last weekend. I called the repair guy and he was coming over Tues morning to fix it. Mr Brilliant (aka DH) messed with machine and claimed it was fixed so I cancelled the repairman. Mr. Brilliant has 2 left thumbs - I was a bit skeptical but he kept insisting it was working. By Wed night, he admitted things weren't going as planned. He cont to tinker. By the time the in-laws arrived we have piles of dirty laundry every where. Thank goodness FIL helped. They finally decided it's the pump (rolls eyes). Of cousre it's Sunday so the part hasn't even been ordered yet (rolls eyes). Who knows when it will be fixed. So DH calls my mom and sweet talks her into doing 3 loads of our laundry at her house - gotta love moms. Is it sad I was more worried about workout clothes than work clothes?? DH is planning a load a night at moms until we catch up. The sheet and towel pile is huge.

I'm going to try for more shut eye. Have to up in 2 hours for my bike ride - I hope this rain stops or I'll be running on the treadmill.

pinbotchick

PS - great job on cooking Julie. What did you make? I'm always looking for more tasty, lo-cal recipies.

Penny - it's great that you've found a someone to keep you accountable.

Armyrangermom - good luck with the running. Deciding to do C25K was the best decision (other than joining MFP) I've made. Speed doesn't matter - just get out and do it.

Justahorsen - it's nice to see someone else from MI. I like your profile pic.

anvy0530

Morning ladies (I guess it's still night in the states but it's morning here!). I got up and was going to do my C25K but it was just too danged hot (It was already 80 at 7 am!). So I cleaned my house instead. And it was STILL too danged hot! I was vacuuming the stairs and sweat was pouring off my face as if I was working out! I just cannot get the hang of this summery weather. For the past 5 years, I lived in Monterey, CA and it rarely went over 75 degrees - even in summer (and I LOVED it). Southern Germany is waaaayyyy hotter than Monterey. And...there's no air conditioning...yuck! But I'll get my Insanity workout in this evening. It helps that my husband does the workout with me. I like knowing that someone is expecting me to show up for the workout, it keeps me accountable. Plus, he's in a lot better shape than I am (being in the military does that to you) so my competitiveness keeps me pushing hard to keep up with him.

Victoria: I hope you got back to sleep. We had a thunderstorm the likes of which I've never seen before last week at about 4 am. It freaked my dog out and my son climbed into our bed cuz the lightening and thunder "kept him up". The rain came down in sheets (I actually thought it was pretty cool) and it kept the whole house up for at least 2 hours in the middle of the way early monring - we made up for it by sleeping in until 10 am (It was a Saturday, thank goodness). I hope your washer gets fixed. Not being able to do laundry is miserable.

Have a great day!

anvy0530

Kendal – Wow! Those pictures are amazing. How do you get the sparklers to show up so well? What kind of camera do you have?

Penny & Julie – It so nice you have each other to support you on your weight loss journey. It’s always nice to have someone make a tasty and healthy meal for you – that’s awesome.

Justahorsen: Where in Iraq is your son-in-law going? My husband is gearing up for a deployment to Iraq at the end of the year <sigh>. He’ll be in the Green Zone basically in an office the entire time but it still stresses me out. When I was working in an office last year, I would walk around the block for 10 minutes or walk up & down the stairs for a bit to get some extra exercise. You could also do some stretches in your chair/office, which would help with flexibility and stress.

Armyrangermom: I started exercising by walking. I was recovering from blood clots in my lungs at the beginning of 2009 and my pulmonologist told me that I absolutely HAD to get at least 10 minutes of walking every day. So I plodded along, barely able to breathe due to the damage to my lungs, every day. I ran a 5K this past February (at a snail’s pace but I finished so I was happy with that). I’m still working on getting faster & running farther but it all started with walking 10 minutes a day & building from there.

Kristina: What did you think of the World Cup game? I thought the reffing was a bit …er, off (but what else is new) but I was happy with the outcome. All my German neighbors were rooting for Spain (for some reason the Germans don’t really like the Dutch but I can’t get them to tell me why…it’s just the way it is…weird.)

justahorsen

hello everyone and Happy Monday....

Pinbotchick....the picture is from the NASA site. they have some of the most wonderful pictures from satelites.

My SIL is in Baghdad for the next year. At least this time he is in a room doing whatever he does and not driving his Bradley like he did the last time he was there. But you still worry.....

akasullengal

Happy Monday! Welcome to all the newbies! Just jump right on in!

Victoria- nice work with the gardening and then biking this morning! Hopefully the laundry situation gets remedied in the near future.

Justahorsen- I'm a Michigander (well, transplant) also!

Anvy- I thought the game was good. I wasn't rooting for anyone in particular, and just had it on in the background- nice thing to have on during a relaxing Sunday.

The rain/thunder last night was pretty intense and kept me up for a while. Work shouldn't be terribly bad today (*knocks on wood*). I've got a birthday lunch at Panera this afternoon, but I think I can keep my calories under control there. Today on the training schedule: strength+stretch. Plan on doing some arm free weights and a pilates dvd when I get home today. Need to keep the eating under control as, while I feel great after doing pilates, it isn't exactly a calorie burner like running or the elliptical is.

KendalBeee

have any of you weighed yourself before you pee and then weighed again after? How much did you lose? I did that this morning.....weighed before I realized I needed to go and then weighed again right after I did. I lost .8 and that just doesn't seem right- it seems like way too much to lose from peeing. It wasn't an omg-my-bladder-is-so-full-if-i-don't-go-right-now-i-will-pee-my-pants type of situation. I even weighed twice when I saw that it dropped that much and got the same thing.
any thoughts?

sobriety_16

i made some butterfly pork chops, cooked them on the stove in a little water so they wouldnt dry out, tried to brown them, with no butter lol, and seasoned them, some lima beans with very little butter and some cucumbers and canlaloupe. It was not my best, but it was good i guess. Its really hard to cook stuff with low calories and still have it taste good. Breakfast today was my biggest challenge. How do you just have one cup of cereal? that was NOT easy. But i told my aunt i would do this with her to make it easier, and ive been trying to lose weight anyway, just didnt realize how hard it is to eat healthier, espically when i have a 2 year old lol. Normally i just eat whatever he eats.... but i guess hes gonna start eating healthier to, he discovered yesterday he loves quaker caramel rice cakes, and they only have 50 calories. My main problem now is finding stuff i can bring to work with me to eat lol, sonic is right across the street, soooo tempting.

KendalBeee

My main problem now is finding stuff i can bring to work with me to eat lol, sonic is right across the street, soooo tempting.

I have a desk job so I keep a drawer full of snacks ready (granola bars, 100 cal popcorn bags, jello pudding, 4 pack of cookie/cracker things, goldfish...). I eat a bowl of cereal and a yogurt for breakfast. and yes, 1 cup is hardly enough to taste the cereal, so sometimes I eat 1.5 or 2 cups. I try to find cereal with the most protein so it keeps me full and an acceptable amount of cals. For lunch I bring leftovers or make a sandwich. There's a grocery store around the corner that has a self serve salad bar so maybe once a week or so I'll go make a really big salad. I also keep a thing of Starkist Lunch-to-go in my drawer in case I forget to bring my lunch or just don't feel like preparing it the night before. We have a cafeteria litterally across the hall from my department and its very very tempting to just go over there and have Tony make me a grilled cheese and fries. Today's special is a Supreme Quesadilla and fries. But dang thats a lot of calories. Other things I bring with me to eat are apples, bananas, string cheese and more yogurt (one for breakfast and one for lunch). I have a refrigerator and a microwave available so I'm pretty lucky in that aspect. You could also try a frozen meal maybe once a week. Don't depend on those too much cause they have really high sodium and aren't as nutricious as fresh food.

pinbotchick

Good morning super pals!!! I finally made it back to sleep and then about killed the alarm for going off at 6:30. Hit snooze and rushed to get out the door for my ride. We took a new path with less hills and went farther. I'm taking most of Friday off for a trip to Canada so work is super busy with 8 clients today. I won't be home until 7. I did pack healthy snacks/lunch.

Amy - are you getting do much site-seeing. I'd love to visit Germany someday.

Julie - i rarely use measuring cups any more. My $20 food scale measures in grams so I put the bowl, plate, bread, etc on the scale and weigh out the serving. The grams are normally in ( ) next to the cup size. If I'm adding multi items, the scale tares out (resets to zero) with a button push. Making salads are easy now. I bet your son may not even realize the transition to healthy eating.

What lo-cal foods have you found?

Joseph pita bread 60 cal from walmart near the deli... Orville redenbacher low fat microwave popcorn 15 cal per cup. 4 cup = 1/2 bag and fills me up. I've been making brown rice in the steamer and adding my own spices to flavor it - by doubling the water, it cones out sticky like white rice (DH loves it). Baking fish topped with garlic and pineapple. This weekend, I used the crockpot for taco cabbage soup 140 cal for 200 gr which fills small bowl.

Gotta run to see my next client.

anvy0530

Victoria: I lived in Germany about 10 years ago and so I have visited a lot of Europe. Italy is my absolute favorite! This time around, we are planning a lot of trips around Germany but haven't started yet as we have just barely gotten our stuff & gotten settled. We have gone to a festival in Stuttgart (think: mini-Oktoberfest) and gone to the Stuttgart botanical garden & zoo (absolutely beautiful and quite a good hike too!). This coming weekend, our village is celebrating it's 700th anniversary (that's right, my little village is waaaay older than the United States - it's pretty cool) so we will be going to the festivities. Happily enough, I am not a huge fan of German food (schnitzel & sausages are soooo not my thing) so I think I'll have no problem staying within my calories (as long as I stay away from the baked goods - German bakeries are sinful!). My village is right on the edge of a huge nature park (forest & stuff) so I only have to walk down the street to go for a beautiful bike ride/walk/hike so I've been exploring quite a bit. I LOVE it here.

pennylbunch

Happy Monday all! I got a new puppy this weekend, he is a Catahoula Curr/Jack Russll Terrier mix, absolutely adorable! Our other dog, Rose, is a lab/retriever mix has finally gotten used to having him around, and has learned to play gently with "Moke" I am hoping that by having to train a new dog it will get me off my butt and away from the computer and tv more. It's a beautliful morning, finally NOT raining here in SW Louisiana, and I was thinking about going for a walk with Julie this evening, IF I haven't "over done it" again by then. My health issues are not allowing me a lot exercise lately, but I figure any is better than nothing! I have found that Yoga is doable for me, without being to strenuous or over taxing me! One of my all time favorite past times has always been shopping, but since the stroke, I just don't have the energy anymore for much of that! Very depressing, but I am finding other, new things, like yoga, to take up that past time, and the DH loves that I am not spending as much money lol. Have a great day everyone, I plan too!

Laceylala

WOW so many new posts and people!! Almost overwhelming to respond to you all!!

Amy - do you speak any german? Or write it I should say? I took two years of german in college and some of my customers are from Germany so I get the chance every once in a while to use my very elementary skills. One of these days I will get over there!

Sobriety - it takes time to get your diet in order but I can garantee you that if you get your two year old to eat the same things you do, and not the other way around, you will have an easier time. My almost 4 year old daughter just eats what we do..I stopped buying the chicken nuggets, etc. for her and now she never even asks for the stuff and looks forward to all the fruits and veggies over the white carby crap she used to get at her old day care and at home once in a while.
I too have a desk job and have about ten different things to eat in my drawer. From Target I have the Archer Farms Simply Balanced strawberry crackers and asiago pepper crackers, I have dried chile mango strips, small bits of chocolate, etc. I also make a meal plan for a week and eat the same thing at lunch each day. And I usually bring enough food with me to last a couple days at a time to take the "thinking" out of the dieting while at work. I try to make it as mindless as possible. It really helps.

Okay ladies, I am BACK to tracking my food this morning and I am going to the gym after work. Yeay me. Time to get going again...I need it. I carb binged yesterday after having a pretty crap day on Saturday.

sobriety_16

i ended up bringing a few light yougurt cups, some fat free pudding, rice cakes, cantaloupe and cucumbers with me, with like 10 bottles of water, that should last a few days, and not to bad a lunch i guess lol.

akasullengal

Like many of you, I have a desk job as well, and always bring snacks with me. It can still be hard, as people bring naughty things to work. I also see it as helpful, as if I make bad things (i.e. the break and bake cookies I bought this weekend. ugh), I just take a few for home, and bring the rest in, and voila! they're gone. For breakfast I usually have cereal (right around the serving size- I know it's not a lot!), and fruit, or I'll have a greek yogurt and fruit. Lunch is usually a cold salad I've made that weekend, or sometimes a Lean Cuisine (watch the sodium though). Dinner is usually something I whip up with lots of veggies or a dish I've made over the weekend and have leftovers. I always have stuff available at work though (yogurt, veggies, laughing cow+crackers, bite size chocolate (if I REALLY need it)), and I'm usually okay. Also pound the water back during the day which helps.

Hope everyone's day is going well!

Laceylala

i ended up bringing a few light yougurt cups, some fat free pudding, rice cakes, cantaloupe and cucumbers with me, with like 10 bottles of water, that should last a few days, and not to bad a lunch i guess lol.

Rice cakes with a bit of peanutbutter on them is a super filling snack and has always seemed more like a treat to me than a snack.

anvy0530

Laceylala: Ich spreche ein bisschen Deutch. I live in a village with only German neighbors (no Americans other than us!) so I am picking up on it quite quickly. I took 2 years of German 10 years ago but lost it all when I joined the Air Force as a linguist and learned Vietnamese. It's slooooowly coming back. I can get around, introduce myself, get directions, order food, find the bathroom, and buy stuff in German. I hope to be able to carry on a meaningful conversation at some point, but I'm not there yet. :laugh:

Laceylala

For those who want a few new super tasty deliciousness and easy recipes to make (kristina), here you go:

Corn Soup - I bought the Chipotle Chile's in Adobo sauce and used three. I should have used two of them. Holy hotness!
http://userealbutter.com/2009/09/17/grilled-corn-chilpotle-soup-recipe/

A-mazing noodle salad with peanut sauce. I use rice noodles instead. I also make the peanut sauce ahead of time and use it for other things too. oh, I also usually don't use hardly any oil in it. Trying to save on cals, I'd personally rather eat them in pb.
http://www.ezrapoundcake.com/archives/5832

And lastly, pineapple curried rice. I add bbq pork to it, but have also used savory tofu in it for a meatless version.
http://chowvegan.com/2009/11/08/curried-pineapple-rice/

Also Kristina - if you look at the chowvegan.com site, she/he lists a ton of other vegan food related blogs that you might find some good recipes on. My fav thing about food blogs is that there are always lots of nearly step by step pics that help you on the way so you know what it "should" look like.

akasullengal

Lacey- great recipes! I will have to try them out!

Hope everyone's day went well. I did a circuit training dvd tonight instead of pilates, but it included a fair bit of weights and some stretching, so I will count it as my "stretch and strength" day. On the agenda for tomorrow: 3 miler. Will have to get up early again (ugh), but it is nice to have it out of the way in the morning. I have a meeting on campus later in the day, so probably won't walk to work- or maybe I will, pick up my car at lunch. Try and get a bit more of walking in, even though roundtrip it's just under a mile. Anything helps!

Should be a relatively good eating day as well. As y'all may have seen in my status update, I tried Oikos' caramel greek yogurt. Holy hell that is amazing. A great dessert- I had it as a late afternoon snack and it totally hit the spot. Might have to get it again (They come in a 4-pack). Had some yummy veggie soup tonight for dinner. Will be ready for a good run tomorrow. Hopefully my time will be decent again as well. The last three miler I did I broke the 12 minute mark, which is great for that distance for me. Want to keep on improving my speed.

Night everyone!

pinbotchick

I'm tired and ready to drop. Finally got home at 8:15 from work DH made thin crust pizza using 110 cal tortilla.

I'm falling asleep as I type so obest the rat

Laceylala

I went to the gym and ended up having to leave early because I couldn't breathe. Again. I don't know what it is blooming right now that Is causing it and luckily it didn't Last long this time but how frustrating. So that was about 25 minutes and then we took Gracie swimming for an hour so that too counts for some cals. So all in all, not bad.

But now I'm tired and about ready to go to bed!

anvy0530

Lacey – your recipes look fabulous. I’ll have to try them out next week when I make my new weekly menu. Bummer about your allergies keeping you from getting your workout in like you wanted. But swimming is good – I need to find a freibad around here and get some swimming in too – I LOVE swimming.

Kristina – I have had that caramel greek yogurt, doesn’t it feel like you are totally cheating?!?!?! Good luck on your 3 mile run. I’m still just trying to get though running for 25 minutes straight and my time is pathetic but I’ve got hope that some day I’ll get faster.

Victoria – Getting home at 8:15 pm from work is rough. I hope you don’t have to do that every day!

I started today out great. I did Week 6 Day 3 of C25K (25 minutes of running – wow!). My heart rate monitor said I burned 900 calories in 35 minutes but I just couldn’t buy that – it seemed really high. Granted, my heart rate hung out between 160-170 the whole time but…900? That’s like an insanity workout.

Then, my sweet 7 year old made me breakfast. He made scrambled eggs on a whole wheat English muffin with some melted cheese. I love that kid! We’re starting the day out great. Hope everyone has a great day.

akasullengal

Lacey- sorry you had to leave the gym early. I'm still proud of you for even going!

Anvy- way to go with the running. I don't wear a HRM, but it's possible you burnt a crapton if you're heart was going that fast. I usually just put what the treadmill of MFP says I burned, but it can be much more. In fact, I track my runs/exercise on dailymile.com (LOVE!- it's like facebook for exercising), and that, according to my weight and speed said I burned just over 600 calories with my run this morning. Though, I still just counted the 427 MFP said. As you keep at it, you will get faster. My speed has not been something I've focused on. I've always been more about the distance or amount of time I can run before stopping (that's how I did c25k- by time, not distance). But, as I've continued to run, I've gotten faster. For instance, in March was my first 5k outside running. My time was around a 13:30 mile. Now I'm hovering around the 12 min mile. Just keep at it, and it'll get easier. Also, I've found that some speed training on the treadmill can help. I don't enjoy the treadmill but it's a good way to up the speed for shorter bursts of time and be able to see actually how fast you're going. Oh and glad you liked the caramel yogurt as well. I might have to bring another today as an afternoon treat!

VIctoria- wow- long day for you. Hope you slept well!

Just got back from running. It was surprisingly easier to get my butt up this morning. A 3 miler (3.1 miles) done this morning in 38 minutes. As I don't time myself super closely (just by the minute), I was somewhere within a minute of this run last week, so I'm happy with it. And glad I'm done for the day with exercise. Week 2, Day 2 is done! Now, off to get ready for another fun-filled day at the office.

makeitallsue

Hello SuperPals.....I finally was able to stay on line long enough to find you...and here another week is almost gone!
I've had internet troubles, plus we've been really busy with baseball playoffs and now football has started too!
The heat has really been high, with humidity, I have been holding water too, TOM paid his visit and our family had an entire ice cream cake in just 3 days.....a big ice cream cake too, not the tiny one!
I have been hitting the insanity workouts pretty well, fell right back into place with the exercise.....but my eating has been a little indulgent.....need to get back on track there.....my weight was up this past week...but I'm sure it was food choices and TOM issues.

Welcome everyone new, look forward to getting to know you .....