Good morning ladies!

Jessica & Jarrettd - laughing at myself is my main source of amusement. Sometimes it's either laugh or cry, lol.

JenT - 4 boys?! Wow. Two of my three are boys and.... let's just say I really appreciate my little girl. The boys certainly make life interesting.

Beeps - May, June? Do you have a deadline you're working towards?

Amanda - Welcome! I tend to be the hungriest mid afternoon, and would rather sleep than eat at night. My husband will lose track of time and skip lunch, but then go through a whole carton of Ben & Jerry's at midnight. We think he may have some reverse cortisol issues, where he's struggling to wake up in the mornings but hyped up at night. Managing stress helps. This may be way overblown for what you are experiencing, but just thought I'd mention it.

Skipping some of Stage 1 - yes. If you are comfortable with strength training, then there's no reason to stay in Stage 1 so long. I think I did all of it, but actually took longer than it should have because I was bored and de-motivated to do the same thing over and over.

So - my first Stage 3.B. It didn't seem as strenuous as some of the others. I even did the HIIT at the end. The YTWL's burned, but the rest went quickly. I really cut the rest periods down because my heart rate wasn't getting up very high. Looking forward to my run today. Sunday is an off day, and I'm not sore, so I can push it.

Hope everyone is having a great weekend!

ETA: Jen - I love the jackknifes too! Hope your hangover gets better.

Catching up with you all after most of the week away. I have been easy going with my caloric intake and the scale shows it! :noway: The body not as much, I guess that is the benefit of this NROL program :happy: Another benefit; out- walked/jogged my Sister-in-law on her regular walking program I impressed myself since cardio and running have not been my focus!

I am thinking to try to keep a little closer to maintenance calories and maybe even a slight deficit for the remainder of Stage 1 stating with day 6 on Mon. or Tues. I hope to drop a couple of the extra lbs. and more importantly firm up the "jelly-roll-belly-roll"

:flowerforyou: Love everyone's ideas for Miss Maggie's dilemma, you will be enjoying that guest room so much more now!

Those prone jack-knifes certainly feel like they are doing something!!

Feeling my muscles today and hope to walk it out on a nice long stroll today.

:flowerforyou: Hope you all are enjoying your weekend!

[/quote]

Oh, yeah! I'm hearing ya! I did a face-plant off the ball with hubs watching. Had to shampoo coffee out of the carpet.

It's a good thing laughter is good for the abs, too!
[/quote]
I know that feeling. I rolled off last night for the first time. Go figure I wait until the last go around to fall off. I pushed it too far and rolled forward. I think that's how I ended up hurting myself.:blushing:

I was able to get a copy of the book at the used book store for $12 today -- I don't have to pay shipping and wait for Amazon after all! I think I'm going to start with the first workout on Monday. Anyone else planning to start this week?

Hi My name is Jen and I just finished reading the book and plan to start stage one on Monday (walking a 5k tomorrow) any words of advise for a newbie? I am so pumped to start this and hope to see some awesome results!

Welcome!
There are lots of us Jens on here.
Have a browse through the other threads in this group for any tips, especially read the first stage 1 thread, chances are any problems/questions are covered there!

I was a bit down when i looked in the mirror this morning, although I'm over 2 months into this, and I can FEEL the new muscle, I still think i look the same in the mirror. Might be time to take some pics and do a comparison. I miss the big moves from stage one and the big strength gains we can do there. Glad stage 2 is nearly done!

@oceanity - YES! DD is the baby - she's 3 1/2 years old. And she has to be the sweetest thing ever. The boys are 7 & 5, the oldest is ADD and we spend a lot of time taking deep breaths (both of us!).

@samantha - I have found that having good food choices readily available to eat is THE most important factor with sticking to my diet. The second is keeping "trouble" foods out of the house. (Otherwise I end up ODing on cookies... see below.)

Despite falling off the swiss ball - it's definitely a great thing. Sometimes I'll use it instead of the bench for a bench press or triceps press (I'm working with dumbbells). It adds some additional core/stabilizing work to the move.

So I went camping this weekend with the family. Of course the food is 80% crap that passes for "treats for a special occasion". Which is a whole other frustrating rant that I won't get into. I did really well avoiding it until the last afternoon, and then I ate pretty close to a whole sleeve of chocolate chip cookies within a couple of hours. Ugh. But I felt like utter dog poo, reminded myself, "oh yeah, that's why you don't need to eat this stuff", and I'm ready to hit this week hard. Besides, the cookies are gone so no more temptation there!

It's been a month for me on MFP, and I've only lost 2 pounds. I had lofty visions of at least a pound a week - maybe even 3!! LOL But at least I'm not still gaining. And I keep telling myself that it's not like I get to stop being mindful of my diet and exercise even when I reach my goal. Most of the people I see on here who have made a big difference in their body composition have been doing this for a year or more.

Hope everyone has a great Monday. It's back to 3.A and the body matrix for me today!

I'm not even going to post about my weekend debacle....let's just say that Monday affords ALL a "new start" and I'm glad to have it!

I finish up Stage 3 this week and I move onto Stage 4 next Monday.

Oh, and just as a "wow" moment...when I posted all my stats/measurements/photos to my challenges on Saturday, I *did* peek at my photos (which I NEVER do, because they just make me cry....) and SOMETHING SHOWED UP. That's right, gf's, something showed up in the PICS that did NOT show up on the scale, or on any tape measurement. But, there is DEFINITE improvement in my bum/saddlebag region. Now, I am HYPERCRITICAL about this area (it's the area of my body I MOST want fixed and, as can be expected, it is the HARDEST area to satisfy!)....so, I pulled my husband over to take a look at the photos and he said, "I TOLD you there was a noticeable difference in that area...."

So, there you have it! March wasn't good for scale and it wasn't good for tape measurements....but it WAS good for photos. And, for me, that means chalking it up to the body matrix. All of those squats and lunges and jumps are tightening up ONE area of my body.

Yep - April, May and June are going to be my GLORY MONTHS - you just wait and see!!!!!

That's awesome, good for you for looking and being open minded enough to actually see your results and not just ignore it!

I'm not even going to post about my weekend debacle....let's just say that Monday affords ALL a "new start" and I'm glad to have it!

I finish up Stage 3 this week and I move onto Stage 4 next Monday.

Oh, and just as a "wow" moment...when I posted all my stats/measurements/photos to my challenges on Saturday, I *did* peek at my photos (which I NEVER do, because they just make me cry....) and SOMETHING SHOWED UP. That's right, gf's, something showed up in the PICS that did NOT show up on the scale, or on any tape measurement. But, there is DEFINITE improvement in my bum/saddlebag region. Now, I am HYPERCRITICAL about this area (it's the area of my body I MOST want fixed and, as can be expected, it is the HARDEST area to satisfy!)....so, I pulled my husband over to take a look at the photos and he said, "I TOLD you there was a noticeable difference in that area...."

So, there you have it! March wasn't good for scale and it wasn't good for tape measurements....but it WAS good for photos. And, for me, that means chalking it up to the body matrix. All of those squats and lunges and jumps are tightening up ONE area of my body.

Yep - April, May and June are going to be my GLORY MONTHS - you just wait and see!!!!!

Awesome!

I guess I will have to pull the ole polariod out...