One Month and Al's Run

One month ago I committed to changing my lifestyle and becoming healthier. It's been a roller coaster to say the least! I've made great strides in that short amount of time. From making better decisions about what I eat to being able to jog for 20 min straight on the treadmill! The scale has not been my friend, but we're working on that! I haven't gotten a chance to do my normal weigh in for the day but the one I do in the morning was promising! According to that scale first thing in the morning I've lost 10 pounds in the last month! W00t! I also took my measurements and lost 2" in my waist and 1.5" in my hips!

To celebrate my accomplishments I've decided to take part in the Briggs & Al's Run & Walk for Children's Hospital. There running and walking options. I don't quite feel up to doing the running yet, so I've chosen to do a walk. The walk options are 3 and 5 miles. I do about 3 miles every day with the dogs so I figure I will try the 5 mile option since it will be more of a challenge! If you would like to make a donation you can visit my Firstgiving page: http://www.firstgiving.com/hhilde99.

My journey has just begun and I look forward to all the fun and positive changes to come!

Week 4 wrap-up

This is now my 4th week eating better and going to the gym 5 days a week. Week 4 was just an "off" week. Ever had those weeks when you just feel as though something is just not right? That was this week for me. Tuesday's Dance it Off class kicked my but! We did some bridge move where you lay on your back with your feet flat on the ground and lift your butt off the ground for the entire song. I felt that move all the way through Thursday! Thursday's run was hard I had the hardest time jogging and I even walked most of the 40 min. on the treadmill and THAT was hard. Today I skipped the treadmill and used the elliptical instead. A few less calories, but a lot easier on my tired sore legs!

I did ok on my eating this week. Tried a new tuna salad recipe and just could not eat it. The fishiness made me sick, so I had to go get a sub instead. Then I created the same recipe with chicken breasts and that was all good!

My weight seems to be stuck again this week. I had a couple nights where I didn't get a good night's sleep and I know that plays a part in it. However, I am a bit frustrated. To help with this aspect I've decided I would use my recent bonus from work to hire a personal trainer at my gym. She's actually the instructor for the Dance it Off class I take twice a week. The lady at the check-in desk said people usually go for 30 min sessions to start off with. So I purchased a package of 10 (30 min) sessions. I start off with the assessment next Friday then we'll start training from there. I'm pretty excited about this!

I hope everyone has a great weekend!

Changing My Life One Step At A Time

About 3 weeks ago I made a decision that I was going to change the things I do not like in my life that I have control over. One of these changes was my weight. Weight has been something I've struggled with all of my life. And as I'm getting older I'm starting to notice the effects the extra weight is having on my body. The one thin I noticed that really pushed me into making this decision was the pain in my hips. It was getting to the point where I had a hard time taking the dogs to the park, something they needed an I enjoyed. I knew from previous experience that it had to do with my weight, so I decided to make the commitment to changing my eating and exercise habits. Almost 1 month later and I don't have that pain in my hips anymore, I have more energy, and I can even jog for 20 min straight - something I have never ever done my entire life! For 3 weeks now we have only eaten out once a week instead of 3+ times a week. I feel awesome about that change as well and we're saving a ton of money! Who doesn't like that in times like this!

I have also decided to do something about my "style" or lack there of. 95% of the time my attire is jeans and plain old t-shirts. I feel frumpy in this attire. So my goal here is to gradually replace my t-shirts with other types of shirts. Out of each paycheck I will be purchasing 2 new shirts that are not t-shirts. This weekend I'll have my work cut out for me! I didn't purchase any new shirts out of my last check therefore, I have to find 4 that I like. This is not a easy task for me as there are certain features I do not like to show.....such as this muffin top. LOL! I did purchase 2 new shirts a few weeks back and I just feel different wearing them, so this will help that frumpy feeling as well.

Next stop is my hair. I want to do something different with it, I just don't know what. I have a natural curl to it, which hinders a lot of styles you see in magazines etc. It just does what it wants when it wants to! And I can't even THINK about bangs...unless I want to spend HOURS trying to get them to sit right and not do a spiral curl! I am also very low maintenance on my hair. I prefer a brush and go tactic, most of the time without blow-drying. So this change is just going to hang out there for a while, until I can figure out what to do with it!

My last change thus far really has nothing to do with my life really, but it makes me feel good anyways. I've started using the reusable shopping bags when doing grocery shopping. I just feel good not wasting all those plastic bags anymore helping the environment.

The Barking

With the current living arrangement Bella has developed a new habit - Barking! This started on Sunday. It was really bad that day, she barked at anyone that walked by, anyone she could hear, and the neighbor behind us cause she could see people in their driveway. Very frustrating to say the least. Perhaps she picked up on the fact that I was a little anxious about being home by myself.

She's gotten better about the barking in the evening. Once I go to bed it's a different story! For the last 3 nights she has barked from 9 -12. Since the house is on a semi-busy street there are a lot of people that walk by, mostly a lot of teens now that it's summer. Every time she hears someone talking outside she barks and her barks are loud, so it startles me and it takes a bit to fall back to sleep. Day 3 and I'm exhausted! I appreciate the warning from her, but it would be SO much better if she kept it to when something is actually going on in our yard and not just people walking by! Hopefully this is just part of the adjustment process and she'll ease up with this eventually. I will also talk to her trainer tonight at CGC class.

As far as things with me are going. I have my ups and downs. Sometimes I'll randomly want to break into tears, and sometimes I enjoy the single life. It is a healing process, and a whole new experience since I've never ever lived by myself! I've noticed that each little task I complete on my own is a real confidence booster! I can only hope that Rick can find the good in this situation too. I don't know how much he knows about what's going to happen so I can't write too much about it, but I know that in the end everything will be fine.

What a difference

So, last week was my first week FLYing. I can say it's made a HUGE difference already. In a matter of a week I got my house to the point where I am comfortable having people stop over at random. I can see my kitchen counters...ALL of them! My bathroom gets a light cleaning every night. And the biggest/best benefit of all is I did not spend all weekend doing laundry! I've been doing 1 load a night since Wed last week, so by time Saturday came I had just 1 load of whites to do and I got that cleaned and put away first thing! This cleared the way for me to get the kitchen in order and get out and have some fun!

On Saturday I went to 7 mile fair with Rick, his Mom, his Grandma, and his Mom's friend. While there I got wind of a bit of drama that may be surrounding our House Warming party this weekend. In a nutshell, both Rick's biological Grandparents will be there in the same house at the same time. There are really bad vibes between the two and they have not seen each other in years...(at least 23). I believe it should go fine, we're all adults, but I still have a bad feeling about it. We will see.

I'm getting excited for the next couple of weekends. This up coming weekend is our housewarming/Rick's b-day party. Then the following weekend is my 10 year (gasp) class reunion. I will be heading up to Hudson on Thursday and not coming back until Monday. I'm looking forward to getting away for a while! Rick and I discussed this weekend and decided it's more important to have some time apart than to go to this reunion together. I will be taking the dogs with me to give him a break from them as well. All in all it should be a good couple weekends coming up!

Changes

I've come to a point in my life where I feel helpless in personal situations that I can't really change at the moment. The inability to make the necessary changes has gotten me down in the past, but I've decided to take a new outlook on this and make some positive changes for the things I can control!

My first change was doing the 100 push-up challenge. I started week 4 and have noticed some improvement already. Not only with the number of push-ups I can do, but also with the way my arms look. To others my arms will still look huge. To me through all that nastyness I can see a bit of muscle definition. It's an improvement for me and I'm excited about it! Imagine what will happen when I move onto real (non-girly) push-ups!

My second change has to do with cleaning. I am horrible at getting motivated to clean. It's a love-hate relationship for me. I love the feeling once it's done and everything is clean and in its place. The hate part is actually doing the work! I feel overwhelmed a lot and sometimes don't even know where to start.

There is one part in my kitchen which particularly annoys the crap out of me. It's where magazines, papers, mail etc pile up. It looks messy and unattractive, but I can't figure out a good solid solution for it. So in my search for solution ideas on how to handle it I came across this site.

I thought I have nothing to lose so why not give it a shot. So I did not shine my kitchen sink yet. Mondays and Tuesdays are late days and I had no bleach at home. I got bleach on my lunch break yesterday dinner is simple tonight so I think I'll be able to do it tonight! I have my fingers crossed. I have done a couple of the other items, one was taking 2 min to clean a hot spot. Well, I was at work when I got the tweet about it so I decided to quick do my desk. Can I say it's amazing how much of a difference 2 min can make???

I'm still trying to find a way to conquer that pile in my kitchen, but I'm sure I'll figure something out.

One more thing about the site...the fly in FLYing is an acronym for Finally Loving Yourself. I love that concept and I'm excited to start this part of my life!

Cheers to positive changes!

Feelin' Old

It's been a rough 2 weeks for my body. 2 weekends ago I was putting on a pair of jeans and when I lifted up my leg to put them on I felt a sudden pain in my hip. It stayed there for a good week and finally started to subside by the next weekend. However, it remained stiff just to let me know it was angry. Even now, sleeping on my left side is almost impossible because my hip gets grumpy and feels I need to move in order to make it some-what happy.

Then this morning came. I got in a good 30 min on the elliptical, showered and dressed, dogs for a mini-walk around the block (cause it was raining, so I wanted to keep it short), garbage out and all of the sudden I turned to grab something off the counter and BAM! pain! in my upper back, right under the left shoulder blade. Almost like a knot but very painful. It lets me know it's unhappy every time I move it. I walk around like an old lady leaning forward with my shoulders, just to try to avoid making it mad. However, we're out of litter and I was doing a Target run, so of course I get some (the big 35 lb bucket of course!). Putting it in the cart required lifting over shoulder height. Upper back did not like that! Then I was thinking crap, I have to do this 2 more times once to get it on the counter and once more to get it in the car. Curse the cat litter! My back yelled at me but it's now in the car and Rick agreed to bring it in the house for me when he gets home.

Meanwhile, it's time to start popping some Ibuprofen like it was candy again. I'm too young to feel this damn old....isn't that a Garth Brooks song? That makes me feel even older!

On the plus side, it's one week until I get my new phone....Palm Treo Pro :D and I take a small step in the direction of Dog Assisted Therapy.

The WI Humane Society is offering a 1.5 hour class covering everything you need to know about this kind of thing. When we first got Bella I wanted to do therapy with her. But she gets scared easily, and doesn't take to new people all that well. I have a sliver of hope that the Canine Good Citizen class she starts next month will help her enough to be able to like seeing people, but I'm doubtful it will help that much. Tucker on the other hand will be awesome at it. As the neighbor girl says, he's that smiling dog. It really does look like he's smiling sometimes! He absolutely loves people and I'm sure he'll be great at it. I have to wait for him to turn 1 year old and pass the Canine Good Citizen test, then we can get involved. I'm psyched!