Monday, January 27, 2014

Week 2 & 3

I missed writing last week about my second week of the healthy lifestyle challenges I have taken on so I figured I would just combine week 2 & 3.  I will say that I am pretty proud of myself.  I have not veered too far off the healthy lifestyle.  Of course I have had a cheat meal here and there but when you are eating healthy and working out 80 - 90% of the time you don't feel as guilty when you let yourself indulge.

A couple things about the clean eating challenge.  While I have not gone to the extent I probably should with the clean eating, I have cut out almost all processed food and most sugar out of my diet.  One of the hardest things for me to cut out was my coffee creamer.  I loved to have flavored creamer in my coffee in the morning but I bought a higher quality flavored coffee and I have started to not crave the creamer anymore.  Another thing I have stopped doing is eating off my kids plates!  I would make a PB&J and cut off the crust to snack on or take a few spoonfuls of mac & cheese...ya know..just to test it out.  Once you start recording what you put in your mouth and make yourself accountable it really does change the way you snack!  The hardest part of this challenge is hitting the percentage of daily protein I am supposed to eat.  It really is a daily struggle and most days I don't hit it but if I come close I am happy.

P90X3 has been great so far.  Yes the workouts are tough and of course there are days I do not want to do it but it is 30 minutes and I just have to walk to the basement to do it.  I can't use the excuse of it being too cold out or I don't have time because no matter what I have 30 minutes.  I also like the fact that I do not have to think.  I look at the calendar and it tells me what disc to do.  No debating which machines to use or guessing how many reps I should do.  I try my best, follow along and before I know it I am finished.  There is one workout called "the challenge" that is 30 minutes of push ups and pull ups...seriously thats it!  That gets a little crazy and I have to get a little (or a lot of) assistance with pull ups.

I can't believe how fast time is going.  I am almost complete with my month long healthy eating challenge and I am in the first transition week of P90X3.  I am excited to continue with the programs and see what I am capable of accomplishing!

Monday, January 20, 2014

Hair Bows & Holder

Around the holidays I became obsessed with making hair bows.  Even though I don't have daughters, my sister never lets my 10 month old niece leave the house without a hair bow in her hair.  For months, she rotated between two barrettes and I was getting sick of seeing the same ones.  I decided for Christmas I was going to make my little niece a bunch of hairbows as well as a hairbow holder to go with them.  I got so excited about this idea that I thought I would make the same thing for my friend's new baby girl.

I found a piece of unfinished wood at Michael's for only a $1!  I painted one pink and one grey.  I stenciled the names on the wood similar to what I did for this sign and carefully painted the letters.  I used my Martha Stewart stencils to decorate, added some hardware so they are able to hang it and glued three long pieces of ribbon on each one.  They came out great and my sister loved the gift!



As soon as I decided I was going to make hair bows I started searching tutorials on Pinterest.  Below is a close up of some of the bows I made along with the tutorials.




6.  I saw a picture of this bow online but it did not have directions on
 how to make it so I had to figure it out on my own.  
I will do my own tutorial to let everyone know how to do it.











Tuesday, January 14, 2014

Week 1 Down!

So I have completed my first week of my P90X3 and clean eating challenge.  While I wouldn't say it has been easy, it really hasn't been all that life changing and the effects have been pretty good.  As with most diets, the ones that really work, are not diets but life style changes.  I did Weight Watchers a few years back to lose the weight I gained from my first pregnancy.  I think WW is a great program but I decided to try something new.

The first thing I did for the eating challenge was download the My Fitness Pal app.  It helps to record and be accountable for everything you eat.  Another thing I have learned is it is not enough to just stay under a certain amount of calories, it is also what those calories consist of.  My Fitness Pal tracks your percentages of fat, carbs and protein.  Different people I am in the group with have different target percentages.  Mine is 40% protein, 30% fat and 30% carbs.  It is not always easy to hit that protein percentage but I am learning every day.

So far P90X3 is challenging but totally doable.  Only a half hour a day is something I can deal with.  No matter how hard the workout is I tell myself that in a half hour I will be done.  It is a very different workout for me because it incorporates a lot more strength training than I am used to but I think it is more beneficial to my body than just running.

I am happy with my results so far and I am excited to see how things will change over the next few months


Sunday, January 5, 2014

New Years Resolution


Happy New Year!!!  With every new year comes new resolutions and like most of America getting in shape is at the top of my list.

After my second son was born last October I really wanted to get my body back.  As many mothers know, weird things happen to your body after kids and I wanted to fix that as much as possible.  I started with Weight Watchers and running at the gym.  Pretty standard but after a few months a friend told me she started doing Insanity.  I was not getting the results I was hoping for so I decided to give Insanity a try.  I am not gonna lie.....it was HARD but it works.  I did not lose much weight but I did see my body tighten up.

I had such success with Insanity that I decided to try out the new work out program T25.  Same creator except the workouts were all 25 minutes.  Ideal for anyone's schedule!  Since I finished this program in the fall I have just been running at the gym.  Tomorrow I am going to take on my next challenge, well two challenges,  P90X3 and clean eating. 

P90x3 has come out and it is a 30 minute version of the workout.  The theory is if you give your all for 30 minutes you can see the same results as if you did any of the longer workouts.   Besides this new workout program, I am also about to take on a clean eating challenge.  I am fairly good about what I eat and try not to over indulge but I know I can be better.  I am doing these challenges with two Facebook groups.  It is great to have other people go through the same challenges to help motivate and share their tips.  I plan on documenting my journey to keep myself in line and maybe inspire some people to do the same.