I have two contests I am participating in. The first is the one with the job my husband holds right now. It is spouses against the people gone, we have quite a while and have been officially started for about a week or so now. I haven’t decided how much weight I would like to lose overall for this contest, I like to work with smaller goals and work toward meeting that goal and then setting a new one.

The plus size bloggers fall tracking is starting today! As of today I weighed myself on my Wii Fit (I don’t own a scale so this works for me since it will be a consistent thing I can easily do) and I took a few basic measurements again. This is twelve weeks and the goal is to lose 15 pounds. Since this breaks down to 5 pounds every month, this is something easily followed.

My Plan

1. Drink more water – I just can’t seem to stay consistent with this! I have days where I drink plenty of water and days where I end up with a headache at the end of the day, and I know it is because of not drinking enough water.

2. Work out daily – I am not going to say “work out for 30 minutes a day” or “work out after breakfast” or something that feels even the slightest bit rigid to me. I just need to work out daily and am going to find all the ways I can do so. If this means a half hour on the wii fit moving, 20 minutes of playing Just Dance with the kids or going for a walk, I am going to be active every single day.

3. Be better at not snacking – ever since I moved into my own place this past June I have been doing a great job not buying junk food when I grocery shop. I buy the kids granola bars and small chip bags for their snacks and for whatever reason the small chip bags have no appeal to me. It’s psychological I know. I have been snacking on babybel cheese, string cheese or wheat thins. But when I do buy a snack – a reese’s big cup (my favorite!) for example, it goes into the fridge to be saved for later. Of course when later means I eat two in an evening…that’s not a good thing. So I need to go back to buying what works for me for a snack.

4. Follow the meal plan – before I go grocery shopping I write up a list of meals for the next two or three weeks. I check what I already have in the pantry and fridge first. This (combined with coupons) allows me to save money while shopping and I know that what we are eating is healthy. One thing I need to do better is plan for the nights the kids have sports – I need to find more crockpot recipes!

Today I weighed myself (trusty Wii Fit to the rescue!) and also took measurements, and submitting my info for the start of the tracking contest!

How is your weight loss going? Are you participating in any tracking contests?

It’s been almost a week since Kelly at Mom’s Talk Network started her “48 Days to a Better Me” campaign. It is a great idea and though I am a few days late joining, I’m in!

My goals are to

• exercise daily for at least 20 minutes
• drink all the water I am supposed to
• No pop – easy since I rarely have any anyway
• less junk food tapering down to no junk food – we have lots of gettogethers where there are chips and dip, bean dip, etc., no junk food at home is one thing, no junk anywhere else gets slightly tougher

I’ve been doing great on my own with the goals. I started out the new year with the intent to exercise every day and I haven’t been able to stick to that, so I’ve been making sure to get up and just do it! I’ve been working out every morning while the kids are sleeping for the past six days. I look forward to continuing this and losing some weight.

That has changed as of today! Over the weekend a friend told me about the Body for Life program. I don’t think I’d heard of it before she mentioned it but it sounded good. After thinking we’d have to buy the book to follow the program, she found the website and from there we got a week one menu plan as well as a shopping list!

Basically you follow this eating plan and also work out for six days of the week. On the seventh day you get a cheater day – you don’t have to exercise and you can eat whatever you want. By browsing the website we found several of the champion food plans and lots of success stories. (

Today I had a breakfast burrito – whole wheat tortilla, eggs, cheese and low fat (or maybe it’s fat free?) sour cream. You are also directed to drink a glass of water with every meal, which I do anyway so no biggie there! For a snack I had a bar – the brand they recommend, and they are bland tasting – good thing I only bought one! For lunch I am planning on having a turkey sandwich (turkey, lettuce, tomato, cheese) and an apple.

I am very excited to do this plan! I think what makes me excited is having a partner – my friend lives right around the corner from me and it’s easy for us to work out together. We also have lunch or dinner together sometimes so the eating plan will be easy to follow too. Really, it’s an easy eating plan and hopefully the workout will be easy too since I have a partner.

How are you doing with weight loss, staying in shape or getting in shape? Maybe it’s time to start a new plan!

I’m not worried about starting now, around the holidays, because you get a cheater day. The excitement of losing weight will help not eating all the holiday cookies and fudge I wanted to make. I suppose now I’ll just bake on the one day a week.

First baby goal: fit size smaller comfortably. I can fit it now, but it’s not so comfortable!

Well today is a new week and I have a new plan. I am back on South Beach starting today. Even if I can’t get to the Y every day, I am going to exercise at home. I found a few exercises to do and I realize that if I don’t train to run, I won’t be able to do the graduation run. I meant to keep that a surprise for Chris but ended up telling him las week. He said if I run, cool, if not no biggie. I really wanted to run to surprise him so I know I should have not said anything.

Really my long term goal is not to become a runner. It is to lose weight. I know I eat healthy already so I am back to using my spark people page to keep track of calories – not to keep myself limited, but to ensure I am getting enough! I need to exercise to be able to lose weight and build muscle. It snowed yesterday and is supposed to until Wednesday so I don’t see us going for a walk – but maybe we will, the cold will give us incentive to move!

We don’t have a scale at home and I haven’t been to the Y since last week – I talked to my cousin who works at the Y and was told lots of kids are still being sent home sick, I really want to avoid that for my kids. I know I have not gained any more weight, but I haven’t lost anything either. I’m going to try to get to the Y so I can at least weigh myself and find out the number so that update will come later.

I weighed in today to find I have gained three pounds. I was very disappointed – for a few minutes. My pants are still loose (if not looser then last Monday) and maybe it’s muscle I’m gaining and fat I’m losing. At least that’s what I’m telling myself.

I had to force myself to go to the Y today. I just did not want to go at all and did not have any interest in working out, getting sweaty, none of it. Once there I did twenty minutes on the treadmill – a good, slow warm up, and then running for six minutes (yay one more then last time I ran!) and a good cool down. Today was also a strength training day and I had a good workout on the machines. Even though I stretched afterward, I feel a little bit sore this evening. That may be because I did two reps rather then just one after a long time since last doing any or because I didn’t play basketball like I was. After I was done I just wanted to get out of there so I skipped the sauna/steam room though I wanted to sit in one of them today.

Starting tomorrow I am cutting out bread from my diet. I had a hard time following South Beach simply because I was restricted and for some reason when I am told no you can’t have that – all of a sudden that’s what I want! I know I will lose weight following the plan but making up meals or a menu plan was too much for me to handle while thinking about working out and running and taking care of kids.

At least I am going back to workout out every day. I’m going to reevaluate next Monday because I know I am not eating poorly.

I am still so happy over losing four pounds!

I also have been

doing cardio every day
strength training three times a week
drinking plenty of water
only having one portion at meals (no seconds)
only weighing myself once a week
more active with my kids
telling others what I am doing and having them motivate me

And I gave my college roommate a call to ask about how to train to make that mile and a half in fifteen minutes. She’s a track coach now and ran track since at least high school (if not before) through college. She had some great tips for me and I’m emailing her every day to let her know my progress, how I feel, etc. I will run that mile and a half!

I have lost four pounds!

I am so happy! I knew I lost weight because my pants fit different – but this time it’s not just they fit different in the waist. This time my pants fit different all over. I also had my daughter take pictures today – from the side and the front – and I’m going to do so every Monday. I didn’t last week but that’s okay with me. But I decided not to share for a month, then I’m going to show a months worth to show the difference.

I did quit following South Beach (more on that later) but after finding I lost weight I think I will go back to a modified version.

Do you have a SparkPeople page? Check out my page here and add me as a friend! I’m not really updating the actual page – there is a spot for a blog and such, but since I’m here I didn’t want to also do that there.

I started this because I wanted to lose the weight I had gained since my kids were born. At the time my son was three years old and I figured I couldn’t blame all my weight on baby weight anymore! With my daughter, I think I gained 40 lbs and after having her, I did go up one pants size. I stayed that size, eating okay and not exercising all that much and then my son came along. If I remember right I gained around the same amount of weight, but honestly I don’t remember exactly.

After having him, I went back to my pre-pregnant size. I stayed there for a few years and then we had to move to the south because of Chris’ job. And for some reason, I gained a lot of weight there. Maybe we changed our eating plans, maybe I was depressed, maybe I started snacking more, I’m not sure.

At any rate, I joined LA Weight Loss and lost over 15 lbs in two and a half months. I think I lost 17 lbs? You would think I would remember losing weight! But honestly, I’m not obsessed with a number, I go by how my clothes fit and how I feel overall. I stopped following LA in May once we found out we were pregnant again – but I probably didn’t need to because it was just changing how I was eating, I wasn’t taking supplements or anything. And I had been doing LA since right around getting pregnant anyway!

But I quit – and then I gained 14 pounds over the next months. Looking back I shouldn’t have stopped. I needed to lose weight and like I said, I wasn’t doing anything to harm the baby. I had already gained another size!

And so now I am stable. I have lost ten pounds in the past few months but I wasn’t following a new diet or exercising more/differently. I joined the Y and have been regularly working out for the past couple of weeks. I am also going to start South Beach (if I can ever sit and figure a meal plan!) and continue to work out.

My goal is to lose 15 pounds. I’ll work on more later, but for now it’s losing fifteen. Chris is graduating at the end of May and that is my goal date.

I am going to make it a goal to work out at the Y at least three times a week, and on days I don’t to at least go for a walk. We pay to be members of the Y so we need to use it. We may go to the pool tomorrow or Sunday so that’s one day, and then next week I know we’ll go a couple of times. Chris is very interested in getting into better shape because he is interested in different jobs within the military that require he be in better shape.

Of course another incentive is the kids love the child care part. They are constantly talking about the kids they meet in there and once we even saw one of the kids out in town – I love that, the connection to the community, even in that small way.

I was just reading over at Blogging Away Fat about saving smaller sized clothes – huge eye opener for me! I still have clothes (mostly jeans or jean shorts) that I wore years ago. Years as in probably 7-8 years. Of course this was my in between college and getting married phase and I haven’t worn them since. Having a baby does that to you. I went from maternity clothes to a size bigger then I was in college. I’ve stayed that size – but kept the clothes.

I’ve long talked about going through my closet and getting rid of all of those clothes. When I joined LA at the beginning of the year I went through them again, separating them into the two sizes I have. Of course now it will be a little while before I can wear them so maybe it is the time to just get rid of them. I enjoy shopping, finding good deals, and though jean shorts won’t really be out of style, seeing the room in my closet would be more encouraging for my weight loss once I have the baby.