Warmer Temps, High Winds, Blowing Snow...

The weather today was good and bad... Temps FINALLY above Zero. Was actually 64 degree's warmer than it has been! Whoo Hooo. I think today's high was around 32° above zero. The warmer temps have caused snow to melt on the highways and then the winds picked up blowing snow across the wet highway causing them to get icy. Between Base and the mall where I work, there was between 10-15 cars in the ditch...including another one that has rolled over. One rolled either late last night or early this morning as we noticed that one when we went to town this morning for breakfast and our veggie run. It was gone however, when I went to work about 2:30.

I left work half an hour early tonight just so I was not traveling back to base my myself. One of the girls who works in the auto center also lives on base, so I followed her home. As long as we stayed in the right hand lane, we were fine but if we were to venture over to the left lane, that's where trouble could have happened. Some of the "finger drifts" or "pillow drifts" (both new terms to me, but some I have heard over the past couple of days...LOL) were close to a foot deep. That's enough to send anyone flying if they approached it and hit it unexpectedly.

As I mentioned, Drew and I got up this morning and headed to town to buy our weeks veggies as the store in town's veggies always look so much nicer than the commissary here on base. Before getting our veggies though, we stopped at Denny's to get breakfast. Let me tell you, for those dieting, Denny's is NOT the place to go. I didn't see any health conscious choices at all on the menu. I decided to go with a Half Moon over My Hammy instead of a full sandwich. Well, the waitress messed up the order as I had pointed to "Monday through Friday" only on the menu as I asked about whether or not I could get the "Half" sandwich today... Saturday. Well, she thought I was wanting the Half Grand Slamwich... I ate it anyway though it's not what I really wanted. It was "ok" but too much maple taste for my liking on a sandwich and I really did not want the sausage and bacon. The waitress kept apologizing and offered to have them make me what I wanted. I hate to see food wasted, so I just went ahead and ate it. Then, Drew went to take a bite of his sausage gravy and biscuits and you could swear they were feeing him a hockey puck instead of a biscuit. Again, the waitress was very apologetic and took it back to get another plate. The manager then came out and apologized and gave us a ticket for a complimentary meal and drink ($10.00 value) because Drew's $2.79 plate of biscuits was hard. Can't beat that deal... We paid all of about $14.00 including the tip for breakfast. I still tipped the waitress well as it was an honest mistake on mine, and she was very apologetic over the mess-ups.

We headed home after getting our veggies then got our grocery list around to head to the commissary. I can't believe we spent over $300.00 today on groceries...between the commissary and the store in town. Man, dieting is expensive! Though, we did grab a few extra's for the kids (Holly and the dog...lol). Like I told Drew when I was putting it all away, nobody can report us to Social Services for not feeing our daughter...LOL.

I then got my shower and got changed into my work clothes and headed off to work. I got caught up on a lot of my work that I have not had a chance to do because either 1, I was too busy with running the MPU, off-loading trucks, or 2, not being at work more than an hour... Since the weather was so bad, it was very slow today.

Well, I got home about 7:45 or so and decided that I should probably eat something as I hadn't had a break at work and not eaten anything since noon or shortly after. Now I'm just sitting here updating my blogs and catching up on my boards.

Today's body blessings...

Breakfast: Half Grand Slamwich from Denny's & Hashbrowns
Lunch: Ham, Provolone, Lettuce, & Tomato wrap with mustard
Dinner: Roast Beef and a small Yukon Gold PotatoSnack: Pretzel & 1 hard candy

Today's Fitness...
None...other than the walking I did while grocery shopping...

Tomorrow I am going to try and make it up to the gym if not before I go to work then after. Work, however, will depend on how the roads are. As of right now, they aren't looking good so I may not be going in. But then, I do not go into work until 11:45, so hopefully by then they will have them plowed. We will just have to wait and see what tomorrow holds...

I Figured Something Out Today....

Well, tonight while eating dinner, I figured something out. It's nothing I shouldn't have already known, but something I never paid attention to really. I carefully measured out my dinner, or I should say my husband did as he measured out his portions. (He is diabetic, so has to carefully measure and count every gram of carb and sugar). I had approximately 3 ounces of ham steak, 1/2 cup fried okra, 1/2 cup scalloped potatoes, and a bowl of salad. I still had about 4 bites to go when it dawned on me, I was full. Before I started my diet two years ago, and again when I lost sight of my new eating habits I had formed, I would have piled that food on my plate and just ate it until it was gone....then gone back for seconds, not even thinking twice that I was full.

I have always been a fast eater, and I guess for the most part, I still am. I think eating the salad really helps me to feel fuller faster. So, I need to continue with my salads. I just need to start buying other fixings for them so I do not get bored with the same old veggie salad every time. When I was doing my diet two years ago, I liked to buy the bagged salad kits. Some had fruits, some had meats, nuts, or a combination of ingredients other than veggies. I need to start creating salads like that to very my nutrients and keep me from getting bored. Time to scour the internet for some exciting salad ideas...

I've had a good day overall. I got up this morning. My alarm went off, I still felt sleepy and tired, so decided to set it ahead one hour. I fell back to sleep and got up when it went off again at "8:00". I got my shower, dried my hair, brushed my teeth, went to put on my watch and discovered it was now 7:30... hmmm, what the heck? I must have hit the time zone button on my alarm and changed the zone so the clock reset itself to the new time zone. No wonder I had felt tired. It had only been 6:00, not 7:00 when my alarm initially went off. So, I came down stairs after getting dressed and fixed myself some breakfast. Not necessarily the best choice, but it was within my calorie range and not totally awful. I fixed myself two whole wheat biscuits with apple butter, 1/2 cup cottage cheese, and a bottle of Mott's 100% Veggie juice. It was plenty satisfying and got me through the morning at work. We were slow again today and no trucks, so I just caught up on my filing, paperwork, UPS shipping, etc.

Lunchtime was good... though, I think that the salad had way too much cheese and ham on it. Drew had bought the salad for himself yesterday for his lunch, but changed his mind and ate something else so told me to go ahead and take it for my lunch. It was just a basic salad with ham cheese, cucumbers, lettuce, & tomatoes. I took my own Kraft Done Right Raspberry Vinegarette Dressing to top it with. I did munch on three Hershey Kisses that someone had brought into work, but I limited myself to the three and skipped the chocolate fudge brownies that someone baked to share with all of us. I fought temptation and I won that round... :)

After dinner, I came in and started working my boards. I was going to write my blog, but decided I needed to do some sort of workout first. I've not done one in a couple of days. I signed up for the SparkPeople.com New You Bootcamp which started this week but had not done any of the video's so decided I would do today's video. Today's was an ab and core workout with the stability ball. It was a pretty good workout. I've never really used my stability ball for anything other than doing my crunches, so it was kinda nice to use the video and see what other options I have with it. The workout was only about 9 minutes long, so I went ahead and did two other video's from earlier this week. They were an upper and a lower body workout. Man, the lower body workout is a killer! My butt was burning so bad, I wasn't sure I was going to be able to finish the workout...but I did the best I could and finished! Yeah Me!

I'm off work tomorrow, so if I can get the hubby and daughter out of the house or living room for a while, I'm going to do another cardio workout. I've not done one the last few days. I did get two really good workouts in early in the week, and some strength training, but not my third cardio. According to my reports from SparkPeople though, if I would have done another cardio, they advise that I should increase my calorie intake though..which I do not want to do. According to the calculation, I burned A LOT of calories with the kick boxing and the Walk At Home Video workouts I did. So, I think that my not getting my third cardio in was OK for me this week. Maybe I can talk my hubby into going to the gym and working out on the elliptical... be good "US" time. We do not get much of that anymore.

Tomorrow will be another busy day in my office/craft/workout room. I'm still weeding through my crafts and paper work trying to get it organized. It was quite a tight squeeze in here tonight doing my workout, so I gotta make more room. I can't do my cardio up here, but I do my strength training here as I can do that while hubby watches tv in the living room and not bother him any.

I'll also have to spend a good portion of the day working on my laundry and getting some house cleaning done too... I'll have to put a little bit of pep into that and get a good workout doing housework...lol.

I hope everyone has a great Sunday and an excellent week ahead of you.

Iky Day...

Well, today was a day that I totally blew it. Not just a little but by A LOT~

We woke up to 9 inches of freshly fallen snow on top of what we already had (this is probably close to 3-1/2 to 4 foot total snow already this winter). I was awake half the night and since I couldn't sleep, I kept flipping the channel on the tv back and forth between Walker Texas Ranger repeats and the Commander's Channel. I was so hoping that the Commander's Channel would say that highway 83 had been black flagged... meaning it was shut down and nobody was to drive on it. Which in turn would mean I would get a day off today. Well, that did not happen. I had to be at work at 9:30 this morning and I totally HATE driving on the roads.

Well, the base shut down except for essential personnel, so hubby didn't have to go to work. He was in a good mood this morning, so offered to drive me to work then come pick me up and take our daughter and I out to dinner after I got out.

I did not pack my lunch today and had initially planned on just going to BK or Subway and getting a salad for lunch.... but when lunch time came around, I wasn't in the mood for another salad so went to Arby's... my downfall, and got an Italian Sub and cheese sticks.

Then hubby came to pick me up and decided he was in the mood for China Star... I added mostly veggies to my plate, but Chinese food always tends to be sweetened with some sort of sauce...so even the veggies aren't all that low cal. I did only eat one plate, but I did have dessert too...

I've not yet worked out today at all... Work was slow, so not even a physically challenging day today. The only thing I have done tonight after getting home from dinner is work in my office/craftroom/weight training room is straighten, organize, and throw TONS of craft projects away that I have printed off of the computer in hopes to make some day and never did. It's all just CLUTTER and Clutter makes me sad, depressed, and not very motivated to really want to come in and work on my crafts or even do my workouts. Besides the fact it takes up so much space that I don't have alot of room to work out... My goal is to get rid of alot of the stuff through freecyle and get the banquet table out of the room so I have more room for my workouts.

Well, I'm not going to be hard on myself about my off day. I've had a pretty good week overall. Considering I was sick the first part of the new year, my calories were low. I had a couple days were my calories were less than 100 calories over but I did my workouts every day for the past 4 days or so... two days of strength training and two days of good cardio workouts.

Tomorrow is a new day. Hopefully we won't get alot more of the snow tonight. Suppose to have gotten 40 mph winds this afternoon which would cause alot of drifting, but as of right now, we've not had much winds at all. Highway 83 had very little drifting on it when we came home this evening, so hopefully by morning things will still be ok when I head to work.

Finally Feeling Better...

Well, I am finally feeling my old self again... only this time, ready to take on my new healthy way of life.

I was off work today and had planned on getting up early so I could get grocery shopping done, then head to the gym before Drew got home for lunch. Well, that did't work out. I woke up again about 3:00 in the morning and was wide eyed and bushy tailed; rearing to go. No matter how much I tried to go back to sleep, I just couldn't. It was terrible, my mind just would not stop thinking of all the things I needed to get done, things that were done and over with, whatever. Most of it made no sense at all...LOL.

Well, I finally got up around 8:00 this morning after finally dozing back off when Drew left for PT this morning. So, only about an hour extra sleep, but an hour that was much needed. I came down stairs, let the dog out, then checked my CafeMom boards and my emails. Worked on my grocery list, then started working some around the house. There is so much decluttering to do it's not funny... After a little bit of straightening up and starting a load of laundry, I went up and took my shower and got dressed so I was ready for lunch when Drew got home. We were suppose to have left overs from last night, but I kinda didn't get around to fixing them, so we went to J.R. Rockers and I had a Buffalo Chicken Salad. That thing is soooo good, but I'm sure the chicken is more calories than I really need as it's breaded.

I came home and grabbed my grocery list, sorted through my coupons, then headed up to the commissary to get my grocery shopping done. I loaded my cart with all sorts of healthy foods for me and the family... well, Holly did have a couple of special requests, so I did get her her Pop Tarts and Club Crackers (reduced fat though on the crackers. Gotta sneak in healthy were I can...LOL).

I came home and made up a batch of my Hamburger Veggie Stoup. A recipe I found on Crock Pot Mom's CafeMom group. It's sooo good. A tad high in sodium, but otherwise a nice lunch time meal for me to take to work. I just have to remember to drink extra water to help flush the sodium out.

I also boiled three boneless skinless chicken breast with fresh veggies, diced them up, and measured out single servings to freeze for use on top of my salads or into wraps; also items for lunches at work to add a bit of variety and keep me from heading to the Food Court.

I decided at 3:30, that if I was going to get a workout in, I had better do it now as Holly and Drew would both be home around 4:00. So, I turned on the On Demand workouts I saved and did half hour of kickboxing. Last time I did the kickboxing, it nearly killed me. Not really, but it was definately a great workout and probably would have been better had I not been laughing through it. I am soooo uncoordinated! Practice makes perfect right?

Dinner tonight was baked boneless skinless chicken breast, another big salad with Kraft Raspberry Vinegarette dressing, asparagus, and stove top stuffing. Yum...

This evening I will just enjoy spending time on my boards, post my daily activites on my SparkPeople page and just have a relaxing evening.

So, all in all... a GREAT day.

Not a Good day. Still Sick, and Busy at Work.

Well, I was feeling a bit better today... about the same as yesterday, minus the headache. I can almost deal with the achey body, but headaches I have trouble dealing with.

My diet today was a bit better... still under calories, but breakfast and lunch I just was not feeling up to eatting, so kept it light and dry... toast with a bit of apple butter and a cup of fruit. Lunch was just another Arby's ham melt, minus the swiss cheese and a bottle of water. I did eat a healthy well balanced dinner though... Roast Beef, potato, carrots, salad, and a couple of pickles...

Work was extremely busy for me today. We offloaded on applience truck which took it's toll on me big time since I didn't sleep well again last night due to my body aching. I was totally exhaused by the time we were done.... then came the other truck (tools, softlines, fitness, etc)... that one, I didn't get to do much of as I was on the SNC and was run raggid with customer pick-ups, staging requests, etc. Again, a very exhausting day. I ended up working an hour over, which was OK too since I went home 4 hours early yesterday since I didn't feel good and I was afraid they would shut the gates going out of town due to the snow storms...

Hopefully tomorrow I will be feeling better and I can get at least some light strength training in or maybe a few stretches at least before I head to work. I so want to get back in the habit of working out every day... I feel so much better when I do.

It's A New Year...time to start my diet again...

Well, it's a new year and things will finally slow down at work. Hours have been cut by more than 100 hours per week for my team of 8 people... so I'll have more time to dedicate to working out and losing my weight. Because most of my team is part time, I don't like to cut them back to so few hours a week that they will end up quitting, so I cut mine back to around 33 hours instead of working a full 40 hours... if we have a busy workload one day, then I'll just stay late as we will usually earn hours by the number of pick ups we have and the number of trucks received... so it balances out in the end usually anyway. Besides, i'm tired of 6 day/ 40 hour weeks... time for me time!

Make yourself a goal.... Yep... but it didn't go so well. My goal was to be within my 1200-1400 calorie range for the day... breakfast blew that right away as it's way more calories than I though... I'll know better next time.
What workout will I do today/ how will I be more active today? My only real "workout" for today was taking down all the Christmas decorations and hubby and I walked around Menards and Walmart after his hockey game. By mid afternoon, I had a major headache so went to bed fairly early.
What will I eat today?... Breakfast...was sausage gravy and biscuits. (I finally calculated calories at sparkpeople for my recipe, and decided that next time it's 1 biscuit with very little gravy)... Lunch... because breakfast was so high, I stuck to a bowl of cereal and milk. Then by 3:30 or so I was getting a headache so ate a few cashews...that didn't help so I ended up getting a candy bar for sugar at Walmart. Nothing seemed to be helping rid of the headache... I knew it was not dehydration because I had already drank 3 or 4 cups of water for the day...along with decaf tea and a small glass of diet pepsi... Dinner. Big Salad, fresh veggies also, and chicken cordon bleu. Last night when my head was really pounding, I pretty much said ok, that cake Holly and her friend baked smells so good, I'm going to have a small piece... so I did.

To top off my day... I DID NOT get a good nights sleep. I went to bed early to try and sleep off my headache, then about 2:30, my husband woke me up, unintentionally, when he got sick... he was up for the next 6 hours or so in and out of the bathroom. Every time I would start to fall back to sleep, he was up again...

Now it's off to work until 9:15.. wish me luck as I am sooooo tired!

5.2 more pounds gone...

Yea! I'm soooo excited. I got up this morning and weighed myself on my scale...scale read 146.4... which puts me at about 6.4 lbs above my goal weight. And, I had my doctor's appointment today for my annual physical and she confirmed my weight as being 146.8 (dressed and after eatting, so not bad)

In actuallity, I guess I really want to gain more weight in muscle though...and loose more weight in FAT to the point I am at 140 lbs. I have lost so much muscle tone since I quit working out faithfully every day... I so need to get back into it. Even thought I am close to my goal weight, I still have a few more "rolls" than I really like. I so need to find me a workout partner here on base to help me stay motivated. I had one girl I was going to go with, but she is in and out of her house here on base as her and her husband have separated. One day she's living in town as she can't stay with her husband, other days she's moved back in as they are going to try working it out. I never know if she is going to around or not.

My workouts have been pretty much at a nill. On occassion, I will lay on my fitness ball and do a few crunches, but that's been about it. I've been so tired after work these days. We continue to get multiple trucks every Tuesday...and we have trucks Monday, Wednesday, & Thursday also. Being the holiday season, they tend to be alot heavier than normal too... On top of all the trucks, I am short staffed. I only have 3 full time associates including myself and 5 part timers that are very limited on their availabilities... and one is leaving as she is being sent TDY with the Army National Guard next week. Needless to say, I've been working one of my days off each week too.

Think I might go post on my Sparkpeople account as well as the spouses group to see if I can find someone that is willing to work out at the gym with me.... Wish me Luck!