Thank you all for your comments - it seems a majority of us are doing this for health reasons. This is always a good reason to lose weight - at any age!

fishead1028 asked "do you use fitday.com?" I do not but I did check out the site and signed up for a free membership. This program can also be bought for your computer and comes with more options that way for $29.99. It helps you track you food, weight loss, exercise, goals, and it also has a calendar, journal, food guidelines (pyramid) and reports on your progress. It looked similiar to the program the Curves uses - but I can't be sure if it is. but I am going to try it out for this month to see what it is like and then I'll review it here. It looks very interesting so lets see how it turns out.

Well right now I have the monsters...er....monkies...er...kids in their room cleaning. But it sounds as if they are making a bigger mess than was in there as they are mad at me for putting them in there. Do they ever grow out of this? Never mind - I don't want to know becasue I just hope they will not turn out like me......not a pretty picture. :)

Well here is my question for the day thanks to fishead1028: Do any of you use a special program to track your food intake and weight loss? No a special diet mind you but something that you use to write down what you ate and your inches and weight for the day - something like that be it on paper or on pc.

Weight Loss Decisions

Weight this morning was 233.8 lb - up a little from last week but not by much. Thank you to those of you who have posted comments recently!

I was wondering how you all made you choice to lose weight. For me it was becasue I can't keep up with my kids, I don't want to look this way at my Class reunion (haha), and I'd like to do a vow renewal cerimony in a dress that I ACTUALLY like, that plus it is always good to be healthy. But my main two where my health and to play with my kids.

I don't have any medical problems yet due to my extra weight - but I am at a higher risk for certain things. Did you know that having a BMI over 30 puts you at a much higher risk for medical problems? Well mine is over that and I already have the family history of heart disease - on both sides. So I thought "hmmm stay the way I am and have a heart problem by 30 or lose weight and maybe have a problem by the time I am 60?" can ya figure out what I picked?

What about those of you out there reading this - What was/is your reason for deciding to lose weight and doing something to lose it? I'd love to read your comments!

Thank you for your comments. My kids are probably at that age where they would like to exercise with me. However I have a small living room and I think things would get broken fast. lol. The reason I would rather go to a gym is - if I'm paying for it I'm more likely to use it. Sad but true. My stair stepper had been gathering dust for the last year and same thing with all my exercise tapes. I even have a couple of the sweatin to the oldies - those I think the girls would enjoy.

I have a Bally's by me and I know they offer the babysitting service - just not at that location. Totally sucks. But I also have to remember that at the time I was looking my hubby's job was sending him all over the state for any length of time so I had no back up plan. But now he is in the office - translation - at home babysitter! haha! I have had a gym membership befoe and I really liked it. I enjoyed going and working out and I miss it. Plus having someone else keeping track of where you are at helps to keep me on track.

Truthfully I think my kids would enjoy doing  pilates with me - if we had the space. My oldest won a yoga class through her school (with the rest of her class) by walking the most in December and January. They really enjoy gym and exercising/playing. Well I guess we'll have to try it out next week as they have the week off school.

Ok Question of the day: Do you find yourself cheating on the weekends and sticking to your diet during the week? Or do you "treat" yourself during the week and do the diet all 7 days?

Look forward to reading all your comments!

exercise

It is an early morning with Clifford on the tv for the kids. Just a typical day for a stay at home mom. But there is part of my problem. I have been using my kids as an excuse to not do things - like exercise. They have a computer in our living room and so is my stair stepper. So if I am not getting them a snack for the millionth time during the day (and snacking myself) I am sitting because I don't want to try the stepper with them in the room.

I try to get them to watch movies in their room so that I can do pilates without them stepping on me. Which never works of course because I have three nosy girls who keep coming out and asking "what are you doing mommy?" and sitting on me.

I can't afford a gym membership and even if I could the ones by us do not provide daycare/babysitting services for it to be worth my while. So any of you out there with kids - how do you work out with them around?

Well it has been one of  those days. I tried to bake a cake to celebrate my daughter birthday (it was earlier this month but we were out of town) and the darn thing decided to stick to the pan even after i sprayed it. DOH! i just realized what i did - i use the non-stick cooking spray and not the non-stick baking spray. I know you are thinking what is the difference? honestly - i have no clue all i know is that when i use the baking spray it doesn't stick. maybe it conatins flour or something - who knows.

Well off the subjest of bad diet food. lol. Hope everyone had a great Valentines day! we celebrated early. my hubby bought us two small ice cream cakes *drool* my fave!

I found something out a few weeks ago - not all veggies are created equal! Did you know that broccoli is only 25 calories for a 1 cup serving? Green Beans are 30 calories for a 2/3 cup serving and Whole Kernel corn is a whopping 100 calories for a 2/3 cup serving (all frozen veggies)! Not that I like broccoli that much but geuss waht i have been eating more often!

 

Well I am a little behind. But as you can see from above my weight has gone down again! Weighed in at 233.2 lb on Sunday. Well I am down 8.8 lb - WOOT! I have been quite busy getting my taxes ready to go to my preparer (my mom) so I can get then done asap.

I did something this time that I have never done with any other diet. I am keeping a food journal. I write down what I eat at each meal and for snack and keep track as best as possible of my caloric intake through the day. My first week shocked me. You would be suprised at how many calories there are in the foods you eat everyday.

Did you know that the serving size of Fig Newtons are only 2 and that those 2 have 110 calories. But te serving size of Oreos is 3 and they are 160 calories. So 1 Fig Newton is 55 calories and 1 Oreo is 53.3 calories. I have also discovered the 100 calorie snack packs. I find I like the Keebler Fudge Striped cookies - but they go so fast and look like little doll cookies. lol

I found myself in the situation of being approached by some Girl Scouts the other day. My down fall is Thin Mints and next is Samoas. Luckly I had just spent all the cash I had on me at the time on my kids toys (to be fair it was their money). But they asked me for some cookies and then the little girls asked me to buy some cookies. As I hear one of the mom's whispering "she's smiling ask her..." I reply "Well do you take credit cards?" Of course they don't and as a former girl scout I know this - but my girls learned I had no money for the cookies and so did the girl scouts - without my being mean. For surely if I had had cash I would be munching on some frozen Thin Mints right now!

Well it has been an interesting week so far. I find that I have a lot more time on my hands now that we no longer have cable. Sad but true - I don't know what to do with myself. I didn't realize how bad my tv watching habits had become. I based my day around when certain shows would come on and no wonder I had no time to do things. And now I have nothing not even the antenna channels. Anyone know how you are supposed to return the boxes to Dish network?

I know not a weight loss topic but I realized how much time I wasted during the day and now need to reevaluate my schedule. Wouldn't you know it I have way more time to exercise now - but nothing to watch unless I put in a movie. lol! Music is ok but it doesn't keep my mind empty - haha. I find myself at the computer more these days. Which wouldn't be so bad if I was actually doing the things that I needed to do - like my checkbook register....man my account is behind.

Thought for the day - non diet related: How many of you update your checkbook as often as you should? Do you do it: 1)after a transaction, 2)at the end of the day/week, or 3) do you wait until the statement comes and go according to that? I'd love to hear what you do so please leave a comment.

Well as you can see even with my ups and downs last week was successful for slight weight loss. I am now 3 lb away from the 10 lb mark. YIPEE!

I have been trying to organize a Weight loss challenge in my area - Novi, MI which has been s-l-o-w going. My upline had computer problems so she hasn't been responding to my emails. But I knew my downline (and mom-in-law) had been doing the same thing so I asked her if she could send me the info I needed and she did. So If any of you are in my area and looking for a weight loss challenge contact me please. You can use any program to lose you weight I will be basically running nutritional information meetings and helping you to keep track of your weight and inches loss. And the biggest loser gets a prize at the end. i figured it would be a good way to help others and to keep myself on track at the same time - not that I get to compete in the challenge. :)

Well we went to visit my in-laws this weekend and to celebrate our anniversary and my middle daughters birthday with them. we had lived with them for a while and so they really miss the girls and bribed us to come up by saying "we'll get a sitter and send you out to a movie nad pay for your gas." how can you turn an offer like that down? lol

I have for the longest time been a practicing Christian and this weekend I decided to take the plunge - literally. I had been battling with the decision for the past few years as I was raised Catholic. Then my pastor was doing a series that began yesterday on baptism and it just hit home. So if I seem a little chipper in this message it is because so far today I haven't gotten the urge to strangle my kids and all i cna say is - THANK GOD! been too long since that hasn't happened. :)

 

rjtrix wrote a comment yesterday on what I had been writing. Thank you for reading and enjoying it! :) I am not totally sure if my hump as I called it is truely a hump or just extra weight carried around my shoulders. But as I went from being 5' 10.5" to 5' 8" I definately plan to get a check up to see if anything if wrong other than being FAT! I don't think my calcium is a problem any more because I take this really great supplement for that. It is so great that when I had my wisdom teeth out last February my dentist had a really hard time removing them because of how strong they were. lol Made him work to remove them - the only downside to that was the novicane started to wear off - OUCH!

Also in response to rjtrix - I agree walking around outside Fla. would be too much. I have heard good things about eliptical machines. I had asked my doctor about ideas for weight loss and he suggested working out on an eliptical machine as it combines all aspects of your workout on the one machine. You won't have to go out and do a cardio workout after wards.

Well this morning I weighed in at 235.8 lb. So I am doing good and hopefully soon will hit that 10 lb lost mark. Hopefully in the next week or two. *crosses fingers* I have to say that having this journal keeps me on track. It is almost like and accountability group. And I just wanted to say thank you to all of you out there who are reading this. I have wonderful support from my family of Herbalife uplines - but I don't really have anyone who is losing weight with me at this time. I also am not getting support for my choice of how I am losing weight from anyone on my side of the family. My mother-in-law was my first customer and became a distributor and went on to lost 35 lb since last March. My hubby supports me because he has tried the products and had results. But my mom and stepmom both looked at me like I was nuts when they saw my shake and the supplements I take with it.

Ok question time - how many of you feel that having people going through the weight loss journey with you helps you to stay on track? Does it help more to have someone there just as support or who is actually losing weight with you?

Exercise choices

Well yesterday I got inspired to exercise while watching tv. I had been reading a while back on the AOL America Takes It Off 30 ways in 30 days that you should exercise while watching tv in stead of just sitting there. So I thought "well that shouldn't be hard." So I got out out my stair stepper and dusted it off and got out my 2 lb hand weights and did about 200 steps while watching tv last night.

I figure the more that I do that the more steps I might actually do. That plus I have a couple good exercise videos. And maybe if I am brave enough I just might break out the pilates dvds again and see if I cna get any farther with those than I did before. My main problem is that I am pretty sure I have a back problem. I am starting to get the old lady hump from bad posture and I have gone down 2 1/2 inches in the past 7 years and I am only 25. But I also know that pliates is supposed to help with your posture - so I should be doing it right? But man was it painful to start it. From what I have read it is really good exercise and helps you to work all the core muscle groups.

I'd like to hear from anyone reading this - what kind of exercises are you out ther doing to help get your weight down?

Well my weekend was hectic. I planned a joint birthday party for my two oldest girls and of course like a good mom I made a cake. Saturday was spent cleaning and watching the kids by myself. Then I got up bright and early Sunday to bake the cake and finish cleaning. The party went well and the girls enjoyed themselves - and I ended up with half a 9 x 13 cake left over. My mistake was of course not sending it home with any of my family.... But the cake is gone now and thank God not all by my doing.

Then yesterday I discovered that I had somehow removed all Microsoft office programs from my computer. And of course I had to figure out what I did because there was no way I could do my daily tasks without any of thsoe programs. Finally got it figured out yesterday afternoon. It was the update that I had tried to download and hadn't finished. So I fixed it and felt it best to stay away from my computer for a while.

Well Sunday morning I weighed and measured myself and I hadn't budged much - 236.6 lb. So even with my candy bar on Saturday cheating I didn't gain much - but I didn't lose any either. But I did lose 2 1/4 inches this past week.

I got on the scale this morning and my weight was at 235.6. So I am still going down even with al lthe cake that I have eaten over the past two days. :)