Early Birthday Loot

I got my birthday presents on Saturday. We're planning to go to the Bakersfield Highland Games this weekend so we decided to begin the birthday celebration early. I got a Bosu ball, a heartrate monitor, a 6-pound medicine ball, weightlifting gloves and some cute exercise clothes. The Bosu is totally fun. You can bounce off of it and fly across the room. It's really fun for step aerobics. You can add a little bounce every time you step on it. I used the ball and the HRM and the medicine ball and did Super Cardio (Death) Mix. I burned just over 560 calories according the the HRM. The bosu made the step segments really fun and the stuff with the ball is a lot harder when you actually have a medicine ball to do it with. Today I'm doing Step Blast but I don't think I'll be able to use the Bosu with it since Cathe's step videos use longer step unlike most of the firm videos that either use the Fanny Lifter or the Firm Box, which is longer but they don't really use the whole thing (or they use the incline and the Bosu would work fine for that.) I will use the HRM though and see how ridiculously high my heartrate goes during the blasts.

The really great news of the week is that we bought two new snails for the fishtank on Friday and they're both still alive. I guess we solved the copper problem. Sometime later this week, we'll probably get a couple more and a new starfish and maybe some of those burrowing snails that eat crud out of the sand.

I flaked out on logging my food over the weekend. I think I did pretty well though. I ate too much cheese yesterday but other than that, I did alright. As far as workouts go, I did Cardio & Weights on Friday and Super Cardio (Death) Mix on Saturday and rested on Sunday.

Great Guacomole Recipe

We had some really yummy soft tacos for dinner last night. I made the filling with onions, garlic, Quorn crumbles, salsa, a can of tomato chunks, cumin and a little salt. While that was cooking, I made some great guacomole. I only had one avocado so I stretched it with frozen peas, oddly enough. Here's the recipe, it's called Mockomole (you can make it with one or two avocados):

Take a 16 oz. bag of frozen peas and empty it into a strainer. Run hot water over the peas until thawed. Dump the peas into a food processer and process until smooth (a little chunky is fine.) Add 1 tsp. salt, juice of one lime, a big scoop of garlic and 1/4 an avocado. Pulse until mixed. Put the mixture into a bowl and add the rest of the avocado, 1/2 onion chopped (I actually used 3 green onions, chopped) 2 tbsp fresh cilantro chopped and 1 tomato chopped (I left out the tomato because I didn't have any on hand.)

It was awesome. I tasted like avocado but it was lighter and didn't taste really fatty. I thought it was faboo! If you make it with 2 avocados, 1/8 of the recipe comes out to 2 points (109 calories.) With one, it comes out to 1.5 points (74 calories.)

Here's my log for yesterday:
B: 1/2 c. oatmeal, 1 egg, 3/4 c. soymilk, 1/2 c. blueberries 6 points
L: Southwest chicken pita, small curly fries 10 points
S: orange 1 point
D: 1/2 c. broccoli, soft tacos made with 2 WW tortillas, 1/3 c. FF cheese, 1 serving quorn crumbles, salsa, tomatoes, 1/8 recipe mockomole 5.5 points

Workout: Maximum Cardio Burn 4 points

Points Eaten: 23.5
Target Points: 22
Activity Points: 4
Flex Points: 0
Flex Points Balance: 23

I can't believe I finished it!

I finished Imax 2 last night. It was the first time I tried it from the DVD. I tried it once from the Tivo (it was on Fit TV) and I spent most of my time just standing there staring at the screen in horror. Last night I marched through parts of the blasts but I made it through the whole thing with no pausing or fast-forwarding the hard parts. I just did my best and marched in place when I couldn't breath anymore and my legs just couldn't handle one more jump. I've been feeling really 'thin' lately. Yesterday I wore a pair of jeans that I bought when I was at my lowest weight. They were my first pair of size 10 pants. Back when I bought them, I was able to wear them for like two weeks before they got too tight again. Now they fit fine! I really can tell that I'm making good progress again. Hopefully I'll be able to graduate to a size 8 in a month or so. I think fitting into single digits right on time for Sean's birthday would be good. Single-digit sizes are the final frontier for me. I remember wearing a size 9 in like 7th grade but I wasn't even fully grown yet.

Here's my log for yesterday:
B: Breakfast burrito made with egg whites, onions, cheese, salsa and a WW tortilla 7 points
L: Stir Fresh lunch made with 2 c. mixed veggies, 1/2 c. noodles and sauce 8 points
D: Ricotta pasta with yellow chard & leeks 9 points
S: Frozen strawberry bar 1 point
S: 1/2 c. light ice cream 2 points

Workout: Imax 2 5 points

Points Eaten: 29
Target Points: 22
Activity Points: 5
Flex Points: 2
Flex Points Balance: 23

Rotation for April

I made myself a workout rotation for April. I decided that my March rotation was a wee too hard (since I skipped so many workouts) and made one that alternates between advanced and intermediate workouts. It's good because it's a nice mix of Cathe and Firm videos. I'd like to lose another 10 pounds by summer. I can do it if I really focus on my diet and exercise and lose a pound a week.

4/1: Rest
4/2: Cardio Sculpt
4/3: Step Blast
4/4: Complete Body Sculpting
4/5: Low Max
4/6: Maximum Cardio Burn
4/7: Muscle Endurance
4/8: Rest
4/9: Step Jump Pump
4/10: Super Cardio Mix
4/11: Cardio & Weights
4/12: Express Cardio
4/13: Imax 2
4/14: Supercharged Sculpting
4/15: Rest
4/16: Boot Camp
4/17: Calorie Killer
4/18: Pyramid Upper Body
4/19: Ultimate Calorie Blaster
4/20: Pyramid Lower Body
4/21: Low Impact Step
4/22: Rest
4/23: Complete Aerobic & Weight Training
4/24: Low Max
4/25: Total Sculpt
4/26: Step Blast
4/27: Body Sculpt
4/28: Imax 2
4/29: Rest
4/30: Step Jump Pump

Happy Dancing

I'm down another 2.5 pounds. I've lost 5 pounds since I started the weight watchers thing. I'm only 5 pounds away from my lowest weight ever and 30 pounds away from my goal. I've noticed that the jeans that had been feeling a little tight are now as comfy as they were when I bought them. It sure does make me feel better about not working out or logging my food all weekend. Not that I'm going to stop working out and logging my food since I gained back 10 pounds that way. Last night I did Cathe's Boot Camp video from the DVD for the first time. I couldn't finish it. I started getting dizzy and woozy so I skipped the last two cycles (the video is made up of cycles of intense cardio, lower body, upper body and abs, there's 8 in all.) I had a popcicle and it made me feel better. I think I burned so many calories that my blood sugar got super-low. Today I'll be doing step blast.

Here's my log for yesterday:
B: 1/2 c. oatmeal, 1 egg, 3/4 c. soymilk, 1/2 c. blueberries 6 points
L: 1 fish taco (no sauce), 1 shrimp taco (no sauce) 10 points
D: pizza 15 points
S: popcicle 2 points

Workout: Boot Camp 5 points

Points Eaten: 33
Target Points: 22
Activity Points: 5
Flex Points: 6
Flex Points Balance: 29

Another Rainy Weekend

We got a new fish on Saturday. It's a bannerfish and we named it Gill. It's about the same size as the yellow tang (Bubbles) but it's supposed to grow a lot bigger. Saturday night we went out to dinner in Old Town with Kat (one of my Oopster friends). She was out here on vacation with a friend. Sunday afternoon we upgraded the lights for our fishtank. There was a $500 reef lighting fixture exactly the right size for our tank on clearance for $200 and we couldn't resist. The tank looks so bright now and the anemone (Ursula) has gotten even more active since we got it. We'll start adding corals and stuff in a few weeks.

Other than that, we spent most of the weekend watching Firefly. Around midnight Saturday we finished watching the last episode and had to go out Sunday and buy the movie. It was really good. There were some sad bits and some deeply satisfying bits and some bits when I wanted to throw stuff at the screen. Overall, I give it two thumbs, 8 fingers and 10 toes up. I'm blaming Paul and Sarah for getting me hooked. We were out in Las Vegas visiting them and Paul mentioned Serenity and we said we hadn't seen it yet. He asked if we watched Firefly and we said we watched a few episodes back when it was on but the network killed it and we didn't catch it when it was on SciFi. So he immediately made us copies of the Firefly DVDs.

As far as diet and exercise goes, I flaked all weekend. I didn't eat too much crap but I didn't log my food at all and lazed out on my workouts. I'll do better this week.

TGIF

I'm so looking forward to sleeping in tomorrow. We're probably going to go out and buy another fish or two for our tank.
We might get one of these guys

because they're really big.

Or maybe a couple of these


Or a pair of these

because we need some blue in our tank.

Or a couple of these guys


My eating is going really well this week. Here's my log for yesterday:
B: 1/2 c. oatmeal, 1/2 c. blueberries, 3/4 c. soymilk, 1 egg 6 points
S: 25 soy crisps 2 points
L: 6" veggie sub on wheat bread, salad 10 points
S: carrot sticks 0 points
D: Leek & Tomato Pasta Bake 10 points
S: 1/2 c. ice cream 2 points

Workout: Body Fusion 4 points

Points Eaten: 30
Target Points: 22
Activity Points: 4
Flex Points: 4
Flex Points Balance: 26.5

My butt still hurts

I did a killer lower body workout on Monday and my butt still hurts. It doesn't hurt as much as it did yesterday so hopefully I'll be able to do lower body again tomorrow. Today I'm scheduled to do cardio. I've got Super Cardio Death Mix on my calendar but I'm thinking I want to do some Cathe instead. Maybe I'll do Step Blast or Imax 2. I'm starting to feel like I've really gotten my groove back with eating. As of today I'm trying to give up Diet Coke. According to my dentist, it's totally staining my teeth. I went grocery shopping at Henry's yesterday and loaded up on healthy food and picked up some Hansen's diet soda. No calories, sodium or aspertame and it's clear so it won't stain my teeth. It's pretty yummy. I got Strawberry Kiwi, Tangarine Lime, Peach and Root Beer. I haven't tried the Root Beer yet. The other flavors have been really good. Today I get to pick up my CSA veggies so I'll be all armed with healthy food.

Here's my log for yesterday:

B: 1/2 c. oatmeal, 1/2 c. blueberries, 1 tbsp. almonds 4 points
L: Shrimp burrito (no sauce) 12 points
D: Tofu stir-fry (baked tofu, bok choy, mushrooms, sauce), 1/2 c. rice 6 points
S: 3/4 c. strawberries, cool whip 2 points

Workout: Pyramid Upper Body (without floor work) 2 points

Points Eaten: 24
Target Points: 22
Activity Points: 2
Flex Points: 0
Flex Points Balance: 30.5

Copper, who knew?

Well, we figured out why we haven't been able to keep snails or starfish alive in our fishtank. It's amazing that in 3 marine aquarium books we've read, not a single one warns that copper plumbing parts will kill invertabrates. Obviously there's not a whole lot of copper in there since the anemone and hermit crabs are doing so well. It's just the ones that stick themselves to the sides of the tank that haven't survived. So we replaced the one copper fitting with a plastic one and got some copper filters that the fish store recommended. Hopefully in a few weeks, we'll be able to get some more snails and another starfish (dang, that starfish was cool.) We finally gave the Royal Gramma a name. We named him Austin Powers International Fish of Mystery since he likes to hide out in caves and swim sideways. He's a bit of an enigma. In the midst of yesterday's fish emergency, I missed my workout. I'll have to get back in the groove tomorrow.

Here's my log for yesterday:

B: Breakfast burrito made with WW tortilla, egg whites & cheese 8 points
L: Stir Fresh made with veggies, tofu, noodles and sauce 7 points
D: 1 c. pasta, 1 oz. lowfat mozzarella cheese, tomatoes 6 points
S: 1/2 WW english muffin, 1 tbsp marshmallow cream 2 points

Points Eaten: 23
Target Points: 22
Activity Points: 0
Flex Points: 1
Flex Points Balance: 30.5

Took the kids to the dentist yesterday....

That was 3 hours I'll never get back. I also left my planner there so I need to go pick it up later today. I've gotten to the point I can't function without that little book. In fishtank news, we got 3 new fish on Saturday. We got a scooter blenny who hangs out on the bottom and eats algie and bits of food from the substrate. We named him Scooter (his uncle owns the tank!) We also got a royal gramma. He's really neat but he hides in the little caves in the rocks. He promply disappeared as soon as we let him out of the little bag and we didn't see him for days. We assumed he jumped out of the tank or got eaten by the anemone until we saw him last night. He swims sideways. It's wierd. He doesn't have a name yet. We need to give him a spy name 'cuz he's so sneaky. Then we got a blue starfish who was AWESOME but died the next day we had named him Patrick. I'm beginning to think the algie on the sides of our tank is toxic. It's the only reason I can think of that we can't keep algie eaters like snails and starfish alive.

Here's my food and exercise log for yesterday:

B: 1/2 c. oatmeal, 1/2 c. blueberries, 3/4 c. soymilk 4.5 points
S: carrot sticks 0 points
L: hot & sour soup, 1/2 c. rice, garlic tofu & veggies 10 points
D: veggie pizza 15 points

Workout: Pyramid Lower Body 4 points

Points Eaten: 29.5
Target Points: 22
Activity Points: 4
Flex Points: 3.5
Flex Points Balance: 31.5

I think I pissed off a lady from church

A few days ago, I got a phone call from a lady from church asking me if I can bring some food for a dinner in a few weeks. I said sure, no problem. She asked if I'd rather make chicken or salad. I said salad since I've usually got lots of fresh veggies in the house and am not much of a meat-eater. She told me that she would email me the recipe. Now, I thought that was weird that anyone would need a recipe for salad. So yesterday, I got the recipe in my email and it was a calorie-disaster consisting of iceburg lettuce, frozen peas, hard boiled eggs, 2 cups of miracle whip and bacon bits. All I can say about that is EW!!! That's just about the grossest thing I've ever heard of. If I'm going to eat food that bad for me, I'd like to eat something that tastes good (like brownies.) I don't even like miracle whip or mayonnaise or even ranch dressing for that matter. When I think salad, I think about a nice bowl of spring mix with maybe some radishes, tomatoes and various other veggies thrown in. You know, salad. So I sent her an email back asking if I can just bring a regular tossed salad 'cuz I can't eat that. She called me back today and said that she gave my food assignment to someone else and asked if I would be okay with bringing chicken instead. I asked if all the food was like that and she said yes. They were having chicken, that salad, rolls and cake. I asked if there would be any regular salad and she said no. I said the salad sounded gross and she said it was her recipe. I think I pissed her off. I think I might have to tell her that I have a sudden trip to Uzbekistan and won't be able to go to the dinner. I'm not eating that food. I'm considering becoming a vegetarian just so I can get out of eating that stuff.

Here's my food log for yesterday:
B: 1/2 c. oatmeal, 1/2 c. blueberries, 2 egg whites, 3/4 c. soymilk 5.5 points
S: tangelo 1 point
L: veggie and tofu pad thai 10 points
D: spinach pasta bake 8.5 points

Points eaten: 25
Target Points: 22
Activity Points: 0
Flex Points: 3
Flex Points Balance: 26

Where did the week go?

I can't believe it's already Thursday! This week has been crazy. Monday I had a dentist appointment. Tuesday I had to bring my car into the body shop for an estimate. Yesterday I was scheduled to drop the car off at the body shop at 7:30 in the morning. I had it all planned out. I was going to leave the house at 7:00, drop Emily off at school a few minutes later, get the body shop by 7:30, pick up the rental car, get Nick to school around 8:00 and then head to work. Unfortunately, there was a really bad accident on the 15 and it took me 40 minutes just to get to Emily's school. I didn't get to the body shop until 8:15 (Nick's school starts at 8:30) and then I didn't drop Nick off until 8:40. It was a crazy, crazy morning. Today's been pretty normal but I'm just marvelling at the fact that it's actually Thursday and the week's almost over. The most exciting thing to happen today was going to lunch with Sean and having some really yummy vegetable and tofu pad thai. It had the rockin'est baked tofu in it. It almost tasted like really good shitake mushrooms. I gave Sean a bite and he said he'd actually eat tofu if I made it like that. I've got some recipes so I guess now's the time to try. He also said he'd pay me fifty bucks to make it, feed it to my mom and make her guess what it is.

Here's my food log for yesterday:

S: 1 c. cereal, 3/4 c. soymilk 3.5 points
B: 1/2 c. oatmeal, 1/2 c. blueberries, 2 egg whites, 3/4 c. soymilk 5.5 points
L: Leftover pasta with boca & tomatoes and mozzarella cheese 9.5 points
D: 1 WW tortilla, 1/2 c. FF cheese, homemade chorizo, cabbage, salsa, avocado 9 points
S: 1/2 c. ice cream 3 points

Workout: Power Hour 4 points

Points eaten: 30.5
Target Points: 22
Activity Points: 4
Flex Points eaten: 4.5
Flex Points balance: 29

Down Another Pound!!!

I weighed in this morning and I'm down another pound. That's 3 pounds so far since I started this Weight Watchers thing. I haven't tracked my points perfectly and I've had a few treats that I haven't really had the flex points for but I'm going with my theory that Weight Watchers purposely makes the point targets low because they're expecting you to screw up. I have 7 pounds to go to get back to my lowest weight and then I need to lose another 25 pounds to get to a healthy weight. That should put me in a size 6 or *gulp* maybe a 4. Yikes!!!

I got to go to the dentist yesterday. I made the mistake of telling the dentist that I had a bad experience the last time I had an uber-cleaning because it hurt. So this time, she totally numbed up my mouth with the topical stuff and gave me two big shots of novocane. I don't know what was worse, the painful cleaning or being numb all day. When it wore off, I felt like someone had punched me in the face a few times.

Today I get to make an appointment to take my car to the body shop again. Some lady in a beamer rear-ended my PT Cruiser 'cuz her dog was jumping around in the front seat. Her insurance is going to take care of it but it's still a giant pain in the butt.

Here's my food and exercise log for yesterday:

B: 1/2 c. oatmeal, 1/2 c. strawberries, 2 egg whites, 3/4 c. soymilk 5.5 points
L: Smart Ones frozen meal 6 points
S: Tangelo 1 point
D: 2 slices pizza, big salad 12 points

Workout: Step Blast 4 points

Target Points: 22
Points Eaten: 24.5
Activity Points: 4
Flex Points Eaten: 0

Flex Points Balance: 35

Blah

Emily got sick on Friday night. She threw up all over her bedroom floor and didn't tell anyone till Saturday morning. So that kicked off a great weekend. We spent most of the day Saturday shopping. Sean needed a new suit and a blue blazer so we got to hang out in Men's Wearhouse for a while. The tailor told Sean he was a "suspender guy" so now Sean has some snazzy suspenders to keep his pants up. So now he's going to take the rest of his dress pants to Men's Wearhouse to get buttons for suspenders sewn in. Then we went to Target and got Emily a new backpack and some new shirts. Emily is getting freakishly tall so all her shirts were getting to short. We went out to dinner Saturday night and I suddenly got violently ill. Not from the food, as soon as they brought me my burrito, I realized that that icky feeling in my stomach was definitely not hunger. It was sad because the burrito was beautiful and I really wanted to eat it. So we boxed up my food and went home. I crashed as soon as I hit the bed. I woke up in the middle of the night just in time to run to the bathroom. It was pretty aweful. Yesterday I felt a lot better. Still not great but I was able to eat a little. For lunch I shared my burrito from Saturday night with Sean. It tasted divine! In the afternoon, we went to the fish store. We got a yellow tang who we named bubbles and another turbo snail who we named turbo. We finally named our anemone Ursula and the clownfish, of course is Nemo. The hermit crabs don't have names because they all look the same.

Here's my food log for yesterday. I didn't track my points but I didn't eat much so I doubt I went over my 22 target points.

B: 4 oz. cup of yogurt
L: 1/2 shrimp burrito
S: crackers
D: 3 oz. cod, 1 c. green chard, 1/2 c. rice
S: scoop of light cool whip

Wierd Day

What an odd day yesterday was. The oddity began when I got to work. They were supposed to have moved my cubicle up to the fifth floor and when I got all the way up to my new cube, some guy was in there working. Turns out, they forgot to make sure the guy had already moved before getting my ready to move (I'm still not quite moved, they moved my stuff and my chair but my computer and my phone are still in my old cube.) Then in the afternoon, I got an email from my friend Kim in Oregon announcing that she's getting married again. It's kind of on a whim since they're getting married in a few weeks. Then I got an email from my old friend Sean who I'm pretty sure I haven't seen since my wedding. He had swiped my email off of the one Kim sent and wanted to say hi. So that was cool. He's still in Escondido so we'll probably get together for lunch or something some time. So then I turned around and swiped our friend Liz's email address from Kim's email and said hi to her. I don't think I've seen her since Kim's first wedding. I haven't heard back from her yet. I suck so much at keeping in touch with people. I really need to do better with that.

As far as food and exercise goes, I did really well yesterday except for my 12 point lunch. Sean and I went for chinese food and it rocked! It's a good thing I only ate half of my moo shi pork 'cuz otherwise it would've been a 19 point lunch. If I'd eaten the rice, it would've been a 23 point lunch *insert horrified expression here* Dinner was really light but awesome! I'm really starting to fall in love with polenta, especially with a little cheese mixed in. I had a dead ripe avocado in my kitchen so I cut it up and threw it in with the chicken & leeks and it was awesome! This week the CSA brought me two avocados but sadly no tomatoes. My exercise is going really well. I did a Firm workout instead of Cathe so I didn't get worked quite as hard as I have been lately. My ass was still kicked pretty thoroughly 'cuz I really heavied up on my weights. I had to pause the video a couple of times to catch my breath. Those leg presses and tall box climbs really wipe me out!

Here's my log for yesterday:

B: bulgar & oats, 1/2 c. strawberries, 1/4 c. soymilk 4.5 points
S: vanilla wafers 4 points
L: Hot & Sour soup, spring roll, Moo Shi Pork 12 points (Eek!)
D: Chicken & leeks w/ polenta & avocado 6 points

Workout: Supercharged Sculpting 4 points

Points Eaten: 26.5
Target Points: 22
Activity Points: 4
Flex Points: 2.5
Flex Points Balance: 10