Ham Bones Are Creepy.

Today was glorious. You want to know why? Because I thoroughly enjoyed an average day. Yep - today was just average. And wonderful.

I had the day off of work today, just because. I woke up naturally at 9:00, which is 4 hours later than normal! I was refreshed and energized. I immediately chopped veggies and through the ingredients into my crock pot for homemade split pea soup. Leftover ham bones are amazing!

After getting ready for the day, I went to school and bought books for this semester. $390 later, I left and went to the grocery store. I stocked up on healthy fare for the next week. Salad fixin's, frozen meals, grapefruit, apples, cheese.

I walked into the door and smelled the soup. Mmmmm. I put things away and settled into the couch with an apple, string cheese, and my computer. The rest of the day was spent cleaning, watching Shutter Island, my daily date with Jillian Michaels, and preparing food for next week; lots of chopping!!

I feel strong. It sounds wierd, but it's odd using my muscles. I turn a corner, and I can feel my abs flex. I squat to pick something up, and I feel it in my calves; not pain, just... use. It's no wonder everything was harder a few weeks ago. My muscles weren't being used, and they had shrunk and gotten into quite a funk! Standing up straight was hard. I tended to walk with my toes pointed a bit out, because it was easier than holding them in. I feel GOOD.

We booked our excursions for our cruise. I'm getting soooo excited. Visiting Mayan ruins in Costa Maya, snuba in Roatan, Honduras, zip-lining and cave tubing in Belize City, and swimming with dolphins in Cozumel. This is gonna be a long 5 months, I tell you.

Today I ate the same meal twice. Deal w/it. It was delicious.

I ate 37 points... oops! One over what I should have. I guess it wasn't hard today!

breakfast: Carnation Instant Breakfast
lunch: Split pea soup (croutons on top)
dinner: Soup again. No croutons.
snacks: apple, grapefruit, string cheese, plain air popped popcorn, 2 TSP semi-sweet chocolate chips.

Have a wonderful weekend, lovelies. Keep your chins up!!!

Skeptical....

Is it supposed to be hard to hit your Points Plus for the day? With the new system, I'm supposed to reach 36 points a day. And it's HARD! I feel like I'd have to eat too much, or too much unhealthy stuff.

Most veggies (all except the starchy ones) are zero points.
ALL fruit is zero points.

I think it's gonna take awhile to get accustomed to this. I also think I need to go to the store. Here's my eats for the day:

breakfast: Oatmeal with walnuts, almond butter, and butterscotch chips

snack: yogurt

lunch: Healthy Choice Portabella Parmesan Risotto

snack: 100 calorie pack

dinner:2 eggs fried in PAM, mashed taters with just salt and pepper, and mixed veggies. Random, I know. Hey - it's what I had available.

snack: 3 cups airpopped popcorn with 1 TSP of semisweet chocolate chips and 1 TSP butterscotch chips tossed in while still hot.

before bed: 1 cup skim milk spiked with 1/2 cup Rice Nog

All of that is 34 points. I need 36. I even threw the chocolate and butterscotch in just because I was short! And if I fill myself with more fruits and veggies, it will still be zero points. I already had whole grains in two of my three meals. I guess maybe... cheese? I want my diet to be as natural and healthy as possible. I don't want to just eat the leftovers in chocolate or crackers!

swear I'm skinnier today. I always lose it in the belly first. My pants are looser today, and I just feel like it's flatter. Still not flat... but flatter.

I'd keep writing, but I don't wanna. Hubby and I are watching Die Hard, and my kitty is trying to get me to move the laptop so that she can sit on my lap. Have a fabulous friday!

Points Plus, Anyone?

Yet another attempt at weight loss... I've officially joined the Weight Watchers cult. I've heard great things, and honestly, I need help. I've got 5 months to get in fighting shape for a cruise with my hubby in the Western Caribbean. Our last cruise was on our honeymoon, nearly 6 years ago. And I was 70 lbs lighter. Now, I'm not gonna expect to lose 70 lbs in 5 months.

But I do plan on weighing 180 lbs. That's 44 lbs in 5 months. 2.2 lbs a week. Ya get what I'm sayin'? I've gotta kick it in gear.

I've got my work cut out for me, seeing as I work full time in an office, sitting on my butt. The rest of my time is taken up as a full time student; sitting in class, sitting at school waiting for class, sitting at home doing homework. I need to be diligent with the time I have on the weekends; grocery shopping, food prep, housework; and I plan on sticking with my workout video in the morning before work. I can do it!!

Hey, do you remember MADD? Mothers Against Drunk Driving? They called me today. And it was a dude.

"Excuse me, could you spare a moment of your time? This is not an attempt to collect a donation." - Dude

"Only if it's very quick." - Me

"It is." Dude. He then proceeded to prattle on relentlessly about drunk kids and drunk driving and drunk mothers and drunk hamsters. The dude went on forever.

"Excuse me, sir, but I'm in the middle of dinner. I need to go." - Me

"That's why I asked if you had a minute. You said yes." - Dude. He then hung up on ME!

The nerve.

Anyway, today I finished day 4 of the 30 Day Shred. Here's my eats:

breakfast: oatmeal (with walnuts, PB, and butterscotch chips)
snack: yogurt
lunch: Sesame Chicken Healthy Choice Meal
snack: 100 Calorie pack
dinner: Pasta Primavera frozen dinner (I know... normally I don't eat two in a day. But I was busy.)
snack: grapefruit
drinks: 1 coffee, 5 glasses water, 1 glass of skim milk spiked with rice nog.

Points Plus? (the new program)..... 32 points. 4 less than daily allotment. :)

OOPS! Day 3. NOT 30.

After seeing Kyoko's congratulations about completing the 30 Day Shred, I realized I made a massive typo. I am on day 3. Not 30. Sadly. WOW... that'd be nice. Wishful thinking, I guess. But hey, at least Day 3 is done!!! *blushes*

For awhile, I am going to need to be babysat (meaning I am putting every bite that goes in my mouth on this blog).

Today:
breakfast: carnation instant breakfast

morning snack: 60 calorie yogurt (french vanilla) and a handful of mixed nuts

lunch: leftover brown rice and veggie stirfry

afternoon snack: 100 calorie pack of cookies

dinner: egg scramble (1 whole egg +2 egg whites, cheddar, spinach, and mushrooms) and side of mixed veggies (from a steam bag)

dessert: a piece of my hubbie's leftover marzipan bar from Christmas

evening snack: white grapefruit

drinks: 1 cup black coffee, 5 glasses of water, 2 mugs of green tea

Booh-yah. Just please forget that I ate the marzipan.

Walk of Shame.

That's kinda how I'm feeling right now... head hanging low, shoulders slouched, eyes averted...

Amy has been a bad, bad girl. Sorry, ladies. I've missed you. I've read you. I just haven't acknowledged you. I feel like a broken record. Again, I've gained it back. I used school and busy-ness as an excuse to get entirely too carried away; then the holidays came around, and I remember two days where all three meals consisted entirely of cookies and cheese.

The damage? Lots of pounds. I am up to 222 lbs. That's only 17 less than my all time high; and 28 higher than my low in China last year.

Sometimes I feel like I'm somehow sabotaging myself. In high school, I played tennis. Most of my matches consisted of me wiping the floor with my opponent in the first set; and then losing miserably in the second and third. The closer I got to my goal, the more I psyched myself out. I see the same thing happening with my health.

I'm on Day 30 (correction... this is an edit added later. Day 3. Not 30. I wrote this with a bit too much excitement, I guess) of Jillian Michael's 30 Day Shred. She is kicking my @$$. Someone at work joked that I'm walking like the Tin Man. I'm back to eating healthy crap, not unhealthy crap. I start classes again in a few days. I will again be scarce on my blog; but I will not be absent.

And I have a Caribbean cruise booked for this May. I've got 5 months. Go.

Oh, gosh.... I leave for a week and great things happen!

I have been INSANELY busy. And do you know what happened while I was gone? I got TWO AWARDS! :) It seriously has made my morning. My day, even!! But the thing is, I have to leave in 10 minutes and I won't be home until 10:30 tonight, after class.
I'll have to learn how to go accept it. I've been trying to figure out how to tag people in a post so that you can click on it and get to their blog... people gave me instructions, and I've googled it, but blogger seems to suck just a wee bit much!!
So when I have some time in a couple days, I'm gonna figure this out. You ladies rock. Thank you SO much!

In other news, I am exhausted, but well. I spent the whole holiday weekend catching up on dangerously foul dishes, laundry, and shoving my nose in my schoolbooks. Oh, and a bit of gym-going, too :) I got a gift certificate to Target from my job, and I bought a fitness ball with it. I'm excited about the new possibilities! It's a turning point for me; I'm a shopping fanatic. Clothes, shoes, jewelry; you give me an excuse, and I'll blow money like nobody's business. The fact that I chose to spend it on my health has made me super-happy with myself.

I'm so sorry that I've been absent, but I can't tell you this isn't what it's gonna be like all semester! I'll get here when I can. I read your blogs on my break at work - which always energizes me. For some reason, my employer has blocked the ability to POST somehow. Oh, well. It just makes sure I have time to read up on all of you wonderful women!!

Due to the holiday, my weight loss meeting on monday was cancelled; so no weigh in this week. It's a good thing, though, because I wasn't an angel this weekend! I had a kids meal from McDonald's one day; and a big family lasagna dinner the other. It was delicious, and I don't regret a minute of that dinner! (The McDonald's... not so much). My mother in law even made brownies with black beans to try to make a healthier dessert for me. It was so sweet; and surprisingly yummy.

Well, it's that time. 8 hours of office work, followed by 45 minutes at the gym, followed by 30 minutes for dinner, 4 hours of class, and then HEAD HITS PILLOW!!!!

(is it bad that I'm already excited to go to sleep tonight?)

This is gonna be bleeping HARD.

Rude awakening: week one of Operation New Amy complete. Full time work (actually, OVERTIME this week, first week of 12 credits of classes (and they each said they assign an hour of homework for each day of the week), and new goals at the gym. I've gone straight from work, to the gym, to school every day. Or to the library if I didn't have class. I'm gonna be one sleepy puppy this semester.
It's going well, for the most part; but GEESH. These kids are babies at my community college. And they take notes on PHONES. I, on the other hand, just bought my first MP3 player 2 weeks ago. A friend told me they were now on MP4's and I believed him... totally asked the guy at Best Buy about it. At least he got his laugh for the day.
On the health side of things, I'm good! My weigh in on Monday was 205.25. The week before it was 206.75, so it's only 1/25 lbs - but I'll take it! I'm putting on muscle as well through my strength training. The important thing is that I can SEE the difference in the way my clothes fit.
What's your body type? I was always very CURVY on my bottom half, and small and trim on top. Bootylicious, you might say. Well, at about the 180 mark, I started putting it on in places I wasn't used to; my belly, my boobs, my arms. At about 200, it starts ALL going straight to the belly. So that's the first thing that's been shrinking. Score!
I've been to the gym every day this week, but tuesday I only walked for 20 minutes. Yesterday I pushed myself farther than I have yet - 33 minutes on the arc trainer. I burned 400 freakin' calories on that thing. I'm an animal!!!
Anyhow, I don't know that I'll be able to blog regularly... but I'm reading your posts every couple days. It's my break from my hectic new life....

so thank you for that, my blogging girlies. :)