New Years Resolutions

I'm finally caught up on reading other blogs I like and noticed that a few of them have started talking about resolutions for 2010.

The Prior Fat Girl and *Bitch Cakes* both posted recently about what they are planning to do in the next month or year. PFG is planning on not eating out for the month of January unless it's family related. BC has used a few of the Weight Watchers Tools for Living to come up with her goals for this year.

I like how both of them approached this and decided that I should do this myself. Since I'm a pack rat and have some WW worksheets saved from past years, I busted them out and wrote down what my Winning Outcome.

I will follow the WW plan to:

-track my foods and stay on the program

-train for a 5k

-get in my 8 good health guidelines everday

-attend a meeting every week

-break into the 150s and get to my goal weight

-be a healthier and happier person

-make it to lifetime member and start going to meetings for free!

Some of my to do things include:

-train and participate in a 5k

-read 10 books

-learn how to drive a manual car

-work on my 101 things list

I'm hoping to start 2010 on a good foot with healthy food in the house and a few healthy meals prepared in advance.

Happy New Year everyone!

Christmastime

(Just pretend I posted this last week.)

I love Christmas! The decorations...the shopping...the music...spending time with loved ones....it's all great!

While out shopping for some last minute gifts a few days before Christmas, I found myself to be in such a joyous mood. At the mall I was smiling, humming along to Christmas music, and just enjoying myself in general. Such a wonderful time of year.

My boyfriend went to his parents house in New York state for the holidays, and I stayed at home because I was working. Since we weren't going to be together for Christmas, we decided to exchange gifts early. In my opinion, guys are extremely hard to shop for. So I ended up giving him some specialty food items, a few things for his cars, and some new socks. (Lame, I know. But he seriously needed new socks.)

In return I received a new vacuum cleaner and a new bedspread set. I'm extremely happy with the presents because I needed and wanted both of them.

The old vacuum cleaner I have is from my very first apartment. It's small and wails this high pitch frequency that drives me and the cats crazy. There are no attachments for the old vacuum, so I have to bring in the shop vac to reach corners and under couches.

My new vacuum is a Hoover Whisper and it is much quieter. It also has a handle that pops out to suck up anything in the corners or other hard to reach places. A furniture brush and a crevice tool also came with the vacuum cleaner.

See the difference between the old one and new one:

As you can tell, the new vacuum is a big upgrade from the last. Even though I'm 27, have been out of college for 5 years, and have been living in my own place for almost 5 years, there are days when I still feel like a college student and not an adult. Does anyone else feel that way?

So I feel like these gifts are helping me and my boyfriend become better adults. Or at least the gifts make me feel like more of an adult and that I really am 27 and graduated college 5 years ago.

Here's the gorgeous bedspread:

Right now we have it flipped over so this side is down and the solid red side is up. I'm so afraid that the cats are going to tear up the bedspread on accident with their claws, so I'm trying to take preventative measures against that.

So far, we love the new bedspread. It's nice and warm, soft, fluffy, and comfy. The cats even like it because they have been sleeping in bed more often lately.

I spent Christmas morning at work and then drove to my parents afterwards. I had a good time back at home. They have 4 dogs living there right now and it's always fun to play with them and get kisses in return.

My family had a good Christmas and I completed another thing on my 101 list. For a Christmas present, my mom told me to go out and buy some business clothes and she would reimburse me for Christmas. But I would have to give her the clothes and wouldn't get them until Christmas. So Christmas morning when my sisters were opening 1 expensive present, I had 5 cheaper presents to open. YEA for bargain shopping and coupons! I wasn't expecting to buy all my new business clothes at once, but that's just how it turned out. There are probably a few other things I can buy (ie: jackets, jewelry, etc), but I will start picking that up when I have a need for them.

I also received some kitchen gadgets that I will have to try out and report back on later. I promise to take lots of pictures when I use them and to blog about it.

I finally have a few days off this week, so I've been busy cleaning up the house and getting things in order before having to go back to work. Hopefully I can whittle down my to do list before the days over today. :)

Biggest Loser & Working Out

Season 8 is coming to an end today and that makes me a little sad. I love watching these people who don't think they can lose weight or exercise accomplish that goal. It's a real inspiration to me.

I've thought about having a last chance workout on Tuesdays since I weigh in on Wednesday morning. But I'm scared. I'm scared I will hurt myself, wear myself out too much, and that I won't be able to drive myself home after working out that hard.

My normal workouts entail me doing some cardio which I either encourage myself to go for longer than normal or I rationalize that doing some kind of cardio at a moderate pace is better than sitting on the couch or sitting at my desk at work. Some days I sweat and others I don't. I'm not sure if there is a happy medium in there to balance out my workouts on a daily basis. But hopefully I can find something.

Today my Zumba class ended early because an older lady in the class wasn't feeling well and almost passed out. Paramedics showed up to see how she was doing. Personally I was overheated, sweating a lot, and tired by that point of the class. I don't know how other people old than me or more out of shape than me do everything in the class.

I would like to break through the next decade of weight loss numbers to get over this plateau I've been facing here recently. Although losing 1lb, and then gaining .4lbs isn't really a plateau. It's more like I'm doing maintenance too early in the weight loss process. Guess I'll have to wait and see what the scale says in the morning.

Does anyone do a last chance workout during the week? Any tips on how to start amping up my work outs?

I've thought about running again, but I get so bored on the treadmill. It's easier to motivate me by sticking me outdoors, telling me to run/walk 1.5 miles and the only way to get back home or to the start is to run/walk the 1.5 miles back. I might start looking into the Couch to 5k program so I can start training for a 5k this spring.

Has anyone done this program? Does it help? The last 5k I quickly walked the whole way.

Annoying Neighbors

Have you ever lived next to the most annoying people ever? You can't control who your neighbors are, similar to how you can't pick who's in your family.

I started noticing annoying neighbors at a young age. I remember being in 1st or 2nd grade and trying to get away from an annoying neighbor kid. Back then we lived in a house that had a chain link fence just along the back of the yard with a gate that let out to the small ditch that was back there. Across the small ditch, which was maybe 5 feet wide, were more houses. There was a girl whose house also backed up to the ditch and we would occasionally play together.

I remember not wanting to play with her when I was in my own backyard, but she would be at the fence trying to peak through the privacy bushes or the gate. I clearly remember laying flat on our slide to hide from her or I would run to the side of the house and hide behind the a/c unit. I would even run inside to get away from her. Of course I can't remember why I would hide from a girl that was my same age or why I'd get my mom to cover for me and tell her I couldn't play today.

The next instance of an annoying neighbor that I can think of was in college. My freshman year some items of mine mysterious went missing during the first semester. Come to find out, one of the girls that I shared a bathroom with was a clepto. My college campus had suite style rooms where a bathroom was between two rooms and shared by up to 4 people.

My sophomore year was great! I had the best neighbors a girl could ask for. As hallmates and suitemates we would all hang out together. Go to the cafeteria together, party together, watch The Bachelor together. We were a tight bunch. I'm still friends with a bunch of the girls, including Morgan. We've remained good friends over the last 7 years and how she met the man of her dreams inspired me to do the same thing. (Thanks girl!)

The last year and a half of college I was a Resident Advisor and my neighbors were pretty good kids. The two apartments I lived in after graduating college I was very isolated and my neighbors didn't seem to exist. In both cases I didn't get to know anyone in my building. The second complex I moved to because some coworkers lived there and I liked the place too. They were the only people I talked to and hung out with.

Since moving into a house with my boyfriend, we've gotten to know a few of our neighbors. There are a few that annoy us, but luckily they don't live directly next to us.

When I started writing this post, a neighbor two doors down was revving the engine on his car and being annoying as all get out. He has a tendency to test out a couple of different engines in this fashion at all hours of the day. Whether it's 10am or 10pm, he will test out his Lexus, Mustang, or motorcycle by being annoying.

Is it wrong for me to think "I hope he will rev that engine, lose control of the car, and smash it into his house."? It's that annoying. I don't want him to get hurt or for his house to be damaged too badly. Just want the car to the damaged where he can't rev the engine anymore.

Has anyone else had to deal with this type of annoying neighbors? Can anyone believe I've written this long of a post on annoying neighbors? Share your stories/comments with me!

What's on your playlist?

Recently I've been a little unmotivated when it comes to the music I listen to while working out. I'm still working out, but I've been moving away from my workout mix playlist I created.

I like to listen to upbeat music while I do the cardio portion of my workout to keep me going just a little bit longer. But for weights, I can listen to anything. Slow pop songs, country songs, probably even classical although I haven't tired that yet.

I even find music that I listen to while cleaning the house is WAY different than the music I workout to. Isn't it funny how music affects us so much?

So what's on your playlist that gets you moving and grooving? I need some inspiration for some new songs!

Thanksgiving

Sorry I've been gone for so long, but I got caught up in the Thanksgiving holiday.

Last week I worked out 3 times before Thanksgiving, and then went to my parents house for Thanksgiving. I did really well for our big lunch. Didn't eat any appetizers and only got one helping of what I wanted. YEA!!

The bad part has been dealing with the leftovers my mom sent home with Ephram and me. My mom and sisters are really picky eaters, so they sent us with everything they didn't like. So we have a bunch of sweet potatoes, all of the turkey that was left, a few pieces of ham (my family prefers ham to turkey), and cranberry sauce. Mom even sent us home with mashed potatoes, green beans, and cornbread stuffing to round out the leftovers.

Ephram and I have been eating on the leftovers, but always in reasonable portion sizes. After my 5th Thanksgiving themed meal, I said enough! Probably should have called it quits before that, but the food is SO good. Guess we'll see how that plays out when I go to my WW meeting in 30 minutes. :-/

The worst thing food wise that could have happened after Thanksgiving did: my mom gave us the leftover Cheesecake Factory Pumpkin Cheesecake!!!!!!!!!

We figured out once we had the cheesecake in our house that only 2 other people besides me ate a slice of it on Thanksgiving day. So we had 9 pieces of cheesecake for us to finish off! I say had because I gave 2 pieces to a coworker as a thank you for bringing me wings from Buffalo Wild Wings while we were working on Saturday. (I know, I should have said no to the wings. But it was a kids portion and SO yummy!)

We have since then finished off the last of the cheesecake. I don't even want to know or guess how many calories are in the cheesecake that I've consumed over the last couple of days. The rest of the Thanksgiving leftovers are his to deal with and I give up eating them.

Overall, my Thanksgiving was great. I got to see my 91 year old Aunt and talk with her about a variety of topics. I also saw my little cousins that have grown up and are almost as tall as me. Plus getting to spend time with my immediate family is always a good thing. I wish I could spend more days with my family than I do, but with work schedules being so different and life activities happening it just doesn't happen as often as I want.

My after Thanksgiving workouts haven't been as consistent as the before T-day ones. I walked a ton at the Autorama car show on Saturday. My thighs were starting to cramp up after a few hours and it felt like I had been doing wall sits all day. Monday- I cleaned the house. Can't believe how dusty it can get in such a short period of time. Tuesday- I went to Zumba and did the elliptical. I'm going back to the gym today and hopefully will spend my last vacation day cleaning up the parts of the house I couldn't get to on Monday.

I promise more posts this week to make up for and catch me up on the things that have been going on and will be coming up in my life.