Workout challenge next 7 days

So as most people I got a little lazy over the holidays and it has been a BLAST. I mean sitting on the couch doing nothing and eating is way more fun then going to the gym and eating healthy right? Um the answer is no. But I still did it and now feel like doo doo. I need a serious reboot.

 

So first thing first get my workout back on track. I would start with diet too but I would be lying if I said I wasn't going to be eating some super yummy new years eve lobster and drinking some yummy wine all night long. haha.

 

Yesterday I started with working out again and went to the gym and it felt AMAZING! Hurt like I haven't hurt in months but sooo good.

 

Today(Saturday)-Jillian Michael's workout because it is just too darn cold to go outside.

 

Sunday-Run 4 miles and Strength training

 

Monday-Jillian Michael's

 

Tuesday-Body Pump and 30 mins elliptical

 

Wednesday-4 miles and strength training

 

Thursday-60 mins elliptical and strength training

 

Friday-Body pump and 2 miles

 

Saturday-Yoga and Jillian Michael's

 

There is my workouts for the next week. This is my way of keeping myself accountable. I need it! I need to get back on track! I still have 25lbs to lose! I still have a long way to go to complete this journey.

 

January 1, 2013 I will get back on track with my diet. I will detox and reboot like its nobodys business. I will go back to eating healthier and eating less carbs and less processed foods. I will do it!

Fun Fun Fun

My sister Devin got here a few days ago and we have been having so much fun and doing SOO much Christmas related activities =) Two days ago we went and saw Santa. Marcus is in LOVE with Santa, Teny on the other hand wanted nothing to do with him. She looked at me like who is this man holding me and then when asked to smile she cried. lol. Oh well maybe next year. After that my other sister Aurora and I went shopping. Aurora is 11 and this is the first year she has wanted to spend her own money and buy people presents. She bought everyone in our family a present all with 71$ and boy did she do good. She had a little help since you know I used my mad couponing skills. lol. But it was really nice to watch her get so excited to buy other people presents cause it shows that eventually that even for kids they learn that its not about getting gifts its about giving and helping others. It was very nice to sit back and see the joy. The joy I feel getting my kids presents, the joy I feel when I see them open them and see their smiling faces. So it was a very nice afternoon spent with her and a sleeping Teny =)

Yesterday my mom and sisters watched the babies and let Chris and myself go out and finish up shopping and just have some time just the 2 of us. I love that I have family near that take my children and allow me to spend so much time with my husband. I feel so blessed that we get to go on at least 2 dates a month and my mom takes Marcus at least 2-3 times a month and has him spend the night with her just because she loves him. So its nice even though we have small children we still get to spend tons of time just the 2 of us.

So we shopped, and shopped and shopped and ate really bad food, and shopped some more. We had a blast =) When the kids are at my moms house they take amazing naps so we got back to her house around 3 thinking they would wake up and when we realized they were still sleeping we decided to play phase 10. This game is seriously the BEST game ever. My family is serious about this game. We get seriously competitive. We were actually able to almost finish the game before either baby woke up, they both slept from 1-5!!

Later that night we went to an event called Christmas at the Park. It was a half mile trail where they had a million light displays. The kids were in heaven, I thought it was pretty awesome. It was just a fun night. Little cold (ok it was 40 degrees).

But I will leave you with LOTS of pictures =)

 



My little Teny is 17 Months OLD!

I can NOT believe Teny is 17 months old. Almost a year and a half. I feel like just yesterday we were celebrating her first birthday and then I feel like it was just 2 days ago that she was born. These last 17 months have gone by so incredibly fast.

This last month Teny has changed ALOT. I even posted on facebook that she went to bed one night a baby and woke up a toddler. Its been insane watching her literally change into a toddler. It makes me a little sad.

She is talking so much. Some of her everyday words are: Bubba, rora, mama(this is actually my mom), dada, mommy, teny, ball, hermie, up, uh oh, whered it go, more, milk, please, thank you, Izzy, bye bye, nigh nigh, hello, stop and open.

She has almost all her teeth. She was a little bit of a late teether but she is all caught up now.

She still LOVES eating!

She got a really bad cold this month that lasted FOREVER!! I also think she has bad allergies like her mommy.

She is becoming quite the Mommy's girl. Like she would love if I carried her around all day long and never left her sight. She does leave me and go play in her room by herself and she is still independent but she does come and make sure I haven't left the house and if she's been playing she'll come find me in the kitchen and say "kiss" and Ill give her a kiss and then she goes back to playing. She just loves her some mommy. I think its mainly because her and I do EVERYTHING together. Even when Chris is home and I could leave her I take her with me just cause she's so much fun and such a good little shopper. I love being with her as much as she loves being with me.

 

She doesn't quite get Christmas but she loves for the lights on the tree to always be on, she loves finding Hermie every morning, she loves the Christmas music, she loves baking cookies, and eating a chocolate from her advent calender, she loves all the Christmas lights on the houses. Im hoping next year we can teacher her about Christmas and show her its more then just Christmas lights and music and cookies. But for now this is Christmas to her.

Teny is just overall a kind, happy, sweet little girl and I cant believe how old and big she is getting. Please make time stop!!

The plank challenge

Ive seen alot about the plank challenge going around and I thought what the heck might as well try it.

 

But let me say how much I HATE planks. I think they are horrible I hate doing them and I try my hardest to avoid them.

 

So yesterday at the gym I told myself I was going to do one and I did and now I HURT so badly. I held it for 1 min and 30 seconds. Which I thought was pretty stinking awesome.

 

Soooo I thought I would try again today and Iam in so much pain I could barley hold 30 seconds. My whole body was shaking and my body literally quit on me. Maybe there is something to planking. Just maybe I should do it more often and not just for the month of December. No promises cause I still hate it and think planking is the worst thing ever. lol

 

I am going to try my hardest to make it past 5 miles today. I really am struggling with this mental block and I dont know how to kick it. So Im downloading some amazing music and hopefully new music will give me some motivation.

 

I also have to go to the doctor and have them take a look at my leg. Every time I run I get a horrible horrible pain in my leg. I stretch it before and after my runs and it still bothers me while I run. So that appts next week.

Happy Wednesday

So yesterday's run was kind of an EPIC failure! Not because I was in pain, not because my toes were rubbing together and causing more blisters, not because my knee was hurting me but because my pants ripped in the middle of my run!!!

 

I was just passing 1.5 miles as my pants ripped right down the middle. I stopped and had to think about what was happening and what I was going to do.

 

So in true Ashley fashion I ran as fast as I could outta the gym. HAHA.

 

I guess it really was time for new pants.

 

I ran to target (after changing) and bought new pants. Not the best running pants but at least they wont rip on me anytime soon. HA

 

Today I went back and ran 4 miles. It hurt. Not gonna lie. I wish I could get passed the 5 mile mark. But I get hit with a seriously mental block every single time. Im hoping Saturday when I do my first ever long run outside and not on a treadmill that I will be able to push farther cause I wont be bored outta my mind. So we shall see.

 

But I have gone back to tracking my calories. I realized that if you don't think about the calories your putting in you eat WAY more then you should. I started off with my smaller portions but since I wasn't counting I would eat an extra cookie or whatever and those things add up. I haven't gained or lost a pound since late Oct/early Nov and it SUCKS!

 

I know right now Im more focused on running then I am losing weight but I saw something on pinterest the other day and its sticking with me and that's "you cant out run a bad diet" and its totally true. I'm working my butt off running everyday and eating like crap. That just doesn't make any sense.

 

So Im back on the calorie counting band wagon. =) Day 2 is going well. Day 1 was going well until my mom brought me mellow mushroom cheese pizza for dinner and then my sister in law brought over yummy brownies those 2 things alone doubled my total calorie count for the whole day!! lol.

 

Im hoping to keep this up through the new year but Christmas is a very tempting time of year. Especially since Chris has 3 weeks of leave, my sister comes for 2 weeks, this weekend we are going away to Charlotte for a marriage retreat, and we might be going to Disney. Its going to be so crazy busy and so full of Christmas activities it's going to be hard to workout and eat right, but I don't want to gain any weight over the holidays so I have to do this. There is no other option =)

Sick

We have been sick for the past oh 7 DAYS! I have not ran since I last posted about kicking that miles butt! I really think Im going to be hurting today after a nice 4 miler.

 

I hate when I get into a good workout grove in this case a running grove and have to stop. Im praying I didnt lose everything I worked so hard for. Running is something you either use it or lose it.

 

So here goes nothing.

 

I'll post later as to weather or not I DIED!! lol

8:55

I am so excited to say I ran a mile in 8 mins and 55 seconds!!

 

I'm super proud of myself!

 

I mean I only started running like 3ish weeks ago and now I am obsessed/crazed about running.

 

I can not believe how fast/far I have come. I mean 3 weeks ago I couldn't run a whole mile or if I did run the mile I WAS DYING at the end. Now I can run 5 miles and then I DIE. haha.

 

My goal today was to run under 10 mins. That was my goal. But then my song came on, you know that song that makes you push harder, that gives you just that extra little something something you need. That song for me for whatever reason (maybe cause its funny and upbeat) but its 50 ways to say goodbye by Train.

 

I LOVE that song and when it comes on I just want to RUN and fast and sing as loud as possible.

 

But after that song was over I had just a tiny bit left to run and Selena Gomez's Who Says came on and I pushed myself so much harder then Ive ever pushed myself before. And I finished at 855.

 

I started bawling my eyes out. Seriously. I was that girl on the treadmill in the middle of the gym crying. I couldn't help it. I haven't been able to run in years. I haven't felt such pride in myself in years. I was overwhelmed and to know that I had beat my goal by over a minute just made it that much more emotional. There were so many times I wanted to quit because it was hard. It hurt. My knees have been killing me, my ankle has been flaring up from when I broke it, I have the worst blisters I have ever had and as soon as I start running they burn. But I pushed through it all and I did it and then I cried. HAHA

 

After I got myself together. I texted the hubs and told him about my 855 and he called me right after. Why this is important is my husband is so busy, so over worked and doesn't even get a moment to spare to text/call me ever during the day. Heck he doesn't have time to eat or go to the bathroom all day. He's so incredibly busy. Like he goes to work at 3am and lately hasn't been coming home till between 8 and 11 at night. Crazy hours the last 2 weeks. So needless to say he hasn't returned any phone calls or text messages in almost 2 weeks until he's off of work.

 

But today I texted him in the middle of one of his work inspections and as soon as he saw my message he stepped out and called me. It meant the world to me. I had told him the night before that my plan was 10 mins and he wished me good luck and he fell asleep (haha). So when he called I was shocked I even said why are you calling me, haha, and he said he felt that this was that important that he needed to call me immediately and tell me how proud he was of me and how much he loved me. It made that moment so much more special.

 

So there you have it. Your body can do anything you tell it to. Mind over matter  =) I proved that today. With how much pain I was in, with how little running experience I have, if you put your mind to it (and maybe have good songs) you can do it too!!

 

Love Love Love

I love my babies so much (as if you didn't already know that)

They drive me up the wall sometimes and there are times where I just want to send them to Grandma's and maybe not pick them back up, but then there are those moments where your heart swells and you cant imagine life without them.

This morning was one of them. Chris had the morning off so we got to spend some time together and they were just being as sweet as could be and so very loving and I love moments like these and want to remember them for those moments when they are driving me insane.

We even took some pictures of this moment.

 

Love these little munchkins =)

Thanksgiving 2012

We had such a good Thanksgiving. It was so nice and relaxing and enjoyable.

 

 

It started Thursday morning with Cinnabon cinnamon rolls and eggs, its what we do every year for breakfast and every year after we eat such high sugary foods we all feel horrible for about an hour or so. We should change it next year but the cinnamon rolls are so yummy I think its that no one cares. lol

After breakfast we start prepping food and have the parade on in the background. The kids LOVED the parade.

We went outside and played some while food was cooking. It was actually a really nice day and playing outside was enjoyable.

Dinner was at 3 and we ate and ate and ate. Then we all laid on the couch with our super full bellies and watched The Santa Clause which is another family tradition.

Chris and I were lucky enough to have my mom offer to keep the kids so we could do black friday shopping. This was HUGE because Tenley sleeps only in her crib. She will not nap anywhere but her bed and she would certainly not sleep all night long without her bed. So my mom took a huge leap of faith and let Ten spend the night. We made sure to bring her blankets and her dolly, Izzy, hoping those would help.

So we put Ten down waited about 30 mins to make sure she fell asleep and then we left. I made an agreement with my mom that if she woke up to call me and I would go straight home so Chris and I took 2 cars just in case.

Chris and I made it to Walmart with 5 mins to spare before they let people start buying stuff and it was CRAZY! We went to get 2 games my mom wanted for my sister cause they were normally 50 and they were on sale for 25 and I wanted to get the kids a play kitchen. This play kitchen normally is over 100 bucks well they had it for 50 so of course I HAD to get it.

Then we went to target which was even crazier then walmart. The line literally wrapped around every single aisle of the whole entire store. So we left. Nothing was worth that line.

We ran to Sears and Toys R Us then to post to buy a new TV. Chris waited outside in the cold for 2 hours for this TV. I stayed in the car and slept. HAHA. They let them in early to wait since it was so cold outside around 2 am so I went and joined him inside. We got a 55in Sony Smart LED tv for 699. This is normally a 1600 dollar TV. It was on sale for 799 but if you got there early they had some coupons and we got a 100$ off coupon for the TV! It was so worth it then.

After that we went back to my moms house (5am) and I woke my mom up to go shopping and Chris stayed with the kids. I was very impressed that Ten had slept all night long =) Proud mama moment.

My mom and I had the best time shopping since it was DEAD out. Like seriously. We went to target, Kohl's, the mall, and had no lines and no problems with traffic or anything. It started getting busy around 10am. So we got 5 hours of crowd free shopping. I got the kids some gifts, some friends some gifts, I got Ten 6 cloth diapers for 30$!! Basically I feel like I scored. I LOVE Black Friday shopping. It is my favorite and even though by 2pm when I got home I was exhausted and even when the husband says lets go to lowes and then go to the farm and get a tree after I have been up for over 36 hours, I would do it all over again.

So to me it was a great Thanksgiving. The fact that I got to spend it with my family and the people I love makes it even better =)

 

The High Running Gives.

Running gives me the biggest HIGH EVER! I have never experienced the "runners high" that runners talk about all the time. But every day I have ran past 3 miles I have gotten it. It puts me in this urophic mood and nothing touches me. Nothing can upset me. Im so incredible happy after I run. I feel accomplished, I feel refreshed, I feel AMAZING.

I ran 3 miles tuesday and kinda was upset with myself for not pushing farther because I feel like I could have pushed farther. So the next day I pushed with everything I had and made it to 4.5 miles!! Woot! Every day since I have ran 4.5 miles. I pushed for 5 today but I have these huge blisters on my feet and they start to flair up around mile 4 and I keep pushing through it but it hurt so badly today I couldnt stand the pain. They are blistering so badly they are bleeding. Not quite sure how to stop this from happening or if I just need to keep dealing with it till it builds up over time.

But not even my bleeding feet take away from how I love running and how I feel amazing afterwards bleeding feet and all.

I signed up for my first ever 5k and I want to start working on my time. I want to run the 3k in just under 33 mins. Which is just under a 11 min mile. Yes thats slow but thats what Im running at now. So anything under 33 mins is awesome for me =)

So I have 19 days to get working on running faster and longer and stopping my feet from bleeding. lol.

Day 5 of clean eating.

So.... I was doing awesome until we made some oatmeal chocolate chip cookies and they were amazing and I couldn't stop eating them. HAHA. But other then that and the corn bread we made to go with dinner last night. I have done really well.

I have eaten tons of fruits, veggies and lean protein. My body is slowly responding and I'm feeling a million times better and have more energy.

I'm so glad I jumped back on the clean eating band wagon because I haven't felt this great in awhile. I'm obviously going to be eating lots of yummy food on Thursday but its just one day and then Friday I will get right back on track with my diet.

I'm so proud of myself for sticking to it. It is really hard to not eat processed meals. Cooking meals and only using fruit, veggies and protein is actually really hard. Ok not hard but its time consuming. It takes forever to make most of the meals. Not a big deal but I see why so many people stick with processed foods. Its just easier. But the benefit of eating clean is worth it to me and to my family =)

I am still at my "normal" weight. I haven't lost any more weight and that's fine. I really think my body like my current weight. But I really need to lose these last 25 pounds. So my body needs to get on board.

I think I would be more discouraged about not losing any weight if I didn't see results, if my pants didn't fit better, if my shirts weren't hanging on me, but you know what I SEE BIG results, my pants are HUGE on me and some of my shirts are so baggy. The other BIG change I see if my workouts.

When I started I couldn't run a mile, a few weeks ago I posted about how I ran my first 2 miler non stop. Well today I ran 3 miles non stop. Whats amazing is I could have kept running. I was feeling amazing! But I had set my goal to make it to 2 miles, then when I made it to 2 I said keep going lets see how far you can go and I went to 3 and then my mind played dirty little tricks on me and told me I couldn't do anymore so I stopped. I'm so proud of myself for pushing to 3 miles but then knowing that I could have done more I could have gone longer but my mind is still stuck back in time 3 months when I couldn't run at all and the idea of 3 miles seemed the longest run ever.

I need to get my mind to today and trust that I can run 3 miles, trust that I can even run farther then 3 miles. So tomorrow I am going back to the gym and seeing if I can run past 3 miles and how far past 3 miles I can go.

After realizing I could run 3 miles I went home and found the next 5k around my town and found one on Dec 15. Chris is going to run it with me and this will actually be my very first official race. I am super nervous but kinda excited to push myself and do it and get a good time.

So I kind of want to not focus on the number on the scale and focus on getting miles under my feet. Seeing how many miles I can run from yesterday to Dec 15 and just getting back to the girl I was in high school that LOVED running. I want to love running again. Today I got a slight taste of that love of running I use to have.

After running my 3 miles. All sweaty and yucky but so very proud of myself

And then of course one of the not so fun things about running. These awesome bumps are all over my legs from my shorts. My shorts were so large and my sweat just stayed in them and rubbed my whole legs raw. They hurt so bad. So I obviously need smaller shorts or some running capris.

A littlr bit of this and a little bit of that

I just wanted to do an update on life in pictures :)

Marcus had turkey day at school and we got to go eat with him. It was a blast :) 

Someone is in love with dadaddy's necklace, her milk and her dolly that she named IzzzzZzYyyy. That's code for Izzy. 

Ten turned 16 months old on Friday :)

They both wanted to hold my hand while waiting ar school.

Once we gave this little girl some celery she has had a much happier belly and has actually pooed!!

My first pair of new jeans since losing 24lbs!!!

Date night with my amazing husband 

Marcus and his new choo choos

Marcus and ten before christmas pics at school

So there you have it our littlr update on life this past week. I love weeks like this one. Fun, busy, happy, crazy, and just pretty awesome :) 

Day 3 of Eating clean

As I said in the title I am at day 3 of clean eating. Overall I've done amazing. I have stuck to my meals and not over eaten once and haven't mindless snacked. I did eat some pita chips yesterday and today and I still drink my coffee so its not completely clean. But like I told my husband you don't want to see me without my morning coffee. 

So day one was pretty easy. I was so determined I didn't care that I felt hungry. I ate what I was suppose to and didn't slip up once. My diet was this on day one. 

Breakfast egg whites with spinach, mushrooms, and tomatoes. 

Lunch salad with chicken, boiled egg, stanch, tomatoes and I used a very light grape based dressing. 

Dinner was another salad.

I snacked twice eating strawberry's, grapes and string cheese for protein. 

So super good for me anyways. 

I did break my promise of not stepping on the scale and jumped on the scale Saturday morning. I had lost 3lbs already though so I knew I was doing something right. 

I pretty much ate the same more salads, some turkey, sweet potatoes, green beans, and some fruits. 

I weighed myself again today (Sunday) and lost another 2lbs. So 5lbs in 2 days. Not bad. I know its just the water weight but I don't care. I needed it to go away so I could get my weight loss back on track and now I'm officially back to my current weight with a weight loss of 24lbs. I seriously need to hit this 25lb mark. I keep getting so close and miss it by .2lbs. Its crazy, its annoying, its frustrating. I really am hoping to wake up in the morning and see that I have officially lost 25lbs. We shall see. My goal with clean eating was to make it to 27lbs weight loss because that puts me at pre Tenley weight. That would be the best buy Thanksgiving present EVER!! 

Let's see what the scale has for me tomorrow. 

I seriously think someone needs to come take my scale away from me. I need scale intervention. I can't not weigh myself every day. Ugh. Maybe one day I'll have self control where the scale is concerned. 

Back on Track

I kinda wrote this 3 days ago and forgot to post so here's the post and I'm about to post an update on this :)

So I fell off the weight loss band wagon bad this past week, but just cause you mess up for a week doesn't mean you should quit all together. So I'm back on the band wagon and starting with eating clean. Gotta get all the (fabulous) yucky food outta my system. I ate clean for a week when I first started my weight loss journey and lost 5lbs the first week. There is just something about eating completely clean that does a body some good. After all the carabaras, outback, wine, candy, ice cream, Starbucks (count 7 in 2 days) and bread my body is freaking OUT! I mean why wouldn't it freak out. I'm holding onto tons of water weight from all the salt from all the bad food. My body hasn't had greasy food in months and has no clue how to procress the stuff anymore. So my body needs a good week or 2 of eating clean. I'm shooting for 5 days of eating clean and then we will see where to go from there. I say 5 days because Thanksgiving is next week and there is no way I'm passing on the yummyness of Thanksgiving.

I have a love hate relationship with eating clean. The first 2 days I feel like I'm starving and then everyday after that I feel AMAZING! So its getting past the first few days that is the HARDEST. But seeing the scale go up from water weight is the WORST thing in the world. So I don't care if I have to "starve" for the next 2 days I am sticking with my clean eating plan.

I got so wrapped up in all the yummy foods over the past month or so that I really stopped watching what I was eating and kind of went with the mind set of "Oh I will just work out and be fine". But that really doesn't work. I need to remind myself that this journey isn't only a couple month thing or a year thing. Its a forever thing and I will always be tempted by food and I need to find a way to have fun, eat and not over do it at the same time.

So my goal for this week is eat clean, don't cheat, lose the water weight, work out twice a day at least 3 times and not step on the scale until next Friday.

I have the worst habit of stepping on the scale every single morning. So my weight changes by ounces everyday. Its a habit I need to change. I need to weigh myself once a week and so from today till next Friday I will not weigh myself I will not even think about it. haha. Ok I will think about it every morning when I normally weigh myself but I think its whats best for me and my weight loss.

So there you have it. I failed with dieting and I'm here to change it =)
Here's a picture of the beginning of my clean eating.