December 10, 2014

I noticed something yesterday: My resolve seems to putter out at the end of the day. I think it may be because I've worked 8-10 hours and have been really, really good with my diet and exercise. I "treat" myself and then BAM! I have had an entire sleeve of cookies. Senseless eating serves no purpose whatsoever and isn't good for any health or fitness goals I have. Being mindful really is half the battle. The other half is motivation and follow-through.

Yesterday (Wednesday) was pretty great besides the fact that I ate about 10 Oreo cookies (which weren't really that good, either. I was just eating them to eat them. Senseless). I did the PiYo Define: Upper Body yesterday, felt some soreness in my lower body from the previous day's workout, and stuck to my 100 oz water goal. Sadly, I was over on calories but still not over the "recommended" calories for the day, so that's a small win.

Thursday's workout is the Sweat workout. I'm very excited to do this workout because Thursday is also my birthday. My family is taking me out for dinner so I plan on making smart food choices while out but my workout will make me feel less guilty about going out to eat.

Have an awesome day, everyone! Take care!

December 9, 2014

School is almost finished for the semester! Wahoo! This week is finals week and I am not stressed (for once in my life). I have two finals and one final that isn't a final since it's just a larger weekly assignment. I couldn't be more thrilled. I'm taking next semester off to focus on my career development. I've got about two semesters left and I plan on finishing but work and developing my career there is my main goal and focus. The good news for is I will have about 10 extra hours a week to dedicate for personal and career development. More blogging for me and I think I'm going to get my yoga certification.

Today was a pretty great day! I stayed within my caloric budget, drank zero booze, and consumed 125 ounces of water! I also did my first PiYo workout today. I did the define lower body workout. It was pretty great! Intense, hard, and only 21 minutes. I was pretty proud of myself. 

I'm excited to see my progress in the coming weeks. Of course I still need to lose weight but my overall goal is to increase my strength, get buff as f***, and work on my nutrition.

Have an awesome evening, friends! Keep checking back for way more frequent updates. 

A Little Change Can Go A Long Way

This week was good and not so good. Good because I had another little epiphany about dieting and because I lost a pound and a half. Not so good because even though I lost a pound and a half and had a little epiphany, it took me an entire week to reach that epiphany. Like, literally, this epiphany occurred this morning. 

Last week I became a BeachBody Coach. I'm super excited to get started with using Shakeology and the corresponding PiYo workouts. I've been doing great with the Shakeology! I am drinking the tropical strawberry vegan. It's all that they claim it to be: it is tasty, it's easy to make, and it really does satiate my cravings. I mix in a banana, a cup of light almond milk, and a few ice cubes. It's a great post-workout drink/snack/meal (I say meal because it really fills me up. If I workout in the evening, it keeps me full until bedtime, so I will usually skip dinner.)

The workouts.... I haven't tried them yet. My BeachBody Coach, Heather, lives by all of Chalene Johnson's workout videos. Heather's progress has been extraordinary!! She's nine months post-baby and she's the smallest, fittest, and healthiest she's ever been! She teaches a wicked boot camp class on Monday nights and they are intense! My goal for this week is to do the PiYo workouts daily along with my regular walks and runs. 

That brings me to my little epiphany. The BeachBody plans really give you a thorough no-brainer approach to food, diet, and exercise. This whole time I've been preaching to myself "less is more." That's not the case: More is MORE!! More food, more calories, more exercise, more sleep. It seems impossible, but it's not. I'm not saying you need to workout for hours a day; quite the opposite. Just do something every day. Even if it's a little walk with your girlfriends on your active rest day: do something. 

The PiYo diet gives you a no-brain approach to food. You figure your caloric range based upon an equation (your weight x 11 - 200 = your calories) and gives you the food "limits" for those calories. I put limits in quotation marks because it's so much food. For example, I was 168.5 pounds. My caloric range is 1653. I had been limiting myself to 1200 calories, 1400 when I worked out. Oh my goodness, was I hungry! Not anymore! The PiYo diet plan gives me what I need to eat. In my case, it's 6 servings of primary veggies, 2 servings of secondary veggies/grains (I typically choose the grains), 3 servings of fresh fruit, 4 servings of healthy fats, and 6 servings of protein. The take-along booklet tells you exactly what is what and the measurements for the servings. NO. BRAINER. I find it hard most days to get all of my servings in because it's all so satisfying and filling. Best of all, I'm eating cleaner than I've ever been eating. 

Want to learn more about BeachBody and all of the fantastic programs that we offer? Visit me at www.teambeachbody.com/summerbuis. You won't be disappointed. 

At any rate, the hiccups of the week have led me to a 1.5 pound weight loss. I have a pretty ambitious goal of losing 2-5 pounds a week until I reach my goal. I used to think that it would be nearly impossible because I was always so hungry and it would just destroy my progress. By evening I'd usually cave and polish off a box of Girl Scout cookies (yes, we still have those in out house. Ack!!). I still will reward myself, but with a sweet and tasty Shakeology drink or with a banana with peanut butter or Nutella. Better choices, better results. 

If I stay on task and focus on my goals, this upcoming week should prove nothing but successful. I'll keep you all updated and posted on my progress! 

I hope you all have a fabulous weekend. I've already done my 2.5 mile run for the day and plan on doing day one of my PiYo workout this afternoon. Remember that it's about balance. Workout, eat right, and sleep! 

Progress!

This last week was pretty decent. I didn't lose any weight but I'm not upset. Instead, I worked out and figured out where to make my tweaks. I discovered a delicious and easy breakfast, I signed up for a 90-day fitness challenge, and I'm thinking about getting some fitness certifications! 

The tweaks: I've realized that my active recovery days need to be one or the other. A longer walk with Pilates or yoga was just as much as a run and weights. So I know now that I need to choose one or the other. I also realized (again) the importance of eating a small meal about 20-30 minutes before a workout and having recovery nutrients. Shakeology has an abundance of nutrients that pack quite the punch. This is my new go-to post-workout treat! 

I had seen all over Pinterest and other health sites about overnight oats. I made my own last night and was not disappointed! It's quite simple: take 1/2 cup of oats and 1/2 cup of milk and store it in the fridge overnight. Of course, add your favorite fruits and seasoning to it. I used strawberries, banana, pumpkin spice, cinnamon, and brown sugar. I also used almond milk instead of regular milk. Give it a try! The cold oats is surprisingly delicious. 

My friend, Heather, is a BeachBody coach and has put together a 90-day fitness challenge that I'm going to participate in. I'm very excited to see where this challenge takes me and see how far I can push my limits. Stay tuned for my "before" post with pics and measurements and check back regularly to track my progress! 

Finally, my BeachBody coach/friend is getting herself PiYo certified in September and asked me to join her! I think I'm going to do it! Her invitation really got me thinking about what other fitness certifications I'd like to pursue. I've always had a passion for personal training and yoga, so I think I'm going to pursue those certifications as well. It will be a slow process, but one that will benefit everyone in the long run. I'm very excited to give it a go!

I hope you all have a wonderful week! My daughter is in Chicago until Wednesday with her grandparents so my husband and I are going to be spending A LOT of time cleaning our house. I feel new paint in my future and my daughter's room being purged like nobody's business. Whatever you decide to do this week, remember to keep yourself accountable  and to do your best! Happy Monday! 

Good Pain?

As I said earlier, our word for the week is "accountability." This accountability comes in several forms for me this week: counting every calorie that I consume, not overextending myself, maintaining my workout schedule, and making sure I am getting enough sleep. 

Well, it's Thursday. How am I doing so far? Pretty good but I could do better. My biggest obstacle right now is sleep. Working at 3:00AM makes it very hard to get quality sleep. I laid down at 8:30 last night but woke up for about 90 minutes and couldn't get back to sleep. I'm rocking a solid four hours of sleep. Everything else is smooth sailing. I missed my Pilates "active recovery" and replaced it with a five mile walk. This was also because I missed my two mile run before boot camp on Monday (which wasn't necessarily a bad thing because boot camp kicked my butt!). 

Yesterday was my 2-mile run and kettlebell workout with my workout buddy, Amber. We felt ballsy and did a tour de (very small high school) stadium. They say big things come in small packages, and it does!! After doing a few rounds of the stands and the kettlebells, I could only muster a mile and a half. I'm not upset though because the overall workout was fantastic! We had fun working those stairs up, down, and up again. The kettlebells were killer, as usual! It was all-around a awesome. 

It's Thursday, friends. It's time to finish the week strong and to maintain that accountability! Keep up the great work and I'll check in on Sunday! 

My workout:

-half mile warmup walk

-round of kettlebells

-half mile run

-round of kettlebells

-half mile run

-round of kettlebells

-half mile cool down walk 

#Accountability

Accountability is one of those changes that I've been slacking on recently. I feel that this is definitely one reason that I have gained weight. Instead of planning my meals and sticking to my scheduled workouts, I ate whatever and made excuses. I promised myself that I would remain accountable here on out and make sure I was planning and scheduling and taking time for myself. 

The results have already been great. I lost a total of four pounds this week! That's a pretty great weight loss. I did it by holding myself accountable. I logged every single calorie I ate without changing the core of my diet. I've told myself that it's going to be small changes over time and not many major changes immediately. That stresses me out and throws me off the proverbial wagon kicking, screaming, and binge eating. 

Along with my mindset of accountability, I've scheduled all of my workouts this week. At first, it looked like a lot but if you really think about it, I'm not doing too much too soon or too fast. Aside from that, I have two active rest days built in. Like my doctor said, "Workout every. Single. Day." Here's my plan for the week:

Sunday: 5 mile walk @ 20" pace

Monday: 2 mile run @ 13" pace and 45 minutes boot camp 

Tuesday: 30 minutes Pilates and 3 mile walk @ 20" pace

Wednesday: 2 mile run @ 13" pace and 30 minutes kettle bells 

Thursday: 30 minutes Yoga and 3 mile walk @ 20" pace

Friday: 2 mile run @ 13" pace and 30 minutes kettle bells 

Saturday: 2 mile run @ 13" pace and 30 minutes of kettle bells

A lot of running and walking, right?! That's because I cancelled my gym membership. Kansas is GORGEOUS in the summertime and runs and walks at certain times make for a great workout!  I've got a great Pilates bar and a yoga video that I love doing. Top that off with some different kettle bell routines and a 10-pound kettle bell, and my "gym" membership went from $80/month to $3 a week (for the boot camp class)! The good news is I also have a treadmill, elliptical, and weight bench for inside workouts when it gets cold out. :) 

The word this week for me is accountability. Let's see where this planning and accountability get me. I already had a GREAT walk this morning! We made a pit stop at my in-laws' house (my kiddo needed a water break), but here's my #accountability already for the day: My walk. Have a great week, friends, and stay accountable! 

Tips and Tricks To Start A Healthier Lifestyle

After yesterday's epiphany, I started fresh. Yesterday was pretty incredible. I had a new outlook which may have been the same outlook I had two and a half years ago when I began losing my weight and before I became complacent and gained it all back. Thinking about my meals and planning them and planning my workouts for the week got me thinking about what I had done in the past that had made me successful. Thinking on that, I have some ideas that I'd like to share that I know everyone would benefit from. Everyone from a seasoned health nut to someone just beginning.

Move Every Day. My doctor actually told me "work out every single day" and there's some stock to that. I was moving every single day. That doesn't mean a grueling workout every single day though; you have to have an active recovery day that gives you a light workout and still gives you the calorie burn that you need for continued success. My favorite active recoveries are Yoga and Pilates.

If you run or walk, take a gorgeous path. Taking a beautiful walking or running path will help you appreciate what is around you and will inspire you to move more and could even help your pace! The anticipation of seeing that view that you love or knowing that you will be back to your starting point soon will motivate you that much more to move.

Plan your meals. I cannot say this enough: Meal planning is crucial to successful and sustainable weight loss! Count your calories and make sure you are not "eyeballing" your portions. Instead, grab a food scale so you can weigh out your portions. Using a food and exercise tracker app (such as Lose It!, my favorite with my Jawbone UP) keeps track of what you eat and your calories burned, which can aid your success.

With that said, make sure you're eating enough calories. My friend, Heather, who is a BeachBody coach and a personal trainer has beat into my head time and time again that the magic caloric number for weight loss is 1200 calories NET for most women. This means that if you burn 300 calories working out, you need to consume 1500 calories. Eating less than a net total of 1200 calories can cause your body to go into survival mode and to hold onto what little calories you're consuming. Not to mention people who consume less than 1200 are typically moodier because they're hungry (or, as Tina Fey said in her American Express commercial: "hangry"). You also need to ensure that you're treating yourself reasonably. That doesn't necessarily mean to eat that slice of cake. My favorite snack right now are French Macarons. They are small and low-calorie so there is no guilt if I eat one or - gasp! - two! You can also treat yourself with a cute outfit or a mani/pedi! Rewards don't have to be consumable.

Don't stretch yourself too thin. This is something that I've had issues with recently. Taking on a full time school work load, working 40+ hours a week, and still being a wife and mom, I gave myself excuses to not fit in fitness and health. Paring back on some things that can take a backseat will help you stress less and give you more time to focus on yourself, which is totally okay.

Hold yourself accountable. This is something that I wasn't doing recently, either. Accountability is HUGE. Accountability means scheduling your workouts in, planning your meals, eating at certain times, drinking your water, and tracking your weight loss. All of these accountability strategies go a long way into living a healthier lifestyle.

Finally, DO THIS FOR YOU AND NOBODY ELSE! Say it with me: I am worth it! You are worth it. Making healthy choices in your life has far-reaching effects. For me, it was anxiety and sleep. When I was working out and eating right, my anxiety went to ZERO and I slept like a baby and rarely woke up at night. There may be some stressors in your life that you will see vanish or decrease with integrating into a healthier lifestyle. When you actually take time to do something for yourself, that's when you will see the changes and the success!

This seems like a lot, but I ensure you that it's not. These are steps and small changes that we can all afford to make every day in our lives. These are changes that we should make. We only get one chance at life (unless you believe in reincarnation, for which you can't remember your past life anyway) so why not live it as long and as healthy as possible?