Challenge-Week of February 24-March 2 :)

Challenge Time:

Ok, sorry for the late delay in getting this up on the blog! I had an eventful Sunday and Monday over here in Knoxville. 

This week's challenge is two-fold: 

1) Research a good body cleanse to get rid of all the impurities in our bodies...whether its natural or whatever. This is mainly coming from the fact of well..I need one, and a good one to get all this crap out of my body and fast! 

2) Come up with 5 exercises that we can do on our own at home to help three parts of our body: arms, legs, abs! I want to get a core list of exercises that we can do before bed and in the morning to get our body moving and then for bed would be a bedtime routine (maybe a little less intensive but something to stretch it down and still build strength). This is something that we can do IN ADDITION to our normal workout...just to put that little extra *umph* in our day :) 

Also, I have some really good news! I HAVE A NEW JOB! I put in my two week notice here at Aerotek and my last day will be March 8, 2013. I will start my new job with Travelers Insurance as a Sales Rep on March 18, 2013. It's such a better environment....$30,000 salary, 5 weeks paid vacation, family oriented, set schedule, 3 months training, 2 months of semi training...its amazing! I cannot wait! I'm hoping that having a new routine and a set schedule will help me be able to get back in my weight loss and fitness mindset! :) 

Have a great week! 

Love always,
Brittany 

Last week update from BB2!

Okay, so here's a look at last week's challenges. I tried the yoga meltdown on wednesday and did the 30 day shred one again today! I didn't manage to do a workout every day this week, but that's also because I was trying not to lose weight this week, because friday I verified my weight for the weight-loss challenge I'm in. So I went in wearing a jacket, my scrubs and shoes and was full of food and water, and the guy said I weighed 197, which is ridiculous. I was 186 this morning with an empty stomach and no clothes. But it works to my advantage, not only with this weigh in, but also because that qualifies me as obese, so I can do a second, free challenge where if I go from an obese BMI to a healthy BMI in a year, they will give me 100 bucks just because! So if you go register at healthywage, get your weight verified (you can do it by video, and i bet matthew would help you, lol), and sign up for this free challenge, you've got nothing to lose (except weight!). 

Haha. but this week, from trying not to lose weight before the challenge started, I thought it'd be good to eat all the junk I wanted. I ended up being miserable most of the time and feeling guilty and gross.  It was the worst on thusrday, when James and I used my coupon for a free pizza from papa johns from guessing the superbowl coin toss. I felt so disgusting afterward, and even the next morning! I guess that's what a food hangover feels like.

For the stress eating, I would recommend if you don't have an air popper, you should get one and make your popcorn that way. It cuts down on a lot of calories - and if you're like me and use i can't believe it's not butter spray, then that's even less calories than you would be spending on butter and oil!. I understand that stress is a killer, and I wish I could help more. Maybe we'll have an upcoming challenge to deal with replacing stress eating with working out or something! (if you're game, that is.)

Anyway, I'm excited to see what you have in store for me! And make it hard! I gotta kick off this weight-loss competition right!

Love you too. :)

Update from BB1 :)

Brit here!

OK, so yeah I kind of forgot to post some stuff up here! I am so horribly sorry! IT was a really rough week yet again for me in general and life kind of took over! So i'm going to hit up what I've missed :) 

Jillian's Yoga Meltdown is amazing! I loved it! I was feeling really stressed all week and decided (after a minor confession needed of some oreos and peanut butter), to try it! I did it and holy cow it was so freaking hard! However, it really forced me to focus in on what I was doing to make sure I was doing it right and it got me into a good peace of  mind in general! :) I am still half way afraid to try the 30 Day Shred! I've heard horror stories about it! lol 

Anyways, I liked the youtube fit videos! It's amazing what you can find online these days that can really help you out! Sometimes it makes me feel like there are normal people out there that can do these so why can't I? I'm going to continue on with those there for sure!

Update on where I'm at: 

While I've done ok on the exercising part, well sort of...I haven't been to the gym but I've been doing stuff at home as much as I can...I have really been bad on my eating habits. Yes I am a stress eating machine...so when I get stressed I tend to want either chocolate or popcorn smothered in butter and white cheddar sprinkle topping stuff...and we're talking like make 6 quarts of it and eat it all! Which I realize is horribly unhealthy for me! So with that being said, today I started fresh! I managed to sleep from 8:30 last night until about 11am today (apparently I was really tired!). I got up, cleaned the house and then went to the gym and did an hour of a kick butt Zumba class where I burned 637 calories! I am sitting at 192.2 pounds at this moment with a BMI of 31.1 which means I really need to get my butt in gear! I have 4 weddings to be in that require me to be in dresses in front of lots of people...and 2 of them are in a month! So with that being said...Brianna, I'm going to come up with a challenge for us this week...I haven't thought on it yet....but I really want to come up with something really good! So I will post it tomorrow sometime and we can be on our way! 

Happy Saturday bestie! I miss you like a whole freaking lot! 

BB1-Peace Out :) 

Increasing the challenge for Feb 16-22!

Here is an optional add-on for this week's challenge! After eating a bunch of junk today, I was feeling pretty down and like a failure. (I mean, I maxed out on calories before 6 pm, and it was all on junk food!). So I decided not to let myself get too down, and instead changed into some workout clothes and let Jillian Michaels kick my butt for a while (day one of the "thirty day shred", one of the links I posted last time).

It inspired me to try to get in to more workouts. I have not been inside the gym more than once since 2013 began, I think. My diet needed an overhaul to get me back in the game, but I feel like now I have a little less flab to flop around as I do cardio exercises, so I want to get back in it. So, for this week, I'm going to push myself to get a youtube workout in every day, preferably something around 30 minutes, and probably from this set of playlists! I really liked the accomplished feeling of completing a workout. It was great! Your optional challenge is to join me! And I'll try to post which one I did, hopefully you can do that too!
 http://www.youtube.com/user/BeFit/videos?flow=grid&view=1


Update on life - I'm 187 currently, which is a little up from a few weeks ago - I got down to 185 briefly. Still working on making it back down to that, but I'm going at a good pace for ME. I've never been able to really get past the 180 mark for me in a healthy way that would allow me to maintain, so I'm working toward that goal overall. I'm also going to join a challenge at school, which will allow me (in a team of 5) to get a chance to win $10,000. It would be super-freaking-fantastic to get some money for getting fitter. I'll post links and stuff when I get a chance and if my team actually gets signed up in time. :)

BB2's challenge for Feb 16 - 22!

Whoops! I'm a day late and a dollar short on this post. But that won't stop me! When I mess up (like I did this afternoon when I ate a whole bottle of sprinkles and a box of special k cracker chips) I have to remember to get up and dust myself off again!

Last week's challenge went well in the sense that I loooove that bedtime yoga. It went badly in the sense that I forgot to do it most nights, though. My sleeping pattern was very strange, and tuesday took the cake when I accidentally napped in the afternoon and then couldn't go back to sleep until 2! So, I think a personal challenge for myself is to be in bed by 11:30 with the lights out!


This week, I have exciting stuff! You get to choose between one of these workouts! They are each 30 minute videos that I haven't finished checking out, but they look pretty good in the first few minutes.

Jillian Michael's Yoga Meltdown: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=q5nyrD4eM64

OR

Jillian Michael's 30 day shred, level one! http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1Pc-NizMgg8


I'd say try it at least once, maybe twice! And let me know how that (and last week's challenge) goes!

Love ya!

Happy Galentine's day!

Love you bestie! Happy Galentine's day! (visit the link to understand)

http://www.buzzfeed.com/kmallikarjuna/a-galentines-day-card-for-each-of-your-besties

Brit's Side of February 2 Challenge

Alrighty well...I hate to come straight up and say it but....this week's challenge I actually found WAY harder than I had anticipated it to be! Basically...this past week at work was probably the worst week that I have had since I started working for this company back in March of 2012. Things have just gone so downhill that its hard to find the strength to do much of anything. This is the low-down on the points of last week's challenge!

The challenge: my week in review

1) "explore the things that can stress you out very quickly and de-motivate you to do anything and write those down"

     -The things that unfortunately stress me the most are the things that I really at this current moment in time are things that I cannot control! It is the way that by boss treats me at work! It's degrading and horrible to say the least. So that is something that after much prayer and talking, that I am going to have to find the strength in God to be positive and be the light of Jesus in this place and rely on the fact that God is sovereign and HE will deliver me through this! 

     -The second thing that stresses me out is wrapped up in failure. Not necessarily a huge failure...but even the little ones...not doing something right at work, or not doing something the way that Matthew likes it and he noticed or just picking a stupid fight with Matthew because I am frustrated and then ruining the mood...all of these things really upset me! Another one along these lines are when I go to try and do something physical and I can't do it the way that I thought I would...I get really stressed out and really upset!
2) "explore the things that make you feel happy and like you are on top of the world"

     -Funny enough...completing a good, sweaty hour workout makes me feel like I have a little bit more control in the world! (the hard part is getting my butt to the gym to do said workout

     -Relaxing at the end of the day with the puppies and Matthew and just reading/watching TV and talking about the day/weekend/week and just being together!

     -Writing in my journal/prayer journal. I have so many things that are going on right now in my life that I want to write about...but just cant seem to find the time or sometimes even the words to try and talk about them with someone. I have so many emotions running through my head. Taking the time to sit in the peace and quiet and just write and pray to God really clears my head!
3) "find a way to combine emotional and physical health in one fell swoop"

     -One of the things that I really enjoy is being able to complete a workout with Matthew together! He really helps to encourage me and keep me going when I want to stop! 

4) "each evening before bed, spend 5-10 minutes reflecting on the day and the things you did really good at... and then congratulate yourself and really focus on those small things!"

     -I think that I could have done more on this this week...with everything so screwed up...I was focusing more on trying to put one foot in front of the other!

Next week's challenge: 

     I am excited to try the bedtime yoga! I am always really tight at the end of the day and have a really hard time unwinding and making my brain at least slow down enough to go to sleep! I just looked at the bedtime yoga and I think that it will be really helpful! You know me oh so well Brianna...the first thing I did today when I got stressed and upset about having to go back to work tomorrow was head straight for the frozen cookie dough in the freezer! I stood there eating it until I realized that well...I was only eating it because it is comfort food and I was stressed! So then I stopped...course by then the damage was done! :( 

     I honestly don't know what I would do without you being there to encourage me...even if you are across the entire state of Tennessee! Seeing these posts and knowing that you are reading them and thinking about me...helps more than you even know! I am happy to admit that at the beginning of last week I weighed 193...I weighed on Saturday and it was 190.6 pounds! So I definitely lost some weight....the goal this week is to lose 1-2 more pounds and NOT put that weight back on! I keep going between 188 and 193 and that is just not going to work! I am trying this new thing of getting up early in the mornings to go to the gym! Lets me clear my head before the day, not have to worry about going to the gym after a more than likley hectic day at work and it lets me go with Matthew...which is the best part :) With that being said, I'm off to watch The Walking Dead and get ready for work tomorrow! Praying this is a better week all together :) 

Challenge for the week of Feb 9-15 from BB2

Whew, what a week! Last week's challenge focused on honing in on those emotional setbacks and triumphs, and how we can use this information to improve our lives emotionally and physically. Good one, brit!

As far as  last week's challenge update:
1) "explore the things that can stress you out very quickly and de-motivate you to do anything and write those down"
-not seeing success where I have put in work (or being disappointed with myself when I can't keep cravings under control)
-being nervous when I think about having to work in clinic this semester
-coming home exhausted at the end of the day, and feeling like I should be entitled to a few hours of relaxation, even when I don't have that time (and any gym time feels like more work)


2) "explore the things that make you feel happy and like you are on top of the world"
-catching up on my favorite t.v. shows
-comfort food
-achieving goals and accomplishing things.
-enjoying quality time with friends and family

3) "find a way to combine emotional and physical health in one fell swoop"
-watch my favorite tv shows on the treadmill, haha!
-work out with someone I love and that will motivate me while also keeping me company and give me a little much needed social interaction. (I actually did that today! took the boyfriend with me to the gym and he kept me going enough that I ran a mile without stopping for the first time in a couple of months!)
-develop better comfort foods (I've been working on this one - I've got a couple of recipes up my sleeve that I love! Including my air-popped caramel corn for my sweet tooth, or healthy baked apples-and-sweet-potatoes, which is a great and filling side dish!)
-set small, accomplishable goals that make me feel better about my health and wellbeing every day. This is the first step (for me) to keep from getting discouraged and giving up. (For this, I've actually been doing fab-ab february every day! It started off easy, and now I just don't want to give it up because I would love to be able to do a 2 minute plank!)

4) "each evening before bed, spend 5-10 minutes reflecting on the day and the things you did really good at... and then congratulate yourself and really focus on those small things!"
-done. :)

It's really nice to brainstorm what I could be doing differently to keep myself on the right track. This week was horrible eating wise, which took my weight up a couple of pounds. It seems like if I stay on the right track and only screw up once or twice in a week, I still manage to lose weight - but if it's a week like this where I screw up every night, my body knows. So, gotta do better next week!


Speaking of next week.... 

I know you've been incredibly stressed by your job lately, and I wish I could magically fix that for you (or at least be there for you a little better). I think a bit of bedtime yoga might help you unwind at the end of the day as you are getting ready for bed, because I know if I'm stressed or if my brain just won't go to sleep, it helps me to complete this relaxing routine. http://www.fitnessmagazine.com/workout/yoga/poses/yoga-routine-before-sleep/

I like to do that routine with the lights low & a little soothing music on, and then right before I do my last breathing exercise, turn off all the lights so I can literally just roll over and go to sleep at the end.

Additionally, knowing that your job is stressful and knowing how you and I both have a problem with stress snacking, I decided to do a little research:

http://www.snack-girl.com/snack/stress-eating-solution/
http://www.self.com/fooddiet/2010/12/stop-stress-eating
http://stress.about.com/od/dietandsuppliments/a/emotional.htm

So, this week your challenge is pretty simple. Try out the yoga once or twice - if it doesn't work for you, google "bedtime yoga" and find one that does, and then try that once or twice. Oh, and read those stress-snacking articles. And feel better, because you are loved and valued by all the people that really matter.

Challenge for Week of February 2 :) from BB1

A New Way of Thinking...

Alrighty! How did last week's challenge go? Well for me...I really enjoyed watching the clip that encouraged us to do something that is really hard for us 2x a week for 1 minute! I chose push ups...I still hate them, but I have a newfound respect for them because I was able to persevere and push through! For the recipe challenge, Matthew and I found a few recipes that we are going to put on the menu this month! One is a healthy stuffed bell pepper and the other is a weight watchers chicken parmesan casserole!! Sounds Yummy right? Ok, for the emotional wellness side of the challenge from last week...Matthew and I spent some time and made our menu for this upcoming week as well as planned out when we are going to work out...as well as some fun things we could do together that were cheap! We found a greenway and park near our house that has a place for the dogs to play while we can walk or do some stationary type exercises (thing lunges, sit ups, push ups, jumping jacks, etc)! We both love to watch the puppies play and why not burn some calories while the dogs are too? :) 

Well that is my update on last week's challenge! You can give your thoughts Bri in another post if you would like!

Challenge Time:

As I'm sure you can tell from the blog post...this week's challenge is going to focus more on the self-respect side of being healthy. There are so many different types of "being healthy": physical, spiritual, emotional. This week, I struggled with all three. However, after really taking the time to buckle down and focus on what the root was...I found it was mainly an emotional health problem. With that being said, this week's challenge will focus on helping me, and everyone, begin to learn to RESPECT themselves...even when they screw up! 

This is a website that I have found pretty helpful when it comes to emotional health and relieving stress. 

http://www.help-yourself-stress-relief.com/what-is-emotional-health.html

One of the things that I have come to realize is that I stress out very easily and very quickly. I can go from happy to depressed in about 2.2 seconds. Also, I have found out recently that when I get stressed out, I have a serious case of 'acid refulx' or something that pops up in my throat and makes it hard to breathe, eat, drink, or focus on anything except for getting rid of the burning sensation in my throat. 

My challenge this week is as follows:

*explore the things that can stress you out very quickly and de-motivate you to do anything and write those down 

*explore the things that make you feel happy and like you are on top of the world

*find a way to combine emotional and physical health in one fell swoop. 

     *EX: while on the treadmill, listen to some soothing music or a motivational speech that lifts you up

*LAST THING:

     *each evening before bed, spend 5-10 minutes reflecting on the day and the things you did really good at...and then congratulate yourself and really focus on those small things! 

My goal for this challenge is to be able to keep this up and have it become a habit to reflect on the day as it passes and to celebrate the small things in our lives! This is the beginning to truly being happy with ourselves! 

A review of the last week of January, from BB2

Alright. So, this week was horrible for me as far as food goes. Most nights I either went over on my calories... or ate out and went so far over that I didn't even log them. It was a miracle that I didn't gain weight last week (periods can be rough) but this week was even worse! Time to refocus and get back in the game. I will probably try to flush it all out this weekend while I'm studying for a test Monday & then assess the damage on the scale.

WORKOUT CHALLENGE: I did complete the workout, which was doing 1min planks twice this week. The second time, I was actually watching the biggest loser, so I ended up doing several other small workouts while I was watching (I feel bad sitting in my chair when Jillian, Bob & Dolvett are yelling at me).

FOOD CHALLENGE: My recommended skinny recipe is one of my favorites - this particular article is a magical slice of heaven for those with several sweet teeth, like myself. http://www.hungry-girl.com/newsletters/raw/1543
It is a list of all the "skinny" ways to make cake (or cupcakes, in  my case) & assessments of which cake flavors go best with which "cheater" mixes. My favorite is the greek yogurt and devils food cake. It makes the most delicious, moist, chocolatey cupcake. I have been making a miniscule amount of buttercream (or this week, peanut butter) frosting & putting it on the mini-cupcakes for a delicious treat under 100 calories! Brilliant!

EMOTIONAL WELLNESS: James and I tore through the first three seasons of "Community" after I got him one of them for christmas... and he bought himself the other two. So, at the end of our viewing streak, we wrote a "community" workout challenge: it goes as follows:::

Every time:
Troy & Abed do the handshake: 25 standing calf raises
Shirley says "That's nice!": 10 butt-lift sit ups
Pierce is racist: 10 squats
Leonard is on screen: 10 Jumping jacks
Jeff gives an inspiring speech: 10 pushups
Chang is on-screen: 10 lunges
Dean comes in dressed as a woman: stretching yoga pose
Famous guest star: plank as long as possible.

We also want to go hiking out at the Shelby county  forest-area where there are trails. It's no smoky mountains, but hopefully it'll be pretty cool nonetheless! There is also a place with famous gardens I want to visit, & James reallllly wants to go walk around the zoo...... we just gotta find the time.

Can't wait to see what challenges are in store for me this week, courtesy of BB1!