BB2 - new month, new outlook

Alright, so it's the last day of march. Both myself and BB1 have been... lax at best this month. I did manage to lose weight, but I haven't kept up with the blog. Blech.

I did, however, do a zumba DVD last week and I did the insanity fit test yesterday!

So here were my results:
Switchkicks - I counted, like, 90 or something, but I also got messed up counting AND my jumps were barely off the ground by the end. So I'm not really gonna count 90 as an official number.
Powerjacks - 50
Power knees - 69
Power Jumps - 25
"Globe Jumps"/squat jumps? - 9 (4 movements per count)
suicide jumps - 12
pushup jacks - 20
low plank oblique - 50

I would like very much for you to post your results from your insanity fit test a few weeks ago, and I'm gonna try day two today! So I think that should be this weeks assignment! And I promise to keep up better this month. We've gotta get this going again!

BB2 hiatus update

Oh my goodness, it's been a while. I'm loving BB1's update though. The cleanse sounds reasonable, the working out sounds good, and I'm so glad you are having a better work experience!

I think I pushed too hard trying to do crazy paleo challenges and whatnot, so I completely fell off the wagon of using the blog and myfitnesspal to stay accountable. I didnt go crazy on food, I just didnt feel like logging everything. Oh, and the mad abs march didn't make it past March 2nd.


I did make myself pretty proud on St. Paddy's day, though...  I ran two miles straight (on the treadmill) at a 4.5 pace without slowing it down or feeling like dying! I started trying to run a mile senior year of undergrad at a 4.0 pace and was always dying to make it to the end, but that fell to the wayside when I gained my 20 pounds of dental school weight. I've started bumping up the pace since I actually managed to get rid of most of my gained Dental School weight, so this is a milestone for me. I'm hoping to be able to finish the color me rad 5k i signed up for for the first week of may.  It won't be pretty, but that's my goal.

However, i'll be traveling for spring break this weekend and part of next week, so I will let BB1 take the reins for this next challenge if that's ok!

Ooops! I'm back! :)

BB1 Back and ready to go! *Update from March 1 until now*

Okie dokie! So we kind of had a little hiatus there where I think we both fell off the wagon there for a moment. Not fall off the wagon like go crazy, but as in we didn't blog! So I'm back! So my plan is to catch up where I am as of now...since its the middle of the week...I'm not going to post a challenge for the half week, but I will come back and post on Sunday for a new one for the following week!

Update for the "find a detox and make up a workout" challenge!

I found a cool little detox that wasn't too scary! However, I didn't try it! It's more of a water cleanse! You take 60 ounces of distilled water, 2 tbsp of lemon juice and 1 tbsp of sugar free cranberry juice and 1 tea bag (ginger root or some time of good detox type tea...we used a lemon ginseng with probiotics).THe plan is that you are supposed to drink this 60 ounce cleanse every day for 7 days and it is supposed to cleanse up to 5 pounds of just simple "CRAP" out of your body. I have been doing it for two days and it definitely makes you pee...but it also kind of makes you feel full so you aren't eating as much either! So thats good! I'll update with more later :) 

For the make up a workout part, I ended up doing kind of a mix of things. Where it has been really pretty and we have such a huge backyard, I ended up doing a workout of sorts with the doggies! Where I would run with them and then stop and squat to get the ball and things of that sort. It was actually a lot more physical than i thought running around with the dogs. However, I wore my heart rate monitor and in like 30 minutes I had burned like 250 calories just playing with them! I was like WOAH! 

Update on life so far: 

So March 7, 2013 was my last day at Aerotek! YAY! I had 8 glorious days off before I started my  new job at Travelers! I was able to really relax, got a massage and really just slept in, took naps and did what I wanted to do! It was amazing! Probably one of the best therapies in the entire world...just being lazy! Also, I was able to really focus on the things of my body that I didn't like and it be OK to get upset because I wasn't at work....but on the flip side...I was also able to focus on the things of my body that I really liked! It was kind of a reflective week! I was mentally preparing myself for starting my first week at Travelers. Which leads me to now. Today is Wednesday, midway through the week at Travelers and I can already tell a HUGE difference in my attitude in general! Its like I actually want to get up, want to go to work and just feel so much more energized! Plus at work at the moment, we are literally studying and learning to be licensed in property and casualty insurance, so its like I'm back in school which is a comfort thing for me! I am still getting used to the 10-7 gig, but its ok! I can so do it! Its nice that at 7:00pm...I"M GOING HOME! I love it! 

So that is what is going on so far with an update! I feel good! I still only have 1 pair of dress pants that fit at the moment which DOES NOT make me happy. However, I have done REALLY well so far this week (haven't gone to the gym but I did the pilates challenge MOnday and yesterday...today not so much...I have a headache that is making me sick to my stomach!) Nonetheless, I'm here and ready to go! 

Bri, hope to see your blog soon! I hope you have a great week! :) 

Love always,

Brittany 

Saturday, March 2: Paleo diet breakdown

Alright, this intended to be a journal entry of sorts to see how well I can pull off this paleo diet for a day. We'll see how it goes without my precious carbs.

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Well, I just finished breakfast, and I've already screwed up. Lol. First off, this is really hard. I had to google my breakfast options because I couldn't think of any that weren't a grain. Haha. I settled on eggs, and I had to cheat to make them - I scrambled them in a small amount of olive oil (better than the butter I usually scramble eggs in). And I used salt on them afterward, because I just can't go without salt on eggs. That would've literally made me miserable. And then, I made my fatal mistake. I thought, for some reason, that juice was okay on the diet (dummy) so after drinking  a full glass of water, I followed with about 4 oz of v8 diet banana strawberry juice (it was the closest thing I've got to real juice, and I was kinda dying without sugar).

[[EDIT: Olive oil and salt are both okay on the paleo diet. a lot of "paleo" recipes I've been reading use olive oil and lemon juice for flavoring while cooking. Also, chicken stock in a pan is another option for cooking mediums. These seem counter productive while on a cleanse, but I'm also trying to drink a ton of water, so hopefully I'm flushing what I've eaten.]]

And now I'm dreaming of coffee with cream and sugar, and those vegetarian corn dogs I have in my freezer (they're SO GOOD) and the chicken & rice I have sitting in my refrigerator, and the goldfish in my pantry, and the popcorn that I was popping yesterday, and... I'm not sure I can do this. I think if I ever try this again, I need to have a solid plan for every meal - something pre-approved, and balanced so I can stick to it. I wish I'd had some oranges to supplement my breakfast. Fruits are a paleo approved item, although in moderation, since fruits were revered as a rare treat.

But, anyway... I'll keep trying. However, from this standpoint, even if I fall off the "wagon", I'll be landing on the relatively healthy (but not pure) foods that I've been using to lose weight all this time. It's nice to tighten the reigns occasionally to realize that all those diet sodas and fruit smoothies and healthy oatmeal carbs and vegetarian corn dogs are delicious treats themselves - things that I normally take for granted on my usual diets.

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So I've been looking around on paleo recipe sites, and I think I've found at least part of my lunch plan - zucchini cooked in a little olive oil and lemon juice. I'll keep thinking to dream up the rest.

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Made the zucchini for lunch. While it was cooking, I also decided to test out my PB2 - that's dehydrated and dried peanut butter. You reconstitute it with a little water and it becomes PB for a sandwich, but instead of 200 calories for 2 tablespoons it's only 45 calories! But anyway, i decided to experiment a little & dip some banana slices in just the powdered PB. It was delicious! (And yes, nuts are on the diet... in moderation.)  Maybe I will make it to the end of today! I've got corn on the cob to cook for dinner, and not sure what else but we'll see!

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Update: I MISS CARBS. THIS IS SO HAAAAAAAAAAAARD.

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Yeah, I caved. This may be the funniest post our blog ever gets. I just ate a vegetarian corn dog & a piece of toast with apple butter on it (my homemade, healthy apple butter at least.) The whole thing without carbs became such a big deal, which is not something that should happen on a cleanse. I should be focusing my mind to get through it and feel better at the end, but instead I was taking shortcuts the whole time, trying not to fall off the food wagon but really sabatoging the point of a cleanse anyway. Splenda with my strawberry snack, sugar free gum by the packful... it wasn't helping. The only really good thing I was doing was drinking water only. I think that's what I really need to do for my version of a cleanse. So, now I'm going back to my way of being healthy. At least I tried, lol. And it put me back in perspective. And the drinking water is what's going to make me feel more cleansed. :)

This is brianna, signing off for the evening. Probably gonna go eat some carbs.

BB2's recap & challenge for March 2-9

So, this week's challenge was a two-parter: (1) Find a detox cleanse, and (2)make up a workout that we can take with us each week. 

(1) I'm going to admit that I'm a little scared of a detox or cleanse. I think the best time to try one would be a weekend because I don't want to try to stay awake in lecture with no caffeine... but this weekend is a test weekend. So, after reading some interesting articles about cleanses (http://www.womenshealthmag.com/weight-loss/fast-diet  ,  http://www.doctoroz.com/videos/clean-detox-manual  ,   http://www.webmd.com/diet/features/detox-diets-cleansing-body?page=1  ,  http://www.doctoroz.com/videos/24-hour-stress-cleanse ) i'm making up my own. I'm going paleo for a day - probably saturday. And I challenge you and Matthew to join me.

The basic idea behind the paleo diet is that "if the caveman didn't eat it, neither should you." However, that's way more complicated than it seems at first glance. Cavemen didn't have any real drinks (no coffee! and especially no creamer or milk) or grains at all. so it's mainly raw fruits and veggies, and water (or green tea, with no sweetener) or juice and some lean meats. Right now I'm a little lacking in the SNACKABLE fruits and veggies department, but hopefully I can correct that. (edit: I just did that! Got some carrots, corn, pears, apples, strawberries, yum.) It sounds like a good, manageable version of a detoxifying cleanse. If you want to do something like a 24 hour juice cleanse, I'd still recommend leading in with a paleo day and then doing the juice only, and then a paleo day to lead you out of it.

Oh, and one more thing - cavemen didn't have girl scout cookies. sorry. ;)

((stress bonus: detox bath? http://www.wikihow.com/Take-a-Detox-Bath ))

(2)Making up a workout. Boy, this is right up my alley! Well, first of all, I've been doing fab ab february almost every night (I think I forgot a total of 6 times). I want to continue, and I know there's a mad abs march! So let's do that every night! It's a great little way to get a little blood flowing, a few calories burning... and it has an easy checkoff sheet to keep track of your increasing challenges! A lot of times I ended up doing them really late in the evening anyway, so it would work well as an "end of the day" thing. 

Check it out! https://pinterest.com/allonsy44/monthly-fitness-challenges/

(from http://sportyafros.com/workouts/the-march-mad-abs-challenge/)

We can do it!

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But enough about last week's challenge - here's this week. Cut the stress snacking, and do the insanity fit test. 

 I feel like because you can see the light at the end of the (employment) tunnel, you can take on a bigger challenge - so let's find a way to cut out the stress snacking. I think we both need to work on a mantra to say to ourself when we want to stress snack. I think mine will be "I want to win this competition for myself, and I want to look and feel better!" I also think finding other ways to deal with the stress is great, and we've worked a lot on coming up with ideas, and now it's time to implement them! I'm going to use one of the techniques we talked about before this blog got started - I'm going to work on really valuing my body & treating it right (massaging in lotion or oil after showers to improve blood flow, say a daily body love mantra, and work on treating it right with food because my body is my temple. And also, summer is coming up!)

Also, workout challenge - keep it up with the daily exercises we came up with last week(mad abs march?), aaaaaaand I've got a new challenge video for you! I got "insanity" from a friend, and am gonna try my hardest to get my butt in gear and do at least some of it (I know 6 days a week with my school schedule isn't feasible), but our challenge is to complete the insanity fit test! Here's the video link: http://vimeo.com/44997921
In theory, with the video series, you take this test every 2 weeks to see how your progress is going. We just want to get an initial baseline to see what we can do - maybe we'll do this fit test again in May? Anyway, post your results on here for each one and we'll see how it goes. You'll probably beat me, Brit, because me and cardio haven't been getting along lately, haha. BUT GOOD LUCK!!!! :)