Takin' It Off Tuesday

I am pleased with how this week went in terms of loss, even though it wasn't the best week in terms of being able to exercise and food...ugh...let's just say I didn't do that great this weekend.

I walked 6 miles on two different days, 3.2 on one day and did a Walk Away the Pounds (3 miles) on two different days. This was a total of 21.2 miles. It's below what I wanted to do, especially since I don't consider the WATP dvds to be a true 3 miles. I need to remember to wear my pedometer sometime to see what that reads. However, it does seem to be a pretty good workout and it's good in a pinch which is what I was in this past week since I had a sick child at home for most of the week.

I am trying not to get too wacky about exercising, but I feel like I have found a good routine. Walking, or whatever, for roughly 25 miles per week seems to be working well right now. I have moved past the point where I was stuck and I have a little more freedom with what I can eat. I do have to be a little careful to not exercise too much because then I feel like I can just eat whatever I want to and that is so clearly not the case!

I am excited because I am 4 pounds away from being at my halfway point for my 40 pound goal. If I can lose that 4 pounds by 5/6, then I feel like I will be on track to lose another 20 by the time my birthday is here. This week didn't get off to the best start. Easter was a busy day so I wasn't able to walk as much as I would've liked to and then I developed some heel pain so I took it easy yesterday. Today I used the elliptical machine for 6 miles (between 6.0 & 7.0 mph the whole time) and I was very pleased with that! Tomorrow I am hoping to get a good walk in and hopefully my heel won't bother me too much.

So...my goal for the week is 25 miles. So far:

Sunday - 1.6 miles walked
Monday - 1.6 miles walked
Tuesday - 6 miles on the elliptical

I think it will be close.

Menu Plan Monday

This is an easy week :)

Monday - Leftover Weeknight Lasagna (in freezer)

Tuesday - Chicken patties

Wednesday - Leftover meatloaf (in freezer)

Thursday - Breakfast - Chocolate chip pancakes, eggs, bacon **

Friday - Cheeseburgers

Saturday - Pizza Night

Sunday - Tacos

**My two oldest girls loved helping me make dinner last week so we are doing it again (my little two were spending the night with my parents). And...it is very true that kids are more likely to eat something when they have helped to make it! This week, I had a hard time finding a recipe that was kid-friendly to make and was something that I thought they would like. I had our Thursday breakfast dinner planned for a different night, but then I decided that it was perfect for a kid dinner because there is a lot of measuring and mixing with it. I think they will love it! I'll just have to pay close attention to how many chocolate chips they are eating while we're making the pancakes :)

For some great meal ideas, visit Laura at I'm an Organizing Junkie.

Happy Eating :)

Takin' It Off Tuesday

(Once again, I'm just going to ignore the fact that it's Thursday already...sigh...)

I did pretty well with walking/exercise this week. My goal was 25 miles.
Sunday - walked 6 miles
Monday - 5 miles on the elliptical
Tuesday - walked 2 miles
Wednesday - 5 miles on the elliptical
Thursday - walked 7 miles (at one time - wow, that was tough towards the end!)
Friday - day off
Saturday - walked 5 miles

My goal for this week is 28 miles. I don't think that I'm going to make it :( At this point, I have 15 miles and 3 of those were from a Walk Away the Pounds dvd, so I don't think that really counts as 3. It's been a little bit of a tough week exercise-wise, because I have a sick child home with me. Hopefully I can pick up some more miles the rest of the week.

Since the weather has gotten nice, I have pretty much ditched the elliptical and have just been walking. Until this week. The weather was cold on Monday so I decided that I really didn't want to be out in it but I wanted to get 5 miles in. I honestly didn't think that I would be able to do 5 miles on the elliptical because I do that at a much faster pace than I walk. I walk a mile in a smidge under 14 1/2 minutes. I can do a mile on the elliptical in about 9 1/2 minutes. I was very proud of myself that I was able to do the 5 miles without passing out or worse. It felt good and I was actually thinking that maybe I should do that once a week. I wasn't really planning on doing it again so soon on Wednesday, but it was raining pretty hard out :( I think it was a little easier to do on Wednesday. It's fun to think back to when I started the elliptical and how I wouldn't have lasted 2 minutes at that pace and I now I can do about 47 minutes straight. Plus, there is a huge difference in what the machine says that my heart rate is now, compared to when I first started. It's nice to see/feel progress!

I had a huge feel good moment this week when I saw someone that I haven't seen in over 2 months and she commented on how I have lost weight. I could have kissed her :)

I feel like I have moved past the place where I stalled out and am now on to my next point where I'll get stuck :)

Menu Plan Monday

I'm so glad to actually be posting this this week. Usually Mondays come and go so fast, but this week I have my menu set, shopping done and am posting this on time :)

Monday - Weeknight Lasagna (from the recent Kraft magazine - I love getting that!!)

Tuesday - Hot dogs

Wednesday - Grilled cheese and soup

Thursday - Oven Fried Chicken Toes and Cheese Fries **

Friday - Spaghetti

Saturday - Pizza night

Sunday - Easter Brunch out and then probably sandwiches or something later

** My two oldest daughters have been showing a big interest in helping me make dinner. Usually, because that is my worst time of the day, I tend to put them off. I say things like "not tonight" or "there's nothing to help with," etc. I know this is not a good idea, but for me, it's hard enough for just me to make dinner, let alone add trying to teach anyone anything. However, I know that I'm not doing them, or myself, any favors by not letting them help out. So...I am going to try, once a week, to make a meal that is designed to have them actively participate. For now, I will probably focus on just letting my oldest two help out, but we'll see how that goes :) Our Thursday meal is from a Rachael Ray cookbook designed for kids (I can't remember the title right now).

Last week we made make-your-own-pizzas as part of my effort to let them participate more in making dinner. They were a huge hit. They don't know about my plan right now, but I'm sure once they find out, they will be very excited. I would like, at some point, to involve them more in the meal planning and the shopping, but, I shouldn't get too ahead of myself...:)

For a bunch of great meal ideas, visit Laura at I'm an Organizing Junkie. Happy Eating everyone :)

Random Thoughts Thursday

I am often bombarded with random thoughts and there have been a couple earlier this week that I wanted to mention in this post, but...I cannot remember what they are! At. all. The mind just isn't what it used to be... :)

Wordless Wednesday

Takin' It Off Tuesday

(I am running behind this week, so even though it's Thursday, I'm just going to pretend that it's Tuesday).

This week was a much better week scale-wise. I didn't see huge changes in numbers, but it did move and it was in the right direction. So...no complaints from me. Also, I can continue to see that clothes are fitting differently. YAY!! I drank a lot more water and really limited how much soda I drank. I could have done much better in the eating department, but I did have one pretty major success with that. We went out to eat one day and I had a delicious sandwich. I could have very easily eaten the whole thing, but decided to just eat half and bring the rest home and eat it the next day for lunch. That is a pretty unusual thing for me to do. Now, if I could just do better with eating in general, that would be great! I look at it like juggling. The balls that I need to keep in the air are exercise, eating well and drinking a lot of water. The problem is that I really don't know how to juggle and can only seem to keep two "balls" in the air at any one time.

I walked 31 miles this past week and my goal for this week is 25. As of today (Tuesday :)) I have walked 8 miles and "ran" on the elliptical machine for 5 so I am saying that I am up to 13 miles right now.

I have a goal to lose 40 pounds total (I have lost 13 so far) by the time my 40th birthday rolls around in July. That would be such a great gift to myself :)