Star for Me

I nailed my eating today and set myself up for tomorrow. It feels good to get back on track, it will be nice to step on the scale on Saturday and see some improvement. I did learn an interesting lesson at work today, I need to leave my desk during lunch. It doesn't matter if I have homework or problems to do, I need to leave my desk and go somewhere else. Today, I stayed at my desk to work on some problems for my exam next week, and I was ready to crawl up the walls around 3:30.

I just need a break out of cubical land. I can't wait for it to get nice out so I can go walking at lunch. It puts me in such a good mood when I get back to my desk from walking outside. Anyway, thats a big dream right now. For the next week, I have problems I have to do during my lunch break, and now I gotta find somewhere else to work on them at. I wonder if I could grab a conference room... Maybe. We will see.

B: 3 eggs scrambles
L: Beef Chili
D: Shrimp Curry

Cheating, the good and the bad

Over this weekend, I cheated. I would rank it as pretty bad. I did have scheduled cheats once a month during the challenge. My goal was to not use them.

Friday: Rice
Saturday: Rice, egg roll
Sunday: Three slices of pizza
Monday: Sushi for lunch, two mini christmas cookies

Sunday and Monday were scheduled cheats. The Pizza was suppose to be next weekend when we originally were going to go home. It's my favorite pizza place, its the only place I eat pizza. It was awesome, honey mustard pizza with chicken, and chicken spedie pizza on a red sauce. Type of pizza you really can't get anywhere else. It was so good and I was glad that I cheated. Monday's sushsi was suppose to be on valentines day, but now my BF isn't going to be here so we decided to go for lunch since I have the day off. Again an awesome choice I am glad that we went.

My grandma makes  Christmas cookies each year, and she had some in her freezer for me. I always have her break my cookies into two bags so I don't get all of them at once. So I had an m&m cookie and a black bottom cup. They are my grandma's own recipes, I have been practicing making these cookies for years, and I still don't have it down. My mom made them last year and they were nowhere at my grandmas level. I enjoyed have one small cookie and one mini cupcake thing. It was awesome and part of a tradition in my family. Totally, worth it.

Friday and Saturday weren't awesome. They were emotional eating, the didn't make me feel good or happy to be eating it. Instead, they made me feel worse, wanting to cheat some more since I already cheated.

It took this weekend for me to realize that there are good cheats and bad. Good are special occasions, things that aren't all the time, they are special. Another lesson learned in this challenge. Now, I just have to stay back on track. It should be easier once my BF is gone since I won't have to cook for him as well. We will see. My goal is to I still want to lose 10 pounds, it doesn't matter if I can fit in my black dress for Valentines day now, but it will still be nice to get back in it.

Tough Love and Life Situations

Its amazing how one little, two sentence email can change your life. One moment, living in Albany just doing our thing. After email, BF moving to Seattle in two weeks, with me to follow in May. One moment, going balls to the wall in the challenge. Next, not so much. The big thing is that I am a person with a plan and radical life change made in a moment can  and will stress me out. Stress equals bad eating.

We had to travel this weekend to talk with our families about this big move, thus my diet wasn't strict. I had rice in a burrito bowl on Friday night because if i saw any more lettuce I was going to lose it. Then looking back on it the salad would have been better, the rice just didn't help.

Today I had dinner with my dad to break the news to him, equaled had sushi and an egg roll. Not to mention I didn't make it to the WOD on friday because I needed the sleep. I wasn't fit to drive at 5 am that morning. Not at all.

At the moment I feel very lost, I know I will snap out of it but right now I am floating. Don't get me wrong I am very excited about this move, it just a big thing that came out of nowhere and it is going to take time for me to get used to it. Thanks for sticking with me.

Nine, Ten gotta do it again

Yesterday, was a good day. I ate well and worked out. I finally got Cindy in, which was way harder then I thought it was going to be. It didn't help that my right elbow wasn't happy. It felt like I had just gotten a shot in that arm. It was really weird.

Still, I did so good. I got 12 rounds. I was aiming for 10, so I broke out in smiles when I hit 11 then was like I can get 12. It was awesome. I am so happy to almost be done with the benchmarks. Just Grace is left, which doesn't sound like too much fun.

Today, I did fine with my eating. Besides the fact I ate out and had the same thing for dinner the last two nights.Its all good. I took my test yesterday and wanted to celebrate and tonight my BF finally came home, so I wanted to celebrate.  I am very excited about tomorrow, I can get back to my normal crossfit schedule. Bright and early I am going to be in. It will be nice to see the crew. Till tomorrow then.
Day 9
B: Bacon & Eggs
L: Beef Curry
D: Pulled pork, coleslaw, sweet potato fries, green bean casserole

Day 10
B:pulled pork, coleslaw
L:beef Stew
D: Pulled pork, coleslaw, sweet potato fries, green bean casserole

Day Eight, am I doing Great?

This will be a short one, my test is tomorrow so I feel like I am not all here. Auditing stuff is floating around inside my head, making me feel like a space cadet. I was hoping to get into ACF to get Cindy done, but that didn't happen. I did make dinner, and replace light bulbs in my kitchen so I did something productive. Pretty soon I will be cleaning more of the kitchen. I tend to clean around test days. At this point I just can't wait to get it over with.

I am going to be so happy to walk out of there tomorrow after noon. That will be another one done and officially I will be half-way done. Only, two more to go. I am hoping to do one in Feb, but then I will take a break until after April 15th. The Feb one will be tough since that's cutting into Tax season. I will have to see, and look over study plans on Tuesday to see if I can swing it.

I will say that it has been a balancing act. Keeping my life in sync as I try to change so much of it. I am really happy with how good I am doing, the fact that I already saw progress on the scale is nice. Now, I just need to get my benchmarks done. I will feel so relieved once that's done, I am not a fan of Crossfitting on my own. I like the community workouts. Doing Fran on my own felt weird and lonely. Next time I will move my schedule around and just come in to get them done. Its less work then trying to come in and make them up.

Well, wish me luck for tomorrow. Hopefully, I will be in, in the morning to get a  WOD in. That would be great.

Recipe Time: Salmon Salad

I used this Salmon Salad recipe as a starting point. I changed it up a bit to suit my tastes and this is what I came up with.

1 can wild Salmon (14 oz)
1/2 cucumber diced
1 can of diced tomatos with peppers (16oz)
1 diced avocado
1-2 squirts lemon juice
1 jalapeno chopped
1/2 cup shredded carrot
4 oz can of diced green chilis

First drain salmon and tomatoes. Squirt diced avocado with lemon juice. Dump everything into a bowl and mix well.

For Paleo eaters, serve on lettuce or in a bowl with a fork. For non-paleo eater put in a wrap with lettuce. This was pretty tasty and very quick to make. I ended up eating it will a fork instead of making lettuce wraps which was my plan.

One out of Twelve

One week down and life is good. The scale mentioned that I am down 1.4 pounds this morning which was a very happy surprise. Maybe by next week I will be in the 170's. That would be awesome. I haven't seen a number in the 170s in two years maybe? That would make this totally worth it. My doctor is going to be so happy in April when I have my annual checkups. I figured since that's right after the challenge she would like to see me and check all my numbers again.

I feel so calm today. I took some practice exams, didn't have a sip of caffeine, and didn't workout, My arms and shoulders were very sore from Fran, and I didn't think I could handle Grace today. My plan is to get to the gym early tomorrow and get Cindy in. Maybe I can get Grace in on Monday. IF not, I am not sure when I am going to have the time, and to be honest I will be happy with Fran, Cindy, 2K row, and my stats. While, I would love to win this challenge, and it would totally help out financially, I am doing this for my health. I was to show myself that yes I can even do something wicked hard, that I thought was going to take years, if I put my mind to it.

So, yes I am doing good. Paleo all the way today, although I am going to have to think about the chocolate that I am eating. I only have what I have then once I am out of my supply I am not buying more until after week to. I really wonder if I am going to run out before hand. I am craving sugar like no tomorrow, and should probably cut it out for a couple of days. My argument against it is that I cut out so much already, so I am not sure what to do about it. I am making gain, but if I cut it out could I be doing so much more? Hmmm... I am not sure.

I hope everyone else is doing well with the challenge, and seeing improvements.