Life is a Journey not a Destination

Finally, I managed a day of eating only healthy foods.

The day started off with a great workout at the gym. I was there at 6am and did 20min interval training on the bike, then 5 mins on the rower. Came home, got the dogs and took them on a short walk.

I did face a bit of a challenge around lunchtime. I was hungry and out with Granny doing her grocery shopping. When we stopped in the biscuit isle it was all I could do to keep my hands off those yummy looking packets. But I did. And came home and had a lovely salad made with lettuce fresh picked from my garden.

As you can see from my food diary I did a bit of snacking today but I made sure I made good choices. I’m rather proud of myself as it’s been a real battle to get one day of fairly clean eating under my belt. And just look at all those cups of tea and not a cookie or piece of chocolate in sight :-).

These books that is. For some unknown reason I have had no desire to go the gym and, in fact, haven’t been in nearly 2 weeks. I had planned to go today but didn’t want to, then kind of ran out of time, so missed again. Not quite sure what’s going on with me. I was really loving my new program.

I think I need to rework my housework routine and clean two days and do gym two days. I find if I clean first, like today, I don’t feel like going to the gym, and if I workout first I’m pretty exhausted for the next hour and don’t want to clean. I tend to only clean in the morning so if it’s not done by lunchtime it doesn’t get done.

Plan to start reading these books tomorrow and hope they give me back some desire to get to the gym. I know I’ll love it once I’m there - I always do - just can’t seem to get myself there. Today I was feeling guilty about not doing any exercise until I realized I walked the kids to and from school - which means I got an hours walk in :-). We’ve been walking home EVERY day so I’m getting a minimum of a half hour walk plus cleaning and stuff around the house. But I need to keep up the upper body workouts before I start to lose STRENGTH.

Well, I have always been a tea drinker. In the summer I might have one cup when I first wake up, in a Winter I might have 2-3 cups over the day. However, in the last month I have started having up to four cups a day. Even worse, I have started buying it when I’m out (something I have NEVER done). So I think it’s safe to say I’ve become a tea addict.

The tea addiction in itself doesn’t worry me, but since it’s usually accompanied by a biscuit (cookie) or some chocolate, and I’m having it around 4 times a day, it’s not so good. So my challenge for the coming week is to enjoy my tea without any treats. If I want the biscuit or chocolate, it’s got to wait until AFTER my tea. During the day this shouldn’t be too hard but I do enjoy my early morning (4-5am) tea and biscuit(s).

Well, it’s been a while since I revamped my workout but I decided it was about time. I purchased Turbulence Training way back in January (for a body weight program I could do on holidays) and dug it yesterday to do my first workout. Later I realized I did the beginner workout when I should have done the intermediate workout. HOWEVER, I’m feeling a little sore today (but a nice kind of sore, not REALLY sore like I sometimes get) so it must have been a reasonable workout. I might stick with it for 2 weeks, then move on. I’ve got heaps of the programs workouts to move through, then I can look at buying more if I need to. I may miss using the weight machines though (he does use some but has a lot of body weight/free weight exercises).

I’m also thinking about buying this book Strength for Life by Shawn Phillips. Being that STRENGTH is my word for 2008 I thought it might be a good book to help motivated me. Actually I’m going to make this my reward for losing 30kg since I never did anything to celebrate that milestone.

I have to say I love being strong (for a girl anyway). And I feel proud of myself for nearly always being the only girl in the weights room - mind you it took me a nearly a year to work up the nerve. I decided to do a Body Pump class today as I won’t be back in the gym for nearly a week and this way I got to exercise all muscle groups plus I did cardio by walking to and from the gym. I had a new to me teacher (since I haven’t done a class in over 6 months) and I know she looked pretty suprised at the weight I was loading on my bar (I mean I’m still overweight and probably look fairly unfit). I was lifting nearly double everyone else in the class and at one point during biceps one of the other girls who was struggling through the track with a slightly lighter weight than I had looked over a me and yells out “Christ, Libby” when she saw I had even more weight than she did. Now I have to confess I pushed myself through the class and am already sore (even after having a spa) so I can only imagine how I’m going to feel tomorrow. BUT I have nearly a week to recover and I LOVE the feeling of SORE muscles - means I worked really hard.

 Well, it’s the first of February, supposedly the hottest, most humid month of the year - the month when I REALLY don’t like the weather. Yesterday was shockingly hot but then a storm came through late and today I awoken to this view.

Looks more like the start of Autumn - I even wore a jacket on my bike ride this morning. Still I know it won’t last so I plan on enjoying it while it lasts.  I’m just back from the gym - all hot and sweaty after doing my upper body workout. I don’t normally go on Fridays and I know why - it was rather busy. I’ve just finished my post-gym protein shake and am off to have a shower. Cheers!!!

While sitting at the computer and eating my very yummy salad for lunch I stumbled across a new magazine called ” CleaningEating”. My links aren’t working but you can find it at http://www.cleaneatingmag.com . It looks great and I can’t wait for my first issue to arrive. It was developed by the same people who publish Oxygen so it should be a good read.

Well, while our meals have remained pretty healthy we’ve started to slip into “holiday” mode with biscuits, chocolate, ice-cream, etc. Only a little bit (since that’s all that fits in our small stomachs) but still not the best things to be having for snacks. I’ve gone through the pantry/fridge and we’ve used up the last few “treat” foods over the last few days and I DID NOT buy any more today. I’ve got my dinner planned out and tomorrow will do some work on lunches - now that the girls will be back at school I can just have a salad or veggie stir-fry for lunch.  I’m still losing weight and have restarted the Body for Life exercise program. I have LOADS more energy than I did before and still find I’ve got some left at the end of the day - which is a real novelty.

Well, it seems to be all the rage in scrapbooking circles (mainly thanks to Ali Edwards) to choose a word to focus on for the year. Since I really want to focus on my fitness this year (and getting down to my goal weight) I decided on the word STRENGTH.

Strength applies not just to physical strength, though that is my main focus but also

- strength in family ties

- strength in friendships

- inner strength to do things I might not normally do

- strength to be the best me I can be

For me, the celebrity who most represents strength would have to be Madonna. I just love her muscles, but she is not just physically strong but mentally strong. I don’t always agree with everything she does but she is definitely someone who epitomises STRENTH. And one day I hope to have arms like hers :-).

Well, I’ve been putting the final touches on my goals for 2008. I really am excited about the coming year. It’s going to be a big one. Both Kevin and I should reach our goal weights and probably have some cosmetic surgery, we have a trip to Queensland and a trip out to Ayres Rock to look forward to, and I need to start planning our trip to the UK in 2009, not to mention all the little things I hope to achieve. I’m not going to make limiting computer time a goal this year cause now that I’ve discovered blogs that it just not going to happen. I am an addict but I do feel the inspiration I get from my favourite blogs really does enrich my life and makes me want to do more and be better. And that has be a good thing :-).

HOME/GARDEN

- Work on household routine - need to incorporate detailed cleaning

- Continue work in veggie garden esp. winter production

- Grow potatoes (have large pot just waiting to be used)

- Get worm farm going again (may need new system)

- Work out how to get seedlings to grow in green house (no success so far)

- Shop for fruit and veg at local markets /continue to buy organic where possible

- Learn to make more things from scratch i.e rolls, tortillas

FINANCE

- Start paying extra of mortgage (by mid-year)

- Start saving for UK trip (due to start next week)

- Stick to budget (you never know it might happen one day)

PERSONAL

- Learn to sew (either in classes or on my own)

- Take a vegetarian cooking class at Nan Tien Temple ( have form printed out, just have to mail it off with a cheque)

- Volunteer work - still trying to find the right thing for me (already do uniform shop and canteen at school)

- Make more hand-made presents (those I made this seemed to be a big hit)

- Organise ( and keep organised) my scrapbook space (can’t wait for my Big Picture Scrapbook class with Wendy Smedley to start)

- Develop knitting skills - make something other than scarves

- Read more about simple living

- Get back to working out 6 days a week (3 cardio, 3 weights)

- Get out and enjoy life more (already started on this one)