College... dun dun dun

I know I haven't posted in a while, but if any of you have recently made the transition to college, you know that it can get pretty hectic. So you're going to have to bear with me on this one. But now that I'm pretty well settled, I'm hoping to get posting things more regularly. Anywho, on to what I actually want to talk about today.

So, as I mentioned before, I recently made the journey into collegiate life. Everyone in the English speaking culture ought to know about the dreaded freshman 15. For those of you who are living under a rock, it is basically just saying that freshman year of college, you are likely to gain 15 pounds. The idea behind it is that you are leaving your wonderfully healthy home cooked meals (um, ok, not exactly, at least for me in my case, but just go with it) and are eating high carb, high fat, high sugar diet of junk food and soda. Obviously, I would like to avoid this. (shocker, I know) Luckily, my school offers fitness classes through the local YMCA. But all (or most) of that is kind of beside the point. The real point of this post is to profess my undying love for Zumba (which is one of the classes offered by the YMCA). I had always heard of Zumba as a fitness thing and wanted to try it, but never really got around to it. This, admittedly, was a mistake. It is so much fun! You are moving and shaking your bum for an hour and you never even realize that you are working out. The music is all really upbeat and fun to dance too. You leave dripping in sweat, feeling amazing and energized. As far how well its keeping the freshman 15 at bay, we'll have to see about that one. I haven't been home in a while to check, but I'll do an update to let you guys know how the weight situation is doing. So the moral of the story is go and find some place that offers Zumba. If you can't find that, look on Youtube or something. I'm sure you could find something out there.

Well that's all for now. I will do my best to keep posting things as regularly as I can, but I can't make any promises, as college level academia is slightly more demanding and rigorous that high school was. But my goal is still to look hot in a bikini by the end of the year! I feel like this goal is fairly realistic and doable, just as long as I stay on track and keep my goal in mind. :)

Becoming a Babe

No Sweets Week 2012!

So, not only have I been a bad blogger, but I've been a bad eater too. Like, I'm not even joking, I've been horrendous. My portion control is terrible, I've had zero self-control when it comes to eating sweets, and I've been snacking like a fiend recently. Thus, I've gained weight. (dur) I'm kind of ashamed to tell you guys how much it is, because its bad. So, my solution, a No Sweets Week 2012! This time it's not just a no sweets week. I'm working on setting up different days to have different themes so to speak to help me get back on track with eating right and exercising. So far, I've got Monday through Saturday. Monday is the straight up no sweets. I just can't eat any sweets. Sweets are definitely one of my major weaknesses. But I just can't keep up this current eating pattern. Tuesday is portion control. I mentioned earlier that my portion control has been out of wack. I just keep stuffing myself to the point beyond full and I have no idea why I'm even doing it. So Tuesday is dedicated to keeping my portions in check. (And in case you were wondering, these do stack. I.e. Tuesday, I can't eat sweets and I need to watch my portions.) Wednesday I wanted to make no snacks, but I get hungry between meals, its kind of a problem for me. ha ha. So instead I made Wednesday healthy snacks only. And I mean truly healthy and nutritious snacks. Not like grab a sugary granola bar and think, eh, its kinda healthy, good enough. I mean like fresh fruit and veggies kind of healthy. Thursday is find a new healthy activity day. I kind of have a tendency to get stuck in a rut when it comes to exercise. I always seem to stick to the same old, same old, and it gets boring... duh! When exercise gets boring, you just don't want to do it. So on Thursday, in addition to eating right and stuff, I need to find a new healthy activity. Friday is focused on eating only when I'm hungry. This one kind of goes along with the portion control on Tuesday. I've been eating when I am hungry, when I'm not hungry, and when I'm really full (which is completely ridiculous!). That behavior needs to end, hence Fridays theme. Saturday is no eating past 9:00pm. Another of my problems is eating really late and then sleeping, which everyone knows is an excellent way to gain weight. I do want this to go through the whole weekend, but I haven't thought of a theme for Sunday yet. So what I did with these were wrote them down on piece of paper and kind of made it into a poster. I'm hoping that will keep me motivated and keep me from forgetting (I regret to say that that has happened before). I like this idea (not to toot my own horn or anything, he he) because it addresses each of my bad habits and hopefully gets rid of them and helps remind me what eating correctly is supposed to be like. I know I have to make a change because I've worked far too hard to get to this point and just turn back to my old habits again. I'm really excited about this, and if any of you (if there are any of you, ha ha) want to do this with me, let me know in the comments. I'd love to know how it works for you. You may have to adjust your themes a little bit to suit your bad habits, but completely ok! Just write them down and STICK to them! It won't work if you don't, and it won't work for me if I don't. I'm hopefully going to be updating you guys regularly to let you know how it is going for me. Hopefully this will help me get back on track and lose some of my weight before I go off to school. I still want to rock a bikini! lol :)

Becoming a babe

Fair Food!

So, today we went to a fair. And as everyone knows, fairs are notorious for bad food. I'd like to say that I powered through and fought temptation, but I didn't. Yeah, yeah, shame on me. However, I don't go to the fair very often. (like maybe once every 5+ years or so). Part of my whole weight loss idea is to not deprive myself. When you deprive yourself, when you do allow yourself to eat unhealthy, you have a better chance of going crazy. I walked past a stand selling fudge and I really wanted fudge. I got one little square, ate it, and my sweets appetite was satiated for a long time. So I didn't eat very well today. But I was walking around all day. So that helped cut down on the feeling that I had just blown all my work. As far as exercise, all I did today was walking around at the fair. I'm not going to lie, my abs still hurt from the night I did Pilates (which I have to say is kind of embarrassing).  So I haven't wanted to do that much in the way of exercise. But I really shouldn't use that as an excuse. The fact that my abs are still sore a few days later give me motivation to get them back in shape and keep working toward my goal of rocking a bikini!

Becoming a Babe

New Start!

So, it's been forever. However, I now need some motivation to keep myself pushing towards my goal. So, I'm going to try to start posting on here again. Right now, I'm sitting at around 181 pounds, and I've gone up and down by about 5 pounds. I kind of wander, but seem to always stick around 180. I'm kind of thinking that that is where my body wants to keep me. But I want to go lower because my ultimate goal is to rock a bikini. I think that now I could get away with a bikini, but I don't want to just get away with it, I want to ROCK it. I bought a bikini as sort of a motivation tool, but I think that I need to perhaps put it on display to keep myself in the right mindset to eat healthy and get my exercise in. I started up my cardio kickboxing/Pilates/yoga routine up again yesterday, and I have the sore abs to prove it today. ha ha. But yeah, that's about all I have today, but I'm going to try to start posting regularly.

Bikini Body?

So, I haven't blogged in a long time, but perhaps starting up again might be a good motivation tool. I have recently decided that my new goal is to look good in a bikini. I don't think I'm too too far away. I'm currently around 180 pounds. I have been eating horribly lately, but I'm really trying to get back on track. Winter kicks my butt because I can't get outside to do any sort of fun exercise. And for some reason, I tend to want to eat better when the weather is warm. It's a terrible habit that I don't recommend getting into. I have also been finding motivation through the fitness tab on Pinterest. It lets me see all different kinds of workouts and there are tons of inspirational quotes. So if you are ever looking for inspiration, that is a good place to start. So, that's about it for today. Hopefully I can start blogging more regularly and as the weather warms up, do some regular exercise again. That would be stellar.