August 2009Monthly Archives

EA Sports Active 30 Day Challenge

Ok, so I’ve decided to join in with the folks over at The Sisterhood of the Shrinking Jeans to embark on the EA Sports Active 30 Day Challenge on my Wii. Part of joining process involves posting my challenge profile on my blog, so here we go.

30 Day Challenge Profile

Name: Melissa

Age: 40-something

Hometown: Lynchburg, TN, but I now reside in Anaheim, CA

Family: A lot of really great friends!

1. Complete the following sentence – “When I look in the mirror I see… a body that still needs more work.

2. What exercise do you take? What’s your current level of fitness? Right now it’s not very good. I injured my knee earlier this year and it’s really impacted my ability to exercise. It’s finally pretty much healed, so it’s time to get back in the game with my activity. I enjoy walking, spinning, step aerobics, my Wii Fit.

3. How do you relax? I enjoy drinking wine, but in the interest of saving myself a lot of empty calories, I pretty much stick with stitching (cross stitch & needlepoint) and reading.

4. Do you watch your weight? Yes, I rejoined WW earlier this year.

5. What’s your favorite body part? My eyes

6. What’s your least favorite body part? My stomach

7. What’s your favorite way to workout? Spinning

8. Its time to work out, we’re most likely to find you decked out in? Bike shorts & a t-shirt

9. You’re due to workout, but it’s pouring rain. What do you do? I live in southern California, so that doesn’t happen too often. When it does, I would either go to the gym, or use one of my exercise DVDs/Wii fitness titles at home.

10. What’s the one item you wouldn’t be without when working out? Water!

11. What do you hope to get from the 30 Day Challenge? I hope to begin rebuilding my fitness level. I’m signed up for a 5k race on Super Bowl Sunday and I’d really like to not be sucking wind at the end of it.

12. What are you apprehensive about going in? Fear of injuring my knee

13. How will you reward yourself after the challenge? Not sure yet. Perhaps another new fitness title for my Wii.

14. Complete the following sentence – “I’m Active for …” me, because I’m worth the effort to get healthy!

31 August 2009

Challenges

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Monday, August 31, 2009

Breakfast:

Iced latte – 2
Yogurt – 2

Lunch:

Eating Right cashew chicken w/vegetables & rice – 6
Grilled veggies w/2 tsp olive oil – 2
WW mini bar – 1

Snack:

Banana – 2
Cottage cheese – 2

Dinner:

Cheeseburger on Oroweat Sandwich Thin – 6
Baked chips – 1.5
Baby carrots – 0
Fudge bar – 1

Snack:

Nonfat milk – 3.5
Muffin – 3

Total Points: 32
Exercise: Wii EA Active Sports – 2 AP
WPA Balance: 35
AP Balance: 2
Water: 64 oz

31 August 2009

Uncategorized

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Food Journal

Weigh In Results/Lose for Good Kickoff

It’s Sunday, so that means I got up and headed over to my WW meeting this morning. I peeked at my home scale yesterday and it looked like I should be down about a pound this week. When I hopped on the scale at the meeting, the receptionist and I were chit-chatting and she never mentioned my weigh in results. Since I knew I was probably down a bit, I didn’t even ask how I had done. When I got into the meeting room and sat down, I opened up my book to see how much I had lost.

WTF?! I GAINED?! How did this happen?!! Admittedly, it was only a 0.2 pound (90g) gain, but it still got to me. I could barely pay attention during the meeting because I was bouncing between anger, frustration, confusion, etc. over the tiny gain.

After the meeting was over, I stayed for a few extra minutes and spoke with my leader about it. Julie (the leader) is awesome! She lost 130 pounds (59.1kg) on WW. She understands the journey for someone who has a lot of weight to lose, and that helps tremendously!

As soon as I started telling her about the gain, I started sniffling and tearing up because I was so good this week and felt cheated over not seeing the results on the scale. She gave me a tissue and then a big hug. She knows I keep my journal online, but asked me to also jot it down in a paper journal this week so I can bring it to the meeting next week for her to see. She said if I stick with the plan this week, she bets I’ll have a nice loss next week anyway, but to bring the paper journal just in case. Then, if I should have another week where I don’t lose or even (heaven forbid!) have another slight gain, she can look over my journal to see where I might be slipping up and not realize it.

In looking back over my journal for the past week after I got home, I did notice one thing. I seem to have consistently been under my points target by 2-3 points per day. In fact, I didn’t actually hit my points target a single day this week. I was still eating enough that it shouldn’t have caused any metabolism issues, but just to be safe, my goal for this week is to eat ALL of my points EVERY day.

Oh, I almost forgot to mention the most important part of the meeting, which is FAR more important than my piddly little gain and pity party! Today was the kickoff of the 2nd annual Lose for Good campaign taking place at Weight Watchers meetings across the country as well as for WW online subscribers. One of the staggering statistics that Julie mentioned when telling us about the campaign is that in 2008, there were 963 million people across the world who were classified as chronically hungry. Conversely, there were 1.6 billion people who were overweight.

I posted about this campaign a couple of weeks ago, but here is a recap since this week is the actual kickoff. For every 1 million pounds lost during the campaign period, Weight Watchers will donate $250,000 (up to $1 million) to help fight hunger. Additionally, the center where I attend meetings has put out containers for us to bring in food donations for local food pantries as well. This way, we are not only helping fight hunger at the global level through WW’s donation, we are helping the people in our own community who are struggling during these rough economic times.

Our weight today is our starting weight for the campaign which will run until Oct. 17. This gives us a total of six (6) weigh in’s during the campaign. I’m setting a personal goal for myself to lost 10 pounds. Julie also challenged each of us to set aside one pound of food for each pound of weight we lose to bring in to the donation barrels for the food drive at the center.

Having volunteered many times at food pantries and in feeding meals to the homeless, I’ve decided to take up Julie’s challenge, but raise it up a notch. My plan is to donate two pounds of food for each pound lost. Even if something should happen and I fall short of my weight loss goal, I still pledge to donate a minimum of 20 pounds of food for the food drive.

So, here’s to another week on the journey …

Brunch:

Iced coffee – 3
Fiber One mix pancakes – 3
MSF soysage patties – 3
SF syrup – 0.5

Snack:

Banana – 2

Dinner:

Pasta w/veggies & Parmesan cheese – 10
Garlic toast – 2
Pudding – 2

Snack:

Nonfat milk – 3.5
Muffin – 3

Total Points: 32
Exercise: None
WPA Balance: 0
AP Balance: 35
Water: 80 oz

30 August 2009

Thoughts, Weigh In

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Food Journal, Weigh In

Stitchy Saturday

Today was the monthly stitching gathering at my LNS. As always, we had a great time!

This month things were a bit different than normal. We generally just have an open stitching class and everyone works on whatever they want. This month we were divided up into two separate groups because some were taking a class called Hagatha’s Slipper designed by Margaret Bendig. The other group followed the usual format and stitched on whatever projects they liked.

As for me, I did a combination of the two. I started out with the class group until Margaret had gone over the basic instructions for the class, and then I moved back over to the main group so I could spend time with Dana, Terri, and Darla. Here’s a pic of the class model along with the progress I made today:

While I was at the shop, I also picked up some fibers for a chart I’ve had in my stash for a couple of years, but have never gotten around to stitching. It’s Voodoo Bob (a.k.a. Voodoo Boy from Haberdashery Designs). After seeing Missy Ann finish her Voodoo Boy, it has me hankering again to want to stitching. Since I’m not a fan of Kreinik, I’ve opted to go with Accentuate for mine. The fabric I’m going to use is some 32-count Black Ask Lugana by Sassy’s Fabrics from my stash.

There were also a couple of fantastic finishes that people showed off today. The first is Mermaid of the Pearls by Mirabilia stitched by Lisa who works part-time at the shop. The other finish was actually a framing finish as well. Olga brought in her beautiful version of Margaret’s Plum Blossom Kimono. She opted to go with a red & green colorway and had it framed using double silk custom-cut mats. It’s gorgeous!

Well, I guess that’s it for now. I’ll post pics of my start on My Lady’s Quaker soon. Yes, I started yet another project. I’m hopeless!

Until next time …

29 August 2009

Stitching

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Class, Cross Stitch, Halloween, kimono, Margaret Bendig, Mirabilia, My Lady's Quaker, Saturday Stitch

Saturday, August 29, 2009

Woo Hoo! I survived a very tasty look potluck luncheon today at the local needlework shop where I go. We get together once per month on a Saturday for a potluck meal and a full day of stitching. Since I knew I would have weigh in tomorrow, I opted to take my own lunch and skip the slippery slope of the potluck although, and I did it!! I did not succumb to a single temptation, including the carrot cake (my favorite!) that one of my dear friends made and brought.

Breakfast:

Iced coffee – 2
Muffin top – 1

Lunch:

6″ turkey sub (no cheese) – 5
Baked chips – 2

Snack:

None

Dinner:

KFC Grilled chicken – 4
Green beans – 0
Corn on the cob – 1
Biscuit – 4
Fudge bar – 1

Snack:

Nonfat milk – 3.5
Muffin – 3

Total Points: 26.5
Exercise: None
WPA Balance: 3
AP Balance: 35
Water: 80 oz

29 August 2009