Half way! Yippee!!!!

Weekly Stats Current: 249.4
Weekly Loss: 3.6
To Go: 74.4
Total 75.6

I had a great Christmas and I hope you did too! I gave myself a great gift, I am now half way to my goal of losing 150 lbs!!!!!! I am really happy about this!!!! It is nice to see my "To Go" number be smaller that my "Total" number! I really think I am going to make my goal. Getting below 250 is the lightest I have been in over six years and I am definitely in much better shape. I also wanted to hit 250 by the end of the year and I made it with a few days to spare. That will help out at being at 240 by the end of January.

New Years is coming up. Maybe resolutions don't work for you, but they say if you write down goals, you have a much better chance of making them. What are you health and fitness goals for the upcoming year? Write it down and work on it. It is well worth any effort that you need to put forth.

My goals:
1. Lose 10 lbs a month until I reach my goal weight of 175. (This should happen by the end of this summer!)
2. Be in good enough (great) shape to:
a. Hike Big Baldy by the end of May.
b. Hike Timpanogos by the end of September

Star time!

Weekly Stats Current: 253.0
Weekly Loss: 2.4
To Go: 78.0
Total 72.0

Got another 10lbs star this week! And I am three lbs away from the half-way mark. A long, hard journey to get here, but it has been worth it. The second half of the journey will bring more hard work and a big payoff!

I made it through another Christmas party with lots of tempting food in good shape! None of the desserts grabbed a hold of me either! I have one more party on Christmas Eve, but it's at home with plenty of healthy options.

Special shout out to Gordon for still getting in a good ride despite the snow on the ground. Sounds like he had fun doing it as well.

Hope everyone has a great Christmas! Stick with staying healthy! Think about some goals for next year to get even healthier. I will share mine with you in the next week or so. Merry Christmas!!!!!

The New Snow Workout!

Weekly Stats Current: 255.4
Weekly Loss: 4
To Go: 80.4
Total 69.6

A great but challenging week! I am within .4 lbs of getting another 1o lbs star. It has been a bit since I have reached the 10 lbs star reward due to the change in the routine by coming off the strict diet, but I have been happy with the getting back to exercise and the progress I am making there. I was looking over my stats over the past 6 weeks and after the week and a half of stabilization where I gained some weight back, I have been on track of 10 lbs a month. I hope that my body keeps responding well. I am also still struggling a bit with my being sick, but I do feel much better.

I made it past the Gudmundson Christmas Party without a set back as well. Barbara fixed a nice prime rib, creamed potatoes and other yummy stuff like spinach and artichoke dip, but I had just a bit of each and loaded up on a salad that one of my daughters brought and skipped dessert.

The snow workout that the title refers to has to do with the snow we got Saturday night and all day Sunday. We had a storm swing in from the south west which brought some extremely wet snow. I wasn't able to get to it until after church. I needed to get the walks and drive done before the family arrived so I had a great workout that I normally wouldn't get on Sunday after I shoveled and snow blowed. The blower helped, but it was so wet, it was still a lot of work.

Christmas is a week from Friday! Hope you holiday fun continues and you don't have a blow out of your own when it comes to weight gain. Janet made a comment on my Facebook status that she likes to diet this time of year. Crazy at it sounds, it is a good strategy. Really watch what you eat this time of year and it has a double pay off. You don't put on that extra pounds that can be so hard to take off after the first of the year. It is almost like a double coupon day at the store if you lose a little weight as well. Same goes for working out. If you keep it up through the holidays, you don't have that hard ramp up after the first of the year! Good luck to you all! Hang in there!

A lucky break!

Weekly Stats
Current: 259.4
Weekly Loss: .6
To Go: 84.4
Total 65.6

I am still fighting off being sick. I didn't even feel good enough to exercise until last Wednesday. Even after I started back up, my weight was all over the charts. When I was up a couple of pounds on Saturday, I didn't have much hope of a weight loss this week. However, I stuck to it and after exercising this morning and clearing the walks I was down .6 this morning. Not as much as I want to lose in a week but after struggling, I am more than happy with it. Not only that, I broke into the 250s. Yea!!!!! And I have lost 65 lbs now!!!! Yea!!!!!! And the workout actually felt pretty good today as well!!!!!

When I was clearing the walks, I attempted to do the snow blower splits. That is where you are cruising along, hit a patch of ice, your feet start going in different directions and you body contorts all over the place. I am glad I have lost weight and have been working out or I think I would have gone down hard. Instead, somehow I kept my balance and finished the job. I am just glad that my daughter didn't see me. She tends to laugh hysterically at this type of things for days! Not good for the self-esteem.

I made it through a couple of party's and eating out. I have found that if you look for the good stuff and load up on that and just have a small serving of things that are questionable. I also have had enough fortitude to skip dessert and that really helps. As far as a restaurant goes, chicken and fish are my friends. Just make sure they are grilled with no extra creamy sauces. Often you can choose steamed vegetables as a side and that helps as well.

Good look to you all. Don't make food the main focus of your holiday cheer. Figure out ways to add to the Christmas spirit in other ways. Lend a hand to someone who needs it! Keep up the good work!