Day 67

March 31

Yikes, I am already down to 67 days!
Since I didn't post all weekend, now it's time to play catch-up. Friday I didn't go to the gym, but I thought I should do something different and I did some TaeBo. I haven't done it in years so it was certainly different. On Saturday my lower back was sore (not from the Taebo) and my energy level was low so I didn't workout. It's really unusual for me to not work out on a Saturday, but when I don't have it in me, I prefer to just not workout than to go and get injured. Instead, I worked out on Sunday which is usually a rest day for me.
Today is a cardio day and I am about to go workout.
I have a link posted below to one of the funniest videos I've every seen! If you want a good laugh, you must watch it.

Day 71

March 27

Great day today. My meals were as planned and I had a great lower body workout. I was going to increase my squats but I kept it at 135lbs, however I did increase my leg curls to 60lbs. I did chew too much gum today. I have to completely cut out gum during my last week so I am going to try to reduce the amount I chew slowly.

FAQ's
I am most frequently asked the following questions.
1. How do you find the time to workout?
My answer is, what else is there to do? Perhaps I can be a couch potato! I can sit on my couch every evening and watch tv. I really don't find any thing interesting to watch on tv, even on my offs days. This evening, I got home at about 8:30 after my workout. I turned on the tv while preparing my meals for tomorrow and there was nothing on tv, so I turned it off.
I always try to find time to workout.
I find the most difficult part is the meal preparation. I eat 6 meals (well, actually 4 meals and 2 snacks since snacks don't really need very much preparation) a day. Just packing my lunch everyday is a chore!
2. How can you eat so much and so frequently?
Honestly, I have to eat so much because I get hungry every 2.5 hours.. If it gets to more than 3 hours, I get irritable and by the 4th hour I want to bit your head off. I am not kidding, just ask my husband.

The fact is not eating slows down your metabolism and causes you to gain weight because your body goes into starvation mode and hangs on to the fat you have. But you can't just start eating 6 meals a day like I do if you are not used to doing so. Instead, you have to slowly speed up your metabolism. I'll explain how to do that another time. It's time to go to sleep and regeneration!

Today I am grateful that it's Thursday! I am also grateful that I have great health. Finally I am happy that my mom grew us up eating healthy foods instead of junk food. Thanks mom!

Day 72

March 26th

Training
Yesterday my gym was extremely crowded so I wasn't able to bench press and instead I had to Dumbbell Press and Flyes. I started with 25lbs and then increased it to 30lbs. Today will be a cardio day, I will do intervals and will be done in 30 minutes, yeah!
Unfortunately I didn't have a 100% clean eating day. I indulged in a little piece of chocolate truffle. I've got to get rid of those chocolate cravings...every now and then I get those.
Today was a beautiful day, I think we had a high of 20 degrees (celsius). I am grateful for that and I am also grateful for my job (I received a nice and unexpected surprise on my pay stub yesterday).
I ordered supplements on Saturday from a new company I've never used before SupplementWarehouse.com and they haven't shipped my order yet. Needless to say, I will not be using them again. I am totally out of strawberry protein powder and I have to use plain vanilla for my protein shakes, yuck! It's not as good in shakes.

Foods to Avoid:
Fried foods
Processed foods
Soda (yes including diet)
white foods (white bread, white rice, etc and colouring white bread to make it brown does not mean it's no longer white bread)
Bad fats (saturated fats, i.e. butter, lard, etc.

Healthy Food List

Healthy Eating is at least 80% of it all. You can workout all you want but if you don't eat well then it shows. I often tell say that people take better care of their vehicles than their bodies. Just think about it, if you put crappy gas in your car it doesn't run as well, so if you put crappy food in your body then you will not operate well either!

Below are some of my food recommendations:

Ground chicken/breast (low fat is okay but I prefer the only white meat because I know it does not include other less desired parts)
Fresh fruit
Egg whites
Turkey or chicken breast
Cheese (not processed)
Low fat cottage cheese
Unsalted nuts (not roasted nuts such as almonds, walnuts, pecans etc)
Unsalted air-popped popcorn
Ezekiel bread, 100% whole wheat bread
Olive oil cooking spray
Lemon juice or balsamic vinegar (for salad dressing)
Brown rice
Whole wheat pasta

Day 73

March 25

Training:
Yesterday I did a cardio workout instead of lifing. Today I will be an upper body workout. I am going to bench 95lbs. I can go heavier but my husband will worked out this morning so he will not be there to spot me.

Meals:
Today wasn't a completely clean eating day. It was one of my co-workers birthday and and I felt like having chocolate cake so I had a small slice, I so felt like having more. Since I cut down on my carbs this week, I thought I would be extremely hungry but so far so good. I wasn't able to eat all my tuna and green beans which was unusual.

Gratitude:
I am happy that today is a beautiful sunny day. I am also grateful that it is not as busy this this at work (as it was the past few months), so I am at least able to create a new post.

Day 74

March 24
So far so good, eating clean today, but I have to cut down on the gum. I've been chewing way too much gum. Today is an Upper Body day at the gym. I've been trying to developing my delts and so far so good, but I still have some way today.
My weight this morning was 119.5 lbs and I will try to get my bodyfat tested today although the gym is always busy on Monday's and I hate that.