Nothing Changes if Nothing Changes.

HooHaa 52 – Resolution (Week 24) (Photo credit: Grizdave)

This morning I was at the gym – I have been to the gym every day this year – and channel surfing since none of my preferred shows were on.   I’m not sure what was going on in the show, but I saw that on the subtitles – and I thought – Thanks God, for that bit of inspiration!  I didn’t stay watching the show, but I’m still thinking about it.

At TOPS last night I recorded a gain of half a pound over the Christmas weeks.  I start the year with my second number still a 2 (thankfully) and a very small gain.  I knew I shouldn’t have eaten so much chocolate!  Oh well, I enjoyed everything – and in relative moderation.  I should let you know that the others who weighed in LOST over New Years, which is highly commendable.

We talked about resolutions – and some of us had made them.  Mine is to move a minimum of 5 minutes every single day this year.  So far, I’ve met that challenge.  I’ve also challenged myself to eat something green every day – and I’ve managed that as well.  Mrs. P has begun writing her bites.

One of our group doesn’t make resolutions, so she won’t break them.  This makes sense to me as well.  In 2010 I printed “One Problem, One Correction” and it is still hanging on my bulletin board as a reminder that I cannot solve all my problems at the same time.

Resolutions or Changes? Either way, something has to become different if we are going to become the people we want to be – and in TOPS we do at some level want to be at a healthier weight.  We want to eat wisely most of the time.  We do not want to be ruled by our emotions.

I struggle with “writing the bites” and have for years.  I’ve tried My Fitness Pal, Spark People, Lose It….and all kinds of papers and journals.  I’ve lasted maybe two days.  I’ve got something new, and I’ll take a picture of it later, but here’s what I did:

1. Obtain 31 index cards, I think mine are 4 x 6, but I’m on a roll here, so I won’t go get it.
2. Punch holes in the top corners.
3. Insert those round rings (I guess I’ll have to get a picture of that) – and voila!
4. On the first 7 pages write the date – don’t get too far ahead of yourself.  I also write my schedule, grocery list….
5. WRITE WHAT YOU ARE PLANNING TO EAT FOR THE DAY

I don’t know why, but somehow this has been working for me when others have failed.  Having the rings at the top and not the sides makes it easier for me to write things down.

It’s big enough to find in my bag, but small enough not to be cumbersome.  I don’t have to hold the pages open while I write….

Something changed, and what’s important for me as I go through this next year of change, is that I keep looking until I find what works!

Have a good day!

Marcia

PS:  Here’s another blog I found particularly inspirational this morning – because she just doesn’t give up!  http://sunnyjane.wordpress.com/2013/01/03/pizza-wine/  I really like her picture!  You go girl!

It’s COLD, COLD, COLD outside!

If  per chance you’ve been following Calgary’s weather (which is always interesting) you’ll know that most of January has been quite warm – I even rode my bike a few days this month!  However,

Today

Chance of flurries
High: -28°
P.O.P. 30%It’s Cold and so I thought it would be helpful to remind you of some ways to keep warm – via the Calgary Philharmonic chorus.  I’ve posted about this before, but it bears repeating, now that we really need the information again!  If you need further explanation of some of their ideas, check here.

It’s been a while since I posted, so I thought I’d better catch you up on what’s going on in my very cold world.

I’ve braved the cold and made it to the gym both days.  And to work.  It just takes so very long to get all those layers on!  But I am so grateful for my ski-pants!  They make walking tolerable!

On the weight side of things, I did half a pound, so not quite what I wanted, but we’ll get there!  I did manage to record all my eating for yesterday, which is a major accomplishment for me.  I find it so very hard to keep track.  That’s where the PLAN comes in so handy.

Here’s today’s plan, based my shift (11 am – 7:30 pm) which embraces both lunch and supper.

8:30 am:  breakfast (which is ready now)

10:30 : am:  a spelt blueberry muffin, made by me.

1 pm: First break – slice of bread with bison

3:00 pm.  Lunch break – vegetable beef stew (lots of veggies) and a lovely slice of my spelt bread.

5:30 pm: Salad with half a can of salmon and roasted veggies for flavour.

8 pm (or whenever I get home)  almonds, 1 cup mixed veggies (mostly beans)

Of course all these times are approximate.  Life isn’t just like clockwork.  But the plan helps me to get it together.

Now it’s time for breakfast, so I hope that wherever  you are, you are warm and toasty.  Have a wonderful day!

Marcia

Year 2, Week 1: Success

  As you can see, my paper is quite filled up by my attendance at the gym.  Not to fear, however.  I’ve started a new one – one that’s a little more organized.

Showing up for the things you say you are going to show up for is important if you want to get to where you are going.  It’s the beginning.

I’ve committed to showing up for Ni90 as well.  Then I signed up for the Canadian Living 6 Week Slimdown!  It should be finished in time for the Calgary Co-op Wellness Challenge. On top of all that, my last TESL course starts this week.  I think I’ll have to say NO to further commitments for a while – at least until April.

Most of my RED posts are heading over to the new blog.  But I will be posting a weekly update and perhaps a recipe or something.  So here, I hope is a chart I made for last weeks efforts.  The olliebollen have taken their toll (more about that later this week) but I still was able to lose a pound.  That was the goal!  That is the goal.  Just one pound.

Hmm.  I thought I had it figured out.  Some blogs I follow have such nifty charts.  Since I can download pdf. files, I saved my chart as one.  It shows up as a link. Sorry.  I am trying.  That’s another goal for the year.  I wonder if it’s the format I’m using, or if I have to spend some money in order to make charts.

In the meantime, here’s my starting picture, taken the last day of the year in my “Olympic” teeshirt!

Let’s see how loose that shirt gets this year!

Have a great Monday.  I’m off to the library, bank and post office before I head to work!

Marcia

Cinnamon Bear: Part one!

Well, good evening.

I survived quite nicely on my breakfast of fish and veggies, but I forgot the sandwich, and ended up buying a bagel!

The boots were wonderful at keeping my feet warm and dry, but they sure are heavy!  I think my legs will get a good workout over the next few days!

But that’s not the reason I’m posting – I just started listening to an old radio show thanks to http://www.getrichslowly.org/blog/2011/11/28/the-cinnamon-bear-an-old-time-radio-christmas-tradition-4/  In this annual posting, J. D. Roth has collected all the episodes in one place.  I’m going to try to create the habit of posting consistently by posting each episode, one at a time!  First of course I”ll have to see if I can do it once. If I fail, at least you have the link for them.  The first one was quite delightful!

“Paddy O’ Cinnamon” is the first of the story.  I won’t spoil it for you, but I do have a yearning to make a crazy quilt dragon some day soon!

See you tomorrow sometime for the next episode!

Have a good evening and thank you all for stopping by!

The Truth will Out!

Before I left for vacation I had all kinds of plans.  I was going to find a gym every day and pay the price to work out.  I was going to do my stretches for physio every day.  I was… I was… I was.

I didn’t.

The reality is that it was too far from my parents place – and their swimming hole didn’t have work-out machines.  (There was an exercise bike in my room – I ignored it!)  Then we had our adventures!  Lots of driving involved and lots of visiting.

On top of that I got sick.  Emma got sick.  My mom was already sick. It was so bad that I drove myself to the Woodstock hospital, concerned that I might have an infection that would spoil all the fun I wanted to have!

I did manage to drag almost every member of my family out geo-caching.  This is the first one that my dad found.  Sneaky hide if you ask me!

I’m writing this on Sunday evening, but I’ll end it tomorrow with the reality of what my two weeks off has done to the numbers on the scale.  It will be good to get back to the gym!  Back to my morning routine!

Marcia

It’s about 7 am.  I’ve been up for about 3 hours now – my body is still on Gormley time, and the extra hour didn’t help either!  On the other hand, I’ve re-inked my printer cartridges, made everything ready so that I could make breakfast and coffee quickly and I was at the gym just after 6 am.

I weighed in with a gain of 4 pounds – which doesn’t surprise me –  too much coffee, too much chocolate, and my mom is a great cook!

My goal for this week is to get back on track and work harder at the gym – maybe right after work!  I want my second number to be a

(I don’t ever plan on buying this kind of tire, but if you have a biker in your life, here’s the link:  bike-palast.com )

And again, thanks for stopping by.  Your visits are an encouragement to me as I move toward my goals.

Back to the Details!

While I’ve been a regular at the gym, and somewhat regular (I’ve posted about once a week on average) visiting here at the blog, I haven’t really been tracking the numbers as closely as I was at the beginning of the year.

This week I did track the mileage a little more closely.  Because of my tendonitis, I haven’t been on the elliptical machine.  I also haven’t been doing my weight routine.   Instead my first stop is the treadmill.

I pop in my earplugs and turn on my I-pod.  It’s hard to find a volume that I can tolerate but drowns out the gym music.  I think I’m going to have to get a different kind of headphone to do that.  Just not quite yet!

I start my “walk to no-where” at 3.1 mph and move it up to 3.5 mph which is my main pace.  Every 5 minutes I move it up to 4.5 (And today I tried 4.7 which worked) for a minute.  This is known as “Fartlekking” in the running world and you can read a bit more about it at the blog where I “nipped” the above picture, http://ridgrunner.blogspot.com/2008_03_01_archive.html

While most people do this to build endurance and speed, that’s not my idea.  I just want to keep from getting BORED!  And I get bored easily.

The bike is reserved for reading time – about 13 minutes, depending on what’s on for the rest of the day.

Last week I managed 6 visits to the gym, and moved myself 21.46 miles.  I also found, somewhere along the way, one of the pounds that I lost.  I’m hoping it will get lost this week and stay lost.

Have a wonderful evening!

Marcia

“Let Habits Work for YOU”

Being week 33, I am reading about habits, and I borrowed the title for this post from Napoleon Hill’s essay.

This morning I woke up at a reasonable hour – meaning I could have been at the gym earlier than I was.  I spent that time reading a book.  Not a bad book, but not one that made my current situation a bit better.  It just made me late.

I got to the gym and did another abbreviated work-out.  I increased my time on the treadmill to 21 minutes, and did some time on the bike.  While on the treadmill I read and I pondered the habits that make up my morning.

God has given us the ability to create our own habits.  That means that by omission or commission, I create habits that impact my day.

Near Bury St. Edmond, England

For example, every night I read something, and I usually read it in the morning as well.  Lately this has been the Harry Potter novels.  Last night it was a Debbie Macomber romance.  I enjoy both books.  But I enjoy them at a price.  This morning’s reading made me re-think the books that I keep on my night stand.

When I got home from the gym, I did a little cleaning up.  The nightstand is less cluttered!  I have not put something in it’s place – yet.  But God has blessed me with a number of books that would make better reading.  I just need to choose one.

Well, I have a physio appointment shortly and I need to have a look at the books I already have.  I’ll let you know what I have decided to go with tomorrow!

Have a wonderful day.  Enjoy the summer while we have it.  (I’m back to wearing jackets to they gym.)

Marcia

It’w Weigh Day! – and a Recipe!

Good morning!  I hit the scale today, after another night of too little sleep.  I live on a main road, and they decided to do some repairs last night.  I did forego the ending of “The Deathly Hallows” which was getting a bit too scary for my liking (I will finish it in the light of day!).  But just as I was adjusting my head on the pillow all kinds of strange noises came out of the “silence”.  After that came the flashing lights.  But the spots they fixed look lovely and traffic has been moving nicely since I got up this morning.

I don’t look well when I’m tired.  I don’t feel so hot either.  I don’t weigh much less either.  I don’t know why that is – but I feel heavier too.

Anyways, I’m down half a pound from last week.  I’ve been to the gym every week day, which is the goal.  I’m also finished all my course work, so I can go back to focusing with “gazelle intensity” (the Dave Ramsey term I was looking for on Friday) on this matter of getting myself to a healthy weight.

I’ve created and am actually working from a menu-plan that I type up on the computer.  It’s pretty simple  but it has room for everything I need to have.  Of course it is printed on pink paper so that I can find it easily.

I’ve also “Messed with the Recipe” again, so I’ll share that with you!  The recipe was handed out at the Calgary Stampede this year, but you can find it here:

http://www.mbegg.mb.ca/salads_E_EggCouscousSalad.html

  Here’s a picture of it as well, to inspire  you.  Because I am trying (mostly ) to stay away from wheat, I don’t use couscous.  But grain is grain, and there are other small round grains that would work.  My choice was quinoa.  I made some other changes along the way as well.   So without further ado…

3 cups chicken or vegetable broth

1 cup raw quinoa or millet – if you are using the quinoa, rinse it well!)

4 eggs, hard boiled.  (I kept them out of the salad mixture because I want to add canned salmon instead and see how that tastes!)

1 can chick peas (19 oz ) drained or cook your own, and add 2 – 3 cups.

1 cup halved cherry tomatoes – I used the whole box because “The more veggies the merrier!”

3/4 cup diced sweet pepper.  I bought an orange one and I have no idea where it is.  When I do find it, and I hope sooner than later, I’ll add it in.

3/4 cup diced or grated carrot.

1/2 cup chopped green onion or sweet onion

1/3 cup finely chopped parsley

Salt and pepper to taste.

I used the broth to cook my quinoa.  It doesn’t take long – 10 minutes or so.  While it was cooking and cooling I chopped and mixed together the veggies.  Once everything was done I added the dressing – there is a recipe on the website, but I just added the herbs (1 tbsp. dried basil, 1 1/2 tsp. dried oregano, 1 1/2 tsp. onion powder, 1/4 tsp. garlic powder) to the quinoa.

To serve, I cut up half a romaine heart and add about 1 1/2 cups of the grain and vegatable mixture.  I top this with some light salad dressing and enjoy my meal.    And it is a meal in itself – very filling!

Having said all of that, it’s lunch time and pouring bucketsful of rain.  I guess I won’t be cutting the grass just yet!  Maybe I’ll have some of this salad for my lunch!

“See you lighter” as we say in TOPS, And thank you for being my encouragement!  Have a great day!

M

It’s Payday!

It’s Friday.  I’m off work.  The sun is shining brightly and the morning chill reminds me that Autumn is not far behind.

It’s been a busy summer for me.  I came to the end of my CERTESL studies with the University of Saskatchewan!  There were thoughts to think and papers to write.  Of course, being me, I was still writing as the deadline loomed.  A slight improvement however – I finished at 10 pm. instead of midnight.  More about that later!

It is also the anniversary of my first year trying to put Dave Ramsey’s Total Money Makeover into effect.

I  have to say, first of all, that I haven’t been focused on this with the focused “Life or Death” intensity that some people have.  I don’t seem to have that kind of intensity about anything – even my health. On the other hand, I don’t have my head in the sand.  I am not ignoring the situation – I’m just not as focused as perhaps I could be.

On the financial side of things I have made some headway.  I have eliminated two small debts totalling about $1400.   I am still paying $200 every pay check towards debt repayment  – and that means that I am paying more than the minimum required on the three debts I still have to pay off. But just think of the fun I could have if those dollars were mine to spend – that’s a lot of boot camps and stuff!

I have also managed to save the $1000 emergency fund.  I’m  not ignoring it, but feeding it $10 every paycheck.  Having an emergency fund is a wonderful thing!  If I needed to move suddenly, I have a damage deposit.  If I need to fly somewhere for work or family, I can do that.  Knowing that reduces some of the stress in my life! If you scroll back to a year ago, you can read how I started building it with extra money that came my way.  It is not an impossible task.  I have mine with ING bank, and it’s been a good experience. (Not to mention that they added $25 to my initial deposit!)  None of my friends have taken me up on the offer of my ING key, but that’s okay.  Maybe they will soon!

My next challenge is a credit card.  “Mr. Sears”  has been let out of his hiding place a few times – and the results are not great.  I now owe $800 on the card and I’m paying $100 every two weeks to lower my debt. Well, after today it’s $700 because I just got paid.  In theory I should have it paid off by the end of November.  My mini challenge then, is to pay it off before the 30th.  Now that I’ve written that, I’m going to figure out ways to make it happen!

I’ll keep you posted. In the meantime, thanks for visiting my blog.  You encourage me to keep on moving towards my goal!

Marcia at 9431

PS:  I haven’t been posting about my weight so much.  (The chart suddenly seemed a bit persnickity!) but my weight at TOPS last night was 228! It was 229 at the gym on Monday.  I’ve set my goal to lose 2 pounds on the gym scale, so we’ll see how that goes.  Stay tuned!

 

 

 

I’m Still Here!

Good morning, everyone.  I know I haven’t posted in too, too long.  Part of it is denial – I’m bouncing up and down, but the second number is still a:

I like that very much.  Last week my cousin posted on Facebook that her first number was a 1 and it took me a while to figure that out.  Anyways, I am moving slowly towards that post myself – with the weight hovering at 228. 

 

I’ve been busy focusing on the yellow stripes in my parachute, as I complete the requirements of my practicum.  In two weeks it will all be submitted and I can go back to focusing on the red!

 

I’ve gone to the gym every weekday morning.  I just need to get back to paying attention to what I eat – right now it’s far too many cherries (and ice-cream)  so I’ll skip the ice-cream and eat the cherries.
I hope you all have a wonderful day, and thank you for your encouragement!  I couldn’t do this without you!

Marcia