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YES! I just got the e-mail from our impromptu Biggest Loser Competition at work, and I’ve WON! Those were 14 challenging weeks, folks, and I worked real hard at it! My final results are: 28 pounds lost, 19.2% body weight. And the last, but not least, I couldn’t have done it without all the support and advice I recieved from this site!

 Photos, left to right: at ~148 lbs, at ~128 lbs, finally, at ~118 lbs!  Below: I look so much better clothed though!

Thank you everyone for support yesterday, and appologies for the whine-fest!

I left from work yesterday, couln’t face the treadmill, all in my worries about my husband’s final assignment, thinking I will walk 20 min to the train fighting the cold wind and snow… And the weather in Calgary’s typical fashion is super mild, no wind, snow is starting to melt. So, I decided to make a walk around the park before catching the train. Then as I started walking, I am going like… what the heck? Why should I miss my run?

And the inner voice tells me: Well, self, you have a big pack, and you are wearing work clothes. And I told the inner voice - big pack is good, it won’t wiggle once I tighten the straps, and workclothes are pants and shirt. If I walk fast, they will get sweaty anyway. So, I just took off and run, and boy, did it help to stabilize my mood, and was it a beautiful run! I couldn’t stop! I went on the second intreval till I got to the bridge going back to town! V. happy! And by the time I got home, hubby handed in his asignment and was in far better mood! Happy Ending! Well, almost. His final evaluation won’t come for a week or two, but I am now hopeful!

Wow, he even promissed me to do the photos today and going to do blood test with me, finally checking his cholesterol level! Now, that’s progress!!! Love you all, ladies! Thank you again!

It’s difficult to deal with the problems your loved one face, and you can’t shoulder it for them. my husband just called me, he is working on his last assignment this semester, it’s due at 4 pm, and he is all falling appart over it. He hates it, and he is going to fail because of it, he can spend 40 years on it and it won’t be any good, and all that. I tried every cheer strategy I had in my book, and I don’t feel like I helped any. I feel so helpless and frustrated. I know, I know he’s 40 yo and should fight his own battles, but I am now paniking, what if he is right and is going to fail… I dunno what’s that gonna do to him. I can’t concentrate on work, but I know that going home will do no good either. Oh, well, time-out for whining is over.

I keep wanting to stop blogging till I have something really exciting to post, like before and after pics, but small things happen, and I just bubble up to share. I am a bit embarassed about taking the space with it; hope you will fogive me.

I feel really excited about finally breaking down and ordering three more workout DVDs - two by Jillian Michaels (banish fat/Bust your Metabolism and No More Troubled Zones) and one the Ripped 1000 one. They are all curcuits, and I can’t wait to see if I can wait to see if I can measure myself against the workouts. I am so excited! Girls and their toys, eh?

So far, the only workout I couldn’t do was the HiLo Extreme by Amy Benito. I actually plan to try it again this Friday, when the baby is in the day care, so I don’t have time limitations and can try to follow it at my leasure. It’s very fast-paced and has tough choreography.

All weekend long I craved… peanut butter. I just diped a fork into the jar from time to time and licked a few drops.

That’s so strange, providing that a few months ago we didn’t even keep peanut butter around the house because nobody liked it all that much. I think it’s because it’s kind of salty without containing sodium, and I didn’t touch the salt shaker (lol, I just typed slat shaker by mistake; now, that’s how I am going to call it from now on!) since Thursday.

I am planning on including a snack with peanut butter daily and stopping the forrays to the jar. It doesn’t have salt or sugar, but it will over-contribute the fats for my metabolic type.

My favorite peanut butter treats nowadays are:

chopped granny smith with peanut butter (1 small apple, 1 tbls of peanut butter)

grated granny smith, grated carrot, and dressing made from freshly squeezed lemon juice, peanut butter and water

simple whole-wheat toast with peanut butter.

Have a great day, everyone!

One pickle - I repeast ONE!- can load you are with ONE pound -I repeat ONE POUND!- of retained water. After I read that in Jillian Michael’s “Making the Cut”, I felt like someone poured a bucket of ice-cold water on my head.

Discarding the salt shaker. I can cook all osrts of cool food, and eat my proper calories. I can excersise with the high intensity. I do it happily and it brightens my world.

But salt. I grew up in a country where if you wanted vegetables with the exception of beets, cabbages, carrots, onions and potatoes for 8 months of the year, you mostly reached for pickled tomatoes, cucucumbers, cabbage, spinach, cauliflower, bell peppers, garlic, etc. We also eat copious amounts of salted fish and salted meats - again, preservation, since the fresh was not always available.

That’s how it was preserved, not track-loaded from Mexica. Which is why I will NEVER embrace the 100 or 200 miles lifestyle, where I now live! I WANT my February strawberries, and my bananas, and red bell peppers and broccoli and… you get the picture. I lived for 22 years on potatoes and carrots and beets. I still like them, but I sure prefer the variety. But back to salt!

When I met my husband 11 years ago, I floored him by salting my chips and pre-made salsa. That was actually the comment which initially made me try to cut the salt back. I made some progress. But it is still a rough going.

My goal is to never use the shaker - as far as I know a person gets enough from all the perfectly healthy pre-made foods that I would not cook myself (bread, yougurt, milk, tofu etc). The industry always adds salt, so it’s really not necessary in the dishes cooked from scratch.

But boy, is it tough flavour-wise! All the sugar substitutes taste like SUGAR! Splenda virtually makes no difference. But to substitute salt they offer… herbs and spices. I LOVE herbs and spices, but they do not taste salty at all.

So, here is to the SALT SHAKER - my strongest and the most long-lasting foe. I hope that I will learn to love my food unsalted… any time now, any time!

Well, to be accurate, there is nothing to do today and tomorrow except for watching calories on Jillian’s program, as those are rest days. I am catching up on my cardio. I am up to 11 min intervals in my running (yay!) and it sure was wonderful to run them outside for a change with the warm April sun on my face. The weather was so nice, that I was out with the baby literally for the most of the day. It was easy so far to stay away from the unplanned food. I also did Beginner Pilates (for abs) from Kathy Smith Fat Burning Pilates DVDs as my ‘get the blood moving’ morning workout and the 2 cardio segments (step) from the same DVD.

I haven’t seen these 2 sequences on the stepby her before, and they are faster than her step ‘per se’ DVDs. It got me nice and panting trying to keep up! 

Everything changes tomorrow, alas. It’s the second rest day on Making the Cut (Day 7). They forecast showers and thunderstorms for the afternoon, so I can’t just get the Junior out! So, I am running first thing in the morning and begging off an hour from the husband to put in a workout in the late afternoon to keep away from food.

Of course, I am seeing the results of going over calorie limit on Tuesday-Thurdsday, when I ate closer to 1,500 than to my 1,350 ‘magic’ on BMR number. I am fighting HARD to have 1 pound loss this week. I can’t imagine how on Earth people want to go below BMR and stay there for long. Well, at least I know that eating more calories is not the trick that will do it for me. No such luck, siree! It’s been 2 weeks on BMR for me, and I find it awfully hard. Luckily, it’s only 2 weeks and 1 day remaining before I can start eating a bit more, since I won’t have to lose any more weight for the impromptu Biggest Loser Challenge at work. Can’t wait to maintain!!!

Have a wonderful day today, everyone, and have a lovely Good Friday to all of you who celebrate Easter! 

Staying home today, so for the first time I did the ‘double’ routine, Day 4. It took me slightly over an hour with warm-up and stretching. I am still slower than Jillian would have wanted, but the amount of sweating and effort was quite adequate. I have to confes that I did the squad thrusts and mountain climbers on the low impact versions from the 30 Day Shred. You need a better woman than me to do it properly! Overoll though, it left me with the excersise high and the feeling of a job well done!

Well, gotta run and cook my balanced breakfast now

I love the EatingWell website. So, I’d like to post the link to their 2009 Healthy easter Recipes Collection:

 http://www.eatingwell.com/recipes/collections/easter_celebration.html?utm_source=EWTWNL

I hope you will find it inspirational!

Food Log

Exercise Log

So, today is the rest day according to Jillian Michael’s Making the Cut program. I did a short beginner pilates DVD this morning to get the blood flowing, stretch out and keep building up to more of a real Pilates. I suck at Pilates….

I do have a lunch class, a Boot Camp, and I think I’d like to make it, because firstly, I only did 1/2 the Making the Cut program yesterday (I am starting to think that this 1/2 is actually plenty for me with my additional workouts), and secondly, there are no classes for a week from this Thursday to the next due to Easter. Then, I will just have a 30 min walk home to keep up with my beginner’s running program (my cardio).

With the weather turning to spring finally, and my in-laws visiting, my husband and me were enjoying the walks ‘as a couple’ for the last few days, on the mild evening nights. It’s such a luxury! I will be so sad when my in-laws leave on Thursday! All the tiny annoyances aside, they did so much to help, I can’t believe it. I don’t know how to express my gratitude properly, I am so awkward with the things like that.

For dinner, I am making Puerto-Rican fish stew for everyone, except the baby and my husband, who will get chicken quesadillas. It will take a bit of cooking to accomodate everyone, but I’d rather do that than my husband eats out. He can’t stand any fish but salmon, poor sod.