So, my daily exercise really isn’t that hard. As Carl (the personal trainer I saw yesterday) said, the next few weeks the work I’ll be doing is basically to get me fit enough to do ‘proper’ exercise… this is more simple building of strength and stamina. It’s rather embarrassing just how unfit I am, I actually have to exercise to get fit enough to do exercise - I like to think he kept it low key as I mentioned I had sore knees. So guess what I’m doing? I’m walking. As I said, really nothing difficult - actually everything I have to do is so very doable (as long as my sister isn’t in the room watching. She’s much fitter than me, and I can just feel her ‘judging’ me for my lack of fitness, she doesn’t say anything, she just takes a sneaky glance my way and I know what she’s thinking :P).

Anyhoo, back to the quad issue. So the walking is “Briskly for a minimum of 20 mins and preferably up to an hour plus” which is fine as we have a family dog (see above - not just a random dog, my random dog) and she’s far spryer than I am. I also drag my darling Father along for the ride, which he says he finds “invigorating”, considering his love of all things cream/sugar based I’m sure it will do him a world of good!

Whoops, side tracked again, back to the quads. So I walked, briskly, for a total of 51 minutes to the village church and back (I recently discoved the church was first built in the 13th century so I’m rather proud of the old girl). When I woke up this morning I had that lightly pleasurable ache of muscles well used, however after the walk, and it came to going up the stairs…. Owie! Now I know from prior experiance that after a few days of these walks the pain will go and all will be forgotten, but at least twice today I’ve almost tripped because I usually run up the stairs, but I forget the ache until I’m already halfway up and then stumble mid flight!

In retrospect my woes are few, but I thought I would tell you about it anyway

Filed under: Exercise on June 7th, 2009 | 1 Comment »

So I weighed myself this morning, and I have lost 3.5lb’s. Calorie counting works, yay!

I’m really pleased about the loss, mainly because I did only a minimal amount of exercise. I’m starting doing exercise everyday now so hopefully this will help with the gradual reduction. But it’s nice to have solid proof that my diet does work

New weight: 234.4

Old Weight: 238

Filed under: Successes on June 6th, 2009 | 3 Comments »

So I finally got to meet with the personal trainer I mentioned earlier, he was very helpful so I’ll be seeing him once a week until I head off to Uni to do my postgrad. Only annoying thing is I won’t see him for another fortnight as on Monday I’m to go off on holiday to Wales for two weeks. I’m going with my sister who wants to get her oil painting skills up to scratch (she’s a sculptor at heart) so I’m hopefully going to be improving my technique with watercolour landscapes. This should involve long walks up hills and down dales to find ‘just the right spot’.

The place in Wales is lovely, the house is on a cliff halfway up a hill over looking the sea and the village is nestled at the bottom surrounded on three sides by hills. With the exception of the beach, which is course of only avaliable when the tide is out, there is not a jot of flat ground to be found. Obviously this sounds great from a fitness point of view but I *hate* hills - they’re Mother Nature’s cruel joke. Fortunately the exercises I were given today are doable almost anywhere, the hills are to be considered an added bonus (eek!).

I am a little perturbed by the lack of facilities there. We’re actually borrowing a single basment room thats part of a holiday house - I say borrowing as we’re not having to pay to stay as it’s my Uncles. However, although it possesses a sink and bathroom that is the extent of the facilities. No shower, no cooking appliances and no fridge or freezer. It’s going to be rather like camping indoors…. We may be able to cadge a shower off some of the tenants in the other parts of the holiday house, however this depends if we’re lucky or not. For a large portion of the summer our various cousins stay there, so it’ll be easy enough to look pitiful and umm… fragrant. If we don’t know the tenants we may have to resort to washing in the sea.

No shower and exercise do not mix!

Filed under: Creativeness, Exercise on June 5th, 2009 | No Comments »

It happened again! There I was innocently flicking through the 3FC forums, only to stumble across another quote that struck my fancy.

“How does one become a butterfly?” she asked pensively.
“You must want to fly so much that you are willing to give up being a caterpillar.”

~ Trina Paulus, Hope for the Flowers

This was at the bottom of Sidhe’s signature, a great quote find deserves recongition!

Filed under: Motivations on June 5th, 2009 | No Comments »

Apparently my family has just decided they can’t be bothered to cook tonight and so we’re all going to the local pub to share a mixed seafood platter… well how on earth am I meant to count the calories in that?!?

Filed under: Food, Whoops! on June 4th, 2009 | 1 Comment »

So I’ve been controlling the urge to weigh myself again until a week has passed from me starting this… that way there will hopefully me a measurable difference (my scales only work to the pound)… but I’ve had have this niggling urge all the time!

Grrrrr.

It shall not win!

Filed under: Life, Uncategorized on June 3rd, 2009 | No Comments »

I stumbled across this quote by Mary Anne Radmacher and I have to say I find it really inspiring. I’m sure many others have come across it before, but I definitely want this ’stuck up on the wall’ as it were.

Courage doesn’t always roar. Sometimes courage is the quiet voice at the end of the day saying, “I will try again tomorrow”

I imagine I’ll want to refer to it frequently

Filed under: Motivations on June 3rd, 2009 | 1 Comment »

I love baking. Love, love, love. Unfortunately it’s not really the sort of hobby that is helpful when trying to lose weight. This makes me sad.

There is a glimmer of light in the distance however. I just stumbled across Oh She Glows blog (link in my blogroll), which has a nice selection of healthy baking recipes. Looking at them, although they may not have the lowest calorie counts, at least they’re made from wholesome ingredients. So I’m thinking when the baking itch becomes I’ve got some recourse other than my favourite banana and cinnamon crunch muffins - which although yummy are far to choc full of sugary goodness.

Please, if anyone else knows of any other sources of healthy baking delights do drop me a line, I’d be eternally grateful!

Filed under: Food on June 2nd, 2009 | 1 Comment »

I got a call back from a local private gym/personal trainer set up (it had been a week since I called them I didn’t think I was going to hear back from them) however, I’ve now got an appointment to go in and see them on Friday - hopefully it will be helpful. This of course is a taster session to see if it’s what I’m looking for and worth the money or not.

Filed under: Exercise on June 1st, 2009 | No Comments »

I spent this afternoon mulling over a cunning idea. You see I live in the country, where there are fields and long village greens and canal paths. Now here’s the brilliant piece of thinking on my part: These things lend themselves to being run… the canal is of course particularly good owing to the fact it fairly deserted… no one need see my embarrasingly bright red, verging towards puce, face. Not that I actually know anyone locally beyond a nodding recognition… but there’s still this sense of shame when someone see just how unfit you are even though you know, intellectually, it’s blatently obvious with just a glace at how big you are.

So I was thinking of possibly trying the couch to 5k exercise plan. Anyone tried it themselves? Heard good/bad things about it? Please drop a line if you have!

Filed under: Exercise on May 31st, 2009 | 1 Comment »