Hey Krizstyling! Welcome and well-done on your efforts and loss so far!

Haha Chele! I am totally guilty of eavesdropping on my neighbours occasionally, once I looked out my window (when I was about 14) and since our house is higher up than the neighbours on one side, I saw my male neighbour sunbathing nude on the balcony! Hah!

I made it through Monday unscathed. Well not entirely, one of my cats vomited all over one of the few carpeted areas in my house as I was leaving for work, making me late, and it was a hellish day at work, but it wouldn't be Monday any other way, would it?

By unscathed, I mean I ate well and on plan all day, if a bit lacking in my water consumption. I've been working on making that up since I got home, though. Dinner was spaghetti with italian sausage, and garlic bread. Have we discussed the woes of living with a significant other that despises anything even remotely healthy?! He tries, I suppose, but it gets rough. I just had a small serving and teeny slice of bread. I planned to fill in the gaps with a veggie filled salad, but I'm rather full as is. Probably thanks to all the water I guzzled before.

I'm feeling pretty motivated to hit the gym tonight. Not gonna lie, though, it is mostly 'cause my pasty behind needs to hit the tanning bed. Luckily I'm too chicken to go in for just the tanning, so I always work out too. Tanning is free with my membership, and having been so busy these last few weeks I've lost some of my lovely Florida-girl summer glow. We're going on a trip to South Carolina in a couple of weeks and I want to look good! I'm hoping to get rid of this annoying 6 pounds keeping me from the 220's, and have time for nails, hair, pedicure.. the whole shebang! Which, of course, needs to be accompanied by a tan :)

Thanks Rainbow!

Amanda, I feel your pain. My boyfriend is 6'5 and worksout 5x a week and wants to GAIN weight constantly! I finally just had him buy tons of protein and he eats that and double whatever I'm eating.

Try replacing any sausage or beef you make with lean turkey meat, see if he notices the difference.

On a side note, can anyone tell me how to create a signature? Do I need more posts or something?

::is impatiently waiting for the electricity to turn back on so she can exercise::

Krizstyling, you have to be a member for 20 days first, but it looks like you've hit the minimum post rule, which I believe is also 20.

Oh, he notices the turkey in seconds flat. Some of the disgusting stuff he eats, I don't know how he can't stomach turkey. I think part of it has to do with his seeing it raw once, and being creeped out by the odd look. I do finally have him eating my turkey chili on occasion, at least. He just won't let it infiltrate any of his comfort dishes.

Amanda I know it's each to their own, but how much water do you aim for a day? I'm only just beginning to realise in the last two weeks I'm probably not drinking enough which could have slowed me down a bit.
Also, exercising at night! How do you do it! After dinner? How late? How much sleep do you get? Haha sorry about 20 questions! It's just something that baffles me. If I exercise in the evening, it has to be before dinner - I don't know why - could be that I like to relax in the evenings, and could also be that I just feel weird exercising later, like it won't do much or will keep me up or something.

I've been doing an apple comparison in the past couple of weeks and have found that the same variety of apple tastes so much better from a fruit+vege shop than from the supermarket. The supermarket ones are way more floury and I swear they have a slight chemical taste. I'm throwing away my last 2 supermarket ones, they are putting me off what I usually love!

SOOOOOOO ready for the next 40 minutes to disappear so I can go home! Have to go to my boyfriends first and pack, and then head to my parents - I hate that I have to drive in peak hour traffic, but I feel like I should be making an effort to see my parents more often so I'm going anyway. Plus sometimes it's nice to stretch out in bed alone haha.

Rainbow - When I've gone out to eat before, I actually just ask if I can have half of my meal brought out and the other half boxed. Most places have no problem doing so. I've found that if it's in front of me, whether it's split in half or not, I'll eat it! Haha. I envy your self control.

Hey rockexrolloh - that was the first time I've ever done that but then again this is the first time I've been really serious about health/fitness/weight loss. I would feel pretty silly asking them to box half before bringing it to me - it seems that that kind of thing is foreign in New Zealand to be honest, I don't think they'd quite know what to do!
Also I kind of preferred seeing how much the full serve was and then splitting it - I gave myself a slightly smaller portion for lunch today than I ate last night. Splitting it up took probably 5 minutes, I did get a few odd looks from my family haha!
At the moment I'm feeling good about my self control but I'm sure it won't last forever, I know I'll slip eventually, and then get back on! It takes all the willpower in the world!
Today I had to go get paper towel/tissue things for the shop I work in and I spent literally 3 minutes in front of the candy/chocolate bars, picking up different ones and looking at the calories/fat/sodium/sugars. I left them all there of course haha - but they had all these awesome (looking, maybe not tasting) Hershey bars that are usually not available anywhere in this silly little country - but I'm probably not missing out on much, right??

And the ones that do cant shoot anything when they try half the time! Do you remember a couple of years ago maybe where there was an armed defender squad raid of some house, and the guy's dog was loose- it was like 2 meters away from the armed defender who had a shotgun, it was barking at him, and he couldnt hit it! *facepalm*

Also, yeah i also feel awkward asking to have half boxed before it comes out at a restaurant in NZ :S But i have ordered an entree as a main and had some steamed veg as a side, people usually ask if you realise its an entree and smaller but if you say yes you do, and you'd like some steamed veg on the side theyre usually ok about it :)

Im feeling a bit better now yous guys :)

I went to my favorite Restaurant last night. Bad idea... I thought I could control myself, but I wound up miserable after. I didn't even eat half my food (enormous portions) but I pigged out on chips and beans and rice.. ugghh.. I'm paying for it today.

On the bright side, turns out my bf got some money someone owed him over the weekend and we got groceries! Yay! Now I have lots of healthy choices in the house. The rest of the week should be smooth sailing.

I have been super absent on 3FC lately and from weight loss in general because of packing for school and then driving for three days to get to school! Ahhhh! I wish I had time for personals, but I have to run :). Have a good Tuesday ladies!

Water is everything! I aim for AT LEAST 64 ounces per day, and I aim to get that in during work hours because I'm certain I'll get another 24 or so at home. When I haven't previously been swayed by diet soda or iced tea (always takes me a couple of days to re-kick those habits), I'm pretty much a water only gal, and it isn't unusual for me to log 100+ ounces. It makes such a huge different in how my body works, feels, etc. and definitely impacts my loss.

Working out at night is great! Sometimes I go to the gym directly from work, which is about 530 in the afternoon. I always have various snacks on hand at work, so 99% of the time there's something to have before a work out and before after work hunger hits. If I'm running/doing my C25K program, I MUST wait until after dark because I run outside and running outside in this Florida summer would KILL me. So since I have to wait until about 830, 9, I eat dinner when I get home, giving me enough time to digest.

Exercise is exercise at any hour... doing it at 10 pm vs. 5 pm doesn't change the activity your doing or whatever. I also find there is absolutely nothing more therapeutic than a good, sweaty work out, a nice long shower and crawling into bed fresh and clean with muscles faintly sore.

I completely agree with this statement, that is a great feeling. I've heard a lot of people say they can't sleep if they work out at night because they have so much energy. However, I usually workout anywhere between 5:30-8 PM and I sleep like a baby :)

Hi girls! Happy Tuesday!!!

Dh and I spent the day yesterday at the waterpark. We had a ton of fun! We got there right when it opened so we were able to walk right up to all the slides without waiting in line. 2 fatty flatbread pizza things for lunch. But was on plan the rest of the day with lots of walking and swimming, so hopefully it didn't mess me up too much. I missed little one the WHOLE time we were there. I kept thinking "Oh, Jackson would love that!" :(

I've decided that on the weekends I am going to start trying at least one new South Beach friendly recipe. This weekend I made a Cheesy Baked Penne dish with whole wheat penne, lean ground beef, skim ricotta, low fat mozzerella, a little tomato sauce and fresh parsley. It was really good! Hubby and little one enjoyed it too. I was able to freeze some for little one's lunches. I also made Taco Stew, it's a lot like chili with a mexican flair (you add some taco seasoning and sour cream.) It was quite tasty. I brought some for lunch today and froze more for my lunches and little one's lunches. DH ate his wrapped in a wheat tortilla.

If anyone wants the recipes, let me know and i'll post a link. I also found a recipe for Peanut Butter Cheesecake Bites (or something like that.) Haven't made those yet though. Let me know if you want that recipe too.

I weigh in at work on Mondays, so I missed yesterdays weigh in and this morning I came in late, so I'm weighing tomorrow. I did do my measurements this morning and I've lost .75 inches from my waist and .50 inces from my thighs and hips since August 6, so thats good!