Sizzling for Summer 2015 Challenge
 

Hey you. Yeah, YOU! You’re awesome and beautiful. If you don't think so then I'm sorry, but you are totally wrong. Go listen to some sexy music and dance in the mirror like it’s 1999 and believe you are delicious! Otherwise we’re gonna have a problem here.

But, I know sometimes when you’re a bit overweight you can feel a little pudgy and a bit like a sad panda. ESPECIALLY when the hot season is almost upon us (anyone else feel like saying “summer is coming” instead of “winter”?!) Not to worry though! You can do something about it! Amazing right? You have the ability to change your future and morph yourself into a delicious candy panda. High fives all around.

To help you along the way is another of my spreadsheet challenges! Please read the rules below before joining.

*This challenge has been renamed to Sizzling for Summer since a few people found "Bikini Ready" to be a little off-putting and I saw people being too hard on themselves!

Please Read These Rules!

• You can join this challenge at any time!! Really really!
• ~~>Click Here to view the Spreadsheet!<~~
• Enter your Username, Starting Weight (at the weight you are at NOW) and scroll to the right and enter your Goal Weight. The spreadsheet monkeys do the rest! Don't worry, they get plenty of bananas.
• Week by week enter your weight on any day you want Monday - Sunday. For example if a column says WK 4 5/25 that means you can weigh in between Monday 25th May - Sunday 31st May. It's NOT the deadline of the weigh in!
• Check back in to the thread and I'll publish a weekly chart to show who's dominating over us all. Let's try and beat 'em!
• If you want to take a break from weighing in then right click the cell for that week and select "Insert Note" (definitely not a "comment" because these won't move with your username if new members join the spreadsheet!) and add your reason for not weighing in.
• If you don't weigh in for more than 2 weeks without a noted reason you will be moved to Standby. Come to the thread and say you want to be back in the game if you want to re-enter the challenge.

Enter your starting weights now and the challenge will begin on April 27th!

FAQ

• Can I change my Goal Weight once the challenge has begun? ~ Yes! Just change the number in the Goal Weight column and the lbs to lose and lbs to go columns will sort themselves out. So no need to fiddle around with anything else BUT the Goal Weight value.
• There's a - mark in my cell for a week, but I know what I weighed! Can I change it? ~ Yes! The more information you can put in the better.

Yay! Exciting! Have you moved yet?! When's the 10K?

Joined!

Nope, I move on Monday! But packing didn't take as long as I thought, so I decided to set this up before the craziness of leaving! The Bolder Boulder is May 25th :)

How are things with you?

Ah, that's so exciting! Have safe travels! :D Hope your training has been going well.

Things are well here except that I am stressing that my own move is in 3 months and I haven't had much luck in the job search yet. But my first 5K is Saturday and I'm excited about that!

Thanks!

Try and keep your chin up! Job searching is really tough...I think it might be easier when you get there and start making friends. It's usually who you know when it comes to job searching.

Oh wow, good luck on your first 5K! You'll do brilliantly, you've been training well it seems and the adrenaline will take you to the finish line!

Signing up and I'm actually going to do it this time. Really, I swear!

Eta: I just request you keep me out of the "runnings" for domination of possible

Welcome!

Not sure what you mean exactly?

The weekly charts. I'm doing a completely different plan than most, and I don't want to discourage anyone. I know some noses were out of joint a couple challenges ago.

Eta: if it's something that is inconvenient or can't be done, no worries! I'm okay with it.

Ahh, so you're expecting a lot of weight loss? What sort of plan are you doing?

izzyboomama I wouldn't worry about it! The winner of our last challenge lost something like 20+ pounds? And everyone was nothing but excited for her. I think it would be motivating for us all to see your loss, even if it is due to some odd/very restrictive/whatever diet plan :P

Ries - We won't be moving until at least one of us gets a job so the whole move and then get a job thing won't quite work lol There isn't really a drop dead date where we HAVE to move, but we would like to move before our lease ends.

I'm so excited for this! I need to get back on my wagon! I've got a dream vacation to London coming up in October and had a nasty nightmare the other day that the dates suddenly changed and I had to leave immediately feeling blah and sad that I had let myself gain 10 pounds for all of my photos to document forever. It pretty much scared me off my cookie binge and back onto this forum just in time!

Anyway, I'll add my name to the list after I weigh in the morning. :)

yay, I've been waiting for this challenge :D Me, I'm in!!

rie: woot woot you're gonne be here so soon! Good luck on the move!
noname: good luck on your 5k!

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so some of you know I got married on a game show. It airs tomorrow morning!!! agh! I'm so nervous that I came out silly looking :(, but I'm excited to see it anyway!

Before a big change in my life I find it incredibly hard to stay on plan. So for the last few weeks I've barely done any exercise, partly due to my knee injury but mainly due to business/a hint of laziness. I did a LOT of walking last weekend since I was travelling with my parents, but the food intake has not been good! Cakes, fatty foods, soda...the works. I'm trying to give myself a break since I am about to immigrate to America, to a place where being fat can feel like I'm wearing a big sign that says I'm a racist, so I will definitely feel the need to fit in and be fit and healthy!

It's my last 3 days in England and I'm all packed up. I thought it would take me a LOT longer, but it seems to be that I'm an absolute pro at packing! Today I'm going to go through all the things I'm leaving behind, see if I can donate any more stuff since the next time I'm here I'm hoping to be at my goal weight so a lot of clothes can probably be given away. It's always such a cleansing process getting rid of things I find! But there is a lot that I want to keep but I can't fit into my cases, so it will be sad to leave those things behind. Hopefully my Mum will send me little bits and bobs as the months go on.

My parents are getting kinda intense about me leaving. Well, not INTENSE, but definitely starting to guilt trip me! Saying things like the dogs will be dead by the time I come home so "make the most of them." It's hard to get really excited about the move when there's this atmosphere of sadness. I know I shouldn't complain, I could have parents who don't care, but I want to get pumped for my new start and not feel so bad about leaving!

Anywho, back on topic, I'm gonna weigh myself in a minute and see what the damage is and put it in the spreadsheet!

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izzy - Like noname said, the last winner lost 20+ lbs in 10 weeks, which is insane. Even I was like "woah, for real?" but no one said anything nasty!

noname - Aaaah, I see! How far are you away from Denver if you ended up getting interviews?

Kellina - Welcome! I went to London in January, it was a lot of fun! I did the touristy thing since my boyfriend was visiting from America. I've been there loads to do official stuff but it was nice to see the sights, it has a lot to offer.

kisskiss - Wee, so glad you made it here! How did it all go for you guys? I know we'll get to see it but what was it like for you? Your wedding pictures look absolutely stunning btw!

Looking forward to the new challenge, so excited for summer time!! :D

@nonameslob We have pretty much the same starting and goal weights! ;)

Hey everyone, I've done these challenges off and on for the last few years and it never fails that when I stop posting at 3FC I gain a ton of freaking weight. I've gained 40 pounds in the year since I last posted and I have got to do something. I've decided to attempt to lose 20 lbs by the end of the challenge. It might be a long shot but I need to get this weight off. I started nursing school in January and the stress of that hasn't helped at all. I don't feel like I have time to cook or exercise because my free time is spent studying or trying to decompress a bit. But I know there is time in there that I could be working out. I need to get to the point where that is what I do to unwind instead of binge watching Mad Men on Netflix. Good Luck everyone!

Ries - "I am about to immigrate to America, to a place where being fat can feel like I'm wearing a big sign that says I'm a racist." Whoa. Is that how we're viewed from the outside? Yikes.

I hope the scale damage wasn't as much as you thought it would be! Moving is such a stressful time. You've got this.

I'm a good 5 hour plane ride away, but most places are pretty open to interviews via Skype and I'm willing to fly out for a final interview if needed.

kisskiss - CONGRATULATIONS!!! I wish I had seen your post last night, I'd have tried to watch it :P Not that I have a TV at work! Did you get to play the game at all?

Buckkeepblue - Yay always cool to have someone around the same weight!

kailpea - Welcome back to 3FC! Good luck finding a new healthier routine!

How fun! I do feel a bit like a sad panda sometimes... and I do want to sizzle for summer. I'm in!

izzyboomama: I agree with the others. I don't think it'll bother anyone. It's actually inspiring to see people doing well.

Riestrella: parental guilt trips CAN get intense. What helps me is to try and...not ignore it, but not really address it, and keep an upbeat attitude and act like they're sharing in it. Sometimes that helps (sometimes not). Good luck with the move! How exciting for you!

kisskiss: You got married on a game show? That sounds awesome! And congrats!

noname - I should probably have clarified a bit, I meant Boulder not America in general! Everyone who lives there seems to have their own fitness thing going on, I couldn't find one weight loss meetup on meetup.com! I also heard remarks by my boyfriends parents about some strangers who were overweight, they said "look at those fat people, they're disgusting" and the people they were talking about were smaller than my parents. It's just a part of the culture there, my boyfriend admits that it's a problem (he doesn't feel the same way obviously having started our relationship when I was 200 lbs!), so I'm a bit worried about how I'll be looked at there.
I was 163 lbs, I was expecting 165 lbs, so I was pleasantly surprised! Still a gain, but I don't care, fresh starts and all that jazz!

Penny - Welcome!! Yeah, you're right, I'm doing my best. I think I was PMSing last night since I got all frustrated and upset that they weren't just being happy for me, but I should just let it slide. Thanks!

yes I got married on Price is Right, by Drew Carey himself...in fact, we were on stage with him when he did the ceremony. They made us sign a bunch of contracts, but since it aired today , I can say WE WON!! We made it all the way to the showdown showcase (we lost that one), but we did win a nice camera, camera bag, and all expense paid trip to Argentina!! I'm still on a high from that day :D I was very very nervous but somehow, after we were called, it was pure excitement. I am really glad that we did it this way. Our families live very far, so we never wanted a big wedding and this seemed so unique.

I'm going to write up a post about the whole day on my blog, and also add a lot more pics on my blog, , but here are a few:

my before and after. The left pics was me at my heaviest--my cousin's wedding. ON my wedding day I was 136.7 :D

the middle pic is from the show.

and the last pic is the after the show photography at LACMA.

Riestrella Boulder is insanely fit! I stayed with a friend who lives in Fort Collins for about a month several years ago while I was checking out schools in Colorado and I was amazed by how active Boulder was. I think I would be intimidated! My husband and I want to run the BolderBoulder eventually. . .Its one of the best 10Ks in the nation (according to our runner friend). We're from flat Kansas though so I worry about the elevation difference when we are finally ready to run the 10K.

kisskiss You looked beautiful at your wedding! And what a fun way to get married!

Ries - It's definitely hard here! It can get disheartening when you have to go out of town to find jeans that fit (for second hand stores anyway!), or when I'm trying the second week of C25K out on the path and people are just flying by me with their casual jog. I try to remember that there are so many professional athletes out here and I shouldn't compare myself. I also tell myself I could dance rings around them. :) Fortunately no one has ever given me a rude glance or said anything about my size that I could hear. And once you get out of the Boulder bubble, there are a lot of bigger people too! Especially the "natives" who were born here and didn't move here explicitly for the fitness.

I haven't weighed in a few days since I've been sick and didn't realize there was a new challenge up! I haven't been successful in losing weight recently but I have at least kept from gaining...I'll weigh in tomorrow and add myself to the chart.

I started doing a DIY version of Ideal Protein. It's not so "ideal" IMO, but it's my means to an end, and I've been having great results so far. I just don't want to discourage anyone, that was my worry, but if no one is fussed by it, that's cool too! :carrot:

kisskiss: congrats on the marriage! you look awesome in your dress! it's so great you were able to do something so unique and fun (not to mention the prizes)!

Riestrella: You'll find that the mindset of boulder can be found in a lot of places here. America may be the hearth and home of mortal obesity, but it's also the land of extremes and there's a TON of super-fit people in just about every city. We do nothing by halves.

Thanks for starting this challenge. I am so excited to be apart of it! I'm not new to this forum and love to read all your wonderful stories but haven't yet posted anything myself. I thought this would be a great way to start off!

kisskiss - Wow, you look amazing! Congratulations again on the marriage, and the prizes! You'll be able to have such a wonderful honeymoon!

My 5K was Saturday! It was a lot of fun, I managed to run the whole thing, but I was really slow. IT WAS HOT! I'm looking forward to taking the lessons I learned over the next two weeks and working on my speed for the 5K I'm doing May 2nd. That's the "big" one to me since it's my work's annual fundraiser. I'm very proud of myself and excited for what's to come.

Unfortunately I have no clue what my official time was because for some reason my chip didn't trip at the starting line, so I only know my "gun" time. I'm pretty sure my real time is about a minute and 15 seconds less than that, but I forgot to check my watch at the end. Oh well!

nonameslob - Congrats on running your entire 5k! It's a bummer your chip didn't trip but it's great that you were able to run the whole thing as a warm up to your next one. Is it the first race you have done?

kisskiss - I forgot to mention, but your wedding photos are gorgeous! What a unique celebration and you look very happy.

izzyboomama - Boulder is a unique place. We call it "Republic of Boulder" or if we want to be snarky "The People's Republic of Boulder", because it seems to be its own country at times. I know I got a culture shock when I moved here from the Midwest. I've heard kids say things like, "I had sugar! But it was okay, it was only 10g of sugar" when referring to a treat, and they like to protest pretty much anything. I'm not saying this attitude doesn't exist in the US in other places, but I've really never seen it so engrained as in Boulder. It is, after all, the least obese city in the US (or was at one point).

I'm up a couple pounds after my illness. Rawr. I'm still searching for my motivation.

just came back after years of being away from 3fc, figured a challenge was a great place to start!

Rie: yup, I've heard Colorado in general is one of the fitter (if not fittest) states, and when I visited I definitely can believe it. I believe you're moving today, so have a safe journey!!

nonameslob:

congrats on completing your 5k, I'm sure you'll beat your time the second time around. Mine is also coming up and I'm really worried I may have to back out. After my wedding (and the day of standing and sitting for 7+hours), my back just has been so sore and doesn't really feel great. I'm not sure if running the 5k on May 2 is wise for me. I have family members who are doing it, so I was really looking forward to running with them but it looks like I may have to back out :(

moralitylikeart: Welcome back!

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Thanks all for the well wishes! We can't wait to go on the Argentina trip and we're still deciding on when the best time to travel would be. I hate planes, and I just read that the flight over is over 12 hours :( not excited about that, but oh well it's a free trip so I wont complain. Happy Monday !

kisskiss ¡Felicidades! The pictures look great, I loved your wedding dress! Argentina is amazing, your honey moon will be amazing, just try to sleep for most of the trip and you'll be fine. I'd honestly try to arrange the trip to be at night and I might even take a sleeping pill to be sure because I also hate planes (and trains and buses and most means of transportation :p).

Rie have a safe trip! I can't believe you're moving already... I hope you've let the guilt and sadness aside by now and you're very exited!

nonameslob Congrats on your first 5K!

I'm so joining but I'm not weighing in until TOM's gone. I've put on like 6 lbs overnight, it's ridiculous. I'm going to get some electrolytes today and see if it works.

I'm excited to join this challenge. My weight has not really been coming off like I'd hoped, but rather than giving up, I'm looking for more and more ways to motivate myself. Some friends at work and I are doing a few of the "30 Day Challenge" exercises and I've been following Weight Watchers now for 2 months or so.

I'm joining this challenge and motivated. I want to start swimming again, anyone into swimming?

I will not "fall off the earth" this time, seeing this one through to the end!

Alright ladies, it's on! I just ordered a bikini top. First one I've owned in a decade! I am so excited to wear one this summer, even if it's just in the privacy of my own home :)

It's funny to think in hindsight, 10 years ago I was bigger than I am now, but I was comfortable in a bikini. What happened? I guess I lost my confidence somewhere along the way, so I am going to try hard to rock it and own my body no matter what size it is.

Welcome goldengirlamy and BlueFlick!

goldengirlamy I love swimming and used to be on a team but haven't done much of it since college as I don't really have access to a pool. Great workout though! Do you have a membership somewhere with a pool?

I'm going to try this as well :)
I'm new to weight loss... and my scale keeps jumping back and forth like crazy.. Idk how accurate it will be. This morning before breakfast/lunch it was 260, and now it's 263. Idk if those few pounds are water weight or what.

Can't wait to start!! If I meet my goal I might just buy myself something nice!!

JigglyFluff only weigh in in the morning, after you go to the bathroom and with no clothes on. You do retain during the day, don't let that bother you!

Joined :)

Joined! I'm just getting back on track. I joined weight watchers 2 weeks ago. Time to get ready for my first cruise (6/14)!! :dancer:

I forgot to add my weight. I just found out that my cousin had been trying to steal everything my dad left me behind my back. My dad left me a huge but useless estate in his village and 87 valuable cows. My cousin's mother has wanted the estate for years but my dad had to keep it because of stupid legal cow stuff. After my father died, I proposed a partnership to my cousin because I want to keep the cows but I can't do it by myself. I told him that they'd get half the estate (they'd get the part with the two-story house and I'd get a glorified shed, mind you) and 22 cows, like they wanted, as long as he partnered up with my, like he'd done with my dad.

He didn't want to be my partner, so he tried to sell my cows and legally acquire the entire estate behind my back. He can't get the estate but he sold 29 cows, including the bull. I found a new partner and because I didn't know how many cows my cousin had stolen, we signed a contract stating that we'd own 20 cows each.

I'm so pathetic that when I found out that there were 58 cows left, I still promised my cousin that he'd get the remaining 18. So what did my cousin do? He loaded all the cows in trucks and tried to hide them in a nearby village. We were informed of it, though, so we stopped him. And I still wanted to let him keep 18 cows. And he had the nerve to get upset because I wanted to "steal" 4 of his cows and because I didn't let him get the cows he wanted. So, he's disappeared with the best 22 cows.

I'm sorry about the rambling and the TMI but I'm at my wit's end. I can't even believe all of this is happening... My aunt has turned my other two aunts against me and they've been awful to us since my dad died. They even claim that my mom and I killed my dad. I'm trying to not let it get to me but it's too much. I can only hope that my dad can't really see us from wherever he is. He'd die of guilt all over again.

Down 3lbs over the past 10 days. :-D

I'm going to be challenged today. Woke up with what has turned out to be pink eye. Got the meds and an order to stay home until I'm not contagious (24 hours). I'm stuck in this house with nothing but laundry and tv to stop me from eating. :/ At least I bought tons of fruit over the weekend if I do end up bored eating.

Hope everyone has a good week!