WOOO HOOO!! I can "identify" with cupid... Cute lil fat guy all about love... That's me to a t (well, except I'm a gal. LOL) GO TEAM CUPID!!!

It was a little disheartening to see I'm the biggest one in the challenge. But that's ok. I promise to do my team proud!!!

Hopefalls, thanks so much for organizing this whole thing! I am excited to get to know everyone and start slimming down as a group! If we all meet our goals, we'll lose nearly 700 pounds!!! Let's do this!

Jackie, woo we're on the same team! Can't wait to get to know you better.

Rachel, your screen name totally cracks me up! I put up a ticker in my siggy, just for this challenge. I plan to blow my goal out of the water!! I can't wait to get to know you better!

I'm in the process of making a new "journal" on paper... so I can view it at a glance. I have monthly calendars to write in "special days" (holidays, birthdays, special eating out days, etc) that might be a trial on my calorie counting. I've decided to do calorie cycling, so everyday I will have in the month long calendar the amount of calories I'm allowed that day. Also on the month calendar I'll write in my weight everyday (since I weigh everyday LOL) and highlight in some way the days TOM is here, and the days I exercise.
Then right behind the monthly calendar will be a weekly one. In these, I will put my weekly menu (I usually don't plan days, but since I'm doing calorie cycling I can put the higher caloric recipes on my "up" days), plus my exercise goals for the week.
Then after that will be my journal for the week. Which will include my food diary, activity diary, moods, whatever. On the cover of the 3ring binder, I'm goin gto paste a bunch of pictures of things that I'm looking forward to doing when I'm goal or closer to goal. So that will be my "inspiration" board.

Hopefully that will help me to keep on track and be a huge asset to team Cupid!

Hopefalls thanks so much for getting this challenge started. I am looking fwd to getting to know you all and becoming a loser with you all!

Hi ladies I would like to join in the challenge?
SW 200
GW 180

Jackie, that is terrific planning! You mention putting pics of activities on the cover of your binder - what are some of those activites? I think that sounds like great motivation. And I'm glad my username makes you laugh - it makes me laugh too! There is a crazy amount of pokey cacti in Arizona!

Well, so far I've gotten pictures of sky diving, hot air balloon, white water rafting, hiking (are you seeing an OUTDOOR theme?? LOL). I am going to add pictures of knee high boots (don't knwo if I'll wear them ever, but it owuld be nice to be ABLE TO), corset and sexy lingerie (I won't put pics of these in cuz I have preteens and teen boy in the house, and.. well, ya. But I'm going to find a DECENT pic to portray it.. maybe a corset blouse or something). Rollercoasters, airplanes (I have to fly in April and I want to FIT NICELY), and right now that's it.

I'd love to hear what would be on everyone's list. I know we all have a ton of stuff to look forward to. I have no specific goals in life right now (such as a marathon, etc), but hope to find something i want to participate in to work toward.

Good morning everyone

Since I am new I thought maybe I would do a little intro. I am a mom to 3 kids a boy that is freshman in high school and twins girls that are 10. I have never struggled with weight until recently. If I put on a few pounds I would watch what I ate and I would loss the weight. Well 35 hit and apparently my metabolism gave up! Ove the past 3 to 4 years I have slowly put on 25 pounds. Last fall I tried weight watchers for several months and lost 5 pounds despite following the program to a tee!

I gave post holidays and this summer was motivated to start exercising. I began c2k and saw my energy levels go up and lost a few pounds. Once the kids went back to school my exercise fell to the wayside of family life craziness and schedules. Finally at the end of September I came across slim I. 6 in a box. I had ordered 2 years ago and did nothing with it. I committed myself at that tome to begin it and finish it.

Indie the first 3 weeks and I am in my 4th week now. I started to lose steam this past weekend which is what brought me to the Internet to find support to keep going. I am really inspired by so many of the stories and people on this site I am reAlly looking fwd to progressing and losing weight with you all

Ooooh la la.....Team Casanova. I feel so naughty!

Hopefalls, I really appreciate how much work you are putting into this! I've joined other challenges where the person who began it just vanished, which is rather disheartening. It's nice to see that you're sincere about this!

Jackie, I thought I was the queen of organization, but you put me to shame....all those charts and lists and graphs, oh my! Have you ever heard of art journaling? It kinna sounds like that is what you are doing with the goals page. (If you google art journaling, you can see photos and read info about it. It's basically keeping a diary by creating pages of pictures and words.)

If you do your goals page in that style, you could use words instead of pictures for some of the things (like the naughty lingerie) or you could aid motivational words or affirmations or something. I do art journaling and never thought to do a goals page....you've inspired me. I'll have to start thinking about what I'd like to include.

I have a sweet story to share, it just warms my heart.
There's a guy at the Y, nice guy, boisterous and funny. He lost his 27 year old son to cancer a couple of months ago. As you can imagine, he was a total mess. He's taken a special interest in my 16 month old son. Just absolutely adores him. He comes into the Y daycare everyday to see him. And my son loves this guy just as much. They adore each other and it's the sweetest thing I've seen. The Y staff says this is as happy as they've seen him for a while and I just want to cry because I can't even fathom.
He takes Mason into the weight room with him for short periods to "pump some iron" and runs the hallways with him. lol. I gave him a couple pictures and he was so grateful. They're on his fridge, and he said he was glad to "see" Mason on Monday even though he was out with a cold. Just pulls at every last one of my heartstrings.

Got my workout in this morning. Lifted more weights than I usually do. Which is a good thing. My routine was getting a little stagnant. Excited for the weekend and Halloween. Must behave so I can post my loss (down 1 lb so far... shhh)

oooh Rochester! We're competing AGAINST each other, and WITH each other! I'll be cheering you on in one competition while doing my best to beat you in another. haha I love the idea of art journalling!! I may do this on some of my journal pages too. To make it more appealing to look at later. It'll be an ART PIECE of my weight loss!! I really like the idea of using words in with my pictures. I think that will be really pleasing to the eye also.

Kim these are all activities I *WANT* to do but my weight holds me back. These are things I *WILL* do (well, at least some of them... I hope oever the years I get to do all). I've dreamed of skydiving since I was a teen.

Julie, how special that he has befriended your son and they "pump up" together. I can imagine that your son really fills a piece of the hole losing your own child would leave behind! And congrats on the (shhh) 1 lb so far!

Hey everyone!

I haven't checked in for a while because for some reason I stopped getting emails when there were new posts! I thought it was strange that no one was posting, so I decided to check and there were about two new pages. Has anyone had that happen before? I can't see why it randomly stopped.

Hopefalls - awesome spreadsheet! Thanks for putting so much work into all of this!

Jackie - You're so organized! I have so many different tracking tools (calendars [with stickers on the days I work out!], food logs, daily weight lots, etc.) but they're all in different places, I think I'm going to get a binder and try to put them all together some how. I'm more of a word-based person, so I have a little book with lists of why I want it, what it will change and the things I look forward to when I get there.

KimL1214- the weather here has been insane! We had the strongest winds in 10 years yesterday. I literally had to stop and brace myself while walking down the street.

As for myself lately, I've been getting super weird cramping whenever I try to do cardio-related activities. It happened both Monday (elliptical) and Tuesday (running). Cramps, almost like extremely bad period cramps, and I get light headed to the point where I have to lay down. It subsides really quickly after, but I'm kind of afraid to try any more cardio for a while.

Also! For the mini-challenge, instead of sugary hot chocolate today, I had calorie-free herbal tea!

Go Team Cupid!!