Alright.. its time to start a new monthly challlenge. May the luck of the Irish help us achieve our goals...... Wait! We don't need any luck!

Ok I suck, I just posted this and I can not edit the subject on the front page.. so we will have my typo for a month!

I saw your other post and fixed this for you. Let me know if you need something else. I have cross site moderator access.

Ruthxxx is a Super-Moderator in more ways than one

Thanks so much Ruth!

Suzanne.. ok that chocolate cake looks really good.. are you trying to drive us all crazy with cravings

Whew ok.. now on to my goals.

Today was a SUPER day. I decided to weigh myself again and I was down a pound. So musta been the TOM affecting my weight. So I am really happy

Goals for this month:
1) Workout 3-4 times a week
2) Get under 150 (I think I can do this!!)
3) Weigh myself once a week (I think this is manageable).

Well I worked out today. It was a GREAT workout. So this month is off to a great start

Good luck everyone!

OK, hi everyone!
I`m so excited! I just registered a few days ago, so this will be my first Challenge. I`ve lost already 38 pounds, but I´d like to lose at least 19 more. So for March my goals will be:

1. To eat 20 points (1200 kcal´s) each day

2. To lose 6 or 7 pounds

3. EXERCISE MORE!

4. To try not to think about food and dieting all the time..

5. Relax..

I have a busy spring ahead with tons of schoolwork but I think I can do this if I just stay motivated. My biggest fear is that I`ll just be too tired to keep on dieting and that I`ll gain back all the weight that I have lost.. I just couldn`t handle that.. sigh..
But hey now!! I can do this! Good luck to everyone!

"Athena will attest that it could be done, and it has been done and I think that I am up to it."

Hi All! It's been a really long time since I've posted, but I'm still doing ok on the weight loss. Lately I've been discouraged about my overeating habits, so I thought it would do me some good to check back in.

My March Goals are:

Get myself out of the habit of snacking when I'm not hungry at ALL.

Continue to challenge myself with workouts...more strength training and running up to 4 miles.

Lose a few pounds out of about the 20 I need to, and not regain them.


Good luck to us!

Your goals all sound great! Mine for the month are:

1. Cardio 5 x / week. I was inspired by a conversation with some triathletes the other day and want to start running again. I was never a great runner but I used to do it on a more frequent basis. So my new fitness goal for this month will be to go for a short run once a week.

2. Weight training 3 x / week

3. Stretching at least 3 x / week

4. Journal - I hope this will guilt me into not eating poorly.

5. Try to break up my meals so I'm not eating huge portions at one time. Ideally, I would like to eat smaller portions throughout the day.

6. To not stress out about dieting and forbid certain foods. I think the deprivation leads to more cravings and eventually bad binging.

7. 1300 - 1600 calories at least 5 x / week. I am upping the calorie range because I can never seem to reach this goal and because whenever I do the low-cal meals for a few days, I seem to binge shortly after (maybe it's the deprivation?). I think I should still be able to lose some weight on this.

At the end of the month, I would like to have lost 4 lbs, averaging a pound a week... I hope I can stay motivated...

G'Day!

I was wondering if I may join your March challenge? A wee bit of background so you know some loopster is not just joining in. LOL

My name is Danielle and I am 33 and live in Sydney, Australia. I have a delectable 3 year old (Emily) and I live with my partner David. Freaking out about hitting triple figures so bit the bullet and decided to "go on a diet." *groan* I joined SureSlim 5 weeks ago (don't know if it's in the States??) and have lost 5 kilos (11 pounds) in 5 weeks and for some reason I am disappointed with that - yeah go figure? Thinking of shaking it up a bit with some WW thrown in for good measure as I just feel like my metabolism is playing silly buggers and needs a boot up the bum! Be good to be a wee bit accountable by visiting here and chatting with you guys. I also do this with some Aussie cyber buddies but I love talking to American girls for some reason - I love your accent!! (And yes it is YOU with the accent and not us Aussies! LOL)

Anyhoo best skeedadle as I'm shagged tonight for some reason....looking forward to getting to know you all better and best get off to convert my kilos as you lot all probably think I'm talking double dutch with this kilo business.

Errrrmmmm, comm. 30/1 (30th Jan 03) 210/199/150

(Sheesh that's a killer calculation when ones child has obviously been playing with the calculator and hidden it hence having to do it manually!)


Take Care Everybody and will report in again soon to see how you are all going....GOOD LUCK!


Dani (The new me in July '03!!)

Hi Dani!
Oh my Goddess, I swear I could actually hear your voice and your accent when I read your message.. Your voice/accent and vocabulary are beautiful! BTW I study linguistics and English so I sometimes pay too much attention to these things, sorry!!
But anywho, just wanted to welcome you! Good luck on getting rid of those extra kilos!

Jenni

P.s Is it warm in Australia right now? It is so cold in here and the sun refuses to show itself.. I am so sick of this..blaah..

Good morning all,

Wow...aren't we becoming quite the international group (Canada, USA, Finland & Australia)?! Welcome all...

Here are my goals for the month of March:

1) Keep going to the gym 3X per week + 1 long walk each weekend

2) Journal. I seem to cheat (ie. creatively recalculate or eliminate food) when I don't write it down

3) go a bit easier on myself. I'm feeling a bit food crazy, because I am not allowing myself ANY flexibility. I would think that anybody else taking this approach was cruel...I should extend myself the same leeway!

4) take my measurements and focus a bit more on this aspect of weight loss rather than the scale.

5) Continue to do the things that have been working (walking to & from work, drinking water, eating vegetables)

6) listen more to my body. Stop eating when I am full (not when the plate is empty), and eat (something healthy) when I feel hungry

That's it!

Looking forward to talking to everyone throughout the month!

Kris
261-192-155

Oh fair dinkum....I'm a shocker! Just realised this thread is "20 somethings" and here I am at an ancient 33, can I still play here and be your honorary 'old fogey' member pretty please? LOL I like the friendly feel that you guys have hence me obviously posting without reading that you were all mere babes at 20+. (Ahh jealousy is a curse hey?)

Yes we truly are an international bunch - and such glamourous locations! Always has been a dream of mine to get to see the US and also Canada (never seen snow in my whole life) as I just love the whole American thang IYKWIM? Australia is a bit overrated I think but that said, it's pretty brilliant. In Sydney we live about 10 minutes away from the Olympic site (Homebush) and during September 2000 the place was just alive and buzzing - best thing to ever happen to Sydney I think ~ sheesh what a fortnight of fun, fun, fun! Funny now as about once a week I take Emily to the Homebush Aquatic Centre so we can have a swim...amazing to think the most elite athletes in the world swam in that exact pool back in 2000 and now I get to take my daughter there for a dip all the time - kinda fun. I was actually born in Adelaide which is a sleepy little place but very beautiful but was raised in my teenage years in Perth (Western Australia) and I loved it there too but too darned far away on the other side of Australia - sheesh! So Sydney it is and it's fast and furious and buzzy and cosmopolitan and the weather is perfect day in day out.

Jeeni - it sure is warm here in Oz right now. That said just looked outside *eek* and saw a truckload of grey clouds, d'oh! We have just began a new season - Autumn and I love this season. (Think the US possy call Autumn 'Fall"?) The colours of the trees are just marvellous in Autumn and it's kinda romantic & yummy. Summer has just finished and it sure was a was a scorcher and officially Australia is in drought conditions. We FINALLY got some rain but certainly not enough, our poor farmers are really struggling so a long way to go before we are out of the poo IYKWIM?

Oh and Jenni how can you way our accent is "beautiful" - I reakon it's a shocker! Certainly different in our pronunciation (and spelling!) and we certainly have a language of our own when it comes to 'slang' which are our Aussie ways of saying stuff. Wonder if that's covered in your linguistics degree, doubt it.


So do you guys all love where you live? The US is sooooo vast it spins me out. There is a rumour (urban myth ??) that 85%+ of Americans do not have passports as you all just stay in the US - golly if us guys didn't have passports we'd die - Australia is so small and we need to get out occassionally! Bali used to be a favourite destination but after going to 3 funerals of friends that died in the Bali tragedy (boys we attended a wedding with just 4 weeks prior) don't think that place will be next on the agenda for visiting. The UK we visit once a year *groan* but mark my words, I'll get to the US one of these days...how much I would love to take Emily to Disneyland - not to mention Jenni getting her to Lap Land also - wow how cool would that be! Rabbiting on now....

Right enough talking about bollocks (sorry for boring you all girls, my fingers move faster than my brain unfortunately!) and will write down some goals for March......

1) Lose 5 kilos this month by:-

** Hmmm, difficult option me thinks! LOL

** Exercising more. Walking my baby girl to daycare 3 days a week which is a 8 km round trip (5 miles'ish???)

** No chocolate! No caffeine.

** Woofing down all of my water - stuff takes like poison but it sure gets us skinny hey?

** Try and stay off the scales - 'tis a viscious cycle with those wretched things and you can vary half a kilo from one day to the next - quite soul destroying sometimes.



I'm off like a bucket of prawns in the hot sun!


Take Care Everyone,

Dani

Welcome to our newest members: AussieDani and Louhi!

So many posts! Its great to have some many people on board for this months challenge. All of your goals sound great! I look forward to hearing your progress as the month goes bye.

Dani - Of course you can join our group!

To answer your question, I personally do not LOVE where I live right now. Thats because I live in the state of Illinois which is very very flat and boring. I grew up in Washington state, so I miss the ocean and the mountains. But every place has its own charm, even in Illinois. Illinois has great summer weather and exciting lightin/thunder storms. I've also lived in Oregon and New Mexico. Oregon is very much like Washington. And New Mexico has the most beautiful sunsets I have ever seen. And I have traveled over half of the states of the US.. so I have a good idea of what most of the states are like.. but the US is so big and each region is do different.. its almost like visiting another country.

There probably are a good deal of people in the US who do not have passports... I do not know the statistics. The reasons are probably because 1) we have a lot of people! 2) you do not need a passport to go to Canada (and maybe not mexico.. but not sure). 3) Most american do not even get to see the whole USA.. let alone the rest of the world. I also think that some Americans are a bit ignorant when it comes to the rest of the world (which you can see in our media and attitudes). But not all of us are like that!

I'm more fortunate in that my mother is german and we visited her family a lot. So I got the travel bug and I've so far been to Germany, India, and soon Norway (summer 2003). Thats just the tip of my list.. Australia is on it! My best friend spent 6 months in australia.. and I would love to do that.. but not sure what the technology industry is like there.

Sorry I have been away so long! Work has been murder. I have worked many nights 8p.m.+, including one night until 1a.m. and another of a 24+ hour day...

Good news is that I am seeing a light at the end of the tunnel, so I hope I can participate in the March Challenge.

Bad news is that I didn't exercise, ate whatever I could get my hands on, and slept sporadically at best. Not the healthy girl I want to be come my 28th Birthday!

My weight is up a bit, but not as much as you might expect. Before I got really heavy, I had a very fast metabolism. I could eat just about whatever I wanted and not gain weight. So, it looks like that has returned with the major weight loss.

But that doesn't mean too much when you feel like a slug from fried foods, no sleep and no exercise! This is really about being healthy, and not just what the scale says.

For the one week in February that I managed to follow my challenge, I really liked it. So, I am repeating my goals for March. I will be a little less stringent with myself and my exercise to start with, my back has been hurting as a result of all my bad behavior and I want to ease into my schedule.

1) 16 Minutes in the Morning, 6x a week
2) Walk 20-30 minutes, 5x a week
3) Bike 30 minutes, 3x a week
4) Drink 2 glasses of water with or before dinner
5) Follow FM (food mover) plan, with extra weekend calories
6) Yoga, 1-2x a week (I have a pull-out from Shape Magazine I am going to start with.)
7) Do inner thigh/ab exercises, 5x a week
8) Do back exercises every AM and PM
9) Pick favorite exercises from “8 Minutes in the Morning” to create my own monthly plan (I think I lose momentum when I don’t particularly care for the exercises – some of them are harder on the back than others and I’d like to eliminate them)

I hope to talk to you guys again soon!

To Dani and everybody!

First of all I`m so pissed off right now! I just spent a good deal of time answering to Dani´s message and I couldn´t send the message cause I wasn`t logged in and it disappeared! I poured my heart and soul and life story to that message.. I´m such an idiot. OK.. I´ll live.
Yes, I love to live here in the middle of huge snow piles. I love our four seasons(winter could be shorter though..), and I couldn`t manage without our forests and lakes and stuff. When I go abroad, it´s the forests and lakes (and rye bread) that I miss the most.. But of course I love to travel to different countries!! I´ve been to Northern-Ireland (wants to go back soon!), Sweden several time, Denmark and I visited Hungary last summer. My friend was recently in India and I so want to go there too! The U.S would be great to check out, Australia of course and New Zealand (LOTR!).. what else.. Iceland etc.
Welcome to Finland and Lapland Dani, although I haven`t ever been in Lapland.. I live in central-Finland and just haven`t got any relatives or anything in there. Of course I´d like to go there, me and my dad have been thinking about going to Lapland to hike. Another good reason to lose weight and get into shape!
I`m really looking forward getting to know you all! Later!

Freaky-Jen

Oh spewing hey? HOW frustrating is it doing a monster post and then losing the lot - grrrrrrr. I am now in the habit of doing is copying it before I hit 'submit' which guarantees me that I won't lose it - these computers can get mighty touchy I have found ~ I have been stung too many times on that and you just wanna put a hammer through your computer screen hey?

Well Lapland sounds DELICIOUS from what I've heard albeit ridiculously expensive....supply & demand though I suppose considering all parents would love to take their kids there to show them the true magic of Xmas IYKWIM? Jenni you sure have been to some great spots around the globe and I too would love to get to Ireland and of course Scotland, I've heard they are just suuuch beautiful countries and picturesque beyond. (Of course the great pubs there that sell smashing Guiness Ale would have nothing to do with its pulling power!

Golly I'm trying so darned hard to get off this damn computer and tidy up this house as 4 cyber buddies are flying in from interstate or a dinner I have organised this Saturday night through another Australian website I am on all the time but I have never even met these girls. Smashing net buddies but heavens knows how we'll all get on "in the flesh"??? *eek* We're from a baby website and funnily enough we talk about anything BUT babies - it's a cack! We do LOADS of moaning about husbands and whingeing about sleep deprivation but we all get on a treat. 32 of us going out to dinner on Saturday night and is nice as it's 10 weeks since I saw them all last and I've since lost 11 pounds & 18 inches so here's hoping they notice! Jeez they had better or they're will be trouble!!!

Tonic - FWIW the technology industry is up $hit creek without a paddle here in Oz - like most parts of the world I would imagine? Moreso think it has just reached saturation point IYKWIM? That said, like I would know a lot about IT - t'was only this afternoon I learnt how to 'defrag' and clear my 'cookies' - I'm tragic when it comes to computers! (Yeah yeah stop scoffing!

Hmm best throw in some talk about getting skinny hey? What are all you guys doing to lose your excess baggage? Are you following WW or doing some other wizz-bang things to shed the layers? As mentioned before I am on the SureSlim programme which performs blood tests and works out your metabolism and then tells you what to eat - and I assure you ladies, it ain't much! *sigh* Lost a heap of inches though so will pull my head out and stop moaning about the fact that I haven't lost that much on the scales. But I better soon or things will get ugly!

Well hope to hear from you all again soon and best get cracking as I'll be flat out like a lizard drinking for the next couple of days trying to organise this place for 6 girlfriends to stay for the duration of the weekend....have a horrible feeling waaaaay too much Southern Comfort (mmmmm, nectar of the Gods!) will be consumed and we'll all be nattering until the wee early hours giggling like brownies on some girly camp - looking forward to it immensely I must say. Has been a long time in the pipeline I must say.



Chat Soon Guys,

Dani

"It does not matter how slowly you go as long as you do not stop." ~ Confucious