So we are back. A million loads of laundry to do, grocery shopping, Costco and Sam's day and 7 mile walk. -- Luckily, I am so anal that I clean my house spotless before each vacation :D

Jo thanks for the :cheer: :D "I did notice my fat on my stomach is more "squishy" (I know, gross right?) and it has been said that the fat does that before it goes away, so hopefully that is the case" Omg...please be right!! Mine is the same way....I told DH that my belly looked "better" fatter...:crossed: The small changes make the biggest difference...I told that to my GF just yesterday....I am so glad we are doing this together :hug: and making progress!

Krystal I am GREEN with envy! :dizzy: You are literally running away from me... 130's will be here in no time. -- I saw your picture on MFP, you look AMAZING!

alaskanlaughter Another runner! -- congrats on that mile!


forloveofself How is your weight today? It was probably just sodium gain. :hug:

Where is Larry?

Plan for today:

bfast; smoothie with flax seed
lunch; salad with veggies, avocado and dressing
dinner; salad with veggies, avocado and dressing
snacks; apple, BP, grapes and plain yogurt

total calories 1430

exercise; walk 7 miles

Krystal, Thanks for the dust! If it were only a problem of Will Power, I would have long ago reached my goal. Still, I feel like a failure at the moment.
Not sure what to do or try next, so I'm simply just eating calories for goal maintenance.
Water weight is most definitely a factor, I can feel the puppfiness in my cheeks, neck, breasts, and inner thighs and calves. 183.5 it is. It's not TOM, I do not cook with salt, so apparently, it's the cheeses, and anything other packaged.

Welcome back Sum I too clean throughly before a trip :)

Hello Jo and alsakan and all the missing.

Have a great day everyone!

Forloveofself; I started spiking a bit as well, and I started eating most of my exercise calories back and I as well broke that barrier. -- I am not as brave as Krystal is on my spike days...but based on her experience, I think I may try to increase my spike day calories. Just try it and see if it helps you. :hug:

Scale rewarded me another pound down. 148 :carrot: -- If I were to follow my last experiences with weightloss; once I got past 150 pound mark, I sailed down to 142 at relative ease.

I feel such relief.

Plan for today:

Bfast: fruit smoothie with yogurt and flax seed
Lunch: Large salad with feta cheese and dressing
Dinner: Salmon, rice, brocoli and cauliflower

1065 cal + snacks. Goal 1500 total calories.

Exercise: :running: Walk with my :drill:

Hi Losers. Hope everyone is having a fab Monday. I have lots to do, as usual. So last week was a great week all around. Going to try to make it two in a row, imagine that! I ended the week with a 2# loss, but only 0.6 of it was weight I hadn't gained the week before :dizzy:. I will take it though.
Finished my weight lifting this morning and then an hour walk. I forgot to mention, my friend hurt her neck somehow and has a bulging disk between C6-7, so no walking for her for a while. I have been on my own for over a week now. I have not walked outside since then :lol: Initially I wasn't walking at all, just doing the weights one day and intervals the next, but I was really missing those 4-500 per day calorie burns, so I have been trying to get an hour of walking on top of everything else most days. I will be glad when she is better, because time goes so much faster outside while talking! I did figure out that I walk much faster without her though, shhhh, don't tell her that. I get about the same calorie burn at any reasonable speed though so I shouldn't fret it too much. I could ALMOST keep up with Kristiina, but not quite yet. 4.2 is about my speed limit for walking. Any more than that and my body would just rather be running. I would actually rather run than walk from 3.8 and above.
Kristiina, I am about to call 911 because you are on FIRE girl!!! Look at you go now. I am so happy for you and am enjoying you see success. Congrats on another pound!!!
Krystal, Yes, I am about 3 weeks into the NROLW. I am enjoying it so far. I have done many weight lifting programs including body for life, body for life for women and some programs out of weight lifting bible for women. This is very similar, but different. The workouts are short and to the point. I am able to up my weights quickly. I am using all free weights right now but my free weights max out at 35# so not sure what I will do at the point I need more weight. I am using 30s for a few of the leg exercises now, so it won't be too far off. Buying heavier than that is out of the question, too hard on the shoulders to hold onto. Not sure I want to buy a barbell, but depending on how much I like the program, I may do that. I also just may stick with the weights I have because it looks like the exercises get more difficult anyways. I found some very helpful excel spreadsheets on mfp, I will see if I bookmarked them. I thought the book was kinda weird to follow for logging exercise, but that was probably just me. Have fun!
forloveofself, sorry you feeling dumpy right now. You said it's not TOM, but could it be Ovulation? Many women (including me) have TOM symptoms at/around ovulation. I gain a couple pounds and sometimes have PMSy type symptoms mid cycle. I find ovulation worse than TOM. Just thought I would throw that out there for you to think about. I think eating at goal maintenance is a good idea. Many people do this from the start and actually they recommend it on the fat to fit radio site. It is a simple calculator to find out your bmr, your activity level and what weight you want to be and then recommends a calorie level based on your goal weight that you should eat while you are losing weight. Makes a heck of a lot of sense. If you have never listened to any of the podcasts, those are good too. Here is the link for the calculator
http://www.fat2fitradio.com/tools/bmr/
If I wasn't enjoying spiking so much, I would probably be using that method. Hope that helps. Hang in there, you will find your mojo again. :hug:

I walked 10 miles!:fr: -- It was a beautiful day... but the real reason is...I got so freaking mad at my :drill: and I walked home after our walk :o Shadow, my puppy, is sooo tired and my legs are achy. -- All is fine now, and my :drill: is not bit#hy more :rofl: we never fight, but I think he was PMS:ing.... men...sigh

Now I am having difficulty eating back my calories. I skipped lunch, because I spent the lunch hour walking home :yikes: Oh well sh1t happens :D maybe I will catch up with Krystal sooner...hehe

Oh well, just save the calories for tomorrow or the next day when you are hungrier. At least you got a good long walk and good calorie burn out of the fight! Men!

My DH didn't show up for dinner tonight which was a birthday dinner for him because tomorrow, on his real birthday, he won't be home. I must have misunderstood him, because he usually calls if he will be late. Blonde moment, I am sure. He keeps telling me I don't listen to him, I guess he is right (don't tell him). His favorite birthday dinner is lasagna, but he didn't want all the calories and too many leftovers so I decided to make a skillet lasagne, kind of like homemade hamburger helper. I sampled it, it was pretty good, I think he would have liked it :lol: It's now all packaged up in the fridge so he can at least take some for lunch tomorrow. I also made the mistake of making cookies for him to take to work tomorrow to share and I ate one, I couldn't resist. I looked up the cals after I ate it, and it was 300 freakin calories! I had no more calorie room for a proper dinner, so cookie it is. Oh well. So it's all his fault I messed up my nutrition and his/my dinner. Men!

Thanks Ladies; Krystal, Sum, Jo, for your encoragement.
Congrats on your successes.
I will do personals next time when my sinus pressure is gone.

I actually increased my cals on Saturday to 1800.

Jo, I got my BMR info on freedieting tools. My BMR for 167 lbs is 1336 and my goal cals are 1594. I have been very near the latter most days and only under eat (1200-1300) by "accident" on rare days. I did not weigh today, but feel slightly less puffy. My breasts only hurt a little. I do have an hormone imbalance, so I know that that contributes to it. My goal besides losing weight and getting healthy, is to stop taking all prescrition meds and only natural supplements. I'm down to only two other meds,one for pain, and one for my ulcer. I have a doctors appointment tomorrow.
I plan to ignore what the scale reads unless it is 179lbs or less :)

Feel better forloveofself

Jo men...sigh...:rofl: Happy birthday to him!!!

I don't know if it was my walk or the fact I only logged in 1400 calories, but I was down another 1.5 pounds.

146.5 I know I stalled but I was losing inches, maybe my body is finally catching up. -- Plus I switched things around what came to my eating...what ever it is, I am not complaining :D I am so glad I have you ladies :hug: I would had given up otherwise when I was not breaking that 150 lb mental mark.

How old are you Deb? Yuck on the hormonal imbalance, that will throw your numbers off for sure, water weight. Good for you getting rid of most of your medicines! I hear ya on the scale, I love it on a low day and hate it most other days! Hang in there. Don't forget that your BMR is what your body needs if it is doing nothing as if in a coma, just to breathe and circulate and such. You have to add to that your activity rate. You can either add activity without exercise and then "eat back" your exercise calories when you do it, or you can just figure in your exercise cals with your activity rate for the week like it does on that fat to fit radio website. Don't know if any of that made sense, it's early and I am having a hard time putting words down.