rosiees

OK, I guess I should update for week 1. Goal 1: Big fail. I ate fairly well a lot of days, but a lot of it was not at home so fail. Goal 2: Um, I bought some more weights. Didn't put them on the bar until today though. Yeah, fail. Goal 3: In progress Goal 4: I honestly don't remember if I worked on this or not. I'm gonna just say fail. I've done better this week though. Well, I said right off that I wasn't as pumped for this challenge as I have been for others. I'm at least determined not to sit it out. Hopefully I'll improve as it progresses.

We definitely do need a decluttering challenge. I've worked on it the past two days but I have a long way to go and I'm still dragging from my illness. I have a bunch of family coming for Thanksgiving too. I think a little PVP action might just be the motivation I need to kick it into gear. I didn't make a big deal about it in my initial post, but I am super thrilled about my weight. I have an old balance scale and it has a big weight that measures 50 lb. increments and a little weight you slide along the bar to measure anything under 50 lbs. I went to get my starting weight measurement, and I set the big weight to 250 lbs. then stepped on and the scale didn't move. I wasn't heavy enough to tip it back the other direction. I really couldn't figure out what was going on at first. I was sliding the little weight around and nothing was happening. Then it hit me that I needed to move the big weight down a notch and I suddenly became so excited that I thought my head was gonna explode! I haven't been under 250 lbs. in well over a decade! The more I think about it the more convinced I am that I could actually be under 200 lbs. by June. It's been at least two decades since I've seen that. YEAH!

OK, this is my third challenge and I have a new Epic Goal to propel me along in my Epic Quest to become Peter Parkour. My cousin does search and rescue in the area (I live next to the Sierra Nevada mountain range) and every year in June they teach a rappelling class. I have decided that I want to be ready to take the class next year. My goals towards that end are to be under 200 lbs by then, and to be strong enough to do a pull up. On June 1st of this year I weighed 262 lbs. and it's taken me five months to lose ten pounds. While I am ecstatic that I lost ten pounds (that's ten more pounds than I lost in the previous five months) I have about 50 pounds to go before I am under 200. At my current pace it would take me around two years to reach my goal. However, I don't have two years, I have seven months, so I'm gonna have to up the pace. By my calculations there are about four 6-week challenges between now and then which means I would need to lose approximately 12 lbs. per challenge. Wow! Not sure I can do this. But I do know that it CAN be done so that's what I'm gonna focus on. OK, here are my goals: Goal 1: Go paleo or as close to it as I can. Since this is my first time actually trying to sustain paleo eating habits, I'm going to allow myself 5 -7 slip ups per week. I'm including in this eating all meals at home. I need to get serious and stop the eating out multiple times per week. Any time I eat out is considered a slip up, even if I manage to stay paleo for that meal. Goal 2: Do deadlifts. Steve says that these are the ultimate exercise, and Staci is the Master of Deadlifts. I figure if I want to increase my strength and build muscle to burn more fat, deadlifts are probably the way to go. I have no idea how much I can lift, so I'll find that out this week and learn about the best way to do a routine based on deadlifts. My husband has a barbell and some weights so I think I can work with what he has at least at first. I'm actually pretty excited about this. My goal is to do deadlifts every M/W/F and get noticeably stronger over the course of six weeks. Goal 3: Take measurements at beginning, middle, and end of challenge and show considerable improvement. Ideally I'd like to lose somewhere between 12-15 lbs. I'm willing to settle for less as long as it's WAY better than I've done in the past. My starting measurements are: Weight - 248lbs., Bust - 52", Waist - 46", Hips - 55". Wow! I lost four pounds between this challenge and the last, and one inch off my bust. It's probably in large part because I wasn't hungry for a few days while I was sick. Goal 4: As there doesn't seem to be a FlyLady cleaning PVP this go around, I'll make this one a FlyLady goal. I will do 15 minutes decluttering every weekday. In the event that a FlyLady PVP returns, I will resume the work in my self-improvement workbook. I'm currently recovering from being sick so my enthusiasm is not what it could be right now. That's also why I'm starting late. I'm not sure if I should just do this week as a partial week and grade myself accordingly, or if I should try to do Wed - Tues instead of Mon - Sun. I'm sure I'll figure it out. Yay. Go me. 0_0

OK, so my final scores for the challenge are: Goal 1: C Goal 2: C Goal 3: D Goal 4: B Looks like I got a solid C this time.

I really didn't fall off the edge of the world or anything. I just went on vacation during Week 5 so I never posted my Week 4 update, then I started a new job during Week 6 so I never posted any more updates. I figured I'd better do it before the next challenge starts so here it is: Week 4 Goal 1: A Goal 2: C Missed 2 days of push ups Goal 3: In progress Goal 4: A Week 5 Goal 1: F Goal 2: D Missed 3 days of push ups Goal 3: In progress Goal 4: A Week 6 Goal 1: F Goal 2: F Missed 5 days (out of 7) of push ups Goal 3: Final Measurements Weight - 252 lbs, Bust - 53", Waist - 46", Hips - 55" I give myself a D in this. I only showed improvement in one area. Weight went down 3 lbs. Goal 4: F OK, so my final scores for the challenge are: Goal 1: C Goal 2: C Goal 3: D Goal 4: B Looks like I got a solid C this time. Attribute points are awarded thus: Goal 1: +2 CON Goal 2: +1.25 STR, +1.25 STA Goal 3: + 0.5 CHA Goal 4: +3 WIS That makes my new level 3 and my new stats STR-2.5, DEX-2, STA-2.5, CON-4, WIS-6.5, CHA-2.5

I would love to do a decluttering PVP! That's really what my house needs most at this point.

I haven't updated for a couple of weeks because I went on vacation two weeks ago, then I started a new job last week. Week 4 I got 5/5. Week 5 I'm giving myself 5/5 because I worked really hard on one room at the end of my vacation and I figure that even though I didn't do anything in the bathroom, I did all the 5 minute room rescues and then some. Last week I did nothing... nothing at all. So weeks 1-5 I had 25/25 points and last week I had 0/5. 25/30 means I don't get to wear my pink Mythical Shoes and I have to paint my fingernails and my toenails black. Luckily I can just claim that it's for Halloween, but dangit I hate wearing nail polish! It really was good motivation to keep me going those first five weeks. My new job just really threw me off my game. And I really wanted to break out those pink Mythical Shoes, too. http://www.tweakfootwear.com/shoes/mythical-shoe-pink-ed-/pink Ah well, I'll have to think of another thing I can accomplish that I can reward myself with them. They came in the mail three weeks ago, and I was saving them for my reward for this. Well done, Elastigirl and Nymeria! I'm so proud of you!

Week 3 update: Goal 1: A Goal 2: A Goal 3: Mid-Challenge Measurements: Weight - 253 lbs., Bust - 53", Waist - 46", Hips - 55" Goal 4: A Yep, I did my 15 inclined push ups every day, though I only did the extra sets on Monday. I'll try to do four sets of 15 on M/W/F to help really build strength. I successfully ate no excess carbs on Monday, however, I ate way too many carbs the rest of the week. That probsbly has something to do with the fact that my mid-challenge measurements are not very impressive. I am down two pounds but my other measurements are the same. I'm going to need to do a lot better if I want to meet goal 3. I also worked in my self-improvement workbook three days last week and I've seen a lot of improvement in my life as a result. All in all I'm pleased with my performance but not excited about it. The thing that excites me the most is when I can see my body changing, and that hasn't been very apparent. It does motivate me to work harder, though, so that's good. And once again I only did one update last week. How am I gonna get people to cheer me on and give me support if I don't tell them how I'm doing or go cheer them on? It's another thing I need to work on. Sigh. This would be easier if I wasn't such an introvert.

Update for week 3: 5/5 On Friday I was working on rearranging some furniture so I didn't think I would get the vacuuming mission done, but it turned out that I needed to vacuum once the furniture had been moved so I just went ahead and did the mission too.

I'm still adjusting my push up regimen. After a friend and I were talking about push ups I started to suspect that maybe I didn't even know the correct way to do them. I checked out How to do a proper push up to figure it out. I took Steve's recommendation there and tried four sets of 20 wall push ups which I was able to do well enough. Today I did four sets of 15 inclined push ups and I'll probably try doing four sets of 20 on Wednesday. I have a tendency to not pay enough attention to my form, so I'll work hard on that too. Here is my update for last week: Goal 1: A Goal 2: B [i edited this and dropped it from an A after realizing I didn't do 15 push ups on Sunday] Goal 3: In progress Goal 4: A I did have a pretty good week last week. I only got one update done on my thread, so I'll need to make sure I'm on here a little bit more. I was working pretty hard on stuff in my house and trying to get my van up and running too. (It's fixed! Yay!) I haven't checked out other people's threads much either. I'll go do that now. I hope everyone's having a super time!

Getting Things Done, huh? I'll have to check that out. I need to get a lot of things done. I did manage to get the missions done last week, though it was harder than I expected it to be. I had a stockpile of old underpants (OMG, I'm literally an underpants gnome!) that I needed to get rid of. It felt really good tossing them and some old worn out clothes into the garbage - once I had closed the bin lid that is. Up to that point I had to keep repeating to myself that I was going to throw them away just so I didn't change my mind.

Thanks! I feel like I should clarify that by "doing negative push ups", I actually mean I'm lowering myself towards the floor until I collapse. I'm not sure that qualifies as actually doing negative push ups. Maybe i should start calling them negative push up attempts. I'm glad your yoga suggestion was helpful to ApfelStrudi, unfortunately I know next to nothing about yoga so I have no idea what you are talking about. If I get up the gumption I'll do some research and figure it out though. It sounds like it would probably be helpful. I don't really drink a lot of soda anymore. Just maybe two or three 20oz cups a week, and that's after I fill the cup to the top with ice so I'm really getting maybe eight ounces of soda at a time. I can't help thinking that I'd be better off if I didn't drink any though. OK, update for the week so far: I've done my 15 inclined push ups each day, and I did my real push up attempts and negative push up attempts on Monday and Wednesday (today). I also did my lo-carb Monday and I wrote in my workbook once so far this week so I'm on track with where I was last week at this time. I also looked at the mini-challenge and though it looks absolutely awesome, I think I'm probably not going to do it this time. It's about all I can do at this point to keep up with my challenge and the PVP challenge I'm doing. I hope I get better at this stuff and it becomes easier for me to fit everything in. If my car was working I'd drive to Fossil Falls and do some climbing there. I love climbing. Dang it! Maybe next week.

Week 1 summary: Goal 1: A Goal 2: A Goal 3: In progress Goal 4: A This is the best week I've had so far in the three challenges I've participated in. Yay me! Now I just need to keep this momentum going and I'll have an awesome six weeks. I love how I'm even doing more than the basics I've outlined. I've added negative push ups and regular push up attempts (hold for 15 seconds). I think I may make those a M/W/F thing as my body probably needs a little time to recover. I've discovered that I actually do have ab muscles because they're sore from the added push up variations. I'm also thinking that I should probably stop drinking soda again. I'm not drinking nearly as much as I was, but if I'm really serious about goal 3 I can increase my odds of jaw-dropping success if I make those little changes.

Yeah, I don't really have a hardhat either other than just deciding I'm going to do something right this second. Sometimes I pantomime putting on a hardhat, tee hee! My gorilla feet (Vibram FiveFingers shoes) should come any day now, though. They were my reward for completing the last challenge and leveling up. Maybe I'll make them my hardhat.

Yay! My first week was a success! Did all the challenges and got all five points. It was pretty hard considering that I'm not used to cleaning that consistently and that there were actually two challenges each day. I probably spent longer on them than I needed to which seems to be a hazard for new FlyBabies. This next week I have to change the water pump in my van and I'm not sure how long that will take as I've never done it before. Luckily though, it looks like the challenges should be pretty easy. Home Exorcism Hour. That sounds like my house too, tee hee! Sometimes I have to be brave when it's time to clean. Hmm... reading the emails. Now that's a concept!