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Cool - you're making great progress towards your goals already! What have you made your sandbags from? Did you follow Vic's guide to the letter, or have you improvised at all? Glad the date night went well too.

Friday night's workout was modified to incorporate the mini-challenge. I went all out in decline push ups & pull ups, upped PBs in both (11 to 17 decline push ups, 4 to 5 pull ups), while still increasing my total reps across my sets. To ensure I hadn't missed and nooks or crannies, I added a set of 2 chin ups and an extra 10 normal press ups onto the end of my workout! No portals here +1 STA for extra sets, me thinks!

Count me in... I like the idea of a rope climb, but without a rope, it is a none starter! (must get me one of those ) I've recently made the transition from chin ups to pull ups, and PB is 4 in a single set. I will aim to improve that in tonight's workout, and see how many extra decline press-ups I can muster too. Let's scale these walls!

In regards to Almond Butter, if you are unable to source any, how about good old DIY? You could choose natural almond butter, or creamy almond butter. Added bonus - Almonds become almond meal, before they become butters, just mix for less! ...That's as long as you can get almonds in SA...

Quick round up for today: Got out on my bike tonight, and covered 5.2 miles in 31m:19s, with plenty of hills, and a few sprints. Full stats as follows (Copied from MyTracks) Total distance: 8.36 km (5.2 mi) Moving time: 31:19 Average moving speed: 16.02 km/h (10.0 mi/h) Max speed: 32.45 km/h (20.2 mi/h) Max elevation: 131 m (431 ft) Min elevation: 101 m (331 ft) Elevation gain: 83 m (272 ft) Max grade: 3 % Min grade: -5 % Recorded: 09/08/2012 19:16 I've finished today at 3014 Calories (& I managed to end yesterday with 3019). All in all, I've had a great day

So, when's your wife due? I had not heard of YAYOG before this, but I will definitely be looking into it. I'm currently following the Body Weight Brigade workouts from the NF Rebel Strength Guide. Before that, I had progressed from the Angry Birds workout plan, to the Advanced Body Weight workout. Take it easy on your knee - Try your squats, but listen to your body; if your knee doesn't feel right, you can always swap your days around and do upper body instead of legs. Good luck for the challenge, and for the safe arrival of your son (and for getting enough sleep! )

And THAT (twinned with the Dino/Alien invasion scenario) is why I'm now following your thread! Sounds like you're making a strong start to meeting your goals. I definitely recommend negative pull-ups to increase strength. Also, (& I'm by no means an expert on this) I think you shouldn't work the same muscles groups 2 days in a row - try to leave a days rest between pull ups & see if they improve. (If I'm wrong, please ignore!)

Your challenge is off to a strong start. Congrats on getting out and exercising when you didn't feel like it, AND increasing your hill runs Regarding the image uploader, I've only managed to get it to work by clicking on the Basic Uploader link in the bottom right corner of the Insert Image box (when on the From Computer tab). Hope this helps. Good luck getting your head around those stats!

It's not the quickest form of grass cutting - it's taken me 4 sessions so far, and I'm about 85% done!! I might have to invest in a sheep... Ah, the good old transatlantic language barrier... The tip - I think you'd call it the dump (it's actually a massive recycling place, where they take all waste and sort it into massive containers for disposal/recycling/etc.). You type tomato, I type tomato...!

WOW, that's... wow!! What amazing accomplishments you have already achieved; congratulations! Looking forward to rocking this challenge along with you! Good Luck

Today has been quite successful - I've had a really good day (always helps!), had a delicious tea (Baked Mustard Lime Chicken, courtesy of my lovely OH!), and have performed better than I expected in my BW Brigade (Rank 2, Workout too! Still got to find another 800 calories from somewhere... (bring on the nuts, bananas, etc!) I'm off to shift some hoard into the garage, ready for a trip to the tip at the weekend

@rocketmama - Thank you! @AngelBlaidd - LOL! Photo's have been taken, but they are staying under wraps, at least until half way through the challenge - I'll happily post before, and improved/during shots as a compare & contrast! Don't worry, they are motivational enough... I'm going through each pic, and choosing at least 1 significant thing to sell,donate,or trash each week. I'll re-do each picture weekly, until I'm happy with how my home looks (and how much bigger, I'm sure!). @elefevers - What? doesn't everyone? You mean there's another way?? I only use shears when the grass is too long for the mower to work on it (it's around 15" is places at the mo) - it's a really good chest & arm workout too! - my mower will keep short grass neat, but tends to get tangled in the more challenging of lawns! I was chatting to my Dad about it last week... I think I might now be getting a petrol mower for Christmas...

So, what's the plan for tonight then, while you're on your rest day from the dumbbells? Is it more craft work? Massive congrats on resisting cake temptation - You are strong, and getting stronger!

Nice solid goals you've got here. As for tracking every spend, I would get a receipt for everything, at least you would have a paper-trail to work from. If you've got a smartphone, there are several apps you can you for tracking every transaction, such as EasyMoney (Android), or Left to Spend (iPhone). NB. I've not used either of the apps, so cannot advise if any good. Reviews don't look too bad though) Good luck with the challenge, and get those applications done!!

I'm following your thread for two reasons: 1. To see how you manage with your life goal - I so need inspiration for how to get organised 2. To follow the amazing story-line of KingMuzza's adventure. (Are there plans to merge your posts into a novel? ) Good luck with the challenges ahead, KingMuzza.

Today was a non-workout day for me (workout MWF) so decided to take advantage of the fair weather we had today and tackle the meadow that used to be my back garden. 45 mins hand-shearing grass - DONE! Garden waste gets emptied tomorrow, & if forecast is correct, it should be fair this weekend, so I'm hoping to get the garden presentable once again on Sunday (we've got a day trip out on Saturday). I'm planning on getting out on my bike on Thursday evening. I've just managed to finish today with 3068 calories, but had to whip up a last minute cheese omelette & large glass of milk to do so, as I was lagging behind - oops!!

Check out these, or this site does some lovely desserts too!

Thanks for the link, that will be most useful!

Ha ha, thanks I'm right on the edge of Sherwood forest, so there's plenty of trails that are only a short drive away, as long as I don't run into a band of merry men... Definitely still working on all body weight workouts, but wanted to create new, interesting goals - aim high! I wasn't going to, but now I'm going to go round my house tonight and create a "Beginning to De-clutter" portfolio. I doubt it will ever see the light of day (not just yet anyway:hopelessness:) but it will be interesting to to see how much progress I can make. I was fascinated by your SCIO test - WOW. When I get round to creating a bucket-list, getting a SCIO test will be on there...

Hi LoD, thanks for the support in my thread. Congratulations on the great results in your pics - You've come so far already! That's excellent news regarding 5k course being less hilly than your current training ground/neighbourhood - training harder than required is going to produce great results, I'm sure. Also, I'm liking your daily goal updates. Simple, but motivational at-a-glance progress!

Hey Edge, welcome to the challenge! They're great goals that you've set. What's you current 3 mile time? Good luck for the next 6 weeks, especially with the beer-brewing! By my calculations, you've 1 day a week to enjoy your Home Brew to your heart's content, without having to count calories

Wow - that's a fine life goal you've set. (Does she read your posts, or will it be a surprise?) Congrats on the successes you've had so far - 90lb is impressive! I attempted 10 consecutive chin ups for my previous challenge, starting at 1, and finishing at 6 at the end of the challenge. I'm sure you'll be able to get up to 10, as I started to see real improvements once I eventually got up to 3 - at least you've got the head start! How are you going to gauge our Paleo percentage? Are you charting what you eat, or are you going 100% Paleo for 9 days out of 10? Good luck with the challenge ahead, I'll be watching your progress

Well done for rebooting - it's never easy to admit that things need to change. It looks like you've set some really solid goals, where you can track your progress. You've got the right idea about a weekly meal plan - I find it eliminates any of the "I'm not sure what to eat" moments. Good luck with the challenge, I'm sure you'll manage to stick with it - They say 3rd time's the charm

Hey Eric, it feels good to be back in challenge mode once again! I took the full week off, and didn't know what to do with my time (spent it mostly watching the olympics!) I must admit, I feel slightly under-qualified to be a ranger reading through some other challenges here, but I know that I will improve in time. I had seen you on some posts, but hadn't tracked you down yet - these pages fill up fast! It's late here now, so I'll catch up some more tomorrow.

Tonight, I was pleasantly surprised with my performance doing the BW Brigade workout (Rank 2, workout A for those with the Rebel strength guide:)). I need to work on my form on 1 exercise, but it will come in time. I have tracked all food successfully today, finishing up with 3001 calories. So far, so good...