Elennare Refocuses

[Elennare]

Apparently 2017 is the year I start off with "re"doing things.

 

I seem to not remember how to play this game as well as I thought I did.  Husband is doing great, but I kept screwing up and barely made it through the first level.  I did it, though, but didn't get enough XP or items to actually level up.

 

Which brings us to the start of level 2!

 

I have a new plan.  I am going to focus only on my diet, and make sure I stick with my goal/plan no matter what happens.  Yay power-leveling!  I figure once I get this down, I'll be on a roll and can keep doing great the rest of the year (and beyond).

 

So, what does this plan actually look like?

 

I'm going to follow the Blogilates 28-day reset, which is more or less a Whole30, but only 28 days long and not quite as restrictive.  Actually, my plan lands somewhere in between the two, because I still want to try to be paleo and the Blogilates plan isn't paleo, but I don't think I'll be able to stick to all the restrictions of the Whole30 right now.  No grains, no dairy, no added sugar, no processed foods.  Will try for no soy or beans, but not going to stress those too much.  Ditto for rice and quinoa.  I'd say no alcohol as well, but I consume that so rarely I don't see much point mentioning it.  Also, I will be drinking at least 8 cups of water every day (flavored with fruit is ok).  Also also, track everything in my fancy planner.

 

I'm also going to be doing roller derby, and hopefully I'll level up at evals on the 19th.  If not, I'm really not going to feel too bad about it because schedules have been weird the last couple months and I haven't gotten as much practice as I'd really like.  I do feel like I've made some improvements in some areas that were lacking, though, so here's hoping.  I'm also going to try to do at lease a little bit of exercise every day, but since it's not a focus for my challenge, I'm not going to stress that either.

 

Let's do this!

 

[Manarelle]

Go level 2! You got this! Love the beach gif, it looks so very warm and relaxing, and then BAM derby aggression.  

[Captainfantastic]

Good luck!! You got this!

[raptron]

Totally got it in the bag.

[Elennare]

I have not been eating all that great over zero week.  Everything is starting to fall by the wayside again.  Although we've made dinner a few times.  I'm so ready to start this challenge tomorrow.  And anyway, the food we cook mostly tastes better than buying stuff!

[Elennare]

Apparently I'm starting my challenge today rather than Sunday like originally planned.  Ended up not feeling too good, sleeping for a big part of the day, and having fast food for dinner because we forgot to thaw the meat and Husband wasn't feeling so great in the evening either.  Oh well.  Monday-Monday challenge is fine!  That's what we used to do, anyway.

[Manarelle]

Sleep is the best doctor. Hope you guys feel better and rock the Monday to Monday challenge!

[Elennare]

Did good yesterday.  Stuck to my goal.  Still wasn't feeling quite right, though, so didn't go to scrimmage.  Also went shopping so we have stuff to make food with again.

 

Then, Husband ended up talking about stuff until really late.  I like talking to him, but I hate that we always seem to have the interesting conversations when I need to be going to bed.  And he just won't shut up, even if I say I need to go to bed.  I think I'm going to have to start being more firm with saying that I need to go to sleep.

 

Little One is still sick, and I ended up getting up 3 times last night to take care of him. :S  Which resulted in me getting up late today, so I'm either going to have to flex time at work (again, which I don't really want to do), or hope my brother can take Little Bug to practice tonight.  Gah!  And my breakfast ended up having sugar in it, because I grabbed something from the coffee stand on my way to work.  Well, it was agave, so slightly better?  Otherwise I'm on track for doing good today.  One little bump at the start isn't too bad.  I still got this.

[raptron]

Monday-Monday is the best IMO. And eh, a little blip is no big deal. It wasn't intentional!

[Elennare]

Yep!   Maybe this is bad, but I think in general diet is one of those things where you shouldn't let perfect be the enemy of good.

 

Also, we got the situation with Little Bug's practice resolved.  Husband will bring him (and my gear) to my office so I don't have to leave early.  I'll be done with work pretty much when it's time to leave, so that works out pretty perfectly.

[Mr.Six]

20 minutes ago, Elennare said:

Maybe this is bad, but I think in general diet is one of those things where you shouldn't let perfect be the enemy of good.

I completely agree with this!  (And glad everything is falling into place today  )

[Elennare]

Yesterday finished out pretty well.  Traffic was bad, so we were a little late to practice, but not too much.  I successfully stuck to my goal, other than the breakfast goof. 2/28 so far!

[Elennare]

Food-wise, yesterday was good! 3/28 days down.  I have a slight head ache this morning.  I'm trying to figure out if it's a result of changing my diet, or if maybe I'm starting to catch Little One's cold (which would be BAD!).

 

I tried to go to the derby club yesterday, because I missed practice this week.  Lol.  Got stuck in a meeting at work that went late, then crazy bad traffic.  I drove past the exit I would have taken to get there almost an hour after it started.  But, I did go to open skate with Little One.  Not particularly productive as a replacement for derby practice (other than more time on wheels is always good), but he had fun, and a random lady gave us a pair of skates for him that are only slightly too big!  Apparently she had just bough new ones for her kid and wanted to get rid of the old ones, preferably by giving them to someone who would use them.  Free skates?  Sure!  He'll grow into them pretty quick I bet.   Also, it's highly amusing when 6 or 7 year olds zoom by him and tell their friends to "watch out for the baby."  I didn't know 3 counted as a baby?

 

[raptron]

Aw, free skates! That's awesome! 

[Elennare]

Stuck to my food plan yesterday, which brings me up to 4/28.  For dinner last night, Husband made deconstructed shepherd's pie.  It was amazing.  We haven't made a ton of stuff from it yet, but so far everything from Well Fed Weeknights has been REALLY tasty.  If you're looking for a good cookbook, I highly recommend it.

 

My league had a Q&A skate last night.  I was really tired, so I whined a lot about not wanting to go, but then I went.  I had a surprising amount of fun for it being adult night (I will spare you the repeat of the rant about that), and I actually started a conversation with a random person.  I know that doesn't sound like anything special, but I am rather shy, so that's a big deal for me.  I ended up (re)teaching her how to skate, and at the end of the evening she said she wanted to be friends on facebook.  I'm still not entirely sure how I feel about that.  I guess I either made a friend or now have a stalker?  I can always block her if she turns out to be weird, right?

[raptron]

Hahah, she thought you were fun and a new friend! Glad it went well. Deconstructed shepherd's pie sounds soooog good. 

[Elennare]

It was amazing.  As were the chicken pesto meatballs with zucchini noodles I made for dinner last night.  It's a good cookbook. 

 

Day 5 went pretty well.  I didn't pack a lunch, so I bought a salad from the deli.  It's possible it had some sugar in it (no label because they make it from scratch there), but it was either that or nothing, and I stand by my choice.  I've really started craving chocolate the last day or so, so for my breakfast I'm having chocolate spice cherry paleo sugarfree scones.  I fully expect they will be everything I want.

 

Tomorrow is evals.  I am excited, and unless something happens at practice today that makes me think otherwise, I'm expecting to do pretty well.  But now I have a dilemma.  I woke up early today to watch the SpaceX launch.  Because they're launching from the same pad as the Apollo missions, so how can I not watch that?  Except, the launch got scrubbed at T-13 seconds.  Their next launch window is tomorrow morning.  I would have to get up at 6:15 to watch it.  That's early, especially before evals.  but it's not early enough to go back to sleep afterwards and actually get any sleep before I'd have to get up anyway (because evals are at 9:45am.  ugh.).  So, do I get up to watch the launch and maybe be tired for evals, or sleep in a bit and watch a replay later?  That's not nearly as cool as watching it live, but not being tired for evals is good, too.  Maybe it'll take a bit longer to fix the issue and they won't try to launch tomorrow?  *Sigh*

 

[Manarelle]

Grats on making positive food choices! Sounds like a good habit in the works.  Hope the launch and evals turn out well for you today!

[Elennare]

Well, my day started way earlier than expected.  Around 2am, Little Bug threw up.  Got up a few more times to take care of that. :/  I did watch the launch, which was maybe stupid, but I watched it and it was cool.  It was successful, too.  Got up a little bit later than I meant to for reals, but still got everything I needed to done and made it on time.

 

KT tape is amazing.  I figured I'd give it a try, since my knee hurts when I do a lot of pace line stuff and there's a fair bit of that in evals.  No pain!  Yay!  For some reason I got light headed just before it was my turn to go skate for the 27-in-5, so that part didn't go so well.  I was standing up way too much for most of it, and I only got 26.25 laps.    Otherwise, though, I think I nailed it.  Definitely better than last time.  And now for the waiting...

 

Still doing good on food, too!

[Elennare]

 

I leveled up!  I'm now eligible to get drafted to a team next time they add people!

[Manarelle]

15 hours ago, Elennare said:

I leveled up!  I'm now eligible to get drafted to a team next time they add people!

 

 

WOOT! CONGRATS! So awesome to see all your hard work pay off! You are awesome!

[Elennare]

Thanks!  I'm super stoked about it.   Just heard they may not be doing another draft until after next evals, though, which is a bit sad.  Oh well.  It'll give me time to get more awesome before I start playing for real, I guess (and to REALLY nail next evals).  Not that we have our next season scheduled yet anyway.  Stupid issues getting a good space for that.

 

It occurred to me this morning that I forgot to post a week one wrap up in the midst of all the excitement.  I didn't 100% nail my goal (had one or two meals that were marginal, and didn't track a couple of days), but I have solidly met it.  So far, this challenge is going very well.

 

Also, I got another one of those protein bars this morning, because I had a thing at work I couldn't be late to and I didn't prep anything last night, and it tasted surprisingly sweet.  I guess my plan is working?

[Elennare]

Week 2 is starting off well.  Our plan for dinner ended up falling apart, and we got pizza, but I had a salad instead.  So, I guess the boys got pizza, though my salad came from the pizza place.  I also found my journal planner, so I can get back to tracking my food.  Oh, actually yesterday wasn't quite on target.  I forgot my water bottle when I went to work, so I ended the day a tad light on water.  But otherwise good.

Edit: I did not find my planner.  I found last year's planner which looks similar enough that a quick glance isn't enough to tell them apart, apparently.  Guess I've got some more looking to do when I get home today...

 

I'm going to start lifting weights.  For real this time.  I'm in the process of making arrangements to go do that with my brother, hopefully on Friday.  Which should give my ankle/calf enough time to get better.  Did I mention I sort of twisted it on Saturday?  I fell down at practice, and one of the other skaters came down with me and she landed on my foot, causing it to twist a little bit.  At the time, it didn't really feel like it had twisted and was just sore from the impact, but Sunday morning I woke up and it was a little bit tender and my calf was tight.  I taped it for evals, and it was fine, but yesterday my calf was really sore/tight.  The ankle didn't hurt, other than the one time I stretched out my calf really well.  Husband massaged it for me before bed, which was amazing, and today my calf feels better.  My ankle is bugging me a little bit today, though.  I'm thinking the calf is sore because it's being all tight to try to protect my ankle?  I'm probably going to tape it for Little Bug's practice tonight.  Or maybe I'll give the KT tape a try on my ankle.  It does say it's designed to provide some support with the goal of helping injured things heal...

[raptron]

Lifting weights!! Yay! I'm excited for you. Plus the level up! Try KT tape on the ankle for sure. See how it feels and if it helps out.  

[Elennare]

2 hours ago, raptron said:

Lifting weights!! Yay! I'm excited for you. Plus the level up! Try KT tape on the ankle for sure. See how it feels and if it helps out.  

I'm excited about weights, too.  I did it for a while (not very well...long story) 9 years ago and really liked it, but then the gym stopped being convenient and I never got back into it.  But now I have a goal to work for, AND someone to teach me (for free!), so it's going to happen.

 

Have you used KT tape before?  All the tutorials on it for ankles are for an ankle that is messed up because your foot rolled inward, but mine went out and sideways.  If that makes no sense, kneel down with your toes on the ground (like your going to set the top of your foot down, but haven't gotten it all the way down yet), and then imagine someone pushing your heel down and towards your other leg.  That probably doesn't make any sense either, but I can't remember anatomical terms well enough at the moment to give a "proper" description.

 

Is it just like regular tape in that you just want to put the long side up the inside of your ankle instead of the outside?  Because it looks like the "typical" ankle taping pattern (whereas some places are quite different), and I already know how to do that (yay soccer).  Or I'm thinking of possibly trying it with it balanced on both sides of my leg, to just give it some general support because there doesn't seem to be a particular motion that really sets it off, just more of a general ache.