Update

Hi all!

Happy Wednesday! How are you all doing today? Sorry for not blogging for a few days, but I have been busy and feeling off. However, I am back now and feeling much better. My nutrition was very off and I was making many excuses. I did not even really weigh-in on Sunday because I knew that I would not like the number that I saw. Monday I had ever intention to get back on track but I had a doctor appointment where I had a procedure done and I was quite uncomfortable after it was done, so I just took some time to relax.

Yesterday was the first day this week that I was actually at my calorie goal and I was incredibly proud of myself. Let’s be honest, it is incredibly hard to get back on track, but it has to be done. I missed my arm day on Monday, so I did it yesterday and I had legs today. My shoulders and legs are killing me right now but I am so happy! I have changed up my strength training a bit, doing more reps in the beginning sets and fewer in the reps in the ending sets. It really is helping because I am able to do more sets and ultimately more total reps. Typically on leg day it was difficult for me to do all the sets I had planned, but today, I was able to do all of them. Yes, I was insanely tired after, however I still did them and did not need to stop.  

My best friend is going to be home for a week beginning on Sunday, I am counting down the days. Even though my best friend was just home for Christmas, I miss her like crazy. We talk numerous times a week but it is definitely not the same as being in the same city as her. She and I have already made numerous plans for while she is here. Monday we are going out for coffee together and lunch with a few of our friends. We will be getting some delicious Mexican food sometime throughout the week and going out for coffee again a few more times. Oh how I miss that girl!

Well, it’s time to sign off because I need to start dinner. Tonight I will be watching a few shows and hopefully finishing another discussion post for school. Once I finish those things, I will be ending the night with some reading. I hope that you all have a wonderful evening. Until next time!

~Sara~

Update

Hi all!

Happy Friday! How are you all doing today? I am doing alright today, ready to get back in the swing of things. I will be honest, the past two days my nutrition was off, especially Wednesday. Yesterday I tried to get back on track and was doing well until the evening, I did not eat enough throughout the day and I paid for it in the evening. Today is a new day though and I am thankful for the new beginning that today offers. From now on, I am upping the intensity of my strength training sessions because I have been slacking with it and if I want to see results, I do need to work harder.

Let me tell you, my workout was intense today! I did my 30 minutes of cardio and 40 minutes of strength training. 4 sets of legwork and 3 sets of ab work, I would have done more but I was so shaky because I needed to eat something. So, I stopped because I thought that was better than passing out. On Wednesday, I missed my workout, which is why I did both legs and abs today. I am probably going to be hurting tomorrow, especially my legs, but I love the burn.

I have a weigh-in tomorrow for my challenge, not sure, how it is going to go because of my two off days this week. Oh well, it is just one weigh-in, it does not define who I am as a person. Even though I had two off days nutritionally this week, I am still calling this a decent week. I have 293 fitness minutes and before Wednesday, I was spot on nutritionally. Two off days are not going to derail  me completely, not this time.  

Time to get back to my schoolwork, this week I am trying to get through most of the information for my final paper and presentation. It is definitely time consuming but necessary. Hopefully I’ll be able to update by Monday at the latest. I hope that you all are having a great day. Until next time!

~Sara~

Busy

Hi all!

Happy Thursday! How are you all today? It is a little cloudy here and cooler, but it is beautiful in its own way. I cannot believe it is Thursday already, this week is going by very quickly.

Things have been insane lately, I've been busy with my homework, so my stress level is quite high. I am still not all that hungry and forcing myself to eat, which is causing me to eat unhealthy sometimes and not actually counting calories. Plus a few days ago, I got foot and mouth disease, so I can barely walk and is leaving me in pain. Hopefully it will clear up within a few days and I'll be able to walk again without issue.

I am really happy to say that I am ahead in my homework this week. All I have left are 5 discussion responses and a video journal. I'm planning on doing my video journal today, along with all my discussion responses, if possible. Can I be this far ahead every week? So, I'll be researching for my finals after this weeks work is done, plus getting a head start on next weeks stuff. Next week I do have quite a bit to do, so I'll have to be working really hard again.

On a happier note, I am really enjoying that books that I have for my classes. They are incredibly interesting, so that makes it easier to do my weekly readings. Well I think it is time to go and keep working on my schoolwork. Hopefully I'll be able to post again soon. I hope that you all have a wonderful day. Until next time!

~Sara~

School Goals

Hi all!

Happy Saturday! How are you all on this beautiful fall day? I cannot believe it is already the end of October, it feels like it just began. Well, soon we'll move from fall to winter and I am not looking forward to that. I wouldn't mind it so much if there wasn't so much slushy snow and ice that get onto the roads. This is one of the many reasons as to why I cannot wait to move.

I am officially done with another class, as I turned in my last written assignment and my final paper and presentation yesterday. Now I am trying to get a head start on my new classes, my goal today is to read all of the 15 chapters that have been assigned, complete all 3 discussions and start the outlines for my 3 journals. It'll be a lot to get done today but I am going to try my hardest to get it all done. So then tomorrow I can write/record my journals. Then next week all I'll have to do is discussion responses, a written assignment and a set of exercises.

Well, I am cutting this short so I can go work on my homework. Hopefully I will be able to start posting longer updates beginning on December 8th. I hope that you all have a wonderful day. Until next time!

~Sara~

Happy Friday!

Hi all!

Happy Friday! How are you all on this lovely day? I'm in a freaking fantastic mood for some reason today and I'm loving it!! :) I woke up before my alarm (not necessarily a good or bad thing), got a great workout in, had a good report at the chiropractor, do not have a ton to get accomplished today, and I'm doing well nutritionally. All-in-all, I'm just in a really good mood today.

This morning, I weigh-in (unofficially) for a fall weight loss challenge I'm a part of and I surpassed my goal my 1.5 pounds! I'll weigh-in officially on Sunday, but today's weigh-in was a nice little pick me up. I've done these types of challenges before, I did one over the summer and it did not go well. I'm back and motivated now though, so it was nice to meet one of my goals.

Today I only need to respond to some discussions for school and then I'm done with my assignments for the week. Although, I do think that I may get a head start on next weeks assignments since I'll have some time. But first I'm going to relax some and get caught up on some reading. I hope that you all have a wonderful day! Until next time!

~Sara~

Weigh-In

Hi all!

How are you all doing on this lovely day? It is a new week, what are you going to do to make it a wonderful one? I had a fairly good weekend, it was very busy but productive. Plus, I had my weigh-in yesterday. I experienced some stress yesterday because of a disagreement with someone but thankfully I did not let it get me down. I am proud of myself, Sunday's are my "cheat" day and I stay right around my calorie range.

My weigh-in yesterday was amazing, I had great results on the scale this week. It is no wonder why, with my increase in exercise minutes and burning at least 500 more calories than my goal called for. These kind of results will not be weekly but it was a nice little jump start. This has helped me to get into an exercise routine again, so I cannot be sad about it. Also, it was a smart call for me to rest my legs this weekend, they are feeling fresh and ready to take on the new week.

Starting Weight: 315 lbs

Last Weight: 291.6 lbs

Current Weight: 287.6 lbs (-4) 

Weight Lost: 27.4 lbs

I have a busy week ahead, a lot of homework to get done. Thankfully, I got a great deal of it done yesterday. Another positive thing, one of my assignments is on a topic that I wrote a final paper on earlier this year, so I already had a great deal of information that I need. My final, journal, discussion responses and another paper still need to be completed but I have a great start since it is only Monday. 

I have spent enough time away from my homework this afternoon though, so it is time to get back to it. I hope that you all have a wonderful day/evening. Until next time!

~Sara~

Fitness and busyness

Hi all!

How are you all today? It is an absolutely beautiful day here in southeastern Wisconsin, too bad I am stuck inside working on schoolwork. Maybe a little later I'll bring my laptop outside with me and get some work done, while enjoying the beautiful weather.

I have been working out daily for 13 days now and my legs are starting to feel a little fatigued. It's no wonder why, I've had 859 fitness minutes, not including the 60+ from today. 442 of them happening this week alone, so I'm pretty exhausted. Today I've already walked 60+ minutes and burned 300+ calories, so I'm thinking about not walking while dinner cooks.

This morning while I was in the bathroom, I was curious to see what my weight was, so I stepped on the scale (my weigh-in isn't for another 2 days). I'm happy to say that my fitness and nutrition is definitely paying off because I saw about a pound loss so far, I'm not logging it and will weigh-in officially on Sunday.

Things are still incredibly busy in my world, my outline is still in process, but hopefully I'll get it done today. Then it's time to start my final and everything else that I need to get done. Time to get back to work. Wish me luck. Have a wonderful day! Until next time!

~Sara~

Getting Back

Hi all!

How are you all doing today? It is absolutely amazing here, our weather here will be in the upper 50's to mid 60's the rest of the week :) This is my perfect weather, not too warm and not too cold. This post is going to be a pretty short one because I have an incredibly busy day ahead, my homework really needs to get done.

Although I haven't been perfect this week, I have improved since the past weeks. My nutrition has been right around my calorie goal every day besides yesterday and I've exercised 170 minutes and over 1100 calories burned. My exercise has only been walking, doctors orders, but every little bit helps. So I am looking forward to my weigh-in this week, to see if I finally have a loss, after weeks of gains or maintaining.

This weekend is also our shopping week, so I'll have more food choices. Before we go, I'm trying to come up with a list of foods I can have for lunch's that are lower calorie and filling. One thing that I'm trying to do is add more protein and fewer processed carbs. I know that I have a carb addiction and pretty much every meal has some sort of processed carb, so I'm trying to cut back a bit.

Before I end this, I just wanted to talk about something that I brought up in my last post. I am in my final year of undergrad work and have applied for graduate school. Honestly, I cannot even begin to describe how excited I am about this fact. My graduate work is something I have been looking forward to for awhile now and it is hopefully less than a year away now. Even though I am excited, I cannot believe that I am at this point in my life. I have only applied to one graduate school and I do not have a plan B but I have faith. Seattle Pacific University is where I have applied to, so hopefully I'll get accepted and be moving out to Seattle in August.

So exciting times are here and will be coming again. My homework is calling me though and there is a lot of it to get done. Until next time.

~Sara~

Update (Day 658)

Hi all!

Happy Thursday! How are you all doing today? Sorry it has been a few days since I've blogged last but it has been a crazy week so far. I had my interview on Tuesday and it went okay. I don't really know either way about it yet, I should know sometime next week. And I have not had any ambition to work on my homework this week but today I'm buckling back down and getting my last paper of this week done. And tomorrow my friends are coming to visit me!! Ahh, I'm way too excited about this! :) Once I finish my paper it's time to get started on my two finals due next week and clean my house. Today I spent a long time watching Starkid's A Very Potter Musical, A Very Potter Sequel, and A Very Potter Senior year and now Harry Potter is on TV tonight. I guess it's a Harry Potterish type day. :)

I have a favor to ask of all of you... can you please keep me in your thoughts and prayers. Recently I've really began stressing out over my whole job situation because my money is running lower now. I have enough to get me through next month but not long after that. I'm trying my best to stay positive through this but it's hard when the money runs low and I'm 16.5 hours from home. So it's not as if I can easy just move back home or anything. God will provide something soon, I'm sure.

Anyways... I'll be posting a picture of myself in my hopeful wedding dress in one of my upcoming blogs and doing a recap of my weekend with my friends. :) Time to get back to homework. Have a wonderful night everyone. So until next time!

~Sara~

Quick Post (Day 621)

Hi all!

Happy Tuesday! How are you all doing today? I have had such a busy day already, a quick workout this morning and I have been responding to discussions and reading a ton for my final paper. The sad part is that I can't begin writing it until I have all this reading done. But I'm taking a little break and writing this for all of you. :) 

Today I'm linking up with Laney, don't forget to link up with us! 

1. What is a challenging thing that you deal with in everyday life? 

Too much homework

2. Where do you see yourself in 5 years? 

Married to Abid and a recent graduate with my Master's degree. Just starting my career.

3. Who has had a major impact on your life and why? 

My best friend because she is so incredibly strong and she is always there for me.

4. What's one thing you wish you could change about your life? 

The distance between Abid and I.

5. What was your dream job as a child? 

Teacher (I'm a teacher's kid).

6. What was your favorite activity as a child?

Honestly, I don't remember. 

7. Where is your faith with God? 

Continually growing

8. Name 1 thing that you enjoy cooking and share the recipe.

I enjoy cooking so many things... cooking is one of my passions.

9. What's one thing you wish you had learned by the time you were 18? 

Do not equate your value with a man's opinion of you.

10. If you do one thing that you normally don't do on a regular basis, what would it be? 

It would be doing absolutely nothing... I'm always doing homework.

11. What's one chore you hate to do on a daily basis?

Vacuuming. 

12. If you had the money and could get your dream car, what would it be? 

Don't really have a dream car.

13. Name one book you can read over and over and it never gets old. 

Anything by Jane Austen. 

14. What's one movie you like to watch and it never gets old? 

So many... Harry Potter, MIB, Jane Austen movies.

15. State a quote that you live by.

This above all: To your own self, be true.

William Shakespeare 

16. Whens the last time you've been to church and do you plan on going back and if so when? 

Sunday morning... I'll be there next Sunday as well. 

17. Do you diet daily and if so what kind of diet is it and what does it consist of?

Sort of... I don't like to call it a diet, it's just my lifestyle.

18. What's the craziest thing you did as a teen?

I didn't really do anything crazy. 

19. What's the world "friendship" mean to you and do you have true friends that you can count on no matter what? 

Friendship to me is an extremely special connection shared by people with similar interests. I do have a close knit group of friends that are absofreakinglutely amazing. We've all been friends for 10+ years.

20. Name 1 feature you like to have in a friend.  

Mature but still knows how to have fun.

Well they ya have it... I've taken enough of a break. Time to get working on homework again. I hope you all have an amazing day. So until next time.

~Sara~

Off Day (Day 545)

Hi all!

Sorry this one is coming so late! How is everyone doing today? Happy first day of "spring". Yeah, pretty sure that it is not spring here in Wisconsin. It's about 20 degrees and sunny but there's still snow on the ground. So that's not a very springy. But at least it's sunny and besides being cold, it's fairly nice out. Tomorrow it's suppose to finally start "warming" up, getting all the way up to 30. I'll take it! How is the weather by all of you?

Today I am just having an "off" day, I'm not sure what's going on with me. I didn't want to wake up this morning, I wasn't feeling like exercising (but I still did), I'm craving carbs like crazy, I just feel exhausted. It must just be one of those days, we all are off physically, emotionally, spiritually, etc... sometimes. But like I said, I still got my scheduled exercise done. It took me longer than I would have liked, but I got it done either way. I have no idea why I'm craving carbs though, it's sort of ridiculous. I was making my lunch today and I just wanted to eat some crackers, chips, peanut butter cookie dough and a bunch of other things. For the most part, I resisted, but I did snag a small spoonful of peanut butter cookie dough. We're having some mashed potatoes with our dinner tonight, so I'll get some carbs that way. Plus the recipe I'm trying out has some apples in it, so there's more carbs there. I'm sure that this will pass, it's probably an emotional thing or stress.

As I was just saying, I'm trying out a new recipe tonight. It was a recipe that I found on a blog (I don't remember which one, sadly :( ). But it is pork chops with apples in this delicious sounding sauce (brown sugar, butter, cinnamon and nutmeg = super yummy)! I'll do a little review of it tomorrow and hopefully I can remember to take a picture before serving them tonight. I'm changing up the recipe a little bit, instead of pan frying them I'm just going to bake them. But I'll still do the sauce and apples the same way. I hope that it turns out well.

I have absolutely no ambition to write my paper that is due on Sunday. It's not just an easy paper, I need to watch a 2 hour documentary first and then write about it. I have my paper all set up, now I just need to watch the documentary and write the paper. Me losing motivation about half way through a class usually happens, and it's right on schedule, I'm on week 5 of 10. But I really do need to get this paper done very soon, it's already Wednesday and I haven't even started it. Tonight I will hopefully watch the documentary and then start writing my paper. And ultimately, I am hoping to get the bulk of the paper done today and tomorrow. I can and will do this!

Time to just relax for a few minutes, start dinner in a little bit and then watching my documentary tonight. I hope that you all have a wonderful afternoon/evening! So until next time.

~Sara~

Starting carb cycling - High carb day (Day 528)

Hi all!

Happy Sunday! How is everyone doing today? It is an absolutely gorgeous day here, a little cold but the sun is shining. :) I had a weigh-in today, and I maintained since Friday (I weigh-in on the first and last day of the month as well as my weekly weigh-in's).

Today I started carb cycling, and it's a high carb day. Honestly, it's freakishly hard to eat this many carbs and protein yet stay lower on fats. One thing that I'm trying to do is plan my meals to see how I'm doing with all my levels. I thought that my low carb days were going to be hard, but it seems that my high carb days are harder. I've had breakfast, a morning snack, and lunch already, and I'm doing good on carbs and fat but my protein level is greatly lacking. But I feel like I've been eating all day, I'm sure I'll go over my calories some on my high carb days (because of all the dang food I have to eat). I'll make sure to stick to my calorie goal on my low carb days though. I'm really trying to eat healthier foods on my high carb days as well. But I guess throughout this week I'll have to research what foods will give me a good amount of protein.

A few of my classmates are finally getting their acts together and posting in our group discussion. Thank God. We're making good progress on our thesis statements (that's a good thing since they're due tonight). It stinks that we weren't able to make progress on this sooner though because this coming week there is quite a bit to do. I have to write a paper that will take a little more time, thankfully the reading assignment is pretty minimal.

But it's just about time for dinner with the family and then onto some homework. So until next time.

~Sara~

Year 1 Day 159 (Day 524)

Hi all!

Happy Wednesday! How is everyone doing today? My mind has been renewed and I'm ready to figuratively kick some butt! Not sure if this new found confidence has anything to do with the pants I'm wearing today (size 20's, oh yeah!) or not, but I'm mentally renewed. I woke up to this huge snow storm this morning and thankfully it's finally stopped (it's almost March for goodness sake).

I'm getting to the point where I'm so ready to start working out again. I have a physical therapy appointment tomorrow morning so I'm going to talk to her and see if she thinks its a good idea to start walking and maybe do some upper body strength training (as long as it doesn't aggravate my back/hip). Honestly, I'm missing my daily workouts, and I just want to start them up again. I'm fairly certain that she'll say walking is okay because she has me warm up our PT sessions by walking on the treadmill. But I just want to run my idea by her before making any decision on it and of course I wouldn't be walking very fast. I probably really got the itch to exercise because one of the people I follow on Facebook posted a March fitness challenge and I really want to do it but I probably won't be able to because it deals with the thighs (and having an issue with my back/hip  right now probably won't allow that).

Today I'm getting a bunch of homework done. I finished my first reading assignment and when I'm done with this I'm going to proof read my paper and then do my two other chapters that I have to read. The one book that I have read for my class so far is really interesting, I love it. It's called Courage & Calling: Embracing Your God-given Potential by Gordon T. Smith. The book talks about finding our personal vocations which dealing with different issues that life throws at us. I would definitely recommend it and I'm so glad that it was required material for my class.

My classmates are being really slow with posting in our discussion (our initial post was due last night, and only 3 of us have posted so far). It's frustrating but I suppose if they don't mind their grade being docked, then who am I to judge? But it's hard because we have a group thing due on Sunday and I'm the only one who has posted anything about it so far. I hate procrastinating, so I'm hoping that the other's will post something about it soon.

Time to go proofread my paper and get more of my reading done. Oh by the way, I'm doing a weigh-in tomorrow (since it's the last day of the month), just be prepared to hear the results of that. So until next time.

~Sara~

Year 1 Day 150 (Day 515)

Hi all!

How is everyone doing today? It's a new week and a chance to start fresh. I'm doing well on my goals for the week so far (and I have realized that I haven't posted my goals yet, I'll get to that in just a little bit). Plus I had physical therapy this morning for my back. My physical therapist said that most exercise is going to be out of the question right now, I can try to walk a little, but that's about it. I need to be up and moving around but I don't want to over do it. So it's difficult because I never really know how far I can push myself before I've over done it.

Yay for goals! :)

1. Nutrition - eat within my calorie range each day (been horrible with this lately)
2. Water - drink at least 100 oz of water per day (this too)
3. Exercise - do my PT exercises as recommended
4. Positivity
5. De-stress (this has been the worst)
6. School work - get a head start on my assignment that's due on the 3rd and respond to everyone who posts a discussion
7. Paperwork - finish up the paperwork needed for Abid and get it sent out as soon as I have the money

I was relaxing this afternoon, watching some TV and working on my homework. Well a commercial came on for this weight loss pill and some of the people on it were saying how you can't lose weight on your own, it's impossible. Gosh, you have no idea how frustrated that made me. This is a national commercial and so many people are hearing this garbage. Another person said that he didn't need to change his diet at all (he ate the same amount of food) and didn't have to exercise at all, and he was able to lose weight. Ahhh.... this is a complete load of crap. These types of commercials really do frustrate me because just a few years ago, I would have believed every word of it. But after learning what I have over these past 515 days, I have realized that it takes a butt load of hard work, a change in nutrition, and exercise. It's a lifelong journey that will never really be complete. And I just hate that other people may be believing what this commercial is saying. So it just upsets me.

But it's time to go and work on some homework. So until next time.

~Sara~