day 89 (day 5 / week 13)

I really hope my days are right (the numbers). my blog is too large for the phone to load, so I am going off of memory on that (i am not known for my great memory).

anyway, things aren't going how I thought they would in my head. there are boxes everywhere and no room for me to do turbo jam anywhere. we (i) also have A LOT of cleaning to do, and I didn't expect that (or my legs being this sore!). but when you have lemons, you make lemonade. I spent a few hours this morning scrubbing the master bath (was really bad!) and the kitchen floor (was even worse). I did a lot of lunges, more squats (moving boxes out of the way), and used my arm and back muscles scrubbing the floor and window to the Nevada room. my arms and back are starting to get sore now. when I am able to log my exercise on sparkpeople again, I am going to call today 120 mins of heavy cleaning (total understatement lol).

we have to switch my son's room and the extra room later tonight (we want him to have the bigger room closer to ours). we have to pull all of the boxes out of both rooms and swap everything because we realized after the fact that we should have put him in the other room. more exercise! :)

hope you guys have a great workout and monday! make today count! :)

I can do this. I am a star.

day 88 (day 4 / week 13)

I wasn't able to get on to post for yesterday (day 87--sunday). we are in vegas now and unpacked the truck yesterday, then went to my mom's house for bbq. at around 10 pm I was mad because I wasn't able to exercise because of how hectic everything was all day, so I got up and did 50 crunches--not much but something conscious--the terms of my resolution.

then I woke up this morning and my legs were EXTREMELY sore and I was a little confused as to why lol. I totally forgot!! at my mom's house, I was playing with my sisters baby (5 mos) and to get her to laugh I was doing this traveling squat thing and then jumping in the air with her. she loved this and was all smiles the entire time. I did this at least 30 times and remember thinking ''well, I'm definitely getting my exercise in for today!'' I just forgot about it because it was so much fun and, if you have ever done a squat before, you would know that they are not much fun lol.

anyway I am really glad that my legs are sore because I feel better now that I did something other than those stupid crunches.

anyway, gonna post about today now.

hope you had a great weekend! I still can't figure out how to respond to comments on this phone (i don't get the option) or how to enter exercise on mobile.sparkpeople either. make today count!

I can do this. I am a star.

day 87 (day 3 / week 13)

I didn't get to sleep until after 1am last night. I went down around 11pm, but there was so much dust in the air (we were sleeping on just our matress) from moving everything into the truck, that it was all I could smell/feel.

I am so tired but did the 20 minute workout (turbo jam) anyway. off to take my last shower here and start day 2 of moving.

I hope this posts. I am on my hubby's phone again.

have a good workout! make today count!

I can do this. I am a star.

day 86 (day 2 / week 13)

Well, today is day 1/3 of moving day. My hubby is out to pick up the truck right now. My In-Law's flight has been delayed almost 2 hours, so they aren't here yet.

I did the 20 minute workout (Turbo Jam) and it felt great. I got all beautified this morning, and then went and got my hair cut, so I didn't want to get all gross and exercise, but I did anyway. I'm not gross though. I cut a lot of hair off and it's been thinned out a lot (I think she called it "textured"), so it's not so heavy/hot anymore. It's so cute! I didn't have to put it up in a pony tail to exercise....although when I do, it looks more like a dog tail now with the cut/texture lol. I didn't get it cut to put it in a pony tail anyway, so it's all good. All that matters is that I exercised :)

Depending on how early we start loading the truck tomorrow, I might be posting from a hotel room in Tonopah, NV and also on Sunday, so hopefully they have wireless and/or a computer with internet access that I can post from. I will try to wake up early enough that I can get exercise in though, before we get super busy and everyone starts arriving.

I hope you guys have a great Friday! Make today count! It's worth it!

I can do this. I am a star.

day 85 (day 1 / week 13)

I turned on Punch, Kick & Jam today and only did 25 minutes of it (it's 48 minutes long). I am just really tired and have been doing laundry and cleaning since 6am. I also feel a little funny from all of the cleaning products and there being no ventilation in our master bathroom (I feel like I burned my sinuses or something). It's spotless though lol.

I hope you all have a good day! If it's nice outside, go take a walk. Walks aren't exercise! Well, they are, but they don't seem like it when you're surrounded by God's art (nature :)). If I can find time to exercise in the middle of moving 450 miles away, then you can too! ;)

I can do this. I am a star.

day 84 (day 7 / week 12)

I really flaked on my exercise today. I turned on the 20 minute workout and only did 10 minutes of it because I kept getting distracted with tidying up and putting stuff in the last few boxes. My brain is in moving mode and it wont stop.

I feel that I have done a lot physically today though, pretty much since I woke up (cleaning each room, moving boxes, etc), so I will excuse myself from not doing more, or feeling bad about it. I'm sure I burned more calories cleaning and moving boxes around, than I would have on this video, so it's all good. In fact, I scrubbed this stain on our counter (I used a square cake pan to put soap bottles, sponges and sink stuff in, and it rusted a HUGE stain in the counter! lesson learned lol) for a good 30-40 minutes, so that alone is more than the video...and my arm is sore now! lol

I still can't believe this connection is working... lol

Hope you all have a great day and a great workout! Make today count!

I can do this. I am a star.

day 83 (day 6 / week 12)

Today I did the 20 minute workout (Turbo Jam). For the past 3-4 days I have been working pretty hard, so I wanted a break. We only have a few more boxes to pack (well maybe 4 or 5) and everything is packed except for our furniture, bedding and stuff we are packing in our suitcases. Sweet!

I can't believe it's already Tuesday. I have been pretty blessed to be able to get on and be accountable for my food choices and exercise. This must be in God's plan for me!

Hope everyone has a great day and workout! Make today count! (it's SO worth it!)

I can do this. I am a star.

day 82 (day 5 / week 12)

My hubby doesn't get off of work until after 4pm, so I wasn't able to post this earlier. I wasn't able to get online to post it either (the connection seems to only like my hubby lol).

Today (around 1:30pm) I did Punch, Kick & Jam (with the sculpting gloves). I'm definitely not as sore as I was yesterday, or even the day before.

95% of the apartment is packed. Yaay!

Hope you guys have a good day and a great workout! Make today count! You'll be happy you did :).

I can do this. I am a star.

day 81 (day 4 / week 12)

Today I did Kick, Punch & Jam. Man I am sore (good sore) from doing it the past few days. I also did the same workout yesterday, instead of the 20 minute workout (I need to change it on my blog from yesterday)

Doing the labels from my hubby's phone is hard. It doesn't list my preexisting labels for me, so I have to type them in from memory (no big deal cause it doesn't affect you guys, but I'm anal lol).

Surprisingly my hubby's computer is picking up a wireless connection (mine didn't find any), so I am able to type this on the computer, and not his phone. He doesn't have a keypad that is easy to type with either--he has Palm Centro (i'm not that impressed with it anymore lol) so blogging on it takes more effort than I want to put out. My phone has a keypad, but has very limited internet access. I can only go to sprint pages (i can't even use OR search for google!). Thank you for understanding if I can't blog for a day and for having faith that I am exercising. I am not stopping now especially after 81 days in! If being sick wont stop me, lack of internet deffinitely wont lol.

Anyway, this connection is not reliable at all and is extremely weak, so I need to post this now before I push my luck! Besides I want to watch the snow fall one last time before we leave (I'm happy that it's snowing right now. The snow is the only thing I will miss about this area!).

Make today count!

I can do this. I am a star.

day 80 (day 3 / week 12)

We are moving on Friday. My hubby didn't pay the cable bill because of this and so we no longer have an internet connection (i am on my hubby's cell now) or TV which I am fine with lol.

If I have problems posting this on his phone, I am going to hand write all of my posts and post them here when we get to Vegas.

I am about to do the 20 minute workout (turbo jam) and may do something more during logan's nap.

I hope this works! I am not able to view my blog because it's too large.

make today count :).

I can do this. I am a star.

Day 79 (day 2 / week 12)

O.M.G. that was hard (Turbo Jam's Punch, Kick & Jam)! I was able to keep up better today without the distraction (God bless his little heart). I am extremely sweaty and so happy to do that workout! I know that I am going to have great results with it, and I love how energetic it is and Chalene is. She totally helps you through it (mentally).

Punch, Kick & Jam is a lot more challenging than the other Turbo Jam workouts I have done so far, and I'm glad. I'm not saying the other ones are easy-peasy, but I don't sweat like this with them.

Anyway, a few days ago I mentioned something that I discussed with my MIL, that I wasn't ready to mention here. Well I guess there isn't going to be a better time, and maybe a lot of you can relate. Maybe coming out will encourage some and make you feel like you aren't alone in this battle.

Hi. My name is Melissa Henning and I am addicted to refined sugar (I said yes to most of these things).

This isn't to say that I eat brownies all day. Or candy. Or ice cream (it's not allowed in the house or I would! lol). Or even table spoons of sugar lol. It's not to say that I will eat an entire box or batch of cookies. I just always have it in my life. Always.

I know it's not a big deal, but I never realized how much I really enjoy my sweets, and baking a lot. I realized this looking at my diet as a whole and trying to cut it out of my diet. Looking for nutrient dense foods, and foods that are lower in calories or low in fat and higher in protein (just depends). Sugar really packs in a lot of unnecessary calories in my diet, and since I cut it out of my diet (it's only been a few days) I have lost 3 lbs. It could be water weight (probably), but I haven't seen a jump like that, on my scale (my current scale) ever! (I need to throw that thing away btw).

For the past few months, since it was mentioned to me in a comment, I have been using sparkpeople.com, but not obsessively inputting my food (just my exercise), until lately. I was packing in almost 600-800 calories--sugar calories here and there and not even realizing it, or I would put aside healthier foods because I knew I wanted to have a brownie or something later! I NEVER enter it into sparkpeople, and when I look back on my days, the days I have only eaten 330 or 500 calories, it's because the rest was something I was ashamed to admit, unconsciously (lol). I feel like I am lying now that I am aware of it, and not inputting it. Now when I want something sweet, I take a tsp of honey. It's sweet enough to knock out my sweet tooth, and leaves me satisfied. If I'm not, then I take 2. A serving size of honey is 1 TBS and is 60 calories. There are 3 tsp in 1 TB. My MIL went through this years ago when she was on the .brain.fart. Prism Diet, and honey helped her. She was a lot worse when it comes to sweets though, she was a hardcore addict, so much so that she still can't touch sweets, because she says she cant just eat a bite, but will eat it all.

I'm not saying that the reason why I'm not losing weight, is because I eat sugar, but maybe part of it is. I know that muscle is heavier than fat and that I am using weights daily (my sculpting gloves) and doing squats and lunges, so I am getting slimmer, but staying the same weight. I know that is fine, but it really bothers me that I am *so close* to 200 lbs, and I can't quite get there. Now that exercise has become apart of who I am, on a daily basis, I need to start thinking about what I put into my body more. I need to appreciate the body that God gave me more, and feed it correctly (again, not that I eat junk all day--I don't). I know some of you will be concerned, some of you wont care either way, and some of you may be right there with me. This isn't to say that I am going to go wacko about it and not eat foods with it in there--I am just not going to cook/bake with it anymore, or at least for a while, until I know I don't need it (I have never wanted to need anything) and I am not going to buy things to specifically satisfy my sweet tooth (even if they are those 100kcal packs).

Sugar isn't the only thing I have changed either. I am forcing myself to drink no less than 8 glasses of water a day (no more soda--but I have been doing that for almost a month now) and I eat 2 cups of salad (no dressing--my preference because I'm not a big fan) with every meal. Yes, even including breakfast.

I feel much better making these changes, just in the last few days...even being sick (my cold is almost gone btw...). I am proud that I am finally jumping on this bandwagon, and now that I have honey, I don't feel like I am depriving myself (when i tried to cut it out cold turkey, w/out honey, I honestly couldn't and didn't want to do it).

Sorry for the long blog entry! I hope you all have a great Friday. This weekend I am going to experiment with my hubby's phone (since his web access isn't limited), and post a blog entry that way, because I will be without the internet for, quite possibly, a while (until we have jobs which we still don't have!).

Make today count! It feels great, I promise!

I can do this. I am a star.

Day 78 (day 1 / week 12)

I feel much better today. I still have a cold but the symptoms are easy to ignore now. My energy is back so I was excited to do a longer Turbo Jam video today.

I totally forgot that my Turbo Jam videos came with another DVD that I never opened, so I decided to do that one today. It's called Punch, Kick & Jam. Man, it's really steppy and it was pretty hard for me to follow. Logan woke up like 15 minutes into it (he slept for less than an hour!) and he wouldn't leave me alone. He accidentally (on purpose) bumped into my bottom and then it became a fun game lol. He kept running into my butt and falling (silly kid--he was laughing really, really hard lol). Then he decided to lean against me, and I just gave up. It will be a lot of fun once I can keep up and understand what she's doing. It's like 47 or 48 minutes long, but I was only able to do 24 minutes. I hope I can do it tomorrow with no interruptions.

I think I will go take him for a walk. It's nice outside :).

Hope you all have a great day and an awesome workout!

I can do this. I am a star.

Day 77 (day 7 / week 11)

I can't believe it's already Wednesday. I am still not feeling that great. The medicine doesn't seem to be working today, because I just feel crappy all around and I can breathe way too well in one nostril and it hurts. The other side is just plugged as well as that ear (it annoys me that I can't pop it) lol. I am just happy that I am sick now, and not next week, because we are finally getting out of here. I can't believe we are moving next Friday!?! I just hope that I'm not still sick next week and that Jason and Logan don't get sick as well.

I mustered up enough strength to do the 20 minute workout today. I want to go take a nap now.

I do want to let you guys know that my pants keep falling when I'm working out now! I thought I had my big pair on (XL), but I was super surprised to find out that they are my small pair (size L--they used to be super tight around my waist and legs). I guess my sweat pants, need to go bye bye now! How exciting is that??

Off to take a nap.

I can do this. I am a star.

Day 76 (day 6 / week 11)

I'm still sick but I figured out an okay combo of meds to make myself functional. Once they wear off, I feel horrible again. About 2 hours after I took some medicine this morning, I thought, "yaay! Maybe I'm not as sick as I thought" cause I felt fine. Then like 2 hours after that I was on the couch feeling horrible with leaky eyes and nose, a scratchy throat and about ready to fall asleep.

My MIL called me to say hi, and I confessed something to her that I had realized in the past few days of going over my food journal and being sick (I'm not ready to out it here yet...but I will eventually). For some reason being sick made me realize it. Her convo woke me up enough to get me off my butt to take some more meds. Now I am fine but I can feel that I'm starting to get tired again. I did 3 loads of laundry and did the 20 minute workout (Turbo Jam) and tried to make it count. I still feel achy but the advil I took earlier is helping that. After Logan is finished eating, I want to go for a walk to the store to pick up some honey (has to do with what I confessed).

So that's it. I feel ok. Still sick, but ok since I figured out a good med combo. Thank you for all of your get well notes, and your concerns. I am ok. It's hard with Logan, but taking this stuff to mask my symptoms and headache seems to be helping. Hopefully it doesn't kill my liver (j/k I know it can't do that much damage in just a few days time that I am taking it lol).

Hope everyone has a happy green day! (can't pinch me! I have green eyes!) Make today count! I did :).

I can do this. I am a star.

Day 75 (day 5 / week 11)

Today I feel worse today than I did yesterday. Today my head feels like it wants to explode, my ears keep popping, and it's really comical how much I keep sneezing (logan pretends to sneeze like 3 times for every 1 sneeze that I do lol). I feel like a zombie. I have no energy and didn't know how I was going to get myself to exercise. I packed the master bathroom and fully cleaned it (so I can just do a wipe down next Friday), and that sucked out the little energy that I did have. Logan is a total ball of energy and refused to take his nap, (until now).

I decided in the end to kill 2 birds with one stone and to take him for a long walk (60 minutes) and get some exercise. He didn't fall asleep during the walk (never does) but he is asleep now (yaay!). It was really windy out and I felt like it was a lot harder to walk him than the last time. My HR confirmed this--it was between 135-140 for the most part. I still need to figure out how to work this thing, so that I can get an accurate estimated HR for a certain amount of time. Anyway, I'm glad I'm done for today.

Hope everyone has a great Monday (it feels like a Saturday to me lol).

I can do this. I am a star.

Day 74 (day 4 / week 11)

I'm sick.

Today I did the 20 Minute Turbo Jam workout. I'd like to say that I feel better since doing it, but I feel pretty bad. I felt bad doing it, which made me sad, cause I LOVE TJ! I thought it would give me energy and help me to feel better, but I just felt achy the whole time. I did not use my sculpting gloves either. I even took some daytime medicine so that I would feel better to exercise. At least I did it--I'm very happy it's over for today!!

On another note, I am not sore at all from yesterday (I really thought I was going to be) so that's a nice treat :).

I hope you all have a great Sunday. Make today count! (I don't know where I read that from, but I stole it--it's mine! lol)

I can do this. I am a star.

Day 73 (day 3 / week 11)

Today I did 2 Turbo Jam workouts. I did Turbo Sculpt (39 minutes) and the 20 minute workout (20 minutes)--in that order.

Turbo Sculpt was a lot more difficult than the regular Turbo Jam videos. I think that I have gotten used to not using any hand weights (just the sculpting gloves) so using my 5# weights was heavy! I used my sculpting gloves instead and my legs hurt (good pain, not bad :)).

After doing Turbo Sculpt I was exhausted and didn't want to do the 20 Minute Workout, but I had already programed it into WOWY, so I figured, "what the heck, it's only 20 minutes." I LOVE turbo jam! I got a 3rd and 4th wind during that workout and am very glad that I followed through and finished it. I just hate that I did 59 minutes and not 60 lol (anal retentive much?). I'm just gonna call it 60. Multiple times throughout the day I will cradle Logan, and jog in place and make him bounce and flop around--he loves that and laughs super hard. Because I love to hear his laugh I do it often. I've done it twice today already. (His laugh makes my heart pitter patter lol).

I am trying to focus on my fiber intake because I don't think I am eating enough throughout the day (I may be but have never thought about it before). I will know for sure by the end of next week because I am tracking it now. I read on sparkpeople somewhere that a reason for lack of weight loss could be not eating enough fiber. I am 1/2 way there for my daily consumption today. I just want to see if I feel any differently by the end of the week, also.

I also feel like I might be getting sick (the stress of the move maybe?). I am going to start loading up on my vitamin C, echinacea and vitamins (I always forget to take my multi until I get sick pssht). Anyway off to go eat something.

Hope everyone has a great weekend and a great workout! Make today count!

I can do this. I am a star.

Day 72 (day 2 / week 11)

Today is gonna be a day of wills. It's my hubby's birthday, and he likes to eat all the yummy evil foods that if I just look at, it slaps itself to my butt. I am confident that I will be fine, I just hate to have tempting food in the house. I am at the point now, where I see everything as calories (this may be a bad thing, because I can become obsessive with stuff I can control), and if something is itty bitty, and has enough calories to be a small meal or snack, I can easily pass it up. Anyway, I have faith that I will stay strong and nothing will stray me. Even if it does, it's not the end of the world, and not like I won't work it off in the next few days anyway :) (*whew* I feel better now lol).

Today I only did the Turbo Jam 20 minute workout. It is so much fun! Lately I have not been in the mood to exercise, but as soon as I turn Turbo Jam on, I am super happy that I did. SO much fun!

I was kind of having an awkward exercise day, in that I didn't put my hair up, so it threw my balance off (I blame it on the hair lol). First I knocked my glasses off of my face doing speed bags and then one side of my bra unsnapped during the "turbo" portion and that...well that was just a little bit uncomfortable and coincidentally pretty funny. I thought it was high-larious (I am the kind of girl that still laughs when my son farts. You'd think after 2 years, it would stop being funny. Nope! I still lmao everytime). What a difference a pony tail makes! lol.

I hope you all have a great Friday and a great workout! It's almost summer...make today count! :)

I can do this. I am a star.

Day 71 (day 1 / week 11)

I don't know if I mentioned this before, but I bought a new HR monitor at Costco for around $30 (a month or 2 ago??). It's a lot different from my old HR monitor. It actually makes my old one look archaic. My old monitor had 1 button. You pushed it to turn it on, pushed it again when you were finished to get your average HR for that bout of exercise, and then it would turn itself off. if you wanted to see that info again, you would press and hold that button. That was it. It was simple and I miss it lol. My new HR monitor has 3 buttons and 3 booklets that came with it lol. I just use the basic functions that I have been able to figure out pretty easily so far--the clock and i can push the little orange button, and it will find my HR and put it above the time. I push that button again, and it fills the screen (I'm a 1 button kinda gal lol). I haven't figured any of the other features out yet lol. I will try to after we move when I (hopefully) have more time.

I mentioned my HR monitor because I have been using it a lot lately. Today I went for a 90 minute walk with Logan, and my HR stayed steadily between 120-125 BPM. Not bad for just walking! (it's 65-69 as I type this now).

I say all of this, because seeing that my HR was in my target zone for 90 minutes (I'm in my 30's), I might just consider this my exercise for today. I thought about making it a (non)rest day and this might be perfect. I still have a lot of packing to do, and would like to focus on that.

If I get a second wind, I might do the 20 minute workout (Turbo Jam) w/out the gloves (maybe lol). If I do, I will post an update.

Hope everyone is having a good day! I can't believe tomorrow is already Friday (my hubby's birthday). Have a great workout!

I can do this. I am a star.

Day 70 (day 7 / week 10)

Today I did Turbo Jam's Cardio Party Mix 1 again (no surprises there, right? lol). The sculpting gloves feel totally normal to me now and aren't awkward anymore :). Yaay :).

Yesterday I was looking around to see if I could see any sample videos of the other Turbo Jam videos out there (there's other cardio parties, and fat burner videos) and I found one that I was able to download and view on my computer! This is going to be a life saver for when we are moving.

Friday and Sat (26th & 27th) we will load the truck, and will hopefully be on our way Sat afternoon. We are going to stop in a little town called Tonopah, NV and stay there for the night. Sunday morning after breakfast sometime, we will finish the trip to Vegas. We don't need to stop in Tonopah (the trip can easily be made in 1 day) but we are going to anyway, just to make the move easier on us, Logan and the in-laws, since they are graciously flying to Reno to help us with this move.

Since we set the dates on moving and made things concrete, I have been trying to figure out how I am going to exercise on that Saturday and Sunday, as we wont have our TV/DVD hooked up. I know moving boxes and all that is like exercise and all, but that just feels like cheating (too easy!). So finding this video online put my mind at rest. My hubby also reminded me that I could probably just play the DVD I have, on the computer (pssht, way to make it easy bub!) which I might actually do (lol).

Anyway if you want to see this video, here is the link. I found it on youtube, and going there now, to get the link for you guys, it looks like you can download ANY of the Turbo Jam videos they have up to view (in the description--it says "Full video in HQ download form:" and gives a megaupload.com link)--they are actually all of the TJ videos I bought and have been doing for $60 in the TJ Maximum Results except for the last one, which didn't come with Maximum Results (Learn & Burn, Cardio Party Mix 1, 20 Minute Workout, AB Jam and Fat Blaster--the one I downloaded) (this is all probably totally illegal which is why i see they aren't available anymore) lol. I will probably end up buying the entire series set anyway, since I <3 all things Turbo Jam (have I mentioned that yet??) and working out to the computer isn't my forte. It is just for the move. You can see everything I have been talking about for the last week or so there though, so you know what I have been talking about :). I think with that megaupload link, you can view the video on that website w/out having to download it.

Jason has a really great job lead, which is a HUGE blessing! It came out of no where, which to me is a total God thing. When it rains, it pours, and if this job is meant for Jason, it means that I will be able to go back to school right away (and I can buy everything else that is all things Turbo Jam lol). We can really use any and all prayers in this department. It's still kind of scary that we don't have any source of income yet, and 2 (yes 2) car payments to make with a fast dwindeling savings account (it'll be gone by the end of April).

Thank you for your prayers in advance. I hope you enjoy viewing TJ on youtube. I <3 Turbo Jam!

Have a great workout! Try Turbo Jam! It's SO much FUN! Do the 20 minute one, it's only 20 minutes! or the Ab Jam--also 20 minutes, but split into 2 10 minute segments, if you don't want to do both.

(sorry for the super long post today!)

I can do this. I am a star.