Ok, I'm impressed.

From the time I finished round 5 just one week ago, I have stuck to my eating and somewhat to the workouts while waiting for my round 6 to start with an online group.  In that one week I worked out a pitiful 2 days, but managed to lose 2.2 pounds!  I think my body's got the message... WE'RE ON A MISSION HERE!!!  So today is the official start of round 6 and I'm weighing in at 146.8. Whoop! Whoop!!!  1.8 pounds from my original goal. Now, I'm not a coach or in any way affiliated with Beachbody, but dang! This program knows how to get results!!!  I am absolutely in love and am a true believer that if we focus on REAL food your body and life will completely change.  It's taken me a long time to figure out the eating part of it and where my shakeology should fit in, but things have really come together for me and I'm reaping the rewards and loving it.

 It's a strange phenomenon that we eat each day, multiple times a day, yet the food we eat isn't usually fuel. It's crap!  And when it comes to RE-training yourself to eat food for fuel, it's a real challenge.  We have become so disconnected from the sources of our food that we have forgotten how to use and prepare real, natural, whole food. This has been a great challenge that I have met head on.  Today, I cooked a spaghetti squash and tomorrow I will turn it into...SPAGHETTI!!!  We'll see how it goes 😀

When I get lucky, Scott joins me in my workout and today was Plyo! ie. jumping with weights.  Definitely a hard workout, but he does his best all while yelling at Autumn telling her what a horrible program this is and that his legs are going to fall off.  I'm not sure if he helps me work harder or just makes me laugh when we do this together. I definitely know is harder to breathe trying not to laugh at all the "what the heck!?!" "You have got to be kidding!!!" and "no flippin way am I doing that!!!" going on.  Maybe one day he'll start to like it...

One Month Later

This has been a great month!  I joined a 21 day fix group that started on December 1st and have been accountable to my coach and others on the page.  It has been a great three weeks with lots of challenges and growing.  These past few weeks I have learned that I have very little self control when it comes to food.  I don't like to tell myself "no" and I make excuses or try to justify to myself why I can have something.  I'm great with my workouts, but not so much with my eating.  After the whole three weeks were over and I analyzed my weekly weigh-ins I realized I could have lost 9-12 pounds this round if I had stayed on track with my nutrition.  I was losing an average of 5 pounds a week and then gaining a few back, losing a few more, gaining it back, etc.  Such a silly game I play.  So, three weeks ago I started at 152.6 pounds and today 21 days later I am weighing in at 149 pounds.  WHOOP WHOOP!!!!  I have officially broke into the 140s!!!!  My friends, that is a very beautiful number.  Technically I only have 4 more pounds to lose to get to my pre-baby #5 weight, however, the closer I get, I'm still noticing so many areas where I have an abundance of fat, so I think my new goal will be 135 pounds.  I'm going to monitor my photos as I go, because I can look very gaunt if I lose too much weight.  Once I get to my "perfect" weight, I will go into maintenance and just work on toning.

I have become a lot more experimental in the kitchen.  In the 21 day fix they say "failing to plan is planning to fail" and when it comes to food prep, there couldn't be anything further from the truth.  Not having healthful meals ready is a HUGE mistake and a big opportunity for failure on the nutrition side.  I'm really starting to enjoy cooking in large batches and portioning out the food into containers to grab and go.  This takes all the thought out of my daily routine and gives me one less area to fail in.  Food prep along with my scheduled daily workouts has brought so much structure into my day and really helped calm me.  It's strange, I guess it's a nice unplanned side affect from the 21 day fix program.  Makes me happy!  :)

I am posting my latest photo collage below of my BEFORE pictures and my pictures after this round 5.  I'm seeing abs and a whole lot skinnier me.  I love it!  Taking pictures has been absolutely imperative during this program for me to see my results.  The scale is one thing, but actually seeing how far you've come is completely amazing.  Some day I plan on measuring and when I do I'll post those numbers :)

I hope you are all working hard, eating healthy and seeing amazing results!

Until next time, happy sweating!!!

I CAN DO PUSH UPS!!!!!!

So, life-long problem for me... push ups.  Never could do them no matter how hard I tried.  Until now, that is.  Five rounds into 21 day fix and fix extreme and I can do 10 push ups!!! Whoop WHOOP!!!!  I am SO celebrating this as a huge non scale victory.  Huge as in I deserve a glass of wine, but I'm not going to because I've had one too many carbs today, huge.  And that's huge!

On another note, I have been failing pretty miserably this round(five) at my workouts.  I have had so much going on this month with the holidays and emotional drama that my workouts and eating have been seriously suffering.  Out of 30 days this month, I worked out a grand total of.......wait for it......................15.  That's an F.  A big... fat... F.   But then, I got this brilliant idea to weigh myself the other day!  I squinced my eyes as I stepped onto the scale dreading the number I would see.  I was sure I was going to be up the five pounds I had just lost, but when I opened them, I couldn't believe the scale.  I had lost weight!  What the heck!?!?!  I lost weight going through three Thanksgivings.  Holy cow is my body awesome!  I'm going to try and do much better with this December round.  Still round 5, but starting again.  This round 5 is going to take me two and a half months at this rate!  Lame...  lame...lame Lisa.  Gotta get my act together.

I have noticed that I'm getting so strong I am no longer shaking in a lot of the 60 second exercises.  It's so cool being able to firmly plant myself and do the workout and still feel strong at the end.  Beats feeling like I'm going to puke or collapse, that's for sure!

And finally, I have a grand total of 7 pounds left to lose to be at my pre-baby weight.  I'm very proud.  I'ts hard to believe I'm almost in the 140s again.  Honestly, I didn't think I was going to see them again, EVER.  I had almost resigned to the fact that I have five kids and this is my new mom body that just won't ever look like that again.  I'm so happy to be proving myself wrong.



Until later,

Happy sweating!!!

Down on myself

It's been just over two weeks since I finished round four of the 21 day fix program.  Two rounds of 21 day fix and 2 rounds of 21 day fix extreme.  I'm so proud of how far I've come, as seen in my pictures from my last post.  However, stress from work, five kids, single parenthood and starting my own business has led to massive frustration/self-doubt and has seriously derailed me.  I have learned a lot from the last two weeks.  One thing, I noticed that when things get tough, I am the first person who gets put on the back burner (I do it to myself) and every priority of mine is sidelined to make room for everyone else.  I think it's called Mommy Syndrome.  Take care of everyone but yourself...  And I'm so not okay with this!  I'm so stinkin' frustrated with myself and not feeling like I deserve it enough to make a time each day that is MINE and ONLY mine.  I love the results I'm getting from the program and I loved feeling empowered by seeing myself physically strong.  Another part of me however, is just plain lazy and uses the above reasons as excuses, because honestly, some days I could squeeze it in, but I find a reason to put it off until later and later never comes.

I'm also having a really hard time eating clean and sticking to my portion containers.  Lately, I have absolutely no self-control and eat anything and everything that I want.  I think to myself "why can't I have it?" or "this program is too restricting".  Just a couple excuses...  After I eat it, I feel like crap for being so weak, which has been a great eye-opener.  I know exactly what I'm going to do for Lent, eat clean for 21 days straight.  It's a great type of self-denial and serious growth when you can deny yourself an indulgent food.  And it's not like I'm going to starve myself, it's just having an awareness and discipline to say no.  I'm excited yet scared of failure to start tonight with strengthening my will power and sticking to it.  I know it will happen and when it does, the results are going to happen like crazy!

So... tonight is the night that I am deciding I am important!  I am worthy!  I am deserving of a hot mom body!  And I'm going to stop being lazy and cheating myself.  Everyone else can give me one hour a day to myself and they'll survive.  They really will.  And I'll survive sticking to a workout schedule and clean eating.  I won't starve.  I really won't.

Happy sweating!

My photo of inspiration for the week.

Four rounds down!

Today is my official four round anniversary.  I have done two rounds of 21 day fix and two rounds of 21 day fix extreme.  I put together a collage so I could see the difference since I am such a visual person.  I haven't weighed myself yet, but just looking at the pictures, I am AMAZED!!!

This transformation has happened in just three months!  Three!!!  I have stuck to the eating plan fairly well and worked out almost every day a week.

I've still got a long way to go, definitely not fully toned and still have lots of baby fat left, but I'm so thrilled to share my results and journey with you all.

Keep pushing and keep working.  It's so worth it!!!
I'll weigh in later and post it :)

Happy sweating!!!

Non Scale Victory

It's been a bit of a rough past few weeks with me doubting my ability to do this workout/eating program and having a lot of frustrations in life with pretty much everything.  This week I have a nasty cold, so I skipped two days of working out.  Good excuse, right???  It was.  Anywho, today I'm feeling a bit better, so I decided to get back on track and what exercise am I on in the 21 Day Fix Extreme program?  Leg day!!!!  Oh...my...goodness.  I felt like I was going to puke then die!  Still being a little sick must've really kicked my behind, because I was in such sad shape.  The workout was HARD!  VERY HARD!  But, I'm so proud to say that I did each exercise without modifications and I did the complete 30 minutes.  I was so happy!  But there's something I was even more ecstatic about, the fact that I worked out in shorts.  You see, I hate my legs.  They're ugly.  And after having 5 kids, I have far from attractive thighs.  I've always had cellulite since as long as I can remember and I've had saddle bags aka. pointy thighs.  That's where my pregnancy weight goes, straight to the thighs.  But today, for some reason I thought I'd put on my shorts and see how it looked.  Crazy scary idea considering every time I've looked at myself in the mirror when wearing shorts I ended up blind for the next 24 hours from the hideousness.  Okay, not really.  Anyways, this particular pair of shorts had a little hang up going over my thighs.  Pre-baby it slid on just fine.  Post-baby, I had to do that little girly jump/wiggle to get something too small over your a little too large hips or thighs.  Today, I didn't have to do that.  It was so weird, they slid right on!  I was shocked!!!!  Is this the same pair of shorts that had been clinging to my thighs just weeks before?  Why yes it was!  They were loose on my thighs!  Quite loose.  And they looked good!  Now, understand that for me to think a pair of shorts looks good on MY legs is a big deal.  It's a FREAKING BIG DEAL and I'm so happy to say this freaking big deal just happened to me :)  So naturally, I worked out in those lovely shorts and instead of looking at my legs with disgust and shame throughout the workout as I had in the past, I looked at them and smiled with pride.  Damn!  I've got nice legs!!!




That, folks is my non-scale victory.  I hope you're inspired to keep on trucking, because although the scale may not budge you're changing your body's shape.

Happy sweating!

Round 3 done!

Today was day 21 of my third round, this round though was the 21 day fix EXTREME. I was crazy nervous to see my results and weigh myself, but evening came and the time was here. My results are... I am down 5.2 pounds in just 3 weeks!!!! I can hardly believe it! I haven't been measuring, just weighing and taking pictures, because I'm a very visual person and it means a lot more to me to see the difference. I am beyond proud of myself and am so excited for this next round to see if I can do just as well or better. A few pictures for you to see the difference.

 Both pictures on the left are my before photos. The pictures on the right are after 3 rounds. Im so impressed with the change. Down a total of 9 pounds in 9 weeks. I'll take it!

Keep up all the hard work. It is so worth it!