Weigh In & #amerryworkoutpledge

Well I went to Weight Watchers and weighed in on Tuesday. After my 4 pound gain 2 weeks ago, I am happy to report that I've lose 3 of those pounds. My current weight is 290.2 and my total loss is 23.6.

I am excited that even after taking a week off, mind you my birthday week, that I've rebounded and I've got the scale going in the right direction. I am hoping to combat all the little gains I've had over the last month or so and really focus on hitting my 10% this month; which is 282.8. Which means I have a month to lose 7.8 pounds. If I can average 2 pounds per week, this will be easily accomplished.

I've made a decision to stick with Weight Watchers through the fall. I think that the meetings really help me, and the weigh-ins are good for me. I can't justify it away. The weight has to come off.

The reason I didn't post this sooner was that Tuesday night, I took my stepmother to the local drive in to see Eclipse. She is a "twihard", I on the other hand could care less, regardless, we both had a great time and she was so thrilled that I went. My dad was thrilled to as now he didn't have to go with her. I have to say, the movie is enjoyment, but I just don't get all the hype.

I also on Tuesday, I offered up my blog to host this month's installment of #amerryworkoutpledge. I first had said that it would be until 3pm, but at 3pm, I only had 3 comments, 2 of which were my own. So I extended until 8am the following morning and I posted on my facebook page for everyone to see. One of my friends picked right up and commented away, but still at the end of the day, only 17 comments! That would have translated to 7 minutes 30 seconds of cardio. Barely enough to get my heart rate in the zone. So I scrapped the whole thing and offered up that instead of it being 30 sec of cardio, that it will be 17 hours of working out this week.

Yesterday, I went horseback riding. Although I was only planning on being at the farm for an hour or two, I ended up being there the whole day, 9:30am to 5pm! My friend with the farm had many children over, so I helped out with barn chores. Basically, I got to play with animals all day. Included was chasing down the donkey who got out of his pen. I was running around all day, and today, I feel it. My legs and arms hurt. What a great feeling though! So I plan on counting that as 7 hours of cardio/working out. Only 10 more hours to go!

I do plan on hitting the gym tonight for another hour or so. And hopefully get some more time in throughout the weekend. It's the fourth of July and I'm scheduled to work this weekend. DBF is off to Rhode Island to visit with his best friend, I wish I could go with him, but sadly, someone has to work. Those phones don't answer themselves. I have a sneaky suspicion with how nice the forecast is, that the beaches will be packed this weekend. So while DBF is out of town and when (and if) I get some time off from work this weekend, I plan on putting some more hours in.

I hope if you are celebrating the fourth of July, that you celebrate responsibly! Wear sunscreen and stay hydrated!

How many hours a week do you commit to working out?

It's that time of the month

NO!!.... not that time of month....

But, it is time for #amerryworkoutpledge! This was started a few months ago from Mary from A Merry Life and her need for a kick in the pants, well turns out that other bloggers joined in and became a pledge of sorts. That every month we pledge to do a sizeable workout at the end of the month.

Well I'm offering my blog up to host this month's installment of #amerryworkoutpledge as I can really use the motivation to get my behind to the gym. This will be my third month of participating (I missed the inaugural #amerryworkoutpledge).

What I need you lovely readers to do, is comment here on this post. 30 seconds will be added for every comment between now (8am) and 3pm EST. I will then post on twitter the total amount of time that was "pledged" Anyone that wants to participate and pledge can, let me know here! Also include your twitter handle, as we usually tweet while working out. You can do whatever you'd like, so long as you are moving! If the time is too much to do at once, then you can break it up into smaller sections. The biggest point is that you are moving.

After you complete the pledge, if you do a post pledge blog post, let me know, I'll link it on mine!

So there you go, I am opening up the floodgates, comment away! I dare ya!

**UPDATE** we are going through till tomorrow morning; 8am EST - I need to do more than a minute of cardio.... 

A Merry Workout Pledge Recap

A Merry Workout Pledge started over on Mary's site. I didn't participate last month; I didn't know about it till I saw Kat and Steve tweet about #amerryworkoutpledge (twitter handle), that is how I found Mary's blog and instantly became a follower!

So this month when Steve hosted the workout pledge post, I jumped at the opportunity to pledge! Last month was 90 minutes of cardio, I could only imagine what this month's total would be....

.... 221 comments, which translated into

                           110 minutes and 30 seconds of cardio.....

OMFG.... I have never done that much cardio in one setting. I liked Mary's take on it. It can seem like a large number so breaking it up throughtout a day seemed do-able. But I really wanted to try and see if I could do it (a bit of a challenge to myself).

The whole purpose of the challenge is to move more. Challenge yourself to move more. Well actually, I believe the first challenge was to help encourage Mary to get back to the gym, but it created a new life and grew into something bigger.

It's great when the bloggy world comes together for something good.

I needed to get back to the gym, between working crazy and being sick forever, I haven't been to the gym. The weather has been nice, so I would rather do something outside. So today, on a bright and warm day (65 degrees) I went to the gym, sat down on a stationary bike and busted out some cardio. My machine would only go for 60 minutes (plus a 5 minute "cool down") so I had to get a little creative.

I did a total of 23.57 miles. Seemed like I was kicking ass the last 45 minutes! If you can trust the machine, looks like I had a good calorie burn.

My usual cardio machine of choice is the elliptical, and I felt as though the machines were staring at me, like I had openly cheated on them with another... but really 110 minutes, I needed to be more comfortable for the long haul.

The first 30 minutes or so was just spent trying to get comfortable, I would end up either with an ass cramp or pain in my calves. I was constantly re-adjusting the seat. Then I hit a stride that carried me to the end, until I had about 5 minutes to go and my knee pain started, so I just re-adjusted my seat again and slowed down, it seemed to work.

I tweeted about having my ass cramp and going through my entire Glee selection of songs. I ended up watching 90% of Evan Almighty since it was on one of the tv's and even read a few chapters of my book. I like using the bike, it's great if you need to multi-task or tweet during your workout.

All in all, I am super proud of myself for having completed this workout pledge/challenge. And it's great to read some of the recaps, I can't wait to read some more. I was pleased also just to get back into the gym.

And because Steve likes sweaty after pics, here are mine! (I almost forgot to do this, hence why I am in my car. Trust me the outfit was significantly soaked in sweat.)

Lovin the hair! Forgot my Bondi Band!

I can't wait to see what happens next month! Any more time, and I may have to switch to breaking the challenge into multiple cardio sessions.

One thing I did notice, is that people were looking at me, probably wondering what my fat ass was doing on a bike for so long... but I caught several people looking over at me and looking at the time to see how long I had been going. Not sure what it was, am I that much of a hot mess when I do cardio? Meh, just something that I noted.

Weigh-In & #amerryworkoutpledge

Starting weight: 313.8
Last week's weight: 291.6
This week's weight: 283.0
Loss: -8.6

Total loss: -30.8

Wow... honestly, I don't know where this came from. I was anticipating a loss, being sick and all... I haven't been eating much. I am feeling better, but still not 100% and for those of you counting this is day 6... I should be all better by now :-(

So I'm now 0.2 pounds away from my 10% goal. I would like to maintain it for a week before collecting my 10% keychain.

Really? I'm happy (super excited) about losing this weight. But I am having doubts, I mean that is an absurd amount of weight to loose in one week. Like Biggest Loser type numbers we are talking about. Do I think I can sustain and possibly loose more next week? I am going to try, but I am doubtful. That is the most amount of weight I have lost in a single week. Something is off, whether it was being sick or not eating enough, I just feel a rebound coming next week.

Don't get me wrong, I am excited about my loss, to finally see the scale going in the right direction, but I am looking for long lasting weight loss, not the dramatic short term stuff...

I did manage to go to Zumba last night. I am finding that the ab work is coming a bit easier to me and I can do the exercise longer, I am happy about that. I did bring a box of tissues with me to Zumba, my friends thought I was crazy, but I really wanted to go and at least move a little, since I haven't done anything exercise/fitness related in almost a week! The bondi band held well and I am working on a review post. (Side note, I will never be a fitness model, the pictures of me are horrible!)

Logging onto twitter this morning I see that Steve, Kat Kerri and Mary are at it again! With there #amerryworkoutpledge (twitter hashtag). Go over to Steve's post and comment. For every comment between now and 4pm (Eastern Standard Time) will be 30 sec added to a cardio workout. Since I can't work out today, I am electing to do my pledge Friday day. How long will you make me work out Friday day ;-)