Tag Archives | calories

Boo-yah!

By on May 12, 2010 in Uncategorized

Just a quickie to start off the day right.  (Well, actually, it’s right before bedtime on Tuesday, but you know what I mean!)

My week got off to a less-than-ideal start with a no-workout Monday.  I have family in town and I worked until 9pm, at which point my long run was NOT going to happen.  I adjusted my schedule for the week and got in a GREAT run tonight (Tuesday) before getting home at 8pm.

I started with inspiration from the lovely badass Tara.  I decided it would be neat to find out how fast I can run a mile.  Believe it or not, I’ve never actually timed myself running one mile.  I’ve timed 5Ks and I time all of my runs, for the most part, but never just a mile.

I hopped on the treadmill and, after a 5 minute warmup, I reset the machine and started at a 5.0.  I didn’t know if I could maintain that for a full mile, but I figured aiming for a 12 minute mile would be a great place to start, and if I didn’t make it?  Well, it would give me something to shoot for.  About 8 minutes in, I got distracted and started to feel like I needed to slow down, but by then I only had four minutes to go.  I can do almost anything for 4 minutes, right?

So I dialed it in and then at 11 minutes, I realized that if I pushed it a bit, I could bring it in at under 12 minutes.  So, I punched my speed up to 5.5 and you know what?  It was totally fine.  A bit fast for me to sustain for a long time, but I could’ve maintained that speed for at least a few minutes.  Too bad I had to stop the treadmill and jump off at one mile to take a photo of the readout – 11:56!  Of course, I don’t have the cord to download the photo, so I’ll be back to post it later this week.

I’m so excited – my first timed mile and I made it in 11:56!  Who knows what I’ll do next time?  I think I’m going to try doing this about once a week or so to keep track of my progress.

Also, inspired by the fact that running at 5.5 didn’t kill me, I decided to turn the rest of my run into a fartlek (interval workout).  I ran 60 seconds at a time at speeds varying from 5.0 to 6.5, and did a fast recovery walk for 2 minutes in between.  I sweat like a stuck pig (I’m pretty sure I’m mixing metaphors here, but you get the point) but it. felt. awesome.

Oh, and my calories?  Dialed in at 1,814.

THAT is what I’m talkin’ about.

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Weekly Report

By on February 20, 2010 in Uncategorized

Whew, it’s been two weeks since I’ve had time made time to sit down and do my weekly report.  I’m happy to report that aside from the two evenings early this week where I made some poor choices, my eating has been spot on this week.  My workouts are also going well – Zumba Thursday night, a kick-a$$ weight training session last night, and today I’m going running.  In the 55+ degree, sunny Seattle weather, no less!  :)

I won’t make you wait for the weigh-in results – I’m up 1.0 to 248.6.  Here are this week’s weigh-ins, workouts, calories eaten, and calories burned:

My deficit for the week is over 7K calories, so I should have lost over 2 pounds.  Instead I’m up 1 pound, but I am not discouraged.  I know my body is changing – someone noticed yesterday that my arms are getting more toned, and I just bought a pair of jeans in a size smaller (18) than I’m mostly wearing now.  So I know my body is making progress and it will just take some time before that progress shows up on the scale.

You might have noticed two days where I didn’t weigh in – Sunday I wasn’t home so I couldn’t, and Thursday I forgot!  I also have two days (Saturday and Sunday) where I didn’t track my food.  I’m estimating I ate around 2,500 calories both days – they were higher than normal, but not outrageous.

Here’s my weekly progress chart from Sparkpeople:

For today I’ve got breakfast, lunch, and a snack tracked.  My husband and I are going out for a belated Valentine’s dinner tonight to a fabulous restaurant in Seattle called Osteria La Spiga – I’m super excited!  The food is excellent and they have a sampler menu where you get to try several of their dishes, which they serve with flights of wine.  I’m budgeting 1,500 calories for the meal but I think I can bring it in closer to 1,000 calories.  My husband will probably get the sampler, so I’ll get something else healthy and just try a few bites from his plate.  Gotta enjoy my wine, though!

What are y’all up to this weekend?  How did your week go?

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Weekly Report

By on February 6, 2010 in Uncategorized

Morning friends.  Happy Saturday!  I hope y’all are coming off a successful, healthy week and looking forward to the weekend.  I know I am!  Before I forget, don’t y’all forget to leave a comment on this post to enter my first giveaway ever!  You can also enter here and here to maximize your chances of winning the book.

Getting used to the numbers and charts here yet?  Here’s one for you; it’s a Weekly Progress Report for how I did with my eating this week:

Today’s numbers are a little low for now, since I don’t know how my evening is going to look.  I’m having a sleepover!  No, I’m not a dork (well, yes, actually, I am, but not for this reason!).  I have a niece and nephews who are DYING to come stay the night at Va-Va’s house.  Va-Va – that’s what they call me – isn’t it great?  My name is Valerie and the oldest one started calling me Va-Va instead of Aunt Valerie, and it stuck!

The kidlets love macaroni and cheese, so I looked up a Paula Deen recipe for homemade mac & cheese and modified it to make it healthier.  I’ll use Barilla Plus pasta, low fat cheese, and light sour cream in place of the “regular” versions of all those ingredients.  Served with chicken and veggies, that will be our dinner.  No sleepover is complete without a treat, so I’m picking up sorbet and individual ice cream cups – the kids can choose between them.  I might even splurge and make a small bit of homemade whipped cream.  We’re also baking banana bread, so I’ve left my calories low for the day (already tracked dinner & treat) so I can have a piece if I choose.  Maybe one tomorrow, too.  :)

My workouts this week were pretty great – here’s my summary for the week:

Date                            Day                  Weight        Workout Details

1/30/2010 Saturday 248.6 off
1/31/2010 Sunday 251.4 chores/cooking/lifestyle activity
2/1/2010 Monday 251.4 running/core
2/2/2010 Tuesday 250.6 strength training am
2/3/2010 Wednesday 250.4 running pm
2/4/2010 Thursday 250.6 walking pm/zumba pm
2/5/2010 Friday 248.6 off
2/6/2010 Saturday 247.6 running

As you can see, today’s official weigh-in puts me at one pound below where I was last week.  TOM is here (sorry, guys) and by the numbers I should have lost 2-3 pounds this week.  It’s okay – it’ll come off one way or the other.  My strength training has suffered this week as I’m babying both a sore shoulder and a strained gluteus muscle.  I have no idea why they are sore or how they got that way, but I’ve adjusted my workouts to give them time to heal and will get back to weight training this week as they are both feeling about 90% today.

A Revelation

And just because Saturday’s aren’t complete without something more, I want to share something I realized yesterday.  I was walking over to Subway to grab a sandwich for lunch when I started thinking about the fact that I will be living like this for the rest of my life.  For the rest of my life, I will need to pay attention to what I eat, plan my meals, cook healthy foods, workout regularly, etc.  And when I asked myself if I could do this for the rest of my life, the answer was a resounding YES!

If you read last week’s Saturday post, you might remember that I had a “who am I??!” moment when I realized that I was only going to splurge if I felt like it.  (In case I need to explain why that’s incredible, in the past if I had a splurge coming, I would splurge whether I really wanted to or not, just because I could.)  As I had this revelation yesterday, that I really could see myself living this way for the rest of my life, I had a similar moment.

In previous attempts at weight loss, I either ignored the future, preferring to fantasize that it would take care of itself, or I lived under the illusion that maintaining would be easy once I got to goal.  I refused to consider whether I could make a lifelong commitment to this lifestyle, partly because I just couldn’t see myself making that commitment, and partly because the way I was losing weight was not something I could commit to for the rest of my life – who wants to live life at the extremes?

So this revelation is nothing dramatic or extreme.  It’s just a very settled feeling within me.  Yes, I am eating healthy, planning my meals, cooking more, and working out because I want to lose weight.  But I am also able to look at the lifestyle I’m leading now and, very comfortably, say that I can and will live like this for the rest of my life.  And it’s not a scary, deprived feeling, because the fruits of these efforts – being at a healthier weight, feeling good, knowing I can do the things I want to do and weight won’t hold me back – are well worth it.

This got way longer than I intended so I’ll keep the rest of my thoughts for another post!  Cheers everyone!

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Weekly Report (Beware, lots of numbers!)

By on January 23, 2010 in Uncategorized

Hello friends,

Happy weekend!  I hope y’all are as glad to see Saturday as I am!  It’s been an insanely busy week in my life, both personally and professionally.  My business is starting to grow a bit, which is wonderful, but having a full-time day job makes it hard to keep up.  My sleep has suffered this week, which I don’t do well with.  That’s okay – I’m taking today to do housey, personal stuff (and veg out a little) and tomorrow will be a productive hit-day so I don’t go into next week with a to-do list 3 miles long.

Without further ado, my official weigh-in for the week has me at 251.8.  Crap!  My weight chart, along with details about my workouts and calories, is below.

A few things pop out at me.  First, I need to cut down on those “off” days!  Because my schedule has been so busy, I’ve prioritized tougher workouts (strength training, zumba) but let my “active lifestyle” workouts (walking, biking, etc.) fall by the wayside.  Those puppies make a serious difference in my calorie burn for the week, so they are going back on the priority list.  Today I’m heading out for a run (40 minutes-ish) and tomorrow I’ll go for a walk at the very least.

Second, I really want to get a third day of strength training in each week.  I’ve made two per week which is great progress.  But I want more.  This means I’ll be doing strength training Monday, Wednesday, and Friday.  Zumba is Thursday.  I’ll really only need 1-2 more workouts to fill in what I’ve done.  Anything more will be gravy.  (Yes, I just said that on a weight-loss blog…booyah! lol)

If you’re interested to know more details about my calories, here’s my SparkPeople Weekly Progress Chart:

Although I am tempted to cut back on my calories, I am not going to do that just yet.  As you can see, my calories are falling right around the 1800-2000 range pretty much every day.  These are high-quality calories; I’m not eating junk.  For the most part I keep my sodium down, too – except last Sunday – look at the sodium from the chicken teriyaki stir-fry at my sister’s place!

Here’s how my BodyBugg numbers are shaking out:

I don’t use the BodyBugg software to track my calories – it was just going to require too much effort to load all my favorite foods into their database, and I don’t see the point given that SparkPeople already has everything I want on there.

My average daily calorie burn is 2,970.  (Although, I would like to point out that Thursday I  broke 4,000 calories!) My average daily calorie intake over this time period has been 2,103.  That’s an average daily deficit of 867.  In the 15 day period I’m looking at, my total calorie deficit has been 13,005, which should translate into a loss of roughly 3.7 pounds.  I’ve actually lost 4 pounds in that time, so I’m sitting right about where I should be for the last two weeks.

If your head is spinning from all the math and you’re wondering why I just did all this (or why the heck I just told y’all!), I don’t blame you!  I wanted to do this for myself, so I could really grasp and understand the numbers behind where I’m at now.  Here’s what I’m learning:

  • Even though my calories have been 100% dialed in this week, my average over the last 2 weeks hasn’t been as good.
  • Even though my weight went UP this week, I’m down 4 pounds overall during this time period.
  • I’m not working out as much as I thought I was.
  • One super high calorie meal really does make a difference.  If my calories last Saturday had been at 2,000 instead of nearly 4K, my average calorie intake per day for this 15-day time period would have been around 1,900.  That’s a difference of 200 calories/day, or 1400 calories/week.  Over a year’s time,that’s a difference of TWENTY POUNDS, people!

I’ve recently run in to folks in blogland and IRL who’re struggling for one reason or another.  Folks who say, my diet has been 100% on track and I’m working out like a fiend, but I’m not losing weight.  I think there are many reasons for that.  Are you building muscle but losing FAT?  Are you measuring and tracking every bite, lick, and taste (BLT) you eat?  Are you, perhaps, eating too LITTLE?  Are you working out less than you think you are?

There are many reasons why we don’t lose weight in any given week.  One of them is self-delusion.  Another is that what we do OVER TIME matters as much as what we do on any given day.  And broadening our lens so we can see a larger chunk of time (like 2 weeks) can totally change our perspective on how we’ve eaten, worked out, and/or lost for that time period.

Anyhow, this sounds an awful lot like I’m trying to explain away my gain for the week.  And, in a way, I am.  I’m trying to understand why I gained so I can change my behaviors moving forward.  Here’s what I’ve got to do:

  • Keep up the work I’ve done this last week with my food.  I’m eating super well and I need to stay committed to that.  This means continuing to shop, cook, track, and pack my meals in advance of each day.  This also means I will have to give up some of my precious relaxation time this weekend to prepare some whole, healthy foods for next week.  (My inner rebellious teenager is stomping her foot now, but this time I’m giving her the finger!)
  • I need to make exercise, both high-intensity and lifestyle, an absolute priority in life.  That means I will have to schedule every workout in advance.  I’ll pull out my calendar today and do that from now.
  • Keep my weekly splurge meal to a more reasonable calorie total.  I’m thinking that since my daily calorie average (less that crazy meal last week) is right around 1,900/day, I will give myself one day/week where I can eat up to 2,500 calories.  That won’t throw my numbers off too much, but will still allow me to plan for a serious indulgence regularly.

What do y’all think?  Any suggestions for me, or am I on the right track?  Does taking a step back and looking at the bigger picture help you not go off the deep end when you have a week where you don’t lose?

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Sunday Musings

By on January 17, 2010 in Uncategorized

Morning!

I never used to post on the weekends, but I have to say that posting daily (or nearly daily) has been so helpful to me.  I now understand what Sean Anderson means when he says his blog is his therapy.  This blog has been that for me, and is, I think, the real difference between my current determination to lose weight and get healthy and all the attempts I’ve made in the past.

I had an interesting day yesterday, capped off by a HUGE dinner.  Wait, wait, don’t freak out – I planned for it!  I’ll back up a bit and explain.

You know how Beck allows/advocates having a small daily “treat” so that you never feel deprived of the things you love to eat?  I decided to forego my daily treats this week and plan for a decadent meal out on Saturday.  My brother-in-law is in town visiting, and on of my hubby’s favorite restaurants is the Icon Grill in downtown Seattle.  The food there is amazing, but it is also extremely high in calories!  So I budgeted 2,000 calories for dinner.  Yes, you read that correctly – 2,000 calories for one meal!

I knew the meal would mean I’d see a gain this morning, partially from the calories and partially from the sodium that’s present in all restaurant food.  I also knew I would be facing one of my biggest hurdles that I’ve struggled with in life before – getting back on track after a planned indulgence.  Whether the indulgence in the past has been for one meal or a full week (vacation, maybe), I’ve always had such. a. hard. time. getting back to a healthy pattern of eating afterward.  I need to overcome that.  I need to practice getting back on track after an indulgence until it becomes easy.

So Saturday’s meal was a convenient time to indulge and practice, today, immediately getting back to my healthy choices.  The meal was wonderful – we shared two appetizers (there were 4 of us): macaroni and cheese and artichoke gruyere dip.  Mmm.  The mac and cheese at the Icon Grill is one thing it’s famous for; here’s a photo:

I ate about 3/4 cup of the mac & cheese, and 3 tiny pieces of grilled bread with the artichoke/gruyere dip on top.  I also had another piece of bread with a flavored butter from the bread basket.

I ordered filet of sole for dinner, and it came with sweet corn and cilantro mashed potatos and steamed broccoli.  I ate 3/4 cup of the mashers, all the broccoli, and between 1/2 and 2/3 of the fish.  The fish came with a lovely lemon butter sauce with actual chunks of lemon in it – beautiful bursts of flavor on the tongue!

The kicker was dessert – we split the following: icon’s Hot Fudge Sundae: Olympic Mountain Vanilla Bean ice cream in a cookie
bowl with icon’s cone of hot fudge sauce and your choice of toppings.

This is not like any sundae you have ever seen in your life!  It comes in a huge bowl (slightly larger than a taco salad shell bowl) made of ice cream cone stuff.  Like a huge waffle bowl, I guess.  Easily 6 large scoops of ice cream, with a cone tower full of hot fudge sticking out of it.  The server smothered the ice cream in the hot fudge and then asked us if we wanted slivered almonds, mini m&ms, chocolate chip cookie chunks, and whipped cream.  Of course everyone said “yes!” to all four (nuts on the side please), and we proceeded with our pathetic attempt to eat that puppy.

I had about 1C of ice cream with the assorted toppings.  It was great.  I put my spoon down when I wanted to keep eating, because I knew the next few bites would be the difference between simply feeling full, and feeling nauseatingly full.  And because leaving food you love behind is one of the things Beck asks you to practice.

So my day ended as planned, with a serious calorie splurge, but without me going crazy.  And what’s even better is that I woke up with morning with NO QUESTION that I would go back to life as usual in terms of planning, tracking, and eating my normal healthy foods.  Huh.  That’s a pretty cool feeling, friends.

Here’s how my week ended nutritionally:

As you can see, my totals for 1/16 are extremely high*, and I’m planning a moderately low day (for me) today to compensate somewhat.  I’m also staying away from all processed foods (which I usually do) and drinking plenty of water so I can flush some of the sodium from yesterday out of my system.

What do you all think?  Am I rationalizing a bad choice?  Is this something you might do?  How might you have handled things differently?  Do I suck as a weight loss blogger because I just posted all this information about a crazy, high-calorie meal I ate?  If so, mea culpa and I’m sorry.

*Note: I overestimated on nearly everything I ate at dinner; I wanted to have as accurate as possible an idea of what I ate, and didn’t want to risk underestimating.  It’ll all come out in the wash at the end of the week, I figure.

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