And so it begins...the Summer Lovin' Challenge

Gooooood morning, lovely ladies!  Since I last checked, I have a new follower for a total of 8!  Hello hello, I hope like my little blog.  : )

Today marks the beginning of Alexia's Summer Lovin' Challenge, a two-part, eight-week, healthy-habit-establishing endeavour sure to rock my socks off!  Er, well it would...if I ever wore socks...  Anyway, there's two parts to this post, so read it when you're home from work/class and have all the time in the world to listen to me!  Teehee.

Part One: The Plan

So here's my plan for this thing.  I'm not using a caloric cap (how will she ever lose weight?! you may be asking).  Instead, I'm focusing on eating the right amount of properly portioned servings of healthy foods.  Fruits, veggies, whole grains, lean protein, and a little dairy thrown in for kicks.

Sidenote: If you have no idea what a proper portion size is, like me a few months ago, check out Mayo Clinic's website. They have a literal asston of information on healthy living and active lifestyles.  

The Food: A while back, I did one of their free assessments that tells you what you should be eating to lose weight and gives you a personalized food pyramid.  Swanky!  My food pyramid says that I should be eating 3 servings of fruit, 4 servings of veggies, 4 servings of carbs, 3 servings of protein/dairy, 3 servings healthy fats, and up to 75 calories in sweets.

The Treat: I know that it's pretty much impossible to do anything 100%, 100% of the time.  I also know that I need a treat every once in a while to keep myself from going off track (aka, running away from it as fast as I can).  I just got a job, HALLELUJAH, at one of my favorite restaurants in town.  They serve Greek and American food, and have the best.damn.falafels I have ever had.  So, once a week, I'm going to treat myself to a falafel sandwich.  If I've been really, really good that week I might even have some fries.  If that doesn't sound like much of a treat to you, you have no idea how good these things are.  I would much rather have one of these falafels than ice cream, or even chocolate!  I'll be looking forward to it every week, that's for sure. 

The Beverage:  Only water or tea.  No soda, sugary iced tea, or sugary fruit juices.  I may have a glass of skim milk every once in a while or some Crystal Lighty kind of thing, but mostly it's gonna be water.  Water, agua, H20.

The Exercise: My goal is to do something that makes me sweat for thirty minutes each day.  That's a great healthy habit to establish.  This exercise could be running, biking, yoga, walking at a fast pace, practicing bellydance, or doing a strength/cardio circuit.  Just gotta get my sweat on.

The Evaluation:  I'm going to record each day how I've progressed toward my goals in my handy daily planner.  Every Wednesday, I'm going to recap the week and determine whether or not I get fries with my falafel.  Let's say if I have 6-7 perfect days out of 7, I get fries.  If I have 3-6 perfect days, I just get the falafel.  If I have less than 3 perfect days, I don't even get the falafel.   That would be a sad week indeed.  Let's hope it doesn't come to that.

Also, I'm not going to be doing weigh-ins every week.  I find that if I do stuff like that, I get way too focused on the scale.  I want to establish healthy habits that will lead to a healthy weight, not the other way around.  I will post my starting weight and will weigh at the end of each phase to see how I did.  However, I will take and post body measurements each week.  Then I can see where the weight is coming off. 


Part Two:  The Starting Stats

We're all starting somewhere, right?  This morning I weighed myself (after waking and peeing, before eating), took my starting measurements, and "before" pictures.

Starting Weight: 208.  This is actually what I weighed when I started my first blog in January of last year.  I'd be sad, but I weighed 216 last summer.  At least I'm not there anymore. 

I know what 208 feels like.  But to be honest, I never thought it looked like this... 

Starting Pictures:

 

 So I'll take new pictures at the end of the Challenge.  Hopefully ones I'm not shocked to look at.  : /

Starting Measurements: Taken in inches, by myself.  I'm not worrying about accuracy, I took a Bioanthropology class last semester that taught me how to take proper anthropometric measurements.  

Mid-Upper Arm:  13.75
Bust: 43.5
Chest (like bra band): 37.5
Waist: 39.5
Hips: 46
Butt: 44.5
Thigh: 24.5


Annnd now I've made myself late for class, so I gotta cut this short.  But I am having a fruit smoothie for breakfast - two servings of fruit down!  See you tomorrow!