2013-Bring It On!

This will be a short one. Mainly because my ADD brain can’t suffer through writing a long post right now. 🙂

REVIEW of 2012:

Reading-I read a total of 226 books toward my goal of 250. Could not make it to the 250! Will lower my goal this year. That’s how you succeed at something-just lower your goal. LOL. 🙂

Running-Oh, boy. I could go on and on and on and….but, I want to be short today. Well, I’m short everyday since I’m 5’1, but you know what I mean. I started running in January 2012. I.AM.A.RUNNER. 🙂 30 lbs lost. Woohoo! 🙂

 

 

Start-163 lbs                               Now-134 lbs

PLANS for 2013:

Reading– Want to read, umm, all the time. 🙂 I’m thinking a goal of 200 books.

Running-I’ve signed up for a half-marathon at the end of February. I actually think this will be the only half I want to run. I’m not good with training. 🙂

Other– I want to gain more muscle tone so I’m going to start some strength training. I DON’T LIKE strength training so I’m thinking some squats, crunches, planks, lunges, and some itty bitty 2 lb dumbbell arm exercises.

Here’s some stats for my blogging from 2012. Boring stuff. 🙂

The WordPress.com stats helper monkeys prepared a 2012 annual report for this blog.

Here’s an excerpt:

4,329 films were submitted to the 2012 Cannes Film Festival. This blog had 39,000 views in 2012. If each view were a film, this blog would power 9 Film Festivals

Click here to see the complete report.

What are your 2013 goals/resolutions?

Cholesterol Queen

I have crowned myself. The cholesterol queen. 🙂

If you have been following my blog you know that back in December I weighed 163 lbs. I’m 5’1. Yes, I was fluffy.

My thyroid doctor checked my cholesterol back in September 2011. It wasn’t good. He wasn’t happy.

When I went to see him at the end of June he was VERY happy. Take a look at why:

Sept 2011                                    June 2012

Total                           241                                                141

Bad                             173                                                 89

Tryglic.                     102                                                 50

 

That’s what running and weight loss will do for you folks. I now weigh 129 (yes I gained a few pounds while I was in DC!).

Before pics.

 

After pic.

I FEEL GREAT!!

How do you feel?

 

 

 

 

Lose a Marathon Challenge

I’m not trying to lose weight anymore since I got to my goal weight of 125 (to 127) back in April and have maintained it so far. BUT Jess over at Run With Jess is having a weight loss challenge called “Lose a Marathon”. You can sign up for this challenge if you are in the process of dropping some pounds right now. She also has a “Lose a Half-Marathon” challenge (13.1 miles).

And even if you’re not wanting to lose weight you still need to go check out her fabulous blog-she is constantly drumming up something new-giveaways, challenges, etc.

Back to the weight loss thing-I can’t tell you how much better I feel now that I have lost almost 40 pounds. Well, I can tell you because I’m telling you right now. 🙂

I mean, that’s like carrying around a small child!

It all began when my husband said…….I think I’ll save that for another post all by itself. Keep you on your toes. 🙂

Have you ever been on a quest to lose weight?

Why I’ve been MIA

I know I haven’t posted a lot since January and here’s why. I started running. Enough said. 🙂

Really, I started training to run a 5k back on the 1st of January. I have now run 2 different 5k races and have lost a total of 30 pounds!! Woohoo!! So this has taken up a lot of my extra time-you know since I have to follow running blogs and then blog about my own running. 🙂

Here are 2 pictures that show my weight loss of 26 pounds. The 1st one was in December, and the 2nd one was at my 2nd 5k race on March 25th. I have lost 4 more pounds since the race. 🙂   So I apologize for not blogging more about teaching and school related things.

 

 

 

 

 

We have been practicing for the state ARMT test which will start next Tuesday-thank goodness. I am so ready to STOP this practicing, get on with real learning, and MOVE OUR DESKS BACK INTO GROUPS!! I hate dislike straight rows!

Only 2 1/2 weeks until spring break!!! YEA!!!

Just 2 miles

Since I am training (again!) to be able to increase my running mileage from 3 miles to 6 miles (hopefully it will only take me 8 weeks to do this), I only ran 2 miles today. AND, since I only ran 2 miles I told myself I was going to see how much time I could cut off of my miles. Not a lot, but enough to tell a difference. AND enough to feel a difference. 🙂

Usually when I run I do so at a SLOW pace of about 12 1/2-13 minute miles. YEAH-real slow. But at least I’m running-that’s what I tell myself!

Today I ran 2 miles in 23:02 which comes out to about 11 1/2 minute miles. So I felt pretty good. I mean, I felt good about having run at that pace-not that I felt good while I was running! 🙂

Here is my training schedule, and I skipped week 1 and have replaced a 3.75 with a 4 miler this week.

WEEK 1: 2, 3, 2, 3, 3.25-Totally skipped using the schedule for this week because I just ran what I had been doing.

WEEK 2: 3.5, 2, 3.5, 2, 3.75-This is the week I am on and so far I have done 4, 3.5, and 2.

WEEK 3: 3.75, 2, 2, 3.5, 4

WEEK 4: 3.75, 2, 4.5, 2, 4.5

WEEK 5: 4.75, 3, 3, 2, 5

WEEK 6: 5, 3, 3, 2, 5.5

WEEK 7: 5, 3, 3, 2, 6

WEEK 8: 6.25, 3, 2, RACE DAY

I am using this training program to be able to run a continous 6 miles, NOT to run in a 10k race. That will have to wait until next year. I’m only planning on doing 5k races this year (hopefully 1 each month). Of course, I might have to repeat weeks once I try to run more than 4 because let me tell you. 4 miles is a KILLER right now!

This is probably the best way to describe my facial expression when I have run 4 miles (which has only been twice now).

LOL!

So far this week I have run a total of 9.5 miles in 3 days. Tonight I decided that YES! I am going to start doing SOME kind of strength training. I started REAL easy-just to say I had done something. I did some squats, some bicep curls and tricep thingies with my teensy weensy weights. I did 50 crunches. Whew! We’ll see if I can get up early enough in the morning to do it again (Have I mentioned I am NOT a morning person?). 🙂 I’m going to try to do this little strength training (and I really need to plan/write it out) about 2-3 times per week. Tomorrow I’ll try to post some before pictures and then after about 30 or so days I will post some after pictures. Here’s to hoping they look different! 🙂

Goodnight!

Update on my journey

I have posted my 3rd set of “progress” pictures on My Journey page. I now weigh 137 pounds-started at 163! Woohoo! 🙂

This morning I went to zumba (even though I stayed up til 4am THIS MORNING! Mapping out “part” of my next year’s science standards-I will be changing from teaching reading/language arts in 6th grade to teaching science to 5th/6th graders. I’m super excited! But DON’T let me get started about how the textbook is FULL of so much info that you couldn’t possibly teach it all and how one Alabama course of study science standard might be spread across 3 different chapters to meet the standard!!!! Oh, sorry-I did get on my soapbox!). So as I was saying-I went to zumba and then walked a 3 mile trail at a local state park. It was a good workout!

I have run 3 miles 3 times this week and walked a lot and gone to zumba twice. It’s been a good week!

Couch25k-Week 6-Day 2

Had to do 2 10 minute jogs with a 3 minute walk in between. The 1st jog was A LOT easier than the 2nd one! Tomorrow is a straight 25 minute jog! Oh, my! 🙂

Here are some in progress pictures from last summer and tonight. YIKES! I still need to shed at least 17 more pounds if not more! 🙂

July 2011                                                                     February 2012

July 2011                                                                        February 2012

July 2011                                                                   February 2012

I can honestly say that the only real difference I see between last summer and now (I have lost 14 pounds) is:

1. under my chin     2. BUTT from the sideview     3. I see my shoulder

From the way I feel and the way some of my pants fit now, I really would have thought there would have been a more visible difference in the pictures. My co-workers are telling me that they can see that I have lost weight so why is it not showing up with the camera? Stupid camera! 🙂

Anyway, I’m trying to remember that my goal for this year is to run a 5k, not lose weight. I was just hoping that the weight would be a side benefit!

So I’ll keep on training. I did day 1 of the Jillian Michaels 30 day shred on Monday and haven’t done it since. Time to kick it into high gear!!

I admit-I covet!

Yes, I know that coveting is a sin, and I try not to do too much of it. But there is something that I have been coveting for the last 5 weeks that I have been following my couch25k training program. Take a look at this picture and guess what I covet.

 You guessed it! Collarbones!! 🙂

Seriously. I know what you were thinking, but noooooo-don’t want them. 🙂

I have missed my collarbones and didn’t even realize it until I started exercising recently. I WANT THEM BACK! So this is my promise to you. You better believe that when I find them again, I WILL POST A PICTURE OF THEM! 🙂

 

14 pounds down!!!

I have lost a total of 14 pounds since December 27th when I started exercising! Woohoo! 🙂

3 pounds in the last week!

I’m on week 5 of the couch25k program. Today was Day1 with jogging intervals of 5 minutes each. The 2nd day will be intervals of 8 minutes. Then the 3rd day will be 20 minutes. WHAT THE?????? From 5 to 8 to 20? Did someone  with a math disability figure this one??? You’re telling me I have to go from 5 to 8 to 20? All I can say is-I’ll try! 🙂

Tonight I was going to start my little strength training exercises at home, but I’m thinking I’ll start tomorrow. When I feel better. 🙂