Happy Birthday Steve!

Happy Birthday Steve! We have no special plans today since we celebrated his birthday Friday, Saturday and Sunday. He does have the day off from working but we will be helping Celina move her stuff home from school.

Tuesday night we took a late evening walk at the local park around the lakes. A perfect night for a walk with Zoey. 

 I just love spring, because we have summer next and warm weather!

I used up all the snicker tiny candies we had from Easter. I made some blondies with all that candy. They smelled sooo good and tasted just as good! 

Day # 108 of my fasting dieting. I wasn't weighing myself these last few weeks and as a result I only lost one pound per week due to all my cheat days. I am at 157 and my goal is to be back in the 140's. 8 pounds to go! I decided I need to weight myself every day at this point. I might not see much of a change from day to day but it will help keep me focused. Its not as discouraging at this point to weight myself since I'm close to my weight loss goal. 

This is what I started out at with my measurement!

January 21st Day #1                          May 8th, Day #108                      Total Lost 

Waisit = 41"                                              31"                                           -10"
Hips = 47"                                                40"                                            - 7 "
Thighs = 26"                                             23"                                           - 3"
Arms = 15"                                                12"                                          - 3 "
% BMI = 27.68% over weight                   23.87% Normal                      - 3.81%
Weight = 182lbs                                         157 lbs                                      25 pounds

My weight loss plan was simple, one meal a day with a few low calorie snacks. I tried to stay under 1000 calories per day. Cheat days 1500 calories or less on Friday and Saturday with some Sundays. 
I ate anything. Mostly I tried to eat low calorie foods, chicken, pork, sweet potatoes, raspberries, popcorn, salsa, veggies and peanut butter with pretzels. I even had wine and beer on my cheat days. I had to make this a diet I could stick with and not feel deprived. This way I could still go out to dinner. Share meals, drink some wine and stay on my diet. 

I still have 8 pounds to lose to reach my goal of 149 and will go as low as 145. Any lower in weight, I know it can't be maintained. 

My exercise is simple. I mostly concentrated on diet first then exercise. 
I always did my daily yoga for an hour, just lazy stretching. 
Planks 6 minutes total every day, at 1 minute each plank
Dumb bells for biceps and triceps. 
I went cross country skiing, biking, running and walking when my working schedule wasn't too full or I wasn't too tired. It all was weather dependent. 
I kept track of what I ate on an app and I wrote down what I ate in a fitness journal, along with exercise and my daily todo list. 

I am on week #16 of my diet and have scheduled out my weight loss plan of losing 2 pounds per week to week #20. Just in time for my weekend at the lake with neighbor friends. My weight loss journey won't be over in four weeks, it will continue with maintaining and adding in more exercise, getting more tone all over! It's a constant struggle to lose and maintain weight. Having lost almost 50 pounds back in 2011, regaining most over the years and now losing 25 more pounds again and now on my way to losing a total of 35 pounds in the next few weeks. It just takes determination and a constant reminder of what your goals are to lose the weight. It will take more effort to keep it off as I know full well.