100 pounds lost in pictures

I leave you with these today as I go celebrate my 100 pounds lost at my party at Weight Watchers. You will be spoiled with pictures all weekend hehe tomorrow will be pictures from the party!

Those were the beginning....

The past few months were better:

Thanksgiving time:

Christmas time:

New Years:

Wow I thought I was fit over the holidays...

Now when I look at these pics :

I see what a difference a few more months makes! I took those pictures last night!!! 100 pounds gone!!!!! And I updated the pics in the side bar ;)
 

Top 5 Exercises I love to hate!

There is a great group of gals on twitter I recently found who are figure competitors and let me tell you they are some wonderful inspiring women. I have come accross so very many people online who inspire me everyday to be better and I am so happy I took my journey online and continue to meet others who are as passionate about health and fitness as I am!

So we are all posting the top 5 exercises we love to hate. For me there are a few exercises that really pain me to do each and every week but I do them because I love the results I get. That is what this post is all about.

5. Push ups. I remember a girl who could not do a push up to save her life! Then in came Jillian Michaels and in every single one of her workout videos there is some version of a push up. I used to have to do them on my knees. But I have fought and pretty hard I must admit to come to the day where now I can do 1 handed military style push ups! I love how push ups work my core muscles and keep them strong but I do hate doing them because it is something I always struggle to do.


4. Biking. I really wish I could learn to love it but for now it is one of those painful exercises which I have not mastered. I set a preliminary goal to become a triathlete next year so again this is one I will keep hating but I know I will love becoming a triathlete!


3. Chest press. Working the chest muscles for me did not start until about 3 months ago. I always avoided working solely the chest muscles because it was an exercise I did not like to do. For me chest presses and chest flies are the hard but I do love having a defined chest muscle. And the chest muscle helps burn more fat ;)


2. Squats. For me number 2 and 1 go hand in hand. The legs are hardest for me to work because it pushes me out of my comfort zone. It is not comfortable for me to squat and I keep adding weight to my workout so it makes me work even harder. But let's face it there is nothing like wearing a pair of jeans and having that nice pop ;)


1. Lunges. The leg workouts hurt. That is the bottom line for me is it bothers my knees and I am sore for 2-3 days after a good workout session focusing on legs and glutes. I push them hard because I know they can handle it. I want defined quad muscles and I want to run faster so I love the effects of these types of workouts.

At the end of the day there are just some exercises that you hate to do but keep doing because when you look in the mirror and see results it makes it all worth all the sweat and tears in the gym! 


What are your top 5 love to hate exercises?

Visit the healthy ladies who blogged about it with me tonight!

Donloree –  http://www.bikiniorbust.com/
Kari –  http://www.figuregirlworld.com/
Dawn — http://www.bareitallfitness.com/
Jen — http://jenklimek.wordpress.com
Alli — http://wholesomefitness.wordpress.com/ 
Liz — http://4amaven.wordpress.com/
Tiffany — http://passlakeprincess.wordpress.com/

My First Gift to Myself: Weight Vest

Well I lost 100 pounds and that called for some celebrating. Now I have not totally finished celebrating hehe I plan to keep on celebrating because life time goal weight is knocking on my door, but I did go out and get myself a present to start the party!!!

By the way there will be a big party on Saturday morning at my Weight Watchers meeting that the wonderful Stacy will be throwing for me and all are invited!!! I wish my inspiring blogger friends could be there with me too! I am sooooo super excited for it. You know if it was not for Stacy and Weight Watchers there would probably not be a 100 pounds lost party so I am so grateful for them!!!

Anyway so what did I buy myself last weekend? This present comes really from my first inspiring person I met Drea. She is my Canadian twin, my other half and she always encouraged the obese person I was to go out and get fit. She really gave me the motivation to begin my journey. She never once told me I was too big to do something, or let me give up. I remember her voice in my head when the workouts get tough and think about what she always says: you can do it Coll don't give up.

She has been encouraging me to go out and get a weight vest. I want to increase my running speed and fitness level over all and she uses one and loves it. I knew she had to be right since she always is when it comes to matters of fitness lol so I worked up the strength and went out and got one!

I found it at Dick's Sporting goods. It weighs 20 pounds and is interchangable you can remove weights. I thought about buying the 12 pounder because the woman was pictured on the front of the box. A man was pictured on the front of this box which left me thinking hmmmm what are they trying to say? ;)

Anyways I ran with it on Saturday and it felt like a ton of bricks was attached to me! I kept checking my Polar HRM and it was showing I was burning more calories and my heart was pumping harder. This is exactly what I wanted so I pushed through to finish the run.

I used it again on Monday while on the elliptical machine:

I love it!!! I love Drea's always awesome fitness advice and like I said this vest helps me bring my fitness to a new level. My speed running on Wednesday was much easier without this and I hope this helps me get faster. I wore it yesterday for the longest time yet a 20 minute 2 mile run and a 3 mile 28 minute elliptical routine and I was working hard. I loved every minute of it!

Do you reward yourself when you hit targets in your fitness or weight loss? What do you do?

Spaghetti Squash Pie

I posted this in the past but I made it last night with my new dairy free alterations so I thought I would post it again and put in the new points plus values! This dish is one of my favorites and honestly whenever I have people try it they love it! Using spaghetti squash is a trick of mine to avoid eating carbs in pasta but still giving into my Italian self's cravings!

You start with a spaghetti squash and I microwave it for 5 minutes whole. Then I slice it in half. In essence of time saving I microwaved half face down for 10 minutes. Usually I bake them on the weekends for about 45 minutes face down. But the microwave does same thing in a shorter amount of time.While that is going on I am cooking the ground turkey on the stove top in a frying pan with pam spray. I saute it with some garlic, onion and Italian spices until it is no longer pink.

And I work on a simple sauce of salt free crushed tomatoes and salt free tomatoe sauce.

When the squash is cooked you scoop out the seeds and toss them. Then scoop out the squash and mash it into a pie plate:

Once the turkey is cooked you combine it with your sauce and some parmesean cheese (in my case my veggie shred)

I blend it all together and then its ready to pour into the pie plate:

I topped it with the rice shreds and its ready to bake! I bake it at 350 for about 30-40 minutes until it looks ready to eat:

It makes a nice dish you can bring anywhere! Or if you are like me you cut it into 4 wedges and enjoy for lunch throughout the week :

This has to be one of my top 5 favorite dishes!

Ingredients:
1 package of extra lean 99% fat free ground turkey breast (15-20 ounces)
1/2 cup chopped onion
1 can of salt free stewed tomatoes
1 can of salt free simple tomato sauce
3 tablespoons of veggie shred parmesean topping
1/3 cup of rice shreds mozarella flavor
1/2 medium spaghetti squash
garlic powder
italian seasoning blend

Yields 4 servings and is only 5 points plus per serving!

Week 5 Check in Spring Into Action

Well I cannot believe this challenge is close to coming to an end! I have learned a lot during this challenge. I have been working with an amazing partner and friend Monica B. Her determination has renewed my own spirit and fire and helped me push past some issues to get to my goal and keep losing weight.

I had an awesome super week. Probably one of the best weeks of this entire journey folks. Yes in case you missed it on Saturday I hit my big 100 pounds lost mark!!!!

I will be weighing in on Saturdays at Stacy's meeting so I will use that weight when I check in for challenges that week. So my weight this week was a nice even 152 pounds!!! When I began this journey 13 months ago I walked into Weight Watchers weighing 252.6 pounds. At my highest weight after having the baby I was 272 pounds. So I am pretty darn pleased with myself in less than 2 years I am down 120 pounds. According to my BMI I am *almost* there! 2 more pounds and I will be in my healthy weight range!!! There are no words that can honestly express how happy I am am.

This journey has brought me many challenges but I have come to meet them head on and focused and just kept plugging along. And I am committed to working hard now to maintain all of the work I have completed. I will keep training for races and keep working towards my next big goal, to run a full marathon this fall :)

Stay tuned for progress pictures coming later on this week ;)

Kale Chips

Well I hear about Kale chips this and kale chips that all over the place here online hehe so I finally decided to take the plunge and try making them myself!

It seems like it is too easy to be true but in fact it was really just simple and easy and quick!

Start with a fresh bunch of kale:

 Then just wash and cut or tear the leaves from the thick stems:

And season with whatever you fancy! I chose these items :

 I used a teaspoon of olive oil, tablespoon of the veggie topping (Parmesan cheese non dairy style ;) and the Mrs. Dash Italian style. Just toss it all together and get it coated. Then bake it for about 15-20 minutes on 350 degrees or until they are crispy!

Yes they shrink up to nothing. It is funny when I was cutting them I was like wow I have a ton here this is going to be around forever! But when I opened the oven I was like oh no worries it all shrunk up hehe

And the verdict?

I liked them. Not totally crazy about them, kale has a stronger taste than spinach and I adore spinach so I think they could grow on me. And for 1 point for a serving and it made 2 servings I can enjoy them. They were a light crispy snack!

Next time I will try making zucchini chips!

Do you have any kale experiences?

 

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