Weightloss and Fitness Journey

I love being a mom my two babies are my life they bring so much joy to our home, it would be very hard to imagine a world without them. I mean just look at these two goof balls. How can you not smile at that?

      Even though I love them It doesn't mean that everything they give I automatically love, like the extra weight I gained and the hundreds of stretch marks yikes. Being the large babies that they were (Weston 9 lbs 13 oz and Skylette 8 lbs 7 oz) I gained a considerable amount of "Baby Weight" over 120 lbs combined between the two pregnancies.
      I have been having difficulty trying to stay motivated to lose my baby weight this time around. So today I decided to start recording my weight loss/health journey in hopes that it will help me to stay motivated, positive and proactive.

History 
I was born in Washington State in a small farming town there wasn't a lot to do but I stayed active with sports, I've played volleyball and softball for as long as I can remember. I love the competitiveness that comes out of me and the challenge of trying to improve my skills. So needless to say I stayed in fair shape though high school. I've never been very skinny I'm 5' 9" average weight then was about 160 lbs. I've always been the same size not small not large, but I think I'm ready for that to change.
    After my daughter was born in May of 2013; and I finished nursing her in December of 2013, I started to actively lose weight again. I have lost 26 lbs since January which is huge and I'm very happy to be back to my pre-pregnancy weight. Unfortunately life changed a little with a move to a different apartment and I decided to take a little bit of a break, I stopped working out and eating right (cringe) causing me to gain about 10 lbs back :( sad day right?

Photos above were taken in the Fall of 2013, while nursing and not actively dieting or exercising. 

I weighed 190 lbs.

Photos taken today not very revealing but you get the idea, this is my half way 

point with 20 lbs down and 25 lbs to go. I weigh 170 lbs.

Goals 
        Current Weight      Goal Weight      Lbs to Lose      
        170 lbs                     145 lbs              25 lbs

        Goal Date               Lbs/week                              
        August 1st        14 weeks=1.8 lb/week

    I currently do not have an accurate body fat percentage, I am a member at LA Fitness where they checked it but it was very inaccurate, it read that my BF% was only 23%. In January I was measuring 31% I find it hard to believe that with minimal exercise and strength training that I decreased my BF% by 11% in 5 months. I thinking I am between 25-27% but I will check very soon and record it here. Ideally I would love to be around 18%.

Diet

      I have decided to continue with the Atkins program. I feel like I know how it works and the science behind it well enough that I am confident that it will work for me again. I have done Atkins several times before with great success, I have found that Carbs, mainly sugar and bread are my personal demons. I love Love LOVE sugar but too much of a good thing is not always a good thing.
     The first two weeks are called the Induction phase this is where you are only allowed 20 net carbs. The simple explanation of a net carb is when you take the amount of carbohydrates in an item and subtract the amount of fiber whats left is the net carb.

 

For example this is my lunch they are tuna salad wraps. The filling: tuna, real mayo, pickles S&P spicy mustard and cheddar cheese has minimal carbs and the romaine was a total of 3 carbs and 2 fiber making it only 1 net carb for the lettuce and a grand total of 2 net carbs for the entire meal. Which I didn't even finish. This is the most intense part of the "Diet" basically all you eat is meat, eggs, vegetable, cheese and fat. It is very important that you are tracking everything that you eat no estimating or guessing how many carbs you had you have to be kind of organized in the beginning. This is a high fat high protein diet if you haven't got that already.  BUUUUT it works, and its delicious!

The downside ... it can be expensive especially the protein. That is why I had to take a break we simply couldn't afford it. After a month I was determined to make it work with a lot of budgeting and planning I devised a strict meal plan not to exceed 200 bucks. That includes the entire month for the whole family, while still doing Atkins. I will write a post explaining just how I did it later. I'm pretty proud of myself cant you tell!

                                                                           (Dork:))
Fitness
To be honest I haven't officially ironed out all the details for my fitness routines but I can tell you what I have done so far. I joined a Gym LA Fitness it s new and just opened up semi close by we only have one car for i will go Monday and Saturday mornings and Wednesday or Thursdays depending on when Nick gets home from work. on the days that I do not go tot he gym I am at home doing T25. I'm not a huge fan of it but it gets you nice a sweaty and I can barely finish each video so I have lots I can work on. I'm planing of using the Body for Life strength training workouts when I hit the gym because the selection of equipment there is amazing.

Wish me luck on this Journey of transformation come August I will be one Healthy and Fit girl for years to come!     

50 years

My Grandpa and Grandma's 50th wedding anniversary was coming up and they planned a huge vacation for our whole family the plan was to go on an Alaskan Cruise. We couldn't go because the Cruise line had a rule that wont allow pregnant women on the boat that are over 25 weeks. Both myself and My sister couldn't go. It was a huge bummer but I still wanted to do something nice for them so I decided to draw the Manti Temple were they were sealed. I used calk in sepia tones. I don't have the original finished drawing but it is inscribed with their sealing date and names at the bottom. My Grandparents are some of the most giving selfless people I know I love them to pieces!

The Happy Couple

They received it the day before everyone left for Alaska... I think they really liked it.

Merry Christmas! Yeah were pretty excited for this one it will be our first Christmas as a family of three, Weston's pretty excited too he just begged us to let him decorate the tree.

How cute is that?

 So I took these on Christmas morning and I don't know what I was thinking because I only took two and they were really bad...Just two really unfocused pictures for my first born child's very first Christmas. Sad day. Next Christmas is going to be different. I do love his little sleepy face though.

 Grandpa and Grandma Arbon got Weston this little bumbo seat he loved it and used it every day

 Grandma Herrud got Weston this grippy ball and he just went to town as you can tell. grrr!!!

Weston's Blessing

We really wanted to bless Weston around family so we hopped on a plane and flew to Idaho. We stayed with Nicks wonderful parents and later my family came down to spend the weekend with us and attend the blessing. We were surrounded with so much love it was such a great week.

                            Here are a few fun picture while we were messing around before the big day.

Baby Tebowing

Cute cousin Jaden loving on Weston

 Weston was such a great flyer he was happy and perfect the whole flight. Just look at that face.

 ok enough with the adorable pictures :) here comes the blessing photos with family

 Grandpa and Grandma Cozzens very first meeting

Adorable Grandpa Anderson

Don't Eat ME

 Ok so Nick really wanted to get Weston on a Horse while we were in Idaho and Weston really had no idea what was going on but I think he had a great time.

My first horsey Ride!

That was traumatic daddy and cold 

My Cow Boys

Wheres Waldo?

 We decided to dress up as a Wheres Waldos Family for Halloween! It was Weston's first Halloween I think he really liked it cant you tell? How cute are they?

 At our trunk or treat night it was pretty cold so we had it inside the church. There were stations in every room. Ours had three different cauldrons and you had to guess where the candy was, most kids didn't have enough patience but it was still fun and a little different.

Wheres Waldo?

Hershey Park Getaway

 So Nick and I decided that we needed a little mini vacation to just get out of the house. So at the last minute we decided to get a hotel room and drive up to Hershey Pennsylvania. It's about a hour and half away so it was a perfect quick trip. It was such an amazing drive it took us out into the country and really reminded us of back home.

Hershey Factory (Chocolate Magic)

 When we first got to the park we purchased tickets for the Trolley tour through town. It was an amazing experience we got a full blown history lesson of Hershey himself and all the amazing good he and his family has done.

 Our Guide and Driver were hilarious hey handed out goodies through our the tour and made the whole experience really enjoyable. Weston was the only child there it was October so we bundled him up pretty tight he was almost 2 months.

 This was a cute little ride that took you through the workings of the Chocolate Factory there was singing and dancing cows it was really fun.

Singing Cows

Making the Chocolate

Timi and Leslie Diaper Bag
this was my beloved Diaper Bag that I saved my whole pregnancy for... I loved it.  It was this trip that it was stolen out of our shopping cart at Target. Along with everything Weston and I brought with us for the weekend Phone Wallet, medicines and my wedding ring :( other than this horrid moment the weekend was pretty great.