Health Journey: Month Three

Last month I posted that my goal for July 17th was to be down 21lbs, total. Who was down 21 lbs on that date? THIS GIRL!

In the last two weeks I lost 7 of those 9 lbs. In the last two weeks I have really upped my gym time. Last week I spent 10 hours at the gym total. I'm going to try and keep up that work... I need to figure out my workout schedule a little better so I'm not doing 3 hours of cardio in one day... Gah.

Am I crazy to set my next goal to be 31lbs down by August 14th? Maybe so. I'll put out 29lbs or 31lbs out there.

I'm feeling really good about my progress. After my training session today my trainer asked if I wanted to take a spin class with her. HOLY CRAP! I lasted... and I use the word "lasted" very loosely, for 20 minutes! Boo. Haha. No thank you. I felt like my quads were bulking insanely.

I have a new rule for drinking out at restaurants... Keep it limited to 2 drinks and cut back on the food during that meal if I'm drinking. Last night for Tristan's birthday dinner approximately 5 glasses of different varieties of wine exceeded 700cals! I was pretty horrified when I was entering my dinner in myfitnesspal. After having worked out for THREE hours at the gym, my damn dinner of sushi and wine made me feel like my progress was spoiled. BUT... myfitnesspal said I could technically consume 1,800 more calories.

ANYWAY! I would love to go for a month of not eating bad at all. Month three had 4 bad days. Let's see! August 14th, I'm coming for you!

xx
M

Little Haul...

I treated myself to some beauty shopping the other day since I feel like I haven't splurged in awhile.

First stop was Lush! I got a foot mask that the sales girl just sold to me. It smells like a yummy cinnamon and papaya. Will try soon. I got the Eau Roma Water - my favorite toner! And my new favorite shower gel The Olive Branch. I would like every product in life to smell like this shower gel, ha.

My next stop was at Sephora. Needed a new powder brush. A couple face primers. I've been using Benefit's The Porefessional. I like it, but I'm interested in seeing if I like Smashbox's better or not. I also grabbed a Nars Laguna bronzer since I'm nearly out. A very good bronzer for fairer-skinned folks like myself.

I got this little kit from Benefit with some nice goodies. $38 for an $86 value, yes please! I've been enjoying the Stay Don't Stray primer. I didn't like Eye Bright years ago when I tried it, but I've actually taken a liking to it! I like to use it on my inner corner then pat a little bit of Urban Decay's Virgin on top. High Beam is a nice highlight. And Bella Bamba blush is gorgeous!

Thaaat's about it.

xx
M

Nosebleeds, Rave Product aaannndddd...

I'm going to be brief with each thing I want to mention.

1) Can getting nosebleeds be in my genes? It seems to be something I got from my mother. My sister gets nosebleeds easily, too. I hate when I'm in the shower and the warm water trickles down my face. I'm CONSTANTLY checking for blood! Ha. What are different reasons for nosebleeds? I try to drink or eat oranges, I hear that stops it back on like that "olympic"/"warrior" show where people compete on different obstacle courses. Am I crazy or does someone know what I'm talking about? American gladiator???

2)
I LOVE THIS SHOWER GEL!!!! It smells DELICIOUS (light sweet) and doesn't dry out my skin. I got the travel size to try out, but I will definitely be repurchasing on the largest bottle!

3) I'm trying out a month supply of Shakelogy. I've been making shakes for almost a week now. I was having one for breakfast, but I've switched to post-workouts instead for the convenience of time in the morning. I'll get back on what my thoughts are about this product in a later blog!

4)
OBSESSED. I can't get enough of watermelon! I've been replacing late night snacks with watermelon. YUM! Bryce is out getting me some at nearly midnight. Ha. Aw. :)

xox,
M

Health Journey: Month Two

Hey guys!

Another month has passed... This morning was weigh-in and measurements. I'm down a total of 12lbs!!!! My next goal is to be down a total of 21lbs by July 16th. I CAN and WILL do this!

I still have ten more sessions with my personal trainer and am seriously so thankful for her! After my sessions are over, I'm going to just fly solo. As for my own workouts I've been really noticing how easier things are becoming. The machine I hate MOST, the jacobs ladder, I could barely do 2 minutes straight, I did 15 minutes straight yesterday! My goal was 10 minutes. It was a very proud moment for me.

Starting tomorrow I will be increasing my resistance and intensity so I avoid hitting a plateau. I really want to hit -21lbs next measurements!

Nutrition has been a struggle a couple times this past month. I think a lot of it has to do with the fact that my receptionist has been off for her pregnancy, so I've not prepared properly for meals and snacks during the day, so when I get home for dinner I get the mentality of, "well I barely ate anything today... straying from healthy eating will be OK" I have removed that from my mentality!!!! I feel so motivated for this month.

Trying not to be too hard on myself for not losing numbers as fast as I have in the past. I'm doing it healthily this time!

xox,
M

Deborah Lippmann The Stripper

Nail Polish Junkies,

Ever have to give your nails time to "breathe"? I used to think that my nails needed breathing breaks from wearing polish because my fingers/nails would feel a dull ache for at least 12 hours. Birchbox sent me a sample of Deborah Lippmann's The Stripper  (to-go). I noticed the smell was very pleasant. Lavender. Not the harsh, "who the hell is using nail polish remover?!" smell.The little mitt got my glitter off SO well! But 6 mitts (one mitt can remove both hands) is $12 and that's just RIDICULOUS.


Beauty.com e-mailed me with an offer of a free DL polish if I spent $10 so I decided to try out the full-size of The Stripper. With a price tag of $18 for 4oz... yikes! I may have 5 uses left in my current bottle. So that will have been a total of 3 months, maybe 3 and a half. That's kind of steep for nailpolish remover. But I can tell you I have noticed a huge difference in my nails. No pain. No irritation. And frankly, it does work better than the removers I buy from the drug store. I will be repurchasing, but also researching alternative removers with lavender and aloe in their formulas.

xx,
Fellow Junkie

Nailpolish Shelves

There are a lot of important things happening in the world... and clearly the fact that my nailpolish shelves are built and finished IS blog-worthy!

A couple of weeks ago I was researching storage options for my nailpolish. I was getting sick of blindly pulling colors and ruining the order of my "beauty table." I was willing to fork over the $100 for a typical clear, plastic polish display until I came across a random fellow lacquer-lover's blog. She had her boyfriend build her some wooden shelves and painted them. AHA! Brilliant!

Luckily, Bryce uses all those manly tools for his job installing art. He cut the wood and did all that drilling business. I chose my colors:

I decided I wanted ROSE GOLD GLITTER with an accent of blue-ish.

After a lot of nagging, I finally got my shelves!

and more...

Okay! I'll stop.

It took me quite awhile to go through all my polish and throw away the ones that were looking retired. Then I had to decide the color-coding... White people problems. Ha. I had to keep shifting the colors around once I'd find more reds or what have you. ANYWAY, those are my babies.

What do I do when I get more polish? I MIGHT be able to use two and half of the shelves with appliances and utensils on it. Did I already mention white people problems? HAHA! On second thought: nailpolish... Asian people problems. Ba-da-bump!

xx,
M

Health Journey (Once upon a time...)

I've probably sufficiently annoyed Facebookers with all my gym check-ins and talk about working out. Oh, but I'm not finished! Ha.

A month ago, I suckered myself into trying the Blue Print Cleanse and figured, "EFF IT! You started, you're going to continue...!" Continue with looking out for my health. I signed up for a membership at a fitness club in literal walking distance and began working out that very afternoon.

I got my free 1-hour personal training session... HOW DEPRESSING! We did a weigh-in, measurements, including FAT measurements. I died. Seriously. I'm still carrying that dead Monica inside me. I will get rid of that ho. We talked about my terrible eating habits (two big not-so-nutritious meals toward the end of the day + nighttime dessert with B) and what I should be doing. The trainer kicked my ass.

I decided to ask my parents to early birthday gift me a package of ten sessions with Nicole, my personal trainer. Sweet. I really didn't want to fork over the $750.

She set up a general workout regimen for me when I'm not working out with her. She's got me consuming a lot more protein throughout the day and loading me up with water. I feel great. I've only very recently started craving pizza, ha. At the moment I'm seeing her Monday and Wednesday. She kicks my ass so badly I wobble home. Every two weeks we weigh. Every four weeks we do all weighing and measuring. I have lost a total of 5lbs in FAT (+gained lean muscle) in this first month.

I'm kind of proud. I'm mostly very disappointed, haha. I know I'm consuming more, but creating muscle which will effectively burn off the fat "for good" as opposed to near starving myself and losing a lot of weight faster. It's SO tempting to do the latter. But she actually caught that I wasn't consuming as much protein when she did my measurements. I didn't think it'd matter, but I felt like a dumbass when I was caught, haha.

Another HUGE disappointment is throughout this month I've truly gotten to see how terribly out of shape I've gotten in these past few years. Nicole has me run up and down two flights of stairs three times, mixed with some freaking jumping jacks and I'm already wishing our hour was up! DYING. I freaking hate our routines with those damn stairs, haha. As well as the Jacobs Ladder. I'm on there for 3 minutes and I'm sweating. My ankles kill. My calves kill. My spirit deadens. Haha.

I think of how a little over a year ago I was getting back into working out because at that moment I was the most out of shape I had been (HAAA). I quit my job and for the past year I've just been gaining weight like a hungry madman (a tiny fuc...thank you to birthcontrol). I quickly gained that 15-20lbs back and why the hell not gain some more, Monica. Not to mention like 6 years ago when I was obsessed with working out and dropped 40lbs but my boobs went up a cup. Haha. Oh to be young... Now I'm working my ass of like crazy to do it healthily and kick my 18-20 year old self for falling off the wagon. I swear it sneaks up on you!

I did this to me. I'm undoing this to me.

xox,
M