Grab the old ladies & pack up the babies

Pixie's falling hard and someone's going to get hurt!

That's right boys and girls, the streak is over. It began January 3 and lasted until approximately 6:35PM April 27. You can do the math. It was a lot of days. It was a lot of days of being totally OP. It was a lot of days of doing exercise 6 days a week. It was a lot of days of being totally in control.

Had a great weigh in Monday night. Lost 3.4 pounds I think. The eating started shortly after that. Outback to be precise. Bushman schrooms...dipped in a copious amount of creamy ranch dressing. Salad, swimming in blue cheese dressing, burger dripping in cheese. At least I don't like their fries. Oh, but the choco cherry love blizzard at the DQ was pretty awesome on the way home!

Did I grab myself by the short and curlies on Tuesday and say OK bitch, enough is enough? Hell no. I ate more. I can't exactly remember what...but I know dinner was at a new Spanish restaurant in town where we had tapas. That is Spanish for little mounds of fried greasy stuff that slides down your throat pretty well. We were out with friends. Decided that really wasn't a full meal so we should go to another restaurant and get some dessert. Can anyone say hot fudge sundae with whip cream...and oh by the way miss, do you have nuts? Did the insanity stop there? Of course it didn't. A binge worth doing is worth doing well. Stopped off at the quicky mart and got a large bag of potato chips.

Wednesday dawned and the day started with cereal and fat free milk. Gave me gas. Had to assuage my bowel with some homemade bread loaded with butter. Let's have lunch at the cafe by the pool, they're serving 1/4 pound hot dogs today. Dinner? Out with friends again....stuffed pork loin, vadalia mashed potatoes, and then creme brule. Hey, it's a milk you know!

I just baked two cheesecakes, and have a double batch of chocolate chip cookie dough in the fridge ready to bake and a double batch of oatmeal raisin cookies ready to go too. Baked up a dozen of the choc chip tonight. They were good. Didn't need a container for the left overs! Nuff said.

Cocktail party tomorrow night. Nuff said.

1400 mile drive back to MI on Monday. Nuff said.

Size 18 pants in the give away pile. Might need to dig them out. Nuff said.

I'm stressing over packing up this house and getting it summerized. It's a lot of hard work.

I'm stressing over needing to work full time when I get home PLUS diet and exercise. I know, most of you do it all the time. I haven't had to. I've been able to concentrate on just diet and exercise.

I'll get my act together again. Not a doubt in my mind. Not right now though.

Meanwhile, if it's edible, lock it up.

Yet another thing I couldn't do at 368 pounds

They say a picture is worth a 1000 words. Too bad you all know me and know I'll use both the pictures AND the 1000 words!!!

Today was awesome. Our friends Mary & Clair got a new motorcycle and Clair took me for a ride today. It was exciting for so many reasons. Loved being out with the sun and the wind on my face. Loved the feeling of whizzing along without constraints of a car around me. I loved the freedom of the ride. That was just the tip of the ice burg.




I loved not being afraid I could actually get on the bike. It never even entered my mind. It would have 175 pounds ago.

I loved not being afraid I wouldn't fit behind Clair. It also never entered my mind until I was actually up on the seat and noticed there was room between us. That wouldn't have happened 175 pounds ago.

I loved just enjoying the ride and not worrying about what people were thinking as we passed them.

I loved everything about today.

I'm guessing it's almost time to jump out of that airplane.....

What does a .8 pound gain look like?

Yes, I gained .8 this week. It was my week to gain. If you're a woman, or know one, I'm sure you've heard her bitch about this. I have one week a month where I gain weight. It pisses me off and there's not a damn thing I can do about it. I was 100% OP this week. I did my cardio 6 days and my strength training 3 days. I ate what I should, when I should, and how I should. I hopped on the scale and it showed me up .8. Such is life.

In the past, setbacks like this would send me off on an eating spree. I mean really. I'm working my ass off and gaining weight. Might as well eat and gain and actually enjoy it! So how did I handle this gain this month? Well, first of all I put on the new outfit I bought a size or 2 too small in September. It fit! I've been waiting 6 months to wear this! Low cut, bell bottoms, embroidered with sequins if you please. Pink of course. I think I should have tried the top on a bit sooner! Don't care. Wore it to my meeting. Wore it out to dinner last night. I love it!!

What else did I do to ease the pain of my gain? Well, today is my 31st wedding anniversary. Papa and I took off for a 2 day mini trip to Ft. Myers beach. Lovely hotel. Big town. Every restaurant known to man. Again in the past this would be a 3 day free pass to eat as much as I could stuff into my fat face. I mean really. It's a special occasion right? I should enjoy it right? How am I spending these three days? Well, I brought my high protein Special K and my low carb yogurt for my breakfast. I packed our lunches ahead of time for the 3 days. I brought sugar free jello, fiber one bars, grapes, my awesome FAF, and my protein drink.

So, how am I handling my .8 gain on my little mini vacation?

See for yourself.

Bumps in the road are going to happen to all of us. We have to learn to roll with the punches. We can't chuck it in at every little difficulty. We're in this for the long haul. Geez I ran out of cliche's there!

I got out of bed this morning on my 31st wedding anniversary and ate a low carb yogurt and some high protein special K. I got on the elliptical at a high intensity, fat burning program for 30 minutes. I ran back to the room (climbing the stairs if you please...no elevator for me!) and woke the big man. I strapped on my stop watch and headed out for my daily 5K training walk. The whole entire day is mine ahead of me. We're going to the beach. We're going to do whatever we want. Food is planned with flexies being used for a treat. I'm in complete control. I feel freaking awesome. The power that I felt when walking this morning was amazing. I felt proud. VERY proud!

Oh ya, life is freaking good!

I've told you!

We've had chats about self esteem on the WW 200+ board before. I'm not lacking as I've said. I keep telling people that they should just let loose, have fun, and screw anyone that doesn't like it. I've always done that. I wore a bathing suit at 368 pounds. I was NOT going to go swimming in my clothes. Was I teased? Yes. Did I like it? No. Did that stop me? Hell no!

We had one of our awesome pool parties on Saturday here. I had a ball! Did I dance? Yep. Did I sing? Yep!! CAN I sing? Hell no! Did I care? Not a whit! I'm all about having a good time. I had a ball! This was our entertainment for the pool party. She could sing, and you can see by the picture she has no problem with self esteem either! I don't quite take it this far!!

To save me copying all the pictures again. Please just click this link and read about my awesome day! Here's a few that didn't make it on the other blog though!!!

A self portrait! See, I started the party out in a swimsuit. It got cool later on so when you go to the other link and see me in a sweatshirt, you'll know the whole day wasn't chilly!

Here's the big man as I call him. All the Michigan WW ladies call him Papa! Call him what you want, Den had a good time too!

Please try to have fun people. Don't let fat stop you. Life is too short not to laugh and smile and love every single day!!!!!

Don't forget to click on that link and see my debut singing photo's!!!

Exercise

Well, I wanted to do something different today. Oh, I love Bonnie, but I keep reading how we should shake up our cardio routines. I thought I'd leave the elliptical gathering dust today, and opt for something else. Hmmmm what would it be? Treadmill? Nah, boring and I have to almost run to get my heart rate up. WATP DVD? I do like those. It's nearly 90 degrees though and I didn't get to my exercise early. I decided I'd bike today. It's been a long time.

What did I learn? I can't get my heart rate up riding my bike in this park unless I A) Ride up one of the 3 or 4 hills we have here in the park, or B)pump my arms up and down and out and back like a sand hill crane with a broken wing! I went up one hill, but that meant going down the other hill so I could go back up another one. Heart rate drops dramatically while going down the hill, and frankly, going up and down the same hill over and over just isn't fun. So, I made like a crane and whipped my arms all over the place while riding my bike. It worked! I'm sure the people here in the park think I'm crazy, but such is life!

I did 5.6 miles in my 30 minutes which isn't too shabby. I'm going to ride around the lake here before we leave to go back to MI and that's 10 miles. Guess it won't be an all day affair after all!

Have I mentioned I'm training for a 5K? NO???? Wow, guess that'll be tomorrow's post. I got my walking training this morning before Mass though.

Pixie is smokin!

Taste buds tingling!

Well boys and girls, today's lunch wasn't your normal tuna fish on whole wheat for sure! It hit a 10 on my pleasure & satisfaction meter!

We're going to a pool party this afternoon. They're so much fun! We eat and drink and dance and splash and play games and just have so much fun with our friends. The party starts at 4, but we're going at 2 so we can get extra hours in with our good friends Mary & Clair! The menu is actually diet friendly this time. Shrimp on the barbie, roasted potatoes, cucumber and tomato salad, and lemon layer cake. Yum! I've saved points for the cake and I'll probably skip the cuke salad as I'm sure it's fat laden. I'll look at it though. We of course needed snacks for before the meal. I made the fake guacamole from Hungry Girl. If it's good, I'll share the recipe tomorrow. I did sneak a taste after making it and I do think it'll be passable!

Anyway, back to my lunch today. I wanted something substantial to hold me through until snacks. I've fallen in love with the Jennie-O lean turkey hot Italian sausage link. Holy crap they're good! Yes, they're loaded with sodium. Yes, when I get back to MI I'll experiment with making my own with turkey breast that I grind fresh. For right now though, these are damn tasty!!! I took one out of the casing the other day (1 link has 4 points) and flattened it out and fried it up in a pan. I put a slice of WW cheese on it and then heated up a Sandwich Thin and made a sammie out of it. I sliced up 1/4 of an avocado and put that on and wow did it taste like a full fat, creamy, wonderful thing! Shoot...I digressed yet again!

Without further ado, I present you my rotini and meatball lunch! It was 9 points. I'll come right out with that. It is, however, being presented on a full size dinner plate so you can see how substantial it is. There were 8 meatballs. OMG it was soooooo good! The pasta was cooked just how I like it, more soft than al dente. It's my homemade pasta sauce that I had in the freezer. I love having things at hand like that. You could easily cut the portion in half and have a big salad with it. I did only eat half of it as I wanted to save the other half for after the pool party tonight as I know I'll be hungry.

Recipe:
1 Jennie-O lean turkey hot Italian sausage link with casing removed (4 points)
10g dry, uncooked oatmeal (more protein than breadcrumbs and nummy!) (.5 points)
1T egg substitute
finely minced onions
Mix up and make 8 balls, 4 if you like big balls. Spray a nonstick skillet with cooking spray and brown the balls on all sides slowly.

Cook 2oz dry Ronzoni Smart Pasta (3 points)

Pasta sauce. I keep homemade in the freezer that is 1 point for a nice sized serving. Heat the pasta sauce in a small sauce pan. Add cooked pasta to the sauce after draining. Add browned balls to the pot and heat through. Sprinkle 1 T Parmesan (.5 points) on top if you prefer. I preferred!

Ta da! here it is.

Yummy snack and weight loss

I lost 1.6 pounds at my WI last night. Yay me! I was afraid with my huge loss of last week I'd not show a loss this week. Can't wait to see what next week brings!!

I was hungry last week and wanted a snack. Not a fiber one bar, or any other piffle. I wanted something substantial and came up with this.

It's a whole wheat tortilla for 1 point. A huge one I might add!! I fried it up in 1 teaspoon of olive oil to get one of my healthy oils in. You could easily leave that out. I removed the tortilla from the pan and tossed in 1/4 cup cooked brown rice that I had on hand and 1/4 cup of fat free re-fried beans. When that was heated I spread it on the tortilla and diced up 1 ounce of 2% Velveeta 'cheese' to melt on top. I shredded up 1 cup of leaf lettuce. Here you see what it looks like before being totally covered with lettuce. Cheese melted nicely! It's on a full size dinner plate by the way! That's how big it was.

I spread the lettuce evenly and dolloped 1/4 cup Greek yogurt (in place of fat free sour cream. Much more protein) and 1/8 cup salsa over it. I forgot the onions! You could so load this up with tomatoes and onions and a few black olives would be good. It was a very filling, satisfying snack for 5 points. Lots of protein and fiber. Can't go wrong with that combo!

I folded that puppy in half and enjoyed it!!!!!

What does it cost?

Weight Watchers monthly pass $39.

Hiring a personal trainer at the gym for 20 sessions, $360.

Going out dress shopping knowing exactly what I want, knowing the last dress I bought was a size 26, finding EXACTLY what I was looking for, trying on 3 sizes before getting one SMALL enough, ending up with a size 14, yes that's right a size 14!

FREAKING PRICELESS!!!!!

You can quote me

Or, more precisely, the following people.

I was reading my DWLZ news letter when I came across the following quotes. They really grabbed me.

As most of you know I've been frogging around with Weight Watchers since 1978. Up and down. Join, quit, re-join. It wasn't until this January, yes that's right, January 2009 that it finally kicked in. I'm so thankful that I kept re-joining. That Weight Watchers was always in my mind somewhere. It was there and waiting when I was finally ready.

"Opportunity dances with those who are already on the dance floor." ~~H. Jackson Brown Jr

Wow. How true. What if I'd given up on WW in 1978 and never revisited it? Since I was 'already on the dance floor', I was able to finally do what I've been striving to do all these years!

"If we are facing in the right direction, all we have to do is keep walking." ~~Buddhist teaching

and finally,

"The secret to a rich life is to have more beginnings than endings." ~~David Weinbaum

There you go folks. Keep your weight loss plan in the back of your mind even when you're having an eating frenzy. Even when you take months, even years off.

Keep trying, never quit moving forward somehow.

Most importantly, never quit re-joining! All it takes is that final beginning to a richer life!

Are you an over estimater?

I think we all are sometimes!

I'm talking about exercise. I get on that elliptical and I swear I'm burning 1000000 calories. I swear the intensity is high, and the duration is at least 5 hours! One reason, as I've blogged before, I love my heart rate monitor. That at least tells me how hard I'm working!

With Weight Watchers, we're awarded activity points for the exercise we do. We can choose to eat these points, or to not eat them. I've never used them myself. I'll admit I'm a bit afraid. What if I figured them wrong? What if I really wasn't doing what I thought I was and didn't really earn the number of points I calculated? What if I then ate them but really hadn't earned them? Oh my, it's a lot of what ifs! I do know I'm working pretty hard, so if I needed a few of the points, I would use them. I know I'm earning at least a few!

I digressed, yet again. I really just wanted to share this groovy site that helps you calculate how many calories you're actually burning. I'd not take it as gospel of course, but it's at least an idea! I know for a fact that I'd have figured I'd burn more than 165.8 calories walking 3.5 mph on the treadmill for half an hour!!!! I was more than pleased to find the same half an hour on the elliptical (which is of course what I do) burns a respectable 314.1 calories in the same half hour. Time is valuable to me. I'd much rather do half an hour on the elliptical than an hour on the TM! That being said, I do want to start changing up my routine...shake things up a bit. Give it a bit of BAM! So, I know now that I should probably do an hour on the TM in place of my half hour on the elliptical. I got this cool info from my daily 'Hungry Girl' email. Some of the mails are piffle, but some are really good. If you'd like to get the daily email, here's the groovy little link for that too!

Just thought it was a far out cool little site and I wanted to share! Peace out!

How to practice safe weighing

I wanted to write about something very important today. It may make some of you uncomfortable, but it really needs to be addressed. Safe weighing. Too many of us are practicing unprotected weighing. Either you don't know the risks, or you're just lost in the passion of the moment and willing to take the chance. So many things can happen. It only takes one mistake and our scales could be ruined.

Here's my new Weight Watcher scale. Oh yes, she's a virgin. She could lose that status in a nanosecond. Some nasty fluid could sneak into her nooks or crannies and she could be ruined forever. Oh, I'm sure the chicken would tell her that he doesn't carry salmonella, but you can't trust those chickens. They're foul creatures. She could become impregnated with some nasty substance. All it would take is one stray drip to clog up her buttons for good. I want to show you all how to protect your scale from unprotected weighing.

You must first begin with the sheath of your choice. A Ziploc bag would be awesome, and they're even ribbed for her pleasure. I didn't have any of those, so I went to plan B.

Remove one of the protectors from the box. Open it up to its full length and slip it gently over the edge of your scale.

When you get to the end of the scale, smooth out the wrinkles and fold the protector around the back and underneath until smooth. Your scale is now prepared for safe weighing. Any stray fluids can be wiped off. Her buttons are protected from being gunked up and future sticking. She should now be safe from disease & impregnation! If the protector becomes too badly soiled to be cleaned. Simply dispose of it properly and apply a fresh one.

Your scale isn't the only thing that can benefit from safety. My baked Tostito's are enjoying the same treatment.

The oranges and mineola's are going bare. They said wearing a protector is like swimming with their socks on. They're whores.

I hope this will help all of you. Accidents can, and do happen. Keep your scale safe. Teach her about safe weighing before it's too late.

Pixie's palate

Roasted vegetable pasta primavera.

It was awesome actually. Preparation was time consuming. I used a ton of dishes. It wasn't difficult. Would I make it again? Yes, if Den were here to do dishes! It was only 3 points a serving as I changed the recipe. It called for regular pasta, I used Smart Pasta. It called for whipping cream, I used fat free half and half. It was supposed to have 3 cups of rotiss chicken in it. I don't like chicken mixed in my food. On the side, yes. Mixed in, no. I'm going to put shrimp in one of the left over batches. It made 8 servings! Note to self. Cut recipe in half next time!

I started with 1.25 pounds of fresh asparagus, 1 cup matchstick carrots, 1/2 a medium onion, a few teaspoons of minced garlic, and 1 teaspoon of olive oil, salt and pepper. Roasted that in a 450 degree oven. Supposed to take 10 minutes. No way. Lots longer.

While that was roasting, I put 8 ounces of Ronzoni Smart Pasta on to boil.

I grated up 3 ounces of Parmesan cheese.

After the veggies roasted for 20 minutes or so, I added the tomatoes. If I make this again, I'll split the veg in half and use 2 sheet pans. They didn't really get to roast good as there were so many of them.

When the pasta was done, and the veg nearly done, I put my talapia on to fry. Only takes 1 minute on each side in my favorite cast iron skillet.

Here's the veg after they were done roasting.

Here I'm mixing the pasta, the veg, 3/4 cup fat free half and half and the Parmesan cheese together.

This is what 1 serving looks like. I used a big dinner plate tonight where I normally use a sandwich plate. There's really more than it looks like there is.

This is the dessert I was going to have. Took me so long to fix dinner I didn't want to make the pears!

This is what my kitchen looked like when I was done!

More mess!

Still more!

Kitchen is all cleaned up now.

Tomorrow is my daughter in law's recipe for sun dried tomato risotto!!

What I can, and what I can't do

I can't jump rope.

No, the evil one tried to make me do that today. Oh I tried. I made it through the first set. I even made it through the boxing glove, punch, & lunge torture she made me do. God help me I did the jumping jacks. I just finished the second set of God only knows how much time with the jump rope when I felt a pop. Seems I've strained my Achilles tendon. Oh joy. It'll heal, it's just sore. It didn't stop me from doing bicep curls, triceps dips, lat pulls, and whatever it's called when you lay flat on the bench and push 10 pound weights up into the air until they touch and then bring them back way down low...oh yes, that's called torture. It didn't stop me from doing torture. It also didn't stop me from doing 30 minutes on the elliptical. It will stop me from ever again doing jumping jacks, jumping rope, and donning the boxing gloves. No, the boxing gloves had nothing to do with my Achilles tendon, I just don't like them! She's still trying to figure out how I got a black eye from doing jumping jacks!

What can I do?

I can figure out what's working with my weight loss journey and what's not.

I lost 4.8 pounds this week. I got yet another star. I reached my #175 off tonight. I have NEVER lost 4.8 pounds in one week. My whole monthly total for March was exactly 4.8 pounds.

I think I might be on the right track!

Comfortable in my own skin

Even if there is a lot of it.

I had a fantastic day today. I intended to make a new chili recipe, an eggplant Parmesan, pickled beets with Splenda instead of sugar, chicken salad, a roasted vegetable shrimp pasta primavera, and without looking at my list, I can't remember what else. I needed to shop before cooking.

I also intended to clean my lanai today & check the gutters to see if I needed to clean them today or if they could wait 3 weeks. I needed to return the Viactive I bought at K-Mart yesterday, and deposit the rebate check for my new laptop that I got in the mail today. I needed to order drugs and I of course needed to exercise. I think there was some other stuff, but I can't remember what now.

You know what they say about the best laid plans.

I got the lanai tidied, I checked the gutters. They're good for another 3 weeks. I ordered drugs and I exercised. Oops, my friend Mary called and asked if I wanted to go to the pool. Hmmm let me think. It's 94 degrees. Would I rather go to the pool or cook?

The water was divine, the company better. What a lovely few hours. Floated and chatted and got all cooled off. Other friends joined us and it was just a wonderful, relaxing, awesome afternoon. I got home around 5:30. I was starving and still needed to shop. I decided I'd take myself out to dinner. Den was in bed sleeping so I would be dining solo.

I perused my dining out guide. I surfed Dottie's website for restaurants. I then put everything down and asked myself what I really wanted to eat. I wanted some juicy ground cow and a baked potato. Outback has the best burgers I think. Off to Outback I went. I thought I might feel a bit uncomfortable. My friend reminded me that I don't like to dine alone. I thought about that for a minute. I don't mind dining alone, I mind eating in a restaurant when whoever is with me doesn't eat. It all goes back to 'look at that fat chick eat' thing.

I walked into the restaurant and up to the counter. "Just me" I said. I was handed a beeper and told there was about a 15 minute wait. You can sit in the bar anytime there is an open seat. There weren't any. I did not want to belly up to the bar, but even those were full. I sat and was watching all the people when I realized I wasn't one bit self conscious. I didn't feel odd, or out of place, or anything at all. I just felt hungry! Got to my seat, ordered my food, enjoyed it tremendously. Never once did I feel anyone was staring at me with pity. Oh look at the fat girl, she has to eat alone. Nope, I didn't feel like that. That's not saying they weren't thinking it, but as long as I don't think they're thinking it, life is good! I know I'd not have been able to do this 170 pounds ago. Nope, not in a million years. I've got a long way to go in my weight loss journey still, but I'm comfortable in the skin I've got right now.

I've come a long way baby.

I've been thinking

About everything but the food I'm eating.

I think about what I'm going to eat. I think about when I'm going to eat. When I'm eating, I think about everything else.

This is the beginning of my 4th challenge to myself. I thought I'd just do what I'd done for the previous 3 and call it a wrap. I've changed my mind. I'm still learning and still moving forward in this journey. Hopefully, someday, I'll get it down pat!

I'm right back to being hungry all night long. I don't eat in my chair, but since my friend left, I'll use his chair and a TV tray. It's really hot here and I've had the a/c on in the house now and then. It's at least 87 degrees out on the lanai. That's my excuse. Well, it's going to stop.

For the next month I will not eat while watching TV. I will not read while I'm eating. I will eat and focus on what's in my mouth. I spend a lot of time planning and cooking, I might as well enjoy it!

I can't believe how these challenges have helped me. They have literally changed my life. I never believed that I could do the things I'm doing. I've always heard that doing something for a certain amount of time makes it become a habit. I believe it now.

On January 1, (I started my first challenge Jan 3) if you'd told me that 90 days from then would find me exercising 6 days a week without fail, planning all my meals without fail, staying OP for 90 days in a row without fail, I'd have called you a liar. Well, I did it. It got to be 6:30 pm today and I was just getting ready to fix my dinner when I realized I'd not exercised yet. It never crossed my mind to not do it. I had a snack and headed off to the gym. So dinner was a bit late, big deal!

My goals for the next month are:
1. practice mindful eating. No TV, books, etc while eating. Enjoy the food I've prepared for myself.
2. Exercise 6 days a week for 30 minutes a day aerobically. Strength train 3 days a week.
3. No eating in my recliner.
4. Stay OP for the whole month. Plan ahead and track my food every day.

I really encourage all of you to challenge yourself with a set of goals for a month.

It's a powerful feeling to accomplish your goals.

Heart palpations!

Do you have a heart monitor? Man oh man, if you don't, I'd get one!

I know that to exercise effectively, I need to have my heart in a certain range. The treadmill at my gym in the park has a heart rate monitor on it. You have to grab the bars just right and it'll give you a read out. Ya, so that's what they say! It doesn't work for me. My hands are too sweaty I think...either that, or when I try I'm really in cardiac arrest! It just won't read mine. The elliptical at the gym I joined is the same also. I just can't get a reading. My friend Ian had a heart rate monitor and let me use it. It was brilliant! I found that it talks to the elliptical both here at the park and at the gym. Awesome! I don't have to wear the ugly, plastic, watch part. Ian went back to England last week :-( and he let me keep the heart rate monitor!

I was worried about working too hard you see. Want to make sure I don't go over my 85% max heart rate. Welllllll that's not the reason I was glad to have it last week, and again Monday. I was on the elliptical in my gym here on Saturday. It was hard. I was working my ass off, it was killing me. I was huffing and puffing and doubting that I could finish 10 minutes, never mind 30. I checked my heart rate as I was sure it would be about 180.....it was 126!! I wasn't working hard enough! Some days are just harder than others. It really kicked home to me how easy it would be to underestimate your work out. I'd have said I was working above moderate level aerobically. Nope, I wasn't even at the low end of my target range! Knowing the numbers allowed me to kick it up a notch and make sure my workout was effective. I mean really, if I'm going to put a half hour into the elliptical and sweat and gasp for air, I want it at least to benefit my weight loss and my health!!!!

Yesterday at the gym I needed it for the other reason. I had my music jamming...I was reading what was going on on the TV and when I looked down I was above my target heart rate...way above. I slowed down a bit. I want to burn fat and not muscle for goodness sakes. Yep, I love my monitor!!!! I love my friend for giving it to me. If you don't have one, I highly recommend getting one!

Now, that really is a gift from the heart! A gift to the heart also.