Diet Bet: Another win!

I won my last Diet Bet (bet $25, won $50 and some change!!)  I just signed up for two more. One is weighing in now (starts in 2 days): Runtastic DietBet with Lunden. The other one weighs in in 3 days: Do Life Diet Bet! both are $25 bets.  My goal is to take the original $30 I bet and see how big I can make it grow!  Who wants to join me!?!?

 

Motivation Monday

Don't forget to enter my first giveaway! Here

Today I'm linking up with Motivation Monday.

Surprise NSV!

Last week, I bought some smaller clothes at WalMart on clearance. When I started this journey in January, my 26s were too small. I didn't expect to fit them yet. This morning I put on the size 24 skirt----and it fits! I tried in the 222/24 shirt---another win!  Total price for the outfit: $6.  (Picture by my 9 year old).

I upgraded my shoes! (GIVEAWAY)

I upgraded my shoes yesterday.  When I first got my shoes (end of February), my 7 year old said they looked like boy shoes (and he was kind of right!).  But I bought for fit---not fashion. (To be honest, when the salesman at Fleet Feet gave me three pairs to choose from, I did ask if any of them came in pretty colors!)  These shoes have carried me over 350 miles already! I wear them every day!  You can see the difference in the color between the two pairs!  But the biggest change is I traded out the blue & white laces for a pair of pretty pink ones!

A month or so ago, I applied to be a Sweat Pink Ambassador (SPA).  And I was accepted.  I was surprised because, 1. I am still a long way from finished with my journey. I am not "fit".  2. My blog is still kind of new and not as popular as some of the others.  But, apparently, they see me as a work in progress.  I hope I can continue to inspire others---as others inspire me---to press on to reach new goals.

 

The mission of Sweat Pink is:

We believe that kicking a$$ is best done in pretty shoes. We’ve learned that real women sweat, and sweat hard. We know that assertiveness, strength, and ambition are the ultimate feminine qualities. We concede that sometimes it takes hours to get ready, but we’re also no strangers to just rolling out of bed and going. We’re convinced that we run faster in pink shoelaces. We believe in pushing ourselves, and we believe in giving ourselves a break, too. We’re all about the rush of endorphins and the thrill of the challenge. We’re all for looking great and feeling even better. We’re committed to finding our best fit, and making it stick.

How do we get there?
We climb.
We journey.
We balance.
We reward.

To celebrate, I'm going to give away a pair (or maybe more than one pair!) of pink shoelaces. The team at Sweat Pink sent me enough to share!

And the entries will be easy.  Leave me a comment. If you don't want/need pink laces (like--you are already a SPA) feel free to leave me a comment anyway.  

For extra entries, do something to help me grow my blog network.  (Shameless plug!) You don't have to leave a separate comment for each thing you do.  Just tell me how many things you did in your comment.  One point for each.  Is that easy enough?

Follow me blog on Facebook or Bloglovin or Google+ or Twitter or GFC or Networked Blogs

Tell someone about Half A Julie (blog, Twitter, Facebook, etc.)

Become my friend on MyFitnessPal or Earndit or ShopKick or EveryMove (you'll have to send me your e-mail so I can invite you).

Think of something else?....just tell me what you did!

(I'd prefer to only send within the US, but I might consider sending to other countries if the shipping doesn't kill me!)

How do you sweat pink?

 

NSV Time

Time for a linkup.  At first I didn't know if I would be able to come up with anything.  It's been a rough week. But I dug deep!

For 135 days, I have logged my food and exercise on MyFitnessPal. I haven't done everything perfectly, but I continue to trudge along.  

I got my prize from EveryMove's Fitcation contest that I won last month.  I got a Body Media (aka Body Bugg) like they use on The Biggest Loser, a t-shirt, an aluminum water bottle, a gift card for a pair of running shoes and a night in a fancy hotel.  The last two items are from Seattle.  But the shoe store mailed out a pair of shoes to me today (after we talked about what I've been wearing and my feet issues.)  The hotel stay is going to be a wedding present.

I got new workout clothes from Mother's Day.  You can see a pretty model picture of the purple shirt at the Old Navy site.  But here's what it looks like on me.  I got three pieces.  The purple shirt is a compression tank top with a built in bra.  (Not nearly enough bra for me.)  The peach shirt is just a regular tank. In both pictures, I'm wearing compression pants.  Apparently I have very thin lower calves.  They are bagging around the ankles!

Some thoughts to remind me that I need to keep going.  I will not give up!

I hit a wall

source

I am nowhere near mile 20, but this is how I feel this week.  I started this journey 133 days ago. (No, I didn't count them, MyFitnessPal told me 3 days ago that I had logged in for 130 days in a row.).  For 133 days, I have logged everything I put in my mouth.  Since January 1st, I have walked or ran over 200 miles (plus another 600 "incidental" (non-exercise) miles.  I've done Zumba at least 1 time (up to 4 times) a week.  I've completed C25K and run over 3 miles without stopping at least 5 times.

Over the past month, I've been struggling to stay on track calorie wise. I'm meeting my numbers, but my choices aren't the best.  I'm struggling with Pepsi again.  But my I have been gaining and losing the same 2-4 pounds for about a month.

This week, I hit the wall with exercise.  After finishing the C25K program, I was a little lost.  Do I just keep running 5K? How do I move forward.  I finally decided to try a 10K app that carried on from my C25K app.  I did the first day: Run 10 minutes, rest (walk) 1 minute and repeat 4 times.  This should have been "easy" (relatively easy!). When I run my 5Ks, it took me most of an hour. A 10 minute run should have been a piece of cake.  But, apparently, I let too much time pass. (Sporadic running for about 3 or 4 weeks).  I have tried (and failed) to do day 2 twice.

And Zumba, my favorite exercise of all, has ceased being fun.  I felt it last week, and I decided I just needed to give it another chance.  Maybe the class with the other teacher would be better.  But that didn't help either. I couldn't wait for class to be over.

I don't like this feeling.  I know that dedication and discipline are not based on feelings.  But it is hard to keep doing it when I just don't feel like it.  Thus the wall at the beginning of the post.  I feel like I have slammed hard into it.

When I was looking for a picture to illustrate how I felt, I found this picture too.

source

I do have a choice. And I am choosing to find a way over (or under, or around, or through) the wall.  I will not let the wall beat me. It might slow me down. But it won't stop me.

Have you ever hit a wall? How do to get around it?

Fitness Friday

I decided to link to link with several friends today. I've been looking for a Friday Fitness link up---today I found 5! :)

Ever since I graduated from C25K, I've felt a little lost.  I've run 5K (3.1 miles) on the treadmill a couple of times and outside once. But I didn't want to just keep running 3 miles, and I was having trouble staying focused.  I came across the Zen Labs 10 Trainer which is the same C25K app I used, but instead of ending on week 9, it started bridging to the 10K.  It was kind of fun to go through and mark 8 weeks of training as "done"! :)  On Tuesday, I did W9D1.  And I thought I was going to die!  I hadn't run for over a week (just no room in my schedule).  The assignment was "only" run 10 minute and walk for 1 x 4 sets.  I made it through.  On Thursday, I just could not get into a run.  So I walked around the track at the gym instead. I will attempt again tomorrow.

That Tuesday I had my biggest FitBit count ever! I surpassed 25,000 steps!  How did I do that? By being a gym rat!  In addition to my run (above) and my regular 6:30 Zumba class, I decided to try an extra class at 5:30. It was "Thighs, Butt, and Abs" Oh My! I still was not quite up to 25,000 steps, but it was close enough that I stepped it out at home.

Tonight, I will expect to hit a big number on my FitBit. I'm currently only at 3260 steps.  And it's 4:30 PM.  But from 6-midnight, I'll be "Walking for Hope". I'm doing the cancer relay. I expect to walk off and on all night. (My goal is to walk at least 1 mile for every hour. So a total of 6 hours.) 

How are your fitness goals going?