What was your dinner?

Mine was a little high on the sodium side due to the turkey sausage splurge (670 mg per serving), but was a great healthy treat we grilled with an array of veggies (tomatoes, onions, orange bell pepper, zucchini, and squash).  For less sodium, sub chicken (yummy is to marinate the chicken before grilling with Italian dressing).  Pre grill pic:

Practice Makes???

You know the saying "practice makes perfect" but that's not really accurate.  If you are practicing bad form for example, then you will never get good form or good results as a result regardless of how much you practice...it will never be "perfect".  The saying really should be Perfect Practice makes Perfect.  You will only ever get out what you put in, so don't repeat bad behavior, bad mental dialogue, bad form, sloppy workouts, bad eating habits and expect to get anything out of it but bad results.  A good example of bad form would be the squat (Importance of a Proper Squat) or the push up....Folks will rush through those moves workout after workout and wonder why they don't get the results for their efforts....simple answer is you are not working the correct muscles and most likely just stressing your joints.  Same with mindless eating....If you nibble, bite, sample your way through the day not thinking those little tastes here and there amount to anything, you are sadly mistaken.  Results = the Effort you put into it.  Perfect Practice = Perfect Results!

Challenge Points Bonus 1

Thought I'd give you a points bonus......If you post a healthy, supportive, yummy recipe in the comments below for everyone's benefit, you can add 15 points to your cumulative total!

I Ate How Much?

What a great example that I can share with all of you this fine Monday morning!  I have my husband doing this Current Fitness Challenge which he is mostly thrilled to do ;-) and is off to a very great start!  I had to chuckle yesterday though as he was logging in his food.....and knew right away it was going to be my next blog post.

Like so many of us, my husband is of the mind set that if he is eating healthy foods (or rather, mostly healthy foods), he shouldn't have to worry with tracking them.  Nor does he really think it matters how much of a good thing he is or isn't consuming regarding his waistline.  His wake up call was yesterday!  I went shopping Saturday and bought for him his requested nuts stash to combine with fruit for one of his daily snacks.  I put them in their own little basket alongside a measuring cup so he could snack healthfully.  As he is off to such a great start, he prepared his own afternoon snack yesterday consisting of nuts and grapes.  Most excellent choice, right?  Depends....depends on what nut you select, how many servings you select, etc.  Well, it was almost full proof regarding type of nuts as I was careful what I bought for him, so selection, while not what I would have chosen, made him happy and wasn't off the charts bad for him.  The problem he encountered was serving size.  A serving size of most nuts is a 1/4 of cup.  Have you seen a 1/4 cup of peanuts, cashews, almonds, pistachios, or walnuts?  Not a ton of content.  Makes you very aware how many calories you are consuming when you just sit down with a bag or a can of nuts for sure.  Anyway, he mixed a serving of three different kinds of nuts, so he had three servings of nuts with his grapes.  As he was logging in his treat, he was astonished at how many calories he was consuming.....over 630 calories!

Lesson is that you can be eating something completely healthy, but if you are not aware of the nutritional breakdown and have not practiced days worth of meals over the course of time to know how many calories, fats, carbs, protein, sodium, fiber, etc., you are actually consuming from the foods you put into your body, you cannot truly know what you are consuming.  You can eat numerous, healthy, supportive meals throughout a day but if you do not know what the caloric intake is of those foods, then you cannot truly know if you are consuming more or less calories than your body needs in a day. 

Eating "healthy", alone does not equal eating supportively!  Need help:  Eating Supportively

Thank You!

For Everything that I am and Everything that I am yet to be, I owe to God!  Thanks to Him for all the blessings He has graciously bestowed on me!  "He that glorieth, let him glory in the Lord." I Corinthians 1:31  There is none other I would glorify or praise!!!  Thanks be to God for all He has provided both the obvious blessings and for those learned and discerned!  Thanks be to God for His Son, Jesus Christ!

Body Comp v Scale?

Did you know that muscles make up 40-50% of your body weight?  What about the fact that they are comprised of 72% water, 20% protein, and 8% minerals, glycogen, & triglycerides?  Did you read the post on Greater Muscle Mass = Higher Metabolism?  Do you realize that a pound of lean muscle not only drives your metabolism but takes up far less space in your body than fat?  So your scale didn't move!!!  How do your clothes fit?  Wouldn't you rather be healthier and in smaller clothes than the scale going down at a fast rate?  Really???  Personally, I'd rather be 10 lbs heavier than folks would ever know and in smaller clothes than 20 lbs less than folks would ever guess because I'm in larger clothes.  That's right, if you are "dieting" and/or over exercising you could very well be ticking down on the scale but your clothes not fitting much better and certainly not in smaller sizes because you are not losing the fat.  Get over what the scale says and go by the tape measure!

Challenge Starts Tomorrow!!!

4/6/12 - 6/29/12 Challenge:

Are you up for a real challenge? Past Challenges have focused on personal/specific goals and results. While that is great, I thought an awesome twist would be to focus this Challenge on just Fitness & Nutritional Goals!!! Sounds similar, but trust me when I say this is going to be very different ;-) By focusing on these set and very specific goals, your results will follow! Targeting fitness goals are a great way to get out of your head about size goals and plateaus and allow you to better achieve them as a product of pushing yourself physically. So let's get this party started!!!!

First, just as the past Challenge: It is going to be a 12 Week Challenge beginning April 6th and ending June 29th. To officially participate, send me an e-mail at cagib1@charter.net letting me know you are "All In". Anyone is welcome to either officially or unofficially participate as it is free either way. The only difference is you will receive some further guidance via e-mail if you are officially participating as well as be eligible for prizes.

Since we will be focusing our attention on mini Fitness & Nutritional Challenges throughout this 12 Week Challenge, the weigh/measure days will be much fewer this Challenge since results are not our FOCUS. That does not mean you will not get results...In fact you will most likely get better results than you ever have in the past BUT only if you do the work and participate FULLY! The weigh/measure dates will be: April 6th/7th; May 18th/19th; and finally on June 29th/30th. As with any Challenge, before/after pics are very helpful to reflect how well you do, so if you do pics, do them for yourself on the April 6th/7th & June 29th/30th result dates. Refer to Measuring Results for info on how to weigh/measure & take before/after pics. If you are officially participating, you will e-mail me your weigh/measure results only on the specified dates.

Prizes will be awarded to the person with the most points, the person with the best results, and the person who overcame the most obstacles and finished this Challenge anyway! Three separate prizes to three separate people. Trying to figure out if the prizes are worth it? Really? Come on, I don't even tell my kids what the reward is most of the time...but it's always worth it!!! See below for how points are earned....

All Mini Fitness & Nutritional Challenges will be posted here as they occur and are the way you earn points. You will be responsible for keeping up with your points and will need to e-mail me at the end of each mini challenge what your points are....As it is on the honor system and only hurts you if you cheat, I trust that you will be honest with yourself first and foremost! It will be a cumulative tab so you will need to e-mail me what you earned within each mini challenge as well as your total points up to that point. The end of the Challenge on June 29th/30th is when you would e-mail me your total points as well as your weigh/measure results for prize consideration.

1st Mini Nutritional Challenge 4/6/12 - 4/19/12 TRACK WHAT YOU EAT!
This is one habit that would benefit you if you did it the entire 12 weeks of this Challenge; however, for purposes of this Challenge you are only required to do it for these first 2 weeks. If you track everything you eat, every day: You get a point for each day you do it from April 6th - April 19th. You get two points for each day you do it from April 20th - June 28th.


Reminder that you can track simply in a journal or on free sites/apps such as sparkpeople.com.

Tight & Don't Know Why?

So you workout with good form and stretch properly post workout and in between workout days, and you are still tight?  Have aches and pains and can't figure out why?  Did you ever consider it might be caused by the way you sleep?  Just as if you sit for long periods of time can lead to tight hip flexors so too can sleeping in the wrong position.  Can't determine why you have neck or back pain?  Look at your favorite sleep position and it's a good chance that could be your culprit.

More Is Not Always Better...

Going to the extremes of anything is not usually the best choice.  The same goes for your vitamin intake.  Make sure you always follow your doctor's advice and recommendations and beyond that adhere to recommended dosages.  Special care must be taken to not consume excessive amounts of fat-soluble A, D, K, and E vitamins that are stored in the body fat as they can impair physical performance and health.  Excess vitamin A and D intake can actually retard growth and permanently damage organs.  But that doesn't mean don't take what you need....Vitamin D is important in promoting calcium absorption for example so make sure you know what you are consuming and what you should consume.  Know too that the best source of any vitamin and mineral is the natural source and that supplements/vitamins should not be your only source of such.

Happy April!

So many things to be grateful for this first Monday in April!!!  Not the least of which, I got to spend two days with  my 2 1/2 week old niece ;-)  Loaded up on new baby kisses, I am ready to hit the week running!  Posted the April workout:  Free Monthly Workouts