Journey with Friends – WEEK 7

Welcome my friends to our weekly issue of Journey with Friends.  This is a time that we come together for support, for encouragement, for fellowship – all with one single goal in mind – to live better.  Welcome to our journey to share our goals and our accomplishments and our disappointments and frustrations.

Together we can do this!

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February 12, 2017 –  I love my Sundays.  I still keep my i-Watch on and track my activity but I don’t push myself on Sundays.  It’s my day of rest.  The scheduled I finally found that works for me is pushing it Monday thru Friday, Saturdays are a bonus if me and the hub workout and Sundays I rest.  This schedule I can maintain for sure.  Today, I kicked up my feet and watched movies on television while cuddling with the anipals.  Now those are great times.  Miles Moved: 1.33

February 13, 2017 –  Coming off of the weekend, it feels good to move and take my daily lunch walk chasing my shadow.  I always bring a jacket in case it’s too cool outside but most of the time the jacket comes off midway.  And I finally found a great walk to do.  I walk all the way around our work complex, through the parking lot making a circle, going back around the complex and then ending up back at my office.  It’s a great walk full of hills.  It does make me feel good afterwards.  Miles Moved: 2.30

February 14, 2017 – Do you know what gets my goat?  Bullies.  Pure and simple.  And they are everywhere – not just in schools.  I’ll tell you a secret that I haven’t told many people in my life.  When I was in middle school, I was bullied.  Why?  For being overweight.  Then in High School, I was bullied for a different reason.  Why?  For being smart.  And let me tell you something.  It doesn’t stop there.  There are bullies everywhere – in the gym, in the church, in stores and Lord forbid in the workplace.  The little bullies just grow up to be big jerk bullies.  I guess from being bullied from a young age, I learned to block a lot of feelings in my youth.  Now that I’m older, I’ve learned that I don’t care what people think about me.  I know that I’m a good person.  Get to know me and I promise you will like me… really 🙂  But some people in this day and time still look at you and assume you must be lazy.  It’s like people that judge a book by the cover.  You never know what you have until you get involved.  So for all those bullies out there – kiss my southern grits.  Now 🙂 I feel better.  That was my soap box issued for today.  Miles Moved: 2.56

February 15, 2017 –  Well we didn’t do too bad last night.  We did split a dessert but also  means half the calories, right?  And hey, we do still need to live and celebrate special occasions.  Got my walk in at work before the date so that counts too.  This week, my i-Watch is set for 400 calories to be used for exercise.  At the end of this day, I did 889!  That’s a personal best so far this year.  Go me!  Miles Moved: 2.03

February 16, 2017 –  I’ll be honest with you.  I sure didn’t feel like walking outside today.  It’s in the 50’s which would be awesome if their was no wind and the sun was fully shining.  That was not the case here today.  It was in the 50’s with LOTS of wind and the sun kept ducking behind the clouds. I took a small walk around the warehouse at work for 10 minutes this morning before work.  Then for my lunch break, I zipped up my jacket, put on my hoody, put in my bluetooth with my music and hit the streets.  Brrr and chilly willy!  But today was a good day and I’m glad I walked.  Not just for the obvious I’m moving and I did 20 minutes outside.  But because one of the other tenants in our work complex was going to their car and stopped me for a minute.  They told me how proud they were of me, that they had seen me outside every day and they had to give me an atta boy for walking in the elements I’ve done.  ❤ Now, hey – that makes everything better.  Miles Moved: 2.18

February 17, 2017 –  Today I realized that I’ve been changing my way of living for 7 weeks.  What have I accomplished?  I’m definitely eating a lot better.  My food choices have some kind of thought behind them.  And if I know we have something special coming up, I definitely make sure we eat better and work out more.  Makes sense huh?  Why didn’t I think of the years ago?  LOL.  And one day this week, I really didn’t want to workout but I did anyway.  I was talking to my sister about this and she said that’s when you can tell things are changing with my mindset.  I don’t want to but I know I need to.  There’s a big difference.  It definitely helps walking at mid-day and gives me a little refresher for the rest of my day. Miles Moved: 2.32

February 18, 2017 –  Today is my moms birthday. With that being said, not much is going to happen today besides a birthday dinner. We still have to live and celebrate life 😀 Miles Moved: 1.26

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Thoughts for the week:  Life is a work in progress.  I don’t expect to make changes overnight.  But I do expect to live each day – day by day working towards a goal.  And YOU my friends don’t know how helpful you are or how much I appreciate your support during this change.  I really love each and every one of you for sticking with me and reading my thoughts every week.  I hope I don’t bore you ❤

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This week walked: 13.98

TOTAL 2017 Miles:  87.03

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January Weight Loss:  -12.00 pounds (88 more to go!)

Next Weigh In MARCH 4, 2017

 

Journey with Friends – WEEK 6

Welcome my friends to our weekly issue of Journey with Friends.  This is a time that we come together for support, for encouragement, for fellowship – all with one single goal in mind – to live better.  Welcome to our journey to share our goals and our accomplishments and our disappointments and frustrations.

Together we can do this!

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February 5, 2017: I’m definitely living for my Sundays – the day of rest from all exercise.  The big game is on tonight so I’m sure I will get some exercise from jumping up/down and screaming at the television.  That counts, right?  Giggles.  Miles Moved: 0.95

February 6, 2017: I’m so excited!  I finally got my green exercise ring to move and I am kicking it like you won’t believe.  My goal this week is to have perfect circles in everything – activity, exercise and stand – all week long.  I think I can do this.  Some people have asked what the circles do.  I have an Apple i-Watch that does everything ❤ .  On the Apple i-Watch, you have an activity app that keeps up with three things – your activity, your exercise and your stand.  Your activity ring is the red ring.  That tells you how many calories you are burning for that particular day.  For this week, my calories are set for 370 calories therefore my goal is 370; however, as you can tell from the picture, I’m normally doing twice as much as that – yay me!  Your goal calories changes from week to week.  It can be higher or lower and gives you something to shoot for.  The exercise ring is the green ring.  It is recommended that you do some type of exercise for at least 30 minutes a day and that is your goal.  If you do more, the green just keeps wrapping around like the red.  And then there is the blue ring.  That is your stand goal.  The app is set up that it wants you to stand 12 out of 12 hours.  Which means, if you sit too long not doing anything, your watch will buzz to let you know you need to get up and move.  Neat huh?  I hope that explains more.  I’m in LOVE with this i-Watch and can’t thank my sister enough for the gift.  It has really helped mt to be more aware of what I need to do everyday.  And the stand reminder is awesome at work because sometimes I get too involved in paperwork and forget to move.  Miles Moved: 2.23

February 7, 2017:  My RA in my hip has really been giving me a tough time today.  It may be the wetness in the air due to some rain we are suppose to be getting.  Do your bones/joints let you know when rain is coming?   It’s the pits for sure.  But still, during lunch at work, I got up and moved it around the parking lot.  In fact, I think I kicked it really well 🙂 Miles Moved: 3.06

February 8, 2017:  The rain did come in – thank goodness!  But my hip is still giving me problems.  It *hates* me moving.  Regardless, I hurt if I move and I hurt if I don’t move.  So what am I going to do?  Walk of course – LOL.  Miles Moved:2.34

February 9, 2017:  People around my office complex are starting to recognize me from walking so much.  I think it’s cute.  If they are outside of the building when I come around, they now wave and tell me how proud they are of me getting out there and moving.  Crazy huh?  It really does inspire me to keep going at it especially when my hip is yelling.  Miles Moved: 1.96

February 10, 2017: YAY!  I never thought Friday would get here.  I have to say that I almost had a perfect week.  I was so tired last night that I went to bed early missing two hours of stand time.  But I’m good with that.  Today I felt really great so I kicked it up a notch on my lunch walk. Felt awesome!  Miles Moved: 2.70 miles

February 11, 2017:  Today’s agenda is to run errands in the morning, movie in the afternoon and then rest.  Lots of rest.  Miles Moved: 1.16

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Thoughts for the week:  As time has went by, there has been several changes that I’ve seen.  My body is one.  My tastes is another one.  I use to be a huge potato chip fan.  I loved them – all of them.  But these days, I don’t want any of them at all.  Just thinking of them, turns my stomach.  And I’m also happy to say that I still have not had a single soda.  It has been 43 days now since my last one last year.  Some days are easier than others.  Some days I struggle and realize that this is a lifetime change.  So how did you do this week my friends?

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This week walked: 14.40

TOTAL 2017 Miles:  73.05

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January Weight Loss:  -12.00 pounds (88 more to go!)

 

Journey with Friends – Week 5

Welcome my friends to our weekly issue of Journey with Friends.  This is a time that we come together for support, for encouragement, for fellowship – all with one single goal in mind – to live better.  Welcome to our journey to share our goals and our accomplishments and our disappointments and frustrations.

Together we can do this!

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January 29, 2017:  Thank goodness Sunday is my day of rest.  We did absolutely nothing today.  We went to the grocery store, ran some other errands and basically chilled.  There wasn’t any football on television and me and the hub actually felt a little lost.  Miles Moved: 1.54

January 30, 2017:  I’m finding that when I get back into my routine on Mondays, I kind of miss it.  What do they say about a body being in motion, stays in motion?  That never really made sense until now.  I enjoy my walking. It has made a HUGE difference already in my legs.  I walk taller for some reason which is weird.  Miles Moved: 1.62

January 31, 2017:  I’m mixing my walk up around the parking lot these days – people don’t know if I’m coming or going and that’s hilarious.  I think a lot of people in my normal route were getting used to me and have started waving at me now.  I’m still doing the same route but just in different directions.  It makes it feel new which keeps it exciting.  Miles Moved: 2.02

February 1, 2017:  No matter what kind of day you can be having, I’m *loving* taking my lunch by walking out my frustrations.  Frustrations of not balancing my work numbers, having a huge workload – you name it.  It’s great to get out and pound the pavement to see what I can do.  And it feels better when I come in and hit the paperwork again.  Even better.  I spoke with the hub and we are moving the weigh in until this Saturday since it falls in the middle of the week.  Hopefully, something is starting to show up on the scales as well.  Miles Moved: 2.21

February 2, 2017: Something is going on with my exercise ring on my i-Watch.  It doesn’t hardly move – LOL.  I mean I’m literally exercising 30 minutes a day.  My activity ring is running circles, some days doubling my movement.  But the green exercise ring doesn’t make it around.  It infuriates me.  But never fear, my sister is looking into it to see maybe if I’m doing something wrong.  And today for work, I went on a VERY long walk all around where I work.  These surrounding people in other offices are going to start recognizing me – giggles.  Miles Moved 2.19

February 3, 2017: My day of rest from walking at work – this is good.  I use Fridays to get caught up with work from the week and if I get time, I walk but I don’t force it. I do this also because I know me and the hub unit will do our own walking together tomorrow.   2.33 Miles Moved

February 4, 2017:  Weigh day!  And we are running errands all.day.long and putting a nice walk in their somewhere together.  1.51 Miles Moved

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Thoughts for the Week/Month:  We weighed in Saturday and I’m officially down 12 pounds for January 2017 – can I get a whoo-hoo!  I’m excited about that!  In years past, I would jump in and lose a lot of weight but then I struggled at keeping it off.  This time, I’m trying to change eating habits and learning to live healthier.  It’s a huge difference… slow but sure.  I’m walking more.  I’m feeling better about myself.  My pain levels are dropping – not gone but dropping.  I feel a huge difference in my body – especially my legs and butt.  And with making little changes, we are eating healthier.  I had one person ask me, “How much did you lose?”  When I told them 12 pounds, they responded with, “Is that all?!”  I smiled and shook my head.  It’s okay.  It may not be something to you but to me, it’s TWELVE pounds and that 12 pounds will snowball into more pounds and guess what I’ll be doing at the end?  I’ll be the one smiling feeling awfully darn proud of myself!

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This week walked: 13.42

TOTAL 2017 Miles:  58.65

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January Weight Loss:  -12.00 pounds (88 more to go!)

 

Journey with Friends

Welcome my friends to our weekly issue of Journey with Friends.  This is a time that we come together for support, for encouragement, for fellowship – all with one single goal in mind – to live better.  Welcome to our journey to share our goals and our accomplishments and our disappointments and frustrations.

Together we can do this!

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 Hello friends – how was your week?  We held our own here at the Hotel Thompson.  From working so hard in the past weeks, we took this weekend to chill.  We turned off the phones, the computers and the iPad and chilled.  Mostly we watched television and cooked in the kitchen.  I have to say, I made some amazing meals this weekend.  I feel pretty good today – which is totally awesome for a change.  It’s finally started to get cooler here – this morning it was 46 degrees when I left for work.  It’s almost finally time to switch from flip-flops to the Ugg boots – YAY!

I’m happy to report that today is Monday and today I feel great.  My pain levels is probably around a 2 from my rheumatoid arthritis – that is excellent for a change!  Hopefully it is finally taking a turn for the better – it seems ages since I felt this good.  This week calls for more work and lots of errands to run next weekend.

So my friends, how was your week?

 

Journey with Friends

Welcome my friends to our weekly issue of Journey with Friends.  This is a time that we come together for support, for encouragement, for fellowship – all with one single goal in mind – to live better.  Welcome to our journey to share our goals and our accomplishments and our disappointments and frustrations.

Together we can do this!

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 Hello sweet friends.  How did you do last week?  Last week, I functioned in survival mode.  I had a lot to do at work for the beginning of the month and ending the 3rd Quarter of the year.  That meant long hours and crashing hard upon getting home for the day.  So no.  My eating choices were not on par but yet again they weren’t the worse in the world either.  I call it one of those okay weeks.  I’m only weighing once a month at this point at the end of the month.  I think that helps me get along without concentrating too much on numbers but more on how I feel.

This weekend I played catch up from the week.  Do you ever have one of those weeks where you over-work then on the weekends you run around so much trying to play catch up that you need a NEW weekend just to rest?  That was me this past weekend.  I grabbed my mom and we went and run all the market errands Saturday.  Thank goodness for her because we were able to tag team the list and get everything done remarkably quick for a change.  Then me and the hub unit went for our flu shots for the season.  This has to be the best year for those shots.  We absolutely didn’t feel a thing which was awesome.  Our arms were a little sore that night and the next day but manageable.  But getting the flu show may account for my clumsiness.  Yep, I’m one of those peeps.  What you mean?  Like being in the car.  My mom opened a water bottle for me.  I grabbed it from the bottom and spewed water all over us and the center console.  Yeah, the car needed to be cleaned anyway – LOL.  Or this morning – shaking my head.  I opened up my awesome Pumpkin Spice creamer to put in my coffee.  My fingers are hurting a little for the worse today and I dropped said full bottle… all over me, the cabinets, the floor, the anipals here – shaking my head.  It did eventually end up in my coffee but now I smell like Pumpkin Spice.  Speaking of pumpkin spice, we saw the cutest movie on the Hallmark channel yesterday (because the football teams sucked Saturday 😦  ).  The movie was called Pumpkin Pie Wars.  Have you seen it?  Cutest little romantic movie.  You should look it up.

Hope you had a fantastic week and weekend sweet friends.  Tell me all about it ❤

 

Journey with Friends

Welcome my friends to our weekly issue of Journey with Friends.  This is a time that we come together for support, for encouragement, for fellowship – all with one single goal in mind – to live better.  Welcome to our journey to share our goals and our accomplishments and our disappointments and frustrations.

Together we can do this!

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Hey my friends.  How was your week?  Mine moved right along with its normal ups/downs.  But overall, not bad at all.  Food wise, we made good choices.  Now I did work a lot and I think my body was telling me over the weekend to slow down – and I did.  I rested all day Sunday with the kids surrounding me.  Who could ask for more than that, right?  We watched a couple of great movies on television, laughed and just had a great family day.

We also watched several football games over the weekend.  Unfortunately our beloved Tennessee Volunteers lost yesterday to Texas AM 45-38.  It was their first loss of the season and they did give it their all.  Shout out to Texas A&M for a job well played.  Now the next important game for our Tennessee is playing against their rival Alabama this Saturday 10/15/2016 at 3:30pm.  This is a game we will *not* miss.  We will be glued to our television.  In fact, you will probably here us screaming from the Hotel Thompson.

Another great game was the Atlanta Falcons playing Denver and winning 23-16.  Now, I have to give kudos to Denver and we know there are plenty of readers from that area here in the blogs.  Denver played a great game.  We also have to apologize for one of our Falcon players who got a little zealous towards the end of the game and got an unsportsman penalty.  We were not too happy about his behavior for sure.  So Denver it was a great game and Lynch was awesome.

Today is also Canadian Thanksgiving.  We would like to wish all of our Canadian friends a wonderful day full of love and happy moments.  Rejoice with your families and know that we love you too here at the Hotel Thompson.

So my friends, how was your week?  Did you watch any great games?

 

Journey with Friends

Welcome my friends to our weekly issue of Journey with Friends.  This is a time that we come together for support, for encouragement, for fellowship – all with one single goal in mind – to live better.  Welcome to our journey to share our goals and our accomplishments and our disappointments and frustrations.

Together we can do this!

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 Hey sweet friends!  How did you do last week?  We are moving right along here at the Hotel Thompson.  I’m actually doing good.  I’ve been working a lot of different hours but I’ve also been watching what I’m eating.  It’s meshing the two half way these days.  Complicated but it’s working.  I no way got my walking in because of work.  But I can say that the weather is getting cooler.  Most days it’s still hotter than you can imagine but every couple of days, Fall tries to kick in and make an appearance.  And another thing about fall – pumpkin.  Oh my!  I just can’t get enough of pumpkin.  I actually found a recipe for pumpkin muffins with cream cheese.  I’m going to see if I can tweak the recipe to get rid of some of the sugar and try it maybe this coming up weekend.  It sounds so marvelous.  I’ll keep you posted and try to take pics.  How are you with pumpkin – yay or nay?

So my friends – how was YOUR week?  Hugs to a great week.

 

Journey with Friends

Welcome my friends to our weekly issue of Journey with Friends.  This is a time that we come together for support, for encouragement, for fellowship – all with one single goal in mind – to live better.  Welcome to our journey to share our goals and our accomplishments and our disappointments and frustrations.

Together we can do this!

Hello sweet friends. How was your week?  Any stumbling blocks?  Did you meet your goals?

I can officially say that I do believe my desire for sodas may be behind me. I haven’t had one for a couple of weeks now which blows my mind. I was so addicted 😦  I’ve made a commitment only to partake on special occasions when me and the hub unit might go out to dinner. At least this choice seems to be working now. Yay me!  

My food decisions last week were also good. AND I weighed this past weekend. I was down a couple more pounds!!  

So I’m learning day by day is the best way for me. So my friends – how was your week?

❤️️

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Journey with Friends

Welcome my friends to our weekly issue of Journey with Friends.  This is a time that we come together for support, for encouragement, for fellowship – all with one single goal in mind – to live better.  Welcome to our journey to share our goals and our accomplishments and our disappointments and frustrations.

Together we can do this!

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Hey my friends.  How did you do last week?  I’m still bouncing right along trying to cook more at home, eating better and walking when I can. Sometimes I get too focused on something and overdo.  Do you know what I mean?  Since a couple of weeks ago when I tweaked my way of eating a bit and not pushing myself so much to do walking, I’m feeling and doing better.  Funny how that works huh?  But sometimes there are days still when the little devil sits on your shoulder and says, “Go ahead, eat that chocolate.  It doesn’t matter.”  I think we all fight the devils here/there in our life.  Let’s all of us get the things off of our chest that need to be out there.

.  I will not let people get me down.  I will not cringe over the little things of extra work on my desk, more bills that need to be paid, kids schedules or deadlines.  I will not play your high school games.  I will not let the devil overtake my life.  I will not curse in traffic.  Today I will put my head up high.  I will be me – take it or leave it.

Now my friends, how was your week?  Do tell and list some of the things that will *not* get you down this week ❤

 

Journey with Friends

Welcome my friends to our weekly issue of Journey with Friends.  This is a time that we come together for support, for encouragement, for fellowship – all with one single goal in mind – to live better.  Welcome to our journey to share our goals and our accomplishments and our disappointments and frustrations.

Together we can do this!

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 Hello sweet friends.  How was your week?  Last week I tried something different.  Less *thinking* about how I should eat and more thinking about life in general.  I concentrated on me, which is something I normally don’t do.  For instance, I ate good foods when I was hungry, not necessarily because it was breakfast time or lunch time or dinner time.  Does that make sense?  I still ate meals but I broke them down into mini-meals throughout the day.  I always felt full and didn’t crave anything which is a first for me.  And a couple of times something weird happened.  What you ask?  I heard my tummy growling – Oh my!  When was the last time you heard your tummy growl?  This was such a weird feeling especially since I felt like I was eating all day.  But even more amazing – I was down on the scales this week – can I get heck yeah!

So my friends – how was your week?