A Great Day!

Just a quick journal post to say that it was a great day! What a wonderful surprise this morning to get up and see the scale register back to 139. Last week I was at 141 and have been working towards getting back into the 130's. Success! The extra exercise and healthier eating is starting to pay off.

I have been able to get a few walks in this past week, and today I made it to the gym for a workout. My goal is to go to the gym twice a week, but for now if i can just get there once it will be an improvement. It is about a 30 min. drive, so i usually combine the trip with errands in order to conserve gas.

One thing that has been going well for me this first week is to drink 2 Qts. of water a day, and make sure that i have at least one piece of fruit. I am trying to think about what i need to add, instead of dwelling on what i should stop eating.

Amy B's Introductory Post

Greetings to everyone from New England. I live in Massachusetts, and this picture was taken at the fair recently with my Dad and my sister's (Madridmom) two youngest children. It has been great to have them back in the states for furlough and to be able to spend some time with them.

My husband is the Director of Camp Northfield, a Christian camp here in Mass. We love serving God here, and He has allowed us to be here for 30 years now.

This is my second Christmas Crunch challenge. For me it will be about getting back on the right track, refocusing my eating and exercising habits, and regaining the losses that I saw last year. My weight and measurements haven't changed too much, but since they are creeping back up there I know that I must get serious again. Thank you Dani!

I will post my starting measurements below. I am up 4 pounds from my lowest weight, but am still down 14 from my highest weight in April of 2009 when this journey began for me. I can not emphasize enough how much better I have felt these past two years, and how much more energy I have had. This alone should motivate me to continue to maintain my losses!!

My goals for this crunch are to eat better, healthier meals once again and cut way back on the sweets and junk food. This week i have been focusing on drinking more water, eating more fruit and trying to walk at least 20 min each day.

Another goal is to get back to working out at the gym 2 days each week, in addition to walking here at home the other 3 or 4 days. I would very much like to say goodbye to 141 and get back into the 130's for my weight. I am stating here that I would like to lose 5 lbs., putting me at a new low of 136. My final goal is to practice more with posting on the blog, enabling me to improve these skills.

Measurements for 10/13

weight 141

bust 36

chest 31

waist 32

hips 43

l. arm 10.5

r. arm 10.5

l. thigh 25

r.thigh 24

My goals

My goals for this challenge: Attempting to learn about this blogging, exercise at the gym 2 – 3 times a week, walk for 20 minutes the other days, and be more careful with what I eat. I am starting this challenge at 140 and would ultimately like to get to 135.

So far I am at 138 and holding. If I would get more serious about avoiding desserts and sweets I would probably make more progress. Today I am trying to drink more water, eat 2 pieces of fruit, and some veg’s - So far so good. I had an orange for my morning snack, and steamed some cauliflower to have with my lunch. Tonight’s supper of baked beef stew is already in the oven, and is loaded with veg’s. (thanks to my dear hubby who volunteered to peel the veg’s.)

This bad winter weather is making it hard for me to get out and walk or drive to the gym, so not sure if I’ll get any points for exercise today. My sister gave me the idea of marching in place when I watch tv later today. My family may think that I’m nuts, but I may give it a try.

I have been having trouble with remembering how to do the blog so hopefully this will work. I’ve decided to type it on Word first and then try to copy and paste. We’ll see how that goes. I have been able to view all your posts, but for some reason I have not been able to make comments. I’ll keep trying. Today’s test was successful, so that is good news.

I finally remembered to take my measurements last week. Next blog I’ll see about getting them posted.

My verse for this past week that has encouraged me from my devotions was from Is. 26: Thou will keep him in perfect peace whose mind is stayed on Thee, whose heart trusteth in thee. That’s from memory, so it may not be the exact wording. What I need to remember to focus on is keeping my thoughts centered on God, and not worrying about things, or dwelling on how “I’m not doing a good job” kind of thoughts.

Amy Byron´s Final Post

Thank you Dani and Alice for inviting me to join the fitness challenge. I am so glad that I joined. I have enjoyed getting to meet some of the other ladies, as well as reading their posts. It helps me to feel like my sister isn't quite so far away to keep up with her posts! I wasn't prepared for how busy life was going to get these past few weeks in Dec.! It seems like everyone else was quite busy too, since not too many of posted during those weeks. This has been a good learning experience for me with the blogging too. I am feeling a little more comfortable with it.

I am posting a final picture which was taken in our home just a couple days after the challenge ended. I didn't lose any weight during this challenge, but I was glad to maintain. I started at 137 which was actually a very low number for me this fall. During the challenge, my weight actually varied and even got as high as 141. On my last day of the challenge I was 138. I was happy with this.
Since my weight didn't change much, I wasn't too good at taking my measurements very often. However i did take them at the beginning, and will post my ending ones too. I have not been able to post points to my ticker lately, but I think that my final points were about 170.

One of the most beneficial things for me has been the encouragement to exercise more. I feel that it is more a part of my lifestyle now, and will strive to keep walking, going to the gym, etc. I am looking forward to life returning to more normal after this next week, and I will once again try to exercise 3 to 5 times a week.

Here are my ending measurements. The first listed will be now, then for comparison the Oct. measurements, and just for fun where I was at almost 1 year ago when I first started this fitness adventure.

weight 138 137 148

bust 34 35 38.5

chest 30 31

waist 31 31.5 33

hips 42.5 43 44.5

Rt.thigh 23 24

L.thigh 24.5 25

Rt.Arm 10.5 11

L.Arm 10.5 11




I am finding this very interesting, that although I didn't lose any weight, I was able to tone up and change my measurements somewhat.This had to be the result of the exercise that I did. I hadn't really realized that until right this minute as I was typing. :-) It's also neat for me to see the changes over the last year as I compare to last January.

I look forward to another challenge with you ladies in the future. May you all have a wonderful New Year as we serve God around the world. May we all see many souls saved during the coming year.

test run of pictures blog

Hi ladies. I am trying to learn how to add a picture to my blog. Thank you to Alice for her help.

This is a picture of myself and my sister (Madridmom) last March taken at sunrise along the Med. Sea in Spain. God blessed be abundantly by giving me this trip from New England to visit Alice and her family for two weeks.

In August our son was married. As I was shopping for dresses last summer, I was so thankful that my daughter and I had worked hard last winter to lose some weight. He didn't get engaged until April, so that would have been hard to do it then.

This challenge has been a great encouragement to me. It is helping me to maintain my previous weight loss. Thank you to my sister for inviting me and to Dani for all your hard work. I have been able to exercise an hour/day for quite a few days. This has been great! I have been feeling much better these last few months than I have in years. Thank you!!

Thankful for the Little Things

Sometimes our days take an unexpected turn, and it causes us to think about things that we may have taken too much for granted. This week my husband was schedules for surgery - expected to last for 2 hours, and then coming home the same day. However, it didn't go that way. The operation ended up lasting for 5 hours, and then he had complications in the recovery room. They wanted to keep him overnight for observation. I stayed overnight in his room, sleeping in the chair by his bed.

Fortunately, the Dr. said that there was no indication of any malignancy. He was much better the next day and we were able to come home yesterday afternoon. The Dr. is encouraging him to eat a high fiber diet, so we are working on that as a family.

Today, I am so thankful for having him home. We have had 31 years together, and I feel very blessed.

Tomorrow we have to go back to town to have some more tests done. My schedule has been all off, and my first priority is taking care of him, as he recovers. This afternoon, he suggested that I take the dog for a walk. It was so wonderful to get in some exercise and enjoy the fresh air.

Back Home Again

It's good to be home, and able to eat at home. We spent the last two weeks traveling from Mass. to Iowa and back. It was a good trip, but I am very tired of fast food. Now that I am home, I will try harder to eat smarter, exercise more and learn about how to put up posts. (Thank you for the email link to get me started, Dani)

Yesterday, my daughter and I were trying to recall some of the things that we did last winter that worked well for us in our journey to eat healthier and lose some weight. I thought that I would share a few of these with you.

Last January, we decided that it was time to do something about our lifestyle, and we decided to do it together. (Having an accountability partner right in the same house is definately a plus.) The previous April, when I learned that I had high blood pressure, I decided that it was time to lose some weight. However, by January I had only gone from 154 to about 148. After, partnering with my daughter the weight came off much better, and by spring I was down to 142.

Here are some of the tips that worked for us:

Get the junk food out of the house - remove the temptation.

Make sure to have good food choices, such as fruit available.

Eat more vegetables with supper. We would often have salad, sweet potatoes, and another veggie.

Try to have at least one or two fish suppers each week. Salmon on the G. Foreman grill was a favorite.

Stop buying soda and ice cream.

Make sure to eat breakfast. Most days we had cooked old fashioned oatmeal & raisins.

Drink plenty of water.

Jen ended up losing 20 lbs. and I met my goal of losing 15 lbs. I am now holding at 139/140 depending upon the day. My goal is to maintain this weight and increase my exercise. At one time I made it to 137, and have thought that it would be nice to see 129 again. We'll see......

Thanks everyone for your encouragement, and thanks to my sister for challenging me to join this fitness challenge.

This is a practice post

I have had a good week, altho it seems as though I have such a long way to go. I have been focusing on trying to exercise more, walking especially, and also trying out a fitness gym in the area. I found that I could try it for free for two weeks.

This is my first time posting and I'm not really sure if I am doing it right, but wanted to give it a try. I have been encouraged by reading the journal entries of others. Last week was a big wake-up call for me. I received a call with the results of my bone density and was told that at age 50 I now have osteoporosis. My goal now is to definately incorporate more weight bearing exercises into my daily lifestyle.

When they told me that I should start taking Fosamax for my bones, I started to panic. I have been told that I should not eat chocolate, caffeine or cinnamon when on this drug. Well, you guessed it - I immediately wanted to eat chocolate!! Challenge or not, I had to go to the store and buy my favorite peanut butter M&M's, consuming much more than I should have!! This was not a very good start to the week - hopefully next week will be better.