New Year's Resolutions Update

Happy 4th of July everyone! Hope you are all celebrating the birth of our nation with your friends and family and enjoying every minute of it! I'll be hanging out with a few friends, getting some sunshine, and of course watching some fireworks.

The beginning of July also marks the halfway point of the year, and what better time to revisit those New Years' resolutions? I wrote about my resolutions earlier this year, and I think I've done a pretty good job with them. Let's revisit, shall we?

1. Read more books for pleasure. I'm getting there! Now that I'm officially done with classes, I have a lot more time to read, and I fully intend to get to the goal of 50 by the end of the year.

2. Apply to PhD programs. Eh... haven't started yet. I'll put this on the top of my list for the summer! It'll also be a lot easier to accomplish this one after I finish my thesis. We'll see!

3. Win the biggest loser competition at work. Check! I didn't win, but Rachel came in second. I consider this one complete and a win!

4. Get my passport. It is in my possession! Hooray!

5. Make a budget and stick to it. Er... not so much! I need to get on this one.

6. Meal Plan every week. I've only missed a few weeks so far this year, so I think I've been pretty successful on this one. Just have to keep it up now!

7. Go on 2 mini-vacations (as in 3- or 4-day weekends. Matt and I hit up Missoula for a weekend not too long ago, so one of two has been completed!

8. Go on an extended vacation (as in a week) with Matt. This is still in the works, but looks like it's going to happen

9. Set up a weekly volunteering activity again. Have not done this yet, need to get on it!

10. And last but not least, make a better effort to keep in touch with all the people that I love that are far away from me now. I've been horrible at this one too! I really need to make a better effort here.

So even though I've only got 2 that I can cross off, I think I'm doing pretty well!

How're you all doing with your resolutions? Hope you're enjoying your holiday!

Biggest Loser Update

I was watching Biggest Loser tonight (OMG, how AWESOME was Nicole's transformation? I hope she makes it to that size 8 she wants), and I realized that I never provided an update on the final results of MY biggest loser competition! The whole thing finished 3 weeks ago, and the results were veeeeery interesting!

*drum-roll please*

I lost 5.84% of my body weight and finished in 6th place overall. Not super impressive - my lowest point in the competition was not during the last week, so that was especially disappointing. BUT! All is not lost! RACHEL did amazing and finished in second place! It was pretty awesome to see how much she transformed in just 10 short weeks. You should all go congratulate her when you get a chance!

The whole competition was not a loss for me, despite not winning anything. It gave me a good reason to focus on fitness and overall health for a little while - something that I need to continue doing - and got me in pretty good shape again! For proof, here's a picture of me finishing a half-marathon earlier this month:

I don't know if you can see that, but it's a 1:45:20 time - only 20 seconds away from my PR from when I was 18!

We'll see how this whole thing continues in the next few months. I've decided to try some new things in the near future - one of which is exercise DVDs. The blogosphere has been blowing up with 30 Day Shred praise, I decided to purchase that first! It arrived yesterday, and I'm going to try it out later this week. I'm also looking into new fitness classes to try, and considering getting into dance classes again. So much to do, so little time!

Project 12 Update!

Well, it's been exactly a month to the day since I wrote about my first foray into the self-help world with the help of Simple Steps. And let me tell you, despite the simplicity of each of the items listed for weeks 1 through 3, they are NOT easy to implement when they're all put together! Even though I've been at this for over a month, I'm just starting on Week 3 of the program.

Honestly, the thing that's held me back from starting (and finishing) Week 3 of the program has mainly been the step that requires taking a multi-vitamin every day. I have some vitamin restrictions that drastically limit the brands/kinds of vitamins I can safely take to... pre-natal vitamins. Yeah. And we're not scaring people with that yet. So I'd been putting it off, until a trip during work to the local drug store when Rachel showed me that some old-school Flintstones Vitamins met my restrictions! YES, I have delicious, kid-friendly multi-vitamins!

Did you know they have adult instructions/vitamin information on the label? They're not just for kids!

Week 3 is already almost half over, so I'm hoping I can get back to the normal week-to-week pace and actually finish this process up. Week 3's steps include: taking a multi-vitamin every day, being aware of posture and breathing (this is hard, I'm such a sloucher!), cleansing and moisturizing daily, and keeping a clear desktop (I'm working on it!). Here are the things that the program has had me actually implement so far - basic, but again, it's a lot to do every day!

• 8 cups of water every day
• Walk 20 minutes every day
• Clean out one drawer/closet every week
• Save $2 every day
• Keep a food journal
• Isometrics every day
• Follow a to-do list daily
• Have an efficient laundry system

I'll give another update in a few weeks as I get further into the process. Wish me luck!

Biggest Loser Update

Well, since Joelle got eliminated this week, I think it's time I give my own Biggest Loser update! We're on week 5 of the 10 week competition, so I'm halfway there! It's been quite the trip so far, and I'm definitely feeling the repercussions of slacking in the first couple of weeks!

As of right now, I am in 5th place among my coworkers. In the 5 week span, I have lost 6.37% of my body weight. I am less than .5% away from the third place person, but a full 2.5% away from first place. This past week, I just barely lost out to one of my coworker "teammates" for the weekly weight-loss champ - I lost 2.62%! Half of the competition still remains, so it's going to be a tough 5 weeks coming up!

Also, Rachel is still kicking butt, and is ahead of me in 4th place. We've got 5 weeks left to dominate, and I think we can do it!

Project 13: Stationary Supplies

Despite the fact that I am absolutely horrible at keeping in touch with people, I really enjoy writing and sending letters and cards. Even in the age of email, there's something so fun about getting a physical letter from a far-off place (haha, I just made Spokane sound whimsical)! Unfortunately, I've had my address book, cards, stationary, and card making supplies spread all over my apartment for the last year, making it incredibly difficult to find anything when I needed it. This, of course, meant that I didn't end up sending what I needed to (uh... Christmas cards? Yeah, those didn't happen). So this weekend, I embarked on Project 13: Stationary Supplies, to organize all of my thank-you notes, stationary, cards, etc.

Step 1: Round it all up in one place.

Card making supplies and stationary.

Step 2: Neatly arrange it all in a pretty box.Everything all neatly arranged in it's new home!

Step 3: Put the lid on and store that bad boy!
So much prettier and easy to find!

The most important part of this process was getting rid of all of the superfluous packaging! I didn't realize how much space a little pack of thank-you notes took up because of its little box - and when you have 10 little boxes, so much room is lost! Also, the box I used is a photo storage box from Michaels; when I bought it, they were on sale for under $4 a piece. They fit cards and envelopes very nicely, and come with little dividers that you could use to separate cards by type if you wanted. I highly recommend them.

February Budget

One of my New Years Resolutions for 2009 is to make a budget and stick to it. Unfortunately, I fell down pretty hard on this one in January. I actually have no idea how much money I spent last month - I could figure it out if I really wanted to, but I don't. It's depressing.

Well, it's time for a change! I'm taking Krystal's February Food Challenge, which for me is going to be $250 - $150 for groceries, and $100 for food out (food at work and meals out). This is going to be a challenge, since we'll be spending a three day weekend in Portland this month, and Valentine's Day always prompts food purchases. Honestly, though, menu-planning and packing a lunch for work seem to have really taken care of a lot of my miscellaneous food expenses, so I think this is totally doable if I commit to bringing my lunch and saving the $100 for a date night or two and Portland!

I'm also going back to the Fritter Finder spreadsheet that I used for several months at the end of last year to keep track of expenses. I've set a goal for myself of keeping miscellaneous spending below $400 for the month - which will be a challenge for sure considering the Portland trip and a few other adventures I have planned for the month.

If nothing else, I figure February is a short month, so it can't be too hard to meet these goals, right? :D

Biggest Loser!

I'm watching Biggest Loser on TV right now, and just realized that I haven't written here about the "biggest loser" competition that I am participating in! Silly me! Some of you might have already read Rachel's recent post about her recent results; I'm involved in the same contest.

So every year, my company puts on a Biggest Loser contest that starts in January and ends in March (10 week span), and costs $20 to buy into. You get $10 at the weekly weigh-in if you've lost the biggest percentage, and the rest of the money is split between the top three losers (based on percentage) at the end of the 10 weeks. This year, the top prize is almost $500. So I decided to enter this year along with Rachel and another coworker of ours, and we've been gung-ho ever since!

How am I doing so far? Well, in the first three weeks (including a minor set-back this past week), I've lost 4.77% of my body-weight, which puts me in 4th place among my coworkers. Rachel's in 3rd, and our other coworker is in 2nd, so we're pretty stoked! We have seven weeks to catch the front runner, and we'll go 1-2-3!

So why am I doing Biggest Loser? Honestly, the main reason is the money. $500 will pay for a trip to Vegas for a long weekend! But also, my girls at work are doing it! I didn't want to be left out, and I've had a lot of fun going to spinning, step, and even hip hop (oh man, THAT was a treat tonight) classes with them! But don't get me wrong, the weight-loss and getting-in-shape-focus are important to me, too. Running season is coming up, and I want to put myself in a good position to do well by training hard now.

So anyway, that's been a huge part of what I've spent my time on in the past few weeks, and what I'll continue to do in the coming 7 weeks!

It's resolutions, baby!

I'm a firm believer in New Year's resolutions, and can't remember a year in the recent past where I haven't made at least one. In my pre-internet days, I'd scrawl them out in marker on a piece of notebook paper and tuck them away in a shoebox (where I also stored all of the notes my girlfriends had given me during the school year with our highly sensitive, *cough* boy gossip *cough*, during the year), and would pull them back out around New Year's to see how badly I've failed at keeping them. Now I tend to post them in my blog-of-the-moment - whichever one I spend more time on or relates most to the goals I've set for myself this year. Therefore, I give you my 2009 resolutions that I will hopefully meet and/or exceed during the next calendar year:

1. Read more books for pleasure. 50 this year, to be exact. And school books don't count.

2. Apply to PhD programs. Preferably after the masters degree is finished, so there's that caveat of this process. So basically, at least one application has to be submitted to a school by December. Lots of work, but doable.

3. Win the biggest loser competition at work. This starts on January 5, and ends on March 13. Prize money is $450, which will put a nice dent in my vacation costs (see below). I entered with my friend Rachel, who's going to give me a pretty good run for the money I think - so basically, if either of us wins, I'll consider this resolution achieved. :D

4. Get my passport. Now that my new project at work will be sending me to Texas and not freezing cold snowy Calgary (sorry, Canadians, but after Spokane's winter I'm just not in the mood for more!), this is a pretty high priority on my to-do list.

5. Make a budget and stick to it. I've been monitoring my spending habits for the past few months so that I can make smart estimates about what I need (or don't need), so I'm hoping to sit down sometime in January and draft out a plan that will work for this year. The main purpose of this will be to establish an emergency fund that is separate from my savings fund, as well as pay off my student loans entirely.

6. Meal Plan every week. It's so much better than constantly running to the store because I don't know what I have, and haven't planned what I'm making until that night.

7. Go on 2 mini-vacations (as in 3- or 4-day weekends. Both must be to places I've never been before - right now, Las Vegas, Colorado, and Southern California are pretty high on that list. Both must not include visiting relatives for a holiday. One must be without Matt.

8. Go on an extended vacation (as in a week) with Matt. We've been discussing Hawai'i next fall, or something else hot/tropical.

9. Set up a weekly volunteering activity again. I used to volunteer at the Women's and Children's Free Restaurant once a week, and I really enjoyed that - it's a great organization with a mission that I really believe in. Unfortunately, it now conflicts with all of my classes. So this year, my goal is to reorient my schedule enough to make a similar situation feasible for me.

10. And last but not least, make a better effort to keep in touch with all the people that I love that are far away from me now. I've always sucked at keeping in touch with people, and I need to get better at that. Also, I want to write people letters. They're so old-school that they're fun, and everyone loves getting mail, right?

What are your resolutions for the new year?