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Monday, December 23, 2013

Liebster Award Time

If you've been around these parts of the blog world for a while now you probably have seen me do this a time or two already. But who am I to say no to an award? And it never hurts to share a little bit more about myself with my readers. So here we go!

One of my new favorite bloggers Tammy Jo from You Wouldn't Call It A Drinking Problem... nominated me for the Liebster Award. What is the Liebster Award you may be thinking? Well it's used by up and coming bloggers who have less than 200 followers to promote one another and make new friends in the blogging community and bring more attention to their blog.

The rules of the game look like this:
Thank the person who nominated you and link them in your post.
Tell 11 random facts about yourself.
Answer the 11 questions provided by the person who nominated you.
Choose 11 blogs you like and link them in your post.
Write 11 questions for these bloggers.
Let your nominees know!

11 Questions from Tammy Jo
1. What is your favorite color? Red, without a doubt.
2. Favorite number? 8 - it was the number of my favorite NASCAR driver {Dale Jr.} for a long time and it was also my softball number on the varsity team. I'm also okay with 88 now since it is Jr.'s new number since he's been with his new team.
3. What is your favorite place to eat? Red Lobster hands down. We don't have one in town so it's always a special treat when we make a road trip to eat at one.
4. If you could be an ice cream flavor what would it be and why? Chocolate Chip Cookie Dough - a classic flavor in my opinion so it never gets old and it's old reliable.
5. What is your favorite Christmas movie? Don't hate me but I'm not a big fan of Christmas movies and I don't have a favorite. But if I had to choose one I would say A Charlie Brown Christmas just because I love Snoopy.
6. Favorite Christmas song? Again, please don't hate me but I'm not a fan of Christmas music. At all. I avoid radio stations after Thanksgiving like my life depends on it because I do not like listening to Christmas music.
7. Siblings? One younger brother who just turned 21 last month. Lord help me I feel old now.
8. Do you prefer multicolored lights or solid on your tree? I could go either way depending on how I wanted to decorate. I think white lights are classic and can give a more sophisticated feel but multicolored lights can be lots of fun and you can go any direction with your decorating.
9. If you could have a movie about your life what aspect would you want it to be about? Oh gosh this is tough. My life is rather boring without a whole lot going on. Maybe if I got my act together it could be about me blogging and my adventures in online dating {yes, I'm dipping my toes in it}, trying new recipes and learning to cook, and of course living on my own for the first time {when that actually happens...}.
10. Have you had any kind of surgery? I had oral surgery when I was 18 to have a dental implant put in. I still had a baby tooth when I was 18 because there was no adult tooth to push it out so I had it pulled and now have a fake tooth attached to the implant.
11. Do you have a nickname? My aunts and uncle on my mom's side calls me Amos or Amos Magoo. I don't have any nicknames from friends though.

11 Random Facts About Me:
1. I didn't go away to school which led to me living at home all through college.
2. I'm an avid reader and seem to really love the paranormal stuff {Twilight, The Mortal Instruments, The House of Night series, etc.}. I'm also a sucker for a good romance novel. {Probably because I have no romance in my life haha!}
3. I've been single for 3 years now. Most of the time I'm more than okay with the single life but I'm also beginning to think it's time to try dating.
4. I'm a NASCAR and football fan. Of course I'll root for the Packers but I also love the Broncos {Go Peyton & Wes!}, JJ Watt {he's from Wisconsin}, and other random players on different teams. College football is not something I go crazy over.
5. My family just put our Christmas tree up this weekend and no other decorating has been done.
6. I avoid eating Jell-O because of a memory from childhood of being sick after eating it. I will do one or two Jell-O shots in the name of alcohol though.
7.  I used baler twine to tie bows on three presents. All three presents are alcohol. Hey, I'm from Wisconsin!
8. I curse the shoe gods every time I shop for new shoes because they seem to never have my size. The curse of big feet I guess.
9. I'm a die hard country music fan.
10. I'm in a long distance relationship with my best friend. Her husband moved her to Maryland because he's in the Marines. But hey, free place to stay when I vacation!
11. I'm closer to some of my blogging friends than I am with people I know in real life. When you click with someone distance doesn't matter.

Questions for my Nominees:
1. Why did you start blogging?
2. What commercial do you hate and why?
3. Who would you want to play you in a movie and why?
4. Favorite part of your day?
5. How did you meet your significant other or how would you like to meet them if you're single?
6. If you could be a drink, what would you be and why?
7. Special features on a DVD, watch 'em or skip 'em?
8. Slippers or fuzzy socks?
9. Vacation place on the top of you wish list?
10. Same accessories every day or new ones to go with each outfit?
11. Pets?

Nominees:
I'm going to break the rules {cuz I'm feeling rebellious} and nominate anyone that wants to participate!
Leave me a comment if you choose to do so! I want to find out more about you.

And with that I'm off to bed because unlike some lucky people I have to work 4 days this week.
Sigh...
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Wednesday, December 18, 2013

WIW: 12/18/13

As much as I would love to say that I've been getting my butt kicked by Jillian Michaels every morning, I can't. After completing the level 1 work out Monday morning I was experiencing quite a bit of lower back pain. Driving to work that morning was rough so I decided to make an appointment with my chiropractor for Tuesday morning {even though I had just seen her Saturday morning}. And while my back has been feeling better since then it's still not 100%. So I made the decision to take a second day of rest from the 30 Day Shred. I would rather prevent further injury than push through just to make a work out happen. Side note: my back problems are not a result of the 30 Day Shred work out and my back didn't bother me during the work out except for one of the ab exercises.

After taking the weekend off from the Shred and then taking Tuesday off as well I was expecting to see a gain on the scale this morning. Some how a miracle happened though and I gained less than a pound, even after indulging on pizza at work last night.

Which brings me to my next point. I seem to be all or nothing when it comes to working out and eating right. Either I'm working out consistently and not eating right or I'm eating right and not working out. The bright side is that I know I can do both. But the dark side is that I haven't done them together. I need to work on incorporating both into my routine. And of course I pick a fine time to want to do that with the holidays coming up.

I hate to say it but it's looking like I'm going to be starting fresh January 1st. I would rather start today because yesterday I said tomorrow but being realistic I don't see that happening with the holiday schedule coming up. This doesn't mean that I'm going to completely slack off on the weight loss but I know I won't be putting in my best effort until after the holidays are over.

That's all I've got for you this week. 2013 didn't turn out to be my year {completely my fault} but I'm definitely going to be making 2014 mine. No ifs ands or buts about it!

Pretty Strong Medicine

Starting Weight {highest weight recorded}: 207.7
Today's Weigh In, Dec. 18: 207
Gain: 0.4
Overall Loss: 0.7

Don't forget that there is still time to enter Fluffy Santa's Christmas Cash Giveaway!
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Monday, December 16, 2013

Grey's Anatomy: Get Up, Stand Up

Thursday's episode of Grey's Anatomy was the mid-season finale and boy did they ever leave us hanging wanting more! Be warned there are spoilers below so if you don't want to know what happened stop reading now!!

First of all I have to say how freaking happy I am that they're finally bringing Shane's guilt about what happened to Heather to life. During the whole episode all I kept thinking was how much I did not like this character any more. But the writers came through at the end when they showed Shane having a break down during surgery. Can't wait to see what happens next now!

Another "finally!" moment during this episode is that Cristina and Meredith are hashing things out. Unfortunately it's happening on the wrong day at the wrong time. Way to go April for standing up for herself and her wedding day by telling her bridesmaids to just shut up because it's her day. Hopefully once the new episodes return things continue in the right direction with Cristina and Meredith.

And then we have my favorite Grey's couple Alex and Jo having quite the moment outside the barn where April's wedding will be taking place. Total "awww" moment right there. And damn is Jo pretty! I think I may have a girl crush on her. And maybe I'm jealous because she gets to make out with Alex...

But the moment of all moments comes during the ceremony. Jackson decides to take Mark Sloan's advice and "say it loud and go from there." He tells April he loves her and wants to know if she loves him too. My jaw hit the damn floor when that happened. And of course we have to wait two months, two months, until we can find out what happens.

Like I said, they left us hanging and wanting more! Hopefully the rest of the season is just as good as this episode was...
Greys


Don't forget to enter Fluffy Santa's Christmas Cash Giveaway for your chance to win some cash!
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Fluffy Santa's Christmas Cash Giveaway!

Hi guys! I've teamed up with Santa {aka Fluffy aka Ashton} and some more elves to give away $200 CASH via PayPal. Who doesn't love some extra cash around the holidays?

See the details of the giveaway below. Best of luck to each of you!





Emily from Beauty and the Greek
Ash from A Step in The Right Direction
Elise from 9toFit


Jess from Living on Sweet Tea
Valerie from Fabulous Chick Gets Fit
Amy from Living N Learning


Nina from The Nina Show
Aubrey from ALG Uninterrupted 


Alicia from Brew Mama
Jess from The Girl Who Thought Too Much


*Giveaway will run start at 12am on Dec 16th until 11:59pm on Dec 20th.
*Winner will be chosen through Rafflecopter once the giveaway is over. 
*The winner will receive the $200 via PayPal as a gift from Ashton. 

Good luck!



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Wednesday, December 11, 2013

WIW: Jillian, you suck!

Thank God it's finally Wednesday. Like for real. Yesterday I kept thinking it was Wednesday so every time I reminded myself it was only Tuesday I died a little inside.

But then after work I did a happy dance when I saw that I had a package from Amazon waiting for me at home. Saturday night I ordered three Jillian Michael's DVDs {1 of 3 arrived yesterday} because getting to the gym has been rough for me. As in it hasn't been happening. So I figured having some work out DVDs that I can do at home would make skipping going to the actual gym not as bad.

I look so excited in that picture from last night. And I was. Until I actually did the damn thing this morning.

Level 1 is HARD for me. And because I'm at home doing it alone I find it really easy to just give in to not push through and completing each exercise. So maybe it's hard mentally rather than actually physically. I can most definitely do all of the exercises, it's just a matter of pushing through the mental road block I have.

I give my girl Ashton from A Fluffy Girl a lot, I mean A LOT, of credit for completing the whole 30 Day Shred. {She's my inspiration for taking on this challenge. If she can do it, I can do it!} And there's also Tammy Jo from You Wouldn't Call It A Drinking Problem...  who has also been an inspiration to me. I don't know what I would do without these two gals to talk to on Twitter and read their blogs.

And I can't forget Carolyn from Fitnasty For Life. She's been extremely helpful to me by giving me meal ideas and talking about all the struggles that come along with weight loss. She's full of great advice and I'm not sure what I would do without her. She completed a Ripped in 30 work out this morning and she said it wasn't as dreadful as she thought. This girl is a rock star if she didn't think it was as bad as she thought.

Well now that I have thanked everyone and their mother I'll get to the weigh in stats.

Starting Weight {highest weight recorded}: 207.7
Today's Weigh In, Dec. 11: 206.6
Loss: 0.6
Overall Loss: 1.1

Not a huge loss but considering last week was a huge fail in the work out department I won't complain. Slow and steady wins the race anyways, right?

I'll be following this calendar that Ashton put together when she was completing the 30 Day Shred. Once the new printer is hooked up and running {mine took a shit on me, insert grumpy face} I plan to print it off so I can draw huge X's through each day I complete.


Unfortnately it is time for me to get ready to make some money. If you don't hear from me again it's because I died after trying to complete day 2. :)
Pretty Strong Medicine
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Monday, December 9, 2013

Grey's Anatomy: Man on the Moon

I just finished watching Thursday's episode of Grey's Anatomy and all that is going through my head is, "You were right. They're setting us up for Cristina to no longer be on the show." I mean what else could it be when Cristina and Meredith start fighting over the smallest things? And based on the short preview for this coming Thursday's episode {mid-season finale} things are only going to continue to head south with the two of them.

And sticking with the whole Cristina vs. Meredith thing, as soon as the sheep died {Meredith put a 3D-printed portal vein into it} I knew that Cristina's surgery on the baby would be successful. Everything in this show seems to have Cristina and Meredith facing off. I'm not a fan considering through 9 seasons they've always been each other's person. But it looks like things went up in smoke in a hurry.

Shane is sleeping with Cristina now. Ugh. I really don't care who he sleeps with {although I think this is a rather strange direction to take their relationship} because all I care about is they seem to have just swept what happened with Brooks under the rug to never speak of it again. Seriously. Did we all forget that he's the reason Brooks went down to the basement and ended up dying?? I really want there to be some closure with that whole ordeal.

And thankfully Richard comes to Bailey's rescue and talks her into taking the medication for her OCD. I am not a fan of this version of Bailey. I know she's stronger than they're portraying her this season and I'm not sure why all of a sudden we had to spring this on her. And does OCD really come on so suddenly? There has to be something more to this whole change in plans for her.

Alex and Jo are still my favorite couple but I'm afraid something big is going to happen between them. Jimmy {Alex's dad} is back and dealing with hallucinations as he detoxes, trying to get clean once and for all. Alex is pissed right away when Jo tells him and wants to kick him out of the hospital but doesn't. And we see Alex come to Jo's rescue just like he did for his mom when he was a kid. I'm not expecting a miracle between Alex and Jimmy but I'm hoping this whole situation can be resolved so Alex and Jo can go on being my favorite couple. I guess only time will tell.
Greys

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Wednesday, December 4, 2013

Weigh In Wednesday: I Can't Believe It!

Good morning! I'm in a good mood this morning thanks to some quality time with Bo {and the fact he let me sleep until 7:30}. Better yet we're approaching the half way point in the work week. I'm ready for the weekend people!

I stepped on the scale this morning for the first time since before Thanksgiving. I thought for sure I would see a gain after that wonderful Thanksgiving feast my grandma prepared. But nope! I managed to STAY. THE. SAME.

I can't believe it!

Stats
Starting Weight {highest weight recorded}: 207.7
Today's Weigh In, Dec. 4: 207.2
Overall Loss: 0.5

Pretty Strong Medicine

And for those of you that saw me posting on twitter last night about not being motivated to go to the gym this morning, I didn't go. But I plan to go tomorrow and Friday morning {to accomplish my gym goal for the week}. It may sound like an excuse, and maybe it is, but I decided to run an errand this morning rather than tomorrow morning. Either way I'm going to get my two gym days in for the week. Don't worry.

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Tuesday, December 3, 2013

5 for Five: December Goals

I'm back after taking an unexpected week off from blogging last week. Between a day off to spend with my best friend and Thanksgiving the week just felt exceptionally short when it came to blogging.

Today I'm taking a look back at November. While overall the month was a good one between looking at apartments, my best friend being home from Maryland for two weeks, and it being my first month student loan free. But goal wise I didn't do so well. At all.

1. Get my healthy lifestyle on track. Yeah that was a fail. I didn't meal plan at all, went to the gym maybe once, and I definitely wasn't drinking 64oz of water a day. So of course I didn't lose three pounds.

2. Wake up and get out of bed by 7am at least three times a week. Fail! I really love to be lazy in the morning, especially when cozy comfy flannel sheets are on my bed.

3. Put more time and effort into blogging. I won't say I completely failed at this but I surely could have done better. At best I was blogging twice a week.

4. Clean my bathroom and room, then keep it that way. Fail, again. My mom ended up cleaning my bathroom over the weekend so I'm going to work on keeping it clean but I didn't clean it so I'm not counting this as any sort of accomplishment. And my room? Yeah, still a mess.

5. Read 4 books. I was able to read 2 books during the month. The Book Thief took me all month to get through, something I wasn't expecting. I was able to breeze through The Single Woman's Survival Guide: Letting Go and Moving On in a day so that helped me reach the half way point at the end of the month.

Like I said, goal wise November wasn't a good month for me. But I've set some new goals for December and am going to take a slightly different approach to accomplishing them. For November I just set those goals and then winged it when it came to actually accomplishing them. So for December I want to set goals for the month but then setting weekly goals that will help me accomplish my goals for the month.

1. Lose 3 pounds.

  • Drink 64oz of water 4 days this week. Today through Friday is a good starting point for me, hopefully not too overwhelming.
  • Go to the gym 2 days this week. I have three chances to get to the gym before the weekend. It can be done.
  • Limit Mountain Dew to one can per day.


2. Wake up and get out of bed by 7:30am at least three times per week.
Last month I set my goal for 7am but that was just a bit much for me. I seem to be able to handle 7:30 much better so we're going to go with that for this month and see how things go. I have three days left to get it right so wish me luck!

3. Clean my bedroom and pack away summer clothes.
This week I'm going to start with catching up on laundry and putting away those clean clothes.

4. Put more time and effort into blogging.
I'm going to shoot for posting 3-4 times this week. I have some things I've been meaning to blog about so this shouldn't be a problem.

5. Read at least 4 books.
Yup, it made the list again. I know I can read 4 books in a month. And with BBC taking a break for the month I will be choosing the books myself so hopefully I can find something that grabs my attention so I can't put it down. I've already started Catching Fire {for the second time} but past that I have no books on list to read. Any suggestions?

I'll be back next week to check in and see how I did this first week of December. {where did 2013 go?!}

Party of One


  • Do you have any tips for motivating yourself to get things done? It seems I struggle to motivate myself to get up in the morning and to accomplish the tasks that I know I need to get done.

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