Challenge Update...

Today's post is about failing. I, apparently, am an expert in this particular area when it comes to losing weight. In the last (almost) 30 days I have lost a whopping 2 pounds. No people, that was NOT a typo. 2. Whole. Pounds.

Big sigh.

It seems like even when I exercise regularly I don't drop any LBs. So for all my years of dancing, for all the nutrition classes I have sat through, it's not working. I have moments of epic fail...yes beer and dessert are my biggest weaknesses...oh, and blue cheese. But really, it seems like I should have lost a bit more than 2 measly pounds. I dunno. It feels like all I do is expand and honestly I don't know what to do anymore. I try eating healthy, but I always fall off the wagon. I have tried allowing myself what I want in small drips and drabs to stem the tide of WANT!, but no dice. I have tried getting up every day at 4:30am to work out for 43 minutes...and honestly that just leads to exhaustion. I DON'T KNOW WHAT TO DO. So, I will concede my loss, my Epic Failure, in the Twitloss Challenge and keep plugging away at whatever in the hell this is that I am doing. And well, if you all keep reading then awesome. If not, I can't say I blame you much. It's not like I am offering any useful advice.

On a totally different and way awesome note. If you missed it this week on Twitter, I have sold my first book! Pop on over to my personal blog (I promise it is a weight loss-whine free zone) and check out the details.

Around the Web in Weight Loss: Saturday June 25th. The "Tiffany kicks ass" version.

Happy Saturday twitloss buddies! Today is usually reserved for me cussing and crying about doing back to back gym classes (Body Jam followed by Body Pump) but there are some fancy pants instructor classes today so my usual classes are canceled. I'm still going to get some cardio in today, I promise. Actually, I'm writing this on Thursday in an attempt to actually post this week so that entire spiel was a fib. 

I am really horrible at blogging lately, mostly because I have no idea what to say. I overanalyze myself and the last thing I needed was to self blog it all out to obsess over! So instead, I decided I'd do a little "around the web in weight loss" type of post. So without further rambling, let's talk about some of the the things that have crossed my greader this week. 

Firstly, it is summer, finally. Las Vegas has had a fairly relaxed summer so far (it was only 105 today!) but that still makes cooking almost unbearable. In the past I would just lay about and not eat out of protest, entirely healthy I assure you. /sarcasm. One of the ways I've been avoiding that pitfall is smoothies, and you get bonus points if you can convince your kids they are better than ice cream! I typically do a blueberry/banana combo but I ran across a cherry blend that I am dying to try! 

Cherry Chocolate Protein Shake
1.5 C almond milk (I'm going to sub milk and/or greek yogurt)
1 C frozen organic cherries
1 T protein powder (I use hemp vanille protein from Trader Joes, higher fiber and omega counts!)
1 T raw cacao powder 
a little honey, cinnamon, ice and one banana
(makes 2 mugs full)

In enlightening and otherwise obvious news: increased consumption of potato chips, sugar sweetened drinks, and meat will make you gain weight over time. However that does not mean you should avoid all things fatty, instead stick to the healthy fats. Weight Watchers has long said that we all need 2 servings of healthy oil a day and I've always nodded my head along with them. Fat is not inherently bad! I dislike their limitation of it being "healthy oil" such as olive, canola, sunflower, safflower, or flax but appreciate their acknowledgement that we can't life a "fat free" life and be healthy. I recently picked up some flaxseed oil to add to my salads, but mostly so I can up my Omega 3 intake. Instead, I've been trying to get my healthy fats through other sources. Hey look, here are some suggestions to help you out.

My best friend and I have been discussing our family food budgets and how we can lower them this month. I stumbled across this Cost of Food estimate by the USDA and was astonished to see the expected 'moderate' budget of a family of four, like mine, was $981 a month. I've been aiming for $125 a week and usually end up closer to $150 if I do really well. When I get some free time I want to go through the food plans used as a basis but for now, I simply found it interesting and worth pointing out. I think I find it most surprising because best friend and I always talk about how eating good healthy food simply costs more, especially once you add in organic and natural products, and yet that plan likely does not include organics or environmentally responsible products. I simply can not afford to eat 100% organic currently, but I try hard to buy local/sustainable/responsible/organic when I can. Coupons help. 

I've been a Body Pump convert for what seems like forever. Or maybe it has only been a year? I don't remember exactly and while I have recently branched out to cardio heavy classes like Zumba and RPM, the Daily Burn has it right.  Weight training gives me confidence. Building muscle has been one of the biggest changes I've noticed on my body, and what keeps me going every day. I look different and it is hard to deny that when I stare at myself in the mirror. I have a long ways to go but I don't want to just be skinny, I want to be healthy and strong. I want to be confident and self assured. I want to know that I can do whatever I set my mind to, and it is impossible to downplay the role strength training plays in giving that to a person. 

Side note: BPA in your canned goods! Actually I'm a little surprised that this is "new" as I've known about it for quite some time. I try to buy canned tomatoes from Eden Organics in bulk from Azure Standard because I read that they have lower levels than most other can linings. You can avoid buying beans in cans by buying in bulk, dry, and then cooking in the slow cooker. Separate out into servings and freeze them until you need them. 

Side note, side note: If you are a parent and are not watching Jamie Oliver's Food Revolution. You should be. Our children deserve better. Do we really want our children struggle as we are now? This journey isn't easy, I don't wish it upon my children or anyone elses. 

If you have made it all the way through this post, you get a cookie! Ok, not really because that wouldn't be very #twitloss friendly. You do however get an update on me. I've moaned and whined and cried over the last few weeks as I felt stuck. I upped my workouts (5+ hours a week, that is 28-30 activity points a week I'm earning!) in order to break a very low weight loss month of May only to have the scale finally move, but slowly. After having a breakdown last week, best friend gave me a mental slap across the face. Again, I'm not eating enough. And I'm not giving myself enough credit, I have probable thyroid issues, I'm still in the first 6 months of a new birth control, my body is adjusting to some pretty drastic lifestyle changes, and we won't even get into the stress and upheaval that is my personal life. I'm not normal and need to stop expecting my loss to be linear. I've upped my activity and lowered my intake.... my body can't possibly recover and build muscle if I don't feed it! This week I made an effort to eat more protein and to eat most of my earned activity points..... and what do you know? I lost 2.8 lbs.

One of these days the saying "it is more than just a number, you are more than just a number" will click. One of these days. I posted something about inches lost not too long ago here. Since then I have measured two more times, once of which was this morning. 

		Inches Lost	May	June
Bicep			0.25	0.25
Neck			0.75	0.25
Over Nipple			1.5	0
Under Bust			1.5	0
Waist			2.5	0.75
Over Belly Button			2.5	2
Hips			1.5	0
Thigh			0.75	0
Calf			0.5	0
Totals:			11.75	3.25

Almost 12 inches lost in May, just over 3 in June. Over that same time period I lost 13 lbs (most of which was in June), 37lbs since we first started this blog and the #twitloss hastag, 47 since the very first time I signed into Weight Watchers more than a year ago. My journey is not a quick one by any means, but that just leaves the end rewards all that much more valuable to me.  

I'm hungry, but my tummy hurts.

First thing's first: I started this challenge at 196, and I'm down to 190.4. That's pretty damned impressive, considering I haven't been able to work out until very recently.

Remember the elliptical I kept promising I was going to put together? The one I bought a year ago and it sat in a box in the corner until I put it in the closet "to get it out of the way for now, but I swear I'm going to put it together this weekend/next weekend/next week..."? Yeah, my friend came over last Friday and put it together.

I've only used it twice since then because I've had a lot going on with work and school (omfg, can you say STRESS?), but also, because my stomach's been bothering me so much. The stress doesn't help a lot, but all the meds I'm on don't help matters either. I take 3 pills in the morning, and 5 at night (remember the part when I told you I'm broken? I wasn't lying). All the pills and all the stress have caused my body to... shall we say "back up." I have to add another pill to the cocktail in order to let my body relax and do what it's supposed to, which will then allow me to get back on the elliptical-horse and kick all the rest of y'all's asses in this challenge. ;) (love you all!)

I don't want to get all TMI on you here. And I don't want to make excuses for why I'm not utilizing my beautiful new(ish) elliptical machine. I'm still going to get on it as soon as I'm not doubled over in pain, I swear.

I'm not slacking on the challenge though. I'm still eating right, and eating far less than I was before. I'm drinking a TON of water (practically drowning myself, actually), and walking as much as I can. I lost my pedometer (yes, again), so I can't tell you what I average daily anymore, but I know that it's more than I used to average, which is more than 3 miles.

How are you doing on the #twitloss #challenge?

Fish Burps & A Twitloss Challenge Check-In

Image via WikipediaPart of my attempt to be healthier includes taking more vitamins. Especially those that can do me some good...like fish oil. The problem with fish oil is that when I burp I small and taste fish. GROSS! Now, I know that this is because I am cheaping out on the supplements I buy. I shop at Costco people, I buy in bulk. I will live with the fish burps and my Twitter peeps will learn to live with my whining on occasion. LOL! According to the NIH Fish Oil in the correct doses is (the ones I am interested in are in green):

Effective for...

• High triglycerides. High triglycerides are associated with heart disease and untreated diabetes. To reduce the risk of heart disease, doctors believe it is important to keep triglycerides below a certain level. Doctors usually recommend increasing physical activity and restricting dietary fat to lower triglycerides. Sometimes they also prescribe drugs such as gemfibrozil (Lopid) for use in addition to these lifestyle changes. Now researchers believe that fish oil, though not as effective as gemfibrozil, can reduce triglyceride levels by 20% to 50%. One particular fish oil supplement called Lovaza has been approved by the FDA to lower triglycerides. Lovaza contains 465 milligrams of EP and 375 milligrams of DHA in 1-gram capsules.

Likely effective for...

• Heart disease. Fish oil may be effective in keeping people with healthy hearts free of heart disease. People who already have heart disease may be able to lower their risk of dying from heart disease by taking fish oil. Though not all researchers agree, some investigators believe that fish oil may be even more effective in reducing death from heart attacks than a group of commonly used cholesterol-lowering drugs called “statins.”

Possibly effective for...

• High blood pressure. Fish oil seems to produce modest reductions in blood pressure in people with high blood pressure. The omega-3 fatty acids in fish oil seem to be able to expand blood vessels, and this brings blood pressure down.
• Menstrual pain (dysmenorrhea). Taking fish oil alone or in combination with vitamin B12 seems to improve painful periods and reduce the need for pain medications such as nonsteroidal anti-inflammatory drugs (NSAIDS).
• Attention deficit-hyperactivity disorder (ADHD) in children. Taking fish oil seems to improve thinking skills and behavior in 8 to 12 year-old children with ADHD.
• Stroke. Moderate fish consumption (once or twice a week) seems to lower the risk of having a stroke by as much as 27%. However, eating fish doesn’t lower stroke risk in people who are already taking aspirin for prevention. On the other hand, very high fish consumption (more than 46 grams of fish per day) seems to increase stroke risk, perhaps even double it.
• Weak bones (osteoporosis). Taking fish oil alone or in combination with calcium and evening primrose oil seems to slow bone loss rate and increase bone density at the thigh bone (femur) and spine in elderly people with osteoporosis.
• Hardening of the arteries (atherosclerosis). Fish oil seems to slow or slightly reverse the progress of atherosclerosis in the arteries serving the heart (coronary arteries), but not in the arteries that bring blood up the neck to the head (carotid arteries).
• Bipolar disorder. Taking fish oil with the usual treatments for bipolar disorder seems to improve symptoms of depression and increase the length of time between episodes of depression. But fish oil doesn’t seem to improve manic symptoms in people with bipolar disorder.
• Weight loss. Some evidence shows that eating fish improves weight loss and decreases blood sugar in overweight people and people with high blood pressure. Preliminary research also shows that taking a specific fish oil supplement 6 grams daily (Hi-DHA, NuMega), providing 260 mg DHA/gram and 60 mg EPA/gram, significantly decreases body fat when combined with exercise.
• Age-related eye disease (age-related macular degeneration, AMD). There is some evidence that people who eat fish more than once per week have a lower risk of developing age-related macular degeneration.
• High cholesterol. There is interest in using fish oil in combination with “statin” drugs for some people with high cholesterol. Doctors were worried at first that taking fish oil might interfere with statin treatment, but early studies show this is not a problem, at least with the statin called simvastatin. Scientists think fish oil may lower cholesterol by keeping it from being absorbed in the intestine. There is some evidence that using vitamin B12 along with fish oil might boost their ability to lower cholesterol.
• Asthma. Some research suggests fish oil may lower the occurrence of asthma in infants and children when taken by women late in pregnancy. Furthermore, fish oil seems to improve airflow, reduce cough, and lower the need for medications in some children with asthma. However, fish oil treatment doesn’t seem to provide the same benefit for adults.

Now, I have shortened up the list from the NIH site, so go check out the link above to see EVERYTHING they list plus some things that Fish Oil won't effect. So...sorry to my Tweeps for the occasional whine. :D

As for the challenge check in...I am back at 204. Sigh. But I have done Tae Bo 4 times for 43min each over the last 4 days. Yay! I think I will sleep in tomorrow. So it looks like my only hope of a win here will be int he inches lost department. Heaven help me I am not loosing any actual pounds. Eh...it is what it is. I think I will be setting a short term goal after this to help me look and feel better before I go to Vegas later this year. So...are you challenging with us? How are you doing? For my fellow Twitloss peeps...how is it going? Any setbacks or hurdles?

Eat and Lose?

Wow, it's been awhile! Dear Twitloss, it's been many, MANY months since my last confession.....

Today's post is sponsored by Debbie Allen talking about the cost of fame.




Iconic, no? It also seems to be correct. Except, instead of fame we're talking a better body. A healthier body? If you follow me on twitter you've been seeing a bunch of workout tweets with crazy calorie burns for the past month. Awesome, right? Well, yes. But, there are still pitfalls lurking to screw with your head (via the scale) and your metabolism. I hate pitfalls.

So, the workouts: I dropped my fancy pants gym (FPG) and joined the Y. Now, I loved FPG, but my employer set up a deal with the Y's around the city for employees and the cost per month is nearly half FPG. For what I was doing there, it certainly wasn't worth double the price. Plus, I can go to any Y in the city AND there is one about 3 minutes from my house. Can't beat that. The one closest to me is pretty small, but they do have some fun classes there, and there is one a little farther away which has MORE classes. I wasn't big on classes at FPG, but they now make up the majority of my workout. The schedule:

Monday -- Zumba! There are two zumba classes, Monday and Wednesday. The Monday class is more latin inspire, the Wednesday class is more hip hop inspired. Both are fun, but the Wednesday class is killer. My knees protested, so Monday zumba it is. Weights before if I can get there in time.

Tuesday -- wildcard. No Y on Tuesdays. I either do something at home (treadmill, exercise dvd, zumba on the playstation, etc) or it's a rest day.

Wednesday -- Step aerobics. I tried this for the first time on a Saturday morning and it was NOT the beginning class. Oops. I stayed for the whole thing. I didn't die. But, I decided the beginning class was really where I belonged. It's still hard as ****. Weights before if I can get there in time. Weights after if I'm not exhausted.

Thursday -- Urban Line Dancing. Dancing is supposed to be fun, right? Um.....last week I burned 826 calories having "fun" for an hour. Bring. It. On.

Friday -- Nothing. Nada. Zilch. Rest day. WHOOOO!

Saturday -- Weights and Cardio at the Y. Treadmill? Elliptical? Stationary Bike? You know.

Sunday -- Usually a rest day, but if the spirit moves me I might walk a mile. An easy day.

It's great fun, but guess what? The scale wasn't moving. No, these aren't olympic sized workouts, but going from relatively nothing to relatively a lot should move the gauge, right? The first week, it was all good. 5lbs down! Then.....crickets. So what could be the problem? I smell pitfall.....

Calorie count could be off -- this is always a possibility. But, I'm using a heart rate monitor, the kind with a chest strap so it continually monitors and you're not stopping to take your pulse, so the count was as accurate as I was likely to get.

Food logging was off -- it's always a possibility that you're eating MORE than you're recording. In fact, it's almost always a SURE THING you're eating more than you're recording. I have a food scale, and I measure things, but I'm not a fanatic. (unless, of course, you think having a food scale makes you a fanatic.....) And, there is always a pinch or a taste here and there, right? But was it enough of a pinch or taste to offset 700 and 800 calorie workouts 4-5 days a week? No.

Hmmmm.....definitely not at a plateau, because I haven't been doing anything long enough to plateau. So, wtf?

I've been a Sparkpeople member since 2007 and I like many things about the site. But, a friend of mine started using LoseIt.com and I joined on there so we could be "friends" and I found it was a stripped down version that I liked. She uses it on her smartphone, I use it over the web. I'm sure there are lots of features I don't use, but it's great for logging food and exercise. I began noticing something, though. It would subtract the exercise cals from your daily allottment.

Say what?!

So, I started on May 19th, Lose It thinks I should eat 1684 cals a day. I like that number. Turns out, though, after exercise, I had a net of 523 calories. Hmmmm. If you think you can do anything on 523 calories a day, you are sadly mistaken. If you keep that up, for say......5 weeks.....then your body will go into starvation mode. Sparkpeople, for all it's good qualities, doesn't make the connection between calories in and calories out. Lose It does it, not only for the day, but tallies it up for the week, which makes it even more plain how I was getting in the way of my own progress.

5 weeks ago: 1,706 calories UNDER my weekly budget
4 weeks ago: 542 calories under
3 weeks ago: 739 calories under
2 weeks ago: 2,661 calories under (someone call a doctor!)
last week: 2,749 calories under

And all of these numbers came with going over daily calorie counts 1 or 2 days a week. Something is definitely not right with that picture.

Now, conventional wisdom would be -- if you're working out and eating fewer calories than advised, you should weigh less. A lot less. That isn't what was happening, though. Instead, my body was all pissed off because it was hungry! There is no way any doctor would tell me to eat 500, 700, 900 calories a day, right? The fewest I've ever heard suggested to anyone was 1200 cals. The amount of calories you're allotted IS the diet. 1200, 1600, etc. It's so much better than the 2000, 3000, 6000 (oops!) you were eating before. So to go below that is just insane.

Now, yes, my clothes fit better. Down a size already. Yes, building muscle. But that would have happened anyway, and I'd probably be farther along than I am if I would have simply eaten my exercise calories. For more on that concept, click here.

So, my goal for this week is to EAT MORE! Yeah, I kinda like the sound of that. Instead of being 800+ calories under budget at the end of the day, I'd like to hit the number right on, or be a little under. Yesterday, I was 158 under at the end of the day.

Is this the answer? Who knows. Maybe the problem is inaccurate logging, or a faulty heart rate monitor calorie counter. But, even if the numbers don't change dramatically, it will be one pitfall overcome.

Happy Tuesday!

Um...it's Thursday?

Image via WikipediaHoly crap! I just realized it was Thursday and I had not posted. *blush* I have been so busy and well so much going on that it totally escaped me. Here is my current status:

Exercise: 23min of Billy Blanks on Tuesday and Wednesday
Food: around 1300-1500 cals per day
Weight: I was at 201 this morning...so I actually lost a little bit. :D

Not much else to share except I woke up with a headache and have so much going on it is freaking crazy...but I can't share the news really yet. Suffice it to say I should have a big announcement this weekend. (I hope...every time I say that the timeline seems to stretch!)

I hope you all have an awesome weekend, and well sorry this is such a sloppy & slapped together post.

Motivation....how do I get some?

I'm going to be perfectly honest with all of you. Since I had my surgery I have totally lost my motivation. I've searched for it. Thought I found it a couple times but alas I have not.

I'm kind of in this rut. I don't want to be overweight yet I can't seem to stay on track. I figure something has got to give one way or the other. I could make excuse after excuse but it simply boils down to this: 1) I'm lazy and 2) I want to eat what I want when I want to.  There I said it! :(

So I have a couple questions for you. What keeps you motivated? What do you do when you feel yourself start to slip? How do you keep yourself on track?

Getting my challenge on!

As you know, we here at Twitloss are all competing in a friendly competition with each other. I'm hoping to beat the pants off the other girls (literally - by the time this is over, I'm hoping we all lose at least a pants size, maybe more), but I'm realistic. My knees don't allow me to do as much as the others, but I'm going to give it my damndest! I pulled out the box for the elliptical and opened it. PK has to put it together because I'm mechanically challenged, but if he doesn't get on it, I'm going to try to do that by myself as well (I wonder if I can count that as part of my exercise, LOL). Might as well - I am woman, hear me roar! ...or something.

I went shopping the other day and I bought nothing but healthy foods. Fruits, vegetables, whole grains, lean proteins... all healthy. While I still have some unhealthy food at the house (namely: the ice cream that PK won't let me toss in the bin), I don't have the craving for it. In fact, my current craving is peanut butter. And in small amounts, it's good for you! Win/Win.

How are you gearing up for the Twitloss Challenge?

Consider It Brought - 2011 Twitloss Challenge

So you may detect a theme here... I'm just sayin' a little smack talk never hurt anyone. ;) By now you are all aware of our 2011 Twitloss Challenge, if not click here. I must say it comes at a seriously inconvenient time for me, what with my annual camp trip coming this weekend; but, I will find a way to prevail. Seriously. So far this week, I did an hour of yoga on Monday and 43 minutes of Billy Blanks on Wednesday, as of this posting I am probably busy sweating my but off to Billy again. Foodwise I am doing okay...there is always room for improvement and I plan to hit the diet part hard next week...right after the camp trip. LOL! Anyhoo! In the mean time I will workout and talk smack as often as possible. I am totally getting one of those cheerleader outfits once I lose all this weight. *snicker* Just for the DH. *Wink*

I started at 204 for the challenge and am hoping to get that down even a little bit. I also took my measures...and well that wasn't pretty either. Like my SparkPeople profile says: I have writers butt and I need to get rid of it.

How about you bee-otches? How's it going so far? Who is dying and who is cruising? Don't be scared to come talk some smack with me. LOL!

Did somebody say Challenge?

That's right! We said it!

So the girls and I have a little challenge going on.

For the next month we will be competing to see who can lose the most inches and/or weight.

Let me tell ya. This is exactly what I need to get myself motivated again. Since I had my surgery I have came up with every excuse I can think of to stay out of the gym and eat poorly. I'm doing so/so with Weight Watchers but I could be doing better.

I wanted to share another website with you guys. If you have an iPhone or Android you can download the Fooducate app.

I recently downloaded it and am finding it useful. You can scan pretty much any food you want and it will tell you a rating for the item, give you list of alternatives that are better options and so on. You can visit this website here: http://fooducate.com/

Well, that's all for this week. Let the smack talk begin!

Eating out

I took PK to the doctor yesterday and he had to fast for loodwork. So, of course, he immediately wanted to get something to eat once it was all said and done. Since the doctor had just finished stressing to him that he needed to lose weight, I told him that I wanted fish. Good idea, right? Fish is good for you. Well, you'd be amazed at how much people like to fatten up stuff that's good for you.

We went to a place called Valdo's Seafood House, which apparently also specializes in Mexican food, now that I look at the website. I'd planned on getting a salad, but I didn't want to pay $15 for a salad. So, I got one of their specials - stuffed grilled snapper (recipe from allrecipes).

I was expecting a regular sized portion of fish, some potatoes, and a side of vegetables. What I got was sweet potatoes, garlic mashed potatoes, broccoli, green beans, rice pilaf, fish, shrimp (both stuffed inside the fish and on top of the fish), mushrooms, and a rich creamy fattening (delicious) Ponchatrain sauce (mostly on the side, thankfully). Even PK, who was starving, said something along the lines of "Holy crap, that's a lot of food!"

I didn't finish my food (and I'm now wishing I would've taken a before and after picture of both our plates, because even he didn't finish everything) and ended up needing TWO to-go boxes for everything. That's how much food they gave me. All I kept thinking was "Gordon Ramsay would be ashamed." and "I need to post on Twitloss about this."

We go out to eat a lot. We live in an area with a lot of really awesome restaurants and lately I've been too tired... ok, lazy, to cook. Because we eat out so often, I find it difficult to make good food choices while I'm ordering. It's no secret that I love food. My waistline is evidence enough of that. But in trying to lose weight, I've been trying to make better decisions. Having salad, chicken, or fish instead of the steak or hamburger I really want. Drinking water instead of the margarita that's calling my name.

Yesterday was a big temptation for me. The foods that were on my massive plate were all my favorites. It was difficult for me to put my fork down and say "I'm done" without picking it back up and having "just one more bite". I think next time when I decide that I'm done, I'm going to ask the waiter to box up my food earlier so that the temptation isn't as prevalent.

How do you deal with temptation when you're out to eat?

It's A Good Thing...

This week was a good week! It was a good one for a couple of reasons. The one pertinent to this blog is, I lost weight! :D Having started out post medical issues at 205 (still not a typo), I am happy to report I am down FOUR FREAKING POUNDS!!!!

That's right, I am at 201. How'd I do it? Hard work. No seriously, like jailhouse type stuff. See, we are ripping up our 2200 sq ft pool deck and replacing it with a newly poured deck. DH decided to save a chunk of change by doing it himself. It has been a slow process in need of some help, so first he dragged some buddies over, and then he dragged me out there.

That's right, my job was to fill the wheel barrow with rock and lug it to the driveway where the dumpster was...and then throw each piece of rock into it. I also spent an hour or so swinging a sledgehammer to help break up the deck. The result was good, but hello can you say HURT?
How about y'all? Any progress this week? Come celebrate your triumphs, big or small, with me!