I Jiggle But Not As Much As I Use to…

 

Here is to the first weigh in week of the Weight Loss Challenge hosted by the fantastic Lindsey over at Mr. and Mrs. Smith (check out her fabulous blog if you haven’t yet!!)

 

I am linking up with all the lovely ladies who are participating and trying to lose the last few pounds before the summer season! It’s a great group that helps encourage each other on one of the hardest roads to undertake. Weight loss and fitness are essential to a healthy lifestyle and I am a strong believe that strong and encouraging support groups are the key to staying on track and meeting goals.

Last Thursday was the first week of the challenge and the initial goals were made. You can read all about mine here.

I am 5’7’’

I weigh somewhere around 146 pounds

I’d like to be at about a 125-130

My goal is to lose about 15 to 20 pounds

I am happy to report that when I got on the scale today I weighed 141.2 pounds. Which was surprising, because my weight had not budged at all in the past two months. I’ve been at a steady 145.7 to 146.2. I do have to admit I am really bad about weighing myself continuously, daily or even weekly, so I think my last weight check was about a week and a half (maybe two weeks) ago. Which means that the weight loss might not be all during the last week. However I’m happy with it! *Dancing a little jig and celebrating*

 

You can read all about what I’ve been doing here, here, here and here.

I have started taking fatty acids and a fat burner in addition to my multivitamins, calcium and protein. I am also looking into some other nutrition methods such as consuming more power foods! 

If you want to get more of my tips check out the 25 Days of Fitness!!!

Day 1: 5 Reasons to Exercise

Day 2: Baby Steps to a Healthier Lifestyle – drinking more water

Day 3: The Four Basic Elements of Health

Day 4: Foundational Supplements

Day 5: Performance Supplements

Day 6: Results take some time

Day 7: Power Foods

Day 8: Reasons weight loss takes time

Day 9: Trouble spots – Thighs and Butt

Day 10: Routines

Day 5 of 25 Days of Fitness

 

“You live longer once you realize that any time spent unhappy is wasted” – Ruth E. Renkl

Welcome to Day 5!

We are now officially 1/5 of the way there! How do you all feel?! Have you kept up with exercising daily?! I know I almost skipped out on yesterday, until the Mister pretty much dressed me in my workout clothing and carried me down two flights of stairs and set me right between the elliptical and the treadmill. I must say, my Hub is the best, and the workout made me feel fantastic. I could feel all the grossness of the day leaving my body with the sweat.

Win! Zara –1 Grossness – 0!!!

Today I’m babysitting my beautiful niece, so my workout will be later in the evening when she is handed over to her parents and I have done tutoring. My hair also needs a good washing and some TLC from Kaitlin, my beautiful hairstylist. I’m thinking of turning the red back into an ash or platinum blond… Much easier to maintain and a higher contrast then red and black… What y’all think?!

I don’t want as much blond in it, but what’s the verdict on the contrast. I am debating between going back to a dark chocolate brown or a midnight black as well… Kaitlin will make almost anything happen, hence I just need to decide what I want.

Now that that’s out of the way, I want to talk a little bit more about supplements for health and fitness! The post yesterday (here) covered multivitamins, whey protein and fatty acids which are the foundational supplements. Today, I want to talk about some of the other recommended supplements that I discovered.

This group of supplements is called the Performance Supplements

Thermogenic Fat Burner:

So I had never heard of a fat burner… I was and still am a little hesitant of what this little guy does, but trainers like Jamie Eason highly recommend it. The fat burner supposedly helps maintain high energy levels, enhances focus and helps get you through the workout with plenty of energy.

When shopping for your fat burner, you should watch out for long lists and huge proprietary blends. Ideally, you want to see exactly how much of each ingredient you're getting. Look for quality ingredients like caffeine or other natural stimulants, tea extracts - green tea extract being one of the best, l-carnitine, and herbal extracts like raspberry ketones.

Mitotropin is the recommended brand from Body Building.com, and the company claims that the fat burner does all of the following:

1. Promote Increased Resting Metabolic Rate*
2. Support Increased Presence of Uncoupling Proteins*
3. Encourage Acute Sense of Well-Being*
4. Promote Mental Focus and Clarity*
5. Support Increased Thermogenesis*

For full details on the Mitoropin click here.

Q: Have you every used a fat burner? Would you recommended? What was your experience/results?

Conjugated Linoleic Acid:

This is another one that I hadn’t really heard about, so I took Jamie Eason’s word for it, and think I will experiment with this as well. Conjugated Linoleic Acid (CLA) is stated to be your supporting weapon to get lean and maintain muscle mass.

CLA is a naturally occurring fatty acid found mainly in meat and airy products. It will help gain muscle and drop body fat.

 

I tried searching for other CLA brands, and it seems that this is the one that has the most reviews. You can read all about what people have to say here. I will be giving this a try as well, so watch for reviews sometime in the near future.

Q: What are you thoughts? Have you taken CLA before? What was your experience?

We are heading out for some pizza and bookstore exploration time.

See y’all soon!