Wednesday Weigh In Week Two

I feel the need to remind myself not to let this blog only be about the weigh in. I really intended to get a post up earlier in the week. So maybe I should have started that on Friday or Saturday...

This weeks Weigh in Results....

• Starting weight December 29, 2008: 236 lbs.
• Overall Goal weight: 140 lbs.
• Weight last week: 231 lbs.
• Weight today: 230lbs
• Amount lost this week: 1 lb

Interesting thing about the single pound loss. Since I am using the Wii Fit as my weigh in tool and it encourages you to weigh in every day, I had a spike on Sunday where I showed a weight gain of 3.3 pounds. While I know a persons weight can fluctuate a couple of pounds during the course of a day, that is still high. Truth be told, I think it was the greasy hamburger I had for lunch on Friday, then the Pizza Buffett later on that evening and Saturday was really no better. We had Mexican for lunch and I don't recall what for dinner, but it probably wasn't healthy.

I know for some people weighing themselves every day and watching that spike go up might cause them to give up. Quite honestly a few years ago that might have been the case with me. However I think for me at this point in my life seeing a real time translation of what happens when I don't make the best food choices is a positive thing. Knowing I need to step up the exercise at that point, and kidding myself that my choices weren't really that bad won't fly anymore.

So to that end, while I haven't obviously been restricting my food intake, I was trying to keep a running total in my head of how many calories I have been ingesting. Monday while wondering just how many calories were in that sandwich at Subway, I decided to google it and found a nice tracking tool. It is called the Daily Plate and while at this point I am not necessarily making huge diet changes, I can know just how many calories I ate. So my goal this week is to keep exercising, track my food every day and then next week I will make some meal adjustments.

Wii are Unbalanced and Exercising

I think I mentioned that Santa left me a Wii Fit for Christmas. Some might want to slap Santa at the presumption of giving that kind of gift. Just for the record, I told Santa I couldn't decide which I wanted more the Wii Fit or Guitar Hero. Seeing how Santa is a professional musician, who does play bass, I thought I had a better chance of winning on Wii Fit.

What I didn't realize was the the balance board not only lets you snowboard, but it also weighs you. I know, kinda sucks the fun right out of a present, doesn't it. Especially when after entering my info it informs me my BMI is 1 gabillion. Yes that is a real number, I think. Okay let's face it I knew my weight was an issue, I wasn't surprised when the balance board informed me I was obese and transformed my Mii from a skinny likeness of me to an almost mirror image where my belly was hanging out of my shirt. Isn't the point of a video game to escape reality?

Undaunted I continued on and was given my first Wii Fit Age, 48 a mere 13 years older than my actual age. Ouch. Then I played my first game. I went for the Balance games thinking they would be easy. After several attempts to head soccer balls I was told I was unbalanced. Who me? How did it know? I thought I hid it well.

All joking aside, I had already decided that I had to get serious about getting some more exercises and losing weight, before Christmas. I didn't research the Wii Fit as an exercise tool, and when someone wondered why in the world one would need a game to do yoga, I had no answer. However after playing with it for a couple of weeks this is my review so far.

Likes:

• I am having fun.

• It tracks your exercise, weight and graphs it. You can even add time spent on exercised not done on the Wii Fit.

• I am competitive so getting keeping the high score is important to me and it motivates me.

• Unlike going to a class, I can do it when I have time and don't have to worry about my appearance. However it can be played in a group so, I can take my board and go play somewhere else.

• Since it measures how much pressure you are putting on your feet or hands, I feel as though I am possibly doing the exercise right, unlike when watching a video.

• You have to play to keep unlocking more exercises or games.

• I actually worked up a sweat doing the aerobic games.
  

• It had me set a goal weight and it told me I had too much too soon, and gave me sugestions about resetting it to something healthier.

Dislikes:

• Right now the only thing that I really don't like is that I would like to program a set of exercises and move through them without stopping to punch the buttons. Maybe there is a way to do that I just haven't found yet.

Reality:

• Right now I am in the heady days of playing with a new toy, will it be a tool I use long term? Or will it join the guitar in my closet? Who knows, I hope to keep with it, to that end I am going to make myself accountable here as well. I am going to start participating in Blog to Fit as an additional motivational tool.
• I haven't made any major diet changes except to measure out what I am eating and be aware of appropriate portion size.
  

So here goes it internets.... I hate to do this, I am totally going to close my eyes when I hit the publish button.

Starting Weight 12/29/08 236 lb

Last week: 234 lb

This week: 231 lb

Pounds lost (or gained): 5 total 3 this week

How many pounds left to lose: 15 for my current goal on Wii Fit but I would like to get down to 160.

Getting back to Reality

All good things must come to an end they say. So did my conference and my trip to Nashville. Today I have been sharing my experiences with friends and family. As I rested this afternoon I watched the GMA's Dove Awards ceremony, which was letting out the other night as we walked by. We hung around as the attendees were leaving trying to soak up their uber talent. Did I mention I saw Sandi Patty and was too starstruck to even speak to her?

As someone who has no early childhood education experience, I was blown away by the things I learned. Dr. Lilian Katz was the keynote speaker and hands down gave the best speech I have ever heard on any subject. She reinforced the notion that playing with my children, speaking to them, encouraging whatever they are interested in is the best way to teach them, instead of worrying if they know their ABC's by sight at 4.

Another class I really enjoyed was presented by Dr. Jo of Geo Fitness. Talk about a fireball of a sixty year old. I swear this lady could out move me at half her age. In fact thinking about how much I need to move to wear off the calories I consumed today at the oil field cookoff, is a bit daunting. I better get moving on that four hour hike, because we brought leftovers home for dinner.

I also wanted to leave you a few more links. I mentioned that Head Start funding was cut last year. Did I mention by $10 million dollars? If you want an easy link to write your politicians about it, please click here. If you want to read more about what Head Start is doing for people around our country, please go read the stories here.

In news from the home front, I have a bunch of cleaning to do, because I left the boys at home for a week without me. My husband though is a smart cookie, though he did get on the roof and get the air conditioning going today so I can at least clean and not break a sweat. ; )