OhNo September and 2WWB Challenges

So, that was an interesting month...

The Results:
Even though I went on holiday and stuffed my face, my strength and fitness has improved even further and I've lost weight again (not that I'm too bothered about losing more weight).

Pretty happy with how I really knocked it out of the park with 2 weeks of being super healthy after my naughty holiday. If anything having a week of no exercising and eating plenty probably helped my fitness and weightloss as it gave my body a much needed break.


The Rules:
In terms of the OhNo challenge I did OK. I've added in some new workouts and in my last week or so haven't even felt cravings for alcohol. I think the relaxed hol helped in righting my mood.

For the 2WWB I did pretty darn good. I worked my butt off and was good with my diet and drinking  - I definitely put on weight on the holiday and this challenge sorted that out in a trice.

Looking back, the original OhNo challenge idea was a bit daft; planning to exercise regularly and not drink when on holiday is doomed to fail. In retrospect I should have broken down into 2 mini challenges; eat as healthily as poss on hol, but still having fun, then do the 2 week hardcore challenge to make up for it. Of course that's what I ended up doing!

Lesson learned is that if in future I don't have a good idea for a specific challenge that I'd like to complete that I'm really keen on, I'll just stick to a few mini challenge to keep me rolling and engaged.

2WWB - Day 14

Today's grade: A+

The last day today! I did a Fitball class after work to round the 2 weeks off in style.  Looking forward to tomorrow when I'm going to have a day of R&R and kick off my new challenge (see other post)

2WWB - Day 13

Today's Grade: A+

Today was very hardcore. I have entered a sporting event (more info to follow) so decided to run 5k before my body conditioning class. I say run; it was jog-walk-jog-walk. It took me about 40 minutes to do that 5k. And my head went so red it looked as though it was about to explode. Oh dear.

In body conditioning I'm still improving:

• Legs: 15 kg
• Back: 10 kg
• Chest: 7.5 kg
• Arms (tris, bis, shoulders): 5 kg

I think that's right! I'm going to keep tracking to see how I improve.

2WWB - Day 11 & 12

This weekend's Grade: B

So this weekend was pretty good on all fronts apart from the not-drinking-booze front which I totally ignored. Oopsy.

Yesterday I tried out Jillian Michaels Killer Buns and Thighs and holy moly it was hard work. You know that you've pushed the barrel when you can't sleep because your legs are aching.

Today was a long bike ride with my boyfriend. He bikes almost every day so made the business look very easy; I totally killed myself for 2 hours trying not to slow him down too much. Guilt obviously works well because I looked at my Polar band when I got back and discovered I'd burned 1300 calories... guess I should do it more often!

Breville Blend Active review: My First Vlog!

So today I've uploaded my first vlog! Dadadaaaa! It's a bit amateurish as it's been shot on my Canon camera, so the video quality isn't the best (I think I may have got the focus wrong or something!)

I've been inspired by the various vlog and videos I've been watching and fancied having a go myself as sometimes the written word isn't quite sufficient to put the message across.

So here it is:

I'm recording another video on Kombucha making so watch this space!

Oaty Pancake Recipes

OK so I make these every Saturday and they are TOTALLY YUMMY

Ingredients are per person and make 3 or 4 mini pancakes, so just double/triple up if you need to make for extra people or are feeling hungry.

Ingredients

• 40g Oats
• 40g Yoghurt
• 40g Milk
• 1 Egg
• Optional extras; 
• Scoop of chia seeds 
• Protein powder
• A few slices of banana
• Raw cacao powder
• Spoon of peanut or almond butter

Instructions

Put your ingredients into your Breville Blend Active (or other blender or food processor) and blend. 

Leave to stand for a little (if you have time) for the ground oats to soak up into the liquid properly. Shake and then pour into rounds in hot frying pan. I like to fry in a little butter. 

Flip the pancakes when they bubble and leave for a little time so the other side cooks.

I serve with honey (or agave syrup) and lemon juice, but you can take your pick.

Yum yum!

2WWB - Day 10

Today's grade: F

Oh dear... It was all going so well. Tonight my body rebelled and demanded that I get into bed after work for a snooze instead of working out, and eat fish and chips from the chippy instead of healthy stuff, and drink a couple of glasses of wine. Or maybe it was my mind. Whichever way I was too tired to fight it... Sometimes when your body yells at you very loud it's a good idea to give it what it wants for a bit.

Anyway I feel a lot better now... My body has had a much needed rest and dinner was totally yummy. I'm just going to book myself on a class tomorrow because yoga is cancelled. Sad face. 

2WWB - Day 9

Today's grade: A+

Another solid day. Yoga was good, although I lacked some focus - at times my brain was just going lalalalalaaa. Something's happening though - my strength and stamina is improving on a week to week basis now. On the downside, it feels as though the pressure and tiredness is building up in my body turning me into one big ache, but I'm going to keep pushing through to the end.

2WWB - Day 8

Today's grade: A+

OK this challenge business is harder than I thought. Most weeks I end up having 2 or 3 days off, in the past week I've had just 1. It's pretty hard.

It's not a long term thing (generally it's a good idea to have some decent recovery time) but pushing myself to keep going to the gym is really testing my willpower. The odd thing is that when I think I'm the most tired; achey and unenergised I go to the gym and BAM... I'm on fire (in a good way). This past few days I've felt as though I'm pushing through a barrier to the next level of fitness and that's pretty great.

On another note I've been reading into producing your own Kefir. My hair has been falling out even more than normal (I'm a red head aka shed head - mass producer of long auburn hairs that get everywhere) and maybe it's age, but maybe it's also another issue. One key worry is that, with all this exercise, I'm not getting enough key vitamins and minerals; so I've been taking the odd (wholefood, organic, nasty-free) multivitamin. I also wanted to improve my absorption of v&m by adding a probiotic, hence the Kefir.

Kefir is a thick, fermented milk drink that is even more packed with good bacteria than natural yoghurt - and it tastes pretty yummy too (like runny yoghurt). After some research I discovered that it is super easy to make yourself, so I decided to turn my hand and have ordered some Kefir grains.

> Cultures for Health @Youtube - make your own Kefir

When investigating this I also came across info on how to make Kombucha; the fermented tea drink that is also tipped to be a superfood (er... superdrink) ..... aaand I may have got carried away and ordered the kit to make this also.

> Cultures for Health @Youtube - make your own Kombucha tea

So, without even tasting it, I've managed to spend £30 on the kit required to make Kombucha. Oopsy! Lets hope I like the taste of it.

2WWB - Day 7

Today's grade: A+

Oh my goodness. Oh my goodness.

So today I tried out 'power hour' at the gym. The description was a bit vague, "High Energy, Fat-burning, muscle toning, core strengthening. The ultimate workout. Power Hour has it all in one class." Reading this I assumed that the class would be a fairly standard HIIT class. Boy was I wrong.

My first hint of the pure craziness was the instructor's advice to go low on the dumbells because 'we would be using them for more than half an hour'. ??? . So, not having an ego problem, I grabbed the 1kg. Of course all the guys ignored the instructors advice to go for 3kg max and went straight for the big ones. 

What followed was basically 40 minutes of non-stop upper body strength work (unending reps cycling through most arm and shoulder muscles); with lower body cardio intervals added in (jogging whilst continuing dumbbell exercises). Mostly the instructor shouted 'up, up, up' in voice that morphed from a cute foreign accent to militant, grating screech (ok so it was still cute, foreign accent, but I was starting to hate it). 

People started sizing down pretty quickly or just throwing their weights on the floor and going without. There were a lot of pain faces; especially from the guys that picked up the big weights. Heh heh.

So I did ok... I managed to do 90% of the upper body work (thanks to the low weights), and 100% of the cardio. Unfortunately my HRM didn't connect with my loop properly before the call so I can't see what my heart rate looked like, and how much calories I burned.

I actually liked it a little because it was completely different, and an upper body workout on the Tuesday fits in really well with my general schedule (see below)

• Monday - Body conditioning (whole body)
• Tuesday - Power hour (upper body)
• Wednesday - LBT (lower body)
• Thursday - Yoga (upper body)
• Friday - Cardio (lower body)
• Sat - Yoga (upper body)
• Sunday - biking/running (lower body)

See - pretty neat! Of course I usually end up skipping the odd one or two sessions throughout the week (good because it means I can recover).

2WWB - Day 6

Today's Grade: A+

Back on it! Today was body conditioning class. I really enjoyed it the class itself, and I'm definitely progressing in strength. On the downside Reading Uni term has started so the Sportspark was rammed, with fresh faced students wandering around like lost puppies.

My current weights are between 5kg - 12.5kg on the bar for arms - legs

2WWB - Day 5

Today's Grade: D-

Oopsy. So today I didn't do too well on the 2WWB front. I totally forgot I was meeting up with some friends back home so instead of working out today I spend 3 hours in the car driving to and from MK, and 4 hours in MK shopping, drinking coffee, gossiping, eating and more shopping.

I bought a cheeky new outfit including a quilted leather skirt that I tried on as a joke but ended up falling in love with; turns out it looks pretty good with a pair of newly toned legs poking out from under it. If I was more daring I'd pair it with boots, a crisp white shirt and my chanel-esque boucle black and white jacket and wear to work tomorrow!

By the time I got home it was late and time to make dinner. After that, working out at 8pm after a full day and a big meal felt like the last thing I wanted to do, so instead I got into bed, got an audiotape on and busted some germs (silly game on Nintendo DS).

About the only rule I managed to keep was not to drink booze, so I'l elevate my grade from a complete F to a pretty pants D-.

2WWB - Day 4

Today's grade: B+

Man... beginning to feel a little bit tired; a combination of sleeping badly and working out every day has broken me a little. That said I did manage to get my butt out of bed and out to yoga in the morning. On the down side I didn't quite squeeze in 7k steps I'd planned to, despite walking to yoga and spending an hour or so doing household chores.

I did manage to resist the lure of a glass of wine and unhealthy comfort food however, so pretty happy about that.

2WWB - Day 3

Today's Grade: A

Cardio today and boy, I'm getting pretty fit. Normally 45 mins of aerobics, sprints & running and doing HIIT is a bit much I have to stop in places, or run so slowly that everyone overtakes me. This time I made it all the way through, running to the end.

I've marked myself down a little because we had takeaway, but I stopped myself from being too naughty and ordered a Thai salad (although a nabbed some of my partners chicken skewers and went a bit crazy on the peanut sauce... mmmmmm)

The Perfect Hummus - FINALLY!

I've been making hummus for a while and I've finally nailed it thanks to some internet research. For the first time my hummus is smooth and even tastes better than the fancy hummus I buy from the shop.

The recipe I used is over on Inspired Taste: Simple Hummus Recipe. It has a great video or, for those of you that would prefer, great step by step instructions.

I didn't measure the ingredients out, just eyeballed it, but the key is in the order that you add things and the energetic amounts of blending! The hummus that resulted was creamy and totally delicious (before it tended to be lumpy, gritty and ok tasting).

Oh... and my secret ingredient that made it just perfect was the addition of Jalepeno sauce (you could use any hot sauce) to give it a bit of a kick.

I won't recreate the recipe here, only point you to the article at Simple Hummus Recipe. Awesome!

2WWB - Day 2

Today's grade: A+

Yoga today was AMAZING. So great to be back at my class and I felt so strong. I even managed to do a handstand and hold it away from the wall for a few seconds. I'm finding the strength and core work from my exercise classes immensely helpful in my practice; with twice weekly yoga classes and a few resistance classes being the winning combination.

This really inspires me to get the handstand nailed, although reading this progression pose over on yoga anonymous shows me I have a little way to go yet.

> 8 Yoga Poses to Help You Get Your Handstand On

Perhaps I can have a progress to handstand challenge at some point!

2WWB - Day 1

Today's Grade: A+

I think I'm addicted to challenges... turns out one a month isn't enough any more; I have to add in bi-weekly challenges. Oh No.

Well if it works...

So today I was back at LBT Bootcamp with the lovely trainer, Karen, who is officially back in the house. We did some HIIT then body conditioning both focused on lower body (but with some upper body worked in). It was great; really hard work and a good balance of cardio and resistance. I sweated so much I started slipping around (ew).

I nailed all the 2WWB rules 100% (but it is day 1 so that is to be expected... hehe) so today I get an A+. Yay!

All that remains is to add a motivational yet factually dubious poster (right)

OhNo September - Day 17

First day back on it and I've cooked up a 2 week workout blast plan to finish out the month with a bang.

It's pretty hardcore; no rest days (if you count yoga as exercise, which I do!) But I will be pairing up Yoga (upper body) with LBT (lower body) classes and mixing in some pure cardio so I give my body time to recover. I've had plenty of rest over the holiday and have probably put on about a kg (I'm not weighing myself throughout the month any more - it never ends well) so this 2 week mini challenge will BLAST away the holiday cobwebs and get me back on track.

OhNo September - Day 16

I'm back from my holiday on the lovely Greek island of Alonissos!

... and I have a confession. I started off well and healthily for the fist week of my holiday, but then just kinda went 'screw it I'm just going to enjoy myself' for the last few days and upped my pie and pizza eating, beer drinking and skipping my workouts. Oopsy. On the plus side the holiday was totally wonderful and fantastic and I feel very very relaxed and recharged. I've been getting lots of sun (yay vitamin D), enjoying the Mediterranean diet (olive oil is my friend), getting plenty of sleep and am so happy that cortisol has probably been banished (temporarily) from my body completely.

It's actually nice to be back in the office and I'm excited about throwing myself back into a super healthy mode and getting back to the gym. I've booked onto a full week of classes to get kick started and blast off the little feta cheese pie and mythos tummy I've got at the moment. I think I've expanded my stomach with all that scoffing because today I've just been eating non stop (although I'm travelling and didn't get much sleep last night, so that could explain things I suppose!)

Given the amount of alcohol I glugged (a little more than a glass a day, with only one day off!) I've made a pact with the Mr to be super good and not drink for the next couple of weeks too.

OhNo September - Day 7

I'm one week in to my September challenge and thus far results are mixed. I didn't manage to get one in on the thurday or friday travelling as the first day I couldn't fit it inbetween work and leaving for the hotel, and on friday we were travelling all day. I was a bit bummed about this, but thus far we've done an exercise DVD (Jillian's 30 day Shred) first thing every morning of the holiday proper. I'm really happy with the habit I've started (see what I did there) and loving doing the DVDs first thing as they really set you up well for the day; you don't have to worry because you've got the exercise in the bag already.

The eating and drinking side of things is going less well. It's fairly easy to have days of not drinking when you are working all day and eating at home. But when you are in a hot country on holiday where it is customary to have a retsina or mythos with lunch and dinner it is a little more of a challenge. In general I'm trying to avoid eating the bread they put out the minute you sit down, and the beer. I'm also sticking to greek salads for lunch to keep it healthy(ish).

I think in general I'm going to loosen the bone a bit and enjoy my holiday - it's the first big one we've had in years. I'm aiming to make healthy, low carb choices as much as I can, keeping the drinking moderate, and get in lots of exercise; DVDs and walking. Success will be if I maintain my fitness level and weight throughout the holiday.

Ohno September - Day 4

Tomorrow is holiday! Aiiiiiiieeeee ai ai.

I've got the obligatory fake tan and spent all day bouncing around the office like an overgrown oompa loompa (further emphasised by my 6 month dental hygenist appointment - boy that lady scrapes them til they shine). I must say I see why body builders go down this route... my recently almost-toned up body is looking even more sleek with a  golden ochre hue. Unfortunately I managed to put the pants on backwards whilst being sprayed so now have a huge white triangle around my bits, which spoils the bikini effect somewhat.

My flight leaves at a ridonculous 5.30am so I am not going to be getting the required 8 hours tonight methinks. I'm going to have to balance that out by being super healthy.

Tonight I'll be staying at a hotel so it will be a challenge to make sure that I eat healthily and do some exercise. I've done my homework and the hotel does have a gym, but bitter experience from months and months travelling for work has taught me that after a few hours driving to the airport, I'll only want to eat, not exercise, and then sleep.

So my plan is to do an exercise DVD (perhaps try out JM's 6 week 6 pick from the youtube) when I get home from work, and tonight to have a big ol' salad, sans dressing, and no booze.

Tomorrow I won't worry about exercise. I'll just try to eat lots of fresh, raw veg and fruit and drink lots of water (no booze and no coffee) whilst travelling. It's the only way I've found to stop flying from making me feel totally dreadful.

This writing before the fact & setting the intention thing is pretty darn awesome (and affective), so I will be stuffing my laptop in my bag and taking it with me to blog as I go. Yay!

Naughty but nice - Black Forest Gateau shake

Inspired by Amanda over at running with spoons, who's milkshakes I've been lusting over, I've finally got round to trying my hand at one of these bad boys. I didn't really follow a receipe, instead just bunging in a bunch of things that were mentioned in other recipes and that I had lying around.

• A few glugs of Almond milk
• A few glugs of Coconut milk
• 1 tbsp Chia seeds
• 1 handful blackberries picked from a local bush
• A looong squeeze of Agave syrup (so I've got a sweet tooth)
• A splodge of yoghurt
• 1 tbsp raw cacao powder
• Half an avocado
• Heaped tsp of whey
• Some ice
• Some vanilla essence

I whizzed this all together in my cheap and cheerful Breville Blend-Active blender then oozed it into a wine glass and slurped it up super-quickly through a couple of straws. 

It's a little naughty (probably about the same number of calories as my dinner) but very delicious and all organic and natural. Nom Nom.

OhNo September - Day 3

Oh boy. Last night's HIIT class was totally INSANE.

For some weird reason I decided to go to the gym early and do some weights, because HIIT is just cardio right? Wrong. I endured the most insane workout of my life so far yesterday (after some weights), and now I am a broken woman. On the plus side this totally cancelled out the pizza from the day before.

Today I'm having a day off of exercising and a little glass of red wine with my meal.

OhNo September - Day 2

So Day 2 and I have the smug glow of one who has started strong! Whoop. Yesterday I managed to totally avoid alcohol, despite having pizza for dinner (ok, ok, not so healthy) and spending 4 hours in the local pub partaking in the weekly quiz.

I also managed to squeeze in level 2 of Jillian's 30 day shred. Oh my goodness. I was happy doing L1, which I find challenging enough, but my boyfriend persuaded me to skip forward to L2. As you can see from my HR profile below, it was pretty full on and in 35 mins (including getting set up, warm up and cool down) I burned a stonking 350 calories. Woot!

Today the plan is to go alcohol free again, and go along to a HIIT class at the gym. I've avoided this one thus far because the description of it on the website scares me a little (specifically the word 'advanced')

"High Intensity Interval Training combines high impact movements with interval training and guarantees to burn maximum calories. It is a great way to increase your power, strength, cardiovascular fitness and all over body definition. As its title indicates this class is of a high intensity and is an advanced class for those with a good current fitness level."

Interested to see the HR profile from that!

OhNo September - Day 1

Day one and I'm going to start as I mean to go on. Unfortunately this could be challenging. We've got friends around for dinner today (pizza) followed by a pub quiz.

Oh dear.

So there is no way around it. I'll be doing a Jillian DVD when I get home and then sipping on water all night (I had a couple of glasses of wine last night... oopsy).

I will also be starting my journalling in my funky new Clash notebook. Groovy baby yeah.

Writing this down is my way of making the intention to be super good in the face of temptation. I CAN DO THIS! :)