It's Bride Time

OH, hi!

Nice to see you all. No apologies for my absence - all my extra online time has been spent trying not to get depressed about the state of the world (ie doing my homework for my class). Oh, and a bit of sale shopping ... whoops!

Anyways, I wanted to let you know that it is on. On like Donkey Kong.
Yes, I've decided it is, finally, BRIDE TIME.

via Pinterest

The time when I go into hyper-gear and knock myself into the beautiful, beaming bride I want to be. It all started when I discovered this man has a new book out.

Oh yes, and it just happens to be a 3-wk challenge to get you fit for a big event (let's just say he mentions "the dress" enough to really get my attention.)

Some of the highlights of the new program include:

• Walking for 45 minutes BEFORE breakfast
• Enjoying carbs at breakfast - and no time ever after
• Bye Bye chocolate 

Yeah, it's going to be brutal. But that's ok - I've been stagnant at this weight (after my 30-lb loss) for a while now and I'm ready to shake things up.

Added to that, I'm going to throw in some health and beauty regimes I've been meaning to try, including:

• Teeth whitening! yummy
• Trying to beautify my hair with these natural treatments. Can it help with the swarm of white hairs I'm growing? Let's see.
• Vitamins
• Dry brushing
• Using all of the many skin serums and miracle creams I buy and forget about. 

The goal is to get any final weight loss done and over before my dress needs to be stitched back together and find out what other beauty regimes need to be added before the wedding (ie day of one thousand photos). Apologies in advance for either further radio silence or a smattering of bitchy posts in the next 3 weeks as I adjust.

Still Resolute

via pinterest

The end of January is nearing folks - how are you doing on your New Year's resolutions?

I've gotta say, I'm doing pretty well with mine!

First and foremost, the diet and exercise plan is going really well. I won't point fingers, but combined, Matt and I have lost a total of 36 lbs! And consumed about 3 tons of veggies, egg whites and ground turkey. Whoopee! In all honesty, The Skinny Rules has proven to be a great diet plan - strict and rule-driven, but accessible enough that the average cook/grocery shopper/habitual dieter can easily jump on the train.

Stop smiling, you tyrant!

And just to add fuel to the fire, we're working out five days a week too. And let me just say that there is nothing sexier than a fiance who will do yoga with you ;)

This may be of interest to some of you -we've also jumped into the world of personal trainers. Nope, we weren't offered hits of steroids on our first visit. And we haven't started inexplicably grunting whenever we pick up a dumbell.  But something even worse happened - they brought out the calipers.... Here's how it went:

• We step out of the locker room. We are both wearing matching T-shirts by Mark C. Myers. Sweet.
• We are greeted by a duo of sleek, svelte trainers. Oh boy.
• We are put through a series of "no stress," "just for some baselines" tests - including jumping up and down on a box, doing as many (or few) push ups as we can, and the infamous President's challenge flexibility test.
• The calipers come out and we are irrevocably shamed in front of each other and told we are basically walking masses of blubber.
• We are committed henceforth and forever more to working out, so we never have to go through that again!!

Actually, since then, the process hasn't been bad. We've met with our trainer twice and he's taught us all the weight and strength training exercises we should be doing. He even made us nice binders of the weekly workouts we should be doing - starting with 2x a week and moving up. If you're interested, he recommends 4 days of weight training and 2 days of at least 20 minutes of cardio. Not awful. 

We've also made headway on the great wedding extravaganza, making play dates with caterers, chatting wit the paparazzi (or wedding photographers as you may call them) and getting our homework from our planner. And, for the most part, we've been sticking to the "have fun or else" idea. Only 1 breakdown in the new year - not bad!

The rest of the resolutions have made quiet progress, rather than big strides. Still in conversations about my masters, starting some new "time management" habits, and thinking optimistically about volunteering. Optimistic thoughts count for something, right?

Stay resolute, my friends!

XO,

E.