Cross-Blog Conversations

How I Plan to Stay on Track for Christmas

Well, We’re in the last two days of the Cross-Blog Conversation with Angie over at LosingItandLovingIt.com. If you missed any of the conversation so far, you can follow the conversation on Angie’s Blog here and on my blog here. 

Today is my turn to answer the question that Angie asked me and it’s a good one!

Shannon, I followed your Thanksgiving challenge where you stayed accountable on your blog for a few days leading up to the big day when it came to food and exercise.  Do you plan on doing something similar for Christmas and if so have you thought about what your goals might be to stay on a healthy track through the holiday?

Angie,

Great Question! This week, I’ve been thinking A LOT about how to stay on track for Christmas, as I’ve fallen off track a bit with exercise and the box of Harry and David cookies that a client sent me has been calling my name from the corner of my office. (I finally opened the box of cookies today.)

I’m thinking the Christmas Holiday is harder for me to “stay on track” with because it’s the only time of year I make candy (fudge and divinity) and my neighbors and clients share their generosity with me in the form of sweet treats (Like the box of cookies!).

I am planning on trying out a few new recipes from the Hungry Girl cookbook (like the Dreamy Chocolate Peanut Butter Fudge on page 171) and of course making our favorite  yummy & healthy Chocolate muffins (also from the Hungry Girl cookbook) to help with reducing the calories and fat intake.

But overall, my plan is similar to that over Thanksgiving, keep a focus on exercise and movement to help keep the calories burn and metabolism up, and to just keep the portions and the choices at a healthy level. 

I’m not planning on starving myself, or missing out on my once a year treats, but I’m also not planning on overindulging either. Just being smart with it (or at least that’s the plan.)

As far as a challenge, Yes! I plan to do a 10-day Healthy Choices Christmas Challenge from Dec 18th (the night of my husband work’s Christmas Party) to Monday the 28th, simply because this is the time frame that is most difficult for me and I found tracking my choices and blogging them helped keep me accountable. 

If you or any of our readers would like to join in, I welcome it! (We can have our own little holiday party online! )

So, my turn for one last question. Wow! We’re really on the last question. I’m a little sad, as this cross-blog conversation has been fun and interesting. But, alas, here we are, so my last question for you is:

Being this far along in your weight loss journey, what have you learned that you wish you knew when you started?

Really can’t wait to read your answer tomorrow (Sunday). And thank you once again for all your insights and time this week. I so appreciate you.

…Shannon

Exercise Challenges & A Question about Rebounding

This week we’ve been having fun with a cross-blog conversation with Angie over at LosingItandLovingIt.com. So far we’ve covered diet soda cravings, personal struggles, and yesterday Angie shared with us how using Exercise Challenges have helped in her weight loss jouney.

So it’s time for me to answer her question, which was:

Have you ever participated in any exercise challenges and if so would you consider doing more in the future?  I am in the process of planning a  fitness challenge for my blog readers in February and would love for you to consider joining in but we’ll talk more about that challenge later.

Angie,

This is a little sad to admit, but I have *started* an exercise challenge (the Fat Loss Quickie 30 Day Challenge) but never finished it.  I am realizing that 30 days is just too long for me to stick to it. 

I did do the Healthy Choices Thanksgiving Challenge (which you suggested – Thank you!) for the week of Thanksgiving and that was a really good to do.  I also did give myself a Exercise Every Day goal last week, which I suppose you could consider a personal challenge. And that really helped in moving the scale that week.

Seven to 10 days seems to be the longest I’m able to really focus and stick to a challenge without getting derailed.  Something I”m realizing that I need to take into consideration as I play games with myself to accomplish this really big goal – I need to break it down into tiny little goals.

I can’t wait to hear what your upcoming challenge is going to be!

So, a new question for you:

You’ve mentioned that rebounding used to be part of your workouts. At what point in your weight loss journey did you start using it (I’m concerned about weight limit) and do you have any tips on getting started rebounding?

I have to add to this a little. Two and half years ago, my then 3 yo daughter was overweight and diagnosesed with high cholesterol, so we took a serious approach to dealing with that through exercise and nutrition.

In six months she went from this little chubby girl to this really thin and fit child, losing 1/5 of her body weight and bringing her cholesterol back in line where it should be. 

One of the things that really helped her lose the weight was jumping on the trampoline (that’s her in the picture a month into her weight loss journey). She had so much FUN with it.  I would love to have that much fun and have the results she did, hence why I’m so curious about rebounding  

Can’t wait to read your answer tomorrow!

…Shannon

P.S. Be sure to check out Angie’s blog tomorrow (Friday) to hear her insights on how Rebounding has helped her lose weight and any tips she might have for getting started.

Challenges with Diet Soda & Cravings (Cross-Blog w/Angie)

Yesterday, as part of our cross-blog conversation this week, Angie at LosingItandLoving.com answered my question on how she managed to give up diet soda (my nemesis right now) and asked me two questions.

The first was:

Have you ever read the Craving Secrets e-book?

And she recommended I check out the section on Soda (page 39 in her copy and page 35 in my copy – I think it depends on how our printers format the pages).

So here’s my answer:

Angie,

It’s funny you should bring up Craving Secrets! I just told my husband on Monday night when he was commenting on how much he craves sugar (despite the fact that it makes him ill) that I would print out my copy so he could take a look at what Diana Walker recommends. 

 But I didn’t even think about going back to read the Soda section. (silly me!)

At lunch time today, after I had given in to my own cravings, I decided to read back through the soda, artificial sweetner, and caffiene craving sections. You can see from the picture the irony of it all; here I was drinking a diet soda and munching on french fries, while reading about how bad they were for me. Sad.

Sometimes I feel like the friend of Diana’s that she talks about on the Craving Secret website – telling my kids they can’t drink my diet soda because it’s bad for them, yet drinking it myself.  How hypocritical I’m being. <sigh> Something else to work on.

I did make it through yesterday without a soda, but obviously not today. Mostly because of poor planning on my part. I just grabbed the easiest thing through the drive thru. But this is definitely something I’m working on.

Now for the second question:

We have discussed our struggles with weight loss and I wonder if you would care to share another struggle you might have when it comes to weight loss and/or fitness?

My biggest challenge I think is keeping it a priority and a top focus, being consistent. As women, we juggle so many different things: home, family, work, friends, etc. that sometimes it’s difficult to make fitness and healthy choices a priority.

At least this has been huge struggle for me. I’m finding that playing games with myself, to keep it interesting, is helping, as is being accountable by posting here on the blog.

But that brings me to my next question for you:

I noticed that you have done several challenges, like Jillian Michael’s 30 Day Shred or the Whittle My Middle challenge you are doing this month. How have they helped you keep on track?

I’ll be by your blog tomorrow to hear (well…read) your answer Thanks again for sharing with us!

…Shannon

Be sure to head over to Angie’s blog tomorow (Wednesday) to hear (well..read) her answer. The link is:

Losingitandlovingit.com/blog

Enjoy!

Cross Blog Conversation with Angie of LosingitandLovingit.com

I’m so excited this week to bring you something very special -  a Cross-Blog Conversation with Angie over at LosingitandLovingit.com. 

I started following Angie’s weight loss blog a few months ago and her journey has really inspired me to bring my quest to be healthy and fit, and lose 100+ pounds to a new level. In fact she’s the reason I started this blog.

Angie from LosingItandLovingIt.com

And because Angie is so much further along in her weight loss journey than I am, I had a few questions that I really wanted to ask her. 

So I’m thrilled she agreed not only to answer my questions, but also to make it public with this cross-blog conversation, so you can “hear” (well, read) her responses and glean from her experience as well. How cool is that!

So, how this is going to work, is that I get to kick off today by asking Angie a question. And tomorrow (Monday) you (and I)  can check out her answer over on her LosingItandLovingIt.com blog and I hear she’s got a question for me.

So then on Tuesday, I’ll answer her question here on TheShrinkingMommy.com and ask Angie another question. She’ll answer on Wednesday… and so on. We’ll wrap up on Sunday over on Angie’s blog.

So, you have full permission to eavesdrop on this little question and answer session we’ll be having this week. It should be fun!

So, my first question for Angie has to do with giving up Diet Soda.

Angie,

I noticed on your blog that you have managed to give up soda. I’m really struggling with giving up soda altogether. I haven’t had a sugar-laden soda in 9 months, but I’m really having a hard time with diet soda.

Can you share any tips on how you managed to give up soda?

So join me tomorrow over on Angie’s blog to read her answer…here’s the link:

LosingItandLovingIt.com

And if you have any tips or experiences to share, feel free to share them in the comments!

Thanks!

…Shannon