Get Hawt – Week 3 Tools

Week 3  – The question is what tools are you going to use to help you acheive your goals.

Measuring Tools

A couple years ago I spent a few weeks measuring out exactly what a serving was and I have to tell you this did two things. First the obvious, dirty a lot of dishes. But I have to tell you it was totally worth it. Second it put into perspective just how much we over eat without even trying. Here are a couple examples.

The left is an actual 1 oz serving of chips for 150 calories the right is 1.8 oz which looks more like what one would put on their plate but it is now 270 calories.

This is an actual serving of OJ, now I know not one person in this house would fill a glass 1/2 full.

After you have measured your food out for a few weeks you will become very capable of dishing out the right amount without even reaching for a measuring cup.

Microsoft Kinect and EA Sports

I am not associated with either of these companies and I am not getting paid for this post, these are just 2 things that I really enjoyed last year.

Last year we picked up the Kinect as good MS junkies would, but then Amazon had a great deal on the EA Sports Active 2 so I picked one up.  I have to say that I couldn’t really run the stairs in my house without feeling a bit winded but after a few weeks of working out on the Kinect I could. Since my dad moved in it has been hard to have the privacy to work out, he doesn’t sleep in late like KLT. During the holidays KLT picked up a nice tv for my sewing/craft/office and then found a nice deal on a new Xbox with Kinect. I now have a nice place to do a quick work out. He even got the wall mount I just won’t let him hang the TV till I find a paint color for that room. I am looking forward to using the Dance Central as an alternate to the work out.

 So it is time to dust off my little arm band and get going!

The metal clothes hanger….errrrr The Treadmill

I had been doing so well and then I got hurt. But really it wasn’t that bad getting up and doing a quick walk in the morning before work. Right now I have a mental block and a long line of excuses. But excuses no more I am going to get on this baby and get with it. I have been looking for a windows phone app or an ipad app that would act like runmeter and read tweets to me.  I know my #SQLFamily is very supportive in these endeavors and I would love the extra accountability.

The FitBit

I love this thing! And I am pretty sure that had my company not given me one I would pay $99 to have it.  The biggest problem is remembering to put the dang thing on and to move it from pants to pants. I suppose that if I just clipped to to my bra I wouldn’t have the last problem but I do look stupid looking down my top all the time. What I love about this is that you can see how you are doing for the day and then make decisions to go for an extra walk through the office or wonder several more isles at Sam’s Club (Did you know that walking in and heading to the dairy section adds like 1200 steps for the day). There is a small break room closer to me in the office but I choose to walk further just to get those extra steps. Maybe I can work on letting this thing update folks with my progress.

 Self’s Nutrition Data Site

The nutrition data site is a powerful tool. First you can find nutritional data for just about anything ever made and even better you can create your own recipes and add your own ingredients. I used this site multiple times a day a few years back when I was tracking every calorie consumed.  I feel that tracking calories may not be for everyone but I do think that if you do it for a couple weeks you will be surprised. I might start tracking again, but not for me I am very aware of what is on my plate but for KLT and my dad they might need a little help in this area. In case you are interested I used an excel sheet to track calories, nothing fancy but I am sure there are apps out there that will do this for you.

A couple of  tricks

Life is all about trade offs, so why isn’t a diet? I haven’t eaten a hamburger on a bun in something like 4 years. I have traded that for my french fries.  Generally a bun has 200+ calories and all it does is deliver the meat to your pie whole, a fork has 0 calories and does the same thing. It is also a carb trade off for me.

Carbs, apparetnly they are the spawn of the devil and bad for your figure. I try really hard to be “good” and not eat so many carbs. I also try to have only 1 carb loaded meal a week (for example we have pizza or pasta 1x).

Fill your plate with color. I love summer, I love that we can cut up chunks of bell peppers and squash to make a wonderful side. It is pretty, appealing and low in calories. You can have a huge heap of veggies if done right. They say we eat with our eyes first.

WATER WATER WATER – drink up.

Take your lunch! For goodness sake this week I went out to lunch and tried really hard to be a good girl, I got the <550 calorie lunch. That’s good right, grilled chicken with bruschetta topping and broccoli. Well the meal was delivered extremely late and pretty cold so what did the manager do, bring me a big ol’ brownie Sunday. What was I thinking!! I did however share it with a co-worker so it was only 1/2 as bad as it could of been.

Well I guess this is all I have for the moment, I am pretty sure it is time to get up and start moving!!  I hope someone finds this somewhat useful.

Good Luck everyone!