Eat, Party, Sleep, Repeat

Well, I did really well working out (for the most part) until the end of this month. Any teacher out there can tell you that the end of the school year is CRAZY! With the end of the school year craziness (only 8 days left!!!!!!) and being away for memorial day weekend I kind of fell off the bandwagon and wasn't really able to get back on this week.

Tal's roommate from college was getting married back home this past weekend so we went up for the wedding. Being out with everyone was so much fun and the wedding was a blast, but I totally feel into the eat, party, sleep, repeat mentality for the weekend and let all of my working out and eating healthy just fall by the wayside. It didn't help that I just couldn't force myself back into a routine when I got back home.

I've officially decided to get back on track this June and get my butt in gear. My hopes are that I can be gone from work all summer and return at least 15 pounds lighter (about 5 pounds a month). I keep kicking myself that I could have done this a long time ago and been 15 pounds lighter before summer, but you know what I am starting to realize that I really can't do anything about the past and I have to stop pushing it back to another week and another week and another week. That's how I got myself here in the first place. I contemplated waiting until July to get started because we are going to be in Ireland for 10 days, but I am hoping that I can walk a lot and just try to watch what I eat.

It's a new month, it's a new me! I saw myself get down to 163 and now I am back up to 166 after only a week. I can't do this! No more excuses! It is now or never!

Nom! Nom! Nom!

Peanut Butter...who loves it?!? Everybody, that's who! Peanut butter is probably one of the best foods (aside from sweets) out there in my book. Honestly, if I could have it my way, it would take up majority of my food pyramid. I could honestly eat an entire jar of peanut butter by itself and I have come close before.

Peanut butter is my go to snack. I figure a small spoonful will help tide me over when I am hungry. Well, that small spoonful turns into two spoonfuls, which turns into three or four. Before I know it, I have eaten half the jar. I just can't help myself! Unfortunately, I don't like (ok....honestly...haven't tried) the healthy peanut butter. I'm super picky about my peanut butter. I have an obsession with love Skippy Reduced Fat Peanut Butter. No, I will not eat JIF or Peter Pan or any of the other crap out there, heck I won't even eat normal Skippy. Don't judge--I used to bring my own jar of peanut butter to swim meets in college so I could eat it with breakfast at the hotels and not have to use their peanut butter.

As much as I have an obsession with love peanut butter I really have two options. I need to learn how to control myself and find better snacks....or I need to get brave enough to try healthy peanut butter and learn how to like it. I think it really needs to be a combination of both and I need to figure it out soon before I let peanut butter and snacking ruin everything I have been working toward. 

Menu Monday

Food....Food is something that has always been a battle for me. I love food, but I love food that is terrible for you. I could sit and eat cupcakes and chips all day and be a totally happy camper. Unfortunately, you can't live like that (although I am still waiting for someone to make vegetables taste like chips or a cupcake). As much as I love food, I am a terribly picky eater. I'm talking PICKY. I grew up only eating food that was cold, processed, and typically in the white or close to white color family. I didn't eat a lot of fruits and barely any vegetables. So it has been quite the process in expanding my palate. I have come leaps and bounds from where I started, but still don't try a lot of recipes because of the taste (or my unwillingness to try the new taste). 

We try to make a lot of our meals during the week and sometimes I get adventurous enough to try a new food. Pasta is a staple in our house and we usually make pasta at least once a week, but since I got my braces we can't use pasta sauce anymore. I found this recipe on Pinterest for a pasta that didn't have any pasta sauce and figured we would give it a try. Of course as soon as I showed Tal, he didn't want it because there was no sauce and therefore no flavor. Well, Tal plays tennis on Thursday nights and I am on my own for dinner so I decided to make it then for myself. I was a little hesitant too, but it was delicious and great for the summer because it isn't too heavy. 

Summer Pasta with Olive Oil and Tomatoes 

Adapted from BigSisLilSis.com

1/2 cup of extra virgin olive oil

2-3 garlic gloves (depending on taste)

3/4 teaspoon salt

1/2 teaspoon red pepper flakes

1 container of small cherry tomatoes

1/2 cup parmesan cheese (grated or shaved) 

1 lb of whole wheat penne 

Combine oil, garlic, red pepper flakes, and salt and simmer on low in a medium sauce pan for about 5 minutes. Slice half of the tomatoes (I like to slice them into fourths because I don't want them too big, but you can do halves if you want) and stir them in with the sauce mixture. Let simmer for about another 5 minutes. Cut and add the rest of the tomatoes (however much you prefer). 

Remove from heat and let sit while you are making the pasta. You want to start this before putting the pasta on so the tomatoes have time to sit. This allows some of the juices from the tomatoes to mix with the sauce. Cook the pasta as package directs for al dente. When pasta is done drain and mix in a large bowl with sauce. Add parmesan cheese and season with a little salt to taste. 

So easy and super yummy! It is a great summer pasta that isn't too heavy and perfect for a quick and healthy dinner. 

Teacher Appreciation Week

This past week was teacher appreciation week and my first one as an actual teacher. Like I've said before I am a first year special education teacher (I work with students on the autism spectrum) and I absolutely LOVE my school. We are spoiled beyond belief!

Monday--Breakfast Day. Sounds great right, well it was, except for the fact that a parent decided to make homemade doughnut holes....O M G. I did stop myself from going back and only had two. The old Kelsey would have gone back for seconds or thirds of those puppies.

Tuesday--We got to take 10 minutes to go get a relaxing (and much needed) chair massage. I did an arm and back workout the day before so I was tight and it felt great!

Wednesday--Dessert Day. I have the world's biggest sweet tooth. I love sugar and could probably eat an entire cake by myself if given the chance. The only thing that I really benefit from (in regards to being healthy...well sort of) is that I don't like chocolate. STOP THE PRESSES!! I know, a woman that doesn't like chocolate. I get that all the time, but it's just gross, I've never liked it. I think my little sister made up for my lack of chocolate gene though, so we're okay. Seeing that most, okay almost all, woman like chocolate, a lot of the deserts had chocolate in them. This limited my options and forced me to only get pound cake. Well I didn't want to look like a total loser and get like 5 pieces, so I got 1 piece with whip cream on top.

Thursday--Luncheon. We got the wonderful opportunity to have a full hour (unless you're a teacher and forced to scarf down a lunch in less than 30 minutes, you have no idea how glorious a full hour is!) for lunch. And, not just a full hour, but a full hour with a catered lunch. I had a salad (good job), chicken wrap (pretty good), pasta salad (ehhh...not bad), and Ritas italian ice (ummm....I was doing a good job). During our lunch we got to pick an envelope with a gift card inside. I got $5 to Tropical Smoothie Cafe! Plus we got to put our names in for a raffle for larger gift cards. Well, the girl who NEVER wins anything, won a $25 gift card to Olive Garden. Looks like someone might be having a date night this week courtesy of my schools PTA.

Friday--Coffee Day. I'm not a big coffee person. I mean I used to only drink water (Now I drink water, wine, and margaritas hahaha). But, I figured I would give it a shot. I tried an iced vanilla something or other because I can't do warm drinks. Needless to say, I still don't like coffee. Point is, we could custom order our coffee that was delivered to our room throughout the day.

Needless to say, I am very fortunate to be at an amazing school, with amazing faculty, amazing PTA/Booster Club, amazing students, and amazing parents. However, as fortunate as I am, my stomach may have over indulged a little bit too much this week. I am definitely paying for it, but I guess I have put in enough work in my first year of teaching that I deserve to give in a little bit, just this once.

I hope any other teacher out there had a wonderful teacher appreciation week! I know I did and I appreciate the fact that I only have 23 days left of teaching until SUMMER VACATION!

I will leave you all with this picture my mom sent me at the beginning of the week. I'm sure some of you can absolutely relate...

Gratification

I hate to admit it, but I'm definitely part of the generation that likes instant gratification; I blame it all on technology. I know that hard work pays off and it takes time, but it is easier to see that in certain things, like teaching or school work in college. For some reason, I am having a really hard time applying the whole "takes time" concept to working out and eating healthy.

I've always been bigger than everyone else. I remember hitting 100 pounds in elementary school and being so sad. I vividly remember a day in middle school where we had to do some experiment that involved us weighing ourselves. I was terrified and did everything I could to avoid the situation, which included faking sick that day. I've never been the biggest girl, but I have always been bigger than my friends and unhappy with the way I looked and felt, but there was always some excuse and no matter how hard I tried, I always fell back into my old routine.

I think sometimes I convince myself that things just aren't going to change and I'm still not going to be that pretty skinny girl so why bother putting in the work. Or maybe sometimes I'm just not ready to give up certain things and put in the work. Loosing weight and living a healthier life is a lot of work and when I don't have anyone there to do it with me, I give up quickly. Both my mom and my sister are tiny, always have been (my sister was a size 00 for the longest time), so they never had to worry about it like I did. Then I went to college and swam competitively, loosing weight and going on a diet isn't exactly the smartest choice when you're training 3 hours a day in season.

Any who.... to try and avoid a whining situation, I need to find my motivation. There has to be someway for me to keep going on this track alone. It's not going to happen overnight and I am not going to loose 30 pounds in a week. It's going to take a while, it might take a long while, but I've never seen myself as skinny and can't remember the last time I was under 160, so I convince myself that it's never going to happen.

I need to find a friend or an accountability partner that can help me stay on track. I really don't think I can go through this alone.

Totally RAD

Are you RAD?

Yesterday I ran, well mostly walked, the Color Me Rad race with a group of co-workers. If you've never run the Color Me Rad or Color Run race, it is something you need to do at least once. It isn't a time race and it is just something really fun to enjoy with family and friends. 

We had planned on running, but some of my co-workers brought their kids (kids under 7 are free with an adult) and it was more fun to stay back and run/walk with them. The kids had a blast and loved running through the color. Everyone I work with is older and a fair amount of them have young kids. I don't have any kids yet, so I really don't mind getting a little fun kid time in. It also made it a little easier for me because I would have fallen back with the pace their parents can run. I could use them as an excuse to walk more haha. A little sad, yes, but oh well! 

Here are some before and after pictures from the race today. It's messy, it's fun, and everyone needs to do it! 

Before

After

I knew that I would end up walking most of the race, but since there was a small chance that I would run I decided to use Saturday as my rest day. Well my weekend ended up with me not working out on Saturday, but doing EVERYTHING on Sunday. I decided that walking 3 miles wasn't enough for my training so after I got home from the race I went to the gym and ran 3 miles and did a pilates ab workout. The old me never would have even thought about running after a 3 mile walk, so I'm proud of my motivation and determination to do what I have planned. 

Tips for Color Me Rad

• Get there early, even if you signed up for a later wave time. There is no check in and no designation of wave times, at least where I did mine. It was super crowded and even though we signed up for the 8:00 race, we didn't end up starting until at least 8:30. 

• You really don't need to buy extra color packets unless you want them before the race. You end up getting one right before you cross the finish line and then they throw at a bunch all over the place

• Wear clothes you don't care about! Duh! It came out of my leggings pretty easily, but the water mixture was much harder to come out of my workout shirt I had underneath my white one. 

• Your tennis shoes will officially be colored so wear an old pair, or give yourself an excuse to go buy a new pair. 

• Have fun and enjoy yourself get RAD! 

Fish Out of Water

Ever since I can remember, my workouts have always and only consisted of swimming and whatever torturous dryland routines my coach put me through. I'm not a land person and am not a fan of doing a workout that requires clothes and sneakers, give me a swimsuit and water any day. I never went to the gym, never did fitness classes, never ran. I really didn't know how to workout outside of swimming. Since my RA diagnosis I haven't been back in the pool except for coaching last summer. Part of this is because it has been hard to find a pool close by since graduating college, but I also started a long journey of figuring out what was wrong with me and managing my pain. 

When I decided to get determined and start my fitness and weight loss journey I couldn't really decide how I wanted to go about doing it. I contemplated many different ideas...

• Finding a pool: No pool close enough to my apartment, plus the whole process of getting wet every day after work just didn't appeal to me. 

• Joining a gym: Pretty big monetary commitment for something I didn't know how much time I would have given I was starting my first year of teaching. 

• Crossfit: I have limited use of my arms because of my RA and there seems to be a lot of need for arm strength. 

• Jillian Michaels: Lots of people love Jillian and I'm sure her videos provide great results, but I don't like her. I think she's mean and I really need some happiness in my workout videos. Plus I live on the second floor with obnoxious downstairs neighbors. 

• Zumba: I am so cordinated. Ha! I took a Zumba class once (on accident...I looked at the wrong calendar at the gym and showed up to the wrong class). Never again.
  

Lucky for me, I got a job in August teaching at an AMAZING school. There are no words to describe how amazing my school is and how much I love everyone who works there. The staff is very close and does a lot together. During one of our first staff meetings a teacher suggested starting a running group after school, immediately I thought oh my gosh...NO! I hate running, I am a water girl, I can't run. Then I started to reconsider. This would be a great way to meet more people I work with and start to get back into shape, considering I really hadn't worked out since my collegiate swimming career ended in 2011. I decided it was worth the $60. We had a running coach and a 12 week Couch To 5K program designed just for the needs of our group. We started in September and our program was set for us to all run a 5K together in December. 

Needless to say, it was a rough start and I wanted to quit almost every day. It was hard, especially for someone who has never run before. Everyone thought it would be easy for me. "You're the young one in the group", "You swam in college"...Let me tell you, being young and swimming in college was no help to me at all! We ran 3 days of week after school and I tried to keep up with teachers I knew, but they were just too fast for me and I ended up falling back, except I was too fast for the group behind them. I literally fell right in the middle. I suffered through the practices, but spent a lot of time crying during my runs. It seemed so easy for others, people who were a lot older than me were kicking my butt. I was dying! I think I was the most discouraged because I did end up falling in the middle of two groups and I really joined this to help find my place a work and make friends. I was the only first year teacher and one of two new teachers at a school where people come and stay forever. There were lots of ups and downs, but I went every time and tried. 

I had made it through 11 weeks of training and only had one week before my first 5K. I was so proud and excited, so of course something bad had to happen (it's funny how it works that way...right). The weekend before I started to feel a little bad, but figured it was just sinuses or something. Well, it wasn't it turned out to be a full blown case of the flu. I was the first positive case of the flu at my doctors office, points for me! I was sick the whole week and as much as I wanted to run, decided it was the best choice to stay home and rest. It killed me not to be there and run the race I had been training for. 

Long story short (sorry not so short). Even though I never got to run that 5K the running club really gave me the motivation to learn how to run and get started with running. Without it I never would have found this determination or even thought it would be possible for me to run. Now I am determined to run (as slow as it may be) the Disney Princess Half Marathon in February. Finding your passion and nitch when it comes to working out is hard and it took me almost two years after swimming to figure it out. But I am happy where I am now and ready for this adventure! 

Challenge Me

Lord help me, I have decided to join the May Plank and Squat Challenge. Sounds like a great idea right....ask me again at the end of the month and I'll have the real answer for you. 

I'm doing the beginners workout out, which really doesn't seem too bad, I guess. I think the planks are definitely going to be the biggest challenge. I hated planks when I was swimming and in my best shape. I would  struggle through planks for 1-2 minutes. I'm definitely not in my best shape right now and 20 seconds on the first day was killer! 

A lot of people are doing planks, squats, and push ups, but with my elbows I can't do push ups anymore. I would love to add push ups and trust me, my arms could definitely use it. However, my arthritis won't exactly allow it right now. I'm hoping that with the change in my medication my elbows will start to get better and I can start to do some arm workouts. If I'm going to work my ass off with the rest of my body, I need some sexy arms to go with it. 

Anyone else out there doing the May Challenge or have done another month long challenge? I keep telling myself I am determined to make it through the whole month. I think I can do it! 

Side Note: Who comes home from a stressful day to a much needed glass of wine? You? Yeah, I thought so. Sometimes you just have one of those days and you need to sit and take the edge off. In my first year of teaching, I would love nothing more, but can't because of the medicine I am taking. Well, today was one of those days were I could have come and used not just a glass, but the bottle to de-stress. Today, was just one thing after another, all with the same student. This little one decided to crawl under all of the bathroom stalls and lock them, then decided to push someone on the carpet, then decided to throw sand at people on the playground (just because), and then cried/screamed for a solid 30 minutes because he missed the Magic School Bus movie during science, due to his behavior. Oh the joys of a special education teacher. I love my job and I love the boys I teach (...yes I did say boys, 9 boys, all boys), but somedays they just make you want to come home to a nice big bottle of wine. Hope you all enjoyed a nice big glass tonight for me.