Fat Girl Slim: Keep Calm and Clutch at Straws

Its the final countdown ( Dana na naaa dana na na naaa!)

The fear has finally set in.

There is a sun lounger in Bulgaria shouting my name and its get louder by the day.

In a little over a month I will be sat on a plane winging my way towards my first beach (read: only) holiday in 5 years and like most women who are no longer 22 I am dreading that moment where I have reveal my not so bikini ready body to the world.

So in a last ditch attempt to not be too self-conscious while i'm there i'm going to reinstate my rather quickly abandoned Fat Girl series.

For the next few Fridays i am dutifully going to check in on the weird and wonderful things i'm doing that week in aid of being a bit more beach goddess and a bit less beached whale.

This week is all hands to the deck as I am going to embark on two rather different ideas. One being the rather self explanatory, well known as being a bit mental and almost guaranteed to do something as long as I actually DO it. The other is a bit more erm..... out there.... well whats the harm if it works, amazing, if it doesn't at least i'm going to see results from the other thing.

So this week it's:

Jillian Michaels: 30 day shred

and 

Paul Mckenna: I can make you thin

I have attempted the 30 day shred on a few occasions now, most recently i little over a month ago when I managed 8 days straight, and even felt ready to move on to level 2 of it, but i fell off the bandwagon when I had some friends stay for a few days, much eating out was had and much wine was drank...needless to say I haven't been back on it since. This will change today.

And as for the Paul Mckenna randomness, this is a book i bought a long time ago when i was on a bit of a 'hypnotherapy will cure the world!' kick. I'm somewhat skeptical about how listening to a CD will help but I've read the first few chapters of the book and there seems to be some simple ideas and tips on how to recognize if your actually hungry and how to recognize when your full. I have a really bad habit of shoving as much food as i can into my mouth as quickly as possible and then i'm stuffed for days, so the idea of putting my knife and fork down between mouthfuls so i can finish chewing what i'm eating is so far helping me realize when i'm full before i'm stuffed. We shall see how it goes.

If you've got any tips or ideas of things I can try (no crash diets though, thats never healthy!) please leave a comment below. And if you'd like to keep up to date with my spectacular achievement/failure in this task please have a click on one of the many ways to follow this blog in the side bar.

Fat Girl Run??

As you will know if your a regular reader last year i had a series called  Fat Girl Slim. It was short lived to say the least, i mean Christmas just isn't the same if you don't keep your sugar levels sky high with a constant intake of Quality Street.

But now we're at the start of February and my habit of having cake for dinner really must end. There's a bridesmaids dress to fit into and even more scarily there's a bikini to be donned on my beach holiday. The good thing about these 2 events is that i only need to lose a bit for the wedding (June) and once i get to that its only a bit more and a case of extra toning for the holiday (September) so i have a decent run at this timeline (see what i did there....)

My problem is that when it comes to exercise i have the attention span of a 3 year old. I've lost count of the amount of workout DVDs that I've used once and lost interest in. They get wheeled out from time to time but not with enough regularity to actually achieve anything.

So onto my next fad, running. I've never seen the point, you'd never even catch me running for a bus but i have friends that run and live quite close to a jolly big park so it seems logical that i give it a go.

Now obviously this requited me to go and buy some running shoes (any excuse to shop!)

They're so pretty! The recommendation is that you should go to a specialist store and be 'fitted' for running shoes so you don't do yourself an injury. I haven't done that  but since i'll probably run to the end of the street and pass out before shoving them in the bottom of my wardrobe i didn't want to spend to much. If this works out i'll go and get a special pair.

So here i am ready to go, i should probably stop procrastinating by babbling on here :-)

Are you a runner? how do you stay motivated?
And can anyone recommend a good android running app?

Fat Girl Slim

Now before I get into this I would like to say i have absolutely no knowledge of nutrition or the medical implications of losing weight. Please see a qualified professional if you are thinking of losing weight.

Nor would i say I'm actually fat, I'm just a sucker for a catchy title.

OK?......then onward we go.

I was reading a post over at missbudgetbeauty and was inspired by what i read.

For quite a while now I've been feeling somewhat out of sorts when it comes to my weight. As I mentioned I'm not what i call fat (though others may have their own opinions on this) but I'm a good 14 and as someone who has spent the majority of my life hovering about the 10 mark this feels big to me.

I'll be honest I don't eat well. I like a wee Mcdonalds breakfast, I'm fond of a cake with my meal deal at lunch and I'm almost on the Dominos delivery drivers Christmas card list.

The only saving grace i have at the moment is that i walk to and from work.

But that is about to change. The bus to my new work place goes near enough door to door. Something will have to give before my jeans button does.

There is an important social event coming up at the end of October and I'm a bridesmaid at a dear friends wedding next June.

Both of these things require photos being taken......
I'm determined that my bingo wings will not feature in them.

I used the app My Fitness Pal before and managed to lose 7 lbs relatively easily.

The app is basically a calorie counter (and FREE!), you put in a few stats, height, weight and age and it works out how many calories you should be eating.
Now instead of being a rigid number you can 'earn' extra calories by doing more exercise. Its really really motivating. You can even add friends to the app to keep each other going.
I think the thing i like most about it is that i have a free app on my phone which means I can keep track of things on the go and i can just scan the barcode of whatever I'm eating there and then.

And as an extra boost, as you finish each day it estimates what you'll weigh in 5 weeks time if you continue as you are (really accurately as it turns out)

So i think I'll go back on the wagon...

So in the spirit of publicly declaring my commitment Monday night will be weigh in night:

I'm currently  159lbs and i want to be 135lbs    24lbs to go!!

Though since I've just been invited to the two for Tuesdays at my friends I'm not sure how this will go :-s

Who's with me?!