Blood Pressure Check

For awhile, my doctor has been telling me that I needed to chart my blood pressure because it seems to run all over the place when I'm in her office (low, low, high, low, high, high, low, low).  Therefore, with my marathon coming up, I thought it might be a good plan to see where it was and what it was doing.  So right before I went to Mexico, I went to my nurse at school and she took it.  She wasn't very excited about what she saw. I think she was actually pretty unnerved.  I was at 143/97.  I wasn't really nervous, because I knew that I was all over the place.  The nurse tried to stress to me how important it was to get it checked with my doctor and I told her I would….after Mexico.
While we were in Mexico a student doctor was roaming the beach asking people if they wanted their blood pressure checked.   I though, "Oh hell no! Not here…they will probably tell me I'm going to die."  Most of the other people in our group got theirs checked, because there was a boy with us, who had diabetes and they wanted to show him that they would get theirs checked too.  Most everyone had normal pressures, but one of the sister's to the birthday girl had one very close to the one I had before I left for Mexico.  Everyone was alarmed and wanted her to get it checked again and maybe even go to the clinic.  I just sat on the beach and breathed in and out hoping mine wouldn't be that high when I got back.
Well, I came back from Mexico and the nurse had gotten me a new toy.  It's a wrist watch blood pressure checker.

I took it and it had dropped to 134/80 and since has dropped consistently.  I'm a bit nervous that it will go up again, so I'm going to continue to check it, but I'm just really glad that it's down for now.

Weight Loss

Found a weight loss simulator while I was supposed to be doing work.  Here is what I look like now at my current weight.

And here is what I will look like after I loose the weight I want to loose.

Pretty amazing huh?!? I can't wait. Bikini season here I come!

Secret Diary

I started something today, Jan. 4th, and I hope that I will be able to do it for at least a month and then I will re-evaluate and change as needed for February and so on and so forth until Spring Break.
I love bread. I love cereal. I love noodles. I love rice. And sometimes I love them all too much. So this month I'm going to cut them out and see what happens. I'm going to do more protein, fruits, vegetables, and like minded things.
I'm going to have only 1 coffee a week (the medium size-maybe)
And I'm toying with only one sweet a week too, but we will see.
I will reward myself with birthday cake and breads and cereals, as this will all end on my birthday.

So here we go, with the secret diary of my month with no carbs...that is what they are right?

Day 2- not so bad, but need to figure out what to replace carbs with, cause candy wouldn't be a prudent choice. I used to grab a cracker or a piece of toast for a snack, but now I'm grabbing candy! That is not a good choice.
I had enough snacks today to stave off the "grabbing candy" but tomorrow may be a different issue. Hmmm I wonder what I could do...oh praying might work or a glass of water instead. Although I was already going to the bathroom 2 as much from all the liquid I drank today.

Day 4- Boo! I had a piece of sushi and I didn't even think about it until I put it in my mouth!!! Oh well. It was one piece.
But I really didn't do well with food. I had a house omelet, a salad, and a coffee. That is it. Need to get better about eating more.

Day 5- Just apples and peanut butter today so far...oh wait and coffee.

Day 12- Decided a donut was in order today as I have been totally good. I've been hungry. Weekends are the hardest as during the week I have shakes and then dinner typically a salad. But now it's 7:19 and I'm dying of hunger and really just want to eat cereal or some sort of soup with noodles..If I would have stayed up at Riles, I could have had a pork chop. Man!! I ended up being good and having taco salad.

Day 13, 14, 15- The weather hit and we've been snowed in for a few days. I've been pretty good eating yogurt, apples and pb, kalua pig and cabbage, green beans, bbq beans, manwich...but last night I really wanted a small amount of apple crisp. Sad to say there was no brown sugar, so I made apple bread and had 1 piece. It was so yummy. I also had a few bowls of cereal :-(

Day 16-18- I fell a little here in the snacks that I ate- cookie dough dip with crackers! Soo yummy and I for sure at more calories than I burned.

Day 20! Only a week left...can't wait to have bread again. All the other things I could do without, but bread I soooo miss and it's the only thing I haven't had since I started oh way back when. Mmmmm toast with real butter, sandwiches, oh my i need to stop talking about it.

Day 22- Really loving the chili and should have realized how many soups could be made without potatoes. Oh well, I still have some days left. Tonight for dinner is chili and artichokes

Day 26- And I'm off or really back on! I'm back on bread carbs and they are soooo yummy! I lost no weight, but feel that some inches were lost. What an experiment...next month I will try something new, I think....

Triathlon Trianing

Finally this week, I'm feeling it. It only took multiple comments and me looking in the mirror in my yoga pants to realize that I'm actually looking better. Yes!
Monday: 21 min. swim
42 min. bike
Tuesday: 21 min. swim
h20 aerobics
Wednesday: 28 min. swim
56 min. bike
Thursday: 28 min. swim
h20 aerobics
Friday: 35 min. swim
70 min. bike
and 2 hr. dancing

Triathlon Training

My workouts are getting bigger and longer and although I thought it was going to be super hard, the shorter workouts have helped me to be prepared for the workouts this week.
This week the biking and running wasn't bad, but the swimming felt like I was swimming in quick sand. I don't know why, but it was just hard this week. I need to figure out how to make it easier, cause it sucked this week.

Monday: 19 min.swim
38 min. bike
Tuesday: 19 min. run
Wednesday: 26 min. swim
51 min. bike
Thursday: off
Friday: 32 min. swim
64 min. bike
Sat or Sun: 26 min. run

Triathlon Training

This week has been an interesting week in working out. I was able to do all of my workouts with ease. Nothing was overly hard, although after about 30 min on the bike, on Friday, I was bored and ready to be done, but I still had 28 more mins. to go. I even thought my workout on Monday was easy, which back in January, there would have been no way that I found it easy.
I re-measured myself this week and have lost almost an inch in every spot. Yes! Still watching the whole weight thing. My thighs are super toned and my calves are bigger and didn't fit into the super cute pairS of boots that I found this weekend! Sad!
In watching my protein, calories, and water intake. I constantly have numbers running through my head and it has been a feat to keep it all in tack. So I was telling my Accountability Partner (AP) about this and she showed me this link: myfitnesspal . It tracks your food intake, calories, protein, fat, and workout calories burned. And I'm sure it does more. I love it!!! All those number are now put down somewhere and i don't have to keep track of it. I just go in and add the things I need to add each day and keep track that way!!! Whoo Hoo!

Monday: 17 min. swim
35 min. bike
Tuesday: 17 min. run
h20 aerobics
Wednesday: 23 min. swim
46 min. bike
Thursday: 23 min. run
h20 aerobics
Friday: 29 min. swim
58 min. bike

Triathlon Training

After 2 and half months of working out, you would think I would have lost some weight or some inches, but nothing has been lost. I'm still the same and it S-U-C-K-S!!! It's so defeating and really makes me wonder why i"m doing all this and not seeing any results. I used to see results no problem, but with such the big increase in working out, I should have been making a big increase in my calorie intake as well as my protein intake, but I wasn't. So, therefore, my body was going into starvation mode rather than loosing weight mode. Many people confirmed this with me, but I never did realize how far I was off in my intake until I was chatting with my accountability partner.
She actually has this big formula that could calculate what my caloric intake should be and how much I should be taking in if I wanted to loose weight and then she found these great little calculators to calculate how many calories I was burning doing the exercise I was doing and what I needed to eat to loose weight and not go into starvation mode.
So for Friday: I should be taking in 2070 calories, but then you had to add the calories I was burning in the swim which was 430 calories and the bike which was 1473 calories. So really I should be eating 3, 973 calories minus 500, so 3, 473 calories. I also needed to eat 150 grams of protein and drink 140 ounces of water.
I felt like I was eating all day long and I still was nowhere close to what I should have been in-taking. I made it close to the calories in getting 3,100, but was not close to the protein in only getting 105 grams. The water was easy, thank goodness.
Hopefully it will get easier to meet as the weeks go by...
This week I'm going to focus on getting all the water and protein I need and be close to the calories and hopefully THEN I will finally see the weight come off.

Triathlon Training

The more people I tell about my triathlon, the more "help" I get as to what I should be doing and I love all the advice, but sometimes I feel a little overload with information and I have trouble wading through it all.
I first started talking to my doctor for some advice.
I now have a trainer, which I'm totally excited about. She is going to help me make all my different trainings work together.
I also have a "accountability partner" who I will be checking in with each week, as we are both working on workout goals. We will talk about weight and inches lost as well as how things are going on in general.
I also have a triathlon partner who is training over in Spokane as well, who I need to check in with to make sure we are both on track to compete in this thing...that is just a short 3 months away.
With all this help, I'm sure I'll do well
This week
Monday: 17 min. swim
35 min. bike
Tuesday: 17 min. run
h20 aerobics
Wednesday: 23 min. swim
46 min. bike
Thursday: 23 min. run
Friday: 29 min. swim
58 min. bike

Walk Jog Run

Thanks to Good Morning Northwest, more correctly Colleen O'Brien or whomever is running their Facebook page now, for showing me this website: Walk Jog Run
It calculates the distance you may walk, run, or jog. I've been looking for something like this for a long time, because the areas I walk aren't necessarily accessible by car, so I could never calculate exactly how far I went, but now I can!
Yesterday I did this route, which took me 1 1/2 to walk, then I mapped it today and found out that it is 4.7 miles, but then I had to add the part it wouldn't let me go over again...so I figured it was 5 miles. Not such a bad time for 5 miles!!! Especially after a 1/2 hour swim yesterday too.
I'm so excited to map other routes I've taken and see how far I actually walked.

ZUMBA!!!

I'm in love ....
with a new workout I've been doing for the past few weeks. It's ZUMBA!!!
My hula sister was talking about it on Facebook and I decided to ask her about it and she invited me to go to.
I showed up the first time and the class was full of women of all ages and no men (typical!) The instructor, built like a solid soccer player (close to my size) had us up and moving for the full hour. We were dancing around like crazy. Shaking our booties and boobies. Going around in circles. It was tons of fun! So much fun, that I came home and looked up all the other Zumba classses I could go to. I know, what a nerd, but I found out I could take a class everyday and although I haven't yet. I'm hooked.
This week I've been Wednesday, Thursday, and today. I'm taking tomorrow and Sunday off, but I will be back to it again when I'm back in town.

Hates The Gym!!!

and it's not because it's kicking my butt!!! It's because it's January and every January the gym becomes packed out! Everyone makes New Years Resolutions (NYR) to get thinner and they all think that going to the gym is going to help them achieve their goal. I'm not saying that I don't believe that people shouldn't make goals like this. All the more power to you, but for all of us that go to the gym regularly throughout the year, we really hate January. We now have to wait in line for OUR machine that we used daily before the NYR people showed up. We, regulars, are subjected to too tight gym clothes on too big NYR people. We have to use a different locker because the NYR people don't understand that the lockers are really assigned even though our names aren't on them! The showers are different than the lockers, showers can't be reserved, but the NYR people think they can be reserved by hanging your stuff on the hooks. Oh they have so much to learn!!!

But the crappy thing is that they won't learn the rules of the gym because they won't stay around long enough. They tend to make it 3-4 weeks and then the gym is back to the regulars for a bit anyway, until people decide they need to get thinner to fit in their bikini's for summer.

Week-in-Review

It has gotten so cold here, my nose is about to fall off! I'm going to have to make dinner, drink something warm, or break down and turn on the heat pretty soon. I don't know if I'm going to make it.

School is going well. The kids are adjusting and so am I. They are pretty chatty, but I have to remember that we have only had 3 weeks of school. It will all change soon, I hope. I miss my old teammates, but things seem to be going well with my new team.

My workout and going to the gym is working out well. I just need to make it there on time...things workout a lot better when I have the full hour to work out. We aren't going to talk about weight right now!

Last weekend, my family went to Spokane

to hang out with my sis, bil, and Leia. We had a great time. I also got to spend some time with my friend Stephanie, we did some pottery painting. I can't wait to get my stuff back, but I will have to wait for a few weeks.
Leia is getting bigger and bigger

and is super chatty. We had a fun weekend reading books, shopping at the mall, watching football and hiding from Uncle Jon. We also rode the carousel.

This huge jersey is hanging up at the downtown mall. The background is a bunch of escalators that head up to the movie theater.

I hope everyone else's weekends were full of fun and that you are all getting ready for Halloween. I'm wanting to go to some haunted corn mazes, but it's so cold....

Sorry-it took so long!

It's been so boring here on my blog. I've just haven't felt like I've had anything to post about. I've used my sister's posts more often than not, because I'm sure many of you love seeing my niece.
The weather here has been crazy going from snow to sleet to rain to wind to bright sun and warm all in less than 12 hour period, which really doesn't account for anything having to do with my blog, just wanted to have it documented.

A quick update is in order I guess:

• School-Report cards are done, just waiting for them to get checked. Parent teacher conferences are coming up in a week. I'm feeling restless there, but with the economy a move this year doesn't seem like a good plan.


• Hula- I've been doing well. Trying to practice. We are getting ready for 2 really big shows in May and our Luau also in May. Hula Camp is this coming weekend. My hula sister Kapua had her baby and hopefully Rylie, Tanya's newest bundle of joy, will be out tomorrow.


• Photography- I had a session today, but because of the above mentioned weather it was cancelled. I have two family shoots coming up this week and next as well as Leilani's 1st birthday. My photography class is going wonderful! I need some models to finish my assignments, so if you would like to help a girl out-text, call , or leave a comment here.


• Family- My family is well.


• Friends- They are either having babies or getting married and if not one of those they are living a wonderfully blessed life, right friends!?!?!


• Gym- still loving the new one. Need a scale at home, there is none at my new gym in the locker room. Need to increase my workout, finding it too easy. I'm in "training" right now for Bloomsday, so I'm using the treadmill instead of the elliptical and I'm working on running a minute and walking a minute. I hope to get about an hour and a half for Bloomsday, but we'll see.

This weekend I was lazy and didn't do much. Just a hula meeting and out for Stella's birthday, which was great fun! Thanks for having a birthday. I did some re-arranging at home in my two bedrooms, because my living room is still overflowing. Still have a stupid extra couch at my house. Anyone want it? I'm re-arranging pictures on my walls and ordering more, plus I stole an idea that started with Nate and then went to Mel and now is in my house. They are still pictureless, but that won't be for long. Once they look like they are supposed to, I'll post a pic.

I'm In the Process!

The process of switching gyms! I've been at the YMCA ever since I lived in Alabama. When I moved back up here, I joined the Auburn YMCA and have loved it. In the 6 years that I've been there, I've made some really great friends, have lost enough weight to equal a 4th grader (or one of my bigger 2nd graders), and have enjoyed the benefits of a new facility, but now I think it might be time for a change.

With my move into Kent, I'm now further away from my gym (that is down by the Super Mall.) Also with the gym being so far away to make my hour workout, shower, and drive time, I have to plan for 3 hours before I need to be at work. Therefore I'm waking up at 4:30am and leaving my house by 5am. Lately I've been rolling out of bed at 5:12am, which makes me late for the gym. Going to bed by 8:30 to get 8 hours of sleep has also been really hard lately too, soooooo

I'm trying out a new gym. It's an LA Fitness. It's less than 5 min. away. It sports a swimming pool, free weights, weight machines, 4 racquet ball courts, a basketball court, spinning class, and multiple cardio machines. I've been in 3 times already and love it. I love the getting up later, I love the workout, I love the less time it takes me to get to work (i.e. the less gas I have to pay), so far I pretty much love everything. The one thing I can't figure out though, is why the heat is on in the morning up in the cardio area!?!?! Anyone? Anyone?

I will totally miss the people at the Y, being able to wear whatever I want and not caring who was going to see me ( I worked out with all the old men), the relationships I built with the machines (-you know what I'm talking about. You always go to the same machine too, for some reason it's your favorite machine), and being able to plug into a machine to hear the tv and not having to have an ipod to hear it. But I'm pretty sure I'm switching...now comes the hard part, telling the YMCA I'm leaving.

Week-in-Review

It's been super busy with school starting and trying to tie up loose ends of the summer and getting ready for the Art Walk.

• School- We started on Tuesday after coming home from California. It was a good day to be in my class. Everyone seemed so advanced, but that was because I had first and second graders in my class. I am really looking forward to the mix of kids. It seems like it is going to be a lot of fun and keep me on my toes.
• Hula- After spending a weekend with them I missed them while I was at school. I would laugh at inside jokes I remembered, but no one was there to laugh with me. We worked on new stuff this week.
• Photography-I'm getting ready to have a booth at the Art Walk, posted about above. I am super excited, but there is so much to get ready for it, it is a little crazy. I've booked some family shoots and hopefully will have some senior shoots rolling in soon.
• Weight- Yep, nothing lost, hopefully nothing gained. I'm back in the gym tomorrow after it was closed for a week of annual cleaning.

I haven't been taking a lot of photos because I'm working on editing a bunch I did before I left for E Hula Mau. I finished the wedding and now am halfway through E Hula Mau. Sorry Tamblyn's I'm getting to yours next.

Week-in-Review

This week was tough getting back to work and trying to tie up loose ends that I had left before I went on vacation, as well as prepare for a field trip this coming week, and try not to think about the blissful time I had last week.

School: Things are well. The kids are lovely. They are growing so much, both in knowledge and height. They are taking over the classroom in the duties that they hold and I am doing less and less of the daily routine, which means I need to be more prepared with things for them to do and not getting ready when they are doing what used to be my job. They still love hugs, telling me how much they won by at soccer, and are sad when someone tells them they are not friends anymore (-they still don't realize that 5 min. later, they will be friends again.)
It is also the time of the year that we find out about staffing for next year, if we will have jobs, and what grade we will teach. This year it looks like there will be a 1/2 split, a kindergarten, a 3rd grade, and 4th grade position open at our school. Three teachers in the building will get their choice and then the last position left will probably hired for. We will have to see what happens. I'm thinking that I'll stay at 1st, but who knows what "the boss" has in mind.

Hula & Working Out: Both are going well. They are taking a lot of time, but it is sure paying off in being able to eat some delicious treats as well as looking better ;) . I have increased my elliptical time to 45 min. and am still doing weights for my arms. Next weekend, I will be working my belly (at least that's the area I want to work) off at hula camp and then the following weekend I will be working the rest of my body at Bloomsday.

Photography: I have been enjoying my cameras and using them interchangeably now. I need them to get cleaned, though there is stuff on the lenses. I will be shooting my first real wedding in May and a maternity shoot soon. I can't wait for summer to gain some more knowledge and take more classes.

This week I have a field trip, dentist appointment, a review at work, hula and then hula camp this coming weekend. Tuesday I hope to rest and catch up with old friends I haven't seen or talked with in way to long.

Week-in-Review

The weeks are flying by as is evident in the fact that I have already posted 14/52 weeks in my Capturing My World: Blessings project, my kids and I have made it to the 127th day of school, and Spring is finally here.

My working out is going well. I have increased weight on all of the machines I work on and last week I was on the elliptical for 45min in the pre-programmed setting called "weight loss" I worked at level 6 with intensity of 6. I hope to continue at that pace so I will be ready for Bloomsday at the beginning of May. I have also been doing some hula practicing there before the "early birds" come and take my area over, so they can "stretch" before their big water basketball game. The weight is still coming off, but it is slowing up again. I did a great job of being off sweets for Lent, now I just need to go back to that.

Hula is going well. I have been only going to Thursday class because of my classes I was taking on Tuesday. In the past three or so weeks Thursday became very crazy with Kumu teaching us 2 versus from about 5 songs and constantly switching up between them all. Although it finally all settled down as the Riatea show got closer.

We are now only practicing her songs (3), but have gone to 3 times a week practices. We have to be $35 hula dancers. I hope I can handle it. My hula sister, Tanya, has updated our hula website that you should check out: Ke'ala 'O Kamailelauli'ili'i & Manawaiopuna

My kids have been really good. I love this time of year, because they have learned all the routines and have become pretty self-sufficient. Yet with Spring comes boy/girl germs and some pretty squirrely boys that have all found each other. Oh the joy! Most of them are reading and enjoying playing electricity. (This is where they all sit around in a circle and squeeze each other's hand to see how fast we can get it around the circle.) Last week when we were playing it, one of the girls was leaning over and trying to talk out of the side of her mouth and ask the student next to her a question. She was trying to be so sneaky about it, but the boy couldn't understand her and kept saying, "What?" louder and louder until everyone was looking at her and wondering what she was doing.

Big Brother is still on and the couple I thought would be gone first,

is still there. Also one of the guys I picked to win is still there. Who would have guessed.

My cousin, Keaka and his wife had their beautiful little girl Leilani. I hope to make it over to see her soon and get some pictures to post.

We had a Superheros Party! It was a blast. It turned into a wonderful game night with lots of good food and good fun.

I am looking forward to lots of fun things this week, that you will have to wait and see.

Long/Short Week

It was one of those this week. I was worried about it being forever long and by Tuesday it seemed like it was going to go on forever, but then Tuesday was gone it was Sunday again. Oh my!
Although I was worried about one of my students being a disruption in my class, it turned out that he was fine and it was another one that was giving me the problems. She went on a plan and that is all I can say about that. We are learning about air in Science and are getting to push all sorts of things around by blowing through straws and using air pumps. We sent balloons shooting across the classroom all Friday and two parents happened to stop by while it was happening. I was a little overwhelmed, but needless to say, they didn't say anything about my kids being out of control. Phew! We also started our Hawaii unit, which for me gets funner every year, because I am learning a lot in hula that I can bring back to the kids. Two kids already know a little bit about Pele, which will make for interesting discussions when we talk about it.
Hula is going well. I am taking a class on Tuesday nights for the next couple of months, so I will only be going to Thursday night class. I am sad about missing Tuesday nights, but I think it will be good for me to see how much better I will be with only one class to prepare for.
With the loss of one hula class, I will increase my going to the gym by one day and take a walk on the weekends. I am sitting right now...not losing anything, but hoping soon to be down the last 8 pounds to make my goal, well really it will be 20 over my goal of losing 80 pounds.
This week will be crazy and fun and hopefully will produce a lot of pictures. You will just have to wait and see what happens.

Week-in-Review

This week was a long week. It was the first week that we were in school for a full five days in over a month. There were no half-days, special assemblies, or anything it was just straight school. I about died.
I worked the kids hard, because pretty soon, it will be too hard for them to concentrate on anything with Christmas just around the corner. In the past 3 weeks, I have lost three kids and gained three new ones. So far the new kids have been pretty good, we will see when the last one shows up on Monday. The three that I lost, although I will miss them, were a bit challenging, so it is kind of hard to say if I will miss them or not. I know for sure I will miss one of them.
I'm back to the hula grind and it has been fun, although two songs we are learning are sitting down. My legs are super sore from it, but it will soon mean that I will have amazing core muscles especially when the people singing the song need to sing it again because they didn't like the way that they sounded, although we danced it well. My hand is getting better, if you wanted to know and this past week I didn't use and ipu, so I had no bruises thank goodness.
The gym is keeping me in shape as well as the shakes I have been drinking, keep on the lookout for a big announcement in a couple weeks. I am enjoying all the weight loss, but it is an expensive habit because I am continually having to buy new clothes to show off all the work that I have done.
Every night was busy this week, but I guess it is the time of the season, but with it being so busy, I have fallen out of my good sleep pattern and have now fallen ill. I think that it is strep throat, but I will have to go to the doc to confirm it on Monday. So although my weekend was packed with a photo shoot, decorating at halau, and getting a tree for my place, I had to slow down and rest, which will just push everything else onto other days.
I hope you all have been doing well and haven't keeled over from shopping and getting ready for Christmas.

Longer...

So it took me longer than I thought to post. Travelling can really take a lot out of a young girl like me, plus coming back to craziness of a non-working computer, going right back to work, and practicing for hula had me working like crazy, but I would like to say:

• I am caught up on my sleep.
• My practice paid off, but we will see what this week brings. I still have sore muscles. Different ones than usual.
• Kids are a bit crazy with Halloween coming up, my mom baking cake, and our cookie party next week.
• I am doing a great job of avoiding grades...not really I am halfway through comments and by the time I go back to work tomorrow they will all be done.
• I have completed all of the enhancing of pictures.
• I will be back in the gym next week to continue the losing of kids. I think I am almost up to a 4th grader now.

Hope you all had a great week. Stay tuned for more posts.