Making_A_Change’s BodyBlog

Sweet, sweet rest and relaxation. Today is Monday and I am on Spring Break. I am going to do some serious spring cleaning and planning. My morning weight was 129.4 and my body continues to change even though I haven’t dropped my calories. In fact, I have been able to allow a few more carbs/calories. I’ve been watching my body really closely. With four weeks to go and still working out vigorously, I am trying to keep size. THAT is proving to be challenging. My upper body wants to lean out, like most women. My legs are, indeed, getting leaner. I don’t have hips, at. My hamstrings and calves continue to change–they are rounder, when I pose to the rear I have a bit of calf poking out! My glutes are slowly coming along, the fat is definitely coming off, but they are flabby and wrinkly at the bottom. Of course I am going to keep chipping away a them, but until they are more muscular I have to use posing to compensate. When I worked on my walking yesterday, I modified my stride to minimize jiggling.

My friend’s mom is a seamstress and is hooking up my competition suit like she did las October. It look so much cleaner when the straps are hooked instead of tied, in my opinion. Everything lays flat on the body.

I am still feeling strong, so I am going to low carb it today and see how I feel.

I waas scheduled to do the stairmill last night and could not make it. I realized that I hardly had any water yesterday! Last night, I woke up with dry mouth and had kept swallowing, but there was no spit. Bad, I know. I find that I get a little tunnel vision sometimes–diet, check! Posing, check! Supplements, check! Training, check! Blogging, check! Water? Water? Water? But I am back on. I plan on carb loading and reducing water for Peak Weak, but I can’t reduce what I am not taking in, so it’s ciritcal that I am drinking a tone of water. I primarily did kneeling abs on the cable, and weighted v-sits with different leg positions. Billy tweaked my positioning and now I feel like I am getting my entire abdominal area on that one.

I did my usual posing practice and focused on holding and transitioning. I and i walked up and down the floor. the other guy in the studio was doing knee ups and lunges, I was doing my ‘model walk’- making the quads pops, swinging the hips, chest up,  hips back. I walked straight ahead and a walk where my body was facing slightly forward (for changing places during call outs). I also practiced coming in on both sides of the stage so that is wouldn’t matter what my orientation is.

I forget to mention that during yesterday’s workout an older woman came up to me and Billy and said:

Are you an athlete that I should be looking out for?

That was really flattering. This morning I focused on high reps and feeling the contraction on my hamstrings and glutes. I did weighted back extensions, oblique work on the extension apparatus, step-ups (15#), standing ham curls, one-legged squats, straight-legged deadlifts. 3-4 sets of everythingx 20 reps. I finished it all off with leg extensions and 30 minutes on the stairmill. I really had to push for that last 15 minutes, but I got it done. Tonight, I go back for abs, calves, and 45 minutes of cardio on the stairmill. I push my hips back and push through I heels to really get get the glutes burning. Thank goodness it’s Spring Break, I get to sleep, recover, train, cook, and do my lesson planning for the quarter. I plan on getting my abs hard and my hamstrings harder. I purchased two new bikinis from Old Navy–one is hot pink paisley and the other is black and white swirls, sort of mod. I plan on getting some silver accessories for the b/w one and some gold for the other. The bronze shoes that I got from e-bay should look really cute with it.

I have to admit, fasted cardio makes me nervous. I learned and applied what I knew about the importance of pre- and post- workout nutrition. I have my ‘perfect’ meals that are equal parts slow digesting carbs and oats. And I go into my workouts with great energy. I think I was psyching myself out a bit and worried about not feeling well. I slowly, but surely, increased my confidence. I did 40 minutes on the stepmill and an additional 20 minutes on the upright bike. By the time I got home I was ravenous.

The evening workout with Billy was fantastic–back, biceps, abs, and shoulders. I used the seated ab machine. I felt my entire abdominal working. The best that I can recall is that we did: a combo move on the cables (rows with one cable and knee-ups with the other), seated abs, deadlift (bended knees), shoulder press on squat (narrow, middle, wide grip-needed assistance), decline push-up (need assistance), lateral raises (curled wrist), squat+front raise. By the end I was so invigorated. The reps were high 15-20.

I weighed in and 133–to be expected after 3 sushi rolls! I feel fantastic and ready for Billy tomorrow evening. I have found that I have been having intinctual re-feeds. I can go 3-5 days on low carbs and, regardless of when I have scheduled a day on my calendar my body seems to know when it’s needed. I have also been trying to use my body as a guage more. In the future this will help me be able to determine my peaks a bit better. I had a high day 300+grams of carbs yesterday. I am low carbing it today. I want to see how I look this weekend. But so far, it seems like 2 1/2-3 days of white carbs like pitas and potatoes seem to work for me.

I have found shoes–I now have 5 pairs of assorted heels. I feel like such a woman, now. I wrote about the strappy red, lavendar, and hot pink ones. I just got lucky on my favorite e-bay store and got bronze 4 1/2-inchers and black shoes with ankle straps. The black ones are funtional. I needed a part of black heels anyway. I am asking my sister-in-law for help with the outfits. She’s good at that sort of thing. She knows where to get the funky hats and jewelry for rock bottom prices.

This Saturday marks 4 more weeks. I feel like I did at the end of my pregnancy. I am anxious for the day to arrive, but there is still so much work to do!

I was supposed to take yesterday off, but I ended up doing cardio. I needed to work off a little stress. I didn’t work out this morning, as scheduled. I am going to do back and biceps tonight. I could not imagine choking down anymore chicken today, so I had salmon. Yum! I feel fuller more satisfied. When it’s time to eat, I’m not ravenous. It must be the extra fat! That Dialene is something else. I ordered the 4x instead of the Dialene ‘regular formula’. I took one with my afternoon meal and whoa! I am awake, now! I like to take one in the early morning and the other with my 1 p.m. meal. That is my largest meal of the day because I go about 3.5 hours, my longest stint, without eating. It works. My morning weigh-ins have been 131, so I am steadily getting leaner. My body feels so different. Sometimes I put my hands on my stomach or thighs, and just can’t believe those are my body parts. The only down part is that I am at the part of my prep where clothes look  horrible on me. I wish I could wear my workout clothes to work.

I can tell that tonight is going to be a great workout. I think it’s the salmon.

I found some cute strappy shoes from the Venus website. They were $9 a piece! I got hot pink, red, and lavendar. Those were the only colors that they had BUT they were what I was looking for! I have a few weeks to get something together. I need a pair of jeans that fit well. That is always hard.

Tonight’s back/bicep workout went well. So well, that I felt nauseous on the way home. Now I get to truly relax for two days–just posing practice and stretching. Cardio remains low/moderate intensity. No HIIT for me–that’ll make me look like a string bean. Since I am trying to maintain and not lose, I get to have some ‘extras’ like a drizzle of sesame ginger dressing on my salad, almond butter, or an extra slice of carrot/raisin protein bread. I want to ensure that my strength stays up.

I have decided to give a photoshoot a try. It wasn’t something that I was interested in, initially, but why not capture these early stages of my figure journey. I’ve been doing my research and figuring out what type of photographer I would like to work with. Proximity is a huge factor but so is sensibility. I would like something unique, but I would also want someone who is experienced with ‘physique photography’. I was on siouxcountry and asked around and found someone is San Francisco. The reviews were positive and I liked his photos. I made an inquiry and I guess we will see what happens. He is going to be at The Contras. I won’t be able to get a shoot done, then. I’ll be paying for the photos by the authorized photographer. But, I will be prepping for a show in July (with a possibility of a June show if the ‘no carb depleting/just loading’ is successful) That will be a good time. I’ve been looking at various pictures and deciding what type of pictures I would like to take. And I’ve been trying to decide on ‘a look’–bikini type/color, dresses, jewelry, etc. It’s exciting–very different from my everyday.

last night, I decided to let how I felt this morning determine the training direction for the week. I woke and a felt like I had been run over by a truck. EVERYTHING is sore [feebly]–yay! I began the morning with 1/3 c. of oats with blueberries and I am cleaning the apartment. I am going to cook my meals for the next few days and make 4-5 of the carrot/raisin or cranberry loaves. I am going to low carb it for the next 4-5 days. I may do moderate carbs on Wednesday depended on how I feel. But I like carbing up closer to my training session or leg day. I had an odd period. I came for a day and then went away. I may be at the point where I actually do not have a period.

I am going to run a few errands and do some laundry. I have to remember to get all of my water in today, too.

After Billy’s Beatdown last night, I decided to train shoulders and abs this morning. I was going to get to the gym at around 6, but i decided to get some much needed rest for an extra hour. It felt so good! I got to the gym and did my elliptical warm-up. I did the shoulder moves that Billy and I did a few weeks ago (wrists curled under, behind glutes; same move seated to one side; front raise ‘pour’ move), front raise using a plate (towards the mirror), shoulder presses (25#). I felt really strong did all reps for 15-20. Then, I worked abs: cable, obliques, etc. Tonight, I have 45 minutes of cardio to do and that is it! That goes quickly. Tomorrow, I wanted to do legs, but Billy had me do the extension move Friday evening and I really want to hit those again–hard! Instead, I may make tomorrow back and biceps. I can’t believe I have just 5 weeks to go! I am really pleased with prep. The recovery time is working, I am training 4-4 4 1/2 times per week. And my cardio sessions are under an hour.

I got to the gym to do my evening cardio. I am beat so I used the upright bike instead of the stairmill.My quads and glutes got a good burn and I can say that I got all my workouts in this week! I did aboutu 10 minutes of posing. I didn’t have my shoes. It didnt matter my feet are so neglected that I wouldn’t want them out anyway–even if I was the only person in the studio. It’s that bad. I hope to have some time to give them a little attention tomorrow. As for now, I’ve eaten 1/2 of a banana and a protein shake. I am going to take a serving of liquid creatine and my glutamine and go to sleep. I am debating on whether or not to begin my two-day recovery period tomorrow or Monday. I am going to sleep in tomorrow and make that determination. If tomorrow is an off day, I am going to begin the day with 1/2c of oatmeal. THAT is pretty exciting! I am also going to be baking tomorrow. I want to make at least 5 carrot/raisin loaves. I was just thinking carrot/cranberry would be pretty good. I’ll compare the nutritional information. If it is comparable that would be a nice variation.