90 Days of Crossfit

To catch you up to speed in a few words, the Paleo challenge went well. Despite two vacations during the month I somehow managed to lose 3 lbs., 1 inch off of my waist and a 1/2 inch here and there. I was in Florida last week and I literally ate everything in my path. I think Jesus was looking out for my poor little diet because he let the calories slide and I didn't bloat up like a blow fish. Whew!

I'm going to keep this post short because its purpose isn't to talk about my diet. This is one to show results. I've got bikini pics on my camera at home but I don't have the nerve to post those just yet. I've got some stubborn stomach fat to get rid of before I'll feel good about those!

Now, when I first started Crossfit I took a picture of myself in some high-waisted linen pants that I bought in college. They were tight when I bought them but at least I could button them! When I started crossfit I needed Vaseline to get them past my thighs and then a crane to pull them up past my butt. They were very tight and I didn't even have them buttoned! I've used these white pants to measure my progress.

Without any further ado:
 
Do not be fooled. If I had exhaled sharply or laughed the button on those pants would have put Polly's eye out. Or broken some glass. I know that my love handles and gut are pouring over the top but I have no intention of quitting after 3 months!

Here I am on my very first day of Crossfit. Barf. Ever wonder "How did I let this happen?" If this picture had a title it would be "I Didn't Know I was Chunky." Seriously? Seriously. My face was beet red from sunburn to add to the attractiveness! I almost died this day. Literally.

90 Days Later: This picture is, in my mind, 1,000x better. In the interest of full disclosure, I will tell you that I folded like piece of paper shortly after this picture was taken and had to strip the weights off of the bar to finish the last 10 reps.

I've had lots of questions about Crossfit since I started and I want to be completely honest here. My body has not changed in the ways that I wanted and/or expected it to. Before, when I would diet and take up a running routine, I'd get skinny all over. I never had any real muscle definition but at least my clothes fit better. This is the only way I had known. With Crossfit, I have gotten smaller but my legs are toned, my arms are taking shape and my butt has lifted and toned up as well. I am not taking on the "model skinny" shape I used to but rather a more athletic physique. So, the JCrew model figure illudes me again! Don't misunderstand- I do not look like, nor will I ever, look like a body builder. I'm not that determined and I like food too much.

I can now wear all of the dresses that were too small when I started Crossfit which is the reason I started in the first place. I feel so much better about myself. I've still got a way to go but I'm happy with the progress I've made.

Anyone else have pics they'd like me to post? Send them my way! (I'm looking at you Denna!)

Off I go to take my favorite munchkin and her mama to lunch!

-Sunny

Tres y Quatro

I feel like I should start off by saying proclaiming that I just ate two scrambled eggs. Without gagging. For the first time I can remember.

Now, back to business as usual. I got tied up yesterday (figuratively, not literally) and couldn't blog so this is a two-fer-one. I'll dive right in.

Day 3
Breakfast: 3 sausage muffins, Diet Coke
Lunch: Somewhere between 1/4 and 1/2 of a smoked chicken, sweet potato, water
Dinner: 4 oz of grilled flank steak, roasted carrots and zucchini, water
Snack: Protein shake shortly before dinner

Day 4
Breakfast: 2 sausage muffins, Diet Dr. Pepper
Lunch: Chicken grilled with red peppers, Spanish rice, water
Dinner: Smoothie made with grapes, mango and peaches with some coconut milk. Protein shake.

I'm actually leaving for Charleston today so I started off with scrambled eggs and bacon. And a Diet Dr. Pepper. Now, some of you are probably shaking your fingers at me saying "Sodas aren't Paleo" and I'm saying "No crap." I allow myself one a day because a month ago I was drinking 4 cokes a day. Not diet, but regular coke. Then it was Pepsi. So, I've gotten down to one a day and if I don't have it my eye starts twitching. I'll find a better alternative.

In preparation for this vacay, I made more sausage muffins this morning so that I'd have something for back up should I find myself stranded in Fastfoodville. I'm interested to see how the Challenge holds up this weekend. Adam is super supportive of my whole Crossfit/Paleo deal so I'm lucky in the aspect that he won't purposely tempt me. Except Wednesday when he waved french fries in my face.

I wanted to go visit the Crossfit in Charleston but I rolled my ankle coming off of a box jump this morning so I think that's out. BTW, I rolled my ankle because I was being nosey and turning my head to hear a conversation behind me and my feet turned with me. NOT because of exhaustion/being pushed too hard. I was, and still am, pretty upset that I didn't finish the WOD because it was a really good one. Anyway, I'll leave you the recipe for my easy peasy roasted carrots and zucchini before I embark on our voyage.


Roasted Carrots
Ingredients:
Carrots
Olive Oil
Kosher or Sea Salt
Pepper

Directions:
1. Preheat your oven to 425. Cut your carrots into quarters length wise and arrange them on a baking sheet. I used my stone baking sheet but whatever floats your boat! If you're using metal I advise parchment paper as the sugar from the carrots may make a mess on your pan.

2. Drizzle some Olive Oil over the carrots and toss them to coat. Sprinkle with sea salt, pepper and paprika. Toss again to coat.

3. Roast them for 25 minutes or until they're fork tender. I have to check on mine frequently because depending on the size of the carrots they may cook faster.

Done! Adam doesn't love these but he's not a carrot eater. I, on the other hand, love them. I'm going to try adding some garlic powder to them next time.

Roasted Zucchini
(I know that this is probably remedial for a lot of you but some people don't cook and have no idea that it's this easy!)

Ingredients:
Zucchini
Olive Oil (Or whatever oil floats your boat)
Kosher or Sea Salt
Pepper
Garlic Powder

1. Preheat oven to 425. Cut Zucchini into quarters length wise, then cut again into quarters across. Did that make sense? Just chop it up!

2. Spread zucchini out onto baking dish and drizzle with Olive Oil. Season with salt, pepper and garlic powder. I like a lot of all of it and some people don't like much seasoning so it depends on your personal taste. Just don't drown it with salt!

3. Roast for 20 minutes or until tender. Again, depending on your oven it may take longer! I roasted my zucchini and carrots together this week and they were great. The zucchini may have cooked a little too long but it still tasted good.

Adios!
Sunny

Day 2

Day 2 went just as well as Day 1. Except on Day 2 I ate breakfast for dinner but it was still within my guidelines. Here's my daily food journal, I figure we'll get it out of the way instead of making an entire post about what I ate.

Breakfast: 2 Sausage Muffins, Chocolate Protein Shake (within 30 minutes of my workout) and Water

Lunch: Leftover Indian Chicken with Spaghetti Squash and 1/2 of a sweet potato that I nuked in the microwave for 4 minutes with a pat of butter. I actually didn't finish my plate, but that's what was on it.

Dinner: 3 sausage muffins with mustard and a glass of milk.

Ok, I was going to lie and leave out the Diet Dr. Pepper Granny got me when we went to the grocery store but in the interest of full disclosure, I drank a Diet Dr. Pepper. There.

I don't know about you guys, but I seriously underestimated my love/addiction for/to bread. Around 3:00 yesterday afternoon I could smell bread in my office. No, there wasn't any bread remotely close to me but I wanted it!

Side story- Last week someone brought donuts into the office. Thinking that it would be funny, my boss brought them into my office and told me to take them on home. Well, having iron-clad will power like I do, I shoved them in the garbage and flattened them. The next day I was having a sugar attack and I remembered the donuts. I dug those same donuts that I'd so fervently smashed into the trashcan out and took a monster sized bite only to find that I'd also thrown a paper towel soaked with windex into the garbage. The windex flavored the donuts. Enough said. Gag.

No, I didn't swallow the donut. I spit it out and could taste my bad judgment for an hour after.

For those of you who are interested, I've been using a website to track my food intake. I like to obsess and chart things, so this is right up my alley. It's called Lose It and you can program it to count protein and carbs in addition to calories. Just go to the settings tab and customize. It's a little tricky setting up foods that you cook yourself but, like I said, I like obsessing over these things so I didn't mind it so much.

I found a website called PaleoMom. She had an interesting article on carb intake. Before I read this article, I was just eating whatever fruits/veggies I wanted. Just this morning I was going to make hash browns to go along with breakfast. Then I remembered this article, googled "carbs in a russet potato" and threw the taters in the TRASH. If I'm limiting my carbs, I'm going to put them to good use! Same thing goes for juice. ONE CUP of Adam's cranberry-grape juice had 31 carbs! THIRTY-ONE!  I didn't even eat that many yesterday!

After just THREE (I ate good on Sunday) days of cutting out the garbage, I can already tell a difference-most notably in my stomach. It looks significantly less fat. Also, my face is less puffy. It could have something to do with the fact that I am drinking an insane amount of water. Before any of you smarties tell me that I need more green in my diet, I went and bought a boatload of the green stuff yesterday so tonight I engorge myself.

Anyhoo, stay strong my fellow losers!

-Sunny

Day 1 and Polly in a Shirt

How did Day 1 of the Challenge go for y'all? It went swimmingly for me! I'm going to post some recipes here so get ready. They are modified Paleo and all of them are delish!

For those of you who don't already know, I issued a challenge to my peeps to eat clean for 30 days. We all know that it doesn't matter how hard you work if you're going to fuel your body with junk. I was sabotaging my progress with the food I eat. As a way to keep myself honest, I'll be journaling my meals here.

Since I have to get back to work I'm going to keep this one short and sweet

Breakfast: 2 sausage and egg muffins, 1 banana, Diet Coke (I know, I know) and Water

Lunch: Garlic Chicken, Steamed cabbage, 1/2 of  a Sweet potato and a small side salad of mixed greens with fresh tomato and a Paleo Balsamic Vinegarette, Water

Dinner: Indian Chicken served over Spaghetti Squash with Water to drink

As promised, here are the recipes.

Sausage and Egg Muffins
These aren't really muffins but I made them in muffin tins so I call them muffins. Muffin.

Ingredients:
6 eggs
1 lb. sausage (can be hot, turkey, sage, mild, etc. Whatever floats your boat.)

1. Brown the sausage and crumble it. Drain.

2. In a mixing bowl, combine all eggs, salt, pepper and a little half-and-half or milk. Beat the tar out of them.

3. In a regular muffin tin, portion out the sausage evenly so that you've got 12 muffins 1/2 full of sausage.

4. Spoon scrambled egg mixture over the sausage. I used a measuring cup to do this. I averaged 1/4 cup of the eggs per muffin.

5. Bake on 350 until the eggs are set. Eat.

*Word to the wise. Don't use muffin liners!!! The sausage is greasy enough that they won't stick to the muffin tin. If you're worried about sticking, you can butter the tin first. That would actually probably be delicious.

Garlic Chicken
This is a variation of a slow-cooker recipe I found. It's delicious and very forgiving. My husband loathes onions so I didn't include them but I can imagine that they'd be divine to caramelize with the garlic!

Ingredients:

1 whole chicken, cut up. (I used 4 leg quarters because I like the dark meat. That, and it was cheap.)
40 cloves of garlic (This is approximately 2 heads of garlic)
Salt and Pepper
2 tbsp of butter, divided
olive oil
Onion (optional)
White wine or chicken broth

Directions:

1. Preheat your oven to 350. To peel garlic, place cloves in pot of simmering water for 30 seconds-1 minute. This will make peeling much easier!

2. In a dutch oven or oven safe pot with a lid (could transfer to a casserole dish if needed), pour in a couple teaspoons of olive oil and  1Tbsp of butter. Salt and pepper the chicken. Once the oil is hot, brown chicken on both sides and remove from pan. This may need to be done in batches. Just add more oil/butter as needed. We're not frying it, we're just browning it. It will not be done when you remove it from the pot. That's fine- we're going to be putting it in the oven anyway!

3. Once the chicken is browned, throw the garlic cloves in there. Stir them around and let them get good and golden. (If you're using onion this is the part where you would put the chopped onion into the mix). After 1-2 minutes (stir constantly!),  pour in 1/2 cup of white wine to deglaze the pan. This should get the stuck on chicken parts off of the bottom. Let this bubble for a couple of minutes.

4. Add the chicken back into the pot and spoon some of the garlic up onto the top. Put lid on pot and place it into the oven and let it cook for 45 minutes to an hour. The chicken will be falling off of the bone! Serve with roasted veggies. This is a crowd pleaser!

*For those of you who don't like to use alcohol, feel free to use chicken STOCK. Not broth! Broth is watered down!

**If you are using boneless skinless chicken breasts you may want to add 1/4 cup of stock to the wine right before you add the chicken. When you use bone-in chicken it creates its own broth. We don't want dry chickens!

This dish reheats beautifully. It actually tastes better the second day so feel free to make it a day ahead! Can also be cooked in a crockpot. I would make sure to brown the chicken, though- it adds a layer of delicious flavor.


Indian Chicken

I already posted this recipe Here.

Adam and I eat this all the time. You can add in heavy cream, half-and-half, or sour cream at the end (about 1 cup) to make it a creamier dish but to make it Paleo I didn't add any and it tasted just as good! Served over Spaghetti squash that I cooked in the microwave for 11 minutes. Yumm-O!

So, good fellows, that's what I done ate! I'll be having Indian Chicken leftovers for lunch and I am contemplating some lemon pepper chicken for dinner. Or a spicy grilled flank steak. We shall see!

Also, Polly demolished an egg carton yesterday. She also nibbled on a tomato for some antioxidants.

Then, Adam put a shirt on her because he thought it was funny. Polly isn't amused. She's been walking around like a prisoner in shackles.

I'm so going to find this shirt in a million pieces when I get home!

Go eat something green and fibrous!

Over and out,
Sunny

Challenge

Hello! It's me! I bet you all thought that I have stopped going to Crossfit and gone back to my donut eating ways. Nope! I've been going strong. With the exception of two weeks ago when I had the cold from hell and only went once, I've consistently gone to Crossfit 5-6 days a week. It's still just as hard and ridiculous as it was before except now I'm actually hearing "Good, Sunny!" and "That's right! Keep going!" whereas I used to hear "That's not it!" and "Get your butt down!"

The workouts are still insane. This morning was Cindy. For those of you who don't speak CFDGA, that's 5 pull ups, 10 push ups, 15 air squats. Repeat. For twenty flapping minutes. Eric actually issued a quasi apology and muttered something like "necessary evil" before we started. You know it's going to be ugly when your coach is apologizing! Dr. Death and I were in a corner together so I did my darndest to keep up with her.

* Dr. D is ridiculously strong and has great form. I am a limp noodle and have mediocre-poor form. She did unassisted pull ups, I jumped off of a block. What I mean to say is that I was doing modified reps to keep up with her prescribed ones! That's nuts!

I somehow squeezed out 13 rounds. After those thirteen rounds were completed I sprawled out on the floor spread eagle in front of the gargantuan fans. I wanted to vomit. Five hours later, I still want to vomit! I mean, that's 390 reps! 130 push ups! Dude!

Here's a shot of me being athletic over there in the corner.

There is no excuse for that leg action.

However, the point of this post isn't to tell you about the workout. We have established that they are all insanely hard and us lunatics are always chomping at the bit for the next one. It's inexplicable! The purpose of this post is to inform my fellow junkies that as of Monday, June 18 I will be self-issuing a 30 Day "Eating Clean" Challenge. We all work so hard but we are slowing our own progress with the food we eat. I came up with this idea after noticing that I'm not really "shrinking" anymore. The first month was really baller. I shed a few inches and felt great. Well, month two is here and I can't tell I've been doing anything! Sure, I'm stronger than I was but I still feel like I look a little bloated and mushy.Someone once told me that I was going to be obese by age 30 if I keep eating like I do so I figure now is as good a time as any to turn this boat around.

Why am I starting this in the middle of the month, you ask? Because I'm going to the beach in 3 weeks and isn't this what girls do? Also, if I'm on the challenge and competing against my fellow Crossfitters, I won't eat so much crap on vacation. In theory. We'll see how that one pans out!

So, for you who want to participate, pick your poison. You can go Paleo or you can just modify your diet to cut out the bad stuff. Whatever you need to do to get it did. Personally, I am going to do Paleo. I will be allowing myself sweet potatoes and the occasional white potato. I will not be eating grains. Yes, you heard me. No grains. No bread, no oatmeal, no nothing.

Once upon a time (last month) I gave up grains for a week or two. Like, I really didn't eat any. And I felt better and I looked deflated. Then I started cheating and I looked bloated again and I felt yuck. So. Moral of the story is: Sunny doesn't do well with the grains. Don't try to change my mind. Ok? I'm trying not to be a chunky monkey here. I'll get my fiber from veggies, thank you very much.

Ok, so. Go weigh yourself, take pictures of yourself, measure... Whatever you want to do to track your progress. If you have pictures, pretty please send them to me or at least let me know your measurements. I would like to do a post around the 15 day mark to track progress. Nothing like a bunch of strangers looking at your fat pictures to keep ya motivated.

Also, sorry I kind of dropped off. Work has been busier than usual and I am going to attempt to start blogging before work so we'll see how that goes. Anyway, go pick your poison and buy your groceries. This is going to be fun!

Winner gets bragging rights and a prize TBD. (To be donated!)


Holla,

Sunny

ps. This does not mean to go home and eat all of the ice cream out of your fridge, by the way.

Mission

I may or may not have mentioned that I'm on a suicide mission this week so I'm going to CF every day. Monday-Saturday. I'm doing this mainly because I'm trying to expedite the slimming process but also because I like being around people and I have a captive audience at CF so it's a win/win. It has been insanely hot this week so the gym has become a steam room of sorts. You know it's hot when you want to go outside when it's 90 degrees to "catch a breeze" that may or may not have been created by the person running by you.

Anyhoo, I went last night and it was a real gem. I thought we were taking a break from legs when I saw that the movement of the day was shoulder presses. I'll be the first to admit that I whiz through them faster than others because I lift barely any weight. I feel that my days of glory with the 30 lb bar are soon going to be over and MP is going to make me be a big girl and use the 45 pounder. Eek!

Once we finished the movement we moved on to the actual workout which was Thrusters and Pull-Ups! Yay for pull-ups! I say this semi-jokingly because it's not that I'm good at the pull-ups, it's that I suck less at pull-ups than push-ups so it's all gravy. We did 3 thrusters and 3 pull-ups, 6 thrusters and 6 pull-ups, and so on until we reached 15 or 18. All in seven minutes.

First off, let me tell you that I had a literal powerhouse of a girl in front of me. It was her second day and she was throwing weight around like Polly does her pet raccoon. I like to attempt to keep pace with everyone else so suffice to say that I was winded by the time the whole ordeal was done. I was a little slow getting my box in place for pull-ups (I do jumping pull-ups since I'm still "perfecting" my movement) so I had to run across the gym for that portion since I didn't get a good spot. I'm pretty sure I had angels leading the way because it was a literal mine field of equipment and things that Sunny likes to trip over. I'm not over my last fall yet so I'm trying to put some space between the injuries. During the pull-up time I was contemplating (aloud) the likelihood of my being physically able to hoist my person sufficiently on the higher bar when I heard MP shot, "This is the 5:30 class! No whining just do it!"

Tom Hanks? Is that you?

Somehow I forgot my multiples of three, skipped 9 and went straight to 12 reps so I had to go back to nine. My set went like this: 3-6-12-9-15. I only made it to seven on the last set of thrusters because we ran out of time and I wanted to kiss that timer square on the screen I was so glad to be done! Being in a class where you are the weakest link will really encourage you to suck it up and hustle through. Being in a class where you are the weakest link will also get you a lot of strange looks but it's all good, everyone sucked at some point.

I was thoroughly drenched in sweat when I left and my legs felt like jello. I considered myself to be completely worked out. Most of the members of my old class have pretty much moved up to the big kid's class so I'll be in good company this afternoon.

The push-ups are coming. I was a smidge "tighter" last night as I was focusing on squeezing everything and keeping that "counter balance" in check. They are a beast, though!

Everyone have a safe and happy memorial day weekend. I know I'll be getting some MUCH needed sunshine!

Adios,
Sunny

30 Days of Crossfit

Well, peeps, yesterday marked the 1 month marker for my Crossfit journey. One month ago I was stomping around my room throwing dresses everywhere because they wouldn't fit. After that little temper tantrum I decided to do something, so here I am now. A lot of people have been asking me how it's going so I'm going to do a month in review.

The first week was really tough. The only thing that got me through was going almost every day the gym was open because I was afraid of the soreness that would sit in during my "day of rest". Week two was a good week. I felt encouraged and like I could tackle pretty much anything that came my way. Week three was tough but manageable. I could really tell a difference in my energy levels. I had been trying to follow the Paleo diet and I'd say I follow it 80% of the time. Breakfast is what kills me. I hate eggs. Love grits, but they aren't allowed so they're out. Biscuits are my life. I want biscuits for every meal. Needless to say, we're still working on the diet part!

Then there was week four. Oh week four. I swear it's like Eric knew that I'd been eating donuts at work or something because I promise you those were the toughest freaking workouts to date and they were all consecutive! Wall balls ran rampant. We rowed until our hearts wanted to explode. We ran. We dead lifted. We rowed some more. And we planked. We ran. It just keeps going! It was insane! I lost 1/2" off of my waist last week alone!

For the one month workout Eric had something special planned. Now, I seriously doubt that he had it marked down as "Sunny's One Month Mark" but I really think that he subconsciously knew. I saw people running the 400m course when I pulled up. Rut row. When I walked in I saw people jumping. JUMPING!  On boxes! Boxes that were 20" or higher! I wanted to just DIE when I saw those boxes! We know how I felt about jumping over the utility blocks, but  now I was supposed to jump on two of them stacked on top of one another! Great! I am not exaggerating when I say that I would have rather someone throw me in a pool full of snakes.

So, to clarify, we were run 400m, do the normal stretches, 10 push ups and 25 burpees to warm up. Then I got to do back squats for the movement (I still do front squats because my hips "roll under" and my core is weak and I tend to lean forward). The actual workout was 20 box jumps with a 400m run in between followed by a 2 minute break. Repeat. Four times.

Somehow I made it through the jumps with minimal drama. I still felt like I was going to fall over the front of the blocks and bust out my teeth (my #1 fear at Cossfit) but I didn't. So I jumped and ran and jumped and ran. Right at the end I tweaked my arm movements and got a little more momentum of ouf them. Oh man, I was so happy to be done with that workout! But wait, there's more! We had to choose between doing dips or "Awesome Push ups" as our cashout for the day. Awesome push ups are push ups that dont' suck like they usually do. Well we know that I suck at all things upper body so I was directed to do push ups so that I could "perfect the movement". Ha. Ha. Ha.

During my first week at Crossfit I remember thinking "Is my lower back supposed to hurt during these?" No, moron. It is not. It hurts because you are doing them wrong and you're being a sissy. My hideous form gained the attention of some of the guys so they took me under their wing and attempted to teach me how to do one properly. The problem is that I'm so weak up top that I'm just pulling my chest up and my butt is sagging behind. A saggy arse is no good when one is doing push ups. After much yelling and discussion and a few comments like "I think there's some extra mass back there weighing her down," we decided that I just needed to practice my "let downs" and worry about pushing up later. Gotta build that core!

The cashout just about broke me. Frustrated doesn't begin to explain the emotion. I don't know what I'm going to have to do to get my core stronger but I'm willing to do just about anything! It takes time to perfect movements and get everything right. You can't start out on top. I know all of these things, but it doesn't make the feeling that you're failing go away. That's a tough pill to swallow! I didn't mention it earlier but I've made the switch to the 5:30 class so I have the feeling that I'm going to be slamming my head against the wall a lot more now that I've got the pictures of health and fitness running laps around me as I dry heave and shuffle my way through the runs.

On a positive note, I can say that I've lost 2.5 inches off of my waist and other miscellaneous inches that add up to 6.5 total. I've got before and after bathing suit pics but I'm saving them for the 90 day marker so that I can really see how far I've come. That, and I want to be a former blubber butt before I start sharing bikini pics!

If anyone has any before and after pics from Crossfit or any other program they've been doing, I'd love to write up a post on you and what you've been doing! Crossfit isn't for everyone, but we should all be striving to be fit and healthy! Nothing like some good before and afters for motivation! (I've got specific people in mind and they know who they are!)

 I hear we're doing shoulders tonight! I would usually dread it but I'm so happy that my feet will be on the ground that I don't care!

On a totally unrelated note, Polly has revealed to us that she is completely able to jump up on the bed unassisted. After a year of me hauling her up and down! The heifer got tired of us ignoring her on the floor so she just hopped up the other day! I really don't know what I'm going to do with her.


Laters,

Sunny