Keeping up appearances.......

HappyNow

Honey_Bear wrote: »

• Lose more weight, ideally down to 65kgs by 1 September. Not a good start - I weighed myself this morning and had gone back up to 65.9, after a 65.3 weigh in earlier in the week. We'll see on Monday what the regular weigh-in time to be recorded for posterity is. Weight does vary day by day though. For my Xmas/birthday combined, the Happys clubbed together and bought me one of those Aria scales, the one that synchs with your Fitbit. I love it and it's really accurate, but even though I weigh myself straight out of bed it can still vary by a few old-skool pounds. I can only put that down to toilet habits (although I accept that .6 of a kilo would be quite a poo!). Anyway, Monday today, see what you get.
• 15 minutes Flying a day, Monday to Friday; Saturdays don't count - yay! Monday today - yay!
• Leg stretches, one minutes for each stretch. Totally forgot. Did two of the four minutes while waiting for the kettle to boil this morning, and I'll do the other two in a minute, and then repeat all of it tonight. My legs hurt an it's completely my own fault! This is one of those that should be so easy but gets forgotten. Post-it on the fridge/kettle?
• Lights out by 11.30 pm (I too have a screen addiction and have taken to watching slightly bizarre Youtube videos late at night - sadly rather addictive.) Total fail. More bizarreness was enjoyed. Youtube is such a great time-waster. I've only just learnt how to subscribe to people, and I've favourited a brilliant gardener (which is actually educational for me), and a cute American family (which is the very definition of time I'll never get back). Not bizarre, but I'm working through their back-catalogues which are BIG.

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HappyNow

Dolphin1 wrote: »

Hi all :wave:

Oh my goodness, we are really doing this, the targets are back!!!:j:j

I'll think about what I want to work on first and be back with my targets soon.

There you are! And yes, the targets are back. Mainly down to your post in June where you said things have gone to pot without them. August is just a half month to get us back into the swing of things ready for Serious September.

HappyNow

Honey - my 'quote a quote' function seems to have disappeared. I'll try in Chrome next time, but for today:

• I do still love the Frys Peppermint Creams, very much. I keep them for grown-up eating. The Boost bars are for cutting neatly into slices and dipping in my coffee.
• Lawn-seeding. When I bought my seed the man at the garden centre said to sow at a 25% higher rate than it said on the pack. He told me a little rhyme 'one for the blackbird, one for the crow, one to die and one to grow'. We sowed half the lawn last year like that but ran out of time (hence doing the other half now) and it's flourished with no baldy bits. It was good soil though which helps.
• I can't get comfy with earpieces/headphones. I took out the free Audible subscription before we went on holiday, then realised I prefer paper so have two un-listened to books. I might give it another try, and hope they're quite boring!

HappyNow

Zero alcohol - Tick. Didn't even think about booze yesterday.
Maximum of 1400 calories per day, to include 5 x fruit and veg and just one sweet treat. Fitbit says I ate 1421 calories. Close enough. SEVEN portions of F & V. Sweet treat was a bit bizarre. Mr H suddenly decided, for the first time in his life, to make scones. He got out the old Bero book (am I the only one that still has that?) and cracked on. They were DELICIOUS but I only ate one. If I'm honest I would have preferred chocolate, but I do want to encourage him. He enjoyed it so I'm hoping it's the start of big bakey-type things.
Six glasses of water per day Yep.
Daily dog walk at a fast pace I walk with a friend and her dog every Sunday so that was easy.
No looking at my phone in bed. I have an addiction here which is seriously affecting my sleep. I'm changing this one because I found a cheat! On Saturday night I stayed up until 2 am and played on my phone downstairs. The target is now 'No looking at my phone in bed, or after 11pm'.
No money wasting. Balance YNAB daily. Petrol bought but that's all.

Seasidegal58

Hi Happy - I've posted my Day 2 on my diary - all still going well apart from the fact that after going to bed reasonably early for me, I tossed and turned and couldn't get to sleep for ages then woke up again before getting up at the crack of dawn for work! I think my body clock needs to adapt!


Clever old Mr Happy! Yes you must encourage him on the baking front! And I think your amendment of No 5 on your list is an excellent idea too!:D


Honey: what leg stretches do you do? I'm finding that this extra brisk walking of mine is giving me a few aches.:eek:

Honey_Bear

• Lose more weight, ideally down to 65kgs by 1 September. Yes no but no, as my grandmother used to say. I hear you, Happy, but sadly the bathroom situation thing isn't working for me. 65.9 kgs this morning, as feared. That's down to cheese and dark chocolate ginger biscuits, Morrison's own, but not together, obviously. Utterly addictive. I seem to have lost half a packet, too, or I ate them without realising what I was doing - far more likely.
  
• 15 minutes Flying a day, Monday to Friday; Three hours! None of it involved a duster or the vacuum cleaner but gibble left the house, a bed got made and various cupboards are a lot tidier than they were. *gleaming halo*
  
• Leg stretches, one minutes for each stretch. I did them, and my legs are agony today, which just goes to show how much exercise I've been getting. For the foreseeable future I need to do them twice a day, or this will just get worse and worse.
• Lights out by 11.30 pm (I too have a screen addiction and have taken to watching slightly bizarre Youtube videos late at night - sadly rather addictive.) Success! And I woke up at 5.30 am, which is just the best of the best for me. It feels like a lie-in and I'm up and about at a respectable time without it hurting.

Honey_Bear

Seasidegal58 wrote: »

Honey: what leg stretches do you do? I'm finding that this extra brisk walking of mine is giving me a few aches.:eek:

Not sure what the stretches are called, or what the muscles that I'm stretching are called, but I'll try and describe what I do and why.

26 years ago I moved from a two bedroom flat to a three storey five bedroomed house, and spent the first three months racing up and down the stairs in my spare time to get it ready to do theatre digs. So, going from a sedentary office job and life to a frantic life, getting the house ready to do theatre digs at 37-ish meant that I pulled most of my leg muscles, which hurt like yellow bu**ery for about 10 years before I decided to do something about it. I do these at bedtime, when I'm warm and the muscles are warm; don't do them cold, or first thing in the morning. The stretches I was taught to do for the muscles I'd pulled were:

Thigh muscles. Stand foursquare next to something you can stabilise yourself on or with; no need to topple over doing these. Lift up your right foot and get it as close to your bum as possible, right cheek, nothing clever/stupid like crossing it over, and then bring the knees together. This one stretches the big muscle running down the outside of the thigh which causes referred pain just above the knee. Hold it for one minute. It will hurt a bit, and if it hurts too much, relax the closeness to the bum. If it feels like cramp, don't do it until the cramp goes away. Start slowly and gently if needed.

Repeat for the left leg - my right leg was always worse than my left leg, and when in doubt do the bit that needs the most help first because if you get interrupted at least you've done the bit that needed it most.

Calf muscles. Stand foursquare to something you can lean into, about 18" away from it - a kitchen counter is an ideal height for me at 5'3", or something a bit higher, which my chest of drawers happens to be. Put your right leg out behind you, about 18 - 20" until you can feel the calf muscles sting a little bit. Hold the stretch for 1 minute, and then repeat for the left side.

If a minute is too much to begin with, try 30 seconds, and if that's too much, try 20 seconds per stretch. Don't rock, just gradually stretch the muscle fibres back into alignment. Even 10 - 15 seconds per stretch is better than nothing. I use the kitchen timer.

If anyone thinks any of this is wrong, please say so. I did it fifteen years ago for about a year last thing at night and it saved my legs, but things may have moved on or I may have remembered the instructions wrongly. (I don't think so because it's working already.)

Honey_Bear

HappyNow wrote: »

Zero alcohol - Tick. Didn't even think about booze yesterday. Had you not tipped that wine away you'd have been thinking about it, so well done on being so decisive.
Maximum of 1400 calories per day, to include 5 x fruit and veg and just one sweet treat. Fitbit says I ate 1421 calories. Close enough. SEVEN portions of F & V. Sweet treat was a bit bizarre. Mr H suddenly decided, for the first time in his life, to make scones. He got out the old Bero book (am I the only one that still has that?) and cracked on. They were DELICIOUS but I only ate one. If I'm honest I would have preferred chocolate, but I do want to encourage him. He enjoyed it so I'm hoping it's the start of big bakey-type things. I like the sound of Mr Happy's baking. Yes, you're probably the only person left on the planet with that particular cookbook, so it's probably worth a fortune. (I put one of my mother's old Elizabeth David paperbacks on Amazon a few years ago and the V&A bought it!) Is he still smuggling the occasional bacon sandwich past you?
Six glasses of water per day Yep. Well done.
Daily dog walk at a fast pace I walk with a friend and her dog every Sunday so that was easy. Didn't you used to run on Sundays?
No looking at my phone in bed. I have an addiction here which is seriously affecting my sleep. I'm changing this one because I found a cheat! On Saturday night I stayed up until 2 am and played on my phone downstairs. The target is now 'No looking at my phone in bed, or after 11pm'. I let myself watch my completely bizarre You Tubers on Sunday evening until 11.30 when I forced myself to slam the laptop. I can't wait to indulge again this evening. This is sick, isn't it?!
No money wasting. Balance YNAB daily. Petrol bought but that's all.

Well done on the financial front.

Dolphin1

Hi all

I'm back with some targets. I have really been struggling with everything lately so, instead of trying to fix it all at once, I'm going to work on just a few things...


1) Be in bed by 10.00pm and light out by 10.30pm Sunday to Thursday (when I have to be up at 6.15am the next morning).

2) At least 30 minutes walking during the day (for the exercise but also to get me out of the house).

3) Drink 3 bottles of water a day (I have a refillable water bottle that holds 0.5l and I'm not refilling it as often as I should be).


...and that's it for now. I feel that if I work on these then it will have a positive influence on other areas that I have let slip like my weight and energy levels so I need to get these sorted before I set any specific targets in those areas.

Dolphin1

HappyNow - I buy the Tesco Value bottled water too as it's only 17p a bottle but I've had to start going in to store for it now because they have stopped delivering it. The cheapest one that I can get delivered is 45p a bottle. :mad:

Honey Bear - I do the Calf Muscle stretch regularly as I sometimes have cramp in bed at night and find that it helps with that. I think it was a podiatrist that told me about it several years ago when I suffered with shin splints.