Have been so busy, new video for the week!

Hi everyone, sorry I have been a bit M.I.A. I have just been so busy lately, my daughter is heading off to Australia for over a month which is going to kill me and I have been busy arranging passport, getting her motivated to get packing and today the day has finally arrived and her and I are travelling back to my home town Gisborne where I will hand her over to my parents who will then fly out next Wednesday..phew!

Here is my YouTube video for this week, I'm so sorry it's late I had a few technical difficulties!

I hope you are all well, and I will definitely be posting from Gisborne and will upload some photos. Take care, Barbs xx

And so the vlogging starts: Week 1

Here is my first vlog which I am just calling Week 1 because I cannot come up with a fancy schmancy name for my vlogs, it's what happens when you stay up too late and are so tired that you can't come up with anything clever. Enjoy!

Ebony and Ivory

Yesterday was such a glorious day, the weather was amazing and I loved my workout in the morning. I was sweating as if I had just  landed in Samoa, walked across the tarmac and instantly felt sweat dribbling down my legs, which incidentally did happen last year :)

The weather is definitely warming up here in New Zealand and I'm loving the extra burn I'm getting, however, I have also acquired the most ridiculous tan lines. My arms are shocking, I'm ebony and ivory in one! I wear a really good sunblock and yet I still tan. Genetics plays a huge part in this as my parents' are both part Polynesian. Do I think it's a bad thing having my skin change colour? no absolutely not but I would like an all over tan rather than looking like a walking life sized neenish tart!

Excuse the grainy picture!

I did it, I'm back at YouTube!

Well like I said a couple of posts ago, I'm back at YouTube and I am extremely glad to be back there. I have reconnected with some fantastic friends, and am so happy that anyone actually remembers me :) Relationships are so important when you are on a weight loss journey and I realise the importance of keeping those relationships going. I am so excited I can barely contain myself!

So here is the video I posted at 4:30am this morning with my lower eyelids hitting the table as I rendered this video for what seemed like an eternity! Note to self, never video on two different formats, silly, silly goot! Am I tired, hell no! I even did my 7.8km this morning, it's a fantastically brilliant day!

Feeling a little ho-hum

Well today, actually yesterday it's 2:17am at the moment, yesterday was a bit ho-hum, I felt a bit out of sorts like I've had a disturbance or something and I cannot get back into line, does that make sense? Yeah I think it does.  When I get like this I tend to feel a bit let down or lost even and then that's when the cravings kick in and boy did they ever do that today...grr...yesterday! I obviously need sleep don't I?

Curbing those cravings were a lot harder than usual, in fact I felt it was near impossible to stay on track, but I pulled myself together and came through, I've been feeling a bit like this for almost a week and it's driving me nuts! Luckily working out and eating right is so ingrained in me that I will not go off my plan!

Another thing that is not sitting well with me at the moment is that I promised I would help a friend with his weight loss and well, I haven't been, there's a communication issue and seeing that I don't like to be a giant pain in the ass, I have left it at that and now I feel bad about it. I guess I will just wait and see if he still wants me to help him to get moving and to reach his goals which I would love to see because he really deserves it!

There's not much else to say except I wish my rendering would hurry up so I can upload this video to youtube and then go to bed!

Nite xx

Salmon with Gremolata & Jasmine Rice

My favourite fish of all time is salmon, it's rich, full of omega oils and while it can be expensive to buy fresh, you only need a small amount. The gremolata takes this fish to a whole new dimension, the lemon and herbs are fresh and tasty it's a power packed vitamin meal.

You can use brown rice instead of Jasmine, whatever floats your boat :)

NOTE: The fish is cooked on the stove and in the oven so you will need a pan that can be put into the oven.





Ingredients - serves 2

2 x 150g salmon fillets, skin on
2 tablespoons Cajun seasoning (approx)
1 tablespoon olive oil


GREMOLATA
2 cloves garlic, chopped finely or grated
3 tablespoons flat leaf parsley
1 tablespoon grated lemon rind


TO SERVE
6 asparagus spears
1 cup of jasmine rice

Preheat your oven to 180C (350F)

Bring water to the boil in a steamer and steam the asparagus until tender, at the same time cook the rice as per directions on the pack.

Place the lemon rind, parsley and garlic into a bowl and mix together. Take a chopping board and sprinkle the mixture onto the chopping board. 

Season the salmon fillet with with a little sea salt and cracked black pepper then sprinkle cajun spice over both sides of the fillets.

Heat a non-stick pan with the olive oil and cook the salmon skin side down until the skin is crispy then flip the salmon fillets over and put the pan into the oven to finish the cooking process. 

Remove the salmon fillets from the pan and place onto the chopping board covering the salmon with the gremolata, cover both sides of the fish.

TO SERVE

Divide the asparagus spears onto each plate and place a fillet of salmon (skin side up) on top of the asparagus. Lastly place the rice next to the salmon and garnish with coriander and a slice of lemon.

My crazy love affair with lettuce!

My daughter's think their mother has lost the plot because while they sit down to eat their calorie laden icecream, I am sitting there with a bowl of lettuce, yes that's right lettuce! No dressing, no nothing just the lettuce and it has to be iceberg. I've become a bit of a looney detective going through the lettuce display at the supermarket checking them all before finding the biggest and healthiest looking lettuce I can find. Just yesterday one of the staff came over and said "you must really like lettuce", I said to him "I'm like an alcoholic is with booze, I can't get enough", and it's true, I can eat a whole one everyday! Is eating this like a maniac helping with my weight loss? you betcha! It helps curb my appetite especially at night, as I've always been a night time snacker and when I get the urge, I just dive into the fridge and grab me some crisp green goodness. My daughter says it's like living with a human sized rabbit!

So what are the health benefits of eating lettuce? It's low in saturated fat and cholesterol, a good source of iron, vitamin B6, K, A and C and is high in dietary fibre. It also contains traces of omega fatty acids and folate. Is this the only vegetable I eat? no of course not, I eat a lot of dark greens, carrots, sprouts, mushrooms and a lot of cruciferous vegetables. So come on, get your lettuce on!

What's that green stuff you're drinking?

I love green smoothies especially this recipe. I was face timing my sister one day and whilst talking to her I was enjoying the fresh deliciousness of my green smoothie, she looked at me, asked what it was, I told her and she greeted me with a face that suggested that one of these power packed morsels was never going to pass her lips.

So what is in my smoothie? It's mostly vegetables, yes that's right VEGES! I had seen Dr Oz create a smoothie on his show and decided to give it a try and I loved it, I did have to modify the recipe as kale is not readily available in New Zealand at a price I believe is fair, so I replace kale with either spinach or silverbeet.

Here's the recipe: take everything you see in the picture below, throw it into a blender add two cups of water and whizz away! It makes around 4 standard glasses.

INGREDIENTS

1 banana
1 apple, skin on
2 stalks of celery
big huge handful of kale or other greens
1 tsp fresh grated ginger
2 tbspns chopped parsley
1 tbspn ground LSA (optional)
2 tsp spirulina powder
2 cups cold water

Finally, I found a gym!

Lately I have been thinking that it is about time I went somewhere to burn more fat and enhance the muscles that lie beneath the layers of fat that currently adorn my body, so I decided I'd go back and join a gym again.

View from the gym upstairs

Last year I belonged to an amazing gym but it's too far away so I needed to find an alternative and I found a great gym in the city called Ocean Spa. It's really quite nice, the gym part is a bit small, but you have the use of sauna's, lap pool, huge spa pool and another pool heated to 38 degrees where you can just relax and let the worries fade away! Will I be swimming, HELL NO! well, not yet anyway, I'm not quite prepared to reveal my chocolate ripple body to unsuspecting clients wanting to relax and not be freaked out at the sight of my half nakedness!

The personal trainer was really helpful, I told her what I wanted, and she suggested a lot of arm, leg and core work but with decent weights, not the prissy light ones so I was happy about that! Don't get me wrong, I just want to be toned and not have batwings, I'm not looking to being Mrs Hercules or anything like that eeeew!

She was very impressed at what I had done to get 21kg (46.2lb) off my body and she congratulated me and boy did I feel fabulous after that. I've done this thing mostly all by myself, concocted my own food and exercise regime and for once in my life, it's worked!!! I am very proud of myself, I deserve a giant pat on the back from me ;)

So I'm looking forward to getting started, not so much the weighing, measuring and blood pressure taking they do before you start, that I won't like but it's a necessary evil to be able to feel the burn!

YouTube videos...yes I'm finally ready!

A few years ago when on yet another weight loss trip, I would sit for hours watching videos on YouTube created by people like me trying to shift the almighty bulge. Seeing how brave these people were, I decided to give it a go and a few months later had acquired 500+ subscribers, it was so weird to me that people would be so interested in anything I had to say, I never got that much attention at home and yet people were taking time out of their lives to sit and watch me prattle on about myself. But as with anything, there was a downside, the comments. Most of the time they were encouraging and inspirational but I received a lot of flack and being as self conscious as I am I started to make less and less videos until I completely stopped altogether, but that wasn't the only thing that stopped, my weight loss did too.


That was 4 years ago and now I'm back and amazingly enough I still have 385 subscribers, more than likely though I will probably only get 3 views per video and do I care? of course I do, I need the support!  I am ready to take on the YouTube video challenge once again, but this time with a decent helping of "I don't care about the crap comments, I'm here for me" armour. I need to be in a community where I can share ideas and be inspired by other's efforts and hopefully offer something back in return.

So next Monday (NZ time) I shall post my first video and I promise to make them interesting rather than me sitting there barfing up an endless monologue of I'm doing this, I'm doing that, well that's the plan anyway :)

Not quite the day I expected.

Today has been a bit of a mixed bag, I can't say it was a good day, or a bad day either because it was really a mix of both. I woke up this morning at a reasonable hour and had the best sleep I'd had in a very long time. Then I get up and immediately my daughter's decide they're going to throttle each other and breakfast becomes yet again, a war zone!

They leave for school and I feel like I cannot be bothered going out and exercising, but I do, I kick my butt and get outside. I leave the house and  power half way down the road and with freezing nips decide to stop and pull on a warm top. I finally make it to town and against a huge head wind which blew my hair in all sorts of directions. Then whilst walking past a cafe down town I see a table of women dripping in label clothing and gold. One of them looks at me directly and says to her friends "oh disgraceful". I couldn't believe my ears! and before I knew what was happening I heard myself say "I heard you shit head!", yes, I had forgotten to switch on my be nice filter, and then I flicked her the bird, oh boy! Thing is, I am sick of these "career cafe" women who do nothing all day because they are married or dating some rich businessman (or woman) who is supporting them. I don't like confrontation and usually the thought of saying something back would fill me with fear, but somewhere deep inside me a fuse had been lit and it had to go!

After that annoyance I went home had a shower and came back to town as I thought it was high time that I try clothes on as mine are all staring to hang off me. I stood at the racks and grabbed a size 18 (US16) jeans and size 20 (US18) top, I thought this would be really funny since when I started this journey, I was a size 26 (US24) top and 24 (US22) jeans. I go into the changing room and OMG the top fits! the jeans, I could get them on but not do them up so it won't be long until those jeans will fit me! The funny thing is, I still see myself as that really big woman that started this journey and it's going to take a little getting used to looking at the shrinking me.

So as you can see, today was definitely a mixed bag of events :)

These shoes were made for walking....and hiking!

A few weeks ago, my parents arrived back from an overseas trip and decided to pass through here for a visit as we hadn't seen them for quite some time. My mum loves to walk, she is tiny and certainly does not look her age (please, let me have her late aging genes!). One morning we decided to go for a 7km along the parade and when I showed up she took one look at my beaten up Nikes and was horrified! "Barbara, how the hell are you walking in those, don't your feet get sore?" to which I said "yes". So we went for our walk then headed to town to exchange a shirt for my father and the next thing I knew she was dragging me into Kathmandu to get some new shoes.

Kathmandu is one of my favourite outdoor gear stores, they have the BEST jackets, packs, tents you name it, if it's outdoor gear you need, they have it, and yes even toilet tents!

So anyway we go into the store and she walks right over to the where the shoes are placed, grabs a pair and asks the sales guy to get them in my size, which happens to be size never mind, tall woman = big feet! Anyway he comes back and there are none in my size the biggest being a size 7 so I had to opt for a pair of men's in exactly the same style except red and black and thank goodness they had a pair to fit!

These shoes, I kid you not are VERY comfortable, at first they felt stiff because there is a metal sheath inside for stability, after all, they are a hiking shoe, but after a few 7km brisk walks, they feel great! They are 100% waterproof and glow in the dark so motorists can see you if you are out at night walking along a busy road like an idiot!

Progress Chart - I finally made one

Just click on the graphic

Finally I did it, 20kg gone!

Well it's actually 20.1kg if I want to be pedantic about it and heck yes I do, that extra 100g is mine!  :)

So I finally made it to one of my goals, how do I feel? friggin' fantastic all the hard slog has definitely paid off! Today I went for my usual walk and decided to do a little video of things I see along the way and once I got to town and spotted myself in a shop window, I freaked out at how small I have become, I'm still a big girl, but I'm not the size of a double decker bus anymore! I am not used to seeing myself that small, in fact, this is the smallest I have been in YEARS since I'm sure, my early 20's!

So what is the next goal I am striving for? 50lbs lost (22.7kg) is the next goal and that is only 6lbs (2.7kg) away. Why do I care about weight loss in pounds? I like to visualise my weight loss as something I can see in real life and staring at myself all day doesn't give me enough of a shock value. I go to the supermarket, head for the butter aisle and stack up blocks of butter as each block is 1lb. Stacking 50 of those suckers is going to be a real sight to see, I just hope I don't get told off for playing with deli goods in the supermarket :)

Time to tighten the wobbly bits

Well it's got to the point in my weight loss journey where I cannot just keep going for walks and that's it, I have to suck it up and start doing the exercises we love to hate, yes you guessed it, crunches and other stomach torture inducing activities. I have to admit though that after I have done the work I love the tightening feel that you get, but the next day, not so much as laughing and simple things like coughing can be a bit painful.

So today instead of my usual pathetic attempt of partaking in some crunches, I got online, found some ab workouts and now I sit here with that lovely tightening feeling I mentioned. Tomorrow will be interesting because not only did I put myself through an ab workout, I also did a multitude of squats, half height squats and the dreaded walking lunges. I can only imagine that tomorrow not only will I not be able to laugh without pain, I will most likely have a real job of trying to go to the loo from the pain in my legs I will be expecting in the morning.

All in all, it's been a fabulous workout today!