Happy First Day of Fall! Another glorious summer is now over and in the books. And while summer is by far my favorite season, I do enjoy autumn in Washington. The morning air is cool and crisp, the leaves on the trees are turning to vibrant oranges and reds, and I can start adding back some of my favorite sweaters to my wardrobe.
A lot of people take a break from their normal routines in summertime, whether they’re on a vacation or just spending as much time outside as possible to take advantage of the nice weather. Then once fall comes, it’s back to the grind. School is back in session, the days are shorter, temperatures are cooler. With more of the year gone than remaining, it’s a great time to reflect on where we started, and where we want to be by the time we bid 2015 goodbye.
Since the start of the year, I’ve been struggling with the extra ten pounds I gained in 2014. I started off January strong by going on a diet, but gave up by mid-February and lost all progress I’d made. Over the summer I spent a lot of time outside, and not a lot of time whatsoever in the gym. I indulged a lot. I had fun. Then after Labor Day, I thought to myself, okay, time to reign it in a bit. Time to get back on track. Honestly though, what was I trying to get back on track to accomplish? Yes, I’d like to drop those pesky ten pounds, but was that really the extent of my end game? I know I didn’t do myself any favors by trying to lose weight through dieting. It just doesn’t work for me. I had my greatest successes in the past when I gave up on diets and just focused on being fit and healthy.
I’ve ultimately decided that I do need to recommit, but to my goal from years ago of taking care of myself and living a balanced life. No diets. No extreme workouts. No restrictions and nothing off-limits. Maybe now that I’m in my thirties, what I weigh and look like right now is what the new normal will be for me. I’m not sure if that thinking falls into the category of self-acceptance or if I’m simply giving up and saying I can’t get back to where I was, but either way I am at peace with it.
I’ve spent the month so far packing myself healthy lunches, enjoying my Zumba classes, walks outside, and Body Combat classes at my gym (if you have access to a 24 Hour Fitness,check these classes out, they’re awesome!). I’ve been determined to make more home-cooked meals for dinner and have really enjoyed trying out easy, healthy recipes. Every time I try something new and Bill goes back for seconds, I practically radiate with pride that I made dinner and it was good. I’m balancing these healthy habits with some not-so-healthy, but fun ones: I still play trivia with my friends every Wednesday night at American Brewing Co., and I’m not going to go to my favorite brewery and not enjoy one of their delicious beers! I still eat a slice of birthday cake when someone is celebrating at the office. I still enjoy nice dinners out with Bill. I feel that these indulgences are absolutely okay if I’m eating healthily the rest of the time. And I am no longer going to force myself through workouts that I don’t enjoy. There are so many options for exercise that I love doing, so it seems silly to make myself miserable doing things (like running on treadmills!) that I just don’t like. I’ve exercised much more consistently and felt much more satisfied with my workouts since making this promise to myself.
In keeping with the be-healthy theme, I went to see my doctor this week for a wellness visit. She assured me that my weight and BMI are within the normal range and that she is pleased with where I’m at, and also said that my exercise frequency and levels were exactly where she likes to see them. So, there you have it. I’m healthy, I’m not overweight, I don’t NEED to lose ten pounds. What I do need to do is live a healthy lifestyle and take care of myself.
When I was younger, what I weighed was very much tied into my self-worth and how I felt about myself. This, thankfully, is no longer the case at all. I love my life, just as it is. It’s filled with love and happiness. A number on a scale does not define me and it does not determine my value. I refuse to let it. And anyone who likes me less because I weigh a bit more is not worth my time or energy.
Recommitting to living a healthy life – and giving up on weight loss goals – has been incredibly freeing to me. I am peaceful, calm, happy. And those things are greater than anything a number on a scale could ever say about me.

Earlier this year, I declared that I was going to attempt to grow out my hair after rocking a pixie cut for the last half of 2014. By July, I definitely had gotten back to a bob:

 
It was cute, for sure…but it wasn’t fun. And more and more I found myself contemplating going back to the pixie. I guess cutting off my hair is addicting.
I found a great new stylist, Lendy,  in my new hometown of Edmonds, Ombu Salon. At first, I simply had her trim and shape my cut, but a week later I called her back and told her that while I loved what she had done, I wanted a new style. I showed her some photos and we talked about things I like and things I don’t, and when I left her chair it was with what is hands-down the best cut I have ever had. I get so many compliments on my pixie cut!

I feel SO much prettier with my new hair and I have a lot of fun styling it every day. Even though my hair is definitely really short (no ponytails for me!) there are a lot of things I can do with it and a lot of different products I can use to achieve different looks. For everyday office hair, I keep it simple and spritz my hair with a spray wax (Bed Head Head Banger is a really great product) to add texture, tame any flyaways with my flat iron, and finish with a flexible-hold hair spray to keep everything in place. If I want more of a bedhead look on the weekends, I use a defining cream from Helios Essentials to create a more piecey look.
My advice to anyone contemplating a new look is to go for it. I wish I hadn’t spent so many years with long, boring hair just because I was afraid that short hair wasn’t for me or that I wouldn’t look good. Once I took the plunge I found that I actually look way better with short hair, and I have a lot more fun rocking it!

Oh hi.
It’s been awhile.
I haven’t blogged in, like, forever (okay, in 136 days – thank you, WordPress) and there have been some major changes in my life. It’s been a crazy few months and I have honestly been too busy living life to take time at the end of the day to write about life. But I miss writing. So, to get back in the swing of things, here’s what’s new and exciting:
I got a fabulous new job. In February, completely on a whim, I browsed job postings at the local power company and came across a job description for a position that was very similar to what I had been doing for the last few years. I applied, but it’s been so long since I put myself out there and applied for any position with another company that I tried very hard not go get my hopes up. I was excited when they called me for an interview but still trying to be realistic, and I went into it trying to stay in the mentality that even if I didn’t get the job, the interview experience was a great opportunity. But after meeting the people and hearing more about the job, I found myself calling Bill afterwards and saying, “I really, REALLY, want this!” And luckily, the company really wanted me, and called me a few days later to offer me the job. I had to keep myself from shrieking “YES!” as I tried to stay calm while accepting the offer.
I’ve been in my new job for four months now and I absolutely love it. I work for such a nice company and the people I’ve gotten to know and work with are all fantastic. As for my time at the phone company (eleven and a half years total), I am incredibly grateful for all the opportunities I was given and the amazing friends I made throughout my time there.
I moved to Edmonds with Bill. Yep, we took the plunge and moved in together. So far it’s been bliss. I love our cute apartment. I love seeing each other every day, and I love being in Edmonds. My parents came to visit us for the 4th of July and it was SO nice having a nice space for them to stay. I had a lot of fun taking them to the little local places that Bill and I have fallen in love with, and taking advantage of our close proximity to the water by taking a ferry boat to Kingston for lunch one day. I’m definitely an Edmonds kind of girl and I’ve found the place for me.
I fell off the Dukan Diet wagon and never climbed back on. My last post in February was one in which I admitted that I was struggling to stay on a diet that was at first pretty easy to stick to, and that I had gained back a little weight. I never got back into the diet and ultimately re-gained most of what I had lost at the beginning of the year. Weight loss continues to be a struggle for me. On the positive side, Bill and I joined 24 Hour Fitness and have been going pretty regularly after work, and I’ve started going back to Zumba on Mondays (long drive to get there, but well worth it). I do see some changes, particularly increased muscle tone, that I’m happy about. I’m working to rehab my eating as my failed attempt at Dukan has only reinforced my belief that DIETS DON’T WORK. Now I’m focusing on making healthy choices, one meal at a time, while allowing myself to make a bad choice every now and then. Currently I’m 9 pounds away from my goal weight. I’ll get there. It’s just not going to be fast .
In other news, I’m turning 31 next week. Time flew by and I can’t believe my first year in “Phase 3” (as Bill calls it) is almost over. It’s been such an amazing year full of great experiences. It’ll definitely be a hard one to top!
It feels good to be back from my unintended blogging hiatus. Maybe I won’t let another 136 days pass before I write again….

I just completed Week Six of my eating plan, and I’ve dropped another pound! That puts me at an even eight pounds down in the six weeks I’ve been following Dukan eating. These results are staggering to me, especially considering that I haven’t been following the diet exactly and have had my share of falls off the wagon.
Last Saturday was Valentine’s Day, and I was not about to worry myself with what I was eating over this special weekend. Bill treated me to a romantic dinner at Anthony’s in Edmonds, and also took me for a fantastic lunch yesterday at Ivar’s in Mukilteo. Both meals were delicious, and I focused completely on the amazing man that I was with and celebrating our wonderful relationship together and didn’t worry even slightly about the fact that my food choices were not Dukan-approved.
And that’s the thing I’m reminded of week after week of doing this: I am making lifestyle choices. I am choosing to eat better most of the time, and leaving splurges to a treat meal or so a week instead of just eating anything in sight. And as a result I am feeling so much better, both physically and emotionally, and when I do choose to have an off-plan meal I don’t feel guilty because I’m no longer doing it all the time. I feel like I’m back in control of what I’m eating and that feels great!
I’ve decided that going forward I’m going to change how I judge my weekly results. So far I’ve just been comparing my weight from one Monday to the next, but weight fluctuates and that method may not give me the most accurate picture of how I’m doing. So instead, beginning next week I’ll be comparing my average week loss for the week to that of the week before. I’m interested to see how this new method plays out!

Week five of the Dukan Diet, quite frankly, was hard. I don’t know if I was struggling because I ate popcorn and a slice of cake during the Super Bowl, or if I was just finally having cravings after weeks of changed eating, but I had a really hard time last week. I lost a record low of 0.6lbs, which didn’t make me feel any better about things.
I was craving everything. One night, I wanted pizza. Another, I was dying for a good Mexican burrito and some chips and salsa. I found out that Dairy Queen has red velvet Blizzards now, and I really did consider getting one. By Friday I gave in and had a cheeseburger and fries with Rachel, but other than that, I really did stick to my eating plan. But where for the first month, it was a breeze, for some reason last week it was hell.
I’m disappointed at my low number for the week, but I’m trying to remind myself that any loss is progress, and that my weight loss is going to go more slowly now that I’m getting closer to my goal. I’ve also promised myself that I’m going to work out at least three days this week, not just my lunchtime walks but real exercise sessions either in the gym or at home. I may just be at a point where the food plan alone isn’t enough to reach the weight I want.
My other new strategy for this week involves eating earlier. I’m working ten-hour shifts right now that end at 6pm. That means I’m leaving the office, driving the half hour to get home, and then making dinner…most nights I don’t eat until at least 7:30, and that may just be too late for dinner. So as of this week I’m officially bringing all three of my meals and both my snacks to work with me. It is definitely NOT ideal, but who knows, maybe it’ll help. And maybe things will quiet down a bit at work and I won’t have to work such long hours soon.
So, all in all it was a bit of a discouraging week, but I’m going to try and not let it get to me. I still lost weight, I still stuck to my eating plan with one exception despite wanting to eat all the things. I’m hoping that this week the cravings will subside and I’ll feel better. But just in case, please nobody let me anywhere near Dairy Queen.

Now that I’ve been on the Dukan Diet for a month, I’ve pretty much grown tired of the foods that were my initial go-to meals and decided it was time for something different. My breakfast in the mornings has typically been turkey sausage links, but a girl can only eat so much turkey sausage before she needs something different.
I started browsing recipes on Pinterest for ideas, and decided to try making scrambled egg muffins. I was a bit skeptical of how they’d turn out, but I really like them! I made them with all protein, but you can also add vegetables like onions, tomato slices, mushrooms, or any others. Here’s the recipe I’ve concocted:
Scrambled Egg Muffins
What you’ll need: 
6 eggs
2 tbsp Nonfat milk
Bacon Bits
Grated cheese (I used a Mexican blend, but any cheese you like is fine)
Pepper
Preheat your oven to 350 degrees. Line a muffin tin with paper muffin liners and place bacon bits at the bottom of each paper.
In a mixing bowl, combine eggs and milk and beat eggs, adding in pepper for seasoning. Pour mixture into muffin liners over bacon bits. Sprinkle cheese on top.
Bake muffins for 20-25 minutes.
 
I let my muffins cool and then transferred them from the muffin tin to a storage container and put them in the fridge. Every morning I can pull out one or two and reheat them in the microwave (I put them in for about a minute and a half) and they make a great breakfast!
 

I just finished my fourth week on the Dukan Diet, and dropped another 1.2lbs! It’s hard to believe that I’ve lost 6.4lbs in just four weeks of eating better. And it’s even harder to believe that I’ve lost that weight while still allowing myself an occasional splurge, and without being hungry or suffering through cravings for junk food!
I’m starting to notice physical changes in myself now that the weight is coming off. Not only do I appear slimmer, but my clothes reflect that I’m definitely smaller than I was four weeks ago. I hung onto most of my clothes from before I gained weight, and I can wear a lot of them again. In fact, today I proudly wore a slinky black dress to work that I absolutely love. I haven’t worn the dress in months because it just didn’t hang right after I gained weight, but I’ve gotten tons of compliments on it today.
The dress wasn’t my only milestone for the week. At the beginning of January, I bought myself a new pair of jeans that at the time were a size smaller than I was able to wear. After noticing that my bigger jeans were getting pretty baggy, I decided to try on the smaller ones and see if I would be able to squeeze into them yet. To my delight, they fit perfectly, and I ordered two more pairs.  And I’m now wearing a ring on my middle finger that just a few weeks ago fit on my ring finger!
Yesterday was the Super Bowl, so I honestly didn’t worry too much about what I was eating. I enjoyed all the food I wanted while I watched the game, and am back to following my diet today. And that’s the lifestyle I’m trying to establish for myself: eating healthy most of the time but enjoying the occasional treat meal or splurge without feeling guilty about it. That’s how I kept weight off before, and it’s how I plan to do it again. I know I’ve been saying this every week, but I’m still amazed at how simple this change has been to make and how much better I feel because of it. If I keep losing weight at this pace, I’ll be able to transition to the Consolidation Phase sometime in March. I’m really excited for that phase because at that point I’ll get to re-introduce daily servings of fruit and whole grain bread, which means apple slices and sandwiches!
I truly couldn’t be happier with my experiences so far on the Dukan eating plan and I’m very glad I decided to try it.

Yesterday, I talked about trying out the Hour of Power workout with Bill over the weekend and how it kicked  my butt. We did the workout on Saturday night, and by yesterday I was really feeling sore. Since I like a hard workout and pretty much expect that I will be sore the next day (I actually get mad if I don’t!), this DVD impressed me a lot.

What makes this workout special (and incredibly hard!) is that it is a cardio workout that makes the muscles of your upper body work just as hard as your lower ones. Loose translation: you jump around while doing about a million reps with weights.

When I’ve done gym workouts with dumbbells, I’ve usually grabbed 5- to 8-pound weights, depending on the intensity of the workout. But Bill warned me beforehand that I did NOT want to start off Hour of Power with more than 2-pound weights. To which I thought, yikes, this is gonna be hard.

Oh, it was hard.

On Saturday we scooted the couch out of the way in my living room and I had my first look at Hour of Power (one thing to note: the DVD is issued in the UK, so it doesn’t work in a lot of traditional US DVD players. I was able to play the disc on my laptop, which I connected to my TV). I grabbed my cute little pink 2-pound weights and then proceeded to follow along with Rajko Radovic as he led us through a warm-up that could seriously have been a full workout of its own, in my opinion.

Just as I was feeling winded and sweaty, we finished the warm up and launched into the workout itself. It consisted of a combination of easy cardio steps, really just bouncing back and forth from one foot to the next, while doing what at the time feels like endless reps with the dumbbells. It didn’t take long at all for me to be dripping with sweat, and my arms were screaming at me to put down what by then felt like hundred-pound weights. I am nothing if not stubborn, and since I had promised myself that I was going to make it through the workout without stopping I pushed through. It helped a lot that the reps are set to music, and I was able to focus on the beat and my steps instead of how much my arms were burning! But Rajko does offer options to modify down for a bit if you need a rest, which I liked. I also liked that once you get used to the workout, you can always increase the weight of the dumbbells you’re using to push yourself harder.

My overall impression of Hour of Power was that it’s a challenging, fast-paced workout that kept me engaged the whole time. I now feel that it’s a must-own, and I will be ordering my own copy of the DVD.

Another week down! I weighed myself this morning and had lost 1lb since last week,  for a total loss so far of 5.2lbs! I’m about a third of the way to my goal weight, which is really exciting to me!
I’m 21 days into this diet, and at this point I would describe my approach to weight loss as Dukan-ish. I haven’t been doing the best job of alternating my protein-only and protein/veggie days…I’ve been eating veggies pretty much every day…but I really don’t feel too bad about eating healthy vegetables like broccoli and salad.
I probably would have had better weight loss results this week if I hadn’t succumbed to temptation and devoured about seven chocolate chip cookies that my coworker Nicholas brought to the office last week. He makes amazing cookies and despite my love of them, I would have been able to pass them up had it not been his last week working with us before moving on from the company, so since it was very likely the last time I’d have a chance to eat them I indulged. I should’ve stopped at one, maybe two, but I sort of lost my mind and just kept eating them throughout the day. It taught me an important lesson: I’m still not in a place where I can have one cookie. Desserts have always been my weakness, and it seems they still are. My approach going forward is going to be to avoid things like that unless they come in a pre-measured amount.
Other than that, it was a good week food-wise, and I got in a couple of good workouts too. Monday night I went to Zumba, and felt absolutely amazing afterwards. On Saturday, Bill and I worked out to his Hour of Power DVD, which truly kicked my ass. I like getting in good workouts and would like to try and add at least one more in this week, so that I’ll hit my weight loss goal looking fit and toned instead of merely slimming down.
I continue to be amazed at how good I feel following this diet. I had balked at doing Dukan last year when my coworkers started it, thinking it was too strict and I would never be able to follow it long enough to succeed. Now that I know just how energetic and healthy I feel, and how little I crave the junk food I used to think I couldn’t live without, I wish I had done this sooner! I do look forward to getting to the Consolidation Phase and adding some more things back in, but I also feel like I can get through a couple more months in the Cruise Phase without feeling unhappy or deprived.
 

At the beginning of the year I resolved to lose weight and get my finances in order in 2015. We’re not quite through January, and after wavering back and forth I’ve come up with yet another goal for this year: I want to grow out my pixie cut.
I cut my long hair into a short, stacked bob in April of last year, and was thrilled with the change. Even though I was absolutely in love with my cut, I had always wished that I was daring enough to try a pixie cut. I admired women with such short hair, especially when my own long, blonde locks were decidedly boring in comparison. So in June, I decided to just go for it and take the plunge, and got the pixie cut I’d always wanted to try.

It was fantastic. I loved it. My short hair was cute, flirty, and everything I’d hoped it would be.
But now it’s been several months, and I’m bored with my hair. Anyone who has known me for any length of time knows that I tire of my hairstyle easily and like to change it up. I’ve had lots of different haircuts and hair colors over the years, and once again I’m ready for something new.
All that to say, I’ve decided to grow out my pixie cut.
Anyone who has ever grown out a short cut is probably snickering at me right now, because the process is quite frankly a PAIN. You go through lots of awkward stages during growout that will tempt even the most patient of pixies to head to the salon to get their hair whacked off again. I knew that there had to be people out there with advice, so I took to the Internet to do some research about how to go about growing my pixie into a short bob. There are lots of great articles and posts on the subject, my favorite being this one by Rachel Perkins. Across the board, one of the biggest pieces of advice offered up by successful former pixies is to get regular trims and discuss your growout plan with your stylist. I know that sounds counterintuitive: you want your hair to grow longer, so why cut it? But the reasoning behind it is to keep shaping your hair into the style that you ultimately want instead of just getting shaggy, uneven hair, and also to keep your hair healthy and free of split ends. I know I don’t want to reach my ideal hair length, just to have a ton of split ends that need to be cut off!
First, I hunted around and found a picture of what I want my hair to end up looking like. I know I don’t want to have really long hair again, I just want a bit longer style, like an inverted bob. I came across this style and just fell in love:

 
Then I made an appointment with Annie, my favorite stylist, and showed her what I had in mind. She assured me that she could get me from my current length to what I had in mind without too much grief, and that it was a great cut to transition to.
Having short hair will definitely give you an idea of what sections of your hair grow the fastest. For me, the hair at the base of my neck gets long faster than any other place on my head, so after five or six weeks I begin to have a bit of a mullet going on. Annie trimmed that hair shorter and angled my hair so it’s longer in front. Ultimately, the goal is to let the hair at the crown of my head catch up to the hair at the base of my neck in length. She texturized and shaped the sides of my hair, and neatened up my bangs (I’m trying to grow them out, I hate having short bangs).
Now the hair at the crown of my head needs to grow about another inch before it can be blended into the hair at the base of my neck. The sides of my hair are going to take a bit longer to finish rowing out, since I want them to end up about chin-length. Already I can see my ultimate hairstyle taking shape, and with my hair freshly trimmed I have zero urge to cut it off right now (we shall see how I feel in a few weeks though!).

 
To style my hair during the growing-out process, I have become rather hair product obsessed. My hair is on the fine side, so I’ve been using OGX Thick & Full Biotin Shampoo to give myself more volume (and because supposedly biotin helps hair grow faster). It smells nice, and my hair definitely looks fuller since I’ve started using it. For styling, I’m loving Bed Head by TIGI products. After I wash my hair, I apply Bed Head Small Talk Thickifier for added volume and Bed Head After Party to protect my hair from heat styling (this product also makes my hair super shiny!). Once my hair is dry, I flat iron the front pieces just to smooth them into place, and then apply Bed Head Head Banger spray wax to my roots for some extra volume and texture.
I’m super happy with the shaping Annie did with my hair last night, and I really can see my desired style starting to emerge. I’m also happy to be free of that mullet! And I’m excited to be sporting my new style by summer.