Making It Work

It's amazing what a difference a few days make. Instead of wallowing in my misery, I decided to do something. Change comes from action, right? I had accumulated a ton of points from Christmas shopping through My Points, and I decided I was going to cash them in for Amazon gift cards and get myself a Fitbit. Because I am home so much since it's the slow season for school photography, I've been sitting around, A LOT, playing Candy Crush and watching marathons of just about anything on Bravo. Inactivity does not help with the process of weight loss, nor the funky gray cloud that seemed to envelop me. A Fitbit would help motivate me to move and be active.

With my gift cards, I also got a Jackie Warner exercise DVD, a box of Atkins protein bars and 8 boxes of South Beach protein bars. All for just $14 of MY money!!!

I reached out to friends who I knew had a Fitbit, as well. Having a partner in an endeavor keeps me honest and inspired. A little friendly competition helps get my engine going, as well! I asked Meredith, my team mate from From Fat To Finish Line about her experience with the device and she suggested 10,000 steps a day for me and 15,000 for her. Since I mentioned how excited I was about getting the Fitbit, my friend and team mate Carly has also jumped on board!! Let me tell you, 10,000 steps is a lot. A solid hour of walking/running, getting me through 4+ miles, isn't equal to 10,000 steps! So, suffice it to say, being home, accumulating steps has been keeping my house clean! Any excuse and tactic needed to get some steps in, I'm doing it. I have plenty of spare time, so taking several trips to get the laundry up and down the stairs and away in drawers/closets is not a big deal. It may seem crazy to an outsider looking in, but they don't have to get on the scale for me or wear my jeans!

So I've had my Fitbit Zip ($51.99 on Amazon!) since the 27th, and I've hit my 10,000 step goal every day and two days I've managed to surpass 15,000! To achieve that yesterday, I walked in my neighborhood fast for 55 minutes and took Molly for a half hour walk (a slow 1.3 miles with her sniffing every pile of poop and blade of grass she could get to), along with my regular activity of the day. Not terribly taxing to achieve it, but on Sunday, after pacing for an hour while watching the Oscars to hit 15k, my legs felt like I ran a half marathon!

The Fitbit website is motivating as well. You receive badges for hitting goals in 5,000 step increments. It has graphs and charts and it ranks your friends 1st through 10th place in steps for the week. For those of you that like to keep track of everything, the Fitbit will fulfill your needs. There is even a version of the Fitbit that tracks your sleep and stair climbing total. Gee, this sounds like a review! I'm just excited about it! Let me know if you have one and we can support each other! I'm either Linda Kuil or Linda K. on the website.