Sending Out 2015 With A Bang!

We are only a few hours away from ringing in 2016 and for the first time I don't know how many years we are sitting at home in our pajamas while our friends celebrate at G and Bo's resort, Lush, out on PK. Originally we were supposed to be on vacation but sweet Fenway's bad eye got an infection and the surgery was supposed to have this Spring got moved up to New Year's Eve!

Over the last few days as we have been home bound administering eye drops to Fenway every hour on the hour, I had a lot of time to reflect on the past year. In January I poured my heart out and I set out to make some changes. The biggest being to break down a wall and step out of my comfort zone.

365 days later I am proud of myself that even though some months were harder than others, I did what I set out to do. And I am better for it. I faced my fears of tracking my food. I learned to believe in myself when it comes to running. In turn I lost 30 pounds and set new Half, 15k, 10k and 5k PRs! I finally got a bike - Princess Sparkle Unicorn. And then crashed it into a bridge the first time I hit the trails. I was able to find a new passion in giving back through The Birthday Party Project and had a blast sharing my birthday by raising money for one of my new favorite causes!

Kipper finished his second Ironman 70.3, changed jobs at Cook and was accepted to TCC's accelerated nursing school program. Once school started our lives turned upside down for the first few months, but as expected he is doing great and is now 8 months away from graduating. Oh and in the middle of all that he had surgery to remove Hector (ended up being a cyst) from his neck.

Together we celebrated our 11th Wedding Anniversary. Enjoyed a few road trips and adventure days. Made some home improvements. Drank some really great and some not so great wine. And most importantly laughed.  A lot.

Oh, and after 15 years together I finally got Kipper to dress up in a couples costume with me. Although simple, this was a big deal! 

And in keeping in the spirit of stepping out of my comfort zone, Kipper and I agreed to be part of an article for 360 West Magazine about normal people who made significant lifestyle changes and stuck with them. If including how much I weighed when I ran my full marathon in my blog wasn't hard enough, it is now in print of pretty a popular local magazine. A year ago there is NO way I would have been okay with that. As scary as it was for me, I told Kipper if it inspired just one girl who was in search of a change it would be worth it. Fingers crossed that mission was accomplished. For those wanting to read the full article you can find it here.

The boys had a pretty big year too! They have found a love for dining al fresco and all the attention that comes with it. While I miss having a girl in the family, we have enjoyed all the fun outings that we could have never done with three babies. The boys were not a big fan of their Daddy going back to school because he always had a book or a laptop in his lap, but they adjusted after a few weeks. We also learned Fenway has a hereditary eye disease, which lead to his NYE surgery. The poor guy has spent at nearly 2 1/2 months of the year in the "cone of shame" but has been such a trooper.  And Gulliver has been beyond sweet. He is just ready for his playmate to be all better so he has someone to chase in the backyard. 

This year had its highs and lows, but in over all it was a pretty incredible year. We have so much to be thankful for it is hard to do it justice in one short blog, but I think this pretty much sums it up:

In 2015: We pushed and challenged ourselves. We achieved goals that before seemed impossible. We stumbled, but picked ourselves up. We experienced God moving in our lives. We laughed ourselves silly and a few times cried ourselves to sleep. (Ok that last past was mainly me) We grew as a couple, but also individually. We took risks and went on adventures. We shared moments of celebration and moments of sorrow with those we hold dear. We faced some pretty big fears and challenges, but overcame them with the love and support of family and friends. We had hard conversations and shared in authentic fellowship with friends. We learned more than one should know about the canine eyeball. We found new passions. We loved deeply and soaked up every moment - the good and the bad - this year had to offer. Even though 2015 ended on a rough patch 2016 has big shoes to fill! Bring it on 2016!

Here Lately - Making Peace When Things Aren't Perfect

How is it already June?!? Seriously the last 2 months are a crazy blur but here we are the first week

of June. The fact I spent the last week sick as a dog is more than likely a result of those blurry weeks and my body saying enough is enough.

When I wrote about my 100 day progress I set new goals for the next 100 days. Since I'm just over 50 days into that time frame I decided to do a little check in to hold myself accountable.

   1. Eat more protein. Some days are better than others but I still need a lot of work here. What can I say, I'm a carb loving Polish girl! My plan now is to start trying to trick my mind into thinking I am getting tons of carbs while actually getting extra protein with things like protein pancakes! 

   2. Go to bed earlier.  Let's just skip this one for now. Its an area of opportunity to say the least. 

   3. Set a new half marathon PR.  Not yet and honestly it will be a stretch. I was supposed to run a night half at the end of May. A few weeks before I started having knee pain in both knees that I had never had before. Thankfully it wasn't my knees, but in fact extremely tight quads that were pulling on my knees. Silly me thought the tightness in my quads my legs firming up. Apparently it was just my muscles turning into rocks! ha! Since my coach, husband and doctor all encouraged me to sit this race out so I didn't run. As the temps start to rise I'm not going to put the pressure on myself to PR in a June or July race. If it happens, awesome. If it doesn't, that's okay too. I can chase that goal this Fall. 

   4. Prepare more meals.  Does reheating chicken count? 

   5. Keep making myself uncomfortable.  Without a doubt this is the one area I have forced myself to stick with. From taking part in small group discussions I would have normally only listened in on to going sleeveless somewhere other than the gym. I even tired sushi! Alone none of these things are life altering but they are positive growth that I wouldn't have ever imagined a year ago. 

So there it is. Things haven't gone smoothly or at all how I had planned them. Aside from those 5 goals I have struggled with some other areas as well. I've missed entering a few snacks and probably some wine into my food log. I have missed or cut short some workouts. I'm still not a domestic goddess. Things haven't been tied up in a pretty little bow. 

Writing it all out makes the little OCD Allie in my head start to freak out a little bit. She starts telling me that I have failed but for once I know I have made some significant personal growth because I can easily tell her to shove it. I wasn't perfect. I didn't completely stick to the plan. And that's okay. 

This journey is about long term life changes. It is about balance. It is about learning to truly live in the moment. This journey isn't a fad or a chapter of my life. Those are the reminders that give me peace when that nagging little Allie starts in on me. Life is messy, but that is what makes it beautiful and exciting! 

In the last 50 days:

• I watched Kipper complete his second Half Ironman, 
• I met new friends. 
• I deepened my relationship of God. 
• I stayed out way too late with girlfriends. 
• I had incredibly meaningful and heartfelt conversations with my best girlfriends. 
• I gave back to my community.
• I shared treasured moments with family. 
• I learned new things. 
• I had adventures Princess Bryn. 
• I tried new restaurants/food. 
• I enjoyed the simple things. 
• I lost 4 more pounds. 
• I laughed till it hurt.
• I bought new running shoes. 
• I bought smaller pants. 
• I looked in the mirror at the gym and for once the voice in my head didn't get in the way - I didn't completely hate what I saw (so I took a selfie to remember the day! Exhibit A)  

• I danced myself silly. 
• I ate WAY too much sugar. 
• I ran some amazing and some not so amazing miles. 
• I celebrated people I love. 
• I cried both tears of joy and frustration. 
• I fell in love with my job, again. 
• I washed a lot of muddy paws. 
• I made some questionable fashion statements. 
• I found joy in my doodles and painting.
• I have loved deeply.
• I admitted my mistakes. 
• I didn't give up. 

In the last 50 day I truly lived my wonderfully messy life! 

One Hundred Days

Yesterday marked the one hundredth day of this chapter! 100 days of facing fears, pushing the limit on my comfort zone and truly learning to believe in myself. I figured it was the perfect time catch everyone up and reevaluate my goals moving forward.

What have I been up?

1. Tracking my food. As you all know, this was one of the toughest things for me. Tracking my food gave me such anxiety, but somehow I have survived for 100 days without missing a beat. I am talking vacation, busy weeks at work, even days I just didn't want to mess with it - I stuck to my plan! Now I would be lying if I didn't admit that there are some days that it still gives me a little anxiety, especially when I don't have control over what is being served. Yet it isn't nearly as scary as I built it up to be and it is so nice to be able to look at my daily intake with a healthy mindset. 

2. Breaking habits.  I wanted everything I was doing to be a lifestyle change, not just a phase. In order for that to happen I had to break some bad habits. First and foremost the one I am most proud of is my breakup with Diet Dr. Pepper! I gave up regular Dr. Pepper about 5 years ago but was addicted to Diet Dr. Pepper in a bad way. Before I came to work at Pier 1 Imports I would drink at least 1 Route 44 Diet Dr. Pepper a day!! I had finally gotten myself down to one can a day by the end of last year but anytime I tried to go more than a day I would get a terrible headache.  After fighting through that I was able to get down to a half a can a day and then just a can every few days. I am now to the point that I am fine without them. That doesn't mean I won't ever drink another soft drink in my life but I certainly don't depend on them or crave them anymore. 

3. Setting new records. This has honestly been the most exciting part to me. In the last 100 days I have pushed myself harder than I ever thought I could go as a runner. I never thought I would get much faster. When I hired a coach I had a goal but I wasn't sure it was possible in the short time frame I had give myself, especially coming off an injury. Yet somewhere along the way it all clicked (get the full story here) and I have cut nearly 3 minutes off what I used to consider my normal pace. Before my goal was always just to finish because setting anything more aggressive made me feel like I was setting myself up for failure. Don't get me wrong - there will still be plenty of races where the only goal is to have fun and finish. As proud as I am of my the PR's I have sent in the last 2 1/2 months, I am ready to crush them with a new PR! 

4. Victories on and off the scale. While it was very important to me that this NOT only be about a number on a scale, losing weight was part of the goal. Since I have been tracking my food and increased my calories I have lost 25 pounds and nearly 2 pant sizes! What is even more exciting to me though is how my body is changing. I feel stronger than I ever have. When I look in the mirror in my mind I don't look like I have lost 25 pounds, but I love the changes I am seeing. And even more so I love how I feel! 

5. Finding balance. Balance is something that I have been working on for a year or so. Learning to say no and basically stopping the glorification of "busy." Even though I have been running for almost 4 years now I have never been good at balancing working out when life gets in the way. I would either ignore training or just be totally anti-social.  I'm still a work in progress here but I am proud of myself for maintaining some sort of balance between training, work, family, friends and social engagements. So far April has proved to be the biggest challenge. If I can keep some sort of balance the rest of this month I will consider that one for the win column. 

What's in store for the next 100 days? 

1. Eat more protein. Now that I have gotten the hang of tracking my food and eating enough calories I really want to start focusing on increasing my protein intake. 

2. Go to bed earlier.  I'm a night owl, always have been. The last few months I have worked on making myself go to bed earlier, but not consistently. 

3. Set a new half marathon PR.  I have a goal I want to reach by the end May - a 2:45 finish. That would be cutting nearly 14 minutes off my time so I know it will be a stretch in this short of time. Although I keep surprising myself so I know anything is possible. 

4. Prepare more meals.  Kipper is the chef in our family and too often I rely on him to cook my meals. With his work and training schedule it is sometimes hard for him to make that happen. I want make more of an effort to learn how to cook meals that I enjoy so that I can do all of my meal prep myself. 

5. Keep making myself uncomfortable. Either big or small, I don't want to settle. I am challenging myself to do at least one thing outside of my comfort zone each week. 

So what are you going to do with your next 100 days?? 

Goodbye Comfort Zone: 1 Month Later

When I wrote New Year, New Me?!?! and laid it all out there, I was terrified. Yet the fact that I did put everything out there has sort of helped motivate and ground me a bit. It has been just over a month since since I started facing my fears, forcing myself out of my comfort zone and making some big changes in my life. And man have there been some changes. 

1. Tracking my food. This was, I think, one of the biggest fears I have had to face. To date I have tracked every bite that has entered by mouth for the last 32 days in My Fitness Pal. This is a record for me. Even when I did Weight Watchers several years ago I always took a day (sometimes more) off each week where I didn't track. And you know what? It hasn't been that bad. I tend to eat a lot of the same things during the week so that makes it easy. Eating out still stresses me a little bit so I try to look at the menu ahead of time and pre-plan. This helps me from panicking and it makes sure I don't 30 minutes trying to figure out what I want to eat. Still working on my anxiety there.  Now when I say it hasn't been that bad, I would be lying if I didn't admit that there have been a few low moments. Thankfully most of them have just been panic over what to order at a non-chain restaurant where I can find no nutrition info online. The lowest moment - and it was LOW -  I hurled a half eaten sandwich across the kitchen.  Then cried because I didn't know how many calories I should enter for the little bit I had eaten. (I'm claiming PMS. Just go with it.) Thankfully after the fact both Kipper and I were able to laugh at how ridiculous it was because at the moment neither of us were laughing. 

2. Eating enough. I mentioned before that Kipper thought I wasn't eating enough. Through tracking my calories it became clear that on days I worked out I wasn't getting close to enough calories in. One week I had a 5,000 calorie deficit. Two weeks ago I finally went and had a Resting Metabolic Rate (RMR) test done.  The test gives you some fascinating results and information. The biggest for me was that for my age, weight and sex I actually have a very fast metabolism. And shocker, I wasn't eating enough! To lose weight I should be eating between 2000-2400 calories a day!! Panic set in when I started to apply this information, but I have stuck with it. Some days I feel like I have had to force myself to eat a snack to get to the right calorie point by mid-day. With that said my body is adjusting and now reminds me when I miss my mid-morning snack. If you are trying to lose weight and feel stuck, I highly suggest you have a RMR test done.  

3. Hiring a coach. When Kipper started training for his Ironman 70.3 he hired a coach. He has been dropping hints for sometime that we should look into a coach for me. And while I agreed I would do that if I ever did another full marathon, I wasn't interested in taking on an additional monthly cost that comes with hiring a coach until then. After a little coaxing I agreed to meet with Monica, one of the coaches at Trident. A week later I was an official member of Trident and was getting planned workouts. When I got my first week's schedule I panicked a bit. I sent Kipper a text, simply saying  "Shit just got real!!" His response? "Welcome to Trident!" Fast forward three weeks and I am thankful I took the plunge. I can already tell a difference in my running. Plus the accountability to my coach (and my checkbook) has been huge. Kipper played his cards really well in getting me here. He knows I am cheap and a people pleaser. Therefore he knew if I did this it would be a potential game changer for me. Well played Mr. Martin, well played.

4. Seeing results.  To make things more exciting I am seeing results. I can already tell a difference in so many ways: my running times/recovery, the way my clothes (and shoes!) fit, the way I feel and even on the scale. While I am trying to not focus on the scale, learning be healthy about the number it shows is a huge part of this journey. The first two weeks I lost a few pounds but nothing significant, but in the two weeks following my RMR test I have lost nearly 9 pounds! (see why I said you need to do it!!!) I am down a total of 13 pounds in the last month but most of all I feel great. Including my bum ankle, which is awesome! I have my first race of 2015 this weekend - Hot Chocolate 15k. While I am not pumped about driving to Dallas early on a Saturday morning, I am super excited to see how it goes. Good or bad there will be chocolate and that is enough for me. 

4. The downfall.  If you know me, you know I am NOT a domestic goddess when it comes to laundry and dishes. Mr. Martin on the other hand is a tad OCD about them. The amount of water bottles and work out clothes that I washed leading up to Kipper's first Ironman 70.3 nearly drove me to the nut house. Well he is training for another 70.3 and add in my workout gear, water bottles and containers from meal prep you can only imagine. I have officially come to terms with the fact we will never be caught up and he will always OCD over the unwashed/unfolded/un put away workout clothes and water bottles. If that is the biggest downfall I can totally live with that! 

Moving forward I know that there will plateaus and rough patches, maybe even setbacks. You don't overcome years of unhealthy thinking and habits in a single month. But I am going to keep pushing myself out of my comfort zone and digging deep to prove to myself just how crazy that old me really was. 

In the coming months I want to challenge you. Pick something in your life that you want to work on or try. Pick something that scares the crap out of you. Maybe something you have dreamed about but have put off more times that you can recall. Then make a promise to yourself to start facing your fears and see what happens. Find a friend or a mentor who can support you and hold you accountable. Be open with others about your goals. And take it one step at a time. I am not saying it won't be scary. It will be hard and at times uncomfortable. After the last 3 years what I can say without a doubt is if you commit to yourself, it will be is amazing and life changing. 

New Year, New Me?!?!

*Disclaimer: This has been the hardest post of my life to put out there. I have sat on it for over a week trying to decide if I really want to go through with this. It is really long, a little rambling and should have been split out into 2 parts. Yet I was afraid I would chicken out and never post the second half. So grab cup coffee and get settled in. I will be the girl over in the corner hyperventilating in a paper bag because I finally had the courage to share something I have been trying to do for almost 2 years. Cheers!

Happy New Year!!  2014 was an epic year for the Martin family. Both Kipper and I set out to accomplish goals that just a year before we could have never dreamed of.  Along the way to achieving those goals we made new friends, grew closer to old friends, celebrated 10 years of wedded bliss, did more laundry and dishes than I care to recall (damn water bottles) and learned more about ourselves than we ever imagined.  As we welcome the start of another year it is time to set new goals and put forth a plan to achieve them.  A new year, a new me…right?!?!

Sort of, but not exactly.

At one time I was REALLY big on New Year’s resolutions. I would spend so much time coming up with big goals and ideas of things I wanted to accomplish for the entire year.  And while a few bits and pieces would happen, the majority always fell to the wayside and made me feel like a failure.  My New Year’s resolutions were just another example of me trying to map my life out 365 days in advance and never planning how I would adjust when life threw me a curveball.  And life always throws you a curveball (or five!)

Over the last two years I have done away with what I traditionally called New Year’s resolutions and focused more on attainable long term goals, reevaluating things every few months.  I think Kipper said it best – there is nothing magical about January 1st!  (Other than getting to use a new calendar; which is kind of magical if you are dorky like me!)  If you have a goal or a dream you can start on a random Tuesday in March or a Friday in September.  And if you get off track, all you need to do is wake up and start again. Every day is a chance to start anew.

Life is about growth.  I truly believe you must continue to grow and develop all areas of your life in order to fully live life the way God intended us to.  Sometimes that means pushing past your comfort zones.  Breaking down walls and allowing yourself to be more vulnerable in the eyes of others.  It is an ongoing journey and it can be so scary, yet so incredibly freeing. 

When I started my blog, my goal was to focus on craft and dyi projects, with the occasional post about my personal life.  I didn’t realize it then, but looking back I realize my blog was away for me to escape from issues I didn’t want to deal with at that time.  I quickly found that I was writing more personal posts than anything, although the majority of them remained up published.  I slowly started posting more of them, but was still extremely guarded. 

In 2013 I made a promise to myself that I would be more transparent in my blogging and I began to open up about my struggle with depression, ADHD and infertility.  In 2014 while my blogging was limited, I shared some of my rawest, most honest posts ever.  Sometimes I still can’t believe I ever hit publish on them, but in the end I am so thankful I did. 

Every time I took a leap of faith and put my heart out there, I was blown away by the response.  The amount of love and support I have received, from places I would have never imagined, has been amazing! I was always so concerned about how others would judge me and I am sure there are some who have. Yet through this experience I have found a support system that I would have never had.  I have connected with others in a way that would have never happened in our casual friendship and have been blessed to have been a very small part of helping a few other women start their journey breaking down their own walls.  

Because of the promise I made to myself in 2013 and the small chance this might help someone else, I have finally decided to open up about the issue that scares me the most and plays a huge part of my battle with depression – my weight and self-image issues. I have written countless posts on this topic, but I have never been brave enough to share.  Today - in the spirit of the New Year - that changes.  

Long story short, I have had a long, extremely unhealthy relationship with food and my weight.  For years my thoughts were consumed with calories, dress sizes and weight. I measured my worth in numbers and even at a size 2/4 and 120 pounds I wasn't truly happy.   

Anytime something didn't work out, in my mind, it was always because I was fat. Seriously.  Broke up with my boyfriend – I was too fat. Didn't get the part in a play I wanted – too fat. Didn't make the grade I expected on a test – you guessed it, too fat!  It never crossed my mind that things don’t always go your way or that maybe if I wasn't so preoccupied with what size my new jeans were and spent more time studying I MIGHT have done better on that test.  

In my 20’s I found some relief from this thanks to antidepressants but at the cost of gaining weight.  I came to a point that I just stopped caring about my nutrition or working out, literally doing everything I could not to think about it. Yet I hadn't actually fixed anything, only band aided it and I still thought about it often. It took me several years to realize that. 

A little over 3 years ago, after the hardest year of my life, I had gained a considerable amount of weight – 40 pounds to be exact.  I was miserable.  By the grace of God I decided to start running with Kipper. My original motivation was weight loss. Only I had no idea how this decision to run would change my life so many other ways.  At the heaviest I had ever been, I signed up and completed a Warrior Dash mud run.

Over the next year I kept running and worked extremely hard to get myself off Prozac and Adderall. It took almost a year but I was able to get off all my meds and was feeling better than I had in ages. I lost a little weight, just not as much as I had hoped. Yet I kept running and setting new goals. Somewhere along the way the goals stopped being only weight related and became endurance and health related.

Fast-forward to 2014. Training for and running a full marathon and watching Kipper complete an Ironman 70.3 changed everything.  For the first time it all clicked. My imperfect body had carried me through the hardest and most epic challenge I could imagine.  I had wasted so much of my life consumed with my weight and being smaller.  When I was 120 pounds, I couldn't run more than maybe a mile. Yet there I was at 240 pounds and I had run a marathon.  It actually makes me more proud of myself knowing that I had the courage at this weight to start and finish something that only 1% of population attempts.  (Now excuse me while a freak out that I just shared my weight with the entire world…something up until now only my husband and doctors have known!)

As I move forward in my journey I know that while I am completely healthy now, my weight can’t stay here because there will come a day it will affect me. I also know that dropping some weight will make a huge difference in my running.  Kipper has long thought that part of my issue is on most days I don’t eat enough or I have a major splurges and am way over. I don't have a happy medium. My body is all out of whack and confused.  And while I have agreed with him for some time I have no evidence to support that theory because tracking my food terrifies me.  It gives me great anxiety and takes me back to a former version of myself that I never want to be again.  I will track here and there but as soon as I start to panic, I stop.

I am finally in a place that I am ready to tackle that fear and anxiety once and for all.  I know it is going to be tough. It is going to force me to face demons I have tried to bury for far too long. But I’m not the girl I once was. Food isn't my enemy or a substitute for a therapist. Even though I struggle some days, a number on a scale doesn't define me.  Somehow surviving the first week of tracking my food without any freak outs has reconfirmed all of this.  

Moving forward I have promised myself I will continue to share this part of my journey. It terrifies me. It is the wall that I have never let many past, but it is time. I am so thankful that I have an incredibly supportive husband and that God has placed a handful of people in my life over the last few years that have given me new perspective and helped get me to this point. 

I'm A Warrior...In Glitter!

For the last few weeks Kipper has been talking about doing the Warrior Dash with a bunch of people from work. I had heard about it before because a few other people I know have done it, but honestly I didn't pay much attention. Early this week we started talking about it again and something clicked. As I looked at the website I came to 2 conclusions 1) This actually might be fun and 2) I can totally do this! Monday, January 16, 2012 the Team Glitter Warrior was born!

I have a feeling many of you are saying what the heck are you talking about? Well to sum it up this is the official description for the Warrior Dash.

"A mud-crawling, fire-leaping, extreme 5k run from hell. Warriors conquer extreme obstacles, push their limits and celebrate with music, beer and Warrior helmets."


The responses from friends have been interesting, both when I tell them I am doing it and when asking them to join me.

Conversation 1: 

Little Alex:  You that it involves mud, right?

Me:  Yea but they give you a Viking helmet, AND there is also a costume contest,  turkey legs and beer. Not that I like beer but still it is an option!

Little Alex: I will do it with you!

Me: Score one for Team Glitter Warriors!!

Conversation 2: 

Me:  Getting a group together to do the Warrior Dash in April. Want to do it? You know you want to join the Glitter Warriors!?!?

J Crab:  Have you lost your mind?!?!?!? Me? Mud? I've seen the pictures of guys doing it. NO WAY!

Me: They give you a beer at the end! :)

J Crab: I can afford to buy my own beer.

 Me: Fine, you can be an honorary Glitter Warrior and a sign holder with Tricia if you would like.

Now Kipper is still a little skeptical and he said that I have to prove to him I am serious about this before he will pay the $60 for me to register. (Apparently planning out cute outfits for everyone to wear the day of does NOT prove ones dedication, just in case you were wondering)  

But I am determined to show him and everyone else I am TOTALLY serious! I am going to not only DO the Warrior Dash, I am going to COMPLETE the Warrior Dash, all while wearing an obnoxious amount of pink and glitter...which I am sure will involve a tutu as well!

 As I was in the middle of Day 1 of Glitter Warrior Training I found that when I started to feel like I couldn't run any further, planning the Glitter Warrior "uniform" helped me forget that I my legs were about to fall off.

All joking aside, today will be Day 2 of Glitter Warrior Training and I am pumped! On Day 1 Kipper and I went 2.5 miles, alternating walking and running, but I ran HALF of it! I was pretty proud of myself seeing that I haven't really worked out in like...um....yea...a year!?!?! Not only did I FEEL amazing, I had a blast working out with the hubby. (By the way, can we talk about how skinny he is getting?!?!?!)



And it will feel even better when I cross the finish line and I'm able to say, " I, Allie Martin, leader of the Glitter Warriors, can do anything...even when wearing a tutu!" Now who wants to join me?????

Ready. Set. Go.

I might need to remind myself of this every so often!  But I know setting the goal and making my choice to go after it is the the first (and sometimes the hardest) step.  I have lost the weight before and kept it off for over 3 years. Somehow I let life get in the way and my weight creeped back up. I deserve better than that and I am making the the pledge to myself that once this weight is off, the only reason I can gain it back is if we have a Little Martin on the way! So if I am a little cranky the next few days, you know I am just adjusting my diet! :)