Zumba?

So...
any of you ladies do Zumba?
My bestest started it about a month ago and she is loving it. She's been urging me to try it because she knows that I love dancing as much as she does. Problem is, my confidence with dancing is zilch nowadays.
But, as I've mentioned before.
I have already bought 2 dance DVD's.
Well more than that, one of them is the Step Up Revolution DVD & the other is the Hip Hop Abs set.
Anywho...I have being thinking about Zumba.
I think I'm going to get a DVD and check into it more.

But the main reason I'm even talking about it is because I stumbled across a Facebook page that is a girl that posts video of her routines. They look like a lot of fun and a good workout & I just wanted to share it with all of y'all.
Go check out & "Like" her page HERE!
Her name is Jessica and she looks amazing! You can tell she put a lot into working out & she likes what she does. She's apparently been teaching Zumba for like 3 years. I kind of want to learn some of her dances/routines!
I like her "Timber" dance & her "Go Buck" dance.

I haven't weighed in on here in a bit,...
let's see where I am...
Last week & the week before I was at 154.1
Today I am at 152.6

Didn't expect that. At all. I won't even lie.

I feel like my endurance it pretty good, about time to challenge myself a little further, as far as cardio and how long I can do it.
I don't feel smaller or much better in terms of being in shape. I still have quite a few days of feeling bloated. Then every so often I have a "small day". I'm ready for those to be more frequent. I'm not pushing myself enough right now, other than on the treadmill. I really need to dive into more strength and toning.
Doug & I went to Dick's to checkout workout equipment like dumb bells and such & I need to go buy some more.  He's also back on the workout train again. & he's feelin' it. He's starting slow as well, I think that's key. Now I just have to help him get a handle on his portions again. Boy can eat, which, honestly...if I weren't watchin portions, I could too. Love food. lol

I haven't posted a playlist in a couple of weeks. Here is the first one I posted.
So here's another...
Let's go for POP this time...
(in no particular order)

1. Pitbull & Kesha- Timber
2. Ellie Goulding- Burn
3. Aloe Blacc- The Man (loooove this song!)
4. Ed Sheeran- You Need Me, I Don't Need You
5. Jessie J- Do It Like A Dude
6. Cher Lloyd- Swagger Jagger
7. Britney Spears- Work Bitch
8. Avicii- Wake Me Up
9. Little Mix- Move
10. Alex Clare- Too Close
11. Little Mix- Wings
12. Zendaya- Replay
13. Ollie Murs- Troublemaker
14. Demi Lovato- Neon Lights
15. Kesha- Blow


If you would like to suggests any songs, I'm always open to them. Any and all genres welcome here.

Welp, off to sit around and wait to go play in the snow.
Snowpocalypse for us in North GA. I'm gonna try to not snack my way throw the next couple of days. That's all I want to do. haha.
Lovins!
♥♥♥
Brandy

You say you want a revolution...

Did anyone what the Beatles Tribute Concert last night?
If not, you missed out.

Via

If you have been living under a rock and don't know what I'm talking about, it was a 2.5 hour concert paying tribute to and celebrating 50 years to the day -Feb.9 1964- of when The Beatles first appeared on "The Ed Sullivan" show. (aka, The Beatles were introduced to America, sparking the British Invasion.)

It really was so great. All of the artists involved did amazing renditions of The Beatles' songs and then Paul and Ringo performed which was the icing in the cake.

Via E! Online

The only thing that could have made it better would have been if George and John were still alive.
I think it was a great tribute & I loved that it told a bit of a backstory of not only the group but also about the guys individually. Left me with wanting to get all of their albums, which I sadly do not have. I was familiar with all the songs played though so, I wasn't lost or anything.
I can't help but think about how great it must have been to see them live back in the day.
Ahh, would have been so fun!

It'd be awesome if they released it on DVD. I'm gonna keep a look out for that. You should too!

So, my weekend...
was again, so good..

Friday was low key. I balanced my checkbook & Pre Ordered my "The Sum of Who We Are" package! The free song that you get to download instantly is so good! We did movie night at home. We watched 2 Guns and Last Vegas. Both were very good. 2 Guns stars Mark Wahlberg & Denzel Washington, they are two undercover agents working on a case together. It's a crime action/comedy. It's a really good movie. I don't want to describe it too much, I don't want to give anything away. Last Vegas stars Robert DeNiro, Morgan Freeman, Kevin Kline, and Michael Douglas. It's a comedy about 60-something men take a trip to Las Vegas to for a bachelor party. I thought it was funny & I recommend it as well.

Saturday was a QT day for Doug and me. We slept in, he finally got me to wake up sometime after noon...oopsie. And then we headed out to do a little shopping. Our main mission was to go to Dicks and scope out their workout stuff. I need some heavier dumb bells and would like to have a medicine ball, but we were just checking out prices for now. He also hit up WalMart, Kohls and Old Navy. Our haul included some jeans for him, me some flip flops and house shoes. A new computer mouse (I had the touchpad thing & my mouse finally died) and some other random but needed things. We wanted to have a date night, we had Texas Roadhouse gift card, but uhh,..at 6:30 there were already people waiting outside the restaurant. Uhh, yea. Five Guys won that fight by a landslide. I loooove a good Five Guys burger!
Then it was home to relax.

Sunday- Went up to my ma-in-laws to check out the trail cam and refill the deer feeder and Doug ended up going to a movie with his mom & bro while I skipped out and came back home to try and help mom meal plan and make a grocery list. Sunday night ended with the Beatles Tribute on TV.
Oh & then this happened...

Sooo, so, so happy/proud about that! I'm also proud of the fact that I probably could have kept going. I didn't really tire, which tells me that my endurance is getting better. Usually I only go 30 to 45 minutes depending, but I just felt good enough to keep going.
Also the first time that I've gotten to and past 3 miles since I've really started to used the treadmill -seriously- again. (Nov.) Accomplishment for sure!

Family, good food, good music & quality time with my man! Pretty perfect weekend, to me. :-)


And then there's today, oh Monday...
It's actually not all bad. My patience is just nonexistent. We're supposed to get more snow over the next couple of days & that sends folks into a frenzy around these parts. So, while mom and I are trying to just to our weekly grocery shopping, everyone else is trying to "prepare" and ugh, it was just annoying. You can definitely tell the difference between the people who were there just doing typical grocery shopping and the people who were there because "omg, it's gonna snow". Ridiculous. And the same goes for people on the road. ASSHOLES. It's not even doing anyyyything yet, it was drizzling RAIN, and I mean barely & everyone was still in rush mode. And on top of all of that. I was just baffled by the amount of people who were at Wal Mart and Kroger in general, I mean, did they not have to be at work? It was morning & afternoon time....ri-damn-diculous. We're supposed to get at least 1-2", at most I think 3-6" of snow. However, that could end up being ice/sleet instead. So, shit...we'll see. Just pray our power stays on!

(Go ahead northerners, laugh it up, I know this is nothing compared to what you're dealing with. But just remember, this household pretty calmly prepares. My Dad's an Ohio-an, he's actually dealt with real winters before.)

How was your weekend?!

Happy Monday y'all!
♥♥♥
Brandy

300/30 challenge & "Am I not turtley enough for the turtle club?...

Turtle, turtle!"
(Name that movie!)

Did you know that today is World Turtle Day?
That's okay, I didn't either until a couple of hours ago.
I like turtles.
I had one as a pet when I was little and I loved the little guy.
I also remember when I was a kid, my mom, dad, brother and I were coming home from somewhere are we passed the big ole thing in the road. We turned around and went back and it was a biiig turtle, I mean...big.
Anyway, it had been hit by a car apparently, the shells was broken and cracked, but  it was still alive. If I remember right, we put it in the bed of the truck and took it to our house, but it eventually died.
That affected me to the point where when I'm going down the road and I see a turtle, I will stop, or turn around (if it's safe and I'm able) and I'll get out and move it to the other side of the road. If there is someone else with me, there is a chance I'll make ask them get out and grab it, if I'm driving and they're willing.
I've even rubbed off on my cousin, I love to get a text with a picture of a turtle saying "saved this guy today." I love that she will do that now.

On World Turtle Day, I would like to ask you a favor.
Save a turtle!
Not just today, but any day. Any time you see one in the road, help it. Or at the very least don't hit it! (But also don't wreck! Avoid it safely, if able.)
They are fairly slow movers as we all know. And a lot of us humans, in our big ole cars don't pay attention to the little things on the road. If you do this move them the direction they are heading. The way I see it, they are headed that way for a reason, if you put them back on the side of the road they are facing away from, they are likely to turn around and try crossing the road again. I always moved them the direction they are facing.
(Be careful of any snapping turtles!)

And now that I've just preached about turtles...lol let's move on to something esle.

Like how I think Holly is maybe trying to kill me! lol I kid, I kid.
Holly initiated a challenge to lose the food baby. She propose that we do 300/30. Which is this workout courtesy of Courtney at The Petite Athleat! And we do it for 30 days. Take your before picture before you start day 1 and at the end of 30 days, take an after picture, to see your results. Visit Holly's blog to see her explain it & talk about a little incentive -a prize- for someone at the end of the 30 days.

Well, I decided to try out this challenge.
I took my before picture last night.
Today is/was day one, and I think I may die.
At the end of the work out, you will have done 300 ab & core workouts, in 15 minutes.
Here's how it went for me...
I'm pretty sure there are several that I didn't do 100% properly. But I'm completely out of shape..so, I have to work up to being able to do it 100% proper.  (Courtney's pictures make it look so....effortless, lol)
I feel it in other places. This is how I know I'm not doing them properly. Although I'm sure you are supposed to feel it a little in other places. My core doesn't hurt too much (right now anyways). But I feel it in my thighs and my back.
I also fell short on like 2 exercises. Again, gotta build endurance for it. But I did not omit any completely. I tried them all.
So, by the end of the workout, which took me longer than 15 minutes (which is normal for beginners, I'm assuming.) I had not done 300, but I did calculate it up, and I had done 236. Not too bad for my first day.
And I'm glad that I'm doing this during the day when my husband isn't home, and doing it in the privacy of my room, because I'm sure I look like a spaz trying to do it. lol 
The point is I did it!

After wards I decided to do just a few Kettle bell exercises, so ya know..I feel a little in my arms too.
And stairs are not my friends right now.
FACK!
I don't know how I'm gonna work out with hubs once he gets home. Maybe I'll be good and rested and rarin' to go!
Maybe...
Or I might get out of it, we tossed around the idea of a date night tonight.
So we'll see.

Happy Thursday, y'all!
It's almost FRIDAY!
BE HAPPY!

♥♥♥
Brandy

I Can't Believe...I'm about to do a Weigh-In Wednesday

2 link ups in one post today, folks! Linking up with the ever-so-lovely Robin! And then weighing in with Erin & Alex, whom I haven't met, yet!

First...

I can't believe... that I've been waking up semi-early lately. (bet I just jinxed myself by saying that.)
I can't believe... that after waking up early-ish this morning I then got up, ate & went to my mother in laws just to get dolled up a bit just to record a less-that-one-minute video. I almost recorded a vlog too...almost. Too shy.
I can't believe... that I haven't did any laundry this week. And I need something to wear for Saturday!
I can't believe... that I get to go to this concert! It's gonna be one for the books for sure! Jason Aldean, Luke Bryan, Thomas Rhett & Jake Owen AT Sanford Stadium (Home of the GEORGIA BULLDOGS y'all!). I know I sound like a broken record but I don't even care! EEEK!
I can't believe... I've actually been drinking water this week. Not much, but some is better than none, right?!
I can't believe... that I actually am going to do a Weigh-In Wednesday...so..here goes nothin' I guess...

So, this is my first time doing this link up, and I'd be lying if I said I wasn't a little nervous. Sounds stupid, but it's totally logical to me (& probably to some of you!).
I have been overweight probably since the end of high school, but I started gaining probably end of freshmen/early sophomore year--so almost 10 years ago). About 2.5 years ago, (Aug '10) I first decided I wanted to get serious about losing weight because I was engaged and about 10 months away from my wedding. So who doesn't want to lose weight? So I joined a gym! Over the course of that 10 months, I only went maybe 4 or 5 times. (the part that's even more sad is I kept the membership up until last summer..July '12 --that's almost 2 years, people--, & I still hadn't used it anymore!) So I finally canceled it. I decided I'd start a health and fitness blog with one of my friends that lives in  Cali. We were both wanting to lose weight for the same reasons; to feel & look good obviously, and to better ourselves because we both wanted to get pregnant. We started that in I think Sept. of 2011. Well, that fell through a little a few months in. Life happens, ya know. Not too long before we started that blog, I had noticed that I had reached my highest weight. Gross. That number on the scale was a driving force behind making the decision to start. I did pretty well. I feel like I eat fairly well anyway. I love fruit and veggies & I don't feel like our dinner are that bad. I was using My Fitness Pal already and I used the blog as kind of a food diary. We had also just got a treadmill & so I was able to use that, but I was going mainly off of a food diary to start with. While I haven't been on that blog is ages, I've teeter tottered with my weight ever since. I had actually lost about 10 lbs. But it crept back a little & plateaued. Well in the past couple of weeks I've noticed it's crept up more and I again hit my same highest weight that I previously mentioned & I refuse to let it go any higher. So...here I am...
Starting over, again...kind of. (Hope you guys understood that, I wanted to condense but still be a little thorough!)
My mindset through this is, and always has been portion, control & not starving/depriving myself of something I want. And that works for me. It's slower, yes, but I'm stubborn & this is my way of doing things. "Everything in moderation."
Anyway.
Weighing in today at: 163
My UGW: is at least 135, I'm 5'2" so my ideal range is 125-135 (if I'm not mistaken).
My reason: I want to feel better. I want to look better. I want to help with my chances of getting pregnant -a current struggle- and having a healthy pregnancy. To be happy!
I'm not setting a weekly target weight right now since I'm still just now getting back into the swing of things (aka incorporating working out) so I'm just gonna see how it goes for the first couple of weeks.
Glad to join this link up!
I have a MyFitnessPal that I haven't started using again, yet, but if you want to be friends just add me & I'll approve! My MFP UN is bnba03.


Hope everyone had a great Humpday!
♥♥♥
Brandy

Operation: I-I WERK OUT!

Welp,

It's getting to be that time where Doug and I are probably about to implement 

Operation: I-I WERK OUT!

LOL

I just thought of that & yes, I made myself giggle.

Now I'm going to have to tell him that & watch him shake his head at me because I'm such an enigma.

;)

I accompanied him to the doctor this morning. It was for his physical (cause I know you needed to know that crucial piece of info) & he asked me to come along to make sure he didn't forget to ask or tell anything.

His doctor walked in & her first words were "you look like you lost weight, have you lost weight?" & she was so happy about it.

He has lost a little. And I told her that we planned to try losing more.

Made her happy.

Over the weekend I made him sit down with me and scroll through pinterest to look for new recipes to try. So we can try some new things, and so we're not always scratching our heads when it comes to supper, or repeating meals too much or eating hamburger helper for the 9830497 time during the week. lol
Now I just have to actually cook some of the things!

We didn't exactly pick healthy looking things, but there are changes that can be made to most recipes that can make them healthier. 

And I won't cook anything that's too bad anyway since we still live at home.

Which is actually beneficial to our eating habits sometimes because my dad has diabeties and my mom has to watch what she eats because of her heart. 

(I am not saying I'm glad that they have any medical issues, I'm saying the fact that their lifestyle change  as far a eating and such affects us all, which is a good thing.)

We still don't do as well and we could (and should) but we've (the whole family) changed a lot around over the past few years. And by few I mean like 5 or 6. 

SO...

I figure since we are finally talking a little more seriously about it, and we're hopefully going to have the basement done, or done enough, soon. We should be able to start some kind of exercising. 

Hopefully.

...I wonder if once we get it done, maybe I'll call it an apartment since it will hopefully look for like one...I just don't always like saying basement when I talk about where we live. lol.

Anyway, trailing off subject!

I haven't decided if I'm going to go the My Fitness Pal route again or not.

I like it, it helps to see how many calories I do consume, but I'm not one of those people who are all "OMG I can only have 5 more calories for today!"

Newp.

I still eat what I want. Just smaller portions, which means I've had several days where I've gone over. And it won't be any different this time around. ha. But I might still use it. I don't know. I don't even know the last time I used it! My username for it BNBA, I think. (if you look it up, let me know if that's right, lol if it isn't I'll check later.)

But yea, so that's that.

I'm ready to start trying to put some of those damn workouts I keep pinning to use!

They're gonna kill me! You just watch!

I'm gonna try kinda of hopping on that health/fitness train with some of you ladies. I've jumped on and off of it over the last I'd say 2.5-3 years.

(I even have a Tumblr just for weight loss/fitness/health that I obviously haven't been on in agesss.) 

Maybe I can stay on this time since Hubbers is gonna do it with me.

So, I'm going to continue to find inspiration in a few personal friends I know, and all of you ladies that are on the road to getting healthy! And Pinterest, of course. ha.

So yea, that's my ramblings for today.

Exciting, huh?!

Now, I gots shit to do, man!

OHH!

I gots buttons!

I made 2, but I've only posted one right now.

It's over on the right...over there -->
Nothing major, but yeeee!
If you guys want to see the other one, just ask, I'll post it too.

KLOVEYOUBYE!
♥♥♥