Fun blog as promised!

Good morning! It's a beautiful January morning even though it is snowing here in Colorado Springs. But as promised a fun blog this week. Back at the beginning of January most of us made some sort of resolution. If you are in the 50-60% of Americans who made a resolution in the genre of losing weight/healthy living/successful dieting are you still going strong? If you are that's great! keep up the good work, but if you are in the group of us that started out strong, and now a month into it are losing resolve to keep that resolution I have compiled some information and tips to boost that motivation again. I found this article on MSN that I really enjoyed so i will share it with all of you. http://www.fitnesstipsforlife.com/52-ways-to-lose-a-pound-a-week.html. It is a list of 52 ways to lose a pound a week. Feel free to click on the article and read the whole thing, but i will list my ten favorite ideas.

1) make a dream book (or poster) include pictures of things you want to accomplish, a healthy bikini body, pictures of plates of salad, people exercising, the finish line of a 10K. Whatever your motivation is, put a picture of it on a poster or in a book and place it in a prominent place where you can look at it and renew your resolve every day!

2)Be flexible. If you don't have time for a 30 minute work out find ways to raise your heart rate and sweat even if its only for 5 minutes. take the dog for a quick jog around the block, park at the back end of the parking lot and power walk to the front door, jump rope in your living room during commercial breaks. just get moving!

3) Use a symbol. Hang a LBD (for all you guys reading this LBD stands for little black dress, the staple in every woman's closet) on your door. Try it on every 4 weeks. each week that it gets a little closer to fitting congratulate yourself, and keep working until it fits!

4) Get it fresh. trade your highly processed, sodium loaded, artificially sweet food choices for fresh, local produce and meat. The more your cook your own food, the more control you have over what you are putting in your body.

5)Check your fluids. trade your sugary beverages and alcohol for water and tea. that will save you (possibly) hundreds of calories a day!

6)Feel whats gone. when you get the urge to splurge pick up a 5-pound bag of sugar (or 2 bags of 5-pound sugar) to feel what that extra weight actually feels like.

7) Announce your intentions. When people know you are trying to lose weight or eat healthier they will support you, and encourage you, and stop tempting you with bowls of candy on their desks, or freshly baked cookies.

8)do 10 then switch. If you get bored at the gym (or at home) do one exercise for 10 minutes then switch to something else. 3 machines later you are already 30 minutes in!

9) celebrate victory, even the small ones. Have you lost a pound? by a new jump rope. lost 10? buy a workout dvd or a new cd that gets you in the mood to move.

10) this of course is MY favorite! please your dentist. Brush your teeth immediately after eating dinner. This signals that your eating is over for the night.

of course there are many more good tips in the article, these were just a few of my favorites! check them all out and tell me which ones you like, or add some that work for you that aren't on the list!

here is some other fun info. I always wonder how many calories I am burning doing things around my house, so I compiled this list of fun activities and how many calories they burn.
you can burn:
125 calories in 15 minutes of Wii boxing
133 calories shooting baskets for 30 minutes
207 calories burned during an hour of child care
266 calories burned during an hour of (vigorous) house cleaning
133 burned during 1/2 an hour of general dancing
295 in a hour of gardening
152 in half an hour of shoveling snow
148 in an hour of walking (slow pace)
236 in an hour of walking (fast pace)
325 in an hour of mowing the lawn
235 in half an our of light effort jump roping.

hopefully some of these helped you. If you are looking for other activities I found these numbers at http://www.nutristrategy.com/activitylist2.htm
See you again next week!
love your friendly dental assistant