She said WHAT?!?!?!?!?

So, my friend Courtney is such a huge inspiration to me. I've really been needing someone like her in my life. It's been a week of exercising and I feel great!!! I didn't think it was possible. I don't exercise quite the way they do on NBC's show The Biggest Loser. But, Courtney and I have been staying at the YMCA everyday for at least 3 hours.

Today, I ran 4.5 miles on an elliptical machine. Then swam 10 laps, treaded water for 10 minutes, and kicked for a while. Needless to say, I am exhausted. But, if I want a bikini body by summer, this is how I have to do it!! :) haha

I understand I may never look like my high school prom pic again, but I won't stop trying!! :)

I need to make myself start eating more healthy. My biggest downfall right now is that I am too tired after my workouts to cook; and the healthiest meals are cooked at home, when you know exactly what you are putting in it.

But, tonight... I think I will attempt this: Chicken Cacciatore (from this week's Biggest Loser episode!!)

It's nice to create goals for yourself when you are attempting a major lifestyle change. I have quite a bit of weight to lose, so I have created mini-goals within my major goal. My mini-goals are 20 pounds at a time.

A huge goal of mine; however, is to run a 5K in April. That is actually about 3 miles. Which, shouldn't be too hard for me right now, because I can do a solid 2.5 on the elliptical. I'm scared of the treadmill, but will try to do a little more on it each day. Today I did .5 miles at 3.7 mph. So, tomorrow I will try to do a little more a little faster. :) Let's hope I can do it!!

If I succeed at the 5K in April, I will train for a half marathon (13.1 miles) in October!! :) We'll see!!

weight-loss update

I haven't written much about my weight loss journey lately, well, because quite frankly there wasn't a weight loss journey being had. But, my friend has gotten me to rejoing the YMCA and go with her everyday. She is a big-time runner. In fact she is training for a half marathon in April... I am no where near being ready for a half marathon, but there is a 5K that same day. I will be training for the 5K... she thinks I will be ready for the half marathon, because she has faith in me and my diet and exercise. She's a peach, I'll tell ya. But, I was looking back on past posts about my weight loss... and I feel the same way I did here. I want to look like my senior prom pic again. So, here goes the start to my weight loss journey. I'll keep ya posted!!!

Whoever knew these were real?

Nantucket. I thought it was a made up place. Turns out, it's not. It is a small island within a group of small islands off the coast of Massachusetts. This is where rich people take springtime vacations, well there and Martha's Vineyard (located on another small island just west of Nantucket) Who knew??

Timbuktu. You know when you were younger and you would box up your younger sibling and tell them you were going to ship them off to Timbuktu??? I thought that was a made up place as well... turns out. I'm wrong. Timbuktu is actually a city in the country of Mali in Africa. Glad I never sealed the package... my poor baby brother!!!

Flamingoes. OK, OK. I know... that may be just me. But, I seriously always thought these were made-up creatures some ninny with a full yard of flamingoes, gnomes, etc., created just to have something else in her yard. I honestly never remember seeing them at a zoo. And, my papa used to take me to the zoo all the time. Until recently I thought these were fake, made-up. Sorry, but you just don't see toothpick-legged, pink, non-flying birds around Amber, Okla.

I may be a little blond-headed after all!!! :)

Childhood Shenanagins

As a child the Disney movie "Alice in Wonderland" was one of my favorites. I am a huge Walt Disney animated movie fan. In fact I have quite the collection started. I want to be able to share with my children the Disney princesses I grew up loving, Cinderella, Belle ("Beauty and the Beast"), Snow White, Ariel ("Little Mermaid"), Aurora ("Sleeping Beauty"), Jasmine ("Aladdin"), etc. Children movies today just aren't the same as when I was growing up. 3-D art has become the new fad for children movies, such as the PIXAR movies "Cars" and "Toy Story." Now, mind you, these are still super cute, I however prefer my animation.

However, one movie I am beginning to question whether I will show my children is "Alice in Wonderland." It's really quite silly, and if you have ever watched it you know exactly what I am talking about. A small girl falling down a rabbit hole, chasing the talking white rabbit, meeting various strange creatures and animals along her way. Weird mumblings and sayings going about while no one questions their validity, they simply let their children watch it.

These weird mumblings and sayings go hardly unnoticed in the Disney version, because its still light-hearted and hidden well enough to keep it a kid-friendly movie. However, TIM BURTON, comes along and creates a new movie with real-people telling the second part of Alice's story. This is where my world has turned upside-down.

I was super excited to go and see this movie, until I was reading more about it and looked a the list of characters. I noticed a character called: The Jabberwocky. I don't recall anyone by the name jabberwocky in the Disney version. So, I had to dig a little deeper to find out where this jabberwocky character was coming from.

Lewis Carroll, the author of Alice's Adventures in Wonderland, had actually written a poem of nonsense about a jabberwocky and put it into the sequel to the first book: Through the Looking Glass and What Alice Found There. If you have the time to look up the poem and it's meaning, I do encourage it. It's quite bewildering the way Carroll's mind was able to create a total nonsense poem and develop his own words to create it. However, I applaud Walt Disney for leaving that out of his version of the story. Although, he did allow the Cheshire Cat to sing part of that wretched poem, although I never understood what he was singing until today:

"'Twas brillig, and the slithy toves

Did gyre and gimble in the wabe;

All mimsy were the borogroves,

And the mome raths outgrabe."