I'm back with my second weekly update to keep track of progress (or lack of !) in my New Year challenges. Last week was a good one for the Fitbit and Flylady challenges, I took a few babysteps for the bookmarked recipes, geocaching and reading, but made no headway at all with the comping, bloggy housekeeping or paperwork for requesting French nationality. What about this week?
1. Get Fit(bitting) !
I'm still loving the Fitbit and the way it gives me a gentle nudge when I haven't taken 250 steps in an hour and buzzes excitedly when I hit 10,000 steps ! I've been tracking everything from calorie intake to steps and even sleep and it's pretty interesting. I hit my 10,000 daily steps on Sunday, Monday and Wednesday but was a bit short on the other days. My 7-day average is 10,054 steps though, so I nailed it ! I had fun walking my way around the New York marathon route on my Fitbit app too and completed it in a few days. Weightwise, I was going down by a couple of hundred grams every day regular as clockwork then suddenly shot up 800g yesterday despite eating really well. I lost 0.7kg last week but this week will end up as a no-change, despite being well under my calorie allowance every day. Which is exactly why I'm focusing on steps and not the number on the scales this year ! My Fitbit has also been telling me that I'm not getting enough sleep - I go to bed at 11pm and the alarm goes off at 6.15 but I seem to wake up at least once a night and have about a dozen "restless" episodes so I usually end up with about 6.5 hours sleep. I've been making a concerted effort to turn off the light at 10.30 instead ... but this means all my reading time has now disappeared - boo !
2. Get cooking bookmarked recipes !
I made the Finnish recipes for crumbed roast pork and a swede side dish from my Kitchen Trotter box. I also got experimental with chestnuts (Brussels sprouts, bacon and chestnuts) and miso soup paste (Miso Turkey Stir Fry with Bok Choi) with products I received to review. We've still been using up Christmas hamper nibbles (pannetone, lebenkuche, shortbread, ...) so I have been resisting the urge to bake !
3. Get geocaching !
I went on a big walk with the kids last Sunday and we managed to find three more so I'm finally into the 200's - wahoo ! (Now on 202.) I also dashed out on Monday and eventually succeeded in dropping off the big travelbug that I haven't managed to fit in any geocaches since we found it in Lanzarote this summer, so that's a double strike !
4. Get comping !
I said I was aiming for one win a month and this week, I won a £20 One-4-all shopping voucher on twitter :)
5. Get reading !
I'm still on track for my book a week. I finished reading sizzling BDSM novel, Brand by Sierra Cartwright. (Click through for my review) I've started on Nordic crime fiction Medusa by Torkil Damhaug but it's slow-going at the moment ... mainly because my Fitbit is making me go to bed earlier so I'm reading less !
6. Get FLYing !
After last week's mini room makeover, transforming the dumping zone on the landing into a homework area, this week was less full-on. I did do a couple of the missions in this week's zone, the kitchen, cleaning the base of the taps with an old toothbrush and doing some dejunking in the kids' bedroom, but that was as far as it went. I've managed to get them on board though, throwing away or tidying away 10 things in their room each day - slow but steady is the way to go !
8. Get bloggy housekeeping !
Last week, my Klout score went up from 55.89 to 56.68 - this week it bounced back down to 55.64. I give up ! My statcounter ratings stayed at A+/B+/C/C+ though. I jumped back into my ongoing mission to remove dead links and old follow links that google don't like, which is very laborious. I went through four pages (with 100 blogposts on each page) and have now completed 2010. Two years down, probably about another 5 to go !
9. Get French !
The birth certificate that Madhouse Daddy requested arrived. Now I need to get on track with the rest because all documents are only valid for three months - sigh.
What about you? Have you set yourself any targets, challenges or new year's resolutions this year?
I am with you on activity not weight, inches is the way to go for me, though I did loose 1.5 st in total last year, mot a lot but it is staying off. Another 1.5 this year and again next year and I will hit 60 4.5 stone lighter than I hit 30, 40 or 50 so is good in my book.
ReplyDeleteLove the tidy/chuck 10 things a day, would take Fifi 20 years but slow but sure is the way.
Well done on the win, a handy one.
Also a big well done on the blog clean up, doing the bits that nobody sees is tedious.
Slow but steady is best when losing weight - well done for keeping it all off :)
DeleteI could never understand how the Klout score is working. Mine is fluctuating between 61-62, without me doing anything at all. Maybe I should join you on the bookmarked recipes. Wasn't there a challenge somewhere on bookmarked recipes?
ReplyDeleteKlout definitely seems to have a mind of its own ! I think you're right for the linky - I'd forgotten all about that one - most of mine are #readcookeat ones though ! lol
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