The onwards road...

Hey all :)

Well life is as hectic as usual. Again thanks to all for dropping by and posting a comment - Rae, I loved your blog, you were soo right with regards to what I was cooking at night, I certainly was trying to be a gourmet chef. So my aim this coming week is to keep it simple. Tonight at the gym (yes I dragged my sorry ass off the gym tonight - yah, and I was feeling very sorry for myself today, of course, I feel better after the gym now!), I went to the butcher and picked out our meats for the following week, so now all I have to do is add salad or veg each night, nice and easy.

I got into a bit of a groove of going to the gym at 5am the last couple months but now the cold mornings have hit us, am having quite a bit of trouble with this, but I'm now actually enjoying my 5.30-6.30pm sessions straight from work, as my house is just 5 mins around the corner, I am home in plenty of time for BB and to cook a quick dinner and relax.

So in some ways I am feeling a bit more positive, I think mainly because I have got back into a routine of going to the gym, other times I feel its a hopeless quest but you just gotta take a deep breath and look forward, don't get caught up in the right now but instead concentrate on improving the right now so that the future will be what you want.

Hope that makes some sense to someone out there :)

Tomorrow night I am off to a friend's house to watch "friday night games" over some red wine, which should be nice as it will just be some "girl" time. Sat I have to work up at the garage with the other half and that night we are having a dinner party with some friends to celebrate our new house - theme being mexican, so should be good to see what people cook up. And hence, I can do some gourmet cooking..LOL!

Sunday will no doubt just be relaxing and cleaning up...oh almost forgot, I went to carousel at lunch time today and bought two pairs of shoes. I can't beleive the bargain I got, and they were from Myers - $59.95 each!!! I don't think I have bought a pair of shoes for under $100 for years, and I love them, they are soo cute, so can't wait to wear them to work!!

Right, over and out, LOST is about to start and I am an addict :)

Melly.
x

A quick check in...

Yep just a quick one tonight as BB evictions is on - sorry to all those who can't stand this show (and I know there are lots) but I'm addicted, every year I try not to be but it drags me back in - LOL!

Thank you all for you lovely comments. The pictures I posted are ones that I love and thought they looked the best...hehe...so thought they were ok to share!

I think my main thing I am concentrating on now is : Aiming to look good out of clothes as well as in clothes - its easy to look good in clothes but without clothes is the hard one, you can't hide! I really want to tone up and get some good muscle shape.....

Gym is gettng more on track, knowing that we don't have to go away for another 6 weeks is great because we can actually get stuck into training - just gotta find a love for cario - agh!

Food is going ok, I am trying to kick my cashew and cheese addiction - I think today is my first day without gorging on either - yah! How long do they say it takes to break a habit??

Work is going great, love my job - am continually busy and all the people I work with are just lovely, so its nice to go to work each day.

House - love, love, love our new house, it feels like we have always been here and its all clean and sparkly and with fresh flowers and candles...awwwww...

Sorry if this one is a bit mis-jointed....trying to watch telly and type at the same time ;)

Ok, will try and catch up on everyone's blog soon and will write more soon.
Love,
Mel.
x

Bahrain pics...

Hmmm, not sure how to format this so I hope it makes some sense!

















Stu getting ready to go out in the porsche for the first time ever! (ab0ve)

The biggest burger I have ever seen, seriously!! But it was also the best burger ever and NO I did not eat this all by myself (below)

Me in a formula one car (far right) and me very gracefully (NOT) trying to get out of it (far below)

Organisation...is the key!

This seems to be my "other" downfall. It doesn't matter how much I seem to try I never seem to have the time/energy to get everything or anything much done. I am amazed how people do it!

Between full time work, then shopping for dinner, gym (be it morning or night), cooking, cleaning and finally sitting down - I never seem to get anywhere - each night when I come home my house still isn't tidy and the same ole routine each night begins again - nothing new is ever accomplished!

Perhaps I'm lazy I have no idea - but by 7.30-8.00pm I really want to sit down and have my dinner and relax for a bit, I'm not the type of person to come home and sit down for a bit before doing stuff, I get straight into it from the moment I open the front door. Can you believe I don't even have kids but between myself and Stuart we make the biggest mess and I am constantly cleaning up and still I can see the dishes from dinner staring at me - my only catch up time is the weekends!!

Sorry if this is a whinge blog, its not meant to come across like that I am just trying to suss out how you guys do it, what's the key!!!

I'm thinking perhaps instead of starting dinner straight away and doing bits inbetween I should perhaps start all my other chores first and finish them then start dinner? Hmmmm, maybe I will test that - Stu is away for the rest of the week so of course that makes it easy, once the house is tidy I keep it that way when he isn't here, so next week will be more of a test - still gonna try that dinner cooking thing last starting from tomorrow to try and get in a routine! Then from there perhaps I can start getting my next day more organised once I've mastered the night!

**WOW, two blogs in one evening, I'm on a roll tonight!!**

Any comments would be much appreciated ladies!

Mel.
x

Another month rolls on...

Its seriously unbelievable how quickly this year is going - can you believe its MAY already!!

Well just a quick post tonight, will update more goals etc later in the week.

I've be trying to concentrate and keep perspective on my aim over. I think I am slowly getting better - very small baby steps. Mainly I guess I realise my mistakes more.

Quite obviously I have identified alcohol as my problem. I'm not good at stopping and then I tend to binge eat and then of course the day after its hard to do anything. So I'm really over this drinking caper! Am aiming to just have a couple drinks on special occassions from now on. Rather than saying I am not drinking for the next year or six months or whatever, I'm taking it small steps at a time - the first one is 2 weeks without a beverage.

I'm actually flying to Melbourne this weekend, Stu goes beforehand but I have to work all week so will meet him there and then we both come back late on Sunday night but this will be my first big hurdle - we normally tend to drink when we are away, but its not necessary and I know I am going to feel really good and then I don't normally drink during the week so when we come back that week will be easy and before you now it 2 weeks and I will be feeling soo much better - I hate that bloating feeling you get after drinking!!!

So there you go, my first goal set with a reasonable time boundary on it....

I hope you guys are all going well - oh and I have started my weights again and getting my cardio back (the ole knee is annoying though!).

Will check up on how everyone's going tomorrow :)

Melly.
x

Where to start??

I guess I will start by saying I am trying to upgrade my blog to reflect "me" a little more...but being completely uncompter savvy, I have no idea how to do this so, so am researching a bit - stay tuned for a funky looking site one of these days...

Next the questions!

Where have I been? Good lord, I have no idea myself, things have just been soo busy and soo hectic and realising its almost May is scary. Well in summary, new job working full time (big shock to system), moving into new house and of course our trip last week to Bahrain. I am hoping things will settle into place shortly but looking at the social calender, its not likely - football next week, Melbourne the weekend after, then mother's day...phew! See what I mean!

Anyways let's talk Bahrain before I get into the heavy stuff :) We went over there for motor racing, the formula one grand prix was on and it was totally amazing. I was really nervous about going there not knowing what the culture was like and what I should wear it but its very western and the growth is amazing, its an extremely wealthy little place and the people were just the nicest people I have ever met, taxi drivers, hotel staff, everyone was there to please any tourist! I do have to mention that we went to two shopping centres...now I've been to a fair few places but these shops just blew me away - so beautiful, so classy, it was like stepping into Paris...quite a spin out.

The big question...weight... well I am going to be brutually honest as this what I need. I am very disappointed in myself and my body at the moment. Again with how the time has gone I can't believe how I have let myself go. I know that is a lame excuse to say I didn't even notice but really I didn't. I've been caught in a rock and a hard place - battling with my mind in not becoming obessive to the point that I have overlooked myself and how I feel. I hope that makes sense but I guess I have been trying to be "normal" without becoming obessive about my weight without realising that I was actually ignoring healthy eating and exercise.

To say I am extremely dissappointed is myself is an understatement. It has now stated to affect most corners of my life. My beautiful husband is starting on a health kick with me to help my confidence and self esteem as obviously it seems to crush him to see me soo down on myself...I'm very lucky and happy to have him in my life to help me but ultimately its up to me.

What I need to remember is that bit of chocolate, that extra serving of dinner DOES hurt, at this stage I can't afford to go off track, I'm not that skinny little girl anymore.

So my aim is to concentrate daily on me and my goals and not to get caught up with everything else going on and neglect myself. Even my skin was getting all dry and yuk because I wasn't taking time to moisturise - how bad is that! But I need to make these efforts, it all adds up in the end.

Here I am back at blogging to help me stay on track. I plan on trying to blog every couple days (everyday would be nice but lets not get over ambitious here - LOL!) on how I am going and what I am doing to achieve what I want.

I desperately do not want to get to 30 and still not be happy or where I want to be - I need to remember that thought everyday.

Well that's enough for my first blog back - wish me luck and I will be updating again this weekend!

Its almost been 2 months!!!

OMG, I can't believe its been like 2 months since my last post :(

Well this is just gonna be a quick one - I am off to Bahrain with the hubby tomorrow night for racing - will be back in a week and will fill everyone in on the trip and everything else - nothing interesting....2 months 2 more kilos on :( That's probably why I haven't posted....but will keep trying!

Will also catch up on everyone's goss soon and hopefully everything is going well for you all.

Take care,
Mel.
xxx

Ups and Downs...

Well its been awhile.

This is going to be a bit of a short one....been really busy with buying the house, going away and my first week of my new job this week.

Work is good, I think I am gonna like....food has been really hard and haven't been that great with my wheat etc...tonight I am unfortunately having a chocolate night...

So I have put on quite a bit of weight in the last couple weeks, I've really been all over the place.

No excuses, I have to train harder, end of the line, that's the answer.

I actually had a really good train last night but unfortunately didn't back that up tonight. I kinda gave myself this week to regroup after adapting to my new work hours and being back from over east. So tomorrow is a new day and I am determined to get that healthy feeling back, so tomorrow is a big fruit, vege shopping day, gotta work in the morning, then some exercise - but I am going to bounce back and shed the heavy kilos...

Right I am going to go for a surf and see how you are all holding up AND to see how the Perth Bloogers Meet went!

Melly.
x

Phew!!!

I can't believe its already been 10 days since my last post. Things have been soo hectic...have lots of news.

Non Fitness Stuff....

Ok, on Sunday we went out looking at houses - our rental property is up in March and we hadn't decided if we would continue on or buy again. The houses in Vic Park are sooo expensive and for the price a wrought - really tiny and lots of work to do or massive mansions that you could only dream about. So on the spur of the moment we ducked across to look at a place in Lathlain to compare what you get in the two suburbs. OMG, we fell in love with the house straight away, it was perfect, it was us. We put an offer on it that afternoon and that evening they accepted!!! So we move in in March. I'm soo excited, its such a beautiful house and we walked past it with our boys last night and checked the area out and its such a great location and the whole street is being done up so I can only see that area going up in value - we are right near Burswood Casino etc, so the river is now even closer, say a 5-7 min walk and we have views of the skyline from our front garden and of the hills at our back patio....oohhhhhhh...can you tell I am excited.

What else?? I accepted a job offer today. I am really really nervous. I have no idea how I am going to go out in the "real" world again but I guess you never know til you try. It sounds like a great job for me to go back into and its soo close to home and the pay is awesome and all the people seem nice - I start is about 2.5 weeks, so I gotta get my butt into action here and find someone to work here and organise all our personal stuff to take home to our home office...aghhh!!!

Fitness Stuff...

I've been really good - exercising 5-6 days a week as planned. Eating better etc. I have started saying little mantras to myself every morning before I get out of bed to remind me of my goals

"I will eat healthily today"
"I will eat smaller portion sizes"
"I will exercise harder"
"I will lose weight"

I love mantras, I find they really do work after a period.

On Monday I also visited a naturopath in South Perth. I think I have mentioned in previous emails about my problems with my stomach, well its been getting beyond a joke so I thought I would try something other than the useless doctors I have been trying.

I loved my naturopath, he was awesome. He really took the time to find out about me and my life and everything, not just the symptoms!!! So at the end of the day I now have a whole bunch of herbal liquids, drops & tablets to take and the bigger...for the next 3 weeks NO GLUTEN OR WHEAT and to cut back on dairy!! Its only been a couple days but my system seems to be starting to process again and other problem was my anxiety of late was really flairing up for no apparent reason - apparently my nervous system is completely out of whack and that is actually reacting badly with my digestive system so if we get my nervous system under control it should fall in line with digestive system.

Sorry about the raving on but I'm just soo excited, I haven't felt this good for ages - its nice when you can really feel a difference.

So in respect to not being able to eat that much stuff coz bloody gluten/wheat is in most things, I am eating soo healthily and I am sure with my exercise this is going to pay off big time soon...motivation and determination!!!!

Take care all,
Mel.
xxx

A Title??

I always try to think up a really catchy and fabulous blog title to set a really good blog up, think of the title and run with it. But to be honest , today I can't, i just can't think of anything at all to be a good blog title..sooo my lovelies, you'll just have to trust me on this blog.

Things in the world of Mel have been up and down to say the least. Why do we find motivation to only lose it soo quickly? I haven't lost my motivation, its still there but it did go into hiding for a few days. But never fear I willed it to come back out and in the end I think I've found the key!

We all lose that complete drive and motivated feeling at times but the key is to remember the feeling and keep trying to get it back, remember how good it felt to be motivated and soo determined, imaging you could take on the world. Remember that feeling and take one day at a time and it will come back and before you know it you've actually strung a few days, a week, a month in a row! Without knowing it you've been motivated, you've done it - the tip is just not to give up when the going gets rough, keep plodding along because it will happen.... even if not as perfectly as you hoped!

So there you go, a little bit of insight into my last week. I've been here, I've been reading blogs...

I had Monday off and I did pretty much nothing all day - i know to some people that would be the worst thing ever, my Mum couldn't quite get her head around the concept that I did absolutely nothing all day but you know what I love doing that, its my "me" time...

Unfortunately today I am sick. I did go into work but only to come home mid morning. I have some antibiotics from the doctors and am starting to feel heaps better so I'm sure the drugs have kicked in and I'll be up and at em tomorrow. I am soo grateful that yesterday I dragged myself outside and went for a jog down near Burswood, because today I can't do anything - it really pays to just push yourself and do it on days you don't want to coz you never know when you CAN'T.

Now tomorrow I have two job interviews, one before work and one after, so I am going to try and get up at 6am and do a quick 30 min jog, coz I don't have enough time to get to the gym and back and then be all ready for my 8am interview...its gonna be tight but if I don't make the effort to jog, I won't get to do anything for the whole day...

Well today I finally finished the complete series of Sex and the City....a bit sad really, not sure what I am going to do without my daily dose of Carrie, Charlottoe, Samantha and Miranda....

Exercise this week:-

Sunday: Walked into the city from Vic Park , shopped and walked back (total 3 hrs without sitting down)
Monday: Jog - approx 45 mins, on/off jogging with the first 20 mins non stop
Tuesday: Sick - sat on butt!
Wednesday: 30 mins jog (morning), situps, lunges, push ups (evening)

Planned for the rest of the week.....(let's see how I go)

Thursday: 1 hour cardio (gym)
Friday: 1 hour cardio (gym)
Saturday: Weights, 30 - 40 mins cardio

**You'll note the one little weights session, reason being I am still getting the confidence up to hit my new gym weights area but next week I'm on it!**

Love to you all bellas....
xxx

2007…New Year, New Mel!!!


Yep I just as the title says….I am all determined to make myself really happy this year, to complete the challenges and goals I’ve wanted for ages but never got to!

I’m not a big New Year’s Resolution person so I’m not gonna call this new found motivation a resolution, its more of a life changing attitude!

Quick run down of the silly season

Surprisingly I’m sure I have been a lot better than previous years. I’ve continued the gym or walking the river daily only missing the days it was closed, so I’m really proud of that. I only drank on the actual special days, not before or the on the eve etc….and I did eat chocolate and naughty stuff but tried to be as good as possible around those times…so all in all I’m pretty happy with those little achievements to start.

Our Xmas was good – very busy. Did the usual lunch with Stu’s family and then dinner at our place with my family. I got Stu a table tennis table so we had fun playing that with the family – love table tennis! And I got the complete DVD series of Sex and the City – OMG, just my favourite show ever, so now must plan a “SATC marathon” with my girlfriends and cosmopolitans of course…haha

My birthday was the 28th so I had a champas brunch with my girlfriends and my Mummy and then went to Mindarie’s to a new pub up that way with my brother and sister-in-law and drank the afternoon away, it was really good fun! And then that evening Stuart to me for a picnic down at the river. He was soo cute he even took our little glass outdoor table and chairs so we just on the riverbank with all sorts of yummy nibbles and champagne…as you can guess, I pretty much just passed out by the time I got home…best birthday is many years!

New Years Eve, was ok. Not the best actually but so be it…am over it. Had people over to ours for pre-drinks and then went to the Broken Hill. It was quite good. I was meant to go to Perth Cup the next day but I just couldn’t be bothered and was feeling a little sorry for myself so I had a 12 hour marathon of SATC by myself at home – I did eat crap but the consolation was that I didn’t drink…so that’s gotta be something!

The New Year….

Well to start with, I think I am going to find a new job. I work with my husband, only 3 days a week but I think it would be good for me to get my own life a little more and start working back in the city. It does mean I will have to work 5 days a week so I get the same money and I won’t just have flexibility to do what I want and when Stu flies over east I will have to fly out by myself on the Friday night and come back early Mondays or late Sundays but so be it…I think it will be really good for me to meet new people and try to become the “social fun Mel” I once was. Working with mechanics in the hills does not help….

On top of that I’ve really looked at my life and what I want. I want to be happy, I want to be independent and more carefree, I want to have the body I have always wanted and I want to see my friends more. I’m too young to be as old as I acting and feeling for the last couple years.

So its now time for me to make more time to do things I want to do, go see my friends after work more etc… I feel really good about getting into tip top shape – I just have this sudden motivation that I don’t think I have had ever before, I know what I want and I will do it – maybe its because I have been good the last month and gyming it and I am starting to feel the positiveness from it….

**Oh also I have my food under heaps better control at work now and its made such a huge difference already!! No picking on my husband’s food at work now, I just have my fruit and my salads and I’m happy…la la lahhhhhh**

Anyways that’s about it from me for this blog, think I will start blogging what my exercise routines are, help me stay on track and up the anti a little bit!

Love to you all,
Melly.
x