Week 5--10 Weeks to a Slimmer Summer

by Rebecca J. Clark
NSCA & ISSA certified personal fitness trainer

Welcome back! If you've been following the steps, you should have dropped about 5 lbs by now. If you're just joining us, be sure to read the previous weeks, starting with Week One. If you're not losing at least a pound a week (assuming you have weight to lose), then I suggest you read through the previous weeks and find out what step you need to work on. 

This challenge is adapted from my new book, The Checklist Diet, available at most ebookstores now. 

Amazon | Barnes & Noble | Kobo 

This week, you’ll continue the steps from Weeks 1-4. Plus you’ll add this next step: 

Eat a fruit or vegetable every time you eat. Aim for 5 total servings — 2 fruits and 3+ veggies a day.

The quickest and easiest way to improve your diet and to lose weight is to eat more produce and less junk food. When you’re hungry, reach for a piece of fruit instead of a candy bar. You’ll still get the sweetness you crave but for a fraction of the calories.

Fruits and vegetables are chock full of vitamins, minerals, and fiber that you just can’t get in a pill or any other food. They’ll fill you up, they’ll improve the look of your skin, and they’ll give you tons of energy. My goal is always to make half of my daily food intake produce. Do I always meet that goal? Oh, hell no. But when I do, my energy is boundless and my skin looks great!

Why am I limiting you to just two fruits a day? Isn’t fruit good for you? Yes, it’s really good for you. I’m pretty sure nobody ever got fat from eating too much fruit. However, fruit is sweet because it’s full of sugar. And too much sugar of any kind can pack on the calories and the pounds.

EXERCISE 

We're changing it up a bit this week by adding the use of dumbbells. You'll need one set of light to medium dumbbells. 

CARDIO: Five days this week, choose one of the following cardio workouts. Feel free to mix and match, or do the same one each day: 

--Walk out your door. Walk for 18 minutes. Turn around and come back. For 10 minutes in the middle, pick up the pace until you’re a bit winded. 

--Get on a cardio machine of choice (treadmill, elliptical, bike, etc). Go slow for two minutes. Pick up the pace a bit for 25 minutes. Cool down at a slow pace for 2 minutes. 

--Pick sevenof your favorite fast-paced songs (for a total of about 30 minutes). Crank the speakers. Dance around your house until the songs are over.

STRENGTH-TRAINING: Two days this week, do the following strength moves (can be done on the same day as the above workouts). 

Pushups--until you can't do anymore (against a wall, counter, or on the floor)--make these harder than the version you've been doing. If you've been doing them against the wall, move to the counter. If you've been doing them against the counter, move to the floor on your knees. If you've been doing them on your knees, move to your toes.

15 Sit and Stands from a chair or bench--hold the dumbbells by your sides. 

15 Dips (slide your hips off a chair or bench, fingers curled around edge. Bend and straighten your arms.) Straighten your legs to make them harder.

10 Biceps curls with dumbbells Stand, holding weights in your hands, arms straight, palms facing away from body. Curl weights to shoulders, straighten.

45 seconds of elbow planks (lie on the floor on your belly, propped on elbows. Lift your body up until you’re balancing on your elbows and toes. Hold.)

20 Supermans (lie on your stomach, arms overhead like Superman. Lift and lower arms and legs at the same time)

Repeat this series 3 times.

Have a great week. Let me know if you have any questions. If you are enjoying this program, please tell your friends!

WEEK 4--10 Weeks to a Slimmer Summer

by Rebecca J. Clark
NSCA & ISSA certified personal fitness trainer

Welcome back! If you've been following the steps, you should be feeling a bit lighter, and the scale should be showing a bit of a loss. If you're just joining us, be sure to read the previous weeks, starting with Week One.

This challenge is adapted from my new book, The Checklist Diet, available at most ebookstores now. 

Amazon | Barnes & Noble | Kobo 

This week, you’ll continue the steps from Weeks 1-3. Plus you’ll add this next step: 

Combine a protein and a “good” carb every time you eat.

You’ll want to eat a lean protein every time you eat, because this will help fuel your body efficiently, support muscle growth, boost your metabolism, keep your energy levels on an even keel, and keep those cravings at bay.

What is a protein? Here are some examples:

·         Eggs

·         Lean meat (beef, chicken, turkey, pork)

·         Fish

·         Cottage cheese

·         Yogurt

·         Beans

·         Nuts & Seeds

·         Quinoa (a grain that’s also a complete protein)

·         Nut butter

·         Tofu or other soy products

Now, let’s talk about carbohydrates. 

Here is a good rule of thumb: when eating a starchy carb (like rice, pasta, grains, corn), keep your portion size no bigger than the size of your closed fist. And eat only one starchy carb per meal/snack. If you do those two things, it’ll be virtually impossible to overeat your starchy carbs.

If your starchy carb comes in a package (like rice or pasta or bread), you can also read the serving size on the label to figure out what one portion is.

This rule might sound complicated, but it’s not. A snack could be as simple as celery or apple with nut butter. Yogurt and berries. A hardboiled egg and a piece of fruit. Half of a tuna salad sandwich on whole grain bread. The possibilities are endless.

EXERCISE 

You’re going to continue with the exercises from last week, but I’m going to make them a bit harder. Next week, we'll be using light dumbbells, so make sure you have some ready.  

CARDIO: Five days this week, choose one of the following cardio workouts. Feel free to mix and match, or do the same one each day: 

--Walk out your door. Walk for 15 minutes. Turn around and come back. For 5 of those minutes, pick up the pace until you’re a bit winded. 


--Get on a cardio machine of choice (treadmill, elliptical, bike, etc). Go slow for two minutes. Pick up the pace a bit for 20 minutes. Cool down at a slow pace for 2 minutes. 


--Pick six of your favorite fast-paced songs (for a total of about 25 minutes). Crank the speakers. Dance around your house until the songs are over.


STRENGTH-TRAINING: Two days this week, do the following strength moves (can be done on the same day as the above workouts). 

20 Pushups (against a wall, counter, or on the floor)
20 Sit and Stands from a chair or bench 
10 Dips (slide your hips off a chair or bench, fingers curled around edge. Bend and straighten your arms.)
30 seconds of elbow planks (lie on the floor on your belly, propped on elbows. Lift your body up until you’re balancing on your elbows and toes. Hold.) 
15 Supermans (lie on your stomach, arms overhead like Superman. Lift and lower arms and legs at the same time) 
Repeat this series 3 times.

Have a great week. Let me know if you have any questions. If you are enjoying this program, please tell your friends!

Authors in Bloom Blog Hop!

Welcome to my corner of the 

Authors in Bloom Blog Hop!

April 7 – April 16 

10 Days of Giveaways--Gardening Tips--Recipes

Plus a GRAND PRIZE of a Kindle Fire or Nook

Almost 80 authors are participating. We will all post our giveaway, gardening tip, recipe or both on our blogs, beginning April 7 and leaving our contests open through the 16th.  You will have 10 days to enter each individual author contest and then submit your entry for the grand prize!!  To win the grand prize, you must visit each and every author on the hop.  Each site will post the links of participating authors but please feel free to visit the FIRST or LAST  stops of the blog hop to find the author link list at any point in time. 

**Be sure to leave your email addy with your comment so we know how to contact you.

My blog's prize: $15 gift certificate to Gardener's Supply Company (http://www.gardeners.com/).

* * *

The theme of this blog hop is gardening and recipes, so we are supposed to give you a gardening tip and/or recipe. You do not want a gardening tip from me. Trust me. This is what my garden looks like right now.

Yes, it's Spring and I haven't worked in it yet, but I doubt it'll look much different come warmer weather.

To go along with the yummy (and healthy!!!) baked apple recipe I’ll share below, I thought I’d share an apple-related story written by my grandmother, Dorothy P. Hyland (1912-1993).

How about them apples?

After the apples were ripe, Mother would peel and slice the them by the bushel. We put clean sheets on the shed roofs and had to lay those slices of apple closely together to dry. As we didn’t have too much rain, but did have hot sunny days (hot days AND nights) [this was in Wisconsin], the sun was depended upon to dry the apple slices. 

Sunny days would lengthen into weeks before it rained. At night we covered the slices with cheesecloth. The cheesecloth came off in the morning and it was our job to see that no birds or flies bothered those apple slices during the day. After two days all those slices had to be turned over, and what a boring job that was! It took hours to finish that job. All in all, it took the best part of a week before the dried apple slices could be gathered and placed in a tight container to be used for apple pies during the winter. If the orchard produced a lot of apples, the same job had to be repeated for several weeks more. That really cut into my play time.

I made sure the neighbors had lots of ripe apples for their cooking and canning needs and I, personally, ate them by the peck just to get rid of them so we wouldn’t have too many to dry. Apples were my favorite fruit, and Mother always said that if she peeled a potato and called it an apple, I would like it and not know the difference.

Baked Apples

(thanks to Courtney Milan for the yummy recipe)

1. Take one apple. I like Gala apples. Cut it in half, and use a paring knife to take out the seeds and make a little divot in the center of the apple. You now have two apple halves.

2. Get a small bowl. Put rolled oats in the middle--not a lot, maybe about a tablespoon and a half. Add some crushed pecans or walnuts--about three pecan halves will do you.

3. Drizzle a very small amount of olive oil over this. 1 teaspoon is plenty. Mix. Now scoop the oat mixture into the hole in the middle of your apple. If you have too much oat stuff, it's my fault, I never get it right. Put these into some kind of a baking dish. You might want to put it on parchment paper because the apple is going to get messy.

4. This is the point where I remember that I SHOULD have preheated the oven to 375, but who remembers to preheat the oven? Not me. Turn the oven on to 375 and pop those suckers in.

5. How long do you cook it? I HAVE NO IDEA, really, I just put them in and then hope I don't forget them. The thing is, these are really forgiving, as long as you don't undercook them. 45 minutes? An hour? That sounds about right. Do that! I would say that you cannot overcook these, but you can. I will say that *I* have not overcooked them, and that's impressive because I can overcook anything. They should be super-soft to the fork when you take them out.

6. Let them cool. Or don't, because I don't, either, but don't blame me when you burn your mouth.

7. If you want to be extravagant, you can add ice cream or regular cream. I never do this, but I just want to point out that you can dress these up so that you have a heavier more dessert feeling dessert for those who want, and a lighter less dessert feeling dessert for those who don't. If you want to be mildly extravagant, a single half-ounce cut of sharp cheddar cheese makes an awesome pair. But you don't have to be extravagant at all because they're ridiculously sweet and delicious all by themselves.

--Thanks, Courtney!!!!

Be sure to visit all the other blogs, commenting as you go with your email addy, for a chance to win a Kindle Fire or Nook.

Week 3--10 Weeks to a Slimmer Summer

by Rebecca J. Clark
ISSA and NSCA certified personal trainer

Welcome back! How is it going so far? If you’ve been following the plan, your pants should be getting a bit looser around the waist and you should be feeling a bit more energetic in your day to day life.

This challenge is adapted from my new book, The Checklist Diet, available at most ebookstores now.

Amazon | Barnes & Noble | Kobo 

If you’re just joining us now, please refer back to Week 1 and Week 2.

This week, you’ll continue tracking everything you eat, and will keep eating a healthy breakfast within an hour of waking up. Plus you’ll add this next step:

After eating breakfast, 

eat only when you’re hungry

This is the hardest step for me. I want to eat when I’m bored, when it’s “time” to eat, or pretty much any reason other than being hungry. This step is where I differ from many of my fellow trainers. You’ve probably heard how you *should* eat every 2-3 hours. From a scientific standpoint, this makes sense, because every time you eat, you rev your metabolism. Eating every 2-3 hours give you steady energy, more even-tempered moods (no more low-blood sugar crashes) and could help you to avoid cravings.

But when I eat this way, I’m constantly watching the clock, counting down the minutes until I can eat again, whether I’m hungry or not. Our bodies are very smart. I don’t think we need to listen to someone else’s rules on when we *should* or *should not* eat. When we’re hungry, we eat. If we’re not hungry, we don’t eat. Pretty simple, eh?

Think of your hunger as a scale of 1-10.

10 — Thanksgiving stuffed

7 — You feel like you ate a bit too much and are slightly uncomfortable

5 — Comfortable

3 — You’re a little bit hungry, but you could wait

0 — Your stomach is empty and you need to eat right now

Eat when your stomach is at 0-3.

EXERCISE 

You’re going to continue with the exercises from last week, but I’m going to make them a bit harder and add one strength move.

CARDIO: Five days this week, choose one of the following cardio workouts. Feel free to mix and match, or do the same one each day:

--Walk out your door. Walk for 10 minutes. Turn around and come back. For 2 of those minutes, pick up the pace until you’re a bit winded.


--Get on a cardio machine of choice (treadmill, elliptical, bike, etc). Go slow for two minutes. Pick up the pace a bit for 15 minutes. Cool down at a slow pace for 2 minutes.


--Pick five of your favorite fast-paced songs (for a total of about 20 minutes). Crank the speakers. Dance around your house until the songs are over.


STRENGTH-TRAINING: Two days this week, do the following strength moves (can be done on the same day as the above workouts).

20 Pushups (against a wall, counter, or on the floor)
20 Sit and Stands from a chair or bench
10 Dips (slide your hips off a chair or bench, fingers curled around edge. Bend and straighten your arms.)
30 seconds of elbow planks (lie on the floor on your belly, propped on elbows. Lift your body up until you’re balancing on your elbows and toes. Hold.)
15 Supermans (lie on your stomach, arms overhead like Superman. Lift and lower arms and legs at the same time)

Repeat those exercises

Have a great week. Let me know if you have any questions. If you are enjoying this program, please tell your friends!

WEEK 2--10-Weeks to a Slimmer Summer

by Rebecca J. Clark

NSCA and ISSA certified personal fitness trainer

Welcome to the second week of my summer slimdown. If you’re just joining us now, be sure to read Week 1 first.

This challenge is adapted from my new book, The Checklist Diet, available at most ebookstores now.

Amazon | Barnes & Noble | Kobo

This week, you’ll continue with the healthy eating habit you started last week (track your food) and add another step.

Eat a healthy, balanced breakfast within an hour of waking up.

When you’ve been fasting all night, your metabolism and digestion slow down so you can sleep. Think of a car engine that’s idling: it’s still on, but it’s not doing much. When you wake up, you want to fire up that engine as soon as you can in order to start burning more calories—you want to break the fast. The best way to do that is to eat breakfast.

You don’t like to eat breakfast because you’re starving a couple of hours later? Yay! That’s a good thing. Getting hungry again just means your metabolism is working as it should.

What constitutes a “healthy, balanced breakfast”?

Start with a lean protein (meat, dairy such as yogurt, soy product, or eggs) and add a fruit and/or starchy carb (like cereal or toast). If you love vegetables, breakfast time is a great place for them.

Here are some ideas:
· Whole grain cereal with milk*; half a sliced banana or berries on top

· Oatmeal with skim milk*, a tbsp chopped pecans, 3 chopped frozen cherries

· Whole grain toast with light peanut butter and an apple

· Scrambled eggs with salsa wrapped inside a whole grain tortilla

· Fruit & protein smoothie (1 cup milk, 1 cup of fruit, 1 scoop protein powder or 6 oz. plain Greek yogurt, squirt of honey)

· Poached egg on toast with just a smidge of butter; ½ cup of berries on the side

*When I say “milk”, I mean any milk-like product: dairy milk, soy milk, rice milk, almond milk, etc.

If the thought of eating breakfast makes you sick to your stomach, then try having just a few bites of something. Like three slices of apple dipped in peanut butter. Half a piece of toast with light nut butter. Something other than just your morning coffee

After a few days of doing this, you’ll wake up hungry. I promise.

EXERCISE

You’re going to continue with the exercises from last week, but I’m going to make them a bit harder and add one strength move.

CARDIO: Five days this week, choose one of the following cardio workouts. Feel free to mix and match, or do the same one each day:

Walk out your door. Walk for 7 minutes. Turn around and come back. For 2 of those minutes, pick up the pace until you’re a bit winded.

Get on a cardio machine of choice (treadmill, elliptical, bike, etc). Go slow for two minutes. Pick up the pace a bit for 10 minutes. Cool down at a slow pace for 2 minutes.

Pick four of your favorite fast-paced songs (for a total of about 15 minutes). Crank the speakers. Dance around your house until the songs are over.

STRENGTH-TRAINING: Two days this week, do the following strength moves (can be done on the same day as the above workouts)

15 Pushups (against a wall, counter, or on the floor)
15 Sit and stands from a chair or bench
20 seconds of elbow planks (lie on the floor on your belly, propped on elbows. Lift your body up until you’re balancing on your elbows and toes. Hold.)

10 Supermans (lie on your stomach, arms overhead like Superman. Lift and lower arms and legs at the same time)

Repeat those exercises 

Have a great week. Let me know if you have any questions. If you are enjoying this program, please tell your friends!