Workout DVD review: Insanity/ week 1

Hey everyone!

Now as promised I will do my review on Insanity. I just completed my first week of Insanity but first things first I'm just gonna talk about the DVD set.

The DVD set comes with:

• 13 DVDs
• A book of recipes/eating guide of advice on how to eat during this this 60 day workout.
• A calender for when you to track down all the days you worked out. The calender also tells you what workout you will be doing on certain days and what days are rest days. 
• A card where you record your results when you do the fitness test from one of the DVDs

And now I will talk about how my first week went. The first day was not very hard because it was the fit test that I was doing but that second day I found was pretty intense along with the third day but the forth day was not so hard because it was a recovery day where you just do a lot of stretches but next two days were tough again and today I am on my rest day. 

This is a really tough workout there is a lot of cardio involved and at times I would would get worn out. I mostly got worn out when I did my second day, It felt like I was gargling my heart and I could not stop coughing because whenever my heart rate goes through the roof it always does that. That gradually went away though as I went through the week as I found I became stronger in the last two days but it was still tough. I still got worn out a few times but even the people in the DVD would get worn out to a point where Shaun T had to tell some of them to take a break! 

Just realised I forgot to talk about the instructor. The instructor's name is Shaun T and he's very encouraging throughout the workout, He's not harsh like Jillian Michaels is but he always encourages you to push your hardest throughout the workouts.

I will now talk about how its effected my body I am actually noticing a change in my body as in my muscles have really tightened and I also lost about 1 inch around my waist. I know I mentioned this already but I became a bit more fit towards the end of the week. I also did get sore mainly around my core and area where the love handles are. so yes I did get sore too.

 I really should be showing you pictures but I don't have any. I will take some of me now and after I am done with the first month and after the final month.

As for How I am eating, well I haven't used any of the recipes from the book that comes with it because again I am a vegetarian and so many of the recipes include meat mainly the lunch and dinner recipes. I might try some of the breakfast recipes as some of them are vegetarian.

I am mainly following the advice in the book as to how much calories I should eat. I do use myfitnesspal.com to track my calories. and really make sure I eat the right amount of calories and I make sure I have my protein and eat my fruit and veg etc. But the book also tells you to go with what works best for yourself and I find that having around 400 calories for breakfast works for me. I mostly went with what worked best for me which I will still do.

And that's that for week 1 of my Insanity work out stay tuned for how week 2 went!

Catch you all later

Love 

     Alice 

My favorite low calorie snacks and snack ideas.

Hey All!

I am going to share what my favorite low calorie snacks are. I really hope this blog gives you ideas for those times where you feel kind of peckish after school at 3 or 4 pm and you really that afternoon tea or at work and you really want to avoid that pathetic vending machine during break or lunch that carries all that high calorie chocolate bars and other glorious fatty snacks that are so hard to resist.

Here are some snacks you can buy from the supermarket that are good options. I got these snacks from a grocery store called  Woolworths viewers from Australia will know what I cam talking about. However for my viewers in other countries I don't if these snacks are available in your country but if you do see them I recommend that you pick them up. As for my Aussie viewers this will be very useful because these snacks you'll be able to find them in Woolworths or Coles. also sometimes Aldi will have specials but they don't really sell these snacks all together.

For all you chocoholics!

I must say despite losing all this weight I am still a recovering chocoholic. there are times where I feel like having chocolate. But these chocolates I am about to mention have been my life savor. If you yourself are a chocoholic I recommend that you try these out. Especially if its that time of the month for all you women out there!

There is a company called "...Well Naturally" this is their website:
 http://www.vitalitybrands.com/well-naturally

I really love their sugar free milk chocolate but they only have two versions one which is just plain milk chocolate and the other is fruit and nut. I always grab the fruit and nut bar. oh yes and they don't add sugar to them but they still have natural sugars in them, but they don't have a lot of sugar in them and they use stevia to sweeten them. They are 65 calories for two pieces of the bar and they have a very rich creamy texture. It literally melts in your mouth and to me its really no different from eating regular chocolate. Its not very low in calories and fat so you still have to be careful how much you have but its still a good alternative to regular chocolate as its not so high in sugar. Sometimes I will buy the plain milk chocolate one and use it for making guilt free snacks like I once used it for making chocolate covered strawberries.

The next treat from the same company is a lot more guilt free than the the first one and they are these little protein bars. They come in quite a lot of flavors. I've only tried three flavors. They are called "High Protein mini bars" Out of all the ones I tried I really love the banana fudge and the peppermint surprise. The Banana fudge flavor reminds me so much of this Austrian chocolate I had ages ago when I was a kid called "Schoko Bananen" and they are these banana flavored candies/lollies that are covered in chocolate and this protein bar has the exact same taste! And as for the peppermint flavored one that flavor reminds so much of  "after eights" or any other chocolate that has mint flavor or mint flavored icing, the taste is exactly the same. If you really love mint chocolate I highly recommend the Peppermint surprise and if you love banana flavored candy I definitely recommend the Banana fudge. I also tried the double chocolate flavor but to me I prefer the other ones that I tried as I find the double chocolate one a fair bit boring in its taste its not that I hate it, its ok but I just prefer the mint and the banana flavor because they remind me so much of those other chocolates from my childhood. Each of these bars are under 100 calories too! And they are naturally sweetened!

The next treat is by a company called "Slim Secrets" they make these cookies called "designer cookies" I really love their chocolate chip cookie. This cookie is also very nutritious as it has chia seeds in them which are high in omega 3 so if you're like me and you really loath fish you should try this cookie. Its less than 130 calories and it only has less than 5 grams of sugar. I really think this cookie is delicious, I really love the chocolate chips in them. They also have a very soft fibrous texture but they don't have the same texture as regular hard cookies but I think they are delicious.

For all the sweet tooths!
The next treat is one that reminds me so much of another thing I had from my childhood and they are called "Uncle Toby's Fruit roll ups" Yup they are fruit roll ups but these roll ups in particular are not very high in sugar they only have 3 grams of sugar per roll and each roll is 52 calories. They remind me so much of this other roll up candy that I had as a kid and I think they were just called "fruit roll ups" and I really loved those, even though the taste of these roll ups are not thoroughly the same as they are not so sweet in taste, they still remind me so much of that other fruit roll up I had as a kid. If you like eating gummy candies or any kind fruit candy I recommend to you try this.

Now for the savories!
Popcorn is a fun treat and this is a popcorn snack that I highly recommend by Sunbites and it is the air popped popcorn  which is 25% fat free, it is NOT cooked in oil which makes it a fantastic low fat snack. I don't know how many flavors they come in, the one flavor I always grab is the sour cream and chives flavor. And it is delicious!

The next snack I think is  great are soya chips. They are a really nice low calorie snack. I don't have a picture of them as I didn't get any today but here is a website that talks about them and there is a picture of them in this website:
http://www.priorityhealth.com.au/DA1200/Soya-King-Soya-Crisps-10kg/pd.php


You can get them in woolworths and coles just look through the savory snack aisles and you should be able to find them, they are usually around where nuts and peanuts are. There are different brands that make them, I know Woolworths makes their own version.

And here are some general options
Nuts are a good snack although you should still eat them sparingly because they do have fat in them but of course fats that are good for you, and Apple chips a are also good too!

Fruits are a good option for snack they are great to have on an empty stomach. You can also have carrot sticks, cucumber sticks celery sticks and eat them with a good tasting dip that of course should be guilt free you can also make your own dips.

Another snack I really love is edamame which is a Japanese snack and they are soy beans that are still in the pods, steamed or boiled I think and you open them and eat the soy beans only, you don't eat the skin. You can buy them frozen, you should be able to find them from your local Asian grocery store in the frozen food section. You can also find them in woolworths in the frozen food section.

Here is picture of them from wikipedia:

http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Edamame_by_Zesmerelda_in_Chicago.jpg

Seaweed is also a great snack if you are that type of person who loves sushi. I sometimes like to have seaweed I know a lot of Asian grocery stores sell them in different flavors, you can get ones that are spicy extra crunchy etc. plus seaweed is very good for you too as from what I found out it has iron and calcium, its good to have if you're a vegetarian because of the iron.

And now for Beverages
There is this powder drink I love by Vitarium called sugar free kids they use stevia and all you do is add four tea spoons of it in a glass and add milk. they come in chocolate, banana and strawberry and they are very delicious. You can make a hot chocolate with the chocolate flavored one too. I highly recommend this oh yes and the strawberry flavored one reminds me of  another powdered drink called Nesquick.

I am personally more of a tea person, one tea I really love is rooibus tea with almond milk sweetened with a tea spoon of stevia which is only about 2 calories and I just love it. As for coffee opt for something low fat like use skim or low fat milk and avoid too much sugar. I'm not much of a coffee person but this is what I recommend if you are a coffee addict. I also love fruit flavored teas like pomegranate, berry and peach.
Green tea is good too but I usually have that for breakfast.

So there you have it, these are all the snack ideas I recommend. There might be more ideas I have but this is what I know of by far that I think are great snacks.

One more thing I would like to mention! it has nothing to do with snacks though. In my previous entry on the ripped in 30 review, I mentioned that I was going to be starting this 2 month challenge exercise program called Insanity well I was thinking I would a weekly review on it like I will talk about how week 1 went and so on. So if you are really curious about this workout program be on the look out those entries.

Have a great day or night whatever time it is!

love

Alice

Workout DVD review : Jillian Michaels Ripped IN 30

Hey Everyone!

It is now time for a review. Ok so last month in May I was using this DVD called ripped in 30 and it was my second time using it.

Here is a quick summary of the work out DVD:

The DVD consists of four different workouts for example there is a different workout for each week.
The workouts run for 24 minutes which is not very long as you can tell. each workout starts with a warm up and they all end with a cool down. The workouts follow this process called the 3-2-1 interval system that Jillian Michaels herself designed where you do 3 minutes of strength, 2 minutes of cardio and 1 minute of abs. so basically they start with the warm up and then they follow the 3, 2,1 system 3 times from what I can remember and then they each end with a cool down. All of the workouts in the DVD including the warm ups are different except for the cool down and each week gradually gets more challenging. Jillian also provides an advanced version and a beginner version as in there is one person in the DVD doing a beginner version and the other doing an advanced.


There is also a meal plan of which you can follow when you use this DVD. here is the link:
http://images.agoramedia.com/jillianmichaels/cms/jillian-michaels-ripped-in-30-meal-plan-v.pdf

Oh one more thing you have to have a set of dumb bells and a workout mat.


Now here are my list of Pros.

• Its challenging. That is actually a good thing because that way you will get good results as doing something that is too easy is not gonna be very helpful plus you won't get very effective results.
• The workouts start from being (Jillian Michaels will hate me for saying this!) a tad bit easy(there I said it but hey I'm not saying its easy overall!) to harder. I personally like it when challenge workouts start from being a little bit easy to harder as starting out too hard I find is not good because I find that too overwhelming and almost impossible to do especially if you are new to exercising. 
• Jillian Provides an advanced version and a beginner version. This I find is an excellent thing because if you are extremely new to working out like you haven't done that much exercise in your life, you can just simply follow the beginner version or if you have done quite a lot of exercise in your life and your are extremely fit you can follow the advanced or if you have gotten better with your exercise you can challenge yourself with the advanced version.
• Jillian will demonstrate how to do a workout properly as in she will point out the proper form you should have. that's good because that will also give you good results as well as keep you from getting injured like she will also point out certain wrong moves that might cause injury. And you want your workouts to be safe, so that's very important.
• Jillian is tough in an encouraging way as in she will say things that will push you to work harder.
• It comes with a meal plan you can follow Which I think is awesome.

And now for the Cons I only have two cons though.

• Jillian will repeatedly say that its not easy and I think that can sometimes be a bit irritating I mean sometimes I got sick and tired of her saying that. In my mind I was all "yeah yeah Jillian I get it!" But I think that is something that you have to put up with when you do this challenge, it's still worth it though.
• My second con well it doesn't tell you how many times you should do the one workouts in a week, as in I wasn't sure whether you do them once a week or 5 days a week. But when I first did it I did it for 5 days a week and the second time I did it for 2 days a week. But over all I wish it would be specific as to how many times you do the workouts in one week. I hope I'm making sense! But that is just my personal opinion as I think that would have been very useful.

My overall conclusion

All in all I highly recommend this DVD. I personally think that it's a 'must have' to add to your collection of workout DVDs. I think its great for making you more fit as I found that after I completed this DVD for the first time  I noticed a change in my my body as in I felt that I became more physically fit and I of course lost weight when I did it and it also made me very sore mostly around my butt muscles or glutes  and the muscles around my thighs like sometimes I had trouble walking or sitting down. I know that doesn't sound good but it IS good because when your muscles hurt then the job has been done! I especially recommend this to beginners as I really feel that it will help you become more fit and its always good to start out with these kind of DVDs,

 BTW I also have a list of DVDs I would recommend to beginners, so to all you beginners out there  I will be making a post on workout ideas for beginners and I will include some work out DVD recommendations. So be on the look out for that!

I also think that Jillian Michaels is a fantastic motivator, I think her work out DVDs are great. Some of you might be familiar with her being on the show called "The biggest loser" and yes I understand she is tough she's very tough but I think that is a good thing as when you are on a weight loss journey its important to push your self and have that discipline this is why it's not easy I know that sounds condescending but you know even though I got slightly irritated by her in the DVD repeatedly saying that its not easy well she's right its not, even if its a beginner workout it will still be tough and that's to be expected when you make a change. But remember being positive will help.

One more thing I would like to add though is I didn't follow the meal plan I just stuck to eating healthy meals so I don't know how good the meal plan is. It looks good though but since I'm a vegetarian I couldn't follow it, but you can substitute the meat dishes if your're vegetarian. I checked the meal plan again and I found that it had recipes  in there and there were some Vegan recipes. If you plan on getting this DVD and would like to do follow the meal, I say go ahead, I mean why not?

 I am also going to be doing another challenge DVD, well it's actually a set of DVDs that I bought a few months ago and its called Insanity and I will be starting that next week. I will definitely do review on that once I'm done with it but that will take a while because it is a two month challenge.

I hope you found this useful or it gave you an idea. Catch you all later

Love

Alice

Collective clothing haul!

Hey guys.

I know I haven't been posting much but since I've gotten some new clothes I just thought I'd share what got in the last few months.

Firstly I went to Target and I finally got some new jeans but this time I got them in in a size 12 because they fit more better than the size 14 ones so yeah I'm officially a size 12 now yay! they are the same as the last Jeans that I got from the last haul but just in different colours.  And I also got two new jumpers.

Today I went to JayJays and bought 2 new dresses because I have a singing workshop coming up and I really needed something to wear so I got this lavender colored dress for the workshop and I got myself this really nice leopard print dress just to spoil myself but of  course I need to keep getting new clothes as many of the stuff in my wardrobe just doesn't fit well anymore.

Oh yes and I also bought these leggings. I got these a while ago like 4 or 3 weeks ago I think, before I got my other pairs of jeans any way I got them from that same store where I got my other clothes my previous haul but it was basically that store that sold the cheap stuff. I still can't recall the name of that store but this is what they look like.

And I also got this a week ago my mum bought it for my actually because she saw it and thought I'd like it and it is this leopard print hoody. Gosh you can tell by now that I really love stuff in leopard print I am such a sucker for leopard print let me tell you lol

And that is it for what I got. I didn't get everything in one go, this is just what I got throughout the last few months. Some of the stuff I got was on sale, all the jeans I got were on sale and those two dresses I got were on sale too. I'll probably be getting more stuff later but not too soon. I must say though it feels so rewarding when you buy new clothes especially when you've lost weight, I also find that that helps encourage me more to keep at it. Well that's it for it now I will be posting a few more blogs soon because I have lot of stuff I wanna share with you all so stay tuned. Hope you all are doing great and reaching your goals.

Love

Alice

What have lost so far #2

Hey Guys,

Its been a while since my last post but this is just an update on how much I have lost so far. I am so happy to announce that I have lost more kilos! Ok my previous weigh in before this one was May 1st which was 66 kilos and today is June the 1st and my new weight is 62 kilos! I have now lost about 26 kilos since I first started. Today I also went to Target and I wanted to see if I could fit into a size 12 dress so I randomly picked out a dress in a size 12 and it fit! I didn't really buy the dress but this is what I do to in order to keep up to date with what my dress size is. I am still more on the size 14  because I also tried on a jacket in a size 12, it was little bit tight but it fit. However the dress I tried on fit me perfectly so I am pretty much heading towards a size 12. I am now planning on getting some more new jeans the new jeans that I got were dirty and they had to be in the wash so as of last week and the week before I had to wear my now oversize jeans with a belt! And it does not look good, because when I wear my old jeans not only does it look weird it also feels like I am wearing a tent! So here is some advice for you when have gotten to a point in your journey where you just can't wear your old  jeans anymore, buy two or three pairs of jeans. Never buy 1 pair as you will end up with the same problem as me. This is one of the prices you pay when you lose weight! but at the same time it feels good to know that.

I am just so happy that my journey has become more successful. I really hope this encourages you guys I'm not trying to brag at all I truly am proud of myself is all I'm saying but as I mentioned before this blog is to help encourage people who want to lose weight. Also if you have lost weight be proud of it! and  never feel guilty about it. All in all I hope that these kinds of entries are helpful. Sorry if they sound like brag type posts. But then again who wouldn't be happy if they lost the weight they wanted. right? I make these posts to prove that it can be done and show how rewarding it feels to lose weight. The main message of these posts is that if I can do it YOU can do it. That is the point I am trying to prove.

Hope you had a great day/evening/afternoon whatever time it is. Stay positive and keep fighting you will get there!

Love

Alice