Motivation Monday!

Hey everyone! Hope you all had a safe and happy weekend. I know it's hard on the weekends but hope you all managed to stay healthy with your eating and get in your workouts! There are only two weeks left in the bikini challenge so it's now or never. You don't want to give up now do you? You've come too far to stop now, I know you can do it and you know you can do it so do it!  If there ever comes a time where you think you think "I can't do one more lap, I can't do one more set or I can't do another five minutes" just think..
I want this. This is for me. I can do it. Do I want to see results? Would I be proud stopping at this point? Am I tired? Do you want to wear that itty bitty bikini to the beach this summer?
If you want it, then do the last few reps, if it's for you tell yourself you deserve it! Tell yourself you can do it, if your optimistic and believe you can do it then your going to push yourself naturally. If you want to see the results you need to keep working and if your not proud of stopping where you are keep pushing until you are proud. If your not tired, then you know you can do more! Last but not least, we ALL want to rock our bikinis at the beach this summer so what betetr way then to do the work and be fit! I tell myself these things and ask myself these questions all the time and it keeps me going. For my bootycall workout this morning I was on the treadmill and I was tired after only 15 minutes (it was my first time on a treadmill) and I said to myself I can do this, I want to wear that bikini and i want to be proud of myself when I'm done on here, sure enough I ran for 30 minutes and burned 205 calories! Needless to say I was very motivated and proud of myself when I got off. I also did the beach bum, sandcastle and beach ball workout tonight too. I didn't eat the best dinner tonight unfortunately but i'm not going to let one meal discourage me, instead i'm just going to be motivated to eat better for the rest of the week!  Hope you all manage to stay motivated this week and have a great bootycall in the morning, don't forget to set your alarm! Don't forget, your closer than you think :)

Grocery List!

Hey Tone it Up ladies. Hope you all had a wonderful Thursday, thank goodness tomorrow is Friday! Today was a decent day overall. For breakfast I had a half cup of cereal with skim milk because I needed a slight energy boost and I find that it gives me energy during the morning. For lunch I had some fresh cut celery and carrott sticks and a quarter cup of soup! This is probably one of my favourite lunches to bring with me. When I got home I had an apple for a snack and for dinner I had a turkey wrap and a side of salad which was fanatstic because I added peperchini peppers for a little kick! Unfortunately I pulled something in the side of my back so i'm taking a rest from my workouts tonight, hopefully i'll be up for my bootycall tomorrow!

I went grocery shopping today and bought some new things to try. Along with my regular green tea I also decided to pick up mint green tea which I am currently sipping on while I write this and I must say it tastes fanastic! Another new item I picked up was Avacado hummus which I cannot wait to try tomorrow in my lunch with the broccoli and celery I bought. I would also like to mention that I finally found larabars! I didn't buy any this time but I can't wait to pick up a couple next time i'm out. Those are just a few small things that I picked up today while I was out but there are other things that I always have with me.

Here's the List!

Starwberries - you can add them to almost anything (salad, wraps, oatmeal ect.) Plus they're freat on their own for a snack!

Blueberries - So full of antioxidants that are great for your body, I add them to my oatmeal everyday.

Oatmeal  - A nice source of soulable fibre to start the day right.
Lettuce - You can make a salad out of anything and it's super quick and easy.
Bellpeppers - Each colour has a different taste that adds flavour to tons of things, eat them raw for a snack or sauted with your chicken.
Green tea - Perfect for when you want a hot beverage that's not calorie packed!
Lemons! - I add it to my water everyday for flavour!
Soup - I use canned soup, low sodium and sugar and is extremely low cal. Great for when i'm tight on time in the morning because I can throw it in a container and heat it up in the microwave at lunch.
Apples - Easy when your on the go because it takes little to no preparation at all, I usually grab one as I head out the door in the morning.

Tone it up Tuesday!

Hey everyone. Hope you all had a great day today. For breakfast I had a turkey sandwich on flax seed bread, lunch was celery sticks and berries and for dinner I admit I cheated a little bit and made pasta! Uh oh, kicking it into gear tomorrow! I have to say i'm pretty tired today so I don't know if i'll be able to wake up early tomorrow for my booty call. For my workout today I tried the new Tone It Up Sandcastle workout and it was pretty tough on the legs, I also thought the name was pretty beachy and cute! I also did the itty bitty bikini workout, the beach bum workout and the bikini strap workout! Toning it up on Tuesday! Can't believe theres only around two and half weeks left of the bikini challenge so keep up the fanastic work and really kick your butts into gear! I know you can do it ladies, we all can just think of those bikinis! I know you all can't even wait to look fanastic! Your all so inpsiring and motivating so keep up the great work and I hope it pays off, don't forget to set your alarms in the morning too! Night :) xx

Beauty Secrets!

Hey ladies, happy Monday! Hope you all had a great day to start your work/school week. Today I ate pretty clean with an apple and a handfull of cereal for breakfast. For lunch I had a turkey wrap with lettuce on a whole wheat wrap. When I got home I had a whole wheat english muffin with peanut butter. Dinner was my all time favourite stir fry, it had chicken, snow peas, bell pepper, celery, broccoli, mushrooms and rice. Yum! For my workout I did the whole beach bum workout as well as the itty bitty bikini and some of my favourite moves from the bikini strap and beach ball workouts. How was your workout today?
So anyways today I am going to share with you my beauty tips. I know this is a health/weightloss/fitness blog but I thought it was suitable with the whole tone it up beauty bag giveaway that just happened, by the way congrats to all you winners!

 Here's my beauty tip and it's honestly really simple. My secret ingredient in my beauty routine is water! I know it sounds kind of crazy but it's true. Have any of you noticed your skins been excellent since you started drinking more water? Well I drink tons of water every day and my skin clears up super quick. When I wash my face in the morning I use the la Roche Posay cleansor Effaclair to cleanse my face of all the oils from my hair/ hair products that clog your pores during the night but at night I take off my make up and just rinse my face with warm water! By only using water i'm not striping my face of the natural oils that it needs so it keeps my skin balanced. To top off my clear skin routine I also use a mositurizer both in the morning and at night to keep my skin from drying out. I also found that using mositurizer helped make my foundation look more natural. So there is my beauty tip, hope it wasn't too disappointing!

P.S Don't forget to keep up all the great work you've all been doing, you inspire me each and every day to work out, eat right and do better. Keep tweeting because I love reading all your tweets every day on my phone while i'm out, it reminds me that i'm not alone. We only have about 20 days or so left to kick out butts into gear and really get fit for bikini season and I know we can do it! Booty call in the morning, work it ladies! Love you all (:

My Weight Loss Journey

I was going to save this entry for a later time but right now I have the time and my blog needs a little more content so I will add it today. First I will start by saying that I have not lost a tremendous amount of weight but it is the emotional, social and physical changes that have affected me the most. When I was a child, up until I was about seven I was pretty much average, the same size as all my friends but that's when everything changed. My dad who thought he was doing a good thing for me by giving me what I wanted didn't realize that bringing me to fast food places for lunch twice a week was detrimental to my weight, mental, social and physical being. I was the chubby girl in school and people who I thought were my friends made fun of me and other kids would sometimes moo at me. I'd come home crying to my mommy after school and ask her why no body liked me. I knew the answer. One summer my parents put me in swimming lessons and I started shedding all the weight I had put on in my childhood years, the kids who mooed at me didn't even recognize me and things started to get better. I'd always been self concious of my weight and I finally decided to do something about it, I would try to work out all the time but I never changed my eating habits and for that I suffered. I never lost any weight but I didn't gain any either so obviously that wasn't working. When I got to high school I was starting to feel really confident in myself, I didn't feel like the chubby girl anymore like I had in elementry school, I felt like I fit in because I made new friends that were like me but things changed I would find that somehow comments would be said sometimes that made me feel like crap. I was sick of feeling bad about myself and being physically run down so I changed my eating habits to healthier foods and I started working out. Now i'm here, I've accepted my curvy body for what it is beautiful! I'm alot heathier, happier and fitter than I was. Since February I've lost a total of 9 pounds which may not be a large number but I am so proud of it because it's more than i've accomplished in a while. I went from weighing 143 pounds which is what i've been seeing on the scale for the last year or two to 134 pounds and I feel and look great. Sorry this entry is so long, but I think i've needed to get this story out for a while and I think that from here i'll just continue to move forward!

Tough Bootycall!

Hey all you awesome ladies and gents, hope you all had a fanatstic week and weekend! I just finished my Tone it Up bootycall and challenged myself to do the beach bum workout, the itty bitty bikini workout, the beach ball workout and the slimming pyramid. It was a little long and kind of challenging at some points but I feel great and I know that i'll benefit from it in the long run. I did eat before my bootycall this morning because for some reason I felt reallly hungry when I woke up so I had a nice bowl of oatmeal with honey, strawberries and blueberries which is what I basically eat every morning. As for the other meals I plan on eating today i'm not quite sure what they are yet but i'm thinking a nice tossed salad for lunch with olive oil and basil dressing! What did you guys do for your bootycall today? Comment and let me know!


 I'd also like to apologize for not keeping up with my blog posts like I promised I would, I am seriously going to keep up with them this week and I plan on writing about my journey and also sharing some of my beauty secrets with you to go along with the Tone It Up beauty bag give away. So keep checking back and there will be more entries soon!

ps. don't forget to kick butt and  comment/message me if theres anything you want me to write about (:

Getting back on track!

Hey ladies, hope you had a relaxing weekend! Sorry that I haven't been active on twitter or writing any new entries the last few days but I'll be back at soon. I've just been so extremely busy the last few days. Lots of  events that needed preparation and all my attention so that took up about 98% of my time. I am soo looking forward to getting back on track with my work outs in the next few days and am glad to see you guys are still going strong!

Anyways I have been getting a few twitter posts here and there and I must say your all doing so fabulous and you should all be so proud of yourselves. There are only 26 days left of the bikini challenge so now is really the time for us to kick our butts into gear! I can't wait to really push myself these next three weeks, I know it's not going to be easy but I know it's going to be worth it and that's all you need to tell yourself, It's worth it. So keep it up ladies and keep going.
I will start blogging and tweeting again tomorrow so I will catch up then(:

ps don't forget to do your bootycall in the morning!

My favourite workout!

Hey ladies! Hope you all had a fanatstic day. I had a pretty long day to be honest, woke up a little late (I've been short on sleep so much this week) which means I didn't get to do my booty call again today but I'm listening to what my body needs and in order to stay healthy I need my sleep. To start the day I had what I start everyday with, a half cup of oatmeal with a little honey blueberries and strawberries. I have to say that it's my favourite breakfast because it's filling and keeps me energized throughout the day. For lunch I had some sliced cucumbers and a slice of flax seed bread cut in half to make a sandwich with peanut butter on it, so yummy and filling. While the rest of my family had calorie loaded chicken parmesean I grilled a plain chicken breast and made a whole wheat wrap with chicken lettuce and strawberries, it sounds like a strange combination but it's great I promise.

As for my workout today, I went for an hour long lane swim. Swimming is honestly my favourite and best excersize! It works your whole body because it gets your heart pumping working your cardio and obviously your engaging your arms legs and core to move and stay afloat. I can't say how much I love getting back in the pool. When I was young I was a really chubby kid who loved to swim, I started taking swimming lessons regularly and lost almost all my weight. It was life changing so i'm hoping that getting back in the pool will help me again! So ladies, if you can, go swimming!Oh and if you haven't checked it out already, Tone it Up added their new beauty video to youtube for us all, you can find the link to their youtube page on my side list where I have created a list of Tone it Up links!
Your all amazing inspiration and motivation, keep up the great work and don't forget to set your alarms for your booty call in the morning! (:

Short and Sweet

Hey ladies, hope you all had a great day! Unfortunately, i'm super busy today and don't have the time to enter a proper entry so I will add a better one tomorrow. I ate fairly healthy today, oatmeal as usual for breakfast with blueberries and strawberries. For lunch I had a salad with a light yougurt dressing and a half sandwich that had peanut butter on it. I know were supposed to keep it lean and green but I didn't make dinner myself tonight and my host made spagetti, which was yummy. I drank lots of water, too much if you ask me lol but I know it's good for me! Like I mentioned above I was short on time today so I did the Tone it Up Celebrity booty camp video twice, it's an older video that you can find on their youtube page! Remember ladies, stay fit, stay fab and stay beautiful! Love you all, keep up all your great work!

ps don't forget to set your alarms for your booty call in the morning!

Pizza Muffin Recipe

Okay so here you have it pizza lovers, a pizza substitute that isn't all that unhealthy for you and that takes about 5 minutes to make. These are also great for kids, they taste great and are healthier than microwave pizza or even oven pizza.

Ingredients 1 whole grain english muffin
2 Tbsp pizza sauce
1/8 cup shredded skim mozerella cheese

Procedure
1. Toast the english muffin in the toaster until slightly crisp
2. Add a Tbsp of pizza sauce to each half
3. Divide the cheese and add it to each half
4. Broil in the oven until the cheese melts

Tips on how to make this recipeToast the english muffin enough so the sauce won't make it soggy
You don't need to use a whole Tbsp of sauce, sometimes less will do the trick
You only need enough cheese to cover your muffin in a thin layer!
You can also add whatever toppings you wish, I only like cheese though.

Checking in

Hey all you awesome people! (: Hope you all had a great day whatever you were doing where ever you are.  Anyways the weather here was pretty rainy and gloomy all day which was kind of a let down because I couldn't get outside. I slept in because I was so exausted from swimming last night and school so I missed my Tone it Up bootycall this morning, doing some extra cardio as soon as I finish this! Anyways I had a great breakfast which was half a cup of oatmeal with a tsp of honey, strawberrry quuarters and blueberries, my fave! For lunch I used my extra berries from my oatmeal and had a berry mix aswell as a pb and j sandwich on flax seed bread, sometimes you just gotta have some pb and j! When I got home for a snack I had a pear and for dinner I made pizza muffins (recipe above) because I was short on time. As for my workout tonight it will consist of the Tone it up best bikini body booty camp video the beach bum workout and probably the lean legs pyramid or beach ball workout! Hope you all had a good day and workout and don't forget to set your alarm for your Tone it Up booty call in the morning! 4 weeks left ladies, you can do anything for four weeks ;)

Oh! Before I forget don't forget to go to the Tone it Up blog to learn about the beauty bag give away!

Bikini Challenge Extended!

Hey everybody! Hope you all had a great day today, I know I did. Anyways i've got some great news for you, in case you haven't already heard the Tone it Up bikini challenge has been extended for another two weeks which means that we have four weeks left! They still have plenty of awesome kick butt workouts to come, beach beauty videos and plenty of prizes so join up it's not too late. For your tone it up workout calender click here .
So anyways today I woke up early and I did my Tone it Up itty bitty bikini workout and beachball workout for my bootycall workout and it felt great. After my workout I had a half cup of oatmeal with a teaspoon of honey and some fresh berries which is my favourite meal to start the day. For lunch I had a pear and some granola cereal with 1/4 cup skim milk (whole grain carbs keep me energetic throughout the day) Finally for dinner I had two chicken fingers with some sliced cucumbers and strawberries on the side, it was so yummy. As for my workout for the night you guessed it tweeps, a one hour lane swim to work that cardio and the whole body! (:
Hope everyone remembers to set their alarms in the morning for their booty call, your all fabulous(:

A little about this blog

Hey everyone! Thanks for coming to my blog. I guess some of you are wondering what this blogs going to be about and that's a good question. Recently i've come across toneitup and i've pretty much become obsessed ever since (may sound a little creepy but whatever). Tone it up is two girls, Karena and Katrina who have a nutrition plan, a fitness studio and offer help to tons of women by posting youtube videos, sending out e-mailsand keeping their blog ect. that contain workouts, recipes and much more! Anyways back to my point, I've found these girls and the tone it up team so inspiring that I wanted to create a blog about my journey starting now documenting recipes, workouts, and recognizing other people who have had great success. Basically in short, this blog will contain recipes, tips & tricks, my workouts/journey and a whole lot of other stuff that has to deal with tone it up, healthy eating and a healthy lifestyle!

To start i'll link some tone it up stuff below!
toneitupblog
toneituptwitter 
toneitupyoutube