New Month, New Challenges

Hello Dear Readers, sorry I've slipped on posting. I started of okay and kinda got away on stuff.

It's December 1st, a new month. Time to begin new goals, new challenges, start over or continue. One of my sisters has recently began taking back her health and has inspired me to up the ante on my own workouts and eating habits. So I'm going to share the December challenges I'm attempting on this post. I may  will truncate them into one calendar, I think, to make it easier to see what's happening all at once.

I hope all my readers had a great Thanksgiving holiday (and my non-USA readers had a great weekend). I hope ya'll made great food choices and made sure to get some activity in (even if it was walking the mall/stores on Black Friday). I was happy to step on the scale this  morning and see no change. I'm down 4lbs from the beginning of last month and was kind of worried that I overdid the junk food over the weekend.

We have just over 3 weeks to prepare for the next big food holiday, and it will be 3 weeks of temptations. Work Christmas parties, Church parties, friend and family gatherings, and your own baking will be all around. These will be hard to avoid without turning into a Scrooge. So make smart choices, eat intuitively (I promise an article/post coming up on that soon, just need to find time to do it right), get active and most of all...don't let it stress you out. Food is great, being with people you care about is better. Do not let the fear of a few extra calories scare you away from being social. Just work it into your plan.

Without further ado, here are the challenges I'm attempting this month:

Well-Girl posted this lunge challenge that I think I'll try:

Sweat Like a Girl has an ongoing challenge event on Facebook. Here is Decembers. 

Blogilates, Cacey Ho has her December calendar up. Just subscribe to her newsletter for the password.

And finally, I came across this one from My Fit Station that I will attempt:

That looks like a lot, I know. So here is all the workouts on one handy dandy calendar to hopefully simplify everything a bit.

I didn't add every day to run, but the goal is to run on the nice days.

Hopes and Dreams and Food Challenge Update

I'm excited about this summer. I'm planning on attending University of Memphis(Go Tigers!) majoring in Chemistry with a concentration in BioChem and maybe a minor in Biology. This is all for my pre-med work. With luck, in 3-4 years I'll apply and be accepted into UT Memphis (Go Vols!) and be on my way to being a doctor. Then, if the fates smile upon me graciously, I'll get a residency in Memphis or near here. Or what the heck by then all the kids will be out of h.s. and maybe a change of pace will be due. Anyway hopefully, if all goes accordingly to plan(and Mice will tell you about the best laid plans of Men,right) I'll be Dr. Jackie in about 10-11 years.

I tell this to people I work with and they are like "Why? Just become a nurse and start working and earn money." Well I'm not in it for the money. I'm in it 'cause I love it. I love the bloody, messy, confusing, frantic, mundane, frustrating aspects of medicine. For years I've told people I wanted to be a nurse. But, the only reason I've wanted to be a nurse is 'cause I was scared of the time it took to be a doctor. Now, it doesn't really seem that long. So I'll be 41-42 when I start to practice. That's nothing when your used to seeing people ages ranging from 70-103. We also have a doctor who comes and sees pts at the nursing home who just turned 82. 82! That would be 40 years of practice if I started at 42. Most likely I'm looking at around 30 years of practice...that is a long time. A 30 year old car is an antique. I will be 47 when I reach my 30th wedding anniversary. 30 years is a good long time.

I'm not worried about the time or cost of school. Nothing I can do about either. It's more important to go into a career that I'm confident I'll love(at least 80% of the time) and not tire of(much). Nursing is a great career, but I never wanted to just be a RN I wanted to be a FNP(family nurse practitioner). That's 8 years of school...so whats as couple more years. I'm not old and as long as I have a will to continue learning I'll never be old.

Okay enough of that. Here's my Food Challenge update: Thrown away; leftover chicken wings, one slice of pizza, small baggie of cabbage. Not too bad. Not zero, but we've done worse and I'm glad I'm doing this challenge and making myself aware of what we waste.