Testing it out

 April has come to a close and with that a new month.   To me, a new month is a time for new beginnings.  This month was no different.  

April was not a stellar month for me in some areas.   But in other areas it was fantastic!    I had some goals for the month of April (ok, they are the same most months).

** Track all my food

** Exercise daily

** Lose Weight

** Continue to bank my miles for my 2024 mile challenge

** Purge 5 items

** Read at least one non fiction /educational/self help (Edifying) book

** Drink 64 ounces of water a day

As I said, it was a mixed bag. here it is, the good, the bad and the ugly!

** Track all my food-  I did this!   I was spot on with my tracking.  I did it each and every day without fail!  I didn't always (rarely) track before I ate but it was all tracked!

** Exercise daily- This was a colossal failure!  I was gung ho at the beginning of the month. I was going to get back to my daily exercise and set the world on fire!   However, when it came down to it I failed.  I started the month strong and exercised two times in the first few days of the month....and then didn't exercise again the rest of the month. Yeah, huge failure!

** Lose Weight-  I had grand plans that I was going to lose and I was going to lose big!   This is one of those mixed bags.  It wasn't great, but it wasn't horrid!  I lost.....1.2 pounds for the month.  So a measly amount of weight loss.   And don't get me wrong, I am tickled with ANY loss.  Heck, I am even tickled with a maintain.  But I know in my heart that I could have done better.

** Continue to bank my miles for my 2024 mile challenge  Here is another colossal failure.  I was holding my own with my miles from January through March.  I wasn't banking a ton of extra miles, but I was holding my own.  And then April hit!  In fairness, I was fighting off some sickness the one week.  But that is just an excuse.  Because that was only one week!   There were three other weeks in the month!   But, the down and dirty of it all is that I ended up the month behind by 25 miles!   Not Cool!

** Purge 5 items.  Nailed it!   Yes, I nailed this one.  I am doing pretty good with the purging.  I need to really get into it and purge some more, but I purged.  I sold some items on facebook market place and the rest I carted to Goodwill!

** Read at least one non fiction /educational/self help (Edifying) book.   It should come as no surprise that I nailed this one.  Reading has never been a problem for me.....even if it is more 'edifying' content. 

** Drink 64 ounces of water a day-  This was another huge failure.    I may have reached the magical 64 ounces, which I want to be my MINIMUM each day once or twice!   I am telling you.  Huge failure!

May is a new month though.  It's a time for new beginnings.  It is time to be fabulous and not just meet my goals but smash them to smithereens!     My goals are remaining the same with the exception of an additional goal.  That additional goal is that I want to reach 5 thousand  steps each day.  I admittedly get most of my steps for the 2024 challenge on the exercise bike.  My steps are just the additional boost to get me over the hump so i don't focus on getting the steps as much as I should.  So this month I am aiming to get at least 5,000 steps a day.

I am trying a new journalling system of my own creation to keep track of everything.  I have never been happy with the journals that I can find.  They never have what I think a weight loss journal needs!  So I made my own. I"m going to play around with it and change/adjust and refine it and maybe I will have one printed for me for next year versus creating my pages each month on my own.  We shall see.   

I have a page where I will be keeping track of my habits, a page to track my food consumption.  And on that page I also have columns where I can indicate I ate fast or slow.  I have a place to indicate if I took my acid reflux pill and I have a column to keep track of the acid reflux.  (I am honestly not sure that the pill is working.)   I have a page for my measurements.  I also have a place for my word of the week.  And of course I have a page for my goals.  I have also included a page for me to keep track of my reading...not just what I am reading by an area for a small review for each book.  
 

I am trying to streamline my intel into one place.  I will still be using myfitnesspal for tracking and my garmin and the garmin app to track my steps.  But I need to have all of this information in one place that I can see all at the same time.  I do better with good old fashioned pen and paper.  SO I'm giving it a test run!   We shall see how it works!