Week 1

Hiya! I hope you've had a good week.

I certainly have. I decided that Friday mornings would be my time to weigh in. So this morning I stepped onto the scales as I did last Friday, and I've lost 4 POUNDS!

4lb.

Four whole pounds. I am so pleased with myself! I've never ever stuck with a diet for this long and I really think that is a testament to Slimming World and how easy it is to follow their  simple plan.

A lot of ladies I've talked to have openly admitted that they have not been exercising at all throughout their SW journey, and even they were losing around a stone a month. It really goes to show that diet really is the most important part of losing weight. However despite them losing weight without exercising, I've been making an effort to be a bit more active.
Here is a little list of the activities I've tried to incorporate into my everyday life:

• Squat challenge:
  Ah the squat challenge. A bitch on your legs but it feels so worth it. I do 3 sets a day of 15 squats. I was doing the '30 day squat challenge' but I read into it and the 30 day squat challenge really eats into the muscle as you end up doing around 250 squats. The lactic burn eats into muscles rather than toning them. Doing 3 sets of 15 squats will really help to tone and get that perfect butt.
  
• Yoga:
  This has been one of my favourite things to work through. I really recommend this video. That is a complete beginner's video from the Youtube channel "Yoga With Adriene" she is an amazing yoga teacher. Really well explained, she's so friendly and I really enjoy my sessions. She has hundreds of videos and loads of playlists to work through.
  
• Walks:
  Admittedly I haven't done much walking, but I've certainly been doing more than before. I aim as close to 10,000 steps a day when I can, usually levelling out at around 7,000. Which is MILES better than what I was doing before.
  
• Keeping 'active' at home:
  This one is kind of miscellaneous. A mish-mash. I've been doing jumping jacks, lunges, more squats, clenching my stomach muscles and releasing at random points. Anything to move around and keep an active body.
  

Every day for breakfast I've been having oats. I didn't think I'd manage oats because I tried some of my friend's overnight oats and I nearly gagged. The texture is too soggy for me. So I made up my own version which tastes INCREDIBLE.

In the morning I mixed a handful of dry oats in a bowl with Muller light yogurt. Muller light yogurts are fat free and classed as 'free' food on SW. Meaning you can eat as much as you like. Then I added some crushed nuts and some dark chocolate chips (I don't ever eat chocolate at any other time, and I barely use and sins throughout the day, so I go all in for breakie) Then I add heaps of frozen red berries. Frozen berries are incredible because you don't need to eat them quickly, they aren't going to go mouldy as soon as you get them home, they're always there. My pack of 'Frozen Summer berries' from Morrisons contains strawberries, raspberries, blackberries, blueberries and red currants. Which are all classed as Speed Food. Speed Foods are really low in energy density. They fill you up and satisfy your appetite without adding a lot to your calorie intake! Therefore speeding up weight loss.

Then for dinner all week I was really focusing on 'free' foods and speed foods. I had a lot of fish, Quorn mince, sweet potatoes, low fat cottage cheese, beans, tinned spaghetti in tomato sauce, Bachelor's Pasta n Sauce (which taste incredible! The tomato flavours are free and the cheesy flavours around 1 syn each) and then I'd pile on the vegetables. The more the merrier and they're what I'd really try to fill up on. I'd make sure vegetables were taking up around half of my plate.

So that's that. My first week done and 4 pounds lost!

I'll see you again next Friday. Please leave any tips, advice or conversations in the comments and we'll chat!

G.x