Tuesday, February 19, 2013

Best Tools for Getting Started

Only 6 years ago - we were here. Happy as all-get-out and madly in love, but seriously out of shape.






It was clear a change was needed, and Timothy began his journey with Lindsay following suit shortly after. Years of being consistent, truly making a lifestyle change, have us here. Still happy as all-get-out and madly in love, but in shape and healthy too!


There are some key tools/advice that assisted in our transformations, and that's what we'd like to share with y'all today:


  • Tracking/logging your food
    • Back in the day, SparkPeople was the only online option so that's what we used. It's still a great community (and still free!) but we find MyFitnessPal (also online and free!) to be a better site. Regardless of how you do it, tracking your food is HUGE, especially when you are first starting out on your journey. It is incredibly enlightening to see what serving sizes really are!
  • Having a workout program that has a schedule
    • Whether you will be using a gym, running or biking, joining a Crossfit box, or using workout DVDs at home - choose a program that has a schedule. When you are starting out, if left to your own devices to come up with a workout every day, it is exponentially more likely that you will "fall off the wagon". If you have a schedule and your workouts are planned for you, every day for 90+ days, this helps keep you on track and takes out the guessing-game!

  • Batch-cooking food and kitchen gadgets 
    •  This is probably our biggest tip: batch cook your food!! Once a week (either Saturday or Sunday), to this day, we batch cook our food staples for the week (meat, veggies, etc.). By doing this, all your meals are ready to go, all you have to do is reheat! Also during this time, you can measure out your servings - a food scale and/or Bento-box style lunchboxes are perfect for this! This one tip can take the headache out of eating healthy and keeps you on track with your nutritional goals.
  • Learn as much as possible
    • Follow health & fitness gurus on social media, read more about fitness and nutrition, follow Fit with Farrar's blog and Facebook page :) Surrounding yourself with this information helps you stay motivated and focused, but also helps you to become more educated on these areas....and the more you know, the better!
These four things made a WORLD of difference in our lives and have allowed us to maintain a healthy lifestyle for 5 years now, so we highly recommend them to you!

If you have a good tip, tool, or piece of advice to share, please leave it in a comment below - we'd love to hear from you!

In Health,

Timothy and Lindsay
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6 comments:

  1. Just wanted to say - I really enjoy reading your posts. I have been making small changes here and there in my own journey especially after finding out that I am hypothyroid.

    I have quit drinking soda [and that wasn't hard because I didn't drink a lot of it anyway], never did diet soda, I don't like sweet tea - I must be the anti-Southerner and gave up juice [that WAS hard - but even when I did drink it, I always cut it with water because it was too sweet] so now it's mostly water with unsweet tea every now and then.

    But I have a huge challenge coming up in the next month. I am going for a week long visit to TX [my home state] and it will mean a LOT of eating out.

    And you know how they say everything is bigger in TX, well's that especially true of the portions in restaurants. That's something I already struggle with now - what are some handy tips for keeping portion size at the ready?

    I'm hoping one of my family members will want to share entrees with me as much as possible to 1) save on $$ and 2)reduce the temptation to overindulge on my favorite dishes.

    But any other suggestions that you have would be welcome.

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    Replies
    1. Thanks so much for reading, Erica! Congratulations on the changes you've made so far. Regarding portion control - when eating out, it's very easy to ask for a to-go box prior to starting your meal, that way you can go ahead and divide the meal into the appropriate portions. If you are eating at someone's home, see if you can eat on a salad plate or the smallest plate you can find. This works in a couple ways: one, you think you're eating a lot of food because your small plate looks full, and two, you keep portions in check because your plate can't hold but so much! Hope you find this helpful - enjoy Texas!!

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    2. Just thought I'd touch base with y'all since I've returned home. I did really good while I was away - to my surprise even!

      I drank so much water while I was away. Even though we stayed with family and friends, I went and bought a case at the local Walmart - just so I could always be sure I had some while we were out and about.

      That's always something I really struggle with - drinking enough, because even though I do pretty good with what I drink - I typically don't until I feel thirsty.

      We did eat out a lot as a family - which I expected we would do and I indulged in things I couldn't get back in VA. My favorite donuts [Shipley's], Tex-Mex, Texas style BBQ, etc.

      But I also carried leftovers back for most of the "big" meals that we had - which worked great and of course, I got more walking in than I normally do in a work week - since I have a desk job.

      I just saw my endocrinologist yesterday and had lost 4lbs since my last visit - so to say the least, I was ecstatic!

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    3. That is AWESOME!!!! Great job, Erica!!! Congratulations and keep up the good work!

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  2. Thanks y'all, I really appreciate it!

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    ReplyDelete