"insert clever quote about getting organised"

ORGANISATION IS KEY... or so Michelle says and so I'm taking that key and opening up doors! My first step was to mark all my red flagged days - these include my birthday, my boyfriends birthday, my snow trip, my colonoscopy (ew I know) and my mid year work function. I decided to create a folder with tabs for each pre season task and each week of the 12wbt to store the emails/ recipes/ menus/ exercise plans etc. I also marked out exactly when I will be working out which is mornings Monday, Wednesday, Thursday & Friday at the gym, Tuesday night at gym and Saturdays at home/park. I decided to give myself an extra advantage by putting up motivational signs all around my house, here's an example of my bedroom door :)

It feels great to get organised, I'm so nervous/excited about getting started but I feel in control and that feels fantastic.

Cheese out xx

I'm obese

That's right, obese - according to my BMI on the 12wbt website. I must say that I totally didn't see that one coming! Overweight -yes, obese - REALLY? When I picture obese, I see someone getting crane lifted out of their bedroom, not me. I've tried not to let that word play too much on my mind but for some reason it's killed my spirit a little bit - like suddenly its become to hard; I didn't even let my boyfriend see me in a singlet top because I didn't want to burn his eyes with my obese goodness! I will need to lose the 25 kilos before I'm considered to be (on the top end) of a healthy weight range for my height (yes I'm a total short ass, maybe if I wore some heals I could cheat the system..mmmm). Im not going to give up and I'm going to try be good this weekend, despite having already had a binge on cheesy pizza and Nerds... although it is that T.O.M and I have raging hormones so I might change my mind in a second! BRING ON THE CHOCOLATE.

That's all for now, or is it... yeah it is.. AND WHERE'S MY CHOCOLATE.

Cheese out xx

Gym clothes for the big hipped woman pt -2

Determined not to let my 'situation' get me down I decided to scourer through the clothes I already had at home to some how piece together an outfit to inspire us big hipped beauties to work out and I think I may have just found something that looks half decent (not to mention on a budget)! Below is a picture of what I wore to the gym this morning (yes I did wear shoes to the gym).

Ok so its not full-proof but I did find that by adding the extra singlet and over jacket thing that it sort of disguises the full extent of my hips! I hope this works for some of you as well, for now its thumbs up and big smiles from me.

Cheese out xx 

Gym clothes for the big hipped woman

Or rather, lack of the above! Yesterday I took it upon myself to start to gear up for the next 12 weeks! I will be mainly working out at the gym (or ‘health club’ as us fancy people like to call it) and I thought that buying some cute gym clothes would put me in the right frame of mind.

Now firstly, to fully understand my situation – let me tell you about my gym, the gym of death (death to my self esteem). For whatever reason everyone who goes to my gym is a sign of perfection – they are fit, toned and sexy, I am by far the most unfit person there and I stand out like grapes on a cheese platter. 

Secondly, my hips. Commonly known as ‘child baring hips’ I have the body shape of a true woman on steroids. During puberty my body didn’t know when or how to stop and I ended up with two massive boulders on either side of my body. 

Combine both of the above and you’ll soon realise that the gym for me is where I not only feel completely of place but I look it too. My solution to my problem was to completely gear up in these gorgeous bright coloured clothes that everyone else was wearing, then I would fit in and might look half decent too. So off I set to Rebel Sport, Lorna Jane, Target, Kmart, Adidas and eBay only to find that all the gym clothes completely cut in to my hips! Hours of shopping and I walked away with not a thing except hurt pride and laughing cow cheese. Where are the gym clothes for us big hipped girls, huh!? Until someone invents some I guess I’ll be working out in tights and a bonds hoodie – oh the horrible horrible sight of me in tights – I’ll spare you all and not include a picture!

Cheese out xx

Im sorry mama, I never meant to hurt you, I never meant to make you cry but tonight...

I'M CLEANING OUT MY CLOSET. Sorry for the Eminem reference but task 5 is all about the kitchen makeover and cleaning out your kitchen closet! Now as fun as it sounds to bin a whole bunch of food, this task is a no go for me. My living situation makes this task impossible, I live in 2 houses and neither are mine.

Here's the situation - Half the week I'm situated in the Northern suburbs of Melbourne living with my parents. My parents are fantastic and so supportive but there is no way that two traditional Italians are going to rid their pantry of staples like pasta and biscuits - it'd be like Charlie Sheen ridding his house of prostitutes and drugs.. not.gonna.happen. The other half of the week I live with my boyfriend and his two housemates in the South East - his house is a man cave! There is junk food everywhere and very limited space which means I can't keep much of my own food there, it also means I can't just go around like a junk food Nazi and throw out all their food. 

So I have legit reasons but being a optimist - here's what I plan to do. GROW SOME SELF CONTROL. Ok let's be honest here.. if the food is not at your house, it could be at work, in the supermarket, in your car, at your friends place, down your bra...ok that one might just be me but you catch my drift. Food is everywhere you go and at some stage its important to grow resistant to temptation, which is what I have to will do. I will also allow anyone to tackle me to the ground if they see me drooling over the junk food! 

Did anyone else have any problems with this task? I could see myself wanting to jump in Michelle's bin after those tim tams!

Cheese out xx   

I Alanna, take you, 12wbt, to be my lawful diet bible

To exercise and to eat, from this day forward, for better for worse, for richer for poorer, in sickness and in health, while we both shall live.

That’s right. I am committing to the 12wbt and saying “I DO”. I’m committing to eating healthy, to exercising 6 days a week, to being determined to lose 25kg, to changing my life and my attitude. This diet is no one night stand, its forever. It will be there to see me look like a zombie at 5.30 in the morning and to see me shrink in size and it will work for me. In return I will be the perfect wife, I will be honest and faithful, I will push through the hard times to see the good and I will not cheat.  I commit to all you reading that I will do this, I will inspire you all, as you inspire me. You have my word – and that word is “cheese”. Mmmm cheese.

In all seriousness though, I plan to be a girl of my word and I plan to do this for myself and for you. Tonight I will commit to my family and my boyfriend – luckily I’m no commitment-phobe! It does feel good to tell people you are in this all the way and that there is no turning back – I’m jumping on the bandwagon and pushing forward – actually who pushes bandwagons these days? Let’s make that a helicopter.... I am flying my helicopter all the way to success. I may lose concentration and hit a tree, but in the end you have to keep on chopping!

So who’s with me?!  

(you better have all just jumped in my imaginary helicopter, it has guns and I know where you live)

Cheese out xx

Where oh where has the cheese lover gone?!?

Don't worry guys I'm still alive and kicking - but thus far have been unable to kick this infection, three rounds of antibiotics and nada, I still sound like a dog. However one thing cheese has taught me is that although something might look horrible from the outside if you ponder inside its almost always positive. So what's the delicious side of a chest infection you ask? Food timing and self control. You see with antibiotics you have to take a pill half an hour BEFORE meals and 2 hours AFTER meals. You know what this means - NO BOREDOM PICKING. Four times a day I'm limited to when I can eat and what I can drink, so far it has really worked. I figure if I can execute self control while I'm drugged up, there is no excuse for me not to do it otherwise, right? *cue light bulb moment*. Lets add "cut out all boredom picking" to my little list of goals!  So you might be sitting there thinking "wow - this girl is an angel" ( highly unlikely that's what you're actually thinking) but alas I am no angel. Im channelling my inner Usher and giving you my confessions - I did in fact buy the huge block of Gorgonzola from Costco last weekend and did spice up my chicken soup with some Parmesan - guess not all habits are easy to break. Until next time...

Cheese out xx

Does coughing up a lung count towards weight loss?

I really hope so because the rate I'm going I might cough up what I ate for lunch too! That's right - I'm sick, respiratory tract infection to be exact.. or in my words THE WORST COUGH EVER. My body is dying for some loving in the form of a cheese toastie and a hot chocolate and I must say that I'm starting to regret my decision to start this in winter (excuse?). Today is pre-season task 2 time and after convincing myself to stop watching repeats of The Bachelor I pushed through and started the task. After 3 goes of watching the video, I am now lying in bed pondering what my goals are and how I'll achieve them. I know I want to lose weight (duh) but I have no idea what kind of time frame I should put on losing 25kg and I can't exactly write "do 12wbt" in all the execution boxes. HELP!? Maybe my mind is just not functioning properly but this is hard. I have decided to just list a few of my little goals below. Here it goes:

1. Fit into snow gear - 29 June
2. Be able to buy a cute dress for my 21st - July 7
3. Weigh less than my boyfriend by end of 12wbt
4. Lose 25kg
5. Not feel the need to include cheese in all meals
6. Get over this bloody cough ASAP

Ok so that's all I could muster up but I will revisit this task when I'm feeling a bit more vivacious!

Hope you are all doing better than me on this task - comment below and let me know what your goals are and how you plan to achieve them!

Cheese out xx

If excuses made you thin - I'd be invisible!

Well as some of you may have found out from your emails this morning - Pre-season as begun! mmmmm-seasoning *drool*. The first challenge is to basically - CUT THE CHEESE - I mean erm CUT THE BULLSHIT! and loose the excuses. As a self professed excuse-aholic I knew today's video would hit home and it did. It was like Michelle was talking directly to me and not only because she has a killer eye stare through the camera lense. I did my homework and had no problem filling up all the excuse boxes with the 500 maximum characters (surprise surprise!). I thought since I'm being all open like a good Swiss cheese, I'd share some of my excuses with you - there are some beauties.

• I'm too busy
• I deserve to eat unhealthy if I've exercised
• Its too cold/hot/rainy/dark outside
• I'm too tired
• I'll be grumpy at work if I'm exhausted
• I have nothing to wear
• People will stare at me at the gym because I run like a horse (or so my grade 9 P.E teacher said)
• Cheese food makes me happy
• Even if I lose weight my hips will still be huge
• In fact, if I lose weight they might be even MORE out of proportion
• ..and my boobs will shrink - I can't do that to my boyfriend ..

And the list when on and on and on... BLAH. So yes, I'm an excuse expert but I can't won't let my excuses deter my good intentions any more. My plan - I will continuously sing *call me maybe* and then I won't be able to think about anything else - "here's my runners, this is crazzyyy but get your ass to a gym - and lose weight maybe" - you like?

Feel free to comment below and let me know what's holding you back.

Cheese out xx

Introductions: Hi I'm Alanna and I'm a cheese addict.

Why stop there? Im also an all round food addict, an excuse-aholic and a quitter. It’s for those reasons that I’m here ready to start the Michelle Bridge’s 12 Week Body Transformation. From what I gather I go into a time machine and in 12 weeks I’m transformed into a sexy goddess. Right? Wrong!

For the next 12 weeks I’m going to be working my double kardasian butt off and giving up my precious cheese and through the entire process I’ll be blogging here about the good, the bad and the ugly vision of me running down the street in lycra!

So here’s my introduction - my names Alanna, I’m 20 years old and I’m fat. Yep the dreaded F word. You see I didn’t really, REALLY notice I was fat until recently when I didn’t recognise myself in photos, I always thought I hid my weight well under my clothes and hourglass body shape, then all of a sudden - it hit me like a bus, a big “ALANNA YOU ARE FAT” bus. My weight has been creeping up for some time and I remember being young and my mum saying “it’s okay being a size 14 now but what happens when one day your an 18 and can’t fit into clothes.” I’m now a size 18 but not for much longer, my goal is to lose 25 Kilos.

I will work at this and for the next 12 weeks I vow to push myself harder, stop making excuses and just fucking doing it. As one of my personal trainers once commented “you didn’t get fat over night so you’re not going to get skinny over night either”..harsh but true. So please join me on my journey, follow my blog and see my progress! I swear to sweet Cheeses I won’t let you or myself down.

Cheese out xx