Walk Aerobics Firm Up Fast Walk

Walk Aerobics Firm Up Fast Walk

This was my last Netflix disc from my free trial. I pick this because it was one of the older workouts, and I haven't seen these on Gaiam TV or on Amazon Prime which are my next two free trials on the agenda. This one looks like it was in that in between 80s and 90s. The hair was still a little big, but not 80s big. The clothes were tight, but not 80s bright neon. This one was also filmed 7 weeks after Leslie had a baby. I took a photo so you can see a different version of Leslie than most people are used to seeing. I really liked seeing her a little chubby. It makes me feel better knowing that she had weight to lose at some point.

The DVD

The DVD gives the option to play the whole workout or to select the sections that you want to play. i selected the whole workout and got to watch the introduction, which was more like an infomercial than an introduction. It had success stories from people who have done the workout. I already had the workout. I didn't need to be convinced to do it. Leslie then did her own little introduction and talked about how food isn't such a big factor in losing weight. Exercise is the most important thing. I'm glad she grew out of this little chat since you can lose weight without exercise, but you could exercise 10 hours a day and not lose weight if you're eating garbage. 

Equipment

Leslie used dumbbells in the workout. One of the walkers used resistance bands. A couple of the walkers didn't use anything. I didn't have dumbbells and she referred to the walker with the bands as the advanced method, so I used my 2 pound weighted balls. I would have preferred more weight.

The Warm Up

This was called Firm Up Fast Walk, but there was very little walking involved. It started with a brief warm up which involved some mini squats and then an abductor move where you lift one leg up off the ground to your side. The warm up lasted about five minutes maybe a little less. After the warm up, she picks up some weights and begins the workout. 

The Workout

The workout started with lateral raises. It then moved to bicep curls, tricep kickbacks, lunges and squats. The lunges were stationary ones. This was the first time that I have done lunges and felt good about them. They hurt and I hated them, but I didn't feel off balance. I could focus on doing a nice deep lunge without falling over. The squats didn't last excessively long and I managed to get through those fine as well. After the squats were done, it was time to get down on the floor for a fun series of leg lifts. I'm not a fan of leg lifts. Laying on my side on the floor is not comfortable and leg lifts hurt! She did some regular full leg lifts followed by some presses. Then she repeated the full leg lifts followed by more presses. Then we moved on to the lower leg. My leg shook sooooooooo bad the whole time while doing the lower leg. It didn't hurt, it just shook like crazy. After the one side was done, we flipped over and did the other side. Woohoo!

Then it was time for pushups! She did an alternate exercise for one of the walkers. She had her lay on her back with a resistance band underneath her. She did chest presses instead of push ups. I hate push ups, so I tried the chest presses, but I wasn't prepared with my stretchie band, so I used the 2 pound weighted balls. I have a wimpy chest, but apparently 2 pounds wasn't enough to even fell it. For the second set, I flipped over and did the push ups. This was the first time that I went deep enough into the push up for my boobs to actually hit the floor. I didn't crush them or anything, but they hit the floor and amazingly enough, my face didn't follow them. I think with lunges and pushups falling is one of my biggest fears. I'm afraid of going down too far because I feel like I won't get back up, but you know what....It doesn't matter! My face is like five inches from the floor, it's not like it's going to hurt if I fall. 

Once the pushups were done, it was time to get on our backs for crunches.There was a lot of crunches. We did normal crunches with both feet on the ground. We did a lot of these. First it was two up two down, then it was three up and down on the fourth, the back to two up and two down. Oblique crunches made the mix as well where you lift your right shoulder toward your left knee. There was a new thing I hadn't done before where you put a foot up on your knee. You then kept your back flat and reached with one hand towards the foot that was on the ground. You did a sideways crunch type thing. It was interesting, but I don't know if I put enough oomph into it because it didn't really feel like it was doing anything. After all of that, it was time to  alternate lifting our knee into our chest. Gotta love those.

The Cool Down/Stretch

There wasn't really a cool down since our heart rate didn't get up and we didn't need to get it back down, There was a stretch while laying on our backs. It was a pretty typical stretch with the legs down flat and the arms up over our heads flat on the ground. There was also some self hugging and then laying the arms out on either side. There was also pulling the leg to our chests and then stretching it up straight. Oh, and the bent knee twist to the side thing. It's hard to explain, but if you've done an ab workout ever in you're life, I'm sure you've done the stretch. 

Where to buy

You can buy the DVD on Amazon, but it doesn't look like it's sold by Amazon. 

BodyMedia Screen shots

Here are my BodyMedia Screen shots. I didn't get a big calorie burn and hardly had any activity registered as even moderate. The tall thing spike on the left is my workout. I had wider spikes while walking around at work. I'm sure I'll feel it in my legs tomorrow though. It's funny though, after the workout was done, I thought to myself, "Wow that went fast. I feel like I didn't do anything." I sat on the couch for a few minutes before my shower. When I got up to head to the shower, my legs shook so badly! I thought I was going to fall over. This certainly worked my legs! 

Receipt Hog

What is it?

Receipt Hog is an app for smart phones that gives you points for scanning you grocery, liquor store and convenience store receipts. Once you get enough points, you can cash in to get Amazon gift cards or PayPal money. 

How do you earn points?

After visiting the grocery store, convenience store, or liquor store, you take pictures of your receipts through the app. The receipts get processed, and you get points. The more you spend on a trip, the more points you get. You can also get points by spinning the slot machine wheel. After you've submitted at least one receipt per week for five weeks, you go into Hog Wild status. Once you're there, you get one slot machine spin for each receipt that you submit. Below is a screen shot of my phone from when I won 400 coins on a spin. If you hit a single stack of coins, you win coins. If you hit two stacks, you win more coins. I haven't hit three stacks yet. There doesn't seem to be a set number per stack though. I will get 5 to 15 coins for hitting 1 stack and I've gotten 10 to 400 for hitting two stacks. You can also get coins by answering short surveys on products that you purchased. I had a survey about some bread that my husband got as an impulse buy and the beer that he got the other day. There was also a general survey about my demographics. You also get coins for referring people. Click here for my referral link. I get 10 coins, but I'm not sure if you get anything.

What's the Point?

After you get to 1000 coins, you can cash out for an Amazon gift card or PayPal. The rewards take less coins as you save up for higher rewards.I haven't cashed out yet because I wanted to save up for the highest reward. I hoard Amazon gift cards for Christmas time. I've gotten some from SwagBucks, mPoints, and even Kiip Rewards. Finding the rewards option on the app can be a bit tricky. At the bottom of the screen, the second box from the right says Rewards. Once you click on that, you'll see the screen below. Once you're there, you'll need to click on the green bar towards the top that says Redeem Prizes. The Rewards Tab is also where the bonus surveys will pop up. Be sure to check there periodically. I don't think you get notifications when they are available. 

Receipts Tab

The second button from the left is the Receipts tab. This is where you go to see the receipts that you've submitted. When you first submit a receipt, it will say Processing instead of a store name. Usually the name will pop up in a few hours, and then in a day or two the receipt gets processed and your points and spins get added. If for some reason, you get a stuck receipt, contact Receipt Hog on Facebook. They are quite responsive and fix things quickly. If you send them a private message with your email address they'll fix it.  

Notifications

In the upper right hand section, you'll see a small white message box. If you have a notification, a number will pop up in the message box. You get them when you get coins and spins added by submitting a receipt, when you win coins on the wheel and if there are problems with your receipt. Click the box to see your Notifications. You can scroll through the list to see older messages.  

Where can I shop?

I've gotten points and pins for shopping at Costco, Walmart, Bi-Mart, Rays Food Place, Safeway, Trader Joe's, Fred Meyer, Natural Grocery, Cash & Carry, Dollar Tree and Thriftway. During Christmas, they ran a special promotion where you could earn points for places like GameStop, Staples and Home Depot. I got points there as well, but that was just a special promotion. I hope that they run that again this coming Christmas. The app says that you can earn points at convenience stores, but you have to buy more than just gas. I've only submitted one receipt for a convenience store, but they didn't accept it. It was for a non-chain store that's attached to the Chevron gas station in our tiny little town. I don't go to convenience stores very often, so I haven't tried another one. They also say that you can submit them for liquor stores, but I haven't been to one since I found out that you can use them. You can also get points for pharmacy type stores like Walgreens, Rite-Aid and CVS. You don't have to buy groceries at grocery stores to get the points. If you go to Walmart and buy a TV, you can get points because they sell groceries there. 

My Overall Opinion and a Tip

I like this app. It's simple to use, and I love the slot machine aspect of it. It takes a long time to earn rewards unless you're shopping like crazy. You can't earn much until you get into Hog Wild Status. It takes five weeks to get you there. Once you're in Hog Wild, it does go quicker. I don't shop often enough to earn anything very quickly even in Hog Wild Status. I submit two to three receipts per week. My tip is to save up your spins until you get at least 10. I would say more, but I can't control myself and have to spin at 10. If I spin a couple at a time, I never win, but if I save up until I get 10 spins, I usually get at least a couple hits with one stack of coins. 

Where to get it

You can use my referral link, which will get me 10 coins. I'm not sure if you get a bonus or not.

You can go to the Play Store https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.infoscout.receipthog

You can go to the App Store https://itunes.apple.com/us/app/receipt-hog-snap-receipts./id525373618?mt=8

You can find out more on the Receipt Hog website. 

Netflix DVD Trial

I wanted access to more Leslie Sansone DVDs so I got a Netflix DVD subscription free trial for 30 days to see what they had to offer and how quickly I could turn things around. We already had a streaming subscription, but I wasn't able to find any streaming workouts. I couldn't find a list of Netflix DVDs without signing up for the DVD subscription, and it was driving me nuts not knowing, so I signed up. My subscription will be over on Monday, but I'm writing this up since I have time right now.

They have a few different pricing options. There are three Unlimited options. One disc out at a time is $7.99 or $9.99 with Blue-ray. Two discs out at a time is $11.99 or $14.99 with Blue-ray. Three discs out at a time is $15.99 or $19.99 with Blue-ray. You can also do a Limited option where you can get one disc at a time for a max of 2 discs per month for $4.99 or $5.99 with Blue-ray.

In my free trial I was able to get 6 discs. The timeline is below

March 1st - I joined.
March 4th - I got my first DVD. I joined on a Saturday, so the first disk took a little longer to arrive.
March 5th - I shipped the DVD back.
March 7th - I received my second DVD.
March 10th - I shipped it back
March 12th - They sent an email that the disc that I wanted wasn't available from the closest warehouse so they were going to ship it from another location, but it would take a couple extra days to arrive.
March 14th - I received my third disc which was an extra disc as a consolation since my other disc was delayed.
March 17th - I received my fourth disc which was the one that was shipped from the other warehouse.
March 19th - I sent back the two DVDs.
March 22nd - I received my fifth disc.
March 25th - I sent back the disc.
March 29th - I received my sixth disc.

I probably could have gotten one extra DVD, but a couple of the DVDs had two workouts on them so I had to do both workouts before I sent them back. Each disc cost me $1.33. If I had been able to get one more disc out of it, it would have knocked it down to $1.14. If I could have gotten two more, it would have gotten them down to $.99 each disc. I thought about going for one more month and bumping it up to two discs, but that puts it over the price of Gaiam TV which gives you unlimited streaming so I can workout every day of the month without having to wait on discs. If you already have a Netflix DVD subscription and just want to get a few extra workouts to try in a month, I would say that using Netflix would be a good idea, but if you're looking for the most bang for your buck, I don't think that Netflix discs is it. I can get more from my local library in a month than I can through Netflix. They did have a good selection of Leslie Sansone discs though.

Here are the Leslie Sansone DVDs that were available.

Burn Body Fat
Walk at Home 3 Mile Slim & Sleek
You Can Do!: Yoga
Walk the Walk: Firm Walk
Walk Aerobics Weight Loss Walk 4
Walk at Home Walk Slim 5 Really Big Miles
The Walk Diet
Walk at Home Walk Your Belly Flat
Walk Away the Pounds Muscle Mile One
Walk Away the Pounds Fat Burning Miles (Power Mile, Walk Strong, Walk & Jog, Walk & Kick)
Walk at Home 5 Mile Walk
Walk at Home Walk Slim 4 Fast Miles
Walk Away the Pounds Power Mile
Walk Aerobics for Seniors
Walk Aerobics Older Adults Walk & Firm (The link is for VHS, but I wanted to let you see the reviews)
You Can Do!: Pilates
You Can Do!: Abs
Walk Slim Fast & Firm 4 Really Big Miles
Walk Away the Pounds Walk & Jog
Walk Away the Pounds Walk & Kick
Walk at Home 1 Mile Workouts (I couldn't find a link to this anywhere)
Walk Away the Pounds Express Walk Strong (33 minutes)
Walk Away the Pounds 30 Minute Walk
Walk at Home 3 Mile Weight Loss Walk
Walk Away the Pounds Express Walk Strong (60 minutes) (I couldn't find a link to this)
Walk at Home 5 Day Slim Down
Walk the Walk 1 & 2 Mile
Walk Away the Pounds for Abs 2 in 1
Walk Away the Pounds Express 1 & 2 Mile
Walk Aerobics Deluxe Walk
Walk Away the Pounds 4 Mile Super Challenge
Walk Away the Pounds Advanced Walk 3 Mile
Walk Away the Pounds 3 Mile Super Fat Burning
Walk Aerobics Deluxe Fat Burning Walk
Walk Aerobics 40 Plus Workout Walk
Walk Aerobics Fat Burner Walk 2
Walk Aerobics Fat Burning Walk 4
Walk Aerobics Firm Up Fast Walk
Walk at Home Walk Slim Fast Start 3 Fast Miles
Walk at Home Walk Slim 4 Fast Miles
Walk Aerobics Firm Off Weight Walk

They also had some Billy Blanks workouts that I would love to try, but I'm just not really ready yet.
Billy Blanks: Bootcamp SOS (this gives me the option to Save, but not add to Queue)
Tae Bo: Flex
Tae Bo Power
Tae Bo Funk
BIlly Blanks Bootcamp Basic Training
Billy Blanks Bootcamp Ab Bootcamp
Billy Blanks Bootcamp Ultimate Bootcamp
Tae Bo Kicks (this is for kids)
Tae Bo Amped Jumpstart Cardio
Tae Bo Contact 1
Tae Bo Contact 2
Tae Bo Flex Express (This only has the Save option)
Tae Bo Cardio Circuit 2
Tae Bo Foundation Energy
Tae Bo Strength & Power
Tae Bo Celebrity Fit Cardio
Tae Bo Celebrity Fit Sculpt
Tae Bo Cardio Explosion (This only has the save option)
Tae Bo Ripped Extreme (This only has the save option)
Tae Bo Cardio Circuit 1
Tae Bo Fat Blasting Cardio
Tae Bo Freestyle Funk
Tae Bo Amped Full Throttle
Tae Bo Amped Fat Burn Accelerator
Tae Bo Total Fat Blaster
Billy Blanks Cardio BootCamp Live
Billy Blank's Boot Camp Lower Body BootCamp
Tae Bo Believers Workout Strength Within
Billy Blanks Bootcamp Elite Mission 3
Billy Blanks Bootcamp Elite Mission 2
Billy Blanks Bootcamp Elite Mission 1
Tae Bo Billy's Favorite Moves
Tae Bo II Get Ripped Advanced 1 & 2 (The only has save option)
Tae Bo Postnatal Power Workout (His daughter did this one)
Tae Bo II Get Ripped Basic 1&2
Tae Bo Live (This only has save option)
Billy Blanks Tae Bo Amped Live in LA

They have The Biggest Loser Workouts.

The Biggest Loser: The Workout
The Biggest Loser: Calorie Knockout
The Biggest Loser:: Boot Camp
The Biggest Loser:: At-Home Challenge
The Biggest Loser:: Power Walk
The Biggest Loser: Power Sculpt
The Biggest Loser: Cardio Max
The Biggest Loser: Cardio Max Weight Loss
The Biggest Loser: Last Chance Workout
The Biggest Loser: Weight Loss Yoga
The Biggest Loser: The Workout Vol 2
The Biggest Loser: 30 Day Jump Start

Leslie Sansone Walk 'N Tone Internediate

This morning I had every intention of doing a step work out called Christi Taylor Totally Cool Step 2. That didn't go so well for me.  I was then left in a panic to find something to fit into the time I had left and still get a decent workout. I turned to YouTube since I didn't have any one mile workouts left at home that I hadn't reviewed. I think it was from Exercise TV. I tried to find a DVD version or some information about the program, but I was unsuccessful. I'm assuming that the Leslie Sansone camp is okay with this being up, since they could get it pulled if they weren't okay with it. This was a 20 minute workout that was posted in two parts. I'm not sure why it's not posted in it's entirety, but it's not. It was mildly annoying to switch back to the computer to play the second one, but oh well. I have a Roku, and one of the features is that I can sync my laptop to my TV. When I have YouTube up on my computer, I can tell it to play on the TV. It makes finding stuff a lot easier.

The walk booster in this one was the New Balance Rock 'n Tone shoes. Once she said that at the beginning, I almost dumped the workout because I thought it was going to turn into one big commercial. I decided to keep playing it though. I'm glad I did. I got a decent 20 minute workout and she only mentioned the shoes a couple time. The walk started out with a five minute warm up. We went through the four basic moves which are walking in place, side steps, front kicks and knee lifts. Once we were all warmed up the music picked up and we added kick backs, double side steps, and walking forward two counts and back two counts. There was one small spot where we were in something between a walk and a jog. It was a little bouncy for it to be a fast walk, but it wasn't really a jog. There's not much to say about this walk. It was only 20 minutes, and beyond the basics,  not much else happened. There was little arm movement. When the arms were involved, it was mainly clapping during the side steps. There were also some presses up and then forward. She didn't rattle on that much and only mentioned the shoes a few times. The walkers were in sync for the most part. A couple of them put a little extra oomph into the workout, and it was interesting watching how they did the moves in a more fun dancy kind of way. Cat was in this workout. I know I've seen her before, but I can't remember what workout. It was probably on one of the ones from the 5-Day Fit Walk.

Below is my BodyMedia screen shot for the workout. The workout was only 20 minutes, but I still got 8 minutes of vigorous activity. The workout from yesterday was an hour and 10 minutes, but I only got 15 minutes of vigorous activity. Leslie says that isn't wimpy stuff, and she's serious.   I do have to admit that my whole back is a bit sore from yesterday's workout though, and I don't think I've ever been sore the next day from one of Leslie's walks. That's not a bad thing though since I really like the straight up cardio aspect of most of her walks. I enjoy the walk boosters too, but I like finding a good cardio workout that doesn't get into strength training so I can do those on the days after my strength training days.

The Biggest Loser Coffee-Crusted Chopped Steak

I normally cook on Wednesday nights, but my husband was craving fried chicken on Wednesday, so he went to the grocery store and picked some up. My night to cook got bumped to Thursday. I made The Biggest Loser Coffee-Crusted Chopped Steak. I found the recipe in The Biggest Loser Quick & Easy Cookbook. I've made a few things from this cookbook, but I haven't read the book yet, so I'm holding off on writing up a review of the book until I actually read it. I'm still working my way through Dolvett's book The 3-2-1 Diet: Eat and Cheat Your Way to Weight Loss.

Once again, I got home and said, "Honey! I have no idea what to make for side dishes!" I don't know why this is so hard for me, but I pick a main dish and then can't come up with side dishes. We had some fresh green beans in the fridge, so I boiled those up with a tiny bit of salt. They would have tasted so much better covered in butter, but I restrained myself. I also made some instant mashed potatoes. I know they aren't the best thing for me, but I put a very small portion on my plate, so this was still an okay meal as far as calories go. The potatoes were processed, but I can't give up everything at once. I'm slowly getting there though.

The Coffee-Crusted Chopped Steak was very easy to make. You form these little ovals and then cover them with coffee grounds. I wasn't really sure that either of us would like this, and I had serious doubts about me liking it since I'm not a coffee drinker. I tried it though because of the whole broadening my horizons thing. In the end, this was nothing more than an oddly shaped hamburger. I could barely taste the coffee while I was eating the burger. After the burger was done, I had a coffee aftertaste, but some of the juices had run into my potatoes which gave them a bit of a coffee taste. My husband got a hint of the coffee flavor, but it wasn't very strong. 

At some point, he said that he wondered if the coffee was going to keep us up that night. I giggled a little and said, "There's a half tablespoon between four patties. That shouldn't be a problem." He concurred, and promptly fell asleep about 15 minutes after his head hit the pillow. I know this because I was wide awake for about an hour after my head hit the pillow. I thought about getting up to read, but decided to tough it out. I'm not going to be making this fun little dish ever again! I just didn't really get the coffee with the beef. It was weird for me. I tried it, and I feel better because of it, but there are more flavorful ways to cook ground beef so I'll stick with those. The Biggest Loser Chili Meatloaf was one of those. 

The Biggest Loser Power Walk

Today, I did The Biggest Loser Power Walk.It had four 1 mile segments that are about 16 minutes each. it also has a short stretch at the end. You can chose to do all of the segments or just the ones that you want to do. I did all four miles and the stretch. The DVD was filmed at The Biggest Loser Ranch. I think that the people in the walk are former contestants. Bob Harper led the first and third miles. The other two people on the cover led the other two miles. The guy on the right led the second mile and the female on the left led the fourth mile. They were in much better shape than the rest of the walkers, so I think these two were in a previous year's show and the rest of the walkers were from the current season's show (which I think would have been whatever season was filmed in 2010). You have the choice to do this with just the music or with the instructors dialogue. 

Bob Harper led the first mile. It was a bit slow paced. There was marching in place, side steps and knee lifts, among other things. Bob announced the 1/4, 1/2 and 3/4 markers. They also showed up on the screen to mark them. Towards the end of the mile, he had us sort of squat down a bit and lean forward and then "run." I don't really consider it running. It was more like lifting your feet off the floor as fast as you can, but only lifting them a very small amount. I think I've seen this type of move in sports warm ups. 

The second mile was led by a former contestant. This mile included weights. The walking was pretty slow paced, but the weights added to the intensity. I used my weighted balls since I still don't have dumbbells. I was able to keep up, but this segment was a bit of a train wreck for me. The walkers didn't seem to know what they were supposed to do, and to be honest, I didn't really know either. I was usually a couple paces behind them while I figured out where I was going. This segment also ended with the "running" thing that wasn't really running. I'm pretty sure that it really worked my glutes though. I did like the punching in this segment, but I think someone should have explained the different punches to the walkers before the workout. He called out an uppercut and people are doing hooks. It's not a huge deal, but it was a bit distracting.

Bob was back for the third segment. There were no weights for this segment. There was a lot of jogging and a lot of jumping jacks. I am not a fan of jogging, but these jogging segments were shorter than Leslie Sansone's jogging segments, so I made it through them just fine. I tried the jumping jacks and managed to get through about 10 seconds of them before I decided I was done with them. I went with the modified version. The segment ended with the "running" thing again. 

The fourth segment was led by a former contestant. This one used a medicine ball. I didn't think they called them medicine balls anymore, but that's what she called it. I used one of my weighted balls which is a lot smaller than a medicine ball, but I wanted something ball shaped and I didn't feel like using my watermelon, although, they did suggest using melons if you didn't have the ball. This one was another train wreck where the contestant was a bit confused about what they were going to do next. The leader laughed it off and was cool about it, but it was distracting to me.  

This workout was a bit odd for me because I'm so used to Leslie Sansone's walking workouts. Her terminology is different, her vibe is different and her walkers are different. This workout had moments of intensity. In fact, I think I got the most calories burned per minute from any workout I've ever done. However, those were just bursts. When not doing those bursts, I think my overall average was lower than most other walking workouts. It felt really slow paced except for the third mile with all of the jogging and jumping jacks. This was tagged as a Low Impact workout, but I wouldn't consider the third segment low impact. The fourth segment had some higher impact stuff too. They always had a modified version for you to follow though. I think I will try this one again in a couple months just to see how many calories I can burn if I don't do all of the modifications. I was about 40 calories short of my Leslie Sansone 5 mile. If I can get through this workout without modifying the jumping jacks, I might be able to pull off 1,000 calories in one workout. I have two goals right now.....1,000 calories in one workout and 5,000 calories in one day. 

Below are my BodyMedia Link screen shots. The wide tall blue blob on the left is the workout. The rest of the blue blips are me walking around at work. I only got 15 minutes of vigorous activity in this workout. I should have had more, but I really can't do jumping jacks.

Graze.com box 9

I finished another graze.com box. I love these boxes! They send four snack sized packs once a week or less frequently if that's what you want. They've added something too where you can buy a one off box or get a second box subscription going. I have a second box that will come every other week. I got tired of running out of snacks! The boxes are $6.00 each and that includes shipping. That puts themat $1.25 per snack. It's not that much more than a king sized candy bar and these are way better for you than that. It's priced right around Lara Bars at Trader Joes. The people who work for the company are really awesome too. They always write something corny and hilarious in response to my Twitter posts. I highly recommend checking them out. You don't need an invite code anymore from what I can tell, but if you have one, you'll get the first and fifth boxes free. You can use Jaimie49P if you'd like. I'll get $1.00 off of one box if you do.

Here is the environmentally friendly packaging. The other side has the address label and a note saying to flip the box over before opening it so you don't make a mess. 

Here is the inside of the box. The top section has a few different variations. 

This is Rock the Casbah. Apparently, I've been spelling Casbah wrong my whole life. This one has pumpkin seeds, walnuts and dates. The ingredients were fresh. The pumpkin seeds and the walnuts were tasty. The dates were just okay for me. It was kind of like eating a Lara Bar. There's a certain nothingness about the dates. Since I liked the seeds and the nuts, I'm going to mark this as Like and give it another chance. I don't like to leave things as Try because then I lose track of if I've actually tried them. It gets one more shot before I trash it. The size was a good snack size, and the combination of ingredients was good. 

Next we have Chocolate Orange. It had roasted hazelnuts, orange infused raisins and dark chocolate buttons. I'm not a huge fan of hazelnuts, but I did like this one. There was a good mix of ingredients, but it was a little heavy on the hazelnuts. I love the flavored raisins. I'm not really sure why the flavored raisins in a lot of these instead of using dried oranges though. Maybe that's too expensive or they don't keep well. I've never tried to dry an orange. The chocolate pieces were yummy. I marked this one as Like. I'm still not sold on the hazelnuts and I'm trying to decide if I really should be eating the chocolate pieces in my quest to lose weight. 

This is Little Figgy Went to Market. I love the names of these things! This had dried apples, cranberries and dried figs dusted with rice flour.I'm not normally a fan of the dried apples, but they were good in this one. They seem to do better when they have berries with them. This had a good mix of ingredients and was a good snack size. I'm not sold on the figs yet. They tasted like they were of good quality, but there wasn't a lot of flavor to them. Maybe that's normal for a fig. For those of you who haven't eaten a fig before or a fig Newton, there's a bit of a grittyness to them. They must be loaded with seeds because it's kinda like eating a strawberry with a ton of seeds on it. I marked it as Like to give it another go. I did enjoy the snack overall. I'm just not in love with it yet. 

This is the Vanilla Seeds. I saved this for last because I wasn't looking forward to it. I'm not a seed fan. I think I have trashed every seed mix since I've gotten the boxes. They just aren't convenient food to eat while sitting at my desk. I took this to the break room so I could take my time and eat it with a spoon. I was very surprised that I actually liked this. It's got pumpkin seeds and sunflower seeds that are vanilla flavored. It really was flavorful. Then I got back to my desk and looked up the ingredients to discover that they have added sugar. I'm going to Trash this simply because of the 10 grams of sugar that I'm pretty sure all came from added sugar since I don't think sunflower seeds and pumpkin seeds have any natural sugars in them. I could be wrong though. If I'm wrong, and most of this isn't added sugar, I'm totally moving this to Love. They were very yummy. It was a good snack size. 

Here is the nutritional content that I obviously didn't read before eating the Vanilla Seeds. I can't wait until my next box shows up. I don't have a graze.com snack for tomorrow at work. I'm pretty bummed about that! I've gotten quite attached to these things and I cheated so I know I have a flapjack coming! Those flapjacks are YUMMY!

Walk Indoors! Interval with Leslie Sansone

This morning I was running late because I wrote up yesterday's workout review when I woke up today. I did a one mile walk off of YouTube. It was called Walk Indoors! Interval. I wasn't able to find that as a DVD title, so I'm not sure if this was just something that was done for Internet release or if it's a mile off of a DVD that I just can't find. It was about 15 minutes long even though my BodyMedia shows a little longer. I forgot to shut it off.

The workout started with the four basic steps which are walking in place, side steps, front kicks and knee lifts. The pace picked up quickly, but then slowed down a couple minutes later. Then it picked up again and included boosted walking. There were two more boosted walking segments and then one last slow section. The workout just ended after a quick high five session and her congratulating everyone for doing a mile. There wasn't a stretch. However, I did find a Walk Indoors! Stretch segment on YouTube so maybe that's why. I played the beginning of it, but it didn't make any reference to the walk that we had just done. It was all very weird. The walk itself looked like a live class more than an exercise DVD. If you've ever done TaeBo Live and the regular TaeBo workouts, you'll know what I'm talking about. There were people who looked like they had just come off of the street. The outfits were not all matched up, and the people were not the perfect smiley on beat walkers that I'm used to. One or two of them were off pace most of the time and I found it distracting, but I was happy to see some bigger people in this DVD.

The workout was only 15 minutes, but she managed to get a speech in it about how you need to walk to train for life. She also managed to talk to both of the guys for a couple of minutes. I'm not really sure why she's so hung up on the guys in the workouts, but she always talks to them or about them whenever there is a guy.

Overall, it was a decent one mile walk, and I would suggest it to anyone who wants to try jogging intervals. Jogging is the same thing as boosted walking. It just sounds less scary. Nothing crazy happened in this workout. It was pretty much just the normal four moves plus the jogging and some boosted front kicks. Basically, you do a little hop with the planted foot while the other foot kicks.

Below are my BodyMedia screen shots. I got 7 minutes of vigorous activity. I thought that was pretty good since it was such a short workout. The tall skinny blip on the left is the workout. Tomorrow, I'm doing The Biggest Loser Power Walk. I anticipate a really tall and really wide blue blob! It's an hour long if I do all four segments!

 

Leslie Sansone Deluxe Walk 2 mile

Yesterday, I did another Leslie Sansone 2 mile workout. I think it was just called Two Mile Walk with Leslie Sansone. it was part of a Deluxe Special Edition where they took a couple of older workouts and re-released them into this new spiffy Deluxe Walk Special Edition. I got the DVD from Netflix. The jacket is above and the screen shot of my TV is below. Those are the two workouts that it had on it. I did the 4 mile on Monday. 

The DVD lets you pick which workout you want to do. Once you've selected, it then gives you the option to play the whole workout or just do segments of it. I selected to do the entire workout. Turns out, that was a bit of a mistake. I procrastinated once again. I know that sounds shocking, but it's quite true. I pushed it until the last minute. The DVD had this infomercial at the beginning of it. It was only a couple minutes, but when you're short on time, a couple minutes can mean being late or being on time. Ugh! After the infomercial is over, Leslie introduces the walkers one by one and mentions how much weight they lost. One person lost 100 pounds. The rest of them lost 40 or less. It was nice to know that the people in the DVD had been using the program and it had worked for them, but again, I was short on time.

This DVD shows a slightly chubby Leslie Sansone. She's actually wearing a little skort type deal too. I think to hide her belly. Seeing a slightly chubby Leslie Sansone was oddly enough more inspiring than seeing the person who had lost 100 pounds on this. Just knowing that at some point in her life she had gained weight, made me like her more as an instructor. To know that she wasn't always the perfect skinny person that we see today. After I got over my shock of seeing chubby Leslie, I thought to myself, oh wow this must have been after one of the kids. The screen then changes to pregnant Leslie and she talks about how she had a baby 7 weeks ago. It didn't matter though. I don't care why she had gained weight. The only important thing was that she had actually gained weight and then lost it. Okay, on with the workout.

This looks like the 80s is finally over. We did have some spandex, but it was getting a little loser and it wasn't brightly colored. I didn't see any big hair at all. 

There wasn't much of a warm up and she didn't go over the four basic steps. She didn't even talk about the four basic steps. She did start out by marching in place. I can't really remember all of the gory details of this workout because it was pretty much all over the place. The workout kept my heart rate up and I was out of breath and sweating the entire time, but I also got lost a bit. This was still WalkAerobics, but it was heavier on the Aerobics than it was on the walk.

Some of the moves that did not go well for me included.....the dreaded grapevine, but this isn't your grapevine of today. No, this is the grapevine of yesteryear. The grapevine of old workout videos that always comes with a little something extra. You start off with just a grapevine, but then we have to make our arms do circles which is okay, except then once we're all good and cozy with having all four limbs moving at once and in different directions, then we add something to the grapevine like knee lifts and taps when you're on the edges. I kept doing the wrong thing. If we were tapping, I was knee lifting. Fun fun. There were a few sections where we would do knee lifts for four counts going forward and then kick backs for four going backwards. I did okay with those unless our arms had to move too. There were also some really fun moves where your arms go up straight over your head and then you do knee lifts or kick backs while angling your toe up and your arm down so your hand touches your toes. I was okay with those as long as we did all knee lifts or all kick backs, but she had us do four of each and I kept missing the change over or I'd change at the wrong time. There were several things on here where we would do four of something and then switch to something else. Not a fan of that. Oh, there was also a part where you walked up two and back two, but then you walked into the right corner two and back two, then the left corner up two and back two and then back to center. That one wasn't back, but there was one where you walked up two kicked into the corner, then turned so you were facing away from the TV and walked two then kicked into another corner then turned again to face the TV and walked forward again. 

Overall, this was not my favorite DVD. It was effective. I will admit that. It got my heard rate up and kept me out of breath. I got 9 minutes of vigorous activity. I could have had more, but my arms stopped moving a few times when I was trying to figure out what to do with my feet. If I did this one a couple more times, I might be able to get the hang of it, but it just didn't seem like something I really wanted to do again. She has so many DVDs that are easier for me to follow. I would highly suggest this workout though just to see Leslie Sansone at her post baby weight. I'm not saying this to make fun of her. Seven weeks after having a baby, she's filming a workout DVD and looks pretty damn good. If anyone saw her who didn't know her as a super skinny person, they wouldn't even think she was chubby in the picture. We all know how skinny she is though, so we know that it's not her normal size. 

Below are my BodyMedia screen shots. The workout is the tall blue blob on the left.  

The picture came out terrible because it was a small spot on my TV and I took a pic with my camera and then cropped out the extra stuff, but you can see the skort and the fact that she's not uber skinny like she normally is in the workouts. This is not me making fun of her. This is me showing people that the perfect body that we see was not always perfect and she too had weight to lose at one point.

Leslie Sansone Deluxe Walk Weight Loss Walk 4 Mile

I got this DVD from Netflix. It contains two workouts. I tried to find a link to this on Amazon, but I wasn't able to find it so I'm not sure if you can buy this DVD anywhere at this point, but you can at least watch it through Netflix disk subscription. The workout that I did this morning was tagged as a 4 mile workout. The DVD gives the option to play the entire workout or just specific segments. I did the the workout as a whole. This DVD is between the 80s and the 90s. We still have tight, brightly colored spandex, but we don't have big hair.  

The DVD starts off a bit weird and gave me a flashback to doing the Richard Simmons workout from a few weeks back. It started off with Leslie walking into a living room type setting and waking up her husband on the couch. Once she gets him off the couch, she starts the workout. It starts with a five minute warm up with just Leslie. The first few minutes she goes over the four basic steps pretty quickly. The basic steps are walking, front kicks, side steps and knee lifts. She then talks about some new moves that she's going to go over. I can't remember them all, but I do remember out out in in. You step to the left with your left foot. Then you step to the right with your right foot. Then you step back in with your left foot and then back in with your right foot. There was also the box step. You take your right foot and cross it over your left foot and then step back with your left foot and then your right. You repeat this and apparently form a box. There was also the golf putter thing which is a little difficult to explain, but it involves picking up your left foot and then with a straight leg, you move it towards the right side of the room like it was a golf putter. There were a few others that I just can't remember.

The first segment is a mile. It seemed a bit slow as far as the pace goes, but it got my heart up for sure. At the end of the segment, the screen changes and you see that you're now about to start segment too. Leslie hears a knock at the door which she answers. her friends come into the room and workout with her. One of them is a guy who looks like he is staring at her butt the whole time, but I really think he's looking at her feet. He's right behind her too which is annoying since she obscures him during the workout, which is a bit annoying. I don't like not being able to see the walkers if they are there. The second segment is similar to the first, but it's 1.5 miles and the pace is supposedly a bit faster. The third segment is another 1.5 miles which another fast pace. The cool down was short, but the stretch was pretty thorough. The stretch involved squats oh fun! It also included what she called lunges, but they weren't your typical lunge. They were more of the 80s sideways lunge where you get into a squat position and then shift your wait from one side to the other.  

This workout was pretty intense, and I was pretty beat after it was over. I only got 16 minutes of vigorous activity, but it felt like more. Maybe it was the specific moves that we did, I'm not sure.  She strung the move together without a lot of walking in the middle. She also mixed things up a lot more than I'm used to. I'm used to her workouts having the main four steps with a few add ons, but this one did a lot more than just the basics. THere were the four basics, and the good old kick backs and double side steps. However, there was a lot more variety, instead of just walking up forward and back forward, she would walk forward and then do knee lifts or front kicks before walking back two steps and doing the knee lifts or front kicks again. Tap outs and heel taps forward were also in the mix. This one had mambos too, but they were different than the mambos that I've done in newer workouts. These were harder for me because you stepped forward, back, forward and then back to center, then you switched legs and did forward, back, forward, back to center. I kept messing it up. I messed up a lot in this workout. I'm glad I did it, and it was an effective workout, but it was a bit too much like regular aerobics for me.The cueing wasn't very good either. I'm used to her warning us before we're going to do something, but she'd be marching along and then be like okay side steps now. She would also say that we would do one more set, but then when we got to the end of that set, she'd have us do one more. I don't like it when they play mind games with me!

Below are my BodyMedia screen shots. I thought I would have had more vigorous activity, but I still got my checkmark, so I'm good with the 16 minutes. The big wide blue blob on the left is the workout. the rest is me walking around at work. I didn't get much walking done today. It was nice to sit at my desk and get something done, but I'm not going to have a nice burn today! I've gotten used to my 4,000 calorie days! Not going to happen today. Tomorrow, I will be doing the 2 mile walk on the same DVD and then sending it back to Netflix. I think I'll only get one more DVD before my trial is over. 

Misto Oil Sprayer

While reading The Biggest Loser Simple Swaps 100 Easy Changes to Star Living a Healthier Lifestyle, I read about an olive oil spray. It said that I could get one at a health food store. I went to a store called Natural Grocery, and they had no idea what I was talking about. They tried to sell me a one ounce bottle with a spray nozzle on it. I didn't really think that was going to work, so we went to Bed, Bath and Beyond. They knew exactly what I was talking about. They brought me to this nifty little gadget called a Misto. It's a non-propellant oil sprayer. For some reason, the stainless steel was less than the frosted glass. I got the frosted glass so I could see how much oil was in there. 

I love this thing. I had been using Pam to spray my pans, but the smell from Pam is horrible, and Pam is a bunch of chemicals. The stuff made me cough when I used it, and I'm trying to work my way up to a clean diet so those chemicals had to go. I had never heard of a non-propellant oil sprayer until I read the book. I'm so happy that I did. This thing was so worth the $15.00 that I paid for it. Amazon has a bunch of colors including red, blue and orange.  

Using this is really simple and it helps you burn a couple bonus calories when you use it because you pump it up by hand. The silver top is the cap, but it's also the pump. Once you pump it up 10-15 times, you've got about 15 seconds worth of spray time with no smell and no chemicals! You can use this anytime a recipe calls for Pam. You can also use it when making stuff like eggs. Instead of free pouring oil into the pan, you just spray it into the pan using the Misto. You'll use less oil and end up with less calories in your food. 

I love this thing and think that everyone should have one. It's better for you and the environment than using Pam! 

The Biggest Loser Goat Cheese Chicken and Carrot Fries

Tonight was Sunday night which is my night to cook. I decided to go outside of my comfort zone and made The Biggest Loser Goat Cheese Chicken and The Biggest Loser Carrot Fries. I've made the carrot fries before, but this was my first time on the Chicken. I found the receipt for the fries on The Biggest Loser website. The chicken came from The Biggest Loser Quick & Easy Cookbook. I have found a few other recipes in the book. I got the book from the library. I haven't read it yet, but I've made a few other recipes that I liked. 

This recipe was pretty far outside of my comfort zone, and I didn't really think that I was going to like it. I don't like sauce on things, and I have an aversion to goat cheese. You may be wondering why I would try this recipe. Well, the goat cheese aversion is from my childhood, and I'm learning that some of the things that I didn't like then aren't so bad now. I was in an adventurous mood and I was running out of things to try that were in my comfort zone since my comfort zone is so small. 

The recipe itself was pretty easy to make, but it wasn't exactly cheap. The goat cheese crumbles were $5.00 for a small container. If you like goat cheese and use it on other things, this might not be a big deal though. I wasn't able to find fruit juice sweetened cranberry juice at all. I ended up just buying the regular stuff that people use at Thanksgiving and Christmas. Once again, I had to cook the chicken longer than the recipe, but my chicken could have been bigger. I didn't measure these. I did pound the life out of them though. 

Now to find out what you all want to know........I didn't like this dish. The chicken itself was good, but the goat cheese was just too strong of a flavor. My husband agreed with me. We ended up scraping the sauce and cheese off of the chicken. I wasn't a big fan of warm cranberry sauce, but I might try the concept again with a different type of cheese. My husband thinks Mozzarella might work, but I haven't decided if I want to try the warm cranberry sauce again. Maybe the fruit sweetened would be better. 

The carrot fries were flavorful, but I didn't cook them long enough. I sprayed the potatoes with olive oil and then dumped some basil, garlic powder and onion powder on them. They were okay, but a little salt would have made them better. 

Leslie Sansone - Walk at Home Advanced 5 Mile Walk

Today is Saturday. I don't normally workout out on Saturdays. Although, I did do the Fat Burning Deluxe DVD last Saturday. I thought that my husband was going to work overtime today, so I decided that I wanted to try my first five mile DVD on a day that I didn't have to work. Turns out, he didn't have to work, but he hung out in the bedroom so I could do my workout. I picked the Walk at Home 5-Mile Advanced Walk. WOW! This thing was intense. I'm really glad that I did this on a Saturday. I've only done one 4 mile routine before, so I'm not really sure what possessed me to do a 5 mile, but I wanted to try. I'm glad I did, but WOW!

There is essentially no warm up in this workout. You do some walking in place while she talks a bit. That's followed by some gentle side steps, but she usually goes about five minutes before the pace kicks up. It's a few more minutes before she usually has you digging into the side steps, but in this workout, she started digging into those sidesteps at about the three minute mark. She didn't start off by going over the steps either. She did mention that if we were doing this DVD that we were veteran walkers and our bodies could handle getting right into the workout. By the same concept, I guess she figured that we didn't need an intro on the steps. I can see her point too. 

Each mile had it's own theme of sorts. It came with a different concept, different clothes and sometimes different people. At the half mile point of each mile, she makes an announcement that you're halfway through the mile. At one point, she said that we were half way down with the workout, and I thought to myself that it had gone quickly and I could handle the full workout no problem. She then corrected herself and said halfway through the mile. I think that happened in the second mile.

The first mile used the hand weights that look more like wrist or ankle weights, but she just holds onto them. You can see them here. Nothing major happens in this mile. Other than the basic steps of walking in place, side steps, front kicks and knee lifts, nothing too crazy gets introduced. There are kicks backs and walking forward two counts and back two counts. The are movements are pretty typical stuff like clapping when you walking up and back, raising your arms up over your head and other stuff like that. 

 The second mile is "the fastest mile" according to Leslie. I didn't time it, but it did seem to go very quickly. There were jogging intervals in this mile, but there were no walk boosters. Again, nothing crazy happened and the moves stayed pretty basic. They were pretty fast and they were stacked with not so much walking in place in between them. This one was definitely about keeping the feet moving fast. There were arm movements too, but it was more about the feet.

The third mile had the walk belt. This was the longest mile of my life. I'm not really sure why, but this was like the never ending mile for me. I didn't use the belt, and to be honest, the walkers didn't use it much either. It took at least five minutes for her to even get to the belt and then she didn't do much with it. It was interesting to see that the tubes on her belt looked like they had been knotted up to make them shorter. She also talked about holding them by the base of the handle to make it more intense. This mile was more of the same moves with nothing different happening.

The fourth mile was a fast mile again. It did not include any walk boosters. There were no jogging intervals though. There was a lot of talking in this mile. Actually, there was a lot of talking in the entire workout. I don't think she shut up at all. She kept referencing some secret. I won't ruin the surprise for you, but it was weird because by the time she revealed the big secret, I already knew the answer because she slipped up in a previous mile. This mile was pretty much your standard moves. This might have been the mile that included doing knee lifts while walking forward, but otherwise, it was straight up basic moves plus kick backs and walking forward and backwards.

The fifth mile used the stretchie bands. I didn't use it though. This was my first five mile, and I needed to just get through the workout without doing anything extra. Even without using the stretchie band, my shoulders were still upset with me. They're pretty weak from using the walk belt in the Walk-N-Tone DVD from yesterday. This mile did't do anything beyond the basics plus the kick backs and walking forward and backwards two counts. It was still a good workout even without the bands. Sometimes the stretchie band parts slow things down, but in this DVD, she kept the pace up while using the band. 

After the fifth mile, you go into the stretch. It's just Leslie and two other people. The stretch is a bit more intense than the stretches for other workouts. You stay in the calf stretch position longer and then you add another step where you drop your need on the leg that's stretched back. I had some balance issues the longer we held the position, but my balance is getting better. 

I'm glad that I got through this workout, but it was hard for me! My legs were pretty much Jell-o by the end. I was tired and soooo ready to be done! I wanted to push myself to do a five mile because I thought it would help me force myself to do more four miles. I've only done one, and I haven't really been doing that many 3 miles either. Part of it has been that I'm a bit restricted since I only have access to a limited amount of DVDs, and not many of them are 3 or 4 miles, and part of it is me not getting motivated early enough in the morning to actually get a long enough workout in. Once my Netflix trial is over, I might be able to change things up a bit. I've been trying to do all of the workouts on Netflix that I know aren't on Gaiam TV which is my next free trial to test out. 

Below are my BodyMedia Link device screen shots. A week or so, I was trashing on Leslie Sansone for talking about burning off a meal by doing the workouts. I had done one of those workouts a few days after I had eaten half of a Papa Murphy's pizza which was about 1,000 calories. I was complaining because I was concerned that someone might listen to that statement and think that they could workout every morning and still have McDonald's for dinner each night. I think the workout had burned right around 500 calories which would not burn off going to McDonald's unless you ate a salad, and why go to McDonald's if that's what you're going to eat. According to the workout tab below, I came pretty close to burning off that Papa Murphy's pizza. That many calories seems a bit crazy and I started to question the accuracy of the device, but if you look at the big blue blob on the image to the right, I was moving fast for the entire workout. It shows I never went below about 13 calories per minute for the entire workout, and I went up to about 18 for a few sections. When you look at it like that, it does seem possible. Whenever I really doubt the accuracy, I just remember that the people on The Biggest Loser use these things, so they must be fairly accurate.