Fidgety Fitness

I found this little craft idea on a web site.

MAGIC WEIGHT LOSS BEANS ~

1 Remove beans from bag.
2 Throw them on the floor.
3 Bend down and pick up each bean.
4 Repeat hourly as needed.

I loved this! It's funny. It's true in that it would be good exercise (though not exactly magic). And it reminds me of myself and the silly things I do when I'm trying to be more active.

Last night, for instance, I mentally congratulated myself for bending over to pick up multiple bits of tissue that fell out of the clothes I was folding--especially since the cleaners were coming today.

This AM at work, I walked round and round the elevator to increase my steps. (Yes, I was alone!) I made myself dizzy.

In the past, I've taken these tiny steps to move me toward feeling and being more active:

• Held up my own body weight instead of leaning

• Sit up instead of lying down

• Bent over to tie my shoes instead of putting my leg on a chair or pulling my leg up (if the bow is in the inside of the foot instead of the middle, you know the shoe's been tied with the foot pulled up!)

• Made a point to hold my shoulders up and back while walking in the hallways at work

• Been incredibly inefficient--walking to the kitchen at work to get my coffee and taking it back to my desk. Then going back to the kitchen to get water. Then going back to get fruit. So I make 3 trips instead of one loaded down one.

• Make myself rise from a seated position without using my hands to get up (doing a squat)

• Leave the basket with the clean clothes in it on the floor (not dumped on the bed) and bend to get each piece.

• Put each piece away separately. Going back and forth to drawers and closets.

They sound silly & and small, but when I'm down and out, they are huge first steps. And the results accumulate and produce results like magic beans!

WHAT I DID TODAY TO FEEL PROUD

• I walked with coworker at lunch.
• I ate this really good frozen Moosewood Restaurant entree: Moroccan Stew (2 pts!), with yummy muscadines, and a ham sandwich on and oat bran pita with spinach and banana pepper rings.
• I went to water aerobics even though I felt tired.
• That made 2 days this week that I exercised twice in the same day. [And the suit I found in the closet fit. Because the unstated miracle from the last water aerobics session was that I didn't lose my suit in the pool! I had a tankini on that that kept sliding off top and bottom!!)
• I was so tired that I didn't want to cook, but hubby was upbeat about us each doing our own thing. I had a lean cuisine 4 pt meal and 2 Morningstar Farms Corn dogs. Hey they're fake meat and comforting at the same time!