To new beginnings...

Hello everyone!

I've started this blog to document my journey towards health and fitness. By writing all of this down and sharing it with the world (or, at least, whoever reads it), I’m hoping that I'll do a better job of sticking with it.

I do have a specific weight loss/fitness goal: to be able to fit in to my size 6 wedding dress (which, if you know anything about the sizing at David's Bridal, is really more like a 4). To give a point of reference, I would have fit much better into a 10, but since the dress was on sale, my choices were between a 6 and a 14. I chose the 6.

Conveniently, this goal comes with a very hard deadline: April 9, 2011. (My wedding day!) And lest I forget, theknot.com informs me that my big day is exactly 277 days away from today. Duly noted.

A little background on me: I was skinny growing up, which is both a blessing and a curse. A blessing because it's probably better than growing up heavy, but a curse because back then I would eat whatever I wanted, and it never caught up with me.

That is, until these last few years. I'm probably 20 lbs heavier than when I started college. (And though I probably did gain a few curves in college, the girls certainly do not weigh 20 pounds on their own!)

I've been trying to become Paleo, in fits and starts, for probably the last three or four years. But I haven't been able to stick with it. School, work, school and work, parties, holidays – there is always an excuse for me not to see it through. But I’m quite literally starting a new part of my life, and this body is the only one I’m ever going to have. It will hopefully see my future hubby and me through many happy years, through children and grandchildren. And I’m going to do whatever I can to increase the length and quality of my life.

What is Paleo, you might ask? It's based on the idea that the age of agriculture is just a blip in our species' history, and that our bodies were not meant to consume grains or sugar, let alone cheese from a can. Our bodies cannot process them correctly. A Paleo diet emphasizes eating meat, poultry, fish, healthy fats (e.g. butter and omega 3-fatty acids), and lots of veggies and fruits. Some eat dairy, but others do not (more about this later).

Another reason I've started this blog is that I wanted to create more Paleo websites for women, both so we have access to more resources, and to combat the craziness that passes for diet advice on the web. A word of warning: I fully expect that I will both extol the virtues of the Paleo diet as well as document my own successes and failures adhering to it. In other words, I’m not perfect.

So here are a few websites that I find particularly helpful:

For general reference: Mark's Daily Apple

For awesome recipes: Girl Gone Primal

And most recently: Gym Junkies
(Sometimes his posts are only geared towards men, but most of it is applicable to both sexes.)

I used to love to go to a blog called the IF Life, but it seems to be undergoing some serious maintenance at the moment. If you google "IF Life" you may find it. If not, I will post when it seems to have returned.

So that is my brief introduction. I'll talk a little bit more about my life in the next post.