Check-In: 27 August 2012

Weight: 68kg

Workout:
4 sets of 5 reps each (90 sec rest) using 2.5kg weights on each side of barbell
Bent over barbell row
Hang clean
Front squat + push press
Jump squats (with barbell on back)
Good mornings

Will be taking measurements of thighs, and waist to add in future checkins :)

Swatch: Sleek i-Divine Eyeshadow Palette in Curious

I'm attempting to sort through my stash little by little to declutter and I'm swatching along the way so that I can see what shades I've got. That way I can sort out the duplicates and clean up a little.

I'm tackling my Sleek eyeshadow palettes first and this is the first one I grabbed. Curious isn't on their permanent line but you can still pick it up on EBay.

On to the swatches!

I love this palette! It's got enough variety of colours to stay in my makeup pouch everyday for simple looks for work. I think my least favourite colour of the whole bunch is the yellow. It simply applies to chalky for my liking. My favourite? That's got to be the olive green! I have a huge huge huge love for greens these days :)

Another palette swatch in the next few days!

Check-In: Setbacks and Restart

Heya peep! I've been missing for awhile and I gotta say it hasn't been a good couple of weeks on the ProjectHotMama front. I came down with a really bad case of either stomach flu or food poisoning and basically spend slightly more than a week throwing up most of what I ate and pooping water. The whole thing left me quite weak and even after the toilet adventures were over, it's taking me awhile to get going again.

It's amazing how time passes so quickly. I stopped working out for the week that I was best friends with my toilet bowl because frankly I had no energy to do anything else. Then I recovered and told myself I'd give it a few days for my system to recover and I'd jump right back into the workout.

A few days quickly turned into a two weeks of no workout. Work is slightly crazy this time of year and it was so easy to say "Oh I've had a hard day at work, I think I need a break. So I guess I'll workout tomorrow".

Couple that with the fact that I'm someone who eats when stressed. "It's ok for me to eat the potato chips, I'm gonna be working out again tomorrow."


Recipe for failure.

It was so hard for me to get started again today. First was that sense of utter hopelessness when I stepped on the scales and saw that my efforts had practically gone to naught, with my weight back at what it originally was. This feeling of "why bother if it's so easy to go back again?" started to set it.

And then I thought back a bit. Yes, my weight is back to what I started at, but my clothes still fit better. So guess what? It's not all bad! I'm that little bit more muscle and less fat!

I almost cried thinking about working out again for the first time, and it took every ounce of discipline to force myself to finish. By the time I was done though, I was starting to remember how good working out had made me feel before.

I was severely tempted to restart and start posting again as Day 1, but that would be lying to myself. It would be a lot more useful to me to list my whole journey together with my setbacks and failures.

So yes, I'm back. And I'm gonna go at it hard again.

See you soon!

Workout: Romanian Deadlifts

I picked this video to feature a pretty much toned girl who doesn't look like a scary bodybuilder to show some people who are scared to do weights of any kind, fearing that they will end up looking like they're on steroids :P

This is not easy to do! Everytime I do this, my hamstrings scream because I'm pushing to be more flexible and stronger. And be very careful not to let the lower back do the lifting, it's actually all about the hips, butt and hamstrings. The strain should be felt from your butt down to the heels, and not your back, arms or shoulders at all.

Workout: Deadlifts

I've had a couple of people asking me what I'm talking about when I describe my workouts. So here's the first video in a series of posts to show you what exercises I'm doing. This is good revision for me too as I get to recap what I should and shouldn't be doing with each exercise. First up is the deadlift!

Rave: Estee Lauder Double Wear Foundation in Tawny

If you've been following me on Twitter, you'll know that I'm on the hunt for a new foundation. I know Estee Lauder Double Wear has been around for the longest time, but I never got around to using it until now.

I happily went off to a local department store (Isetan@Katong) and enlisted the help of a very nice BA by the name of Doreen to get my shade matched and she recommended Tawny for me. She gave me a very generous sample jar of the foundation to try at home. How generous? I've used the foundation about 5 times and I'm still not even quarter way through what she gave me.

So far, I'm liking this foundation. The consistency of the foundation is a little thicker than I'm used to, but I don't find that it feels heavy on my skin at all. I apply foundation using my fingers so I'm able to get it on as thinly as I'm used to.  I like that the coverage is pretty good for one layer. If you look at the pic above, you can see that my blemishes are more or less concealed and my skintone is evened out. I don't even need to use a concealer,  I just dabbed on and blended a little more foundation wherever my pigmentation was a little more severe.

Under natural light, it doesn't look chalky or cakey at all!  I had on just a touch of blush and tinted lip balm, and I didn't look washed out at all.

Staying power is pretty good. The day I took the pictures was a nice warm day, and I was in and out of aircon environments. It held up pretty well and I had only a touch of shininess at the end of the day. I'm wearing it today as well but today's weather is really hot and even at 7.30am I was breaking a sweat just being in the heat. So now, 5 hours after application, I've just blotted and dusted on some mineral loose powder. The foundation itself hasn't budged one bit, I've still got very good and even coverage. Just that I'm shiny! But that's easily fixed and I honestly don't really expect any foundation to stay totally matte the whole day.

So that's my review on the Estee Lauder Double Wear. Would I buy this? Yes. It's not the absolute favourite of the foundations that I've used, but it's pretty high on the list.

Thanks for reading, loves, and have a great day!

Have you used Estee Lauder Double Wear foundation? What do you think about it?

Day 17: Checking In + Workout

Hey all, I realise that it's been about a week since my last post. In case you got worried that I got sidetracked and gave up again, never fear! I haven't!

I did get sidetracked a bit due to my birthday (I'm now no longer 20-something, boo hoo!!!) so I did go off track a little bit in terms of one or two missed workouts and taking pictures. I have, however, been checking what I eat, so at least in terms of the calorie count in food consumption, I don't think I did too badly. I will admit to pigging out slightly at my birthday BBQ, but not as much as I usually would have at such events!

So anyway, right after my birthday, I've been right on track with a workout everyday and back to recording every morsel that passes my lips (I've still got to share the app that I use on my phone to do this!). The past few workouts since have just been the 'Crazy Complexes'.

Checking in today, because the workout today is slightly different from what I've been doing so far.

**********

Workout:

5 sets, no rest in between of:

15 x prison squats

10 x pushups (I'm still currently doing the girly version, on my knees. Hoping to scale up to full pushups soon!)

5 x inverted rows (eventually, I'm working to get this up to full pullups)

YTWLI - 10 reps of each

3 sets of 10x barbell bent-over row (2.5kg weight on each end of the barbell)

**********

Since I started working out, I can feel that I'm getting stronger overall. I'm doing my squats more effortlessly, because my body is starting to build up the muscle plus my technique and muscle memory is getting better. Shoulder presses are also easier. I remember 2 weeks ago struggling to get past 5 reps and now I'm doing 10 reps easily. My back muscles do need more work as I'm still struggling to get through the inverted rows, so I'm going to be incorporating more back exercises into my workouts soon.

Alright all, thanks for checking in with me! Have a great day!

xoxo

Day 8 - Workout

Just a quick check-in on this Monday morning. No workout over the weekend, but I still kept track of my calories. Weekends being what they are, bringing kids out to entertain them, I end up eating a lot outside so I either tried to eat healthier options or I downsized my portion by sharing with Evie.

Today's workout was the "Crazy Complexes" again, but I doubled the weight to 10kg. Last workout was too easy, I feel that whenever I do a weights workout I need to feel the muscle strain. To me, a good workout is when at the end of it my muscles feel like jelly. If I'm going to be crude about it, the end of a good workout should feel like I just had really good sex  :P

Isn't it weird that me, who hates exercising with a passion should equate a good workout with good sex? I'm a cranky, angry monster before I have to work out, but at the end of a really good workout, I feel really good and feel a very real sense of accomplishment. It's starting to grow on me. I'm starting to see how people can get addicted to working out.

So anyway, on top of the Crazy Complexes with increased weights, I also did 15 reps each of a YTWLI. If you don't know what that is, here's the video showing the moves.

I added this because I noticed that I'm having some issues with shoulder presses and push presses, so this exercise is going to help me strengthen up my upper back and shoulders. An added benefit is that this also will help me with my posture as I tend to slouch over a lot.

Have great day and thanks for reading!

Love,
Farrah

Day 5 - Workout and Breakfast!

I did my HIIT run again today. Still the same 7 minutes but I'm seeing an increase in fitness as I covered a longer distance :) 

And here's a pic of breakfast post-run! Kiwi, HL milk, psyllium husk, DHA fish oil, Vitamin C and multivitamin. 

My shoes also decided to give out on me today during my run! 

Old me would have said "Meh it's a sign to go home!" New me ripped off the flapping rubber sole and kept on running. Oh well, these shoes are about 4 years old anyway. About time I picked up a new pair! 

Day 4 - Workout

My hubby calls this the "Crazy Complex" workout:

6 x deadlifts
6 x romanian dead lifts
6 x bent rows
6 x power clean
6 x front squat
6 x push press
6 x back squat
6 x good morning
90s rest

Repeat, reducing the number of reps by 1 each until the last set consists of 1 rep per exercise. eg 2nd round of exercise, do 5 reps each, 3rd round 4 reps each.

Today, I did this with a barbell and 2.5kg on each side. Very light, but this is to get me used to the exercise. Next round I'm going to try 10kg weight in total to push it.

Day 3 - Workout and Thoughts

Let's get the details of today's workout out of the way before I go into my rambling...

Workout - HIIT (High Intensity Interval Training) Run
30s flat out run
30s slow jog
Repeat for 7 cycles

Simple looking workout on paper (screen!) right? I can tell you I was drenched in sweat and seeing stars at the end of that 7 minutes. I'm not one for loooong workout sessions so I'm trying to get my workouts packed into short but high intensity sessions to maximise the time that I've got.

So anyway, that's the workout and now on to my yammering.

After my workout, I had a good hot shower and I started thinking about what's different about this time around and why I think it's going to help me get to my goals.

1. I'm putting it all out there. My ugly cellulite pics are up for the whole world to see. I can't hide the ugliness of my body and pretend that everything's ok. I went around severely deluded into thinking that "I'm not that fat, I'm normal!" until I saw a shot of myself from behind that someone had taken. I couldn't really believe it, and then I got hubby to take shots of me from behind and the photos just shell-shocked me. I really couldn't believe that the elephant in the photos was me. So yeah, sometimes the image of yourself in your head is a lot better looking than what people actually see and that was the case for me. Putting my pics up there means that I get to adjust my head-image with my actual-image until they are in sync and I can truly be sure that I'm as hot-looking to other people as I think I am.
2. I've got a plan in place to obsessively keep track of my food. I've downloaded a pretty user-friendly and naggy app to keep track of the food I eat and the calories. My biggest downfall is food. My friends and family know I love to eat. And when I eat, I really really eat. So, I'm not going to stay away from food in general. I'm not going to limit the type of food I eat. I'm still going to eat what I feel like eating, but to make sure that nutrition and calorie goals are met each day. Consciously knowing that I have to meet these goals should make me subconsciously plan on eating more healthily.
3. My reward system no longer involves food. Previously, I'd stayed away from all the foods that I enjoyed and rewarded myself with them whenever I hit a weight loss goal. That was insanely STUPID. Because then whenever I got access to them, I binged and nullified all the good that I'd done. So since I altered my strategy and approach to food, I have also decided not to look at food as a reward. Every weight loss goal met will be rewarded with a purchase in another obsession of mine: MAKEUP!!

Ok, I think that's enough rambling from me for today :) Thanks for reading!

Day 2 - Update

Ok, there is no Day 2 to Project Hot Mama simply because yesterday was jam-packed with activities. Dropped off Princess Evie to school in the morning, then took Monsterboy to the doctor to get him checked out. (Monsterboy had HFMD last week, and he needed to get cleared by the doctor to go back to childcare).

After Monsterboy's breakfast, we took a trip down to ICA to collect Monsterboy's passport.

We'd planned to go grab lunch at Muthu's Curry at Racecourse Road for the longest time, so we headed there before going home to give Monsterboy his lunch, and nap. After nap, we were out again to pick up Princess Evie and then off to the airport to see my mum and dad off to New Zealand.

So yeah, second day of Project Hot Mama, and already no workout. But regardless, I still watched what I ate and had to really really REALLY restrain myself from pigging out on the oh-so-good food from Muthu's. I'll share and review the app I'm using on my phone to track my food intake later.

This is boring stuff, I know. But I think it kinda helps me keep on track writing all this down so that I know what I'm doing all the time. One of the problems with me never having stuck to a workout schedule/diet for a decent length of time is that I never documented anything and that made it easy for me to hide and lie to myself that I was still on track and I was doing fine.

So, if you're still reading this, THANK YOU SO MUCH AND I LOVE YOU! ;P

Have a great day!

Day 1 - Workout

Today's workout:

8 sets each of:

20 sec of burpees followed by 10 sec rest

20 sec body weight squats followed by 10 sec rest

20 sec bicycling in the air followed by 10 sec rest

I could feel the burn! Towards the end, the 20 sec of exercise feels longer and longer while the rest period seems shorter and shorter! I didn't aim for crazy reps within the time given. Since it's thr first day, I concentrated on keeping good form and completing the sets with enough reps to make sure I couldn't talk comfortably. 


Took me all of 12 minutes!

Project Hot Mama - Reboot

Today marks Day 1 of Project Hot Mama.  AGAIN. 

I know I've done this I think a billion times and each time I start, I'm convinced that "this is the one this is the one this is the one". Well this time, I'm truly committed to doing this. Which means humiliating pictures, stats and habits are going to be plastered all over this very public space. 

It's not going to be pretty for the first few months but I assure you that my goal is to make your sightseeing here a little more pleasurable as the days go by. 

I am not a disciplined person when it comes to food and exercise, so I am appealing to the precious few who read this blog to be my support network. You have no idea how even one positive comment on any of my posts makes me so happy and motivated to do more. So please let me know that you're behind me all the way! 

Thanks for stopping by, and here's to a hotter, fitter, healthier me! 

Swatch: NYX Round Lipsticks in Peach Bellini, Chich Red, Chaos, Shiva

Chaos and Shiva are favourites in this batch. Shiva especially when I'm going barefaced and want a pop of colour on my face.

Swatch: NYX Round Lipstick in Paparazzi, Lip du Jour, Rose Bud

Pinks! Not what I usually wear unless I'm going for a pastel or sweet look.

Swatch: NYX Round Lipsticks in B52, Saturn, Topaz

At any one time, one of these colours are in my handbag and makeup bag. These are my go-tos when I can't really be bothered choosing a lipstick colour. B52 is actually the first NYX lipstick that I ever bought.

Swatch: MYX Round Lipsticks in Ulysses, Protus, Brown Sugar, Pinto Bean and Iris

First group of swatches from my NYX Round Lipstick Army! I wear Protus a lot, either on it's own or layered over too-pink lips. Iris is too pale for my dark lips as a lipstick but I do use it as a sheer layer over lipbalm.

NYX Round Lipstick Army

I'm a huge fan of NYX Round Lipsticks. They're pigmented, and moisturising for my dry lips. There seems to be mixed reviews on the moisturising factor as some of my friends say that the formula does nothing for their dry lips whereas it really does work wonders for myself and for some other beauty bloggers out there. These lippies don't last very long though, and they definately don't last through a meal. I find myself reapplying at least twice throughout the work day. I don't have an issue with that at the super pocket friendly price these lippies are sold at (about SGD6 each) and I do check my makeup several times a day, but I do see how having to reapply would be a bugbear for busy busy women.

Swatches of my army coming up in the next few days!

Neither Here nor There, I'm Everywhere!

Hello loves,

I haven't been posting for awhile because I've just been so swamped with stuff.

First, work. Thank goodness the school holidays are here! Before anyone says that I'm so lucky to be getting a whole week off because I'm a teacher, let me tell you that I'm still going to be at work from Monday to Wednesday to get meetings, admin and various other projects out of the way that we would not be able to do on normal school days when the students are around. Officially, I'm only on protected time (aka the school is not allowed to ask me to do work during this time) from Thursday to Sunday of next week.

Next, kids. My son (7 months old now) is crawling everywhere! And that means he's getting his grubby little hands on everything. He loves following his big sister around the house in what seems to be hero worship in the early stages. Irritates her sometimes to no end, but most of the time they get along pretty well! I'm still not getting more than about 2 hours sleep at any one stretch, which is leaving me with huge sandbags under my eyes but I keep telling myself that this will be over in a couple of months.

Brother's wedding! Things were quite busy.  I wasn't that involved in the actual preparation. I was rushing around to get my stuff done so that  I could pick up my son from mum to free her up for the wedding prep! On the wedding banquet day itself, I was busy helping my mum with hosting the guests.

So that's what I have been up to the last couple of weeks since I last posted. I've been so busy that I haven't even really been on Twitter either! Will be back soon, after the weekend. Seeya then!

-hugz-

Swatch: NYX Round Lipstick in Lip Du Jour

Day 4 - NYX Round Lipstick in Lip Du Jour, one of their 2011 Summer line. Its a sheer baby pink, and appears quite frosty. I won't wear this alone a lot as it's not very forgiving on my dry lips. The frostiness comes from microglitter in the lippie which settles into the cracks and creases of my dry lips.