Ambassadorship & Project Life

First things first…back in October, I applied to be an ambassador for the Altra shoe company.  As you may or may not know, I currently run solely (HA!) in Altra shoes.  I love them.  My feet love them.  My running pace loves them.  Oh and my sports therapist loves them for me based on my body mechanics.  Well, they finally got around to notifying everyone that applied (I’m sure it was in the thousands) and, well, I did not make the cut.  So, next year, I’ll up my game and try harder to make my application more appealing to them so that hopefully I get picked out of all the thousands of people that apply for this privilege.  While I’m disappointed that I didn’t make the cut, I suppose it’s for the best.  I just finished up a year as an ambassador for the wonderful and amazing INKnBURN clothing company and, honestly, that gig was a little stressful.  I felt like it was not only expected of me to purchase ALL the new products, but that it was almost required.  It felt like an obligation to buy things that had designs I wasn’t super into just because I was expected to promote them.  heck, I have my cowgirl shirt from the Halloween pre-order that I still haven’t worn yet.  I do love the shirt, I just haven’t had an occasion come up where it would fit in.  But, I do love the company and will always be a customer of theirs.  Just like I’m not going to rage quit running in Altra shoes just because they didn’t pick me.  No, I love the company and their product and it works really well for me.  So there.

So I mentioned the other day that I am going to start doing a Project Life type of scrapbook after the first of the year.  Well, on payday, I ordered a BUNCH of the wallet sized Project Life cards off Etsy.  I am super stoked about them too.  The album I ordered arrived on Thursday while I was at work, so I picked it up in the office the following day.  I really like it a lot.  The cover is covered with sketched cameras of all different types and styles.  I think it’s perfect since this album will be all about capturing life’s moments and lots of pictures (ahem…lots of selfies…cough). 

Another thing I wanted to start after the first of the year was being as frugal as possible.  That means setting some pretty hefty limits on my spending.  I am allowing myself 2 non-homemade meals a month and 2 clothing purchases a month.  And that’s it.  Anything else random that I might want to purchase will not be an impulse purchase and it will require me going home to think about it for at least an hour before decided if I absolutely have to have it or not.  My hope is that the fact that I would have left the store and drove all the way home and then if I decide I just have to have it, knowing I have to drive all the way back to the store will dissuade me from actually going back and buying it.  Another portion of this plan involves saving money.  I mean, yes, I plan to put aside half of what I have left over after bills as savings (the other half will be for the purchases I’m allowing and limiting myself to, and for gas and food for meal prepping), but what I mean specifically is that if I want to eat out…if I really want fast food, then I’ll take $10 and put it in savings…if I want to go to a regular restaurant, I’ll take $20 and put it in savings.  And this is IN ADDITION to the half of what’s left over after paying bills.  Then, once I have a good chunk saved up, I can start knocking off my credit cards one by one and jacking up my credit score to a more attractive level so that I have a chance of getting approved for a home loan later in the year.

Something I’m thinking of doing again…the Shred Diet.  At least in part.  It worked for me when I did it a few years ago.  I mainly like it because I have the option of little 100 and 150 calorie snacks that are easily packed and super yummy.  Plus it was super easy to calorie control myself on it.  So, I’ll flip thru the book and refamiliarize myself with the plan and see if I really do want to do it again or not. 

This week is going quite well with the dropping of what I’m quite sure is just water weight.  It must be since it’s just coming off in large amounts…like 3-4 pounds a day.  So, I think I’ll definitely be back in the 150’s by the start of the new year and that makes me VERY happy!  I’m already really liking how much trimmer and more svelte my body is looking after dropping over 6 pounds since Monday. 

My meal plan for the upcoming week will be…breakfast: 6 boiled eggs, lunch: meatloaf (turkey and pork with almond flour, egg and seasonings), snack: sweet potato dish (undecided which at this point…kinda want to make the sweet potato chip recipe in the new sweet potato recipe book I bought last week), dinner: Greek yogurt, overtime snacks: Skinny Pop popcorn (the cracked pepper one is my favorite!) & sliced apples.