If you follow me on snapchat (name: lizadamsss) then you probably saw my rant on Sunday about my decision to get my butt in gear and finally get healthy after having Charlie. Not that I’m not NOT healthy, but after 7 months I’m ready to give a little love back to myself. I had so many followers show interest in me sharing my experience with you all so I wanted to break it down for you.

Let me start by saying that I am currently 1 pound below my pre-baby weight – which is great! However, my body is completely different and areas that used to feel ‘tight’ are now feeling extremely soft. I am sick of making up excuses for as to why I didn’t fit in a quick workout or opting to grab a burger and a beer with Dave rather than cooking something nutritious at home. I am ready to hold myself more accountable and I think by sharing my goals with you I’ll be more inclined to keep up with the plan (with so many of you following along, too!).

If you have followed Sequins & Stripes for awhile then you probably noticed me mention Tone It Up, a fitness and nutrition program and website that makes being healthy fun thanks to Karena and Katrina, the brains behind the brand. I learned about them when I was pregnant and would do at least one of their workouts daily. They make it easy to set aside a few minutes to yourself and you have fun doing it because K+K are cute, fun and their bodies are dreamy. Every year before summer they launch the Bikini Series, an 8 week fitness and nutritional program that they make easy to follow along because they break down EVERYTHING for you on a daily basis. This year I decide to sign up but knew that I wouldn’t be able to follow their exact program. Unfortunately my days are so unpredictable with Charlie that I have to give myself a little leeway but map my days with the intention to follow the 8 Week Nutrition Plan and Bikini Series workout schedule as best that I can.  Ok, so what is my plan?

My plan is to document this on my social channels, mainly snapchat. Every Sunday morning I am going to post a schedule like the one above to my snapchat account (name: lizadamsss) Not only does it help me to write everything out and cross it off as I go, but that way you can see what my goals are for the week ahead and plan accordingly! I don’t want to put a lot of pressure on myself to do this for a specific period of time (like the 8 week bikini series). For example, Charlie is sick with a double ear infection and I ate TWO large bags of Skinny Pop yesterday, oops. My goal is to be really regimented until Thursday, May 19th because that is when I leave for Charleston to celebrate my grandmother’s 90th birthday for a week with my family. So don’t put a lot of pressure on yourself to be all-in, all-the-time. Life happens and in my book that’s okay. I want it to be fun! If we get to May 19th and I am feeling great then I am going to take these concepts with me on our trip and go from there.

I have set aside a few rules for myself:

• 10,000 steps/day – I ordered this to track!
• 100 oz of water/day
• exercise in the morning, followed by breakfast with a protein
• NO dairy
• NO processed sugars
• NO carbs past 2pm
• NO food past 7pm
• LEAN, CLEAN, GREEN

On my snapchat I’ll be sharing daily snaps of the meals I’m cooking, my workouts and anything else that may be exciting – my outfits, Charlie being cute, duh. Tone It Up provides daily workouts here and you can find all of their Youtube videos here (so if I say ‘booty’ or ‘arm’ day you can find a workout to match). I love that their workouts are 8-20 minutes long, making it easy to fit them in! I’m going to try my best to be regimented about my meals but somedays I’m out of the house and in that case I’m going to focus on lean, clean and green choices. Also, my calendar may change but hopefully it is a platform for what I can expect for the week.

Do you have any questions? I tried to lay it out as clear as possible since my brain is kind of a mess. Feel free to email me with any specifics! Love you guys, you are such an amazing support system and I value you all more than you’ll ever know.