The Fitness Diaries: WEEK 5

This week's theme: Finding time to work out
Ok, so this week was quite difficult. I could sit here and give you a million reasons why I didn't find time to go to the gym, and give you excuse after excuse, but I'm not going to do that. I'm coming off one of the worst weeks I have ever had and it's definitely the worst of the year. However, I did find tie to get in a few workouts ( even though the blog wasn't out on time).
Last weeks targets were to build up my endurance when running, and beat my previous cardio times. As for endurance, I'm currently trying to build it up so I can just run a mile straight, without any walking in there. I'm asthmatic so it is tricky to regulate my breathing but I'm currently running for half a mile, then walking for a minute, running for 1/4 a mile, walking a minute and running the rest. That is actually an improvement on last week so I'll keep you posted! My first mile on the treadmill was 13 seconds better than in week 4 and my 5k on the bikes was 7 seconds better.
As far as incorporating strength training goes: I've been doing it via my at home workouts. I've been loving blogilates '6 minutes' videos.
These videos have really helped me this week as I was still getting a workout in even though I didn't have a lot of time; I did these workouts either first thing in the morning or last thing in the evening and I managed 4 of them! So proud of myself!
Moral of the story: when you're feeling sorry for yourself, don't let it affect your body, even though I've been stressed and I have slacked on my workouts. I haven't let it affect my eating. I still manage 2 litres of water and 5 pieces of fruit and veg a day while trying to watch my carb intake.
Next weeks goals: I'm going to a jump nation workout this week and I'm so excited to give it a try, so one goal is to do that and at least 2 more workouts which are cardio and strength combined. I'm going to start building up my strength training with a leg day this week!
Wish me luck!
CJ x

 

Week 4

Week 3

Week 2

Week 1

 

I've also got some super exciting announcements coming up soon on the blog - we're going to be seeing some huge changes leading up to the 50th blog post!



The Fitness Diaries: WEEK 4

This week's theme: At home workouts
Hello everybody! I hope my tips from last week about drinking water have worked for everybody! I used to find it so hard to stick to drinking 2 litres of water a day, especially if I wasn't doing anything, I just wouldn't remember. But now I drink at least 2 litres a day without any fizzy drinks and I'm so happy about it, I feel so much better, more energised, my metabolism is better. I have one coffee per week on a Saturday morning, and for the rest of the week it's off limits. It's slowly killing me, but I know it's better for me in the long run.
So, for the workouts, I've made it to the gym twice; once for a class and once for a workout. This is mainly due to the fact I had to write my LAST two essays of the year (yep - I'm essay free, yay!). However, I've found that working out at home can be just as effective as going to the gym, just a little less time consuming. At the gym, I usually spend about an hour an a half doing strictly cardio for the first month. Therefore, if I couldn't make it, I'd still keep to a cardio workout using youtube videos, and I'd make it equal the same amount of time. I've found channels like POPSUGAR Fitness and Blogilates have the largest variety of videos to follow.
My  choice to build up my healthy lifestyle has really paid off. I used to go to the gym 4 or 5 times a week and I knew if I picked up immediately where I left off, I would have given up by now. Set yourself weekly targets and you'll be amazed by what you can achieve. Coming into my fourth week, I'm astonished that all of my cravings for Dr Pepper and coffee have gone, I don't feel the need to eat large amount of carbohydrates anymore.
I've found that having 3 small meals and 3 snacks is the best way to combat hunger and cravings. Every morning I have either yogurt and granola, oatmeal or a piece of wholemeal toast and peanut butter. Whichever one I choose I have with a portion of fruit too. Mid-morning I like to have either more fruit or a nakd bar. For lunch I'm sticking to either an omelette, soup, a wholemeal sandwich or pitta or a salad. My afternoon snack normally consists of carrot and cucumber sticks with hummus. And for dinner I'm having mostly protein (chicken, turkey or fish only) and vegetables, with a small amount of carbs.
As I've only just finished week 3, and I'm starting week 4, I haven't noticed any visible external results yet. But I do feel stronger, I have more endurance when I run (something I've previously found really difficult due to breathing problems). I'm nowhere near where I want to be, but I know I'm off to a good start. I'm also sleeping better and spending less time staring at screens all day. Something for the mind as well as the body!
This week's goals are simple: build up my endurance when running, beat my first mile in the 5k on the treadmill and beat the overall time for 5k on the bikes. After this week, I'm hoping to incorporate strength training into my workouts! Fingers crossed it pays off!
My favourite video workouts of the week:

 

 

I hope you enjoyed this week's fitness diaries! If you'd like to see pictures of any of my meals or a run down of any of my workouts, let me know in the comments and I'll be happy to put them up weekly! This will be much better when I start doing strength training exercises!

When I start seeing visible progress, I might even keep you updated with pictures. But for now, here's my week 4 motivation picture



 

If you've missed any of the previous weeks, don't worry! Here are the links:

Week 1 

Week 2 

Week 3

 

Have a nice week!

CJ x



Spring Fashion Wishlist

Hello everybody,
With Spring fast approaching, I couldn't think of a more appropriate blogpost than what's on my Spring fashion wishlist!
Not all products on here are what you can wear exclusively in Spring, some of them are summer pieces and others are transitional. I might add though, there's no real theme here, there's a huge variety in items, colours, textures, you name it.

Zara Ladylike Backpack £39.99

River Island Jacquard Flippy Skirt (Found on asos) £28

Asos Eagle Stone Rings £15

Topshop Longline Kimono £38

Vans Grey Slip on Trainers (found on asos) £55

Topshop Pale Pink Court Shoes £55

Urban Outfitters Dress £42

Urban Outfitters Gold Layering Necklace £18

AX Paris Crochet Crop Top £22

AX Paris Check Monochrome Playsuit £25

New Look Grey Tote Bag £29.99

Office Cut Out Shoes £60

I know it's a lot and a huge variety but it's a new season so it's alright ok?! No, but seriously, I know I can't justify everything, yet that doesn't mean I won't give it a go!
Let me know if you want to see more fashion related posts on the blog, I already have this wishlist down on my phone and it constantly has at least 20 things on it, I just want all the things. Sigh. It's nearly Spring though! Happy Sunday
CJ x 
 

The Fitness Diaries: WEEK 3

This week's theme: 5 a day
Hello there! I am pleased to announce that last week's targets were achieved! I consumed at least 2 litres of water a day (even more if you count my twice daily green tea and once daily mango juice). Now, I've not been one for drinking loads of water, I don't know why, but I just can't do it. I've tried carrying a bottle round all day with me, but that only seems to get me through one, maybe two 500ml bottles a day. Want to know my secret? Increase the bottle size. Yep, it's that simple. I bought a 75cl bottle. I fill it up with filtered water before bed, and I'll have that one gone before I go to uni. I'll consume another 75cl during my day at uni, and another in the evening. If you struggle with drinking enough water, you definitely need to try this!
Furthermore, I went to the gym ... wait for it ... 3 times this week! And I knocked 30 seconds off the time it took me to run the first mile in my 5k last week and 45 seconds off overall! I also took 25 seconds off my 5k on the bikes too!
I have also been trying to get at least 5 pieces of fruit and veg in a day. I've done this by having peanut butter and banana on wholemeal toast for breakfast, taking an apple and grapes to university with me, and having at least 2 vegetables with my tea, I'm trying to mix it up a bit more though! Healthy eating this week has been OK, but I need to do a food shop so there was an incident with a fish finger sandwich (I know it sounds horrible and I wouldn't normally eat it if we actually had food in).
However, there have been incidents with starbucks this week (sorry, not sorry), but they do have to stop. I need to give up coffee for good because I've realised it's just not worth it. But I haven't had a single glass of Dr Pepper in 3 weeks now! So happy that I've managed to stay away from fizzy drinks all together because those were my downfalls. OK, OK, so there was a slight situation on Saturday with a cherry Dr Pepper, but it's because I was in Manchester! That's one fizzy drink in 3 weeks, don't judge me!
As for next week's targets, I'm going to continue walking between campuses and I'm going to go to the gym 3 times next week hopefully. I have a kettlebells class on Monday so I'll report back on how that goes! Hopefully I'll be doing at least 1 class a week from now on too. Also, I'm going to try and cut carbs .. this will be a massive challenge for me as I am a carb fiend. But hopefully with my app called My Fitness Pal, I'll be able to keep track of the amount of carbs and sugars I'm eating.
Wish me luck!
CJ x



Missed Week 1 and 2 no problem? Links here. Week 1 and Week 2.

#DearMe - A letter to my teenage self

Happy International Women's Day everybody! This is something really close to my heart as I am a firm believer in equality. International Women's Day has been around since the early 20th Century and it has been radically gaining popularity ever since. Now the day is an official holiday in over 25 countries! That's crazy! All to celebrate the change in the way in which the world perceives women.
I have decided to jump on the bandwagon and do the Dear Me hashtag by writing a letter to my teenage self and hopefully this will help some of the younger readers learn from my own mistakes!

Dear Me,
Don't change yourself just to fit in.
You don't have to hide the fact that you're capable of getting good grades in school for the fear of people making fun of you and calling you a geek. If these people really were your friends, then they should be supportive of you rather than tearing you down. I had a terrible time with this in school. I remember being placed in all the top sets but none of my old friends were and they would make fun of me constantly for it, so I just felt so down all the time. Actually, I remember trying to change this and trying to make friends with some people in my classes, but they wouldn't be friends with me because I was friends with the other people and I was too scared to speak out for myself. If I'd have known then what I know now, I would have never intentionally tried to get bad grades in school so I could move down sets (don't do it - it doesn't work, and you end up regretting it). I would have never skipped classes and hung around with the 'cool kids' if I knew they didn't care about me.

Dear Me,
Do not always put the needs of others before your own.
Yes, it is important to help people and charity work, tutoring, having your part time job - that's all great. But don't get to the point where you're sacrificing your own well-being to please others. Mainly because these other people that you are trying so hard to please, they won't care anyway. I massively messed up my a-levels when I was 18 because I was working full-time at a bar. You know why?! My assistant manager stole all the money we'd saved up for our staff weekend away, the money out of the till and most of the stock. To make matters worse, my manager had a newborn baby and didn't get his paternity leave. So I did what I thought everyone else would do in my situation and sacrificed EVERYTHING. I thought I could handle it, but I couldn't. I thought everything was going to turn out ok, and it did, but it's taken years to fix.

Dear Me,
Don't be ashamed of what you look like.
Right now, you are 5'0 while everyone around you is growing, you have wavy/frizzy strawberry blonde hair which all of your "friends" swear is ginger, you wear round glasses with thick lenses, you have braces, you're chubby, you haven't developed yet but somehow you're still getting spots. Do not worry about it. You aren't going to look like this forever. Put the bottle of bleach down, put the awful £3 fake tan down. The people that peak in high school don't usually stay that way. Some people transform, loads of girls at my school did and they're better people for the fact that they didn't think they were the 'fit' ones in high school. Nothing is worse than arrogance. You don't have to diet or dye your hair. You are perfect just the way you are.

Dear Me,
It's OK to be different!
Just a reiteration of my previous points. So what if all of your friends are starting to smoke and you have asthma? At least you don't have a gritty voice and yellow teeth now. So what if you want to play the classical guitar? So what if you never grow? Nobody else sees you as any less of a person for these things, so why should you? If I could tell myself where I was going to be if I'd have tried harder in school, if I hadn't dropped out of the drama school or cheerleading. Who knows where I could be right now?

This was a slightly emotional post to write as there are so many things I wish I was able to tell my younger self. But she probably wouldn't listen anyway. So I'm telling my nieces, my next door neighbour's daughter, I'm telling you. My hope is that we can create a world where nobody is ashamed of being who they are. You define yourself, nobody else does. Do not go around pretending you're something that you aren't. You are unique and different and that's great! This is for the next generation; you are perfect,

Love, CJ x

For inspiration, this is a picture of my 15 year old self. This is when I was starting to change, but still feeling self conscious about everything. I loved hats so I bought this one, but as you can see I'm still rocking the Henley's jumper that I never really liked. I was always afraid of people finding out my real taste in music so I used to fake it and pretend I liked things when I really didn't. Thus the peace sign. Sigh. At least I tried.






For more on #DearMe, created by youtube, check out this video complied of some of the most inspiring youtubers from around the world.

Thank you so much for taking the time to read this! What would you all say to your younger selves if you had the chance? Do you think life would have turned out differently? Let me know in the comments or tweet me @milliegordonx
P.S. I really would have loved to have made a youtube video on this topic but I just didn't have the time or the equipment to get it ready in time for International Women's Day. Maybe next year!
CJ x

International Women's Day website.

The Fitness Diaries: WEEK 2

This week's theme: Healthy Swaps.
YESSSSSSSS. Week 1 is officially over. And I stuck to it! OK, so I didn't go to the gym that much, but I DID find my pedometer and walked between 9 and 12000 steps a day, which is right where I want to be.

My target was to go to the gym twice last week and then just do a healthy amount of walking a day. So I commuted into Liverpool by train and walked, I got the farthest parking spots at university, and even walked between campuses instead of driving (impressed? You should be.) If I wasn't happy with the amount of steps I'd done that day, I'd either go for a quick walk in the evening, or walk up and down the stairs if it was raining and I was close to my target, that isn't cheating by the way.

As for the gym, I haven't been overdoing it, in fact personally I think I've been underdoing it. Before I decided to start the Fitness Diaries, I went back to the gym for the first time in about a month and a half. I wanted to start slow and not burn out, but once I got on the treadmill, I felt like I wasn't pushing myself enough so I cranked up the gradient and the speed aaaaaand I threw up. Yep, like actually threw up in the gym, classy right? What did I do next? Went right back to working out! Pushing myself like that really wasn't my finest moment. So this week I just took it slow. Jogged for 15 mins and walked for 5 mins on the treadmill. Then did 5k on the bikes and had a quick 5-10 mins on the rowing machine and the stairmaster. Second workout I took it a little further, jogged for 15 minutes, walked for 5 and jogged for 10. Then did 5k on the bikes, 10 minutes on the rowing machine and 10 minutes on the stairmaster.

Now let's talk food and drink. I STARTED my healthy swaps, meaning I haven't cut everything that's bad for me out. My super sweet coffee has gone (let's just take a moment) and has been replaced by green tea with 1/2 tsp of honey. My beloved dr pepper has gone and been replaced with water, although I do treat myself by having 1 glass of mango juice after dinner. Furthermore, I try to drink 2 litres of water a day, but it's hard to keep tabs on that. As for food, I don't think I was necessarily eating unhealthy things, I just wasn't eating enough. Now I actually get up really early and eat breakfast every day (usually wholemeal toast with banana or yogurt and granola) and I have 5 pieces of fruit or veg along with that too.

This week my goal is to increase the amount of water I'm drinking to at least 2 litres a day, and beat my times for 5k on the treadmill and bikes. I'm going to try to go to the gym 3 times this week, but I won't be upset if I only go twice as I have a massive essay due in on Thursday. To motivate myself, I pack my gym bag every morning so and keep a pair of trainers by the door so I can just get up and go whenever I feel like it.
Talk to you in next week's post!
CJ x

If you missed Week 1's post, find it here.

New In Beauty February 2015

Hello!
I've been on a little bit of a beauty product splurge recently, there's just so many undiscovered products out there that I just couldn't resist! Furthermore, once I find a brand I like, I really love it and have to have multiple products/colours so there are a few of these on here.

Lush
Firstly, Lush brought out their Valentine's day collection and it was so cute! I didn't get everything, but I picked up these 3 things as they were calling to me. Lonely hearts bubble bar, lonely hearts bubbleroon and unicorn horn bubble bar. Just look at how sparkly they are.

L'Oreal
I've been mooching at the L'Oreal counter for a while now, and every time I find myself drawn to their Color Riche Exclusive Reds Collection. So I took the plunge and went for Blake's red, it's such a lovely red with slight blue undertones, perfect for fair to medium skin with yellow, pink or peach undertones. And it's a really good dupe for MAC red too! It definitely has the staying power.
Buy this lipstick here.

NARS
Just one new purchase from NARS this month, and that is the Velvet Matte Lip Pencil in Sex Machine and oh my god I am obsessed. The colour is what's described on the website as an 'Innocent Pink Mauve'. These lipstick pencils are incredible. The pigmentation is great, they are super easy to apply (and make it ridiculously easy to get those desired Kylie Jenner lips) and there is a huge range of colours! I went for the perfect dusty pink in my opinion, just right for Spring! I can't wait to try more of these.
Check this lipstick out here.

Essie
To those of you who have been reading for a while, it's no surprise to you that I have bought yet more colours. I really fancied some brighter, spring/summer colours. I went for lilacism, which is the perfect pale lilac. Lovie Dovie, which honestly, was on my nails throughout the whole of February. It's the most gorgeous bright but muted pink, it just brightens my day. I also went for a lovely coral colour called Tart Deco.
Essie's Full Colour Range (from shops) here.

Kardashian Beauty
I popped in to Liverpool recently and as I was battling my way against the wind, a light at the end of the tunnel appeared. And that light was a Kardashian Beauty pop-up store. Not only that, but as it was closing and moving a few days later, everything was 50% off! Unfortunately, they didn't have the bronzer I was after, so I played it safe and bought 3 lip products. I got their joystick lip lacquer (kind of a mix between a lipstick and a lipgloss) in a name that is so tiny I can't read .... Love something (sorry!). I also bought two lipglosses; the lip plumping shimmer gloss in Revved Up Rose Gold is such a gorgeous colour, and because of the shimmer it definitely makes lips appear fuller, but it's honey flavoured. I do like honey, but the smell and the taste is just a bit too strong for every day wear, it makes me reluctant to reapply it. I also bought their Honey Stick (this one, ironically, is not honey flavoured) in Natural Honey, which is the exact colour that Kim K herself wore to her wedding in Italy, this is a beautiful, slightly dark nude lipgloss. Also, I need to add that the white and rose gold packaging of the Kardashian Beauty collection is to die for!
Joystick Lip Pen.
Lip Plumping Gloss.
Honey Stick Lip Gloss.

Burberry
Aaaaaahhh Burberry, why must you be so beautiful?! On the same trip to Liverpool, I came across the only Burberry beauty concession stand outside of London (or maybe it was the only one in Debenhams outside of London?) Regardless, it was the only one that I had ever seen so I knew I had to visit. I'd heard a lot about Burberry's new wet and dry eyeshadows and how gorgeous and pigmented they were so if I was only going to buy one product, it was this one! These weren't even out on display yet because they were that new and not even advertised in the slightest, if a customer wanted one, they had to request one! I settled for the colour Rosewood, which, as the name suggests, is a slightly Rose taupe colour and once again, I'm in love with an item of makeup.
Rosewood eyeshadow.

There isn't a product here that I regret buying, and I am over the moon with my luck on the purchases, please let me know of any recommendations of products that I haven't mentioned here as I am always looking to try more. And guys, you need to try that burberry eyeshadow! How many people can say their eyeshadow comes with a duster bag? Exactly, point proven
CJ x