Happy Sunday Everyone!

Not only is it a great Sunday morning, but it is also Memorial Day weekend. So, Charlotte, Colt, and I are heading over to our neighbor Joe's house in a little bit for a barebeque with some our neighbors.

Usually, holiday parties are tricky. Typically I'm on some diet, and I don't want to eat a bunch of junk food. But, now that I'm vegan, there are a whole new set of problems. When you think of cooking out on the grill, you typically think of meat... lots and lots of meat. And the sides are usually full of dairy products.

Luckily, Joe knows all about our eating habits, so he made sure to buy some veggie burgers and a few other vegan things for us! We are bringing our favorite black bean burgers for everyone and I just made some really great chocolate chip, banana cookies. So, hopefully this holiday party will be much more guilt free than normal.

In other news, I've been doing a great new exercise routine, that I just have to talk about.

I've been doing HIIT for a while now, but I've always used the little method. Well, out of curiosity, I decided to try the Tabata method, and I love it!

Basically, you do 20 seconds of really high intensity exercise, followed by ten seconds of rest. You do this four times, and the whole workout takes only 4 minutes.

Sounds crazy right?

I was skeptical too, but after adding this into my daily workout routine, I'm already five pounds down.

Now, let me start off by saying that this isn't all I do. But, I do it every morning as soon as I wake up. It raises my heart rate enough that it wakes me up, and helps my body burn more calories for hours afterwards. (Some sources say up to 36 hours.) I should also say that, by "high intensity" I mean, really high. You have to  work so hard that by the end of the 20 second interval, you feel like your heart is going to burst.

Some athletes do only this... four minutes a day and that's it. A quick Google search brings up tons of research and testimonials about Tabata. I'm so glad I found it!

Aside from that, I've been doing a lot of HIIT on the elliptical, and I have been doing a weight routine which I'm going to do for two weeks, to see what kind of changes I see.

So far, I've increased my weight to 30 pounds, and I've been improving my count every day!

I feel really good, and I'm gaining confidence every day!

Happy Memorial Day!