Tied Pretty With a Bow

IM ENGAGED

I cannot believe that I just typed that. I am going to be his wife soon…

itstheskinny:

THE NFL CHEERLEADER WORKOUT : shape.com
Warm-Up
The Minnesota Vikings cheerleaders take their warm-up seriously, starting with a slow-motion run a la Baywatch. Kidding! Although they do look like swimsuit babes, these fit chicks actually get their hearts pumping with jogging a few laps around the field and/or some light dancing.

The World’s Greatest Stretch

How to do it: Lunge forward with your right leg, stepping out as far as you can comfortably. Leaning over your front leg, rotate your torsoto the right, placing your right elbow on the inside of your right knee. Hold for 1-2 deep breaths before returning to standing. Repeat on the left side. You should feel this lunge mainly in your hip flexors. Perform 10 reps on each side.
Cheer style: Cheerleaders are masters of strategic stretching: too much and you can hurt yourself, too little and you’re the lone girl two feet off the ground when everyone drops into their splits. Since stretching before your workout is a no-no, the Vikings girls are all about dynamic warm-ups for getting their body ready for whatever their trainers have coming.

Walking Toe Touch

Unless you have an entire football field, like NFL cheerleaders do, you’ll probably need to turn around. How to do it: Extend your left leg forward. Bend over from your hips and grab your left calf, ankle, or foot, depending on your flexibility. Return to standing and repeat the motion, stepping forward on your right leg. Do 10 on each side.
Cheer style: Why all the walking with the stretching? The motion is what makes it dynamic! Ryan Svenby, corrective exercise specialist for the Vikings cheerleaders, explains that “all the movements in our dynamic warm-up are specific for the best stretch activation to open up the hips and get the muscles moving and functioning properly.”

Inchworms

From standing, bend at your hips and place your hands on the ground in front of your feet. Walk your hands out until you are in a full plank position. Perform a pushup. Walk your feet in as close to your hands aspossible, pushing your hips up to the ceiling. Start the next inchworm from this position. Do 10, steadily moving forward.
Cheer style: Inchworms work your entire body, making them one of the best dynamic warm-ups you can do.

Cat Pushup

Pushupstake on a whole new meaning when you add a cat stretch at the top for your shoulders and upper back.
How to do it: Begin in a plank position and perform one normal pushup. At the top of the pushup round your back like a mad cat. Return to plank. That’s one rep. Do 10 reps total.
Cheer style: The ladies I trained with were definitely tough—they do this conditioning routine 2-3 times a week—but while some of them did the pushups from their toes, others went to their knees or did some of each. It’s better to have good form than to stay on your toes the whole time.

Hand-Touch Plank

Start in full plank positionwith your arms straight. Lift your right hand and touch the top of your left hand. Return your right hand to its original position. Then pick up your left hand and touch your right. Go back and forth like this as quickly as you can for 1 minute.
Cheer style: While this is a great move for your core and shoulders, the real purpose, says the girls’ head trainer Steve Rosga, is to teach you how to move while keeping your core and pelvis stable. Your hips and shoulders should stay square to the ground the entire time—no wiggling!

Falling Pushup

Attention chest, shoulders, core, and back: get ready to work! Still in your kneeling position, let yourself fall forward onto your hands. Slowly lower your body into a pushup and then return to kneeling up. Perform 5 reps total.
Cheer style: Since this move is about the fall, it doesn’t matter how you return to kneeling. Ideally you would push yourself back up the whole way, keeping your body straight, but if that’s too tough just bend at the waist and walk your hands in. Also, no matter how tough you are, stay on your knees for this move to keep from taking too much impact in your wrists.

Plyometric Pushup

The reverse of the previous move, this plyo pushup works the same musclesbut in a totally different way.
How to do it: From your kneeling position, lower down into a low pushup. Contract your chest and explosively push off your hands as hard as you can. The goal is to push yourself all the way back up to kneeling without having to stick your rear out.
Cheer style: To make this move a little easier, lift your feet. To make it a little harder, keep your toes on the ground. If you are having a hard time getting the motion down, brace your feet against a wall. Next step up is a clapping pushup!

V Pushup

Why stop doing pushups just because your shoulders are getting fatigued? Move the work to the backs of your arms with this V pushup.
How to do it: Begin in standard pushup position, but move your feet forward and raise your hips so your body almost forms an upside-down “V.” Keeping the slight bend in your body and your elbows tight against your ribs, lower down into a low plank. Push back up to the starting position.
Cheer style: Don’t do a “wave” motion to help rock your body back up (like I got busted doing!). Your whole body should remain in a line as you push back up, i.e. your head should not pop up first.

Spiderman Plank

Of every move we did during this workout, this one probably hurt me the worst (Although it did make me feel like Tom Cruise in Mission Impossible!).
How to do it: Start in full plank position and move both your arms and legs out to the sides, like a spider. Bend your elbows and lower your body down until you are hovering a few inches above the floor. Hold until you want to die, which was only about 30 seconds for me, but you’re supposed to go for a full minute.
Cheer style: Static holds look deceptively easy. This one will have your whole body shaking by the end. Make sure you aren’t letting your back arch or hips drop yet you also don’t want to stick your bum up in the air.

Squat

Toes forward, knees stable, chest up, rear out like you’re sitting in a chair: you know the drill when it comes to squats. They may be staid, but they’re very effective for building lower-body strength. Lower down just past parallel and then return to standing, pressing hips forward. Do 30 reps total.
Cheer style: When I became concerned that my knees were going too far beyond my toes—like we’ve always been told not to, right?—the trainers assured me that this is actually “how people are supposed to squat.” So save the worry for keeping your knees from bowing in or out, because that truly is bad.

Squat Jump Hold

Plyometrics and static holds: It’s the worst, er, best of both worlds! Lower down into your best squat position, hands lightly clasped in front of your chest. Hold your squat for 10-30 seconds (the trainers surprised us by varying the intervals), and then explode out of your squat, jumping as high as you can.
Cheer style: See how high the girl is on my right? I bet it’s the tights.

Knee Raise to warrior Lunge

Lower-body strength, flexibility, and balance all in one graceful two-step move!
How to do it: Sand tall with your feet hip-width apart, arms by your sides. Raise your right knee so you are balancing on one leg. Hold for one breath.
Without stepping your foot down, bring your right leg back into a deep lunge. Lean over your back leg until you feel a stretch in your hip flexor and raise your right arm up over your head. Return to the raised-knee position, again without putting your foot down. Do 20 reps on each side.
Cheer style: According to the trainers, an oft-missed cause of tight hamstrings are tight hips—tight hip flexors pull on your pelvis, tipping it forward and stretching your hamstrings taut. By loosening your hips, you also take the pressure off your hams, so really get deep into this stretch. Hold it for several breaths if needed.

Glute Bridge

No matter how awkward this glute bridge looks (and feels), it is unparalleled for isolating your glutes.
How to do it: Lie on your back with your feet wider than hip-width apart. Press through your feet to raise your pelvis towards the ceiling (don’t arch your back, we’re trying to keep the work in your butt). Gently push your knees outward as you tighten your rear. Hold for one minute.
Cheer style: To add some leg action, try pulsing your thighs in and and out as you hold the bridge. And be sure to keep your weight resting on your shoulders, not your neck!

Dance Cardio

Lead group fitness instructor Katie Pribyl takes the girls through 10 minutes of dance cardio. We started out slow with some moves straight out of Jane Fonda’s leotard days, but just as I was feeling superior about my hamstring-curling abilities, she whipped out some Zumba-esque shimmying and shaking. I tried to keep up but while the girls looked electric, I just looked like I was being electrocuted.
Cheer style: Dance party! Polka, cha-cha, hip-hop: bust out whatever you’ve got to a favorite tune or two. This is one of those moves that is as good for the soul as it is for the body.

Cool Down

The girls finished up with 10 minutes of stretching, doing the following: Crescent lunge stretch, hamstring stretch, runner’s stretch, hanging stretch, down dog with pedaling heels, triceps stretch, and a quad stretch.
Do a little cheer for yourself! You just made it through a professional cheerleader’s conditioning workout! (And next time you watch a football game, you’ll remember all the hard work that goes into those gorgeous bodies!)
I found this on shape.com! <3 itstheskinny.tumblr.com
THE NFL CHEERLEADER WORKOUTSHAPE.com

THE NFL CHEERLEADER WORKOUT : shape.com

Warm-Up

The Minnesota Vikings cheerleaders take their warm-up seriously, starting with a slow-motion run a la Baywatch. Kidding! Although they do look like swimsuit babes, these fit chicks actually get their hearts pumping with jogging a few laps around the field and/or some light dancing.

The World’s Greatest Stretch

How to do it: Lunge forward with your right leg, stepping out as far as you can comfortably. Leaning over your front leg, rotate your torsoto the right, placing your right elbow on the inside of your right knee. Hold for 1-2 deep breaths before returning to standing. Repeat on the left side. You should feel this lunge mainly in your hip flexors. Perform 10 reps on each side.
Cheer style: Cheerleaders are masters of strategic stretching: too much and you can hurt yourself, too little and you’re the lone girl two feet off the ground when everyone drops into their splits. Since stretching before your workout is a no-no, the Vikings girls are all about dynamic warm-ups for getting their body ready for whatever their trainers have coming.

Walking Toe Touch

Unless you have an entire football field, like NFL cheerleaders do, you’ll probably need to turn around. How to do it: Extend your left leg forward. Bend over from your hips and grab your left calf, ankle, or foot, depending on your flexibility. Return to standing and repeat the motion, stepping forward on your right leg. Do 10 on each side.
Cheer style: Why all the walking with the stretching? The motion is what makes it dynamic! Ryan Svenby, corrective exercise specialist for the Vikings cheerleaders, explains that “all the movements in our dynamic warm-up are specific for the best stretch activation to open up the hips and get the muscles moving and functioning properly.”

Inchworms

From standing, bend at your hips and place your hands on the ground in front of your feet. Walk your hands out until you are in a full plank position. Perform a pushup. Walk your feet in as close to your hands aspossible, pushing your hips up to the ceiling. Start the next inchworm from this position. Do 10, steadily moving forward.
Cheer style: Inchworms work your entire body, making them one of the best dynamic warm-ups you can do.

Cat Pushup

Pushupstake on a whole new meaning when you add a cat stretch at the top for your shoulders and upper back.
How to do it: Begin in a plank position and perform one normal pushup. At the top of the pushup round your back like a mad cat. Return to plank. That’s one rep. Do 10 reps total.

Cheer style: The ladies I trained with were definitely tough—they do this conditioning routine 2-3 times a week—but while some of them did the pushups from their toes, others went to their knees or did some of each. It’s better to have good form than to stay on your toes the whole time.

Hand-Touch Plank

Start in full plank positionwith your arms straight. Lift your right hand and touch the top of your left hand. Return your right hand to its original position. Then pick up your left hand and touch your right. Go back and forth like this as quickly as you can for 1 minute.
Cheer style: While this is a great move for your core and shoulders, the real purpose, says the girls’ head trainer Steve Rosga, is to teach you how to move while keeping your core and pelvis stable. Your hips and shoulders should stay square to the ground the entire time—no wiggling!

Falling Pushup

Attention chest, shoulders, core, and back: get ready to work! Still in your kneeling position, let yourself fall forward onto your hands. Slowly lower your body into a pushup and then return to kneeling up. Perform 5 reps total.
Cheer style: Since this move is about the fall, it doesn’t matter how you return to kneeling. Ideally you would push yourself back up the whole way, keeping your body straight, but if that’s too tough just bend at the waist and walk your hands in. Also, no matter how tough you are, stay on your knees for this move to keep from taking too much impact in your wrists.

Plyometric Pushup

The reverse of the previous move, this plyo pushup works the same musclesbut in a totally different way.
How to do it: From your kneeling position, lower down into a low pushup. Contract your chest and explosively push off your hands as hard as you can. The goal is to push yourself all the way back up to kneeling without having to stick your rear out.

Cheer style: To make this move a little easier, lift your feet. To make it a little harder, keep your toes on the ground. If you are having a hard time getting the motion down, brace your feet against a wall. Next step up is a clapping pushup!

V Pushup

Why stop doing pushups just because your shoulders are getting fatigued? Move the work to the backs of your arms with this V pushup.
How to do it: Begin in standard pushup position, but move your feet forward and raise your hips so your body almost forms an upside-down “V.” Keeping the slight bend in your body and your elbows tight against your ribs, lower down into a low plank. Push back up to the starting position.

Cheer style: Don’t do a “wave” motion to help rock your body back up (like I got busted doing!). Your whole body should remain in a line as you push back up, i.e. your head should not pop up first.

Spiderman Plank

Of every move we did during this workout, this one probably hurt me the worst (Although it did make me feel like Tom Cruise in Mission Impossible!).
How to do it: Start in full plank position and move both your arms and legs out to the sides, like a spider. Bend your elbows and lower your body down until you are hovering a few inches above the floor. Hold until you want to die, which was only about 30 seconds for me, but you’re supposed to go for a full minute.

Cheer style: Static holds look deceptively easy. This one will have your whole body shaking by the end. Make sure you aren’t letting your back arch or hips drop yet you also don’t want to stick your bum up in the air.

Squat

Toes forward, knees stable, chest up, rear out like you’re sitting in a chair: you know the drill when it comes to squats. They may be staid, but they’re very effective for building lower-body strength. Lower down just past parallel and then return to standing, pressing hips forward. Do 30 reps total.
Cheer style: When I became concerned that my knees were going too far beyond my toes—like we’ve always been told not to, right?—the trainers assured me that this is actually “how people are supposed to squat.” So save the worry for keeping your knees from bowing in or out, because that truly is bad.

Squat Jump Hold

Plyometrics and static holds: It’s the worst, er, best of both worlds! Lower down into your best squat position, hands lightly clasped in front of your chest. Hold your squat for 10-30 seconds (the trainers surprised us by varying the intervals), and then explode out of your squat, jumping as high as you can.
Cheer style: See how high the girl is on my right? I bet it’s the tights.

Knee Raise to warrior Lunge

Lower-body strength, flexibility, and balance all in one graceful two-step move!
How to do it: Sand tall with your feet hip-width apart, arms by your sides. Raise your right knee so you are balancing on one leg. Hold for one breath.

Without stepping your foot down, bring your right leg back into a deep lunge. Lean over your back leg until you feel a stretch in your hip flexor and raise your right arm up over your head. Return to the raised-knee position, again without putting your foot down. Do 20 reps on each side.

Cheer style: According to the trainers, an oft-missed cause of tight hamstrings are tight hips—tight hip flexors pull on your pelvis, tipping it forward and stretching your hamstrings taut. By loosening your hips, you also take the pressure off your hams, so really get deep into this stretch. Hold it for several breaths if needed.

Glute Bridge

No matter how awkward this glute bridge looks (and feels), it is unparalleled for isolating your glutes.
How to do it: Lie on your back with your feet wider than hip-width apart. Press through your feet to raise your pelvis towards the ceiling (don’t arch your back, we’re trying to keep the work in your butt). Gently push your knees outward as you tighten your rear. Hold for one minute.

Cheer style: To add some leg action, try pulsing your thighs in and and out as you hold the bridge. And be sure to keep your weight resting on your shoulders, not your neck!

Dance Cardio

Lead group fitness instructor Katie Pribyl takes the girls through 10 minutes of dance cardio. We started out slow with some moves straight out of Jane Fonda’s leotard days, but just as I was feeling superior about my hamstring-curling abilities, she whipped out some Zumba-esque shimmying and shaking. I tried to keep up but while the girls looked electric, I just looked like I was being electrocuted.
Cheer style: Dance party! Polka, cha-cha, hip-hop: bust out whatever you’ve got to a favorite tune or two. This is one of those moves that is as good for the soul as it is for the body.

Cool Down

The girls finished up with 10 minutes of stretching, doing the following: Crescent lunge stretch, hamstring stretch, runner’s stretch, hanging stretch, down dog with pedaling heels, triceps stretch, and a quad stretch.
Do a little cheer for yourself! You just made it through a professional cheerleader’s conditioning workout! (And next time you watch a football game, you’ll remember all the hard work that goes into those gorgeous bodies!)

I found this on shape.com! <3 itstheskinny.tumblr.com

THE NFL CHEERLEADER WORKOUT
SHAPE.com

Thought

its easier to sabotage yourself by stuffing your face than putting yourself out there and going for what you really want.

Negative Calorie Food List

Veggies:

asparagus, celery, beets, chicory, broccoli, chili pepper, green cabbage, cucumber, carrots, endive, cauliflower, garlic, lettuce, onions, papayas, spinach, turnip, zucchini

Fruits:

apples, mango, cranberries, oranges, grapefruit, pineapple, lemons, raspberries, strawberries, tangerines

so, one of the girls in my sorority pulled me aside a while back… she asked me if i was bulimic, i of course said no. i asked her why she thought i was, and she said that she remembered me cutting, and said that when she stopped cutting she was bulimic for like three weeks. i just smiled and said i was fine, she said if i ever need to talk that she was there. ive been purging off and on for almost a year now, and restricting when i can. its gotten worse, when i let it. im so lost. im so cold. im so tired.

i can’t have an eating disorder, im still fat.

A thought

Here in America, we are taught that more is better. More is NOT better. Control, discipline and patience is better. More right now leads to the epidemic of obesity that we are seeing, and society is ignoring. Why isn’t the news at all concerned that the voters of today might not make it to the next election because most of them are obese or getting there? What happened to the health crisis, are we ignoring it? Why is it not on everyone’s tongue? Why can’t we talk about how fat is destroying our livelihood and longevity?