High Five for Friday

Welcome back to your weekly installment of High Five for Friday, along with Lauren Elizabeth over on her blog.

This week, I'm doing something a little different and sharing something I found on Pinterest the other day. It's actually originally from Buzzfeed, which isn't normally where I go for great advice, especially for weight loss, but I think this one's a winner!

So, this week's High Five for Friday ...5 weeks to cleaning up your diet! I've never made it a secret from anyone about my weight loss issues and have previously posted about it here on the blog. After that "Weight Loss Woes" post, I thought I'd be more motivated to clean up my diet. Well, nope. I scheduled my knee surgery, then postponed it, and life has just gotten in the way. No excuses, that's just how it is. Knee surgery is now one month from yesterday, it's only seven and a half weeks until I head to Vermont for a week for vacation and one of my best friend's weddings, and summer is coming fast. Time to get real with my diet and exercise. My goal is to lose 15 pounds before Vermont, which is doable, but it's going to take real work.

Week 1. Add real fruits and real veggies to every meal. I believe in not starting a program by taking something away from yourself, but adding something in to the mix. This is also going to be a bit of a challenge for me for 2 reasons- 1) I'm a picky eater and 2) I have major texture issues with food. I started off this morning by having an apple. Then a doughnut. Whomp. But at least I tried? I'll try again at lunch. That's all I can do.

Week 2. No more fast foods. This is definitely going to be the most difficult step of all. I've always had a fast food addiction. I can talk myself out of it and go weeks without it, but then, I snap and have it once. Once turns into twice in one day. Then twice in one day becomes seven fast food runs in five days. That's going to stop. I'm going to modify this one from the get-go and not say no fast foods, but I'm saying only once a week. And I'm sticking to it.

Week 3. Give up white breads and grains. Switch to whole wheat bread, brown rice, and whole wheat pasta. Thankfully, this will not be the most difficult for me since I already use whole grain english muffins, breads, and pasta at home. But, it WILL definitely put me on the struggle bus when it comes to biscuits (y'all know this North Carolina girl loves biscuits), pizza crust, and general eating out. However, I know this is one thing I can conquer!

Week 4. Use a fruit or veggie as the base of every snack. Again, I'll be on the struggle bus, but I can handle some apple and peanut butter or carrots and ranch. YUM.

Week 5. No more soda or sugary drinks. This one will be a Coke walk through the park. Get it? Haha. Yes. I haven't been a "real" soda drinker in years, which is great. I only have a full sugar soda when I have a migraine from hell because the caffeine helps and the sugar does, too. I'm altering this week's challenge to include limiting myself to only one day of sweet tea a week, and limiting sweet treats to the same, just like during Lent.

I know this is ALL going to be hard, tough work. But no one else can do it for me. Week 1 officially starts on Monday and I will have an update post every Monday morning about how the previous week went. Feel free to join me on this journey and let me know how you're doing, as well! Here we go! Have a great weekend!

xoxo!

Scrub-A-Dub-Dub, I'm Cleaning the Tub!

Good Monday morning, everyone! I hope everyone's weekend was at least as enjoyable or as productive as mine. I did some shopping and splurging on myself, made some headway into preparations for my friend Ashley's bachelorette night out, worked at my part-time job, and cleaned like a mad woman.

I have blogged a little before here about buying my house on March 7, 2013. When I say I bought the house that day, it means my parents, aunt and uncle, and two cousins helped pack 2 pick-up trucks and 3 cars, and the movers packed the moving truck while I signed the papers at 1pm, and everything was moved in by 6pm. It was no joke. If y'all knew me in real life, you would know the 3 Xanax I took that day were necessary but still didn't help much. My nerves were tore up. (Yes, I just said tore up. It was for emphasis.)

I fell in love with my house the minute I saw it. It's vintage, squeaky, and 1970s, which is exactly why I love it. But, it was build in 1972, which means there are still 42 years worth of dirt and grime in some spots. Now, I'm not a clean freak, but I'm not dirty, either. I clean after myself, especially my bathroom. Well, I've been trying to get the tub and shower in the guest bath since the day I moved in and usually clean it once every 2-3 weeks. I've tried Magic Erasers, Clorox bleach pens, Scrubbing Bubbles, a $40 bottle of chemicals from Home Depot that's said to work miracles, and nothing worked. Until now.

Enter the wonderful invention that is Pinterest. I found this Pin a good while back, and finally got around to trying out the homemade cleaner. Well, y'all, it works. 

(baking soda not included because I forgot I wanted to take a picture and threw it away)

The recipe calls for:
1/2 cup White Vinegar
1/2 cup Original Blue Dawn Dish Soap
4 T. Baking Soda

Heat the vinegar in microwave safe bowl for 90 seconds. Allow to cool slightly and add Dawn dish soap. Mix well. Then, once a little cooler, add baking soda. (If you don't allow cooling of vinegar, the mixture will form a volcano.)

Mix well until a paste-like substance is formed. Spread over shower walls and tub with old cloth.

You can clearly see here how grimy and dirty-looking the tub and tile grout are. This is even with weekly scrubbing of tub and cleaning shower walls every 2-3 weeks.

I let the paste mixture sit for over two hours before scrubbing. I then used the same washcloth to scrub the walls first, making sure to get in all the grout, between every little blue tile. I then scrubbed the tub, itself.

You can see in this photo an in-photo comparison. The top left was left to soak in the mixture then scrubbed, while the right wasn't touched by the magic cleaner! CRAZY!

This is a great side-by-side comparison of how this really works! And while the original Pinner said the grime wiped right off without scrubbing, my tile and grout did require lots of elbow grease and a hot, steamy shower running while scrubbing. No complaints here, though. My tub and shower are FINALLY white(ish)!

If you've been looking for a magic, miracle cure for your tub and shower, please try this and come back to let me know if it works! I was genuinely SHOCKED when it worked for me and can't wait to do it again for (hopefully) even better results!

xoxo!