Grab our button!!

<div align="center"><a href="http://www.whatjeanlikes.com/search/label/aloha" title="Aloha Friday Blog Hop" target="_blank"><img src="http://i1226.photobucket.com/albums/ee419/whatjeanlikes/AlohaFridayBlogHopbutton.jpg" alt="Aloha Friday Blog Hop" style="border:none;" /></a></div&gt>

The Aloha Friday Blog Hop is more than a "Friday" hop, it's a way to share aloha and friendship to our fellow bloggers all weekend long!!  I consider this particular blog hop to be more of a weekend hop because Fridays are so hectic that a lot of people function on what we like to call "Hawaiian Time" here in Hawai'i which means they link up on Saturday or sometimes even Sunday which is just fine and dandy with me!  That's why I keep it open from Friday through Wednesday because I sincerely believe, the more the merrier!! 
Can you believe it's the 39th Aloha Friday Blog Hop?!  My how time flies!! 

Aloha Hoapili translates as Hello Close Friend. So, without further ado let me introduce you to this week's featured friend ...

Want a little taste of her blog? Check out these posts to find out what you've been missing: Home Sweet Home Planning Bring it on 2013 Exploring England Want your link to be one of the first people see?  Sponsor What Jean Likes by purchasing an ad space!! All Sponsors are automatically linked up! More info on becoming a sponsor {here}

Link up below!  

Have the loveliest of weekends!!

Aloha,

Sorry lovelies, this is just an iPhone photo.  Haven't been using the real deal DSLR for awhile because I've been so busy with the day job although today I got to combine the two.  Anywhoo, I'm on day 11 of my juice fast and it's going pretty well.  I am impressed at how much energy I have without coffee.  I consider myself to be quite the coffee fiend and could barely function early in the morning without it.  I'm faring well though, tons of energy, never groggy and I get a lot more sleep at night.  I think that was a huge part of my problem with my weight.  Beyond not eating right or working out, I was getting very little sleep (3 hours or less).  Not healthy!!  I'm all about healthy changes so now that I juice, I end up falling asleep way earlier...like at a normal time of night... and I get at least 7 hours of wonderful sleep and wake up feeling fresh.

I have to say, the positive changes far outweigh the fact that I miss food.  My skin is clearing up, my eyes are whiter, I have more energy, I feel better, no more chest pains, blood pressure back into normal range (I've been pre-hypertension for years), gut fat going down..and oh yeah.... 15 lbs shed off!!!   So worth it.  My doctor said that if I want to continue, I can do so for up to 60 days but not to beat myself up if I don't make it that far.  I'm gonna try for it but truth be told, I'll be happy with 30 days of fasting.  Only 15 more to go!!

When I first started the juice fast, the days seemed to drag and I was groggy and exhausted.  Now time is back to flying by and I have all this energy.  I actually started working out again to tighten everything up.  I never thought I'd say I like going to the gym...but I do... what the???  In the last year I went from 268 lbs to 242 from December 2011 to December 2012 and that was just cutting out fast food and soda and eating generally healthy foods.  It wasn't enough though because I was still cheating so I started this juice fast on January 2nd and I went from 242 lbs and today I'm down to 227 lbs!!  Feels like winning!

For those of you who asked, I have my juice 3-5 times a day depending on how hungry I am and I usually have glasses around 12oz.  The strainer of fruits and veggies was my breakfast this morning.  I juice all those veggies and I get pure micro nutrients that my body absorbs immediately and by juicing, I'm getting the nutrients from all these fruits and veggies.  I try to concentrate mostly on veggies though, specifically green veggies because it really detoxifies and gives me energy.  I could never sit and eat all these veggies and fruits whole in one sitting so it's like I'm getting turbocharged vitamins.  Love it!  The fact that my doctor gave me the go ahead to go up to 60 days on juice fast really motivates me even more because my health is improving so much from this.

The only downside is going to sleep early means I am running behind on posting to my blog and following everyone so if I haven't followed you back yet, I'm sorry. I promise I will and have the entire 3 day weekend to work on that!!!  Another lovely surprise was waking up to 1003 GFC followers, thanks guys!!

I hope you all are doing well.  I am about to work on the Aloha Friday Blog Hop code and then feed my son and get him all ready for bed and go work out.  Oh...did I mention, he got all A's and 2 B's on his report card today. So proud of you Alaka'i!!

Xo,

Grab our button!!

<div align="center"><a href="http://www.whatjeanlikes.com/search/label/aloha" title="Aloha Friday Blog Hop" target="_blank"><img src="http://i1226.photobucket.com/albums/ee419/whatjeanlikes/AlohaFridayBlogHopbutton.jpg" alt="Aloha Friday Blog Hop" style="border:none;" /></a></div&gt>

The Aloha Friday Blog Hop is more than a "Friday" hop, it's a way to share aloha and friendship to our fellow bloggers all weekend long!!  I consider this particular blog hop to be more of a weekend hop because Fridays are so hectic that a lot of people function on what we like to call "Hawaiian Time" here in Hawai'i which means they link up on Saturday or sometimes even Sunday which is just fine and dandy with me!  That's why I keep it open from Friday through Wednesday because I sincerely believe, the more the merrier!! 
Can you believe it's the 38th Aloha Friday Blog Hop?!  My how time flies!! 

Aloha Hoapili translates as Hello Close Friend. So, without further ado let me introduce you to this week's featured friend ...

Want a little taste of her blog? Check out these posts to find out what you've been missing: I Don't Need Thor's Hammer M is for .... Mama Leisha's Super Duper Bracelet Tutorial If you're not already a follower than you definitely should be! Now, let's link up and start spreading that Aloha shall we? Want your link to be one of the first people see?  Sponsor What Jean Likes by purchasing an ad space!! All Sponsors are automatically linked up! More info on becoming a sponsor {here}




Have the loveliest of weekends!!

Aloha,

Sometimes I feel like this truck stuck in the mud. Gotta push myself to achieve my goals.

So for those of you don't know, I've been on a juice fast since Sunday and it hasn't been the easiest experience of my life.  I was utterly exhausted and had the worst headache I've had in years.  (Think hangover of your life x 2!)  The smell of food made me want to cry and watching my son eat the things I miss so dearly was harder than I can say.  Days 1-3 were the worst of it, they were the days I absolutely didn't think I could continue on my juicing fast and that I should give it up and quit.  I decided to go to sleep instead of pig out on the oh so yummy spaghetti I made my son the night before and sheesh, I'm so glad I did.  On day 4 I woke up energized and ready to go.  It was like I drank four cups of coffee but without the jitters, no mood swings, no head aches, no pains.  It was wonderful.  I have to tell ya, it's day 5 now and I got the all clear from my doctor to go up to 60 days on this juice fast as long as I get blood tests every couple of weeks to make sure my levels are all healthy so I'm thinking this might be doable for me.  I know it seems extreme but it took a lot of years of extremely bad eating and no exercising to get me here and it's going to take rather extreme measures to get me back to normal.  I haven't been in a single digit dress size since middle school and I'm so ready to change that!

Extreme as it may be, I wasn't prepared for the exhaustion days 1-3 presented me with and I am so far behind on everything that I used to do at night like blogging, answering emails, following people and all of that.  I used to do most of my blogging at night and prepare ahead of time but the last few nights I got so tired so early that I ended up going to bed.  Normally I'm up into the wee hours of the morning doing my blog work so it's definitely an adjustment and I know I need more rest than I normally get so I have to figure out a balance.  So if you are awaiting a response to an email, a contest, a follow, or anything else, I'm so very sorry and I am literally working on all of that right this second to get back to all of you!!  Another superdy duper not-so-fun thing was having my email server crash on me for two days so I wasn't getting any email.  Frustrating! Thank goodness it's back online!

I'm about 9 lbs down from where I started on Sunday so it's worth it.  Thank you all for being so kind and understanding while I go through this adjustment period.  I hope all of you are having a lovely week!

Aloha,