One Super Sunday Sleep In

I know there was a sleep study that indicated it was better for the body if you had a consistent wake up time every single day. But for ME? Weekends are made for sleeping in!

This was my Fitbit sleep tile Sunday morning when I FINALLY rolled out of bed. I'd gone to bed at 9:59, and got out of bed at 9:53. I was in bed for 11 hours and 54 minutes, and "asleep" for 10 hours and 4 minutes. My average is probably around six hours of sleep a night. It felt good to catch up a bit. Sunday was actually the only day over the entire Thanksgiving Weekend that I was able to really sleep in though.

My MIMM Weekend Recap ...

• Friday, I planned on hitting my Zumba class at 9:00. So that WAS a sleep in, based on my usual 6:00 rising time. I ended up needing to pick up #2 from his friend's at 10:30 that evening (that is past my bedtime!) even though Daddy and #1 son were out late that night already.
• Saturday ... #2 had to be at the high school at 8:00 in the morning to go driving for driver's ed. Normally, he has basketball practice at that time, but not this weekend. I was glad #2 got one of his driving done (he has to do three) as the other workable time is 5:00 a.m. THAT is early! #2 actually attended a family event (see the picture below) and so he was home, instead of out with friends that evening. That meant an early in night for me!
• Sunday ... It felt SO good not to set the alarm and just stay in bed until I was ready to get out. It made breakfast quite late, insomuch that it was more of a brunch. We are on the 1:00-4:00 church schedule for another few weeks. Then we'll switch to the 9:00-12:00 with the new year. I'll miss my Sunday sleep ins I think ...

 At the annual "Leg Lamp Lighting" party. 

Missing #1 (he had to work), and Anxiety Child was NOT happy.

I have to say ... I'm very happy to have the Thanksgiving holiday and the November birthday's behind us. I know Christmas is right around the corner, but I feel like I have three "normal" weeks (as far as school and such) to try and get back on track a bit. The return to the routine. Basketball is starting up again, so schedules will be a little crazy in the evenings. #3 has a game starting at 9:30 at night, downtown! He won't get home until after 11:00 on a school night ... and that's definitely past MY bedtime!

I did bop over 150 for my weigh-in this Monday morning (150.5). I'd done so well for several weeks, I'd like to get back to bigger deficits, lower caloric intake, keeping up the activity.  I had been quite nervous about this morning regarding Anxiety Child. He struggles almost every Monday, having to return to school after the weekend. With this longer weekend, I was anticipating a complete meltdown. He surprised me (and himself) by having a good morning and getting off to school without complaints or crying.  I've told him I want him to make it through these next three weeks, and then we'll revisit the homeschool possibility if that's still something he really, really wants.

But for now? Three weeks of a schedule. 

Which means alarms set for 6:00. 

With a few more Sunday Sleep Ins. I'm going to enjoy every one!

Sleeping In

Ah, the weekend. For me, it means sleeping in!

I grabbed my little "sleep tile" from my Fitbit dashboard. This was yesterday (Sunday). I went to bed at 11:31 and got out of bed at 8:30. I was in bed for 8.59 hours, but only asleep (according to my Fitbit) for 6.20 hours. Sunday sleep-in. It felt so nice. I slept in Saturday too. 

I read an article that said your body is better off if you wake at a consistent time every day, even over the weekends. I don't care ... I'm sleeping in! It's so nice to turn off the alarm clock and just wake when I want. 

It was a really relaxing weekend. I banked calories in case the hubs suggested dinner or a movie on Friday night. We didn't end up going out (which I'm fine with too) and then I didn't eat much more anyway. I had a nice little scale drop for Saturday.

Saturday and Sunday were really slow, relaxing days. Not much on the docket. #5 had his final soccer game (they tied! The first game they didn't lose!) I actually got a little nap both Saturday and Sunday. I got in a bit of exercise (elliptical and bike), and just barely managed to keep calories under by burn. Still under 150 this Monday morning!

Normally I'm not a big fan of weekends. They just throw off the routine too much. I'm usually more than ready to get back to my schedule Monday morning. This weekend ... I really enjoyed, even though we didn't really do much. But ... still looking forward to today and the week ahead. Will this be the week I stay under 150 the entire time? I'm looking forward to Zumba today (and every weekday). I actually feel the urge to lift weights today, I want to feel the strength that comes when I finish. I've been enjoying my "hikes" on the treadmill, and I'm watching "Hostages" which is quite good and keeping my interest. I've also liked getting back to my reading and riding on the stationary bike. I finished up a book over the weekend (Gated) and started a new one (Anna and the French Kiss) which I'm enjoying a lot. I do have a 10:00 pickup tonight, so I'll probably keep exercising through the evening, just an attempt to stay awake. I know I was up until 11:30 over the weekend (the image at top) but that is unusual for me!

I got some blogging done over the weekend. My Saturday Stats and a September Recap. As I was inputting my journal entries, I noticed a statement I made early in September ... "The new carpool schedule gets me up a little earlier, but allows me to get in a full 40 minutes on the elliptical in the mornings (20 min before the first carpool and another session after, before 2nd carpool)." Ha Ha ... that hasn't exactly been happening of late! I've been struggling to get up and get in 10 minutes before first carpool. I usually (but not always) get in a second 10 minutes before elementary carpool, but it doesn't always happen. I really should get back to that motivation I had when school first started.

Why does sleeping in feel so good?

Linking up with MIMM and the Motivation Monday team. 

Feel free to link up YOUR Motivational Monday post too!

An InLinkz Link-up

Five Fitbit Wishes and WWI#54

It's the end of the month. It's a Friday.  Time for monthly recaps, weekly weigh-ins and the Friday Five. Just a couple days ago I mentioned the changes to the Fitbit dashboard. For today's Friday Five, I thought I'd bring up five things I really WISH Fitbit would change (but alas, I'm still waiting)!

See the graph above? It's my July "intake vs burn" graph. There are two things very wrong with this image. 

• #1 ... the key colors are blue and pink, but the line colors are two shades of green. What is up with that? It drives me CrAZy! Seriously Fitbit, how hard is it to make the colors match? I don't care if the lines are blue and pink, or if the key colors switch to the green (ok ... I do actually prefer the blue and pink) but it's simply bad form to present the graph this way!
• #2 ... I am absolutely kicking myself for not snagging this image last night, on July 31. There is no way now for me to get a proper "July2014" intake vs burn" graph because it only shows the last 30-days. I really wish the Fitbit would allow us, the user, to input dates for this graph manually and look at past dates. Is that really too much to ask?

 My next (this would be #3) "wish list" item update request 

is about SEDENTARY time.

Being active is great, and having our active time graphed out is good. And at least on this graph, the key colors and line colors actually match. But there in the key, sedentary time is listed, but NOT shown in the graph! It would be really good to see how the sedentary time compares with the different types of activity. I'd like to know how much time I spend NOT moving!

On the old dashboard ... and I mean the OLD one, that people who have joined in the last year have never even seen, we had this nice pie chart. I thought this was a GREAT graph! Some friends and I would have competitions to make sure we had a "half a pie" or less of sedentary time. This graph simply disappeared with the new tile dashboard.  I can manually switch back to the old dashboard to check out this chart, but I rarely go to the bother. I would LOVE to see this as a tile on the new dashboard! I think the information and presentation is perfect for moving motivation!

 My #4 request, would be updated/better information about the sleep cycle. Now not all the Fitbit devices even track sleep, and even for those that do, not everyone bothers with this feature. I do. I don't know how much I trust the information as correct, but it is interesting nonetheless. 

These graphs have ALWAYS bugged me! Why? Because they are absolutely repetitive! The top one shows the "Time asleep over the past 30 days" ... ok, that is all well and good. The third one down is "TOTAL time asleep over the last 30 days" ... ummm, that is exactly the same thing! The "Times awoken" and "Total times awoken" are the same too! How about a different two different graphs showcasing some of the other information. Show us a line graph of the TIME we went to bed and woke up, show us a graph of our ours in bed vs hours asleep. Show us a graph of the "sleep efficiency" ... I'd really like to have a visualization of these numbers and having this absolute redundancy again ... drives me CrAZy!

My #5 request would regard the "friends" list feature.

You can see Fitbit did make some changes. Circles instead of squares. Bigger focus on the numbers over the names. Having been on Fitbit for over four years now, I've had several people "friend" me. I actually don't know any of these "friends" ... I've perhaps exchanged a text or two here and there with a couple of them.  Now that my entire family is on Fitbit, I'd really love to "see" them, but they aren't quite competitive enough, although occasionally my #2 son has managed to make it into my top7. I wish I had a little control over my friend list, select who I compare myself to, rather than just this "surrounding seven". I have made a family group, but it doesn't present in the same way. I'd like to see my family on my dashboard every time I check in.

So Fitbit peeps ... any chance you might incorporate any of these into your NEXT update? Pretty please? I'm a HUGE Fitbit fan, I'm usually raving about Fitbit, not complaining. Still love you Fitbit ... there is always room for improvement. Nobody is perfect. Linking up with the DC Bloggers ((Courtney, Mar and Cynthia) Friday Five. Friday Favorites at Running4Cupcakes and Five Things Friday at Fitting It All In.

Now time for the weekly weigh-in ...

... after three weeks at exactly the same weight (156.2) I guess I would have preferred that again. That is what I was yesterday! I had a good weekend and was lower on Tuesday morning. I had high hopes for Friday, but then I went a bit astray. I lost my momentum and motivation. Seriously ... such a struggle! 

NUMBERS: Weigh-in today is up 1.1 from last week, although my average is actually down .77. Average intake was 2193, average burn 3068. I actually had a weekly deficit of -4716. I was a little surprised to see that, as I've been so bad these past couple days, but I was really quite good for the days before. But the scale seems to reflecting the naughty rather than the nice.

 Checking in with my weekly link-ups: Fitness Friday with Jill and Aubrey  and a late Weigh-In Wednesday. I will be recapping the month and updating my "Daily Doings" for July coming up shortly.

Sleep Stuff

Sleep. I love it! I feel pretty lucky that I have very few issues with sleeping. Yes, I have the occasional night when I have trouble getting to sleep, or wake up in the night, but those times are pretty few and far between.

There are a lot of articles out there telling us all the importance of sleep. We need our "beauty" sleep, we need to be well rested to function. I remember reading one not long ago saying that inconsistent bedtimes can lead to weight gain.

For the most part, the hubs and I are a pretty "early to bed early to rise" couple. It's not uncommon for us to start shutting things down around 9:00 or 10:00, much to the chagrin of our teenage children (#2, Mr. Social who wants to stay out late with friends but then also needs a ride home). I remember pushing the curfew myself when I was that age, but I was never really a night owl. My friends knew that after 10:00, Jen got a little loopy!

My wear my Fitbit One to bed, clipped onto my nightshirt (not in the little wristband as it is actually supposed to be worn). It tracks my sleep. I don't know how accurate it really is, but as of this year, I have been recording my "to bed" "awakened" and "hours asleep" with the rest of my numbers. It has been interesting to watch the trends. To compare how I felt my night was, with what the Fitbit feedback reflected.

I mentioned we did get #3 set up with a Fitbit (Tracking the Family. He was the last one to get one). He has the One, and I did want him to have that model because I was interested in having him use the sleep tracker. He complains constantly that it took him hours to get to sleep, that he didn't sleep at all. I thought it would be interesting to see what the Fitbit said about that. It's still very new, so we don't have a lot of data yet.  He's actually on a little vacation right now. I received a text from him this morning with a picture of his Fitbit, with 45 steps on it. He said he woke up with that. Now if you read the Fitbit forums, you'll probably come across tales of "phantom" steps ... sometimes that happens. But for my son, apparently there WAS a little sleepwalking going on (he does do that) as both a cousin and Aunt verified that he had walked around a little bit in the night.

Wearing the Fitbit to bed can track simple things like how often/when you got up during the night, as well as your restlessness while you lay in bed. I have posted about the Fitbit sleep tracking before. There are several other devices that track sleep too ... apps for your phone, or beddit (that one looks interesting).

I'm a very light sleeper ... maybe it's the "mommy" in me, always keeping an ear out for the kids. We're at a great stage right now though, where all my kids are really good about going to bed and staying asleep. I don't miss the baby days of night-time feedings and kids in the bed with us!

While many things affecting our sleep are out of our control, our actions can contribute to bad sleeping habits.  Caffeine or over eating too close to bedtime ... the late exercise, watching tv or electronics really doesn't seem to impact ME negatively (generally I'm falling asleep with my iphone kindle app in hand). I DO keep our bedroom cool, as I have trouble sleeping if it's hot. We keep the room pretty dark, although I do wish our window blinds were a bit better at blocking out any outdoor light. I thought this article (Can't Sleep? Your Guide To A Better Night's Rest) had some good ideas. 

Tracking Sleep

I pretty much wear my Fitbit 24/7 (I do take it off for showers and use that time to recharge the battery). When it's time for bed, I keep my Fitbit on me.  I sleep with it on, not only to catch any odd steps during the night, but because it has a sleep function as well as a step function. I don't know how accurate it is, but it is interesting. 

As the graph indicates, the blue is sleeping (or at least very still and unmoving), and the pink is awake (or restless). An actual spike means I got up and walked for a minute (potty run). Now the BIG pink area around 3:30 in the morning is NOT normal for me! That only happens when stupid teenagers decide to doorbell ditch us. And I got a few steps in as I had to go outside and put out the fire that they started on the front porch (and as it would happen our front door was stuck and so I had to go out the back and walk around the house to do it!) Could not get back to sleep for a while ...

This is a little more "normal" ... hubby is off early, so I usually wake up, but don't quite make it out of bed for a bit. I know, I should just get up and get going on my day!  There are two settings for sleep (normal or sensitive ... try which seems to work best for you). There is a sleeve included to wear your Fitbit on your wrist. I just clip it to my jammie top.  My son sleeps with his clipped to his boxers.

But back to the Fitbit as a sleep tracker. I didn't think I would use this feature, but I've really enjoyed having the feedback. I always thought I went to sleep earlier than I actually do. It's interesting to see the trends (going to bed/getting up) and getting an idea of how much actual sleep time I get. When we splurged on a Fitbit for my 14-year old, I was going to suggest the less expensive Zip. It does not track sleep. The boys had already rushed off to the store and purchased the One before I mentioned the Zip option, but my son has enjoyed the sleep feedback more than I would have thought (and as a parent it's fun for me to point out just how much he is sleeping in this summer!). As my parents bought Fitbits as well, one of the things they were looking forward to MOST from the device was the sleep feedback.

With the new dashboard, there are new, weekly reports of the sleep graph.

They look like this (above).

You still get the look pictured at the top if you go to the Log/Sleep area.

... so if you were considering a Fitbit and wanted an idea of what some of the feedback looked like, there you go. There are a couple other graphs too, showing some of the same info over time (hours asleep over the past 30 days, etc.). My Fitbit is mainly for steps and counting calories burned throughout the day, but I appreciate the night feedback as well!