Techy Tuesday

Most of you know that I detest math. I use it a lot in everyday life, work, and school but I still can't stand it. That being said, I love numbers; I love being able to quantify things. This especially applies to working out. I have never been one to work out without no how much, how far, or how long I have gone. Before I used pedometers, google maps trails, the counters on elliptical/bike, and other tools to measure my workouts.

Two weeks ago I got a new gadget: a FitBit. It is a wireless device (seen to the right) that connects to an app on my phone and records my activity. It tracks everything from how many steps I take, calories I burn, how many miles I've walked, how many calories I can eat, and even my sleep pattern.I can set goals for myself for how far I want to go each day and how much weight I want to lose. It then comes up with a "plan" for me and then tracks me to make sure I'm staying with my goal.

It's also a great tool for tracking my food consumption as well. It has an endless database of food that I can look up and add to my daily intake. It then calculates how many calories I've eaten with how many calories I have burned and let's me know how many more I can eat in that day. It is very cool! On the flip side though it shows me when I go over like on when we go out. Grant and I went to Chevy's (Tex-Mex) one night and I had the seafood enchiladas. Yeah... I went about 1,000 calories over my daily goal.

The other part that I really like about this gadget is how it tracks my sleep. I can set it to go into "sleep mode" when I lay down and then press "I'm awake" when I wake up (it even has it's own vibrating alarm to wake me up). It monitors my movement when I sleep, how many times I wake up, and for how long I'm asleep straight. Have to say that even I was a little taken back by how restless my sleep is. Last night for example I said I went to bed a 10pm but I didn't fall asleep until around 10:30 and I woke up about 18 times.

All in all I'm so happy that I spent the money ($99 through amazon and got free shipping) to get my Fitbit. It is a great tool to be able to see those numbers and outputs that I crave. It's also really fun to see how much I do just on a daily basis. If you have the money to get one I'd highly recommend it! There is also two other models that they have all ranging in price. To learn more or to order your own visit their website: http://www.fitbit.com/. Happy tracking ;)