I'm petite, around 5'3" and 125 lbs. I'm trying to lose 10 lbs. to shape up for beach week and this summer coming up. I definately know how to loose weight, because three years ago I weighed 160 lbs. and lost it within three months. But what I used to do isn't working now. I used to burn 500 calories a day every day and eat okay-ish.

Right now, I do atleast an hour of cardio everyday (except for days that I work which is only one or two) and do a little bit of weight lifting just to tone up. I eat very healthy and I am a vegetarian so I make sure when I'm looking in the 'fridge to grab the food with the most protein. I tend to eat 1500-1600 calories a day. I've been eating well and working out regularly for about a month now and feel where I am toning up but alas no fat is gone.

Why is this happening?
I just hope it's not like...super stubborn fat from when I used to be super fat that will never go away.
Please help

Because you're not fat. You're 5' 3" and weigh 125 lbs. That's not even close to fat.

Your calories are most likely too high for someone of your weight.

To boot, optimizing the nutrient quality of your diet would go a long way along with reducing the cardio and emphasizing the strength training.

I know I am not fat, I know what it is to be genuinely fat. I've been there. However I have baby areas of pudge left over which is what I'm trying to get rid of. Less jiggle more tone!

How many calories should I eat a day? My BMR is around 1400, and if I eat below it I'm very hungry :/
And what do you mean optimizing nutrient quality? I'm very new to all of this stuff.

I'm not really a fan of helping people who weigh so little lose more weight without seeing a picture. Hopefully you understand that... there are a lot of people, especially women, who have very distorted self images and because of it, they do things that feels right mentally even though it's physically damaging.

That said, I've known plenty of women who are 5'3 or shorter and could stand to tighten up at 125 lbs.

Assuming you're the latter case, you really need to ditch any focus you have on weight. Make this about body composition. At your stats, the body doesn't handle stress well. Stress comes in a lot of packages.

Work, family, life, cardio, weight training, lack of calories, etc.

When things add up, things go haywire in the body. This holds true mostly for relatively lean women looking to get leaner. When things go haywire, water retention will mask actual fat loss, you'll feel like crap, etc.

To avoid this, you need to be very economical in your training and diet.

On the training front, you shouldn't be doing a high volume of cardio unless it's absolutely necessary. From what you're saying now, it's not working, so I'd scale it back to 3 sessions per week or so.

You should be focusing on weight training 2-3 times per week using low volume, high intensity full body routines. These should be very simplistic.

It could be as simply as:

Squat 3x5
Bench 3x5
Row 3x5

This is assuming you're familiar with these exercises.

On the diet:

Calories are a funny thing. I've seen lean women your size have to drop to 8 calories per pound to realize any appreciable weight loss. You're currently up around 13. That's most likely maintenance for someone with your stats. I'd suggest dropping down to 10-12 calories per pound.

What comprises those calories is also very important... and that's where I was going about nutrient quality. For instance, eating adequate protein is critical at your stage for its muscle maintaining qualities. Without it, it becomes much easier to lose muscle while dieting which will only lead to a lighter, still soft version of your former self. Adequate protein will also satiate you better. Something like 1 gram per pound you weigh is a good target.

At the end of the day, losing the last bit of fat is extremely difficult, especially for a woman. Evolution doesn't want women lean. Fat is what kept humans alive all this time.

In terms of scale change... expect 1-3 lbs per MONTH. Let that sink in.

And just to be clear here... b/c I feel like I was rambling in my last post. The hierarchy of importance here looks something like this:

Rest/recovery
adequate fuel (calories)
quality fuel (macronutrient breakdown)
weight lifting
metabolic exercise such as cardio for added calorie control

This was the closest thing I could find that was close to a body shot. It's from the side as you might be able to tell I have baby areas of fluff that I'm just trying to tone up.

And thanks so much for all the info!

You might want to up the amount of weight training you do. Also, I'm assuming you want abs. Don't stick to the "conventional" ab workouts - by that I mean situps and crunchies. Planks, pivot-based arm exercises, and certain types of cardio can go a long way to improving your abs.

The reason I suggested weight training is because cardio clearly isn't working for you. The reason is, is that you are simply too healthy for your body to struggle with the 1 hour cardio sessions. Your body won't be forced to burn fat until it absolutely needs to. Try doing 30 minutes of cardio and then 30 minutes of intense weight training. Also, don't be afraid of becoming 'buff' because with the typical testosterone levels in a female it is relatively hard to bulk up. You will only tone. Which everyone wants.