The brownies filled with peanut butter cups day

Today wasn't awful but I did indulge a little on treats made by my pal Cary.

I had some oatmeal with cranberries for breakfast and it held me over until lunch which was good b/c I forgot my trailbar. However, around 11:15 I found myself wondering what the brownie treats downstairs were all about. Turns out my friend Cary is trying out a new little brownie pan she has to experiment with treats for her ranger's packages. So in honor of her ranger, Ty, I indulged myself in two of the best little treats. Brownies with a peanut butter cup in the middle. And bitesized so you don't feel bad having two.

I had some Campbells Select Southwestern Vegetable Soup for lunch with oyster crackers. About 15 minutes before lunch ended, Cary started to offer the last three brownie bites up. I asked for one and was told no b/c I had already tried them :( Damn it woman! Thankfully my pal Hellen who was able to resist temptation requested one and gave it to me. HAHAHAHA, take that CARY!

My soup didn't hold me over as expected so I reached for a small personal sized bag of kettle corn popcorn around 3:00.

For dinner we had leftover spaghetti. YUMMY.

Oh, at some point during the day I ate the candy that came with my Avon order too. So that would be one bite sized caramel, one dark chocolate hershey mini and one candy can hershey kiss.

My weight was the same this morning which was great and I have high hopes for a healthy weekend. Maybe I'll hit the 5 pound mark soon :)

Again, I forgot to take pictures so here are my kids sitting in stay position waiting for a cookie.

Tuesday went healthy

Today was actually a pretty healthy day, it went really well.

Breakfast was coffee (w/cream) and strawberry yogurt with blueberries and some kashi cereal for that special crunch factor.

Snack - my yummy in my tummy trailbar :)

Lunch was a ginormous salad. Lettuce, spinach, peppers, green onions, tomato, cucumber, cranberries, chicken salad, low fat cheddar and some cottage cheese topped with low fat dijon dressing. SCRUMPTIOUS

Snack was an apple.

I was starving while making lunch for Wednesday and waiting for Justin to come home from work so I had some Food Should Taste Good Cheddar Chips and a cheese stick.

Dinner was whole wheat angel hair with homemade spaghetti sauce that I canned this summer and about half a chicken sausage link. I did have some buttered bread on the side and a larger than normal glass of milk. It was spaghetti afterall.

No pictures. I seem to keep pulling the camera out to take pictures of my doggies but not my food. Ooopsie. But for fun here is a cute pic of the fur-babies.

A day of indulgence which amounted to about half a pound in weight loss!

I really don't get how you can be sooooo goooood one day and lose nothing and then another day you can indulge in sweets off and on all day and somehow mysteriously drop weight. But who the hell cares really? What's important is I'm trying to make healthy choices and it's working!

I started my Monday with a yummy coffee with light cream. It was the start to catch up week at work and I wanted to enjoy my coffee on the way to work. As much as I try, I can't enjoy coffee made with anything other than light cream....except of course Irish Cream :) So I pushed the fat free half and half aside for the third day in a row.

I gave it a healthy jump start with some yogurt and blueberries and a trail bar while deleting the email about Bruce's homemade peanut butter ice cream. But then in came my favorite underwriter. She had lost like 40 pounds since I saw her last and looked hot as hell with her new blonde hair and tiny figure. But she still brought the cookies from the bakery in Keene. I said no, no, no! I am not going to eat that cookie. I don't even like raspberry that much. Maybe if I just wait it out, someone else will eat all of the chocolate chip, brownie filled delights and I wont have to worry about how many calories and fat grams are in that thing...not so much. I ate one. I set it on my desk and said this is for after lunch and then about 30 second later, I ate the whole cookie. There goes my sugar for the day, now it's going to be out of whack!

Lunch was healthy, Justin made me a chicken salad sandwich with low fat swiss and a cucumber on the side. Unfortunately we got an ice cream reminder before lunch time and I then fell victim to about half a cup of peanut butter cup ice cream. I blame the sugar freakout on the cookie from earlier. I followed the ice cream with a fun sized snickers :(

At like 4:00 my sugar craving body wanted more but I did the right thing and ate the apple that had been in front of me all day. It tasted grainy and was awful.

Dinner was leftovers from Sunday so I had a healthy portion of chicken cordon bleu casserole and some steamed broccoli which somehow tasted almost as fresh as summer. Maybe I just want summer to be here b/c I hate winter and want to garden again and pick my veggies the moment I am ready to cook them.

Somehow this day of cookies, ice cream and candy bars wasn't all bad and the scale let me jump for joy with roughly a half pound in weight loss!

Sunday - Funday

Got up this morning and we dove right into bottling beer...which of course inspired us to brew some beer. So inbetween all of the brewing fun, the food went something like this.

Got super hungry and thought I would puke from starvation, lol. Made a bowl of cereal with a banana. That didn't hold me over so after making trailbars, I ate half of one. I altered the trailbar recipe to only use 1 cup of oats and instead added about two cups of kashi cereal. This combined with the switch from raisins to dates made them even better than last time!


We went out to Home Depot in between the brewfest to buy some bathroom renovation stuff. Managed to score a new vanity/sink and some flooring today. When we got home, we were starving and since we would be outside most of the afternoon, I made grilled cheese and tomato sandwiches with soup. I would guess there was about 3 ounces of cheese on my sandwich and that I ate about 1 ounce while making them. We split the can of soup.



We got down to brewing and that meant I had to drink a beer. I indulged in a Winter Hook since it was cold out. But I was good and only had one. Unlike my hiccuping husband...









About 4:00 Justin made some cheese and crackers so naturally I ate like 3 or 4 of them and it was not low fat cheese and even better it was not cut thin at all.

I cooked a new made up recipe for dinner using the leftover roasted chicken. I created a chicken cordon blue casserole with farfalle pasta, ham, swiss and a Common Man cheese sauce recipe. I also made garlic creamy spinach on the side. It came out pretty good but would need tweaking to make it again. The sauce was a bit thick for my liking. I think next time I would turn it into a lasagna layering the chicken in one layer and the ham and swiss in another and then topping it with sauce and panko bread crumbs.

For comparison, I have shown my glass of milk next to Justin's glass of milk. I used to have a 16 oz glass of milk at night but now I just have my one little tiny cup.




To conclude today, my weight stayed the same despite Friday nights pizza and ice cream and Saturday nights giant bowl of ice cream. Tomorrow I do not expect the same. I managed to consume an awful lot of cheese today. I guess that is what happens when cheese if your favorite food.

Saturday - Finally feeling better...

My cold finally broke today and I felt so much better. I made some coffee and I spent the day doing lots of chores. I managed to muscle up the energy to go out for groceries, bring a month's worth of recycling to the dump, go to the bank, and go bathroom renovation shopping. Then I got home, put the groceries away, unloaded and reloaded the dishwasher, started laundry and finally ate some breakfast before washing out 4 recycling totes which of course led to an entire douche of the bathroom. It felt like a workout after spending days on the couch.

Breakfast was scrumptious. I had two pieces of toast with an egg white omelet that had sundried tomatoes and low-fat cheddar in it. Had an apple on the side and some Tropicana 50/50 just to be sure the cold germs were not going to come and get me.

I got busy and never had a snack or needed one.


For lunch I had a much craved salad. In the salad were three types of bell peppers, diced onions, cucumber, olives, ham, swiss cheese, cottage cheese and french dressing. It was awesomely delicious. I could actually taste something, WAHOO.

After lunch I paid bills. And while this has nothing at all to do with food, it's exciting to share the fact that I have officially paid off my car.

My energy level around 4:00 had met it's match and apparently I burned some calories b/c I was starving so I had some yogurt with a little Kashi cereal in it...and was not satisfied and followed that with a small piece of last nights fatty pizza. OOPS :(





I made up for it at dinner though. I roasted a beautiful seven pound chicken and we made roasted chicken sandwiches for dinner with some buffalo sauce and blue cheese. It was fucking gross. Why is it that you can't buy Blue Cheese dressing in the store that tastes as good as the restaurant stuff? I ate maybe half my sandwich and and threw away the rest. I did eat the Food Should Taste Good chips though :)

I think I had a beer with our movie but I honestly don't recall. I do however recall the giant bowl of ice cream. We managed to eat the entire half gallon in two nights. That's two bowls for Justin and two for me. At least it's gone right? It won't call out my name all week long from the freezer around like 8:15pm...

Friday - not feeling better but forced to go to work

I still felt like run over dog poo today but my career in insurance beckoned me to sit in misery in my cubicle for the day :)

I didn't think to take any pictures that morning of what I planned to eat in my breakfast and lunch and I don't have one of those fancy phones that takes nice pictures so there wont be any photos for the day.

Breakfast:
Two pieces of toast with peanut butter and a banana that had been sitting on my desk since Tuesday morning.

Snack:
Another banana because that is what I had available.

Snack again:
about 4 pretzel sticks that I dug out of the back of my desk drawer

Lunch:
Chicken noodle soup. Good ole Campbells and some oyster crackers

Snack
An apple. Feeling the need for some vitamin C so that I could maybe not fall asleep driving home

Dinner:
At this point I decided I had no energy to cook, knew my husband was not about to cook after a long work week, snow blowing and having to work again on the weekend. So while I picked up a movie at redbox, I ventured to the dangerous frozen food aisle. I stared into the upright freezers knowing that no matter what I chose, it was going to have nearly 20 grams of fat per serving and the serving size would be so small that I would ultimately eat two servings. After literally 10 minutes of staring into the freezer land and zoning out, I chose Digorno. Garlic bread pepperoni pizza. I didn't flip it over to look at the back because I wasn't going to change my mind.

And then I turned around, in search of light ice cream or even better, fat free frozen yogurt. I just wanted something cold and yummy. So while I scanned the shelves of healthy frozen treats, there it was...one of my favorite ice creams put back in the wrong place. Full fat ice cream in the healthy ice cream section. Why was it there? Staring at me, the girl with pizza already in one hand? Some smart person had grabbed it, then made the healthier choice and put it away in the spot where the healthy ice cream they chose had once sat. I'm sure that they purchased some sort of fat free, 100 calorie per scoop "delight". I did what any tired, sick, ice cream craving girl would do. I bought the creamy triple berry cheesecake ice cream.

So now I'm sure you want to know just how much I ate. Surpisingly, I did not eat two servings of pizza (nevermind the half of a pizza that I would have typically consumed). I ate about one and a half servings and did look at the back of the box which told me that accounted for about 25ish grams of fat. YUCK. Why couldn't they have just made that same pizza with turkey pepperoni? It really would have tasted exactly the same and been so much healthier.

As for the ice cream, I probably had a cup and a half which is 3 servings. However, it turns out that my creamy "non-healthy" ice cream wasn't that unhealthy and thankfully this really wasn't that many calories and fat.

So in conclusion, probably the least healthy day I have had since starting this blog. Did I step on the scale this morning? NO fucking way! I intentionally forgot.

Another sick day

So my last post was on Thursday, which means that was Wednesday's meal. Now it's Saturday and I need to catch up.

Breakfast on Thursday:
2 pieces of toast with a little peanut butter. Fiber plus cinnamon oats with blueberries and half a banana and a glass of OJ


no morning snack, breakfast kept me wicked full

Lunch:
Leftover mac and cheese. I have finally put the other half of the pan in the freezer for another time. I am officially sick of mac and cheese.

Snack:
80 calorie cherry yogurt with about 1/8 cup of kashi cereal sprinkled on top

Dinner:
A piece of bread with ham and rice soup. Only ate about half the bowl. I am officially sick of ham too.

It turns out that leftover meals are great but when you are sick and don't want to cook anything new, you get really friggin sick of eating the same shit for more than 5 days.

You can lose weight while sitting on the couch

Who knew, apparently planting your ass on the sofa and eating soup and leftovers can help you lose weight. Or maybe blowing through two boxes of tissues in 24 hours had something to do with it. Either way, I'll take it! I saw 166 on the scale this morning. A familiar number but one that I haven't seen since before Christmas when I was doing Weight Watchers. I haven't been out of the 160's in years. I actually don't think I have seen any number starting with 15- since my first year of college when I was partying all the time. So I'm not that far away. If I can hang on at this pace, I just might break into that old group of tens. Of course getting rid of this damn cold would help. Working out was starting to become regular but now a workout means making my own soup or getting off the couch to go pee.

I spent the day yesterday on the couch, wallowing in my own mucasy misery. I wanted in the worst way to cave to familiar favorites like scrambled cheesy eggs, pasta covered in butter for lunch and dinner. But I didn't. Why? Because of my BFF's blog. She is going strong and being so good. I hit my weakest point in a week and her blog saved me and the scale this morning was my proof. Thank you Mandie!

Breakfast (on the couch):
Fiber plus cinnamon oats with blueberries and a small banana. Also had two pieces of low calorie toast which I am using up from my freezer before buying the healthy stuff. I put a thin smear of peanut butter on each, added a cup of 50/50 OJ and my multivitamin and a Zinc pill.

Snack - There wasn't one. That healthy, nutritious and balanced breakfast kept me full until like 1:00.

Lunch (also eaten on the couch):
Leftover improved nutrition mac and cheese. I also had what I thought was an orange until I peeled it. It appeared to be some sort of mini grapefruit which much to my liking was delicious and I hate grapefruit...so I go back to thinking perhaps it was a type of orange. I added some apple cider and tried to boost my lunch with some vitamins.


Snack - of course I had one. Pasta did not really hold me over and never does, even if I eat a half a box worth. So I had some fat free/sugar free pudding with a little whipped cream and some chocolate drizzle. It was yummy and looks pretty.





Dinner (again on the couch):
Leftover rice and ham soup made by my caring husband. Instead of crackers I opted for some Food Should Taste Good cheddar tortilla cracker/chip thingies. These things rock. So good for you and wicked yummy. Thanks to my dietitian sister, Katy Magoon for teaching me about these. And as you can see, there is that little cup of milk that I love so much.


I never eat on the couch unless it's Friday night which is our "fun food night". I learned a long time ago that eating in front of the TV in a comfortable place like the couch leads to overeating. You aren't talking to your dinner partner, you are involved in too much other stimulation and you end up overeating. So we eat most of our meals at the kitchen island. It gives us a chance to catch up on our day and talk without the stimulus of technology interrupting. Even when I'm home alone, I usually find myself eating in the kitchen but not when I'm sick. I'm a baby and want my blanket and a doggy to pat.

Sick day #1

Not feeling well so this post will not only be boring to read, but the food was not that interesting either.

Breakfast:
Coffee w/fat free half/half
Low fat vanilla yogurt w/fresh blueberries and some kashi go lean crunch on top

Snack:
Multi-grain goldfish. Probably two servings worth

Lunch:
Campbells chicken and stars soup w/oyster crackers

Dinner:
Bear Creak Wild Rice Soup with Ham and Love (Justin added the love and the ham) and a slice of lightly buttered potato bread. Oh, and a few oyster crackers.


I did have a very healthy day planned, an entire bag of food is sitting at the office filled with fruits and veggies but we went home early due to snow and today I am calling in because I feel like poo that has been run over.

Monday - Day Eight - Out with girls

Had big plans with great friends today for a day of snowshoeing...but first we went out to breakfast. I instantly did the right thing and ordered from the healthy section of the menu.

I had a one egg sandwich with low fat cheese and a tomato on a whole wheat bagel thin. Yes, apparently you can get this type of food at a restaurant. Much to my disappointment...but relief...it did not come with home fries. I was going to split a side of hash with Julie but when the waitress asked, I looked at my healthy friend and said we don't need that. Which was for the best, did I really want to burp up hash while snowshoeing?

After breakfast we went out on the trail in below freezing temps and had an awesome time trailblazing...and blazing off the trail...for three hours.

At this point it was well after lunch time so we went to Cary's house for some low calorie cocoa...which was gross so we added baileys and a scoop of fluff. Cary had beautiful salmon falls mugs and the cocoa and company rocked.

On my way home I had to stop for coffee, milk and a roof rake...and the whole time I had to pee but was still in snow pants and was STARVING!

I got home and got to lunch. I went right for the fast option and had a bowl of Kashi Go Lean Crunch with fresh blueberries.


The cereal did not hold me over to say the least. I mean honestly, I did just hike through the woods all morning. So I had a weight watchers toffee ice cream popsicle that was lingering in my fridge from Weight Watchers (you know, the journey before the blog journey). I then followed that with another cup of cocoa and fluff. While I didn't add any baileys to this cup, since I didn't have any, I did make a huge cup with full sugar/calorie cocoa. Not my best decision but it warmed me up.

The husband came home and asked that I make his lunch while he tried out the new roof rake outdoors. This of course means that I ate one and half pieces of cheese which I would have otherwise not had if he had made his own lunch. Damn it...I don't even like American cheese that much but I popped it right in my mouth like the fatty that I am.

Dinner was leftovers so it was the same thing we had last night: Ham, Mac & Cheese and Green Beans...and my lil' cup-o-milk :) Oh, and one bite of cranberry sauce.

Spent the rest of the night on the couch feeling like shit which made avoiding an after dinner snack easy

I hate food on weekends

I do so good all week. I can only eat what I bring to work so I do really good all day long and usually stick to it when I return home. Then along comes the weekend and I have free range in my fridge and cupboards to find that one unhealthy food in my house. Yesterday didn't go bad but clearly even fat free brownies can catch up with you b/c my weight went right back up over the weekend. So here's the proof to that ticker...

Breakfast:
I had coffee with light cream, not half and half b/c it's the weekend I decided when I managed to step down to fat free half and half that I would still let myself have light cream once a week. I also had egg whites with 1 oz of low fat cheddar and sundried tomatoes with two pieces of low calorie bread/toast and half a banana.

Lunch:
Veggie Lasagna with one piece of bread and a small glass of milk

Snack:
Dove into those damn brownies and not only added some whip cream but also added a drizzle of a chocolate sauce we were given for Christmas by our niece who made it. Didn't feel bad about this as I had just put in 2 miles on the treadmill with a run/walk/hill combo

Dinner:
Started by testing a cranberry muffin (the smallest one the batch made) I had just baked and was worried I had fucked up since I accidentally put in an extra teaspoon of baking soda. Thankfully the muffins are fine since they are my husbands breakfast all week.

Then we had a delicious lean ham. I only ate 2/3 of what you see pictured here, I decided I was full. We had green beans and mac and cheese. I made the common man recipe since it is so delicious. BUT...I altered it to make it a lot healthier. I used fat free half and half, 1% milk, and of the 16 ounces of cheese, only 3 of them were full fat cheddar. The remaining 13 ounces were low fat cheddar. I also used reduced fat parmesean for the top with the bread crumbs. And I used Barilla's protein pasta instead of plain old pasta. So I made an effort to healthy up a delicious recipe so I could still have it. It came out really yummy if you don't know what it could taste like but you could tell it was not full fat ingredients and the cheese flavor wasn't quite what we wanted it to be. However, you can expect many more posts about this mac and cheese b/c I have a 15x9 pan of it to eat.

After dinner Sunday snack:
This is a terrible habit of ours. We used to plan for it and actually buy dessert for Sunday since we always make a nice Sunday dinner. We had nothing in the house. Not a drop of ice cream, cookie...nothing...EXCEPT that one last brownie square. So I did what every girl would do and topped it with cool whip and peanut butter baking morsels. I took a picture but didn't have the card in my camera and am just now realizing that but this blog is my proof that I ate that.

Day Seven - Be Honest...You Are Only Lying to Yourself

Today was my first weekend day of healthy eating...which we all know can be a challenge since everything in the cupboard is within arms reach. Luckily I had my Damsel in Diet Stress with me most of the day to help me along and keep one another in check.

I started the day with groceries, even decided to make two new recipes for this week and cook a ham which is something I have never done. I bought one that clearly read lean to know I was getting a good healthy cut. I'm planning to mimic some of the Common Man Restaurant recipes this week but will be altering them in an effort to keep them healthy. For example, instead of regular half and half, I have bought fat free. I will use low fat cheddar instead of full fat and I bought healthy pasta instead of plain old pasta. My bacon is center cut which has 25% less fat than regular and I will use half the amount called for in the recipe.

Okay, the food. Breakfast was delicious and kept me super full...

Coffee with fat free half and half to start while out doing the groceries and dealing with bullshit at wal-mart (Don't EVER use their Tire and Lube department). Came home and made myself an omelet of sorts in the microwave with less than 1/4 cup of egg whites, 1 oz ,low fat cheddar, about 5 slices of turkey pepperoni, two sundried tomatoes, salt and pepper. Served with two low calorie slices of toast and one apple and a small glass of milk. This was delicious and will be repeated again. I was super pleased with how full it kept me.


Lunch...kinda.

My BFF came over to play and we had plans of eating healthy junk food which meant baking No Pudge Brownies. We got to baking right away and while the brownies cooled, we played Kinect which was tons of fun and we got exercise. Around 2:00 we were hungry for lunch...so we did what any two BFF's would do and decided to call the brownies lunch rather than eating an actual lunch. Now as bad as this sounds, if you saw what we would normally eat, this is a healthy decision. We are in the habit of eating good on our own but we get together and go HOGWILD with appetizers, main courses and desserts when we go out (not to mention the booze). So substituting brownies for lunch was in our minds better than lunch and the brownies. We each had a hearty serving with two dollops of whipped cream. We also had about 2-4 Food Should Taste Good cracker/chips. These were purchased at the suggestion of my dietician sister and were a great find! They were $3 a bag but I am very pleased with the flavor, texture and nutritional value. Not to mention, each cracker/chip is huge so you feel good about only needing to eat like two of them.


Snack: A few hours later...and after steady Kinect play
We of course reached for the brownies again but had a much smaller portion this time around. I calculate that in total we probably each had roughly 1/3 of the pan throughout the day which works out to a total of 480 calories for lunch and snack. Not too bad in reality.

Dinner, a healthier cheap fun food:
Frozen Chinese Food. Believe it or not, these are pretty good. The takeout box styles are yummier but not quite as healthy...unless you get the vegetable one which is scrumptious but gives me a tummy ache every single time. I ate approximately 1/3 of the total box for dinner but then did the right thing and passed out watching a movie which meant no late night snack.


And finally...since it was Saturday and all. I drank 4 beers. They were not light beers and they never will be. I hate light beer unless it's a hot summer day and I plan to drink 15-20 in one day (yes I can do this and have many times, no this is not a lot of beer if you are used to drinking GOOD beer and not beer flavored water in a can). For those that don't know, my husband and I brew our own beer...well...we are learning actually to brew good/drinkable beer. So far only about half of our homebrew has been drinkable. But we are working hard to conquer that and with the help of a new book (yup, we are reading books...shows our age), we will brew the best of the best GOOD beer. So I drank Red Hook Winter Ale which we discovered on Friday night when I had just one beer (after posting). This beer kicks ass and has earned it's way into my top five favorite beers...which for your pleasure I will now list but please note these are subject to change at any time as I am and will always be an avid beer drinker.

1. Gordon Ale (Oskar Blues)
2. Mojo (Boulder Beer Co.)
3. Punk'n (Four + Brewing Co.)
4. Midas Touch (Dogfish Head)
5. Winter Hook (Red Hook)

I'm quite certain that today was not a weight loss day...BUT...normally my BFF and I would have been so much worse. We find comfort in indulging together and are working hard to change that and be a support structure for one another. So I am not disappointed in the day.

Day Six

Did okay today, a few little office impulses but not bad. Going to try hard to behave over the three day weekend. I will have my blog buddy with me on Saturday which should help us hold each other to our posts and stay healthy and I am going snowshoeing on Sunday which should counteract anything I eat at breakfast with Cary before hand. Though I am planning on an egg white omelet with veggies and cheese...but haven't seen the menu yet to know for sure that I will go that route.

Breakfast 8:00am:
1 cup cooked oatmeal with sweetened cranberries and simply smart 2% milk

NO MORNING SNACK, I WASN'T HUNGRY UNTIL 15 MINUTES BEFORE LUNCH

Lunch Noon:
2 cups of quinoa salad, 1/2 tomato, 3/4 of a cucumber, a cheese stick and then I dove into some office baby shower leftovers and had a few bites of bread from the inside of a bread bowl and a few bites of salsa/sour cream/shredded cheese dip

Craving 2:15
one lonely hershey kiss

Impulse 3:00:
A candy from the box downstairs at work

Snack 4:30:
Trailbar

Dinner (not eaten yet):
Lasagna with one piece of low calorie bread and milk

That's it for today, it's Friday night which usually means "fun food friday" and a movie...tonight it will be healthy leftovers and Social Networking...just need the husband to get home now...

Day Five - A great success

Today went really well. I ate really healthy all day long. I even avoided cake and chips and dips and bagel bites and spinach balls at lunchtime when we had an office baby shower. GO ME! I stuck to the nutritious lunch I brought.

Breakfast 8:20:
Strawberry yogurt with oats and a banana. This seems to keep me full longer than most other breakfast foods. You will likely see a lot of repeat of this.

Snack 11:15:
Trailbar (I plan to make these again this weekend, but instead of oatmeal, perhaps crushing up a nutritious cereal)

Lunch 12:15:
Turkey salad made with celery and cranberries on low calorie bread with american cheese and a side of cottage cheese, roughly 1/3 cup. I ate one three bite size flat bread pepperoni pizza thingy at the baby shower. It was cold in one bite and burnt my tongue in another. Not worth it.

Snacks but I don't remember what time in the afternoon because I left my food list at work:
Apple
3 small pretzel rods

So now I got home and my husband was working late which meant preparing dinner, making lunches, paying bills and cleaning the kitchen. I made his lunch and didn't take ONE single bite of anything that went into the lunchbox. I seriously put the cheese on the bread and immediately closed it up. I didn't dive into the trail mix or eat a pickle. I saved my appetite for dinner...

Dinner 7:20pm:
Lasagna, made healthy and delicious and won a round of smiles out of the husband. I took my roasted vegetable lasagna recipe and altered it a little to add in chicken sausage. Here comes a series of lasagna building pictures for your enjoyment. I did find that trying to stretch one jar of sauce didn't work and I should have used more or added tomato puree or something.

Layer One: Roasted bell peppers, sauteed mushrooms, spinach and carrots, sprinkled with seasonings

Layer Two: Two chicken sausages sliced up and sprinkled with reduced fat mozzarella


Layer Three: Fat free ricotta, reduced fat parmesean, reduced fat mozzarella, fresh spinach, one egg

Top Layer: sauce and reduced fat mozzarella

Finished and finally time for dinner!

So dinner took so long that I did not get a workout in like I had planned but I intend to exercise all three day this weekend (I have Monday off..WAHOOOO!)

Exercise

So in addition to eating right, I plan to find ways to be active each week. Not following any program at all but instead doing what I feel like doing to be active, have fun and not get bored with a routine. So far the actual exercise isn't as productive as I want but my prep-work is in place.

We have purchased the kinect for our XBOX 360 and I love it. The games are a blast and a fun way to work your muscles. So far we have the sports game and I recently purchased the personal trainer game. Next time I have money, I'm purchasing the dancing game and will be engaging friends in this fun exercise.

Saturday afternoon I spent quite a bit of time playing the sports kinect game with my husband and mother in law. Unfortunately that was the day before starting my blog and we followed our exercise with steak and cheese and pizza but it was a lot of activity

Monday night I spent two hours unlocking achievements, doing cardio kickboxing and zen classes and setting up my personal trainer program. Holy shit, I forgot how many squats are involved in kickboxing and how much quad work is involved with yoga and tai chi. But it was fun and I broke a sweat.

I was going to work out tonight but then we got like 18 inches of snow. So instead I shoveled, twice and put on my snow pants to jump in thigh high deep snow with my doggies. Tons of fun and physical...not really a work out but not sitting on my ass facebooking so I'll take it.

I've been planning on getting up in the morning to walk on the treadmill a few days a week but the TV is no longer in the same room as the treadmill so I had to learn to put music on my MP3 player. Tonight the hubby showed me how and currently lots of great energy music is converting it's way to MP3 format for me .

So I hope to add an exercise component to this blog because with healthy eating, should be healthy lifestyle and that means getting physical.

Day Four

And today started with....drumroll please....homemade ice cream...after coffee that is. Gotta love the office environment and pressure from co-workers but honestly, how could I pass up Bruce's homemade peanut butter ice cream? So I had a portioned half cup at 8:15 this morning after spending over an hour driving to work in one hell of a snow storm. I risked my life this morning...for what...THE BEST ICE CREAM EVER! Thank you Bruce and thank you me for having a little and thank you to the rest of the office for finishing it before I had the option of going for an additional half cup full.

Then I did the right thing and ate my healthy breakfast at 8:45:
Strawberry yogurt with fiber one oat cereal and a banana

Snack 11:15:
trailbar

Lunch at noon:
Turkey salad sandwich that totally rocked. Used left over turkey (of course right), light mayo and bulked it with celery and dried cranberries followed by a sprinkle of celery seed. Added a piece of american cheese and put in on my low calorie bread. For Katy - I am using up what I have so that I don't waste (apparently there are starving people out there, I'm just not one who has ever let myself get to the starving point). I will not buy low calorie unhealthy bread again :) So anyway, had some celery on the side with a laughing cow wedge and 1/4 cup of low fat cottage cheese. Bummed one small meatball from a co-worker and polished off lunch with two hershey kisses from the front of the office. Didn't exactly stick to the lunch I planned but kept my splurge in moderation with only one meatball and two kisses.

Snack 4:15:
6 Garlic triscuits, 2 oz low fat cheddar, 6 slices of turkey pepperoni (note only five are picture b/c I ate one while making it) This fatty couldn't wait until the picture was taken to show you all 6 mini sandwiches. Also had one bite of a trail bar.


Dinner 6:00:
Turkey soup with a small hand full of oyster crackers and as always, my little cup-o-milk

It's 7:52 and I'm hungry...but trying not to have that late night snack...while my husband sits next to me and eats the final quarter of a pint of carrot cake Ben and Jerry's.

He kindly says, "Can I have this?".
I immediately say, "NO, that's my fucking ice cream."
"But you are on a diet." he replys (for the record, I'm not on a diet). He walks away saying what the fuck, there is barely anything in here....

At which point I let him eat it because it wasn't a full pint and I was saving a full pint for my safety PMS net...apparently there is not a full pint left though... :( My dog is now enjoying licking the empty container while I still sit here hungry. I can hear the cereal calling me from the kitchen.

Today's conclusions:
1. I need to buy an ice cream maker
2. Turkey salad sandwiches rock when you add cranberries
3. We have no more B&J...but it's probably for the best
4. No wonder my dogs fart, we let them lick ice cream containers

Hope you all head a healthy day :)

Trailbars Recipe

Everyone seems to want to make a homemade trail bar. Here is the recipe but you could mix it up and change the type of fruit or nuts to suit your tastebuds.

2 1/2 cups rolled oats
3/4 cup of dates or figs or raisins
1 tsp. cinnamon
1/2 cup honey (warmed for 20-30 seconds in microwave to syrup consistency)

Put oats, fruit and cinnamon in food processor, pulse while slowly adding honey until combined (wet and sticky).

Add 2/3 cup of nuts. I used sliced almonds and peanuts. Toast nuts on 325 in oven for 15 minutes to enhance flavor if desired.

Add 1 cup of dried fruits. I used pomegranate juice infused cranberries and a medley of mixed dried fruit.

Stir in the nuts and fruite or pulse a few times to mix.

Squeeze into a ball. Line a 9x9 or 9x12 pan with foil. Spray foil with oil. Press mixture into pan until flat. Freeze in freezer for 20 minutes. Remove, turn over on a cutting board and cut into desired sizes and bag or wrap each bar.

See my snacks from this week's posts for a picture of the final product.

ENJOY!!!!

Day Three

It must feel good (Justin)

What? (Me)

Knowing you inspired someone... (Justin)

It does feel good. My blog is helping someone. I inspired someone else on a weight loss journey to start their own blog, to get their feelings about food, self image, self confidence and life out on paper (electronic paper but paper). When I started this blog it never occurred to me that it could help others. I did it to help myself. Sounds selfish...but ya know, it's okay to step back once in awhile and put yourself first.

So I read my friends blog, she is an amazing writer, always has been. It reminded me how much I used to love to write, like ten years ago. I used to sit in my bedroom and write thoughts, poems, diaries. I even wanted to be a journalist at one point. It feels good to be writing...blogging. It's like somehow I get to say what I want that day and maybe someone will read it, maybe they wont. It doesn't matter because I can say what I want.

Okay, on to the food portion of the day. Not too exciting today but on the healthy train. I like to save money by using what I have bought so I eat a lot of variety of the same foods until I grocery shop again.

Breakfast 8:30 am (went right into a meeting and didn't have time to eat it first):
Coffee with fat free half and half (not great but I'm trying to get used to it, I still plan to use cream on weekends for a treat). Strawberry yogurt with fiber plus oat cereal and a banana. It was so delicious, this will be tomorrow's breakfast too because I LOVED it.

Snack 10:30:
Homemade Trailbar (yes, the recipe is coming and will be posted on facebook too)

Lunch: 12:00
Quinoa salad w/tomato again but with some turkey to help keep me fuller than yesterday and two slices of low calorie bread (35 cals each) with spray butter. This was a great choice, I stayed completely full all afternoon and didn't need a snack at all


non-snack 2:30:
a non-snack is when you want one, you aren't hungry but want one and win and don't give in :)

5:30:
two spoonfuls of turkey salad (eaten while making tomorrow's lunch). My biggest downfall is sampling my next day's lunch while I make it and even worse...sampling my husbands which is usually heavier in calorie dense foods. I did not however cave to the deli cheese which I ALWAYS eat a piece of.

Dinner 6:00:
Turkey soup. Made from a bag but added our own fresh turkey and celery. Crackers and a slice of low calorie bread with 1/2 tablespoon of butter (the real stuff, not spray) and of course my little cup of milk. I have to have my milk but before this blog, my cup was often three times the size you see here.

After dinner snack 8:30: weight watchers toffee pop

So I have totally had a good day of healthy food. I got on the scale this morning and I'm down nearly three pounds since Saturday. This past Saturday I hit the all too familiar group of tens that is usually my breaking point. I'm glad to have gotten back on track before that number could start rounding its way up.

I have no intention of counting calories, points, carbs, etc... I am not going to count anything...except to count on myself to learn to eat healthy, balanced, properly portioned meals and snacks.

Danielle

Day Two

Today was the first day where I had to pack my food and bring it with me and avoid any other food that entered my office world. Thankfully there were no bagels, donuts etc... to greet me this morning.

I stuck to my planned breakfast...

Low-fat strawberry yogurt, half a banana, homemade trail bar


Surprisingly made it through most of the morning without feeling hungry. At about 11:15, decided I needed something to get me through to lunch...

Banana (ya, I know, you are so bummed there is picture of a banana)

Lunch went as planned, decided to heat up my quinoa salad today and add a tomato. Had a cucumber on the side with about 1/4 cup of low fat cottage cheese. Best cucumber I have had since this summer, somehow it was super fresh even in winter.


And....lunch held me over for not even an hour. I found myself in the afternoon rut with a growling stomach and a bloated gassy feeling...WTF man?!?!?! So along came a snack...

5 small pretzel sticks (again, I know you are sad there is no picture). They were snyders as always but I don't know what kind since they were the scraps left from Justin's lunch last week.

And of course caved to that cute little blue and white plaid candy basket out front and had only ONE...honestly, only ONE Hershey fun size bar. It just seemed to go with the salty pretzels from the 15 minutes before.

Had an apple at 3:35 in an effort to boost my sugars and go home with energy to EXERCISE.

Dinner was left overs (something you should get used to b/c I like to cook one to three times a week and stop cooking by Friday).


Roughly 3 ounces of turkey, about a half cup of potatoes, about one third cup stuffing, a few tablespoons of cranberry sauce, less than two table spoons of gravy (ya, I'm proud of this) and a handful of baby carrots. And of course milk on the side.


It's 8:28 and I spent my after dinner time breaking in my new kinect personal trainer game for almost two hours. Now to fight that late night desire for snack...which I failed at last night and had a weight watchers toffee ice cream thingy that I dug out of the far back of the freezer...but hey...I didn't choose the final pint of carrot cake Ben and Jerry's so I'm not feeling too bad about it.

Day One.

I knew this blog was coming and in turn prepared for it with a trip to the grocery store this morning. I hope to post pictures, thoughts, feelings etc... regarding my day and the foods I consumed.

Brunch: Coffee w/fat free half & half, Lowfat strawberry yogurt w/kashi cereal, half a banana, scrambled egg whites w/black beans, purple onion, corn, quinoa, sundried tomatoes and 50% reduced fat cheddar.

This was so delicious, completely satisfying but I should have had it earlier and not at 11am when I had already been up and moving for nearly four hours.


Lunch: Quinoa Salad (quinoa, black beans, purple onion, corn) topped with a touch of 50% reduced fat cheese

Ate this with my mom today while we did crafts. Delicious and made enough to have this for lunch most of the week.

Snack: homemade trail bar

Forgot to take a picture but these are a new favorite of mine and so healthy, picture to follow later this week when I eat one again.

Dinner: Roasted turkey w/about 2 tablespoons of gravy, mashed potatoes made w/butter and 1% milk w/1 tbls. of gravy, stuffing, broccoli, cranberry sauce, milk

Justin made me dinner, made it a point to use a small dinner plate to I couldn't over do it and tried to fill the plate with broccoli first so that I wouldn't pile on the potato and stuffing. The turkey was moist and amazing, first time we have done a turkey in our rotisserie.

I feel good about today's food choices. Breakfast should have been eaten earlier and dinner was heavy than it needed to be but all in all, not a bad first day

Maybe this will work

I've tried everything imaginable to lose weight...over...and...over...and...over again. But nothing works, at least not for longer than a few months. So I'm trying something new. FOOD ACCOUNTABILITY. Now you can all see what I eat, why I go up ten and down ten and ultimately back up each and every year.

Every January 1st, half the damn country makes a "resolution" to lose weight. Not me, I always swear that I will just eat healthy and exercise and make a resolution that is more important than a stupid diet that I won't follow anyway. For the record, my resolution this year is to manage my stress level in a healthy way.

But of course I have those damn holiday pounds floating around my mid-section. This year I managed to gain seven of them in the month of December. So I spent the first week of the year eating everything delicious and bad for me that was left in the refrigerator. The refrigerator ran out so I guess it's time to eat something good for me and find a new way of life.

Here I go...