Me

Me

Friday, January 14, 2011

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...

Thursday, January 13, 2011

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!)

Wednesday, January 12, 2011

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 :)

Tuesday, January 11, 2011

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

Monday, January 10, 2011

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.

Sunday, January 9, 2011

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...