4/30/2008

Activia Yogurt

This morning starts out with a cup of green tea and some vanilla yogurt. I am really going to work on not eating unless I am hungry. And I'm going to the gym this afternoon, probably around 2pm.



Also, I guess I should review Activia yogurt because I just bought some from the store. I am torn between the low fat version and the regular fat version and not because of the fat content. You see the low fat version is full of fake sugar and the regular version is filled with fake sugar in the form of high fructose corn sugar. Why do they think this is okay?

I enjoy the flavor, it has a nice vanilla-cookie taste to it but I'm going to stick to the organic stony brook flavor from now on because it is not made with bad ingrediants.

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4/29/2008

on and off

Its no suprise that my biggest mistake with my weight loss efforts is that fact that I go on and off so often and so quickly. The off time quickly starts getting longer than the on time and then its just a cycle. I realize this on some level, but not enough to obviously stop doing it.

Remember when I wrote about the gym every single day? I was on fire, and it was so wonderful. I felt good and not foggy. My muscles burned. I loved it, and then this job stuff happened and then I didnt go for a few days and now I'm baking banana bread and figuring out where I went wrong.

sigh sigh sigh. What needs to happen? Fewer off days from the gym, no more than two days in a row. Period. More good "on" diet days. Fewer off days.

Its annoying and I feel like as soon as I saw the scale going down, I suddenly gave myself permission to eatttttt and not go to the gym.

It ends here. I did walk a lot today, we walked a lot. Its hard to tell how much, but the amount of walking that makes your legs hurt.

So this whole off cycle ends tonight. Thats all I wanted to say, have a lovely evening.

PS: give me some of your getting back into gear tips, pahleassse!

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4/28/2008

Snack Attack: Pretzel Crisp Review


I first tried a pretzel crisp at Weight Watchers back when I used to buy those $5 boxes of snacks to feel good about myself and my weight loss efforts. They came in a box of 6 packets and were honey mustard flavor. Let me tell you, they were delicious, but not worth what I paid for them.

I'm not a big fan of fakey diet food snack packs for about a hundred reasons, but I'm human and I like snacks on occasion. Yesterday I discovered a bag of pretzel crisps at the little store down the blobk with more crips for a fraction of the price! I got the plain pretzels and served them with about 2 tbls or hummus. Oh hummus, who knew mashed chickpeas would ever taste so good?

Anyway, I give these the Token Fat Girl seal of approval. At 110 calories per serving of 11 crips I find them to be a satisfying and delightful snack that I don't want to over eat. Yes, I said delightful, now if only I could find the hot wing flavor.

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Forgiveness breakfast


After a day of indulgences the next morning I wake up ravenous for food! I don't know why, but if I've spent the day eating foods in excess I tell myself "yogurt and carrots for a week!". We all know how well that works out. As it turns out, my go-to day after too much food get your ass back in gear breakfast is protein, with a side of protein. My body does not like too many carbs, however my mouth does. Deep down I feel like I need to start the day off with a punishment breakfast in the form of an apple or a little container of yogurt. This in turn makes me curse my fat and my inability to eat just one cookie. But, it was just one day and high ho, onward I must go...

Turkey bacon and eggs it is!

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Monday, monday: self-employment at its best

I hope you enjoyed the southwestern egg roll recipe from yesterday. Let me know if you make any, I'd love to here how they turn out!

So, its monday. Agh. Actually this Monday is very different for me than other Mondays because of some recent work issues I took the leap over to self-employment. Which means more blogging by me and more weight loss goodness around here. And more, well, weight loss by me!

I'm holding steady around 273. Looks like the 270 was just water weight, but never fear 273 is great! I got down their recently after my freakish flu in March and shot right back up to 278-281 there after. Now I know its due to hard work. IE: exercise and food counting.

Yesterday was a bit of a food free for all for me, as I feel like I'm recoverig from the shock of my work decision. Which in my world means more eating. But it was temporary and snickerdoodles + Mexican food aside I'm ready to continue kicking ass.

Have I mentioned that I'm getting married? I have? Oh, sorry I get repetitive at times. But, in nine months I will be marrying my lovely Joshie and back on April 10th I realized that if I lose just 11 lbs. a month until February 10th I could be down to 168. Whattttt?

Yes thats right 168. Let me honest here, 190 would be good, 168 is like rolling on the ground good. So far I'm on that path to get there. On April 10th I weight 278, and on May 10th I need to weigh 267. I'm at 273 now, thats 6 lbs in about two weeks. We'll see. But, regardless my goal this week is to exercise every day with one day off. And since my week started yesterday and I didn't exercise that means everyday this week until Sunday. I've done it before and can do it again! More good days than bad I keep telling myself.

More good days, fewer bad days.

Does anyone else out there want to share their goals for the week?

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4/27/2008

Southwestern egg roll recipe

I love Southwestern egg rolls! I knew I could make them healthier by baking them instead of frying and still taste just as delicious. I used pre-cut won ton wrappers from the store, but you can also use tortilla shells.


chicken and cheese! mmm








(click recipe to enlarge for printing!)

PS: spray your pan with non-stick cooking spray before baking
Nutrition: 41 calories each
or 4 points for 5

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4/21/2008

banana nut smoothie

I love it when food is both delicious and easy to make. This smoothie is so nice in the morning. Really, truly delicious. I just had this, and I might be glowing.

You change the ingredients around to suit your taste.

Banana nut smoothie:

1 large banana (or two small)
1 tsp. cinnamon
8-10 walnut halves
4-6 ice cubes
4 oz. low fat vanilla yogurt

Blend or process until smooth.

How easy is that? Its kind of thick, but if you want to thin it out add some skim milk. Also, for a nutrition boost add a tablespoon of ground flax seeds. You could also use pumpkin puree instead of bananas.

Nutrition:
350 calories
15 fat (mostly from walnuts)
4 fiber
7.5 grams protein

7.5 points

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4/20/2008

I can't believe it!


Hello! Its me! Guess what?

You might not believe it.

I exercised every day last week. 6 days in a row. I went to the gym when I was tired, feeling lazy, or just simply didn't want to go. It was apart of my challenge (www.muffintoes.com) goal this past week. In order to get points, I had to work out every day. No matter what.
And I did it! Everyday that I went into the gym I seemed to expect some sort of ticker tape parade or the gym attendents to break out in song and dance that I was there again and again and again.

It didn't happen, but I'm giving myself a pat on the back for it. I wasn't motivated to go, but I was driven to go. I didn't give myself another alternative. I'm taking the day off today, but I'm headed into another week of gym days, no matter what. I was doing 40-60 minutes of cardio + strength training every couple of days.

So, this week I'm going to go to the gym+not eat out at all. I like setting week-long goals, of things I can't do or have to do no matter what. It's like playing that game when I was a kid with the balloon, you know, the one where you could not let the balloon hit the ground or you would just absolutely die! Okay, its not that intense, but its like I these rules and guidelines are helping me. Sort of how when I do some weird diet I'm driven just because there are foods I can't eat.

My weight goal is to be back down to 273 by May 2nd. Lately I've been depending the scale less, but I know I go back and forth between 277 and 281. I've calculated that if I lose 11lbs a month until Feb. 10th, I could be at 168 lbs. I can picture this, I really want to make this happen!

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4/08/2008

Focus

Ahh, my post earlier was pretty much a repeat of the post from a couple of days ago. I didn't even realize it until just now and had to laugh at myself for talking about the same things over and over again. Well besides this whole being fat thing.

No more repeat posts, I promise. Now, I have to go and focus on some projects. This entry was probably procrastination of some sort. I'm sure of it. Its almost 4:30, I'm going to the gym...

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Quick challenge update

The challenge is going really well. You can visit us at www.muffintoes.com if you're interested. It gets updated at least 3-5 times a day.

In more recent exercise news I've discovered dance dance revolution. I really like the customizable workout programs where you can set calories burned. I set it recently to burn 400 calories, and I wonder if I really did? I guess I'll never know, but I've been reading a lot of stories about people who have lost weight playing this game. I woke up the next day after playing it and I felt very sore all over, especially in my arms. It felt as though I did hours of intense weight lifting the day before.

I have a hard time equating this as "real" exercise, even though it is face paced movement. I guess I'm in the mind set that exercise has to be hard and not fun. I'm going to the gym today at 4:30. I have it written down and scheduled in. I am working on time management, which I know is something I talk a lot about. I guess I just sort of suddenly and alarmingly realized that time is going by a lot faster than I'd like and in a few short months I will be moving and self-employed. And then a few months after that I will be getting married. I have no idea where my path will lead me, but I am defiantly trying to figure out how to prepare for all of this now, while trying to lose weight and working 40 hours a week. I'm working on a motivational poster right now, something to hang up as a reminder that this is what I'm doing and why I'm doing it. A visual of my goals.

Anyhow, I made some really great greek turkey burgers last night that I will post the recipe for this evening. I need to make my blogging rounds today and visit some new bloggers that have been popping by lately.

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4/04/2008

Healthy Thursdays: What to do with left over chicken

I had some baked chicken breast left over from last nights dinner and thought I would add it to homemade tomato sauce. This was really good and an easy way to use left over chicken that probably would have been tossed out.

Sauce Ingredients:

1.5 tbs. olive oil (cut back to 1 tbsp. if you prefer)
1 (14 oz) can diced tomatoes
salt to taste
basil and garlic to your preference
1 tbsp. parmesan cheese

heat oil on medium, add basil and garlic until fragrant. Lower heat, add tomatoes. Simmer for about 10 minutes crushing the tomatoes with a wooden spoon. Stir in parmesan cheese.

While the sauce simmers. Put your chicken breast (cut up a bit) into a food processor and pulsate about 5 times. Add this to your sauce and continue to simmer for about 5 minutes. Serve hot over spaghetti noodles. Add cheese and a dash of hot sauce if you prefer, and congratulate yourself for not wasting chicken.

Enjoy!

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4/03/2008

Where does the time go?

Its been awhile hasn't it? About two weeks to be exact. I've been busy, or busy trying to figure out how to better manage my time. It wasn't that long ago that we decided to move to the rural town of Floyd, VA which at the time was like "oh! its so far away. 8 months. We've got plenty of time". And now I somehow find myself in April and I'm becoming a bit more frantic. Being frantic isn't exactly productive, so I had to tell myself to calm down.

Anyhow, today I find myself at the weight of 277 (I checked this morning) a bit up from the flu inducing 273.5 of two weeks ago. I also realize that I have a lot on my plate right now, and if I'm going to get it all done I really need to manage my time better. And that includes blogging more often.

What exactly do I have going on? Well, I plan on being self-employed come September. The idea of being self-employed is equal parts exciting and scary. And then, I may have mentioned that I am getting married in a year and I still have arms the size of Kansas! Oh, yeah and I'm still working 40 hours a week and working on a million projects for making money in September. And and and. But, this is all good stuff and a good direction so I am very much staying positive about it all.

How is the diet going? It just so happens that I started a 12-week weight-loss challenge yesterday with two of my closest friends (one lives in WV, the other in DC.) We are actually documenting the whole thing on another blog, which I will post the link to as soon as we get some of the bones finished. The challenge goes until June 25th, which works nicely with my plan to be in the 240's in June. I'm really excited about this, to have accountability and motivation in some fresh new ways. We are working everything on a point system to measure our success and to determine who the winner is. I will blog about my progress here as well, of course.

For example, we get two points for every 30 minutes of exercise we do, 2 points for staying within our food guidelines (1500-1700 calories for me), 1 point for posting food points, etc. I've started going back to the gym which has been a welcome re-addition to my life. I really feel like the gray cloud of winter has started to fade and its defiantly lifting my spirits and creating some new motivation to exercise in my life.

Oh Spring, how I've missed you!

Todays Lunch:



540 Calories. Yup, thats white bread.

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