May 21 food and exercise

Confession: B and I had a bowl of ice cream last night.

Breakfast: bowl of HN Cheerios/Golden Puffs with a 1/3 of a banana, full-fat milk

Two string cheeses, a granola bar, and some banana bread.

Lunch: two strawberries and about 8 or 9 cherries.

A few Guittards.

Dinner: 1 taco

Ice cream for dessert.

Exercise: we FINALLY went on a walk this morning (the Boys and I) for about an hour. It was finally not too hot, not too windy, we were finally not feeling sick (or rather, I was finally not feeling sick), and we were finally not too lazy! Felt good.

I've Slacked Off

Yeah, I know. I'm so bad. I took a week "off"...which is kind of an oxy-moron because I don't feel like I've really been "on" since I joined this blog. I'm kind of ambivalent about changing my eating habits! I KNOW I need to get myself committed to this.

Anyways, yesterday I can't remember well but I did eat fairly healthy and did my 'Shred' exercise video.

Today I did 30 minutes on the stationary bike. Not great exercise but some is better than none. I have an easier time motivating myself to do the bike because then I can read at the same time. I get bored with exercise otherwise, plus reading takes my mind off the fact that I'm tired and well, that I HATE exercising!

Breakfast: kashi granola and skim milk

Lunch: bowl of soup, two Ritz crackers

Dinner: cheesy chicken (awesome recipe...yum), green beans, some cucumber and red pepper slices, and cauliflower.

Snacks throughout day: approximately 10 cinnamon bears, strawberries, an orange

I still have the evening ahead of me but I'm planning to only eat some more raw veggies if anything.

May 20 food and exercise

Breakfast: bowl of Honey Nut Cheerios/Golden Puffs with 2% milk


2 string cheeses and a granola bar


Lunch: toasted-cheese sandwich, 3 strawberries, and a few cherries. A couple of coookies afterward.

String cheese and granola bar.

Dinner: a taco and a piece of fudge.

Exercise: again, nada. I am finally over the vertigo, mostly over the cough (about 95% over it), mostly over the runny/stuffy nose (about 98% over it)... and now M and I are feeling funky in our tummies. At least today wasn't quite so hot as the other days. I even weighed myself this afternoon (when my weights are usually higher than my morning weights [when I take my official weight]), and I was only 0.8 lbs. above my starting weight. So I felt much better about it than I did on Sunday morning, when I was up 3 something pounds. If it's the heat to blame, thank Heavens it's cooling down, at least a few degrees!

May 19 food and exercise

Breakfast: bowl of HoneyNut Cheerios and 2% milk (out of fat-free) with a banana.

Snack: banana, a few almonds (dry-roasted and unsalted)

Lunch: peanut butter and jam sandwich, about 3 bites of lemon yogurt (can you tell M did the yogurt-serving?), and a couple of pieces of fudge (about 1-inch cube).

Snack: oats and honey granola bar, string cheese, and a saltine cracker.

Dinner: pot roast and salad (the usual salad stuff).

May 17 food and exercise

Ok, let me see if I can remember today's food. Breakfast was a bowl of Nums and 2% milk (all out of fat-free and we forgot to get some while grocery shopping today!). Had a string cheese and some pretzels on our way to the theater (to see Prince Caspian. AWESOME show. Loved it.). Brent got us some popcorn (I haven't had movie theater popcorn in forever. At first it was yummy, but soon it was quite oily and I didn't need more.). I had a little over one bear claw after grocery shopping. But here's the creme de la creme:

DINNER: salad, consisting of dry-roasted and unsalted almonds (my fave), raisins, cauliflower, celery, carrots, tomatoes, pretzels and cucumbers, dressed with Asian Silk vinaigrette, one of WishBone's Salad Spritzers. Oh my GOSH, have you guys tried the Salad Spritzers? They were on sale today, so we tried them, and for one thing, the Asian Silk is YUMMY, and for another thing, it is only ONE calorie per spray, and I only needed three or four sprays! AMAZING! First of all, today was so blasted hot (and alas, we have no air conditioning in this house. The fans only move around the hot air. It's sad) that I did NOT want to cook (haven't wanted to cook since about Wednesday I think. Blasted heat. What happened to our 70-degree weather??), so this salad was sooooo refreshing and cool, and what a wonderful plus that my dressing didn't kill the health of the rest of it! HURRAY! So, I recommend that you all try the Salad Spritzers and tell me what you think. I am 100% pleased. That's it for now.

Exercise: Just walking around the grocery store I'm afraid. Yesterday I did a bit more walking, but when I weighed myself this morning, I was up an insane amount of pounds. I haven't eaten as badly this week as I have in other weeks, and I have exercised more this week than the last few... is the heat making me expand? I am going to try to not have dessert tonight (I have my Sunday School lesson to prepare, so I don't think we'll be watching a movie or anything that would tempt me to dessert), so I really am hoping that when I weigh myself tomorrow morning, I'll see better results, but if the heat is playing part, then I don't know what to expect, because it's been 75° by 8am the last few days. UGH. I like 70° and that's it! But anyway, can't change the weather. Ciao!

May 15 food and exercise

I'm melting, I'm melting! And the only source of cold I can find is the carton of ice cream in the freezer that is fast-dwindling. Ah, save me!

Breakfast: bowl of cereal with half a banana.

Half a banana.

Lunch: fruit salad and green salad (same as yesterday's dinner). Banana shake (banana, ice, cinnamon, a bit of Ovaltine powder that the Boys suggested, a spoonful of sugar, and milk).

Two string cheeses, a bite of ice cream and some cookies. (Yes, some. I hang my head in shame...)

Dinner: A bowl of Nums.

Exercise: Nada. Kind of a difficult evening.

May 14 food and exercise

It's been a crazy few days; sorry for the absence. I don't remember what I've eaten really, but I do know that I did 1.25 miles on the ellliptical Monday night at resistances 3 and 4, as well as my usual stretches and moves on the exercise ball afterward.

Today:
Breakfast: 3/4 bowl of cereal with a banana.

2 string cheeses.

Lunch: slice of pizza, half a Subway sandwich that Brent brought home last night after his meeting. Piece of homemade fudge.

A few more snitches of fudge.

Dinner: Fruit salad (bananas, apples and pineapple -- no dressing of any kind) and green salad (lettuce, cauliflower, cucumbers, raisins, crushed tortilla chips, and Romano Basil dressing. Not as good as Romano Cheese, but it was on sale.)

Oh, and I had a glass or two of orange juice with cayenne pepper. Still trying to fight this cold.

Not sure if I'll exercise tonight. It's so hot, and my eyes are killing me. I can't tell if I've got pink-eye or if I'm developing an allergy. Great...

Forgive me, Glenites...

for I have sinned. It has been 10 days since my last confession.

So my family just left this morning. They had been visiting since last Wednesday. It was wonderful having them here, but whenever family is in town, or whenever I visit family, I eat like a maniac! I am uncontrollable. I eat anything and everything I want, everything I normally deprive myself of. This past week was no exception. You name it, I had it-brownies, cookies, pizza, ice cream, Red Robin's bruschetta chicken burger, mongolian stir-fry, an AMAZING (if I do say so myself, since I cooked it!) Mother's Day dinner of beef roast, pork roast, oven roasted onion red potatoes, mashed potatoes, and potatoes cooked all day long in the crockpot (we like our potatoes over here!), beans, rolls, and to finish it off, my sister-in-law's absolutely decadent Texas sheet cake and my mother's best friend equally sinful pumpkin chocolate chip cake. AND PLENTY OF IT.

I was nervous to step on the scale this morning, but to my surprise and glee this whole fiasco only cost me 3 1/2 pounds. I was expecting double that, so I'll take it. Now I need to go back to my old routine so I can get back on the losing track. Only 11 weeks til the wedding!

The Day Before Mother's Day

We always go out for Mother's Day lunch on the Saturday before. So it was a very BAD day for me!

Breakfast: leftover pizza

Lunch: Vermont Cheddar bacon burger (mmmm), fries, a few bites of Bentley's sundae

Dinner: leftover fries from lunch

Exercise: jumped on the trampoline with the kids for a while. As good as it got today!

May 9

Exercise: housecleaning. Lots of serious housecleaning.

oatmeal, chocolate milk

Italian wedding soup

two slices pizza

May 9 food and exercise

Breakfast: 2 bowls Marshmallow Mateys (my weakness in breakfast cereals!) with fat-free milk

String cheese

Lunch: Peanut butter and honey sandwich, 1 slice banana bread, and a few nachos with salsa

Granola bar, some Guittards

Dinner: Cheesy Bow-Tie Treasures

Exercise: Nada. Felt awful again today. Will this &*%$ ever stop? Driving me bonkers man. Brent and I will probably split a bag of popcorn tonight.

Yesterday (May 8)

Didn't get a chance yesterday so here's the catch up:

Exercise: 45 minutes stationary bike

Oatmeal and chocolate skim milk

orange

Chicken tetrazzini, broccoli, salad

dry kashi

ice cream sandwich (this is what happens if I'm up past 10 pm...I lose my willpower!)

May 8 food and exercise

Breakfast: Marshmallow Mateys/Honey Nut Cheerios with fat-free milk

String cheese and a pickle coin-thing. But alas, the pickles have gone bad, methinks, so I must throw them out.

Lunch: more fried rice from last night, 2 slices of banana bread, and two spoons of peach yogurt. Oh, and a dark chocolate Kissable from Maria. Milk chocolate is still the best. (Alas, Maria has left us now, and it is sad.)

2 granola bars and a string cheese.

Dinner: Nachos

Guittards, some peppermint candies, and a couple more granola bars. Yikes.

Exercise: I am writing this at 8:42 in the morning, so this may not happen by the time the day is done, but I am hoping to exercise today. The vertigo is getting a bit better, so if I can stay awake long enough, I hope to get on the elliptical. I've been eating so terribly this week.

Did 1.25 miles on the elliptical at resistance 4.

May 7 food and exercise

Breakfast: Honey Nut Cheerios and fat-free milk. Glass of orange juice with cayenne pepper.

String cheese.

Lunch: spaghetti, peach yogurt, a few apples, and some pretzels. Finished it off with another yummy Millionaire Bar.

A couple of pretzels, and way too many snitches of the Millionaire Bars.

Dinner: Chinese Chicken Fried Rice, two strawberries.

Exercise:
None. Slept pretty much all day thanks to the vertigo medicine.

May 6 food and exercise

Breakfast: Bowl of Honey Bunches of Oats/ Honey Nut Cheerios combo, fat-free milk. Orange juice with cayenne pepper (if any of you saw my post "Speed" on Slamaville yesterday, you'll know that my voice is gone and I'm attempting to fight off a possible oncoming cold).

Lunch: granola bar, potato soup, and peach yogurt.

Dinner: Spaghetti and corn.

A few Guittards and a few Andes Peppermint Crunch pieces, a Millionaire Bar, and some pretzels.

Exercise: Not today. I'm still fighting this vertigo/dizziness/head-cold/laryngitis/whatever-in-heck-it-is. AND I JUST GOT HICCUPS. BLAST.

May 6

Breakfast: two cereal straws

Lunch: leftover mac and cheese

Snack: two more cereal straws

Dinner: chicken, salad

Snack: popcorn

A word on the cereal straws: They. Are. AWESOME! I don't know if any of you have tried them. I had not. But my four-year-old begs every time we go to the store and they were on sale this week so I thought what the heck. I got the cocoa crispies kind. They taste like cereal NOT AT ALL. They totally taste like those yummy Pepperidge Farm cookies. Granted, they have virtually no nutritional value. However, they are only 45 calories each. So if you want a yummy snack, they are a good bet. Granted, eating two at a time twice a day is not the way to go. But if I every actually get good at sticking to this diet thing, nibbling one at the end of the day for a sweet treat may be just the ticket. I definitely recommend giving them a try.

May 5 food and exercise

Breakfast: Honey Bunches of Oats and fat-free milk.

Snack: a few Guittards and a string cheese.

Lunch: burrito; salad of carrots, celery and cauliflower with Romano and Basil dressing; strawberries with whipped cream and chocolate.

Dinner: YUMMY potato soup that Maria made for the Boys last week. They took one look at it tonight and said, "Not me! Me not have that!" I don't know what they were thinking, 'cause it was, as always, divine, and sooo hit the spot after a rough day. Also, carrots, celery and cauliflower, and some soda crackers.

Dessert: Oh dear. A very rough evening. So after grocery shopping, I had a granola bar, and then a piece of banana bread with cream cheese, and then a bowl of ice cream while drowning my sorrows in more hilarious episodes of Seinfeld. I'm getting Maria addicted to them too, I think. Hurray for the complete set on DVD!

Exercise: Well, chasing the Boys around various stores while running errands, going grocery shopping and walking down the dog food aisle, the soda aisle, and the ice cream aisle for no reason other than to get steps. Yea, not much exercise going on.

May 5

Okay, so Glenn Beck's wonderful advice notwithstanding, I had a fairly bad week last week. I exercised several times but didn't really eat right. I think I was feeling too guilty to even blog it in. I consider myself lucky that I stayed at the same weight and didn't gain anything back. Kirsten, I admire so much that you actually kept track of the food you ate while you were away!

Today's exercise: 45 minute walk (that I actually dragged myself out of bed at 6 am for! ...I am not a morning person at ALL).

Breakfast: Kashi Honey Almond Flax cereal (dry)

Lunch: minestrone soup

Dinner: grilled pork chop (small), two mini corn muffins, corn on the cob, homemade mac and cheese (which as we all know it is not possible to resist), some grapes and orange slices.

Snack: two of those yucky sandwich cookies...I don't even like them so I'm unsure why I ate them. Bad habits I suppose.

Where in the world is Kiddle97?

Sorry I've been AWOL the last week. B and I went to Las Vegas for B's APA convention. I basically went for the food (have I ever mentioned how much I do not like Las Vegas?), which isn't helping matters, as I am currently X + 2.2 this morning. So last Sunday I ate cereal for breakfast (can't remember which kind) with fat-free milk, a peanut butter and jam sandwich with a string cheese for lunch, some trail mix and a couple Mentos at the airport to tide me over till dinner, water and peanuts on the plane, and then ... dinner. So delicious, so definitely unhealthy. We ate at the Asia restaurant in Bally's and had the Velvet Chicken Corn Soup (YUM), Fried Rice, Lemon Chicken (oh man, it could've been dessert, it was so good!), and the Stir-Fried Chicken with Roasted Cashews. Ok, so we both had the soup and rice, and B ordered the lemon chicken and I ordered the stir-fried chicken, but of course we shared with each other. It was so divine. Granted, we didn't eat ALL of it, but we ate plenty. Alas.

Exercise: walking around the airport and around the Paris and Bally hotels.

Monday: no breakfast (B had class at 8 and I was sleeping in), which put me in Desperate-Mode for lunch. B got us reservations at the Eiffel Tower restaurant, which was fun. As the elevator opened onto the kitchen, we were greeted with a cracker with smoked salmon. I split one with B because I wasn't sure if there were enough to go around. There was bread and butter at the table, and I ordered the Eiffel Tower hamburger and french-fry chips. And water. Dinner wasn't going to be until 7 (the APA reception), so to pass the time between 5 and 7, B and I had a cookie. Dinner was... lame. We were able to snatch a few little bites of cheese, a bit of caesar salad, a cracker or two, some gross mushroom risotto that I could only eat about 2 bites of, some water, and the last thing we were able to get to: more cookies. Two each. Yea, basically that was dinner. Cookies. Sad time for my tummy.

Exercise: Well, if the "Miracle Mile" shops at Planet Hollywood really is a mile long, then we got about 2 miles of walking in before dinner.

Tuesday: no breakfast again (see above). Lunch: Sbarro's pizza and lemonade. Dinner: Le Village Buffet. YUM. Lemonade to drink (should've done water, just to save on calories somewhere!). Can't remember exactly what food I ate, but I know there were bites of sausage, sweet potatoes, various vegetables, a Nutella and banana crepe (heavenly!), and who knows what else. SO delicious.

Exercise: 4 miles' worth of walking from the Paris hotel where we were staying to the Mandalay Bay and back (plus walking around the Shark Reef Aquarium at Mandalay Bay, so a little over 4 miles total).

Wednesday: B was a dear and brought me some French toast for breakfast (1 slice of bread total) with maple syrup, and some orange juice. Lunch: water and a not-very-appetizing taco salad that I couldn't finish from MexItaly (or something like that) at Circus Circus before we played miniature golf. Since I lost (what's new?), we bought a bag of candy (gummy bears, gummy worms, Peach rings, etc.) that I snacked on the rest of the day (it was HARD not having things to snack on between meals!). Dinner: Le Café Ile St. Louis. I had Le Parisien sandwich (Swiss cheese, Dijon mustard, and ham), bread beforehand, and water to drink.

Exercise: Too tired. Just chilled in the hotel room after dinner.

Thursday: Got up early to have breakfast at Le Village Buffet before B went to class. I had some yogurt and berries, a couple of strawberries, and another Nutella and banana crepe, and water and orange juice to drink. Lunch: Pepperoni pizza and breadsticks from Pizza Hut at the airport. Munched on some Mentos afterward to attempt to freshen the breath. Cranberry juice and peanuts on the plane. Dinner: a bowl of Nums (aka cereal).

Exercise: Not really anything. Just walking where I needed to go, but nothing that would really count.

Friday: Nums with fat-free milk for breakfast. Probably a string cheese for mid-morning snack. Lunch was a bit of chicken enchiladas that Maria had made for the Boys. Then came our downfall, our delicious downfall: we made Hazelnut Ravioli and Chocolate Bundles with Chocolate Ganache (see the Sugar and Spice Recipes blog for the recipes), and I ate way too many of them, but boy, were they good. Dinner: Tortilla with a bit of Cheese Dip for the filling, salad.

Exercise: Nothing I can recall.

Saturday: Cinnamon-Apple-Peach Breakfast Pockets, made with yogurt, apples, cinnamon, and whole-wheat pita. I think I had peanut butter and honey for lunch, as well as salad. A late-afternoon bowl of Nums (we had to dash to a baptism that I was the chorister for, and we didn't know how long it would take, and I was starving). Dinner was stuffed shells and salad. And after the Boys were asleep, B, Maria and I had some ice cream with the chocolate ganache topping for dessert. And there was no real exercise. Thus my weight GAIN this week! Yikes. But anyway, I think that brings us up to speed.

Oh wait, today:
Fasted through breakfast and lunch. Broke our fast after Home Evening when we had strawberries and whipped cream for our home evening treat. Then I snacked on a few miniature candybars and a string cheese. For dinner I think we're going to make nachos out of whole-wheat tortillas. We'll see. No exercise today.

PS. I know my weight this week is up 2.2 lbs. from my Glen Starting Weight, but this is actually the same weight I was at a year ago. So I guess, looking at it that way, at least I'm maintaining. Sad though, that after a year's efforts, I'm not losing again. Some plateau, huh.

Fallin' off the wagon again

Well I have had a few great, disciplined weeks...but this weekend I could take no more! Friday and Saturday night I had Filiberto's...yummmm....but of course now I am wondering why I did it. Was it really THAT good? Good enough to cause the certain weight gain? I was 2 pounds away from the next decade, and I am dreading finding out how much I gained when I weigh in tomorrow. Oh well, hopefully I got it out of my system!

The only problem is, family is coming into town this next week, and when family is here I actually have to make good dinners, the kind with a lot more calories than I usually eat. HELP ME BE STRONG!!!

Update: I felt so awful about my bad eating that I went upstairs and worked out for 23 minutes on the elliptical and 7 minutes on the treadmill. I feel a little better now :o)

The Little Things

So I was listening to Glenn Beck this morning and he was talking about how it's the little things that add up to make the big things. He related his comments to dieting, and said that usually people arent' fat because they just sit down and pig out...it's because they are constantly snacking. A tiny thing here and there that all adds up to a big problem.

That is TOTALLY me! It's not my meals that are the problem here. Granted, I should watch portion sizes even at meal time; but the biggest problem is the nibble here and the cleaning up the rest of a kids' plate there, the sneaking of a cookie or just ONE bite of ice cream, etc. He went on to say that if we focus on taking care of the little things, usually the BIG problem will be resolved, too.

I loved that! It's also less overwhelming. If I look at the amount of weight I need to lose as a whole, it is so overwhelming I hardly know where to start. But if I just think to myself, don't worry about the big thing right now, just focus on the little things (stop sneaking tastes and nibbles, start adding exercise), I feel more able to handle it.