Monday, March 31, 2008
Update
The first 2 weeks of core I lost a combined total of 5.5 pounds. All together, I am at a total loss of 31.6 ponds. It feels great to pass the 30 lb mark. I don't think that I posted but last week I hit my 10%. Yeah! That feels awesome!
I am still liking Core and loving not counting as much.
I saw a picutre of my posted on a friends' blog and was not repulsed. This is a big step forward. I usually cringe upon seeing pictures of myself. I can see the difference in my face.
I also found an awesome waffle recipe made out of oatmeal that I will post soon. My husband even liked it which says a lot. He is funny about new recipes.
Tuesday, March 18, 2008
Baked Oatmeal

Since starting Core, I have had to search for new recipes to fit the plan. I was craving waffles so I went off in search of a recipe that used oatmeal instead of flour. I found one but it has to soak overnight and so that wasn't an option for breakfast this morning.
This Baked Oatmeal recipe was one that I found at halfmysize.com. I immediately whipped up a batch and threw it in the oven. It turned out exactly as I imagined it. I mix between a muffin and a cookie. I entered it in the recipe builder and it is 3 pts a serving for flex but all ingredients are Core. Yeah!!! Each serving is huge, 1/6 pan. I ate it hot. It would be delicious with baked apples or other warm fruit on top and maybe 2 T. of Cool Whip Free on top. I am letting the pan cool and I am going to bag up the rest for snacks or breakfast on the go.
Also, my daughter loved it. She ate 1/2 piece all by herself. It is nice when your kids will eat what you are eating. Now if I could get my husband to do the same.
Sunday, March 16, 2008
I'm done!
I switched to CORE and so far I am pleasantly surprise how much I love it.
Not what I expected.
I was really nervous that I would over-eat.
I was so hungry on flex and kept going over my daily and weekly points.
I have still been tracking online and just added up the points for the past two days and I am still in my point allowance.
But I am not so hungry.
I guess better quality food helps. I don't think that I noticed how much junk I was still eating.
I am also learning to listen to my hunger/full signals better. This is something that I have been really bad about in the past. I have noticed that I have been eating past full just because I had the points.
I was also getting really bad at tracking. Now I just pick something on the list.
My husband is trying to be supportive but not as supportive as he was on flex. He doesn't trust my full meter. I also think that he is a little frustrated that my number is going down while his is the same. We both gained weight with the baby. My number is still much higher than his. I know that when he puts his mind to it, it will come off fast. He is fortunate that way. Hopefully, he gets back to being supportive.
By the way (If there is anyone still reading after a month of blog boycotting.) I hit the 25 lb mark and was only 0.6 away from my 10%. I didn't have a good week last week, hence the change to CORE to refocus me, so I didn't weigh-in. Couldn't stomach a gain written on my card. Used a no-weigh pass and just attended the meeting. Glad I did! The meeting was great and remotivated me. Linda, my leader is great!
Peeked at the scale and it is moving in the right direction. I think I was retaining some water because of poor eating.
Friday, February 15, 2008
Lost a Big One!


Tuesday, February 5, 2008
It doesn't taste like a grape...

Saturday, February 2, 2008
My Pet Fat

As you know, I only lost 0.6 last week and was initially disappointed. That was until I was looking at blogs one day and came across this posting. It totally changed my attitude. Heather, who runs http://www.thewwchick.com/, helped me to see that losing anything was something.
I was telling a friend about the post and the gross little visual that was pictured there and she said that her WW leader had one too. "My Pet Fat" So I looked them up. A not so little mountain of fat. 1 lb. Who knew 1 lb could be so big. Then I started imagining these little jiggly mountains taped all over me. YUCK! I am suddenly very satisfied with just 1 lb a week. 1 less attached to my hips or my stomach.
Well this week I lost 1.2. While a few weeks ago that would have seemed like nothing, this week I am pleased with myself and I am excited for another loss next week. Even if it is just a pound.
Tuesday, January 29, 2008
How many did I eat?

Friday, January 25, 2008
Getting Over Disappointment...
Tuesday, January 22, 2008
Food Find - Morning Star Farm's Spicy Black Bean Burger

Monday, January 21, 2008
Contest

So Roni at Weight Watchen is doing another contest and I decided to enter. This scale looks awesome and I know I could put it to good use if I magically win. Here's to hoping anyway!
Check out Roni’s new contest! I can win a Nutrition Smart Scale from Eat Smart and so can you! Click here for details!
Did anyone else enter?Friday, January 18, 2008
Weigh-ins and Star Stickers
Thursday, January 17, 2008
Today's Menu

Thursdays are my planning days. First, I consult our calendar and then make dinner plans for every night so that I can plan my shopping accordingly. This helps with the grocery budget because I am really thinking about what we need and not buying a lot of unnecessary things. It can also help my waistline because I can plan healthy meals and carefully consider the allocation of my points depending on our weekly schedule.
This process has helped me so much in doing WW. Like I said, I plan Thursdays and then shop Fridays right after my WW meeting. Also, knowing what we are having for dinner at the beginning of the day helps me plan the rest of the day around dinner. We frequently have people over for dinner and go out so these are both things that I usually need more points for dinner on those nights. On the flipside, I like to eat light the night before I weigh-in or maybe have planned to meet a friend for lunch and on those nights I plan a low point dinner.
I have been using the recipes on the WW tracker. I really like them. I have probably tried 15 different ones and they have almost all been delicious. The only one that we didn't like was the chicken paella. This didn't really apeal to me in the first place but my husband always orders it at restaurants and I thought that I would give it a shot. It was terrible and after forcing a couple of bites, I decided it wasn't worth spending the points on and we decided to throw it away and eat something else for dinner. My favorite so far was the Chicken with Honey-Balsamic Glaze.
GOAL!!!

Tuesday, January 15, 2008
A Happy Anniversary!

We went to the Cheesecake Factory in Caesar's Palace on our first date. We both lived and met in Vegas. After we walked around the Forum Shops after. We decided to revisit the Cheesecake Factory, of course here in San Antonio instead. It was so fun and the food was super yummy.
I have been trying to limit using my flexies especially the last half of the week so I planned accordingly today. I am really proud of my planning and follow-through for the day. I went online and investigated on the menu and had it narrowed down to two things, depending on my mood. They were both fairly low point, especially for a restaurant like the Cheesecake Factory. (You have to admit that this is not a restaurant that is associated with low point foods. The name says it all!)
I ate sensible all day long,not a lot but enough that I wasn't famished and felt like I had control. . We went in the restaurant and turned right to the section I would order from. (They have a "weight management" section.) I decided on the Asian Chicken Salad. I also saw that they had Fresca and added that to my order along with water. I drank a full glass of water before I let myself dig into the bread. The brown bread there is my favorite! I had two small slices with no butter. Before I would have easiely eaten at least half of the bread basket. Once I ate my predetermined amount I pushed it to the other side of the table so I wouldn't sneak another slice. Our food came pretty fast. My salad was huge and delicious and 14.5 points. My husband ordered the Bang Bang Chicken and Shrimp, my favorite dish there. I think he was being nice, just in case I wanted a little bite. It is quite spicy and that is not his thing. I had 3 small pieces of chicken and 1 piece of shrimp. We skipped dessert there and settled for Stawberry Shortcake Skinny Cow at home.
I am extremely proud of myself. I stayed within my daily points allowance and had a great night out. It makes me feel like I can still eat wherever I want, I just need to balance those choices out all day. It helped that I set aside points early in the day for my meal. I also set aside 6 extra points for things like breads and bites off my husband's plate and dessert (at home, of course).
Well, number 3 down and looking forward to a great year and a happy number 4. It was a nice day. I have such a sweet husband and I love him so much. He is trying so hard to be supportive of my WW and is trying to understand my food issues. He is a great listener and puts up with a lot. I am sure blessed.
Saturday, January 12, 2008
Taking Advantage of Good Fortune
We have a treadmill that we bought about 6 months ago. I am much better at using this. It is in our bedroom because there is more room. It probably would have fit in the gym, however, I was worried about hitting my head on the ceiling fan. The treadmill is awesome! We splurged and got one with a TV and a fan along with other user friendly features. We almost bought a different one but after talking to a friend that has one, she said that she wished she would have gotten one with a TV and thought that she would use it more if she did. We took that into consideration and like I said, splurged. It makes all the difference. If I get up before the baby in the morning or when she is down for a nap, I like to watch the Today Show or Food Network or even CNN. I figure, if I can sit on the couch and watch these, I might as well walk.
Since starting WW, I haven't started a structured exercise routine. I occassionally record activity points. This week at I bought a pedometer. I love it! I counts your step and tell you how my points you earn when active. It also tracks my steps for the day. I am aiming for 10,000. Last week my husband was asking if I ever used it. Mind you, I do, but never around him. Most of the time, he sleeps in on the weekends and I feel walking in the bedroom while he is trying to sleep so I go downstairs and watch TV on the couch. He told me not to worry about waking him and use it if I want to. This morning I hopped on and walked 45 minutes before the baby woke up. It wasn't a fast pace but I walked over 2 miles and was able to watch some TV. It was 3 points. Yeah for activity points!
So the goal for the week is use at least one peice of this fantastic equiptment each day. I know that I can do it. After all, I want to get our money out of it and it will do nothing but good for me! Also, this week, my goal is to earn at least 2 activity points a day. (So far, do good!) I can't wait to have 14 (or more) recorded by Friday!
Friday, January 11, 2008
No Use Crying Over Spilt.....

..........COFFEE!
Well first, I was down 4.6 lbs this week and I wasn't nearly as nervous for my weigh-in. I was confident that I lost. I didn't know how much. To be honest, while I am happy with this number, I would have LOVED another .2 lbs. Why aiming for 4.8 lbs? Well because it would have taken my total loss to 10 lbs and thus another star. Those little stars are so motivating for me. On the flip side. I am pretty sure, actually positive, that I will get one next week.
However, when I weighed in I felt discounted by the lady weighing me in. I knew how hard I worked this week, no flexies, eating lost of fresh food and fiber and staying on plan. I was very proud of myself. As she recorded my weight she didn't say "good job" or "way to go" or "you had a good week". Instead as she showed me my number, she said "you know, you aren't going to keep losing this much every week" in a very negative and sassy tone. OK, this is something that I know, something that I know from talking to my leader, something that I know from previous diets (I know that is a 4 letter word here). SO I KNOW! I go to WW for encouragement and felt like that was such a downer. I am going to weigh-in with the other woman at the table from now on.
While I was pleased with the weigh-in, I was not so happy with the meeting. I have been getting there early the past two weeks knowing that there would be a lot of people because of the new year. This way I don't have to wait in line very long and I can get a seat near the front even though most of the early birds camp out in the middle or back. A man that I have seen at the last two meetings sat on the row with me a chair apart. He had a terrible scowl on his face and was sending out bad vibes. Thought that I would say "hi" to lighten his mood but no response. I decided that I was not going to let his bad mood me problem and moved on.
There were a couple of new faces hanging out around the room and I cam to the conclusion that they were WW staff. I think that my leader was being observed. She seemed a little flustered and trying extra hard. The line in the back was huge as the meeting started and people were talking and she had a hard time getting everyone's attention. The late-comers started filling in the empty seats on the front row. A lady sat in front of me. About 5 minutes into the meeting there was a huge crash. The lady in front of me had dropped her coffee and it spilled all over. The leader had it all up her legs and the women on both sides of the dropped had gotten hit too. The woman behind me said "Well, there goes the meeting!" At that point, I felt the same way too. A bunch of ladies rushed up to the front to help, people went to get paper towels from the bathroom and the next 10 minutes was spent cleaning it up while the leader tried to keep some kind of order and tried with no luck to keep the conversation going.
The meeting was totally chaotic and the ironic thing was that the topic for the day was on how productive and necessary meetings are. I was relieved when it was over. I know that life is totally unpredictable. I know it was just a fluke and next week it will be back to normal. I am going next week, the week after, and every week after that. I need people to be accountable to and I think that meetings are the way to go for me. Just thought I would share this crazy experience.
Thursday, January 10, 2008
What I Ate for Breakfast
Well it was delicious.
I love pumpkin pie and pumpkin muffins, pumpkin smoothies, pumpkin everything!
Hot cocoa is such a treat, especially for breakfast.
So how did I justify eating this?
This is how.
Pumpkin Pie:
I was reading on Hungry Girl some new ideas for spicing up oatmeal. She had some great ideas for add-ins. One of them was canned pumpkin along with some pumpkin pie spice. I have been dying to try it. This morning I gave it a try. So delicious. Like warm pumpkin pie. So much better than plain old oatmeal. I gave my daughter a taste and she loved it too so I made her a bowl too. It is only 40 calories and 4 g of fiber in 1/2 c. I used about half that much.
Hot Cocoa:
I am not a big milk drinker so I am always looking for good ideas for meeting my daily milk guideline. I have tried the diet cocoa and have not been that happy with them. Very watery. Las night I had planned to have 1 c of milk for a snack and just didn't find it appealing. I decided to heat up the milk and stir in a packet of the diet cocoa mix. Just 25 additional calories and it doesn't up the points, still only 2. So creamy and delicious and felt like it was so much more than it actually was. Try it! You will be in love.
Tuesday, January 8, 2008
The Biggest Loser?

Warning: Spoiler
So I am sure that all of you who watched The Biggest Loser tonight are picking your chins up off the floor and still wrapping your mind around it all. I know I am!
Temptation:
Paul was stupid for sharing that bit about his calories and deserved to lose the challenge for that. The black team seems unstoppable. I don't know what Mallory was thinking eating on the temptation but I don't think that it made a huge difference in the outcome.
Weigh-in:
Again, the black team seems unstoppable, both in weight loss and in strategy. I think they will go far but will be eliminated as soon as they fall below the yellow line because others will see them as a threat.
I was also shocked that the brown team was sent home. I really liked them and I thought that they really had their hearts in the game. The only encouraging part is seeing how great they looked in the follow-ups. Good for them! I am sure that they will look amazing at the finale.
Monday, January 7, 2008
I Got Mail!
Lasagna

Speaking of not missing out, I am off to have my ice cream bar. Mmmm, Cookies & Cream.