Lost a Big One!

Well, it has been too long. I am sure that some of you are thinking that I fell off the wagon. Happy to say that I am still going strong. I also realized that I haven't posted my weight-loss for the past two weeks. Last week I lost 2.6 lbs! Yeah! I was pleasantly surprise. Wasn't really expecting a big loss because I haad been so hungry all week and so I stormed through my WPA with no shame. I lost 1.4 this week. Not a big loss but I am definately happy about it. It was a party-full week. Friday we had a going-away BBQ for friends, Sat was my daughter birthday party, Sun was the leftovers from the birthday party, and Thurs was Valentines. I went over my WPA before Sun was over but exercise self-control for the rest of the week.

All said and done, I have lost 20.4 lbs since Dec. 28th. I am pretty happy about that and I am approaching two milestone, 10% and 25 lb star which could potentially happen the same week. It feels good to pass the 20 lb mark. I am pretty proud of myself. still have some baby weight left but I am 20 lbs closer than I was a month and a half ago. The fish above is 20lbs. Can you believe it? It is huge! My friend Em said that her WW leader told them to carry around a 10 lb bag of potatoes at the grocery store and you will have a true appreciation for every 10 lbs you lose. I can't imagine carrying around one in each hand, but yet, that is what I was essentially doing all of the time. YIKES!

I have some catching up to do on blogging so hopefully when you check back this week I will blog about the cookies and ravioli I made for Valentines Day and the circuit training I did last week. It kicked my butt.

By the way, if you want to see what you "fish weight" just type in __ lbs in http://www.images.google.com/. I think you will be surprised. TB, I put in 80 just for you and here it is. Wow, you should be very proud. Can't wait to see your "big one"!!!

Today's Menu

So this is what is on my menu today. I have always been a planner. As a child I remember my mom planning out our weekly menus before going to the grocery store and today I find myself doing the same things. Every once in a while I slip out of the habit but it is easy to get back into.

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.

Well after reading this, you are all probably thinking that I am a bit of a control freak. Well, I am. My eating was one of the things that I had a hard time controlling in the past. I fell like I have control of what goes in my mouth. The Flex Plan gives me tangible limits and I like that, but with enough flexiblity that I don't feel like I am depriving myself.

Happy Fondue Eve!

Tonight, some of good friends hosted a New Years party Fondue style. I know it was coming and so I made sure that I had a lot of points available for tonight. The food was so good and so much fun to eat. The eating was slow and so we all sat around the table all night and a lot was consumed. The meats were fried in oil, the bread was drenched in cheese and the strawberries, marshmallows, brownies, pound cake and bananas were absolutely devine in the chocolate walnut fondue. I ate myself sick!

The night was an awesome night and was a great kick-off to 2008. I came home and entered everything that I could remember eating on the WW Tracker. 46 for dinner and 60 for the day. CRAZY! Just a few days ago I would could have easiely eaten that many or more points in a day without even realizing it. Luckily, I had some activity points from today and a lot of flex points along with most of my daily allowance left. Yeah for planning and yeah for the flexibility of WW.

Here's to 2008 and looking great!