What a week...where did it go?? Oh yes....

Hey friends, family, strangers, and anyone else reading this. Sorry I haven't posted all week. No idea where the week went, I feel like it flew by!  It's been a great week, full of successes, fun planning, healthy choices and other positive things! :)

Saturday was Passover at my BFF's parents' house, and it was a blast.  I took a bunch of photos, but they're all on my camera and unfortunately that hasn't been hooked up to my computer yet.  Kristi went to Boston PAX EAST before Passover and came home with a "Mustache Monocle" which was pretty awesome. If you click on that link, it's at the top of the page and she got the solo one on the top right in the picture.  It has become a little game to "photo bomb" people while wearing the mustache. Good times.  We even got an innocent bystander at CVS on our way home from Easter on Sunday. Speaking of Easter, we went to Newburyport, MA to visit some of my family and had a good time all around. Good to see everyone, and once again, Kristi's mustache was a big hit.  Every year there is an awesome bunny cake, and this year was no exception.  Please see below for the original bunny, and then the bunny with a 'stache.

Like I said, good times.  The food was also delicious! We had fruit salad, the salad I bought, 2 types of quiche, spiral ham, mini home fries and a make your own bloody mary station, which I did not take part in.  See below for most of the food...so good.  Tough to gauge points since I couldn't measure, and I didn't know the ingredients, but once I got past Passover and Easter, I just decided to not use my weekly points anymore this week, just in case I was off in calculation.  I did enjoy about 1/2 of the bunny's left ear as a treat, but stayed away from Easter chocolate all weekend, and week!

Once the weekend passed and Monday hit, I decided to go get my 10lb loss reward...a manicure! I met up with my friend Julie Ann and we got fancy shiny manicures to celebrate.  Check out those fancy hot pink nails, and my awesome watch, and engagement ring from my fiancee. Polished nails make my ring even more sparkly! Love it! (Sorry, I'm such a girl sometimes!)

So Tuesday-Thursday sort of flew by in a daze, not really sure where the days went!  I did make great meal choices all week, and want to show one of them off.  I made bell pepper, fresh pineapple, and chicken kabobs, with a mandarin orange vinaigrette glaze.  So good!!  Add a salad, and you have a very summery, fresh, healthy meal.  I made 10 kabobs, using a total of 12oz of chicken, at 1pt per oz, and the glaze was a total of 6 points.  Very healthy, and low in points indeed!

As I said, I'm not sure really what I did Tuesday-Thursday, other than housework like laundry, dishes, vacuuming, etc. Actually, Thursday was a good day.  We decided to sign up for The Color Run 5k. Heidi signed up first, creating team "Spell It With Your Peas" (from Easy A...watch it...it's comedic genius, just like the entire movie).  Kristi and I also signed up, along with Heidi's boyfriend Frank.  We're super excited and if you're reading this and think it looks fun (click the link above), you should sign up too.  It's not too expensive, especially if you join a team, and it's going to be a blast!!  There's a little party after, and we're thinking of ending the day at the beach, likely Salisbury since it is so close.   I've written out a training program to help me be able to do the 5k, as I would really like to be able to jog some, if not most, of it.  I am realistic though, so I changed up the C25K program a bit, and lengthened it, so that it suits my needs better.  I hope it works, and if not, I'll make changes as needed.  

Nothing super special happened today but it was a great day! We got tickets in the mail for the Chad Perrone show on 5/12/12, with Lisa opening, who is also awesome.  If you like supporting local music, check out Chad Perrone and if you like what you hear, buy tickets to his Tupelo Music Hall show in Londonderry, NH! We also started booking our week-long trip to The Berkshires for next month, which we're psyched about.  A 7 night already paid for getaway in a 2 bedroom condo and we can bring the dog!  It'll be so fun!  Did I mention we can have guests, and we have a spare room? :) Other fun thing today that happened? Heidi bought tickets to Summerland Tour 2012, which includes Sugar Ray, Smashmouth, Eve 6, Lit, Gin Blossoms, and Everclear.  How could we pass that up? She got pretty awesome floor seats for Mohegan Sun casino, on July 29th. Heidi, Frank, Kristi, and I will be going. It's the day after The Color Run, which basically means that's going to be one helluva great weekend!!  

My NSV (non-scale victory) of today was 2 fold.  I ate some things I don't normally like, because I'm trying incorporate new things into my diet.  Breakfast today was 1/2 cup of egg beaters (1pt) that I made into scrambled eggs, which typically I don't like.  I added some turkey sausage crumbles and a little Mexican cheese.  I have one word for you: Delicious! 

The picture doesn't really make it look great, but I assure you, it was!

My other NSV was completing a 2.2 mile brisk walk in about 45min around the neighborhood with Samson (our dog).  It was perfect weather, the sun was shining, there was a cool breeze coming in off the lake and harbor, and Samson was a very polite walking companion.  I plotted my route ahead of time so I knew the distance and the mile marker to turn around to come home.  I loaded up a new iPod playlist, and just kept putting one foot in front of the other until I was back home.  From the 1/2 mile mark to the mile mark, my legs got tired and sore.  It's like the all of a sudden realized that I was exercising and not just walking out to get the mail.  Once I got through that though I felt great and didn't get worn out again until I got home and sat down for a minute before making a great after-workout meal.  I thawed some already cooked wild and brown rice, added a few ounces of chicken, and some steamed/seasoned asparagus. Great walk, great meal after.  Go me!  

This is a good NSV because last time I walked, about a week ago, I only went one mile and felt terrible during almost the whole thing!  I am doing a 5 mile walk for "Walk MS" this Sunday in Manchester, NH and am excited to do it per the request of a great friend for her birthday, but I'm also really nervous because well, it's not like I walk that far...ever.  I'm hoping with the support of a lot of friends who are doing it, along with the fun I'm sure it'll be, I'll get through it. If you read this, and want to support the cause, please feel free to donate.  It's a great cause, and every penny helps!  Please click here to donate if you can.  

Whew..what a week.  So many things to smile about, look forward to, and look fondly back on.  Tonight Heidi and I spent awhile in the hot tub just chatting about our weight loss journey(s)...we've each been on several individual weight gain, and loss, journeys to get to this point, and we're trying to think of how to keep ourselves motivated once we get close, or meet our goal weight.  For me, this is so far off that I'm not really thinking about it, but once in awhile it does occur to me how long this process could take, and that it's going to stay hard to stay on track the whole time.  But I know I CAN DO IT.  And if I can do it, so can she, and so can you.

Thanks for reading.  Hope you have a great day with plenty of things to make YOU smile.  Tomorrow is my weigh-in, and I am pretty confident that I will have a good result.  Here's hoping!

Good Meals and a Good Week

It's been a great week so far.  Nothing really special or remarkable, but any week that I do well with staying on track and eating right, according to the Weight Watchers guidelines, I feel great.  It's Friday which means it's the last day of my week, before my 10am weigh-in tomorrow. I've made a lot of good, healthy, balanced meals this week and I wanted to share some more with you!  I know it's tough to think of healthy things to eat sometimes, especially if you get bored of eating the same thing over and over again. I know a lot of people eat the same meals all week so they know they're staying on track etc, but I just can't do that. I do like leftovers, for a day. But I can't seem to get excited about something after the 2nd time, sometimes I can do 3 meals if it's really good.

This morning I made a brunch like meal for a late breakfast, pictured below.

Brunch (Weight Watchers Points Plus Values in brackets): 9pts


Orange wedges - (0)
Grapes - (0)
100 Calorie English Muffin - (3)
Thin n' Trim Oven Roasted Turkey 2oz - (1)
Weight Watchers spreadable garlic & herb cheese (1 wedge, on english muffin) - (1)
Nonfat store brand mixed berry yogurt - (2)
Fiber One Cereal, 1/2 cup or 30g - (2)

Breakfast/Brunch was filling, balanced, and delicious.  As I said in a previous post, fiber was the focus of last week's meeting, so I tried to think about that while meal planning this week.  The 1/2 cup of Fiber One cereal as 14g of fiber, which is a really great amount to start the day! I had some extra orange wedges, not pictured, as well.

Hamburgers were on last night's menu.  Kristi said she was craving a McDonald's hamburger, so rather than give into the craving, I told her I'd made hamburgers one night this week.  I decided to make them on the grill outside, and I put corn on the cob on the grill too! I had to ask Heidi for some grill instruction since I've never owned a grill and therefore have never had to start a grill up. It was pretty easy, but thanks Heidi for the help! :) 

Dinner  (Weight Watchers Points Plus Values in brackets): 21 pts

Fresh cut veggies (cucumber, celery, red pepper, carrots, dill pickles) - (0)

Red pepper hummus (1.5oz) - (3)

Corn on the cob, made on the grill with some seasonings in tin foil - (2)

Sweet Potato Fries (homemade, cut up sweet potato, a little oil and seasonings) - (4)

Hamburger, 1/3 pound patty - (5)

Wheat hamburger bun - (3)

Lettuce, tomato, ketchup (1tsp) - (0)

American cheese - (2)

2 small slices of center-cut bacon - (2)

So, that was dinner. Dinner was amazing. The corn was possibly the best corn I've ever had.  I used about 1/4 teaspoon olive oil, over 2 ears of corn, then added small amounts of salt, pepper, garlic powder, and vegetable seasoning then wrapped them individually in tin foil about 2 hours before cooking.  They were seasoned perfectly.  They were on the grill for about 15 minutes and that was a perfect amount of time.  The burgers were preformed store-bought 90% lean ground beef, and I added some pepper, Montreal burger seasoning, and Worcestershire sauce, also about 2 hours before cooking. They were perfect.  I was very pleased with the meal.  The sweet potato fries were a little crisp on the outside, and warm and soft on the inside.  I'd like them to be a bit more fry like, but these were pretty darn good!

Yesterday afternoon I decided to try a Weight Watchers recipe that was suggested in the Weight Watchers weekly for this week. Kale and Bacon and Cannellini beans. This proved a little more difficult than I expected, with a few changes and set backs.  The recipe is below the pictures, so you can see where I subbed thins from the original list.  I ended up using dried minced garlic instead of fresh.  While the taste was just as good, I forgot that it wouldn't need to simmer as long since it isn't fresh.  I let it simmer in the bacon grease, as directed, for under a minute, but when I turned around, it was very dark , which ended up meaning it was burnt to a crisp.  Unfortunately I didn't really realize it was burnt until I added the fresh onions, so then I had to throw out everything through that step.  I ended up cooking another 3 slices of bacon, so that I still had bacon grease to cook in, per the recipe.  I used some of the extra bacon for dinner, on my burger, so that worked out.  I didn't want to chop another onion, so I ended up using onion powder.  The taste, again, is pretty much the same, but it creates less food for the recipe.  The rest of the meal I proceeded as per the recipe, but I realized I didn't have 1lb of kale, instead I probably only had 1/2 that.  Oh well.  The dish turned out pretty well, and I think I'll try again, but this time use everything fresh and follow the recipe exactly.  I think it'd be better that way.  With no onions, and not enough kale, it only came out to about 2 servings, and the recipe says each serving is 5pts, but I know each of these is more since the ingredients are only split between 2 dishes.  I don't think each one is 10 though, so I called it 7 points per serving.  I could be off, but since I haven't used my weekly points, that's fine. I've only used 8 out of 49 and today is the last day of the week, so a few extra points from varying recipes is fine to not be sure about.  I also have activity points I gained this week so I know there is no way I'm over my points.

Pictures are below of the ingredients, and then the finished dish.  It was very flavorful, maybe a little too salty, but I think using fresh onion would make that better, as the salt and balsamic vinegar would have more to mix into.

Kale with Bacon and Cannellini Beans: 7pts per serving, served 2, recipe at the bottom of blog

 

I ate this yesterday for lunch, along with a 6in Subway sandwich that Kristi brought home for me.  Heidi had some BOGO coupons that expired yesterday so Kristi got us each a 6in sub for lunch on her way home from her class at UML.  I forgot how much I loved Subway! I worked there for awhile, when I was 19, at Plymouth State College. It was a fun, and easy, job, and the perk of free subs was pretty decent!

So, a few great meals. A pretty great week.  A weigh-in tomorrow that I'm feeling good about, and not stressing like I normally do, so that's good.  I need to run to the grocery store to stock up on some fruits and veggies for the weekend, and for my salad that I'm having for dinner tonight.  I try to always eat a light meal, low on salt and heavy meats, the night before a weigh-in, so that I'm not "weighed down" when I get on the scale.  Tonight's salad will likely be with either tuna or shrimp on top. I haven't decided yet.

I hope all of you reading this have a fantastic day, and if you're doing Weight Watchers, or any other "diet", I hope your results this week are where you wanted them to be.  I'm hoping for minimally 0.4lbs lost, so I hit that 10lb goal I wanted to meet last week, but I really want it to be more than that of course. I usually feel good as long as I'm losing 2lbs per week, but we all know that just doesn't happen every week.

Happy Friday friends, family, and supporters. Have a great day, and a fun-filled holiday weekend, whatever you may be celebrating! :)  I'll be sure to post tomorrow about my weigh-in results!

Kale with Bacon and Cannellini Beans Prep time:  10 min Cook time:  32 min Serves: 4, Points Plus Value: 5 3 slice(s) uncooked reduced-fat bacon    3 clove(s) (medium) garlic clove(s), minced    1/2 tsp crushed red pepper flakes    1 cup(s) (chopped) uncooked onion(s), diced    1 pound(s) uncooked kale, stemmed, roughly chopped    1 cup(s) canned chicken broth, or beef broth    15 oz canned cannellini beans, rinsed and drained    1 tsp kosher salt    1 Tbsp balsamic vinegar    1 tsp sugar, in the raw    Instructions ·         Set a large, heavy pot or skillet over medium heat; add bacon and cook to desired crispness. Remove bacon from pot and set aside; leave bacon drippings in pot.  ·         Add garlic and red pepper flakes to bacon drippings; cook, stirring, until garlic becomes fragrant, about 30 seconds to 1 minute. Add onion; cook, stirring occasionally, until soft, about 10 minutes. Add kale; cook, stirring occasionally, until it starts to wilt, about 5 to 7 minutes. Add broth; cover and simmer over low heat until kale is just tender, about 8 to 10 minutes. Add beans; simmer, uncovered, until liquid is almost evaporated, about 5 to 7 minutes. Stir in salt, vinegar and sugar; sprinkle with crumbled bacon and serve immediately. Yields about 1 1/4 cups per serving.