Tourists, Bridal Luncheons, Traveling, and a Light Meal (Days 75 - 77)

Hello my blog readers.  All 3,500 of you!  I can't believe my personal little blog project has been read by over 3,500 people.  I appreciate that my blog is being followed and read by so many people.  Please continue to read!

DAY 75

Breakfast - go to breakfast.  As per usual.  

Today I took off the morning from work to be a tourist in my own town.  MJ and I are planning on moving in about 4 months and I created a bucket list of things that I must do in this city before I leave.  Today I went to a top tourist site with Mrs. Jordan.  Without ruining the anonymity of this blog, I'll just say that we did a lot of walking.  So much so that my fitbit total for the day was 16,182 without going to the gym or actively exercising!!!

  

After being tourists in our own city, Mrs. Jordan and I went out for lunch at a hot spot in the city.  The place was packed by 11:30am!  Luckily we got a table without a wait (the last one!) and enjoyed a delicious lunch.  I had two small slices of bread with butter, and the special of the day: chicken with stir fry veggies, rice, and a sweet teriyaki/cherry sauce.  It was delicious and I basically ate the entire thing.  I also had a diet coke so I'd have enough caffeine to have a productive day at work for the rest of the afternoon!

I don't remember what snacks I ate for the rest of the day, but I think it's safe to say I had a cheese stick.

For dinner, I met up with a few friends from high school at this Italian restaurant.  WHAT?  Out to eat TWICE in one day??? I know, right?  Bad choices.  


But I still tried to be good!  I picked a whole wheat pasta with shrimp and veggies in it, topped with a light lobster sauce.  I also had two slices of bread with that and some wine.  Then MJ and I split some chocolate mousse for dessert.


I'm glad that I had a high-scoring fitbit day in lieu of my not so great meal choices.    Sorry I have no pictures to share with you from today.

DAY 76

Breakfast - go to breakfast.  As per usual.  Again.

Today I happily attended my friend's bridal shower luncheon.  There was a pre-selected menu for us with a few different options.  I picked a potato leek soup (very good), a grilled chicken caesar salad, and some vanilla and chocolate haagen dazs ice cream.  How could anyone say no to haagen dazs??  Picking the grilled chicken was definitely a good choice, and the salad was very lightly dressed so I think I did fairly well considering we were out at a restaurant!

After the bridal luncheon, MJ and I hopped in the car and headed to the beach to see my college roommates: Annabelle, Tiffany and Desiree.  And all of their respective boyfriends.  I was really good not to snack in the car.

For dinner, we had some homemade burgers and veggie kabobs that Annabelle's boyfriend grilled for us on the BBQ.  I limited myself to 1 burger + bun + ketchup and as many veggies as my heart desires!  I also had some bites of a yummy potato salad.  And one slice of American cheese.  Just because I missed it.  Processed American cheese is NOT included on the recommended clean eating food list!  

After dinner I had a few drinks.  When my friends went out for late night snacks I caved and got 3 chicken fingers.  Which was really only 1.5 chicken fingers because MJ ate half of them.  Which was really about 6 bites of chicken.  I know that eating late at night is bad for you.  So is eating fried chicken strips.  I recognize that most late night food options are really unhealthy, but I think chicken fingers may be the lesser of the evils.  No, I don't think chicken fingers are healthy.  But I ate them.  They weren't good.  

However, the plus side for my horrible late night eating is that after midnight and before I went to bed, I had 5600 steps (dancing) on my fitbit.  Quite an impressive way to start a day.          

DAY 77

This morning for breakfast I had an egg and cheese sandwich on a croissant and a cup of coffee.  Once again, croissants are not healthy.  I should not have picked a croissant.  However, when faced with a list of 5 unhealthy bread options for a breakfast sandwich, I'm going to select the yummiest one every time, and the yummiest one is definitely a croissant.  And it was yummy.

Then I said goodbye to my college roommates and drove back home with MJ.  Again, on this car ride home we were very good about not snacking.  

For lunch, we got deli sandwiches on kaiser roles (again, not healthy.  I miss you wheat bread!!!).  I had half of a turkey, lettuce, tomato and mayo (GASP) sandwich.  I know, I know.  How horrible could I possible be in one 24 hour period?  Pretty horrible.  

When we got back home I felt that I needed to cleanse myself of my junk food habits and cook a good, clean eating meal for dinner.  Before dinner, I snacked on one cheese stick.  Then I planned out our meals for the week and took Michael Jordan to the grocery store with me to get everything we needed.  We also saved over $20 by buying things that were on sale and using coupons!  


For dinner I made a tilapia citrus couscous from the best of clean eating cookbook!  

This was really easy to make:

Step 1: Cook 1 dry cup whole wheat couscous

Step 2: Chop up 2 carrots, celery (I skipped this because I don't like celery), 1/2 red pepper, 1 medium yellow onion.

Step 3: Cook 4 tilapia fillets on a pan - 2 minutes per side.

Step 4: Make a dressing from the juice of 1 lime  + zest, the juice of 1/2 lemon + zest, 1/2 tsp dijon mustard, 1 tbls evoo, 2 tbsl dried parsley flakes, 1 clove garlic - minced.

Step 5: Add everything in a big bowl

Step 6: Eat!  1 cup = 1 serving = 154 calories!

MJ and I agreed this meal was light, healthy, and easy!  In the future, we might try to marinate the tilapia before hand or cook up the veggies to give a fuller taste.  Let me know if you try out this recipe!

Day 72

Aloha!  I am not in Hawaii.

Breakfast
For breakfast today I tried something new and totally different!  I got a frozen breakfast called Amy's Organic Tofu Scramble which is all natural, has all ingredients I can read and pronounce, and was a nice change of pace from my normal breakfast routine.  The whole breakfast was only 320 calories and it definitely held me over until lunch time!  It wasn't extremely attractive to eat, but it was definitely palatable.

At work I drank a super big coffee.  Shocker.  Does anyone else find coffee a necessity on a Tuesday? 


Lunch
For lunch I had more leftover pasta and meatballs with tomato sauce.  I only had 1 serving of turkey meatballs and this will likely be the last time I eat the pasta.  I did find a single guy from my hometown who just moved in to my building and said he would love some free pasta, so I will be passing that on to him and advising him to freeze it or toss it.


Snacks
My snacks today were 1 red delicious apple and 1 slice of whole wheat bread with almond butter - my go-to snack.  We're at the point where Michael Jordan will pack his own almond butter slice every day!  I'm impressed how much our regular routines have changed since we started eating these new foods.
 

Dinner
MJ was working late today, so I met my fairy blog mother out on the town for this fun girls event (with free drinks) and then dinner.  At the girls event, they were sampling these new Micaelob Ultra Dragon Fruit Peach that is only 95 calories!  I didn't think it tasted anything like beer, but it was definitely sweet and pretty tasty.  Mom - you might even like it!

For dinner I got a bento box at this Asian place - my bento box came with seared tuna (probably 3 oz), broccoli, sweet potatoes, rice, 1 veggie egg roll and some veggie tempura.  It also came with a mango margarita, which was gross and was not consumed.  

The good news is that today was another high-scoring fitbit day!  17,400 steps (7.49 miles - 2308 calories burned) without setting foot in the gym!  And a lot of them in high heels!


Overall just an okay day clean-eating wise, but all for a good cause - Happy Birthday to my Fairy Blog Mother!!!  

Days 67 - 70

Dear Readers,
I'm so sorry that I haven't been blogging!  I was about two days behind when computer mouse stopped clicking, and the apple store needed to borrow it for a while to fix her up.  She's back and working, and now I have a lot of food to share with you!  I'll try to do a quick synopsis since I have so many days to cover!  Unfortunately I have no pictures to share.  I'm so sorry, I'll do better next time!

DAY 67

For breakfast I had a half cup a kefir.  Clearly that means I was starving by the time I got to work, so I purchased an egg and cheese sandwich.  It was on white bread, and I can't remember the last time I ate white bread.  I tried to pick off the extra pieces/crust and only eat the egg-y and cheese-y parts.  Along with this white bread sandwich came a huge coffee.  

For lunch I ate the leftover Jack Daniels pulled chicken with brown rice.   


I ate a lot of snacks throughout the day, including:

• 5 multigrain flaxseed crackers with peanut butter
• 50 calorie blueberry yogurt
• cheese stick
• apple

For dinner, we went on a double date with our friends the Paternos.  I had edamame, 1 vegetable dumpling and delicious sushi.  We also had some tasty martinis and a few beers.

Overall, I did a good job eating up some of the leftovers we had in the house, but shouldn't have purchased breakfast AND dinner.  

DAY 68

For breakfast today, I had a whole wheat English muffin with peanut butter.  I couldn't have my "go to" breakfast because we were out of bananas.  

I met my fairy blog mother  for lunch and we shared a Chopt Salad, which as you remember is super low cal and also great for sharing!

For my snack I ate a Twix.  It was one of those days.  You know what I mean. 

For my other snack, I had a cheese stick.  Much better option.


After work I went to an African Dance class, and set a new "fitbit high score" with 18,482 steps!  Take that twix bar!  


After the gym I had a little bit of a smoothie that MJ made and then we ordered in some dinner.  I had some trout with a butternut squash and wheat berry risotto.  Delish!  Pretty sure it's not healthy though.

For dessert I had a VitaMuffin Top and loved it.

DAY 69

Tonight we had a big banquet for work, and I was hosting a pot-luck dinner before the banquet for some coworkers.  This meant that MJ and I needed to pre-workout in anticipation for the night to come.  We went for a run (about 3.3 miles) and ended at our favorite bagel place as usual.  This will surely become a once a weekend habit, weather permitting!  At the bagel place I got a whole wheat bagel (scooped out) with low fat cream cheese, lox, tomatoes and onions. 

The only other snack I had during the day was a "go to" almond butter slice. 


Then I made an epic amount of pasta.  For the pot luck, I was making pasta, some one was bringing different sauces, another person was bringing garlic bread, someone else was bringing bruchetta, someone else mini hot dogs and some baked cheese dish, others brought desserts, and of course all the men who were not domestically inclined brought alcohol.  

I think it's safe to say that this was definitely my "night off" of my clean eating meal plan.  I wasn't too too bad though!

However, I did set a new new world record in my own fitbit stats!   After running in the morning and dancing at the banquet, I put in 19,861 steps! And the crowd goes wild!!!!!!!

DAY 70

Today for breakfast I had a little 50 cal yogurt and a half of a banana.  Then MJ and I ran some errands (AKA to the apple store to bring my poor little laptop in to get fixed!)  We also stopped at Costco and I had a few free samples - turkey bacon, tuna, and apple juice!  Don't you just love free sample day at a food store?!  I mean they stuff they have is always so random but you can't help but try it, right?


For lunch we had pasta and turkey meatballs.  I mean I have a TON of pasta left over and hate to see it go to waste.  YES, I did call the local homeless shelter and unfortunately they can't accept cooked food.  


In the afternoon we had some cantaloupe and mini cheese quiches.  Also we had some brownies.  Also a caramel machiatto from starbucks.  I forgot to say a skinny one.  Shoot.

For dinner we went out to eat with the Jordans.  I had 2 little slices of bread and 1 cup of mushroom/barley soup (with 2 saltine crackers).  For my main dish, I had cod with green beans almondine and rice pilaf.  


For dessert I had 2 bites of dark chocolate with mint in it.  Totally unnecessary.  Man I was not good at all this weekend.  This is not going to go well tomorrow on that scale. 

Day 66

My first day without a meal plan.  On the agenda is to clear out our fridge of food that we acquired over the week.  I hate when leftovers go to waste.  

Breakfast: Fat-free plain yogurt with blueberries and granola
I certainly missed plain yogurt.  Sorry I've skipped you so many days my dear friend yogurt!  The blueberries and granola were a fantastic addition to the yogurt.  This would probably make a better snack than breakfast because I was pretty hungry shortly after breakfast.  Mental note to keep yogurt as a snack instead of a breakfast.  

Snack 1: 1 cheese stick. 
Pathetic, I know, but that's what I packed.

Lunch: pulled chicken sandwich with onions and green peppers on a whole wheat roll- just like yesterday
Today's lunch was just as good as yesterdays, and just like yesterday, someone again asked me where I bought my sandwich.  And, just like yesterday, I didn't have a camera to take a picture.  Sorry I've failed you. 
 

Snack 2: 1 huge, unhealthy cookie. 
I couldn't help it.  I was in the mall after work and passed the cookie stand.  I gave in to my cookie cravings and purchased $3 of unhealthiness.  I almost felt bad with each bite, but it was so good.  I don't even want to look up how many calories it was because I'm positive it's a number larger than I could ever imagine.

After my ridiculous snack, I went to the gym to a zumba class.  According to my fitbit, I walked 17,077 steps today!!!!  That puts my old record of 15,000 steps to shame!  I also burned 2,410 calories, which I think makes up for the cookie, but probably not.  

When I got back from the gym, I was famished and ate another cheese stick before dinner.   

Dinner
For dinner we cooked up a ton of the leftovers we had in the house: green pepper, scallions, onions, snap peas and spinach.  We sauteed the veggies and served them with whole wheat pasta.  I topped mine with mozzarella cheese, and MJ topped his with the Jack Daniels chicken.  We were both really happy with our meal.

Dessert - because I make the rules now!
I firmly believe that dessert should be a regular part of the daily meal plan!  Tonight for dessert, MJ and I split a VitaMuffin Top.  I would have had my own if I didn't scarf down a deliciously horrible cookie earlier today! 

Week 4, Sunday (Day 64)

Monday Morning Weigh In:

I lost another half pound this week.  That means I'm only 2 pounds away from my goal weight.  I'm also 2 days away from finishing the meal plans in the book.  

Breakfast: 1/2 cup oatmeal, 1 chopped apple, 1/2 tsp cinnamon, 1/4 cup low-fat milk; 3 egg whites

This morning's breakfast was pretty good.  I ate the apple as a whole apple instead of spending time chopping it up.  The oatmeal was decent with the cinnamon.  I upped the milk to 3/4 cups and instead of 3 egg whites had 1 hard boiled eggwhite.  Very filling.
  
Snack 1: 2 tbls natural almond butter, 1 whole wheat English muffin

This was a nice twist on my normal "go to" breakfast.  I think I like peanut butter on an English muffin better than almond butter on an English muffin, but it wasn't bad at all. 

Lunch: 1/2 cup edamame, 3/4 cup wild rice; 1/2 cup blueberries with 3/4 cup yogurt

I vote this meal in the "strange" category.  When I went to prepare this lunch in the morning, I was disappointed to see that MJ selected a package of edamame that expired the week before.  I could see that the edamames were brown and slimy inside.  I ran to the grocery store and went right to the customer service desk.  They let me replace the edamames, but all the fresh packages were expired or dated today (I advised the customer service lady to take the bad edamame off the shelves) and so I had to get frozen edamames.  This only required a little more effort on my part in the morning, but I definitely like the ease of using the fresh, shelled edamames.

Instead of wild rice, I used microwavable frozen brown rice.  Way easier since I had to spend more time with the edamame.  I threw in some soy sauce as well to add some flavor to  my otherwise boring lunch.  


I never got around to eating the yogurt or blueberries.  Whoops.


Snack 2: 1 sliced banana with 1 tbsp natural peanut butter wrapped in 1 whole wheat tortilla; 1 handful unsalted almonds

Another snack similar to my "go to" breakfast and lunch, but different.  This was a pretty good snack, but could definitely use a big cup of milk!  


I also had 1 mini Reese's Peanut butter cup.

And a free iced coffee from Dunkin Donuts (SO MUCH BETTER THAN STARBUCKS!)

And 2 beers at happy hour.

Dinner: 3 oz grilled pork chop (replaced with chicken thighs), 1 cup torn romaine lettuce and 1/2 cup chopped cucumbers with 1 tbsp balsamic vinegar and 1/2 tsp evoo; 1 cup cooked black beans; 1/2 cup cooked quinoa

MJ and I don't eat pork, so we replaced the pork with some chicken thighs.  I ended up broiling the thighs so they would cook fasted.  We also didn't have any black beans, so we used a can of chickpeas instead, which went well with the "salad" side dish.

This was my first time making quinoa.  My mom warned me to rinse the quinoa a few times before I cooked it to get off the "yucky" taste.  Rinsing quinoa is kinda tricky because it is so small!  I need a strainer with smaller holes!  Mom also suggested throwing fresh, raw garlic bulbs into the water while the quinoa was cooking to give it some added flavor.  I think the final result turned out very successful!

 

Looks good right!??!?! It was super filling and I would definitely make this meal or some combination of this meal again!     


The only negative thing was the amount of dishes I used making this meal.  Good thing the rule in our house is whoever cooks doesn't have to do dishes!  Thank you, Michael Jordan.

Also, I didn't go to the gym today, but Mr. Fitbit says I walked 12,419 steps (5.35 miles) and burned 2,152 calories!


Also, I now have over 3,000 blog hits!  Thank you for reading my blog!!! Maybe one day my blog hits will surpass my fitbit steps.... maybe...

Days 61 - 63

Hello all!  This Saturday I had a huge event for work, which is why I've been exhausted all week and not eating my best.  Here's how the weekend played out, clean eating wise:

DAY 61

For breakfast I had a cup of Blueberry Kefir.  Kefir reminds me of those drinkable yogurts I used to have as a kid.  Gogurt I think it was called. Was there another kind?  Mom feel free to comment if you remember!


I honestly can't remember what I ate for lunch.  I'm 90% sure I had my "go to" snack of almond butter on whole wheat bread, but I can't say for sure.  Sorry :(

For dinner, we had a "kickoff" cocktail hour for the big event.  At the cocktail hour I had some wine, some bites of cheese (I love brie cheese!), 1 beef satay stick, 1 coconut shrimp, 1 mini chicken empanada, and some pita chips with artichoke dip (not very good).  


After the kickoff cocktail hour, we stayed at work until past 11 working to finalize things for the big event.  I ate a twix bar.  It was 100% necessary.  One of those "In case of emergency, break glass" type of things.  You understand, right?  Great, thanks!

DAY 62

Today was the day of the "big event".  In the morning, I wanted my "go to" breakfast, but we didn't have any bananas, so I settled for a whole wheat english muffin with peanut butter only.  I also had a huge coffee.


During the day, I only ate 1 granola bar and 1/4 whole wheat bagel.


Next thing I knew it was 6pm and the event was finally over and I was ravenous!  I had some chips and bean dip, and then we went out for Spanish Tapas to celebrate a successful event. 
I had a few bites of the following items:

 

We also order Sangria, and then we went out drinking.  I allowed myself to have beer.  Partly because I knew I had eaten so few carbs that having beer really wouldn't matter, and partly because I just really wanted to, and I make my own rules!

DAY 63

HOOORAY!  For the first time in a LONG time I could sleep in today!  And then, I had absolutely no plans.  Probably the best day ever.  Mr. Jordan and I decided to start our day with a nice run, and then to end at our favorite bagel place (where the owner knows us by name and has 2 waters ready for us as soon as he sees us!)  The run was great - I surely missed the warm weather and I like spending that quality time with MJ.  When we go to the gym together, MJ is in the "big boy" room with all the weights, while I usually just go to a class.  

For brunch at the bagel place I had a whole wheat bagel scooped out with chicken salad, lettuce, tomatoes and onions.  It was delicious.  They use cranberries in their chicken salad so it reminds me of thanksgiving!  

After we ran/walked back home, I check my FITBIT STATS and found that we had taken over 7,000 steps and traveled about 5 miles.   I didn't look at the exact mileage before we left, so that's an approximate guess. 

In the afternoon, I ate a health valley granola bar and a little bit of thai food leftovers.  


Since it's March Madness, and there are few things in life I enjoy more than March Madness, MJ and I made some homemade guacamole and homemade pita chips as a snack to enjoy the basketball games.  Delish!  

homemade guacamole!

homemade pita chips!

For dinner, I made a quick and easy salmon with cauliflower.  Just broiled in the oven for 10 minutes.  We weren't really hungry, so it was the perfect, light dinner to end our relaxing, pleasant day.

 
Only bad part about today was that my basketball team lost.  Time to start rooting for the underdog!!

Week 4, Wednesday (Day 51)

Breakfast: 1 cup peach coconut smoothie (blend 1 cup sliced peaches, 1 oz vanilla protein powder, 1/2 cup light coconut milk, 1/2 cup low-fat milk, and 4 ice cubes - freeze leftovers as pops); 1/2 cup oatmeal, 3 egg whites


Wow.  Who has time to make a smoothie, oatmeal AND eggs in the morning?  I woke up early just to get a head start on breakfast!  I decided to alter the smoothie because we have chocolate protein powder, and what tastes better with chocolate than banana?? Ok sure, peanut butter is a good answer.  So is mint.  Fine.  I'm wrong, but what FRUIT tastes better with chocolate than bananas?  I guess strawberries can be a close second.  

Making the smoothie was easy, but I was instructed to freeze the leftovers as pops. How does one make a pop?  I don't have any freezer trays that would be good for pop making.  Heck I don't even have paper or plastic cups!  I end up putting the leftovers (which was a TON) into a bowl and sticking that in the freezer.  I guess I just made chocolate banana ice cream.  We'll see how that turns out later.

The oatmeal was plain-jane boring.  


The eggs cooked up quickly, but I can't eat just regular old egg whites without cheese, so I threw in a little bit of low-fat mozzarella cheese.


SOO much effort for breakfast.  I will probably never again make eggs AND oatmeal AND a smoothie.


Snack 1: 1/4 cup hummus on 8 multigrain flaxseed crackers; 1/2 cup grapes


I went to the gym before I got a chance to eat this snack.  It was a class on core conditioning.  THe class really kicked my butt!  There weren't that many people in the class so the instructor could really modify each exercise for everyone in the room.  (Un?)fortunately, I was one of the youngest in the class and therefore the instructor decided I was "most fit" and gave me the advanced versions of all the exercises to do.  Like I said, this class really kicked my butt.  I was sweating like crazy and very out of breath.  But my fitbit hardly registered a change!  This class was definitely harder than zumba and African dancing, but perhaps because the motions are core related rather than steps, the fitbit has a hard time picking them up.  Or maybe I'm just wrong about how much I burned, and I was really just tired because the exercises were hard.  


Either way, I enjoyed that class and hope that my usual Tuesday meetings get cancelled again so that I can go back!  


After class, I rewarded myself with a Twix bar.  Ugh I know, I really shouldn't have done that, but, hey - it's fat tuesday!  I get to cheat a little, right? No? Shucks.


Back at work I ate my hummus and crackers.  My perfectly portioned hummus from Costco was just the right amount.  I held off on eating the grapes until lunch.


Lunch: Spinach Salad (3 cups spinach, 1/4 cup chopped mango, 1/4 cup sliced onion, 3 oz chopped roasted chicken, 1 tsp evoo, 1 tsp orange juice, 2 tsp fresh lime juice)


I had to make this salad on the run, so it ended up being leftover chicken from last night, spinach, mango (1 slice - no time to chop!) and some evoo/balsamic vinegar as the dressing.  I threw the grapes in for good measure and it turned out to be a yummy, light, simple lunch.  Nothing fancy, but no complaints here.  


Snack 2: 1 peach coconut smoothie pop; 1/2 cup strawberries, 2 tablespoons natural almond butter


1 smoothie pop.  What size is one smoothie pop?  How many ounces?  Cups?  I open up the freezer and see that my bowl of smoothie is indeed frozen, but I can't even get my spoon in it to scrap out anything.  With the help of my friend Mr. Microwave, I soften it up enough to be edible.  It just tastes like smoothie.  I eat what I think is one "pop" size.  Okay really I just got frustrated trying to scoop out the frozen smoothie.  I would have much rather had leftover un-frozen smoothie to drink.  Sigh.  I guess it's nice having a "healthy" "ice cream" in my fridge.

Now a half cup of strawberries really isn't that many strawberries, which is disappointing.  I only had one table spoon of almond butter because as much as I love almond butter, I can't really eat it by the spoonful like I used to do with peanut butter when I was younger.


Dinner: 2 cups spring mix greens, 4 oz tuna, 1/4 cup each cooked chickpeas, shredded carrots, chopped tomato, 5 cucumber slices, 2 tablespoons balsamic vinegar, 1 tsp evoo; 1/2 cup blackberries


False alarm.  For dinner I went over to Aimee's house.  She made a weight watcher's friendly dinner: 1 morningstar mushroom burger in a pita with salsa and corn.  Total WW points: 5.  It was pretty tasty. I'd consider adding the mushroom burger to my list or veggie burger options.


A little while after dinner I had a "breakfast on the go - berry blend" pack.  It was 5 points.  Apparently my twix bars today were 8 points.  I'm not sure about the rest of the day.  I also would gain "activity points" by going to that gym class, so that let's you go over in your points (if you want/need to).  

Week 4, Tuesday (Day 50)

Monday Morning Weigh-In:
I'm about 5.5 pounds from my final goal weight.  Which means I've lost 8.5 pounds in 7 weeks.  That's a little more than pound a week.  Not too shabby.


As for MJ?  I think he's given up gaining weight.  What a lucky SOB.  


Today I took more pictures.  Hope this makes the experience of reading my blog better!


Breakfast: Peanut Butter Breakfast Wrap (2 tablespoons peanut butter, 1 tsp honey, 1/4 tsp cinnamon, 1/2 sliced banana on a whole wheat tortilla); 1 cup low fat milk

This breakfast was a nice change of pace from the usual peanut butter/banana/carb combo.  I'm not sure if the honey and cinnamon were really necessary, but they added some extra pizzaz and that's probably worth it.  I guess.

My friend Aimee is doing weight watchers and we figured out that my breakfast is 9 points.  I'm not following weight watchers, but it's interesting to see how this meal plan correlates with weight watchers points.  I do think the peanut butter I'm using is probably not the best and might consider switching.  Also, 1 tablespoon of almond butter is 3 points in case you were wondering.  Aimee says I get 29 points a day and 49 bonus points on weight watchers.  If I remember, I'll put my WW points in per day/week and we can compare.




Snack 1:  1 cup pineapple with 1/4 cup low far feta cheese


Is this not the weirdest snack you have ever heard of?  Do people really eat pineapple with feta cheese?  I measured out the two items and ate them at the same time and just thought it was ridiculously strange and not very tasty.  I will not be trying that again.




Lunch: Asian Tofu Stir Fry (3/4 cup sliced carrots, 1.5 cups shredded cabbage, 4 oz light tofu, 2 tablespoon light green onion, 1/2 tsp each chopped garlic and ginger in 1 tsp sesame seed oil; toss with 2 tsp low sodium soy sauce, 5 shredded thai basil leaves and 1/2 tsp crushed red pepper flakes; serve over 1.5 cups of cooked soba noodles)


Does anyone know what soba noodles are?   This required me to stop in the grocery store and google "soba noodles" on my phone.  I learned that they are buckwheat noodles, so I searched the asian section of my grocery store for he closest thing, and came across wheat noodles that were called soben or something similar.  I decided those were close enough.  


The noodles only took 3 minutes to make!  I wish all pasta was that easy!  

The rest of the meal was a really simple stirfry that was really easy to make and very colorful.  

I thought the meal was pretty bland until I realized I forgot the seasame seed oil.  I added it immediately and the meal instantly tasted better - and actually like a meal you would order from an asian restaurant.  I think I would like this much better with chicken and yellow onion instead of green (for more flavor).


I also didn't even come close to finishing it.  Which leads me to wonder - how does someone organize their leftovers in the fridge?  I'll have to write a separate blog about this.




Snack 2: 1 apple, 1 tablespoon natural peanut butter, 4 multigrain flaxseed crackers


Okay, this must be the 9th different type of cracker I've tried since I started following the meal plan.  I still like my whole wheat crackers that taste like shortbread the best.  I also obviously replaced the peanut butter with almond butter since I had peanut butter for breakfast.  




Awkward Gym Experience: Before dinner, I decided to try out this new bhangra dance class at the gym.  Turns out, the instructor was sick so my regular zumba class was taking it place.  This was fine with me, since I love zumba already, but I guess for bhangra it's standard to wear no shoes, so the girl next to me was barefoot.  And she was definitely more a free spirit moving all over the gym floor instead of staying in her set spot.  I was so nervous I was going to step on her feet and definitely came close a few times!


More importantly, I got to compare how much of a workout zumba is with the African dance class I went to a few weeks ago.  According to my fitbit, I had 44 minutes of being very active.  When I went to my African dance class, I had a full hour of very active minutes.  And I definitely got more steps in during the African dance class.  Good to know!  I'll keep analyzing the different gym classes as I go to them.


Dinner: 4 oz diced broiled chicken mixed with 1 cup wild rice blend, 1/2 cup sliced red or green grapes and 2 tablespoons chopped walnuts; 5 steamed asparagus spears (make 10 and freeze 5 for later in the week); 1/2 cup mango


This dinner called for the most random assortment of items ever, but I decided to give it a shot.  By the time we started dinner, it was too late to wait for some fancy shmancy rice to cook, and instead we used our frozen brown rice that is ready after 3.5 minutes in the microwave.  

Kind of crazy looking, right?   But it was actually really good.  I couldn't take a picture of MJ's plate because he had about 3 times as much chicken as I did and double everything else!  He was actually full before he could finish!  That's the key to fattening him up!  We both agreed the broiled chicken is really good, and will probably use broiling as our "go to" method of cooking instead of baking chicken.  Okay who am I kidding???? I will probably use broiling as our go to method of cooking, while MJ will continue his role of dishwasher after the meals.


Overall, a pretty great day in the eating world.


If you are interested in planning out your meals, visit orgjunkie.com to see meal plan options and links to other meal planning blogs!

Within the past 24 hours I've had over 100 more hits on my blog, and I'm sure orgjunkie.com is to thank for that!  Please take the time to fill out my poll while you are here so I can make my blog even better!

Days 47, 48, and 49

I now have over 1,600 views of my blog.  That is a huge number.  I encourage all my readers to become followers on my blog or make comments.  Apparently my blog is being read in countries like Vietnam, United Arab Emirates, and Taiwan.  All I can say is wow.  And I hope you've all tried almond butter.

DAY 47

Today was a really busy day for me.  And not a great day.  For breakfast I had an egg and cheese with mushrooms on a whole wheat roll from PotBellys.  I don't think this is healthy.  In fact, the PotBellys website tells me it was 587 calories.  Shoot. 

For snack 1 I had a slice of whole wheat bread with almond butter.  For lunch I also had a slice of whole wheat bread with almond butter.  For snack 2 I had an apple.


When I got home I was not in a good mood, so I decided to order sushi.  I had edamame, some pieces of a spicy tuna roll, some pieces of a crunchy salmon roll, and some pieces of a shrimp tempura roll.  It was good.  I also had some low-fat cookie dough ice cream.  I felt better after that.  And fat.  But better.

DAY 48

Today for breakfast I made a sandwich with two slices of whole wheat  bread, almond butter, and bananas.  Just like my English muffin sandwich, except I ran out of English muffins.

I forgot to pack snacks.  

For lunch, a friend bought me two slices of Domino's Pizza.  It was free, which makes me feel less bad that I ate some crap.

Then I spent the rest of the day out with friends.  I had some beer.  I also had some nachos and some bites of a quesadilla.  For dinner I had a spinach empanada.  They were all delicious.  

The best part about spending the day out and about with friends is that I got a TON of steps in on my fitbit.  15,513 steps to be exact.  This is my new record number of steps in one day.  I can't wait till the weather is nice again and I can start running.  I bet I'll get some great stats on my fitbit then!

DAY 49

Today for breakfast I had another two slices of whole wheat  bread, almond butter, and bananas.

For my morning snack, I had some slices of a red bell pepper with 2 oz hummus.

For lunch, I had a few leftover bites of sushi and edamame, and then I had a veggie burger with a little bit of cheddar cheese served on 2 slices of whole wheat bread.


Then MJ and I went to the grocery store.  I hate going on Sundays but sometimes it's unavoidable.  The store was actually much less crowded than a typical Sunday, and we didn't have any problems finding the food items we needed - which is unusual because on Sundays most of the shelves are empty.  However, they only had salted almond butter.  The next few days of meal plans call for almond butter, so we decided to go ahead and try the salted kind.  


When we got home, I had 2 whole wheat crackers with a little salted almond butter.  I can taste the difference between the salted and unsalted version, but I still like it.  MJ and I both prefer the unsalted kind though.  


For dinner I used what we already had in the house to make dinner.  I made hummus chicken with broccoli and corn.  

YUM!!  Baked hummus tastes great and this meal was really simple.  I've also made this chicken before with crushed terra chips, but I decided not to make it this time because:

1) I didn't have terra chips

2) Adding chips would not be healthy


Overall I'm really pleased with dinner.  Tomorrow I'm back to the meal plans!  Week 4, here I come!

Days 32 through 38 (Ski Trip)

Have you missed me, avid readers?  I am back from my ski trip with the Jordans and had an amazing time skiing for four days.  Unfortunately on the last day I started to feel sick and have been home with a fever and sore throat since we returned.  And no appetite.   But first, the ski trip.


I tried to eat balanced meals, but really didn't try that hard beyond breakfast.  Every morning I had a whole wheat english muffin with peanut butter and bananas.  Sometimes I also had Cheerios.  Once a hard boiled egg.  Every day while skiing I ate one or two balance bars/Luna bars.  For lunch I tried to eat protein - turkey, chicken, etc.  I usually also got french fries and a cookie.  I drank a lot of hot chocolate.  For dinners I was pretty good - one night I had shrimp and risotto, one night I had seared tuna, the next night pizza, and then the last night french onion soup (I ordered salmon also but really didn't eat it because I wasn't feeling well). 


I brought some Chewy Mocha Brownie Cookies for the Jordans and they were a big hit.  


My new ski pants were also a big hit.  They fly never fell down.  The snaps never unsnapped.  I love my new ski pants.  


I was very interested to see my fitbit stats when I got home.  I don't think it is completely accurate tracking skiing because you're not really taking "steps" and I never changed the time zone, but it was still really interesting to see:


Day 32 (traveling): 6,761 steps (2.91 miles), 1947 calories burned, active score: 631
Day 33 (skiing): 11,962 steps (5.15 miles), 2312 calories burned, active score: 1020
Day 34 (skiing): 13,836 steps (5.96 miles), 2381 calories burned, active score: 1039
Day 35 (skiing): 13,507 steps (5.82 miles), 2483 calories burned, active score: 1201
Day 36 (skiing and sick): 10,013 steps (4.31 miles), 2237 calories burned, active score: 940.
Day 37 (traveling and sick): 4,330 steps (1.86 miles), 1178 calories burned, active score: 451.
Day 38 (sick): 1,698 steps (.73 miles), 1494 calories burned, active score: 218.




As you can tell, I've really gone downhill since I stop skiing downhill and starting feeling downhill.  I'm also completely lost my appetite and can't keep any food down.  I weighed myself today and I'm down another 2 pounds.  I don't know how much is from my active days skiing and how much is from my sick days.    Hopefully I will start feeling better now and then I can get back on track in eating world.


Until then it's more tea and nyquil for me.  

I Can't Zip My Ski Pants, Round 2

The time has come the walrus said, to talk to many things.  Of shoes and ships and sealing wax of cabbages and kings, and why the sea is boiling hot and whether Julie will fit into her ski pants.

Julie v. Ski Pants

Round 2

It's been 31 days, 6 pounds (I weighed in this morning and I'm down another pound!), and a lot of missed chocolate chip cookies.  I put the pants on the bed and just stared at them.  You don't own me.  I've got you beat. I think. 

Today I am leaving for a ski trip with the Jordan family.  The last thing I need is for Michael Jordan's mom to see that my fly is down.  Constantly.  Prior to today, I made the executive decision to buy another pair of ski pants.  I couldn't stand the thought of failure of myself losing weight or the failure of my fly remaining in the upright and locked position.

I already knew I was going to take the new ski pants with me today.  Totally not worth the risk of bringing along the old pair with fake hope that they fit.  But it was still necessary to see if I could have gotten away with wearing my old pair.

So here I am.  Ready to test my fate/fat. I gather up the courage to put them on.  One leg.  Two legs.  I pull them up, adjust the waist, zip the fly and close the snaps at the top.  They are tight, but they are closed.

MJ gives me an approving nod of encouragement.  I hold my breath and squat down as far as I can go, waiting for the "popping" noise of my snaps coming open and my zipper flying down.  But no noise comes.  I look down and my zipper is totally secure.  I squat down again.  Nothing.  Then I smile and start twisting about, sitting all the way down on the ground and then back up again.  Eventually my zipper slid down a quarter of the way, but my snaps remained loyal to me and stayed put.  


I gave MJ a hug and kicked off the ski pants - probably never to wear again.  I did it!  I totally did it!  BUT, I'm not done.  I still have 7 more pounds to go to get to my goal weight and then why stop when I'm doing so well already!?  Rest assured, avid readers, the blog will go on.  The meal plans will keep coming.  


However, for the next 4 days, I'll be off on a ski trip with the Jordans.  I've already decided that because I will be burning so many calories when skiing, I will not be watching what I eat as much as I do on less active days.  I will actually need to eat more to have enough energy while I'm skiing.  When I get back I'll report all my fitbit stats and let you know how much I ate/gained/or loss.  And if my new ski pants turn out to be a flop!

Week 3, Monday (Day 31)

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Breakfast: Egg Sandwich (3 egg whites, 1 slice part-skim mozzarella on a whole wheat English muffin); 1/2 grapefruit
For some reason I just hated this meal.  I know I've liked it in the past but the eggs came out horribly and there were far too many of them for my little English muffin.  And we all know how much I love grapefruit.  Epic fail.


Snack 1: 1 oz raw, unsalted cashews
Fail again.  If you peeked ahead, you'll see that the editors have me eating cashews the same day as they have me eating cashew butter.  I'm cashewed out and say no way.


Lunch: 1 whole-wheat wrap with 2 tbsp unsalted natural cashew butter and 1 small sliced banana, 3/4 cup low-fat plain yogurt with 1/2 cup blueberries
I was going to just replace the cashew butter with almond butter since I'm such a  huge fan of almond butter now, but I decided to be brave and try it out.  The first lick was horrible.  I didn't like the taste or the aftertaste.  I went ahead and put it on the wrap and it was actually a good meal.  I was shocked because this "lunch" sounds more like a breakfast or a snack.  I ended up eating my yogurt and blueberries hours later because the lunch was actually a pretty filling lunch.


Snack 2: 3/4 cup low-fat greek yogurt, 1 tbsp cocoa powder, 1 cup sliced strawberries
Alright what's the deal?  Two cashew meals in one day and two yogurt meals in one day?  Despite the fact that chocolate and strawberries sound delicious, I eat a hardboiled egg with 2 RyKrisp crackers.  Sue me.


Dinner: 5 oz baked salmon, 10 spears steamed asparagus, 1 medium baked sweet potato.
MJ made dinner!  This is such a user friendly meal I couldn't resist putting him in charge.  He baked everything in the oven.  When it was done we decided to whip up some orange glaze (from Day 11) and it was delicious!  And then MJ did dinner.  He's definitely a keeper. 


I forgot to say that my parents sent me chocolate for Valentines Day.  Yesterday I brought them over to a friend's place and we ate some of them.  I had three, which adds up to 140 calories.  Totally worth it.  Happy Valentine's Day!




Fitbit Stats: I didn't do that well in fitbit stats today because I was being so productive at work.  Doesn't it suck that the more productive you are mentally the less you are able to be "productive" physically?  I ended up doing a workout video on demand because I had practically no steps in my day.  My end totals were 2170 Calories burned, 8641 steps taken (4.26 miles) and 94% sleep efficiency.  The jury is still out on whether that's legit.

Week 3, Sunday (Day 30)

Today I had more readers in Canada than I did in the United States.  Perhaps I should start using more Canadian friendly language, eh?  
We've also expanded to Israel.  Shalom.


Breakfast: Strawberry, Chocolate Shake; 1 banana
Although Michael Jordan is not the weight gaining king, he is the reigning smoothie making champion of the household and was nice enough to whip up a yummy smoothie for me before work.  I saved my banana for a later snack, but Probably would have liked it more in the smoothie with strawberries for a snack. Oh well, you live and you learn.


Snack 1: 1 cup chopped cooked butternut squash, 1 tbsp chopped walnuts, 1/2 tsp sucanat, dash of cinnamon
Hmm.  I bought this butternut squash like you told me to, but it's not cooked.  And you're not telling me how to cook it.  I check the index.  There are two other butternut squash references in this Clean Eating cookbook.  One for a soup and one for a side dish.  Perfect.  It says bake the pieces in the oven for 30 minutes, turning half way.  Done.  But why do I have to put so much effort in to find that on my own?  Come on editors.


But YAY delicious snack.  The butternut squash was yummy and sweet with the sugar and cinnamon.  The walnuts were a nice touch.  I will definitely be adding this to my favorites list.  


Lunch: 5 whole wheat crackers dipped in leftover Spicy Black Bean Hummus (from Day 29); 1 cup low-sodium lentil soup; 1 orange
This is one of the few times where you actually eat your leftovers, and I am thrilled that I don't have 16 extra servings of bean dip sitting in my fridge.  Kudos, Editors.  
I find the thought of lentil soup slightly repulsive, so I picked a different type of low-sodium soup (chicken noodle) that was only 70 calories.  I will have to explore the healthy aisle of the grocery store to see if they have better, natural, healthy options.
My clementine had seeds, but you can't win em all, eh?


Snack 2: Mini Yogurt Parfait (8 oz low-fat greek yogurt, 1/2 sliced banana, 3/4 cup Post Shredded Wheat Spoon Size Original cereal)
This snack was very fun to make - and it came out pretty so I took a picture!

 Once again, I replaced the Shredded Wheat cereal with the Nature's Path Optimum cereal and swapped out the banana for some blueberries.  I mean, I already ate a banana for breakfast.  Two in one day is kind of overkill.  If I make this again I will try to get the layers of yogurt, fruit and cereal more evenly.


Dinner: 4 oz broiled cod (replaced with tilapia), 1 cup summer squash or zucchini, steamed; 1 white potato, sliced and baked

I have to be honest when I say this dish was prettier than it tasted.  Not that it tasted bad, but it was just regular old plain Jane in terms of flavor.  I used ketchup but MJ said it didn't really need anything.  What a sweet guy.  And a liar.  I did really enjoy the "potato chips" and will probably make them again.  As per usual, the meal plan didn't tell me a temperature for the potatoes or how long they needed to bake.  As per usual, I figured it out on my own.  Next time I would probably use one yellow squash and one green zucchini for more color.  Overall, a pretty successful day in the eating world.


Fitbit Stats: 1881 calories burned, 6,245 steps taken (2.69 miles traveled).  Boo not getting to 10,000 steps.  I'll have to walk more tomorrow to make up for it. I did figure out how to change my sleep monitor to "sensitive," so instead of sleeping for 7+ hours last night, I apparently only slept for 4 hours and 30 minutes (60% efficiency rate).  I really don't know if this makes sense either, but I was pretty tired today.  Guess I should hit the hay to optimize my sleep!