Oh Mother Nature, you joker!

Well, leave it to Aunt Flo to visit the first week of our challenge! Grrr! Women so get why this is frustrating...no wonder I've been having "fatter than usual" days!  Hello bloating and water weight! Thanks for showing up mid-week, right in time for the big weigh in on Sunday!

I'm trying to do what I can to combat it, trying to up the exercise ante, which trust me, isn't much, but I'm so out of shape the 18 minutes of yoga we did on Tuesday? Yeah, still sore.  As I write this right now I am 11 minutes into Quick Start Yoga for Weightloss and waiting for the other 15 minutes to buffer - I got sick of holding poses for ridiculously extended periods of time and having the video and sound all out of whack.  Now I know for next time!  This was the Yoga DVD that started it all last go round.  I ran in to Derek's mom at Target, we picked it out, D and I started doing it, and viola - there we were, skinny bitches! Well, not quite but almost how it worked.  So I figured it was familiar and not too difficult so a good place to start - easier on the muscles at first than that Nazi-style yoga we did Tuesday!

Another small victory for me tonight - I ate cauliflower.  I won't go as far as saying I like it, but I didn't vomit, so we're getting there.  I tossed it with olive oil and Mrs. Dash and baked it while the turkey tenderloin baked.  It was alright but still something is "off".  I grabbed a tablespoon of bbq sauce - we have no light or FF ranch in the house, boo! And dunked that crap in bbq sauce and choked it down.  I"ll try it 20 more times - apparently you have to eat something 21 times to develop a liking for it or something, The New Winnie (Rosemary) told me. Vegetables are hard! Why did no one make me get this part over with as a child?!

Today was kind of lame food wise.  Lunch was a spinach salad with chicken breast, light cheese and balsamic vinegarette, while snack was cottage cheese and almonds.  Stupid me put the almonds in the cottage cheese and they got kind of soggy. Dinner was not so bad, turkey wise.  I'm just not a huge fan of turkey that isn't cut deli thin.  But, it was in the freezer, and easy to cook while I cleaned.

Oh crappy, now my neighbor's internet that I'm "borrowing" is not going to be strong enough to finish streaming my yoga video! I see myself frustrated and just giving in and ordering the damn DVD from Amazon! I had a copy, or two, actually...maybe my sister has it.  I am pretty sure she's the one that has my yoga mat. Hmmm...

Oh yeah.  Lacy and I decided that $59.95 for a family gym membership is worth it.  I totally think it is.  It's within walking distance of our house, and it's a Snap so it's 24/7.  That means that she can go in the evenings after work or whatever, and I can either go after Nathan is in bed and she's home with him, or in the morning before they both get up.  I don't work out well with others, I like to do my own thing, so convenient, financially do-able, and I've got to do something to get in shape! (stupid "borrowed" internet!)

Anyhoodles, I might try to spruce up my page a bit, get some recipes up and maybe figure out how the hell you make friends here.  This place is scary compared to my safe, closely knit community where I keep all things personal!

Technical Difficulties

I think my body finally figured out what I was doing to it – trying to feed it vegetables and not giving it sugar and fats in quite the amounts it’s used to.

The first few days it probably thought, “Oh, not a big deal, these green things…we’ll just deal with them and not see them again for a year or two.”

Then, it began to get a little wiser… “Hmm.  More green things? Red? MORE green?  What is she doing to us?!”

And today, it finally just revolted.

You may just as well send my mail c/o The Ladies’ Room.  Cause every 10 minutes I’m right back there. 

I’m gonna win this battle, no matter how many rolls of toilet paper it takes!

I can breathe! (kinda...)

Holy snot, Batman! Food-wise this week's been alright.  Health-wise, not so much.  Monday I was suffering hard core, this sinus infection be damned. Tuesday I stayed home sick from work and went to the doctor again (my, my they love my money!) and sat there until she gave me drugs I thought would work and refused to leave unsatisfied.  Yesterday was a little better, today I can breathe! Kinda.  Better than I have been able to in three weeks anyway! Small vicotries!

Speaking of, I had a small personal victory on Tuesday...let's start at the beginning though.  Even though I felt like death warmed over, I plugged along and made healthy eating choices, and came in under my calories for the day. I don't remember breakfast, but no matter, it was food, it was healthy, and it was delicious or I'd remember otherwise.  Mid-morning snack was a Green Monster.  Our first one! Spinach, flax seed, kiwi, blueberries, strawberries and almond milk...

Lacy insisted on pressing the blender button...I wanted to! Not fair! It was delicious none the less...a little bitter thanks to some not-quite-ripe enough kiwi, but A for efftort.  The one I made this morning with strawberries and banana, spinach, flax, greek yogurt and almond milk was way better!

Lunch Tuesday was turkey pita pizzas.  They were alright.  They'd have been really good if I hadn't gone quite so gung-ho on the onions!

Yesterday's lunch was an organic vegan burrito.  I used to eat them a lot.  I don't know what I was thinking when I bought them.... decent cal, low fat, good protein, but hella carbs - hello white flour tortilla. *duh* So yesterday was like carb city...blargh.

Dinner Tuesday was AH-MAZING! We made kabobs on the grill and this is where my small personal victory comes in.



See those red things? Those are cherry tomatoes.  And I LIKE THEM! *cue angels singing*  That brought the grand total of vegetables I'll eat that don't come from a can and I like to TWO! (The other is spinach) (The burger is Nathan's - he begged me for a burger.  Dad's a farmer so I've got a freezer full of homegrown beef, what else am I gonna do with it?)

For the record, even though there are green peppers on all the skewers, I gave my share to Lacy - I loathe that horrid vegetable. Ick.  I'd rather take my chances with cauliflower again.

We paired the kabobs with some taboule and it was delicious! Filling and low-cal, low-fat, whole-grain...perfect!

Dinner last night was pretty damn good, too.  I had chicken breast on the menu, but had to modify thigns a bit since I was a wee bit short on veggies and really close to hitting my target carbs, and needed a healthy portion of protein thrown in, so this was what I came up with:

I came home, roasted some red pepper on the grill, seasoned some chicken breast, threw that on the little George Foreman (I didn't have enuogh charcol do do the chicken AND the peppers outside), sauteed some spinach and a clove of garlic, put it on top the chicken breast with a piece of light string cheese I had shredded in the little blender, and roasted red pepper slices, baked that until the cheese melted and YUM!  Some grapes and one of the last Easter eggs to go along with it...

I've hit right around my target calorie goal without going over every day so far!

The only thing is, is I don't *feel* anything happening.  I don't feel like I'm losing weight.  And yeah, it hasn't even been a week, but usually (in my past failed endeavors) I've been able to TELL I've been making progress...maybe I feel this way because I haven't been able to work out yet? With the exception of 18 minutes of yoga that almost killed me because I was so out of shape and so snotty I couldn't breathe on top of it...

The scale will tell me on Sunday though...

And considering that I was eating over 1,000 calories, tons of fat, nutritionally stupid foods, and a bajillion refined carbs more every day prior to startingt his, I would THINK I'm going to make progress, despite the lack of exercise this week...

Lacy is home in Wisconsin unitl Saturday afternoon.  Better stay on track while she's gone!