Fitness Fridays: Scottish Country Dancing

So it seems I may be making these Fitness Fridays more often than I would have thought. I am far too eager not to make this post because I have a bit of a secret I've been keeping for the past few weeks. One of my goals for my journey towards making it to my goal was to try out different forms of cardio and/or work-outs. Originally I had thought this would mean taking classes such as kick-boxing, spin, or zumba. However, I discovered last month that the University at which I work offers a variety of physical education classes that I can take for next to nothing.

With that being said, I'm taking a <b>Scottish Country Dancing</b> class. It's only one day a week, every Friday from 1:25-3:05 PM. In general, it's A LOT of fun especially because of the students in the class (read: we're all mostly a bunch of nerds). The professor comes into the class wearing a kilt along with other Scottish garb. I've already learned 8 different dance moves. My only weakness when it comes to learning Scottish Country Dancing is that I have absolutely NO rhythm -- I can't count the beat along with the music as we're doing the steps. I can only hope that with time this will change.

I feel like the only way to full explain what I'm doing in class is to show a video. Enjoy!

Weekly Weigh-In [8/48]

This the first time of my new Weight Watchers meeting day, a Wednesday instead of a Thursday. Before I got a chance to tell the receptionist who weighed me in that I didn't want to know how much I gained/lost, she told me. Oops! I know I mentioned that I would find out how how much I weighed this week but after mulling it over, I decided that I should get in the habit of not knowing because it's a really hard habit to break. It's been a bit of a struggle this week to not be tempted by the scale as I walk past it every morning in the bathroom. I'm almost tempted to stash it in a closet for the time being.

Anyways, I'm not going to share my weight this week because I'm trying my hardest to forget what I heard this morning. I like my focus being on what I eat and how much I eat -- it really helped me this past and I hope it continues to help. I would say that I had a very good week with only a few minor eating hurdles but nothing like it's been before. There isn't a lot I would change about this past week other than trying much harder to stay away from gluten because I had a day or two this past week when I felt ill. Other than that, I indulged when I was really hungry but I didn't binge or over-indulge.

For this coming week, my plan is to once again focus on doing good over the week. There's nothing major coming up this weekend that I foresee myself having trouble with necessarily. The only two days I can see giving me cause for concern are Thursday and Saturday night.

• Thursday: Since I've now shifted to running a majority of my errands to today (Wednesdays), I'm now left with very little I absolutely have to do on Thursdays. It will definitely be nice to have a relaxing day off on my "weekend" but I do worry that I'll get bored and mindlessly munch. However I'm not going to worry about that idea too much right now, simply because I have a list of tasks to get done at the house on Thursday (laundry, meal prep, working on a new crock pot recipe, etc). I think I'll keep myself sufficiently busy between my to-do list and going to the gym.
• Saturday: The only reason I'm slightly worried about going off plan on Saturday is because I might go bowling with friends. Nothing is set in stone and I may very well end up enjoying a relaxing night in with my boyfriend. However, on the off chance of us getting together with friends to go bowling, there is the possibility that they may order pizza or other foods while we're there that I just won't want (or should not have) to eat. So I think my game plan is to make sure I have my more filling meal for dinner at work Saturday night before we possibly go out, take a banana or other easily portable fruit, and a snack to munch on like a bag of chips or yogurt. Just in case I get hungry anyways, it will be nice to have these foods on me because I find it's often hard to go more than 3 or 4 hours without eating anything.

So those are my plans for the weekend. Fingers crossed that I have another good weekend -- staying on plan, tracking honestly, and eating healthfully. Oh! And before I forget, I have a Non-Scale Victory for the week but I'm going to keep a secret until Friday. You'll have to keep a look out on the blog for a new Fitness Friday post.

Weekend Wrap-Up 03

This past weekend was quite possibly the best weekend I've had in awhile as far as tracking and staying on plan goes. I think what has helped is the shift in my focus from worrying about my weight (having a gain or a loss) as oppose to just focusing on what I'm eating and how much I'm eating on a daily basis. I feel much more at ease knowing that I won't be finding out what the scale says every week.

With that being said, I did great Thursday & Friday. I ate all of my 26 points+/my targeted calories for the day without going over. I didn't feel like I needed to eat anymore than my daily allotted points+/calories for those days either. Looking back on Friday though, I might have been able to make somewhat better meal choices: I basically skipped breakfast and instead had a brunch, then I had a deliciously filling dinner, but I ended up having quite a lot of points+/calories left for the day. I opted to have a large bowl of air-popped popcorn though which counts as a power food for Weight Watchers. So even though I had a big snack with a lot of points/calories, I at least felt satisfied that it was a smart/healthy snack.

I had another pretty good day on Saturday. Instead of waiting to have dinner when I got home from work after 8pm, I opted to take my lunch and dinner to work like I normally would on a typical work day for me. In the past, Saturdays have been the exception to this rule in hopes of getting to spend time with my boyfriend by going out for a nice meal. However, I figured that we could spend just as much quality time and save a bit of money by skipping the dinner out on Saturday nights. This past Saturday night I ended up taking a late-night nap no thanks to the huge headache I had (but at least it saved me from any potential over-eating I may have done). I would have only eaten my daily allotted points but I opted to have two pieces of chocolates from the box that my boyfriend bought earlier in the day. And you know what? I'm proud of myself because I stopped at 2 pieces of chocolates, feeling satisfied enough with only eating two pieces.

Sunday was a bit of a different sort of day for me. I had work like I usually do but I happened to catch by boyfriend on my hour dinner break who was free enough to grab a bite to eat with me at a nearby restaurant. Since I had already packed my dinner for the evening, I told him to pick out the place he wanted to go so I could opt to just drink a soda. This plan mostly worked. I did end up nibbling a little bit on the burrito he got to eat but it certainly wasn't a lot. I had enough points/calories that I made sure to track what I had eaten while we were out as soon as I returned from my hour break.

My other hang-up on Sunday was late that evening after I was home. For some reason I still wanted to snack and munch on something. I ended up going over my daily points+ target by for 4pts+ which wasn't too bad considering how well I had done for the overall weekend.

So I'm really, really happy with how well this weekend went for me. I can only hope that I can keep up the effort all future weekends to come!

Weekly Weigh-In [7/48]

I opted to not weigh-in this week. It's something you can do when you feel you've had a rough week and I'm honestly glad that I did it. I had a couple of bad days that weren't over the weekend and I can't pinpoint what caused them. My week wasn't rough emotionally -- I wasn't stressed or sad or overwhelmed. I was just... me.

The meeting topic at Weight Watchers this week was how to stay on plan over the weekends. I definitely struggle with being 110% honest with myself over the weekend but this blog is helping, for which I'm thankful. I've already got my weekend planned out to the best of my ability:

• Today I kept myself busy with going to the gym, going out to the movies with a friend, cooking some meals for the week, and doing three loads of laundry.
  
• I didn't buy a small bag of Goldfish Puffs when I had the chance earlier -- something I would've taken with me on Friday to have as a late-night snack on Friday night. Instead I'm going to take a 2pt+ bag of sea-salt popcorn or another 2pt+ snack bag with me.
  
• I already have Saturday's meals planned out -- no more having zero idea what I'm having for dinner Saturday night. I'm hoping this helps me stay on track and helps us save some money.
• I will allow myself to have a snack on Saturday night, for which I have saved some points. I may go over my daily points/calories for the day but 1) I will definitely be getting in a good cardio work-out that morning; and 2) Saturday is the only day I have in mind that I will go over my daily points, possibly into my weekly 49 points.

I'm really proud of myself for having a better game plan for this weekend and I'm considering the above points to be my goals for the week. However, I'm also going to be making a few changes:

1. I'm going to be switching my meeting from Thursdays to Wednesdays. It will be at the same time (9:30am) but Wednesdays work better for my schedule.
2. I want to try not finding out how much I weigh until the end of each month (so I will find out next week but I'm waiting until the end of March to find out the number again).

My reasoning for the second is change is because one of two things happen when I find out each week how I did with my weight journey. I either become quite defeated & frustrated OR I become overly confident and I think I can treat myself because I did so good. I have to admit that those are a bit extreme and I'm usually pretty good not going to one extreme or the other. However I've heard so much about how I should not let myself be defined by a number. It's very hard for me not to do so since seeing my weight go down (or up) is what helps me see my progress but it can also be harmful for my journey.

I want to continue tracking 110% on both Weight Watchers and My Fitness Pal (because the latter helps me keep in check how many fruits & veggies I eat in a day). I will still be blogging about I do over the weekends and how I did throughout the week. I'm hoping that putting out there the fact that I just randomly ate food Tuesday & Wednesday night with no rhyme or reason will snap me out of whatever addiction or problem I have with food. It's hard but it's the truth.

Anyways, as I said I will only be trying this method of only finding out my weight once a week. I'm going to put my scale away at home, too. I want my journey to be more about how I feel about myself (inside and out). I want my journey to be about the improvements I make in my food choices -- how much I eat and what I choose to eat. I want my journey to be about being healthy in all ways. So here's to hoping that my clothes start to feel looser in a month or two because I think that will be my only gauge.

I plan to still post Non-Scale Victories every week because I like seeing the small progresses I make in ways other than the number on the scale. For this week, my NSV is that I lengthened my planks from 20 seconds to 25 seconds! Let me tell you, planks are more difficult than you would think.

Weekend Wrap-Up 02

I like to think of my weekends as being Thursdays through Saturdays since a normal work-week for me is working Saturdays through Wednesdays with Thursday and Fridays. So I tend to splurge on Thursdays & Saturdays the most while I sometimes splurge on Fridays. This is a bad habit of mine that I'm trying to break hence the need for a public blog so I can be brutally honest with everything I'm eating. Hopefully it will help me to keep myself in check with what I'm eating during the weekends.

Thursday, February 13th I already talked about this day in my Weekly Weigh-In post but I'll recap it a bit again. Since I was trapped indoors due to Snow Storm Pax, I had tried to prepare a bit by picking up extra fruit and veggies to snack on but that only helped a bit. If I hadn't bought the bag of Tostitos that I bought, I would have been generally safe. However, I did buy a bag of the salty corn chips and didn't think to portion them out since I had already portion out a couple of other bags of snacks. Plus, I had other pre-portioned snack bags that I had bought as well so I thought I would be safe.

My other downfall for Thursday was the small bag of Buffalo Wing Goldfish Puffs that I had bought as well. These type of Goldfish are gluten-free and absolutely delicious so they're on my "Do Not Buy" List yet I still allow myself to buy the small bags for some stupid reason. You would think that the small bag would be okay but since it has two serving sizes it comes out to be about 8 points+ which is too much for a small snack. So I think it's time to put the small "snack size" bags on my "Do Not Buy" List except for maybe as a special treat.

Friday, February 14th

Ah, the Day of Love. Since my boyfriend and I couldn't make Valentine's Day reservation at my restaurant of choice until the following evening, we opted to join friends/co-workers of his at Outback Steakhouse. I made sure to do really, really well throughout the day. I had my smoothie for breakfast, a low-calorie/low-point salad from Saladworks (I wanted to treat myself), and tried my best to plan what I would eat at Outback Steakhouse (a Simply Grilled tilapia filet with seasonal fresh veggies). When it came down to it, I completely blew my evening when I had a drink which I often do when I start to get nervous (I don't do well socializing in big groups and there were going to be 13 other people I'd have to be around). Once I had a drink, everything went down hill. I had about a fourth of a Bloomin' Onion that I shared with friends at the table; I ordered a buttery appetizer of crab-stuffed mushrooms that I only ate; and the Simply Grilled Tilapia that I had planned on ordering wasn't on the menu.

The good news is that I ended up ordering Chicken on the Barbie with seasonal fresh veggies and when I got my entree, I was too full to eat the whole thing so I only ate half and took half home with me (along with most of the veggies). It's now my lunch for today and eating only half saved me on points+/calories. The bad news that while a Bloomin' Onion is apparently low in points+/calories (surprisingly), it is filled with gluten which completely made my stomach feel terrible. The worst items that I ordered with the highest points+/calories were the drink (a piña colada) and the crab-stuffed mushrooms. So, hopefully I learned my lesson for the future (even though I've previously learned in the past, argh).

Saturday, February 15th

During the day I did very, very well. I made sure to eat filling meals that were low in points+/calories since my boyfriend & I couldn't get a Valentine's Day reservation until later in the evening this day (I work until 8pm anyways, so our reservation was for 10pm). Since it was a special occasion, I asked my boyfriend if we could go to The Melting Pot which we had gone to once before and I had wanted to go back ever since then. I did my very best to track all/most of what we would get to share that night for all four courses earlier in the day. Overall I think I did a decent job of eating there even though I'm sure it wasn't the lowest meal in points+ or calories. I could not emphasize the fact that every bite was 110% every point+/calorie that evening.

Plus, The Melting Pot was very accommodating for me to have as little gluten as possible. For example, they gave me gluten-free bread to dip in the cheese fondue; I was able to substitute extra shrimp for the spinach ravioli I would have gotten in my third course; and they had gluten-free pound cake as well as brownie pieces for me to have for the chocolate fondue course. It was all magnificently delicious. I'm really happy we went!

Anyways, this coming week's Weight Watchers meeting is focusing on eating better during the weekends. I'm very much looking forward to Thursday's meeting and setting some goals for me to adhere to next weekend.

Fitness Fridays

The idea for this post came to me while I was working out at home yesterday during Snow Storm Pax. I'm not going to commit to making fitness posts regular -- these are the type of random posts I mentioned in my introductory post.

When I found out about the huge snow storm that was supposed to hit the East Coast on Thursday (yesterday), I decided to get all of my usual Thursday errands completed so I could spend all of Thursday hunkered down indoors relaxing. (For those wondering, I work Saturdays through Wednesdays with Thursdays & Fridays being my weekend.) I was really looking forward to relaxing on Thursday which I hardly ever do since I always keep myself booked up with grocery shopping, Weight Watchers meeting, meal prep for the upcoming week, getting together with friends, etc.

However on Wednesday I stumbled upon a cardio Bollywood work-out video on Weight Watcher's homepage. It was then that I realized that I didn't have to go a day without working out. I could work-out without leaving the house!

After sleeping in to catch up on some much-needed rest, I made a deliciously different brunch that consisted of a PB2 banana wrap using a 1pt+/50-calorie corn tortilla, diet hot chocolate with mini peppermint marshmallows, and Yoplait Key Lime greek yogurt. I love when I get a chance to change up my routine and have a special/different meal!

Then I started with the 15-Minute Cardio-Abs Bollywood Workout on the Weight Watchers episode. It was fun for the dance part of the routine but I had a bit of trouble following some of the other exercises.

Since the internet at my house was lagging a bit, I decided to see what Comcast Xfinity On Demand might offer for work-out videos. I was in luck! There are TONS of work-out videos On Demand, nearly 200 of them! I really recommend checking out your cable company's work-out videos, especially if you have Comcast because there's huge range of work-out videos. I decided to try one of the kick-boxing videos which I personally loved because I'm a big fan of kick-boxing. Following along might have been easier for me simply because I've gone to a few kick-boxing classes before but again this is something I would recommend trying out.

Aside from the video work-outs, I also did some push-ups, squats, and planks. Oh! And before I even began working out, I helped clean snow off the cars as well as shovel a bit which was much harder than it looked.

All in all, I think I worked out for about 45 minutes and surprisingly work up a sweat. I earned 3 APs which is nothing compared to the 9 APs that I earned yesterday. Too bad my weeks restart on Thursday!

Eating-wise I didn't do terribly today despite being stuck in the house. My biggest downfall was a bag of salty corn tortilla chips (Tostitos this time). I should not have even bought a bag of them but oh, well. I didn't go through the whole bag which is good. I pointed everything else I ate honestly, keeping within my 26 daily points+ but going over caloric intake on My Fitness Pal. I could have done much worse so I'm fairly proud of myself.

Weekly Weigh-In [6/48]

This week I opted to weigh in on Wednesday morning instead of Thursday because Delaware was predicted to get a wicked snow storm so my WW Leader mentioned that she'd probably be cancelling our usual Thursday meeting. Despite the fact that it meant I would have a really long Wednesday, I still got up and went to the 9:30am meeting. I gained 0.2lbs but that's okay -- it could have been much worst (a bigger gain).

As mentioned in my introductory post on this blog, I was planning on making my Weekly Weigh-In posts a reflection of my week leading up to my weigh-in as well as a space for me to make a few small mini-goal(s) to work on for the upcoming week.

With that being said, I think a had a few set-backs this week. I splurged over the weekend as I mentioned in my last Weekend Wrap-Up post. Whenever I splurge over the weekend (which is quite frequently), I almost always feel compelled to under-eat during the week even though I have very active days. Therefore, Monday & Tuesday I had quite a few remaining daily points left/calories remaining that I didn't eat. On Monday I had 8 daily points+ left and 980 calories despite earning 6 activity points (APs)/674 extra calories for that day. On Tuesday I had 7 points+/904 calories remaining even though I earned 7 APs/690 extra calories. So, I'm wondering if under-consumption is setting me back.

This coming week I'm making it a goal of mine to continue tracking honestly and to eat all of my daily 26pts. I think it will be hard for me but I've learned from my WW Leader that sometimes you have to experiment with what works for you on Weight Watchers. This could mean eating only your 26 daily points without going into your weekly 49 points or the APs that you earn in a week. It could also mean eating all or some the APs that you gain. So first I'm going to experiment with just eating my 26pts and seeing how my body fares with that method.

The good news is that I've really adapted my eating habits/schedule to my work schedule -- something I struggled with before the New Year because I had started a new job with completely opposite hours than what I was used to before. Learning what meals to eat at what times with my schedule back to being 3:30pm to midnight leaves me with very little time for snacking at work. However, if I'm going to start eating all of my 26pts in a day, then I will need to learn how to find time to have a snack at work.

Anyways, my Non-Scale Victory (NSV) for this week is that I've started trying to use the stair climber at the gym. I needed a new form of cardio for the gym that I go to because they have arc trainers instead of ellipticals. If you've never tried a stair climber, let me tell you they are quite difficult! The first time I tried one, I was out of breath in the first 2 minutes of the work-out. Now I'm up to 10 minutes on the stair climber but I'm hoping to work up to 15 minutes. It's a difficult work out but I can tell it's really great cardio.

Weekend Wrap-Up 01

Since I said in my introductory blog post that Mondays would be dedicated to Weekend Wrap-Up posts, I've decided that for this week I'll make that day be today.

This weekend wasn't one of my worst eating-wise but it certainly wasn't one of my best. For the past few weeks I've been really craving salty chips, specifically corn tortilla chips. Recently I discovered Garden of Eatin' chips which are delicious. The problem is that their stats are high for the amount of chips you get to eat -- 140 calories, 7g/18g/2g/2g (Total Fat/Total Carb/Dietary Fiber/Protein), and 4 Points+ (WW). There's 9 servings in the bag but one of my hardest old habits to break is eating a whole bag of chips when they taste so delicious. So, these chips ended up being my downfall Friday night.

Thursday and Saturday, if I remember correctly, I had the same problem like I did with the corn tortilla chips but with these Gluten Free Rice Thins. They satisify my desire for some crunchy and salty or with a flavor (the white cheddar ones are too good). I've found that when you're trying to follow a gluten-free (G-free) lifestyle change like I am, you get bored of having the same ol' popped chips over and over again. However, I have the same problme with a box of these Rice Thins that I do with the tortilla chips -- I have very little self-control when I'm eating them right of the box.

Lesson learned? Only buy snacks that come individually package for single servings with calories/points+ that I can handle. A great example are the small bags of Smartfood White Cheddar Popcorn or Pop Chips that I can find at places like Walmart or Target. If I can't find the snacks I want in single-serving packages, then I absolutely MUST measure out the snack as soon as I get home with it and put each serving size of my liking into ziplock baggies. I've done it before so I can certainly do it now.

Sunday was a different hurdle all on its own. My boyfriend and I decided to have a little adventure since it was our first day off together since the holidays (I work nights & weekends whereas he has a regular ol' Monday through Friday job). After doing a little researching I found the Reading Terminal Market was in Philly, not too far of a drive from us. Now, I've been to markets before (especially in Lancaster County where I lived for about six years), so I knew to not eat a lot that morning before we left because the food I'd probably eating later would not be necessarily healthy.

I started my Sunday morning/afternoon (we slept in until noon, which worked out in my favor) by having a PB2/peanut butter banana wrap on a corn tortilla with some greek yogurt. It was a filling, protein-packed brunch with very little points+/calories.

When we got to the market I made sure not to snack on a lot of things. Around 4pm, we decided to stop and have dinner since the market would be closing in an hour (plus, we were both hungry). We wanted to have something a little different so we stopped at a booth/vendor that made New Orleans inspired food. I got a catfish wrap instead of the roll it would have come on but then I realized that the spinach (green) wrap probably had gluten in it. Oh, well. I also should have asked to have the spicy mayo that came on the wrap on the side and just dipped my wrap in it but that was something I didn't think of at the time.

So aside from the catfish wrap (which was delicious and worth it), my other weaknesses included the gluten-free veggie chips that were sold by the 1/4lb. There was also many bakery booths and when I found out that one of them sold flourless/g-free cookies, I decided to get one. Again, the cookie at least, my choices were out of the ordinary, tasty, and totally worth the points.

Overall I think I had an okay weekend. Like I said earlier, it wasn't the best weekend and it wasn't the worst. The most important thing to take away this weekend is to find snacks with fewer serving sizes and to measure them out as soon as I buy them.

Let me introduce you to my blog...

As you can read in my sidebar, I started my weight loss journey in April of 2011 by joining Weight Watchers [WW]. When I started I weighed 242lbs and I easily lost over 75lbs in my first year of WW. Then I started to plateau because I had not truly broken most of my old habits. At some point between 2012 and 2013, I sort of lost my motivation to keep my journey going. I'm happy to say that I didn't completely back-track! I've still lost 75lbs and I'm incredibly proud of myself for keeping that much weight off.

However, it's now 2014 and I still have 40lbs to lose. Last April I traveled abroad to London and Paris because I've an Anglophile for many, many years. With the trip out of the way (during which I splurged because, oh hey -- foreign cuisine!), I feel like I can finally make it to my goal with smaller hurdles to overcome (e.g., the upcoming trip to California in October with my boyfriend). I've been thankful thus far that posting my weight loss/gain on Facebook has been a huge help but I think it's time to take it one step further with this blog.

A few things to note. I weigh in Thursday mornings at Weigh Watchers (my meetings are at 9:30am with Tracy, my Leader from the start of my journey). My plan for this blog is to make two posts a week: 1) a Weekend Wrap-Up post to hold me accountable for what I eat over the weekend; and 2) a Weekly Weigh-In post to write about how my week went, make a few weekly goals for myself, and post my weight loss. With any luck, all of this will help keep me on track. Periodically I want to re-visit my goals that you'll see below and see how I'm doing to meet those goals. I may also throw in some other random posts to share favorite recipes or meals, product reviews, etc. Who knows!

With all of that being said, I made it my HUGE 2014 New Year's Resolution to reach my goal weight of 125lbs. Since this is such a big goal, I broke it down into little pieces with lots of goals to meet to hopefully help me accomplish my resolution. At this point I feel like it's easier to throw in some stats and then copy + paste my 1½ page list of goals.

★My 2014 goal is to lose 40lbs in 48 weeks★
The Math: 40lbs ÷ 48 weeks = need to lose approximately 0.85lbs per week
Starting Weight as of April 2011: 242.6lbs
Starting Weight as of 1/1/2014: 165.8lbs
Current Weight: 161.2lbs
Pounds Lost in 2014: 4.6lbs (as of week 5 of 48)
Total Pounds Lost thus far: 81.4lbs

☆Fitness Routine☆

• Continue to meet with a personal trainer every 4-6 weeks
• Continue doing work-routines from my personal trainer at least 2 days per week
• Cardio!!!
  • At least 4 times a week (ideally 5 times) for at least 30 minutes (ideally 40-60 minutes) of either elliptical*, stationary bike*, treadmill, arc trainer, biking, etc.
  • HIIT = High Intensity Interval Training
    • Elliptical = 2 minutes at baseline, 1 minute fast
    • Stationary bike = 1 minute baseline, 2 minutes fast
  • On my days off from the gym/working out, do at least 30-45 minutes of walking (or other cardio activity), even if it means breaking this time up into 15 minute segments (this will probably occur on the weekends)
    • Saturdays = 30 minute walk during 1-hour break (at least)
    • Sundays = 30-45 minute walk or hike with Tom OR by myself by leaving for work 1 hour early
• Take a fitness class either once a month or every other month
  • Options: jazzercise, kick-boxing, zumba, spin class, water aerobics, etc.
  • Find links/locations online for these options

☆Healthy Eating/Food☆

• Continue tracking food with Weight Watchers
• Only use weekly 49 points for special occasions (date nights with Tom, outings with friends or family, etc.) → i.e., I will not use my weekly 49 points on Friday/Saturday nights for snacking alone just because I don’t weigh in for another 5-6 days
• This is not about sacrificing the foods that I love → I will find alternative foods and/or healthier recipes for foods that I am craving
• This is not about feeling deprived → When I am hungry, I will have veggies for a snack with a glass of water; if that doesn’t work, I will have a piece of fruit; if I’m still hungry after that, then I will have a high-protein snack (such as PB2)
• I will continue to buy a limited amount of pre-packaged/single-serve foods that I crave for chocolate/cheese/salty/ice cream cravings so the option is there
• I will continue my Do Not Buy/Weakness Foods List
• Find/narrow down 3-4 recipes to try throughout the month; aim to try and make at least new meal every other week
• Buy a weekly calendar in order to make menus
• Try at least one new veggie or one new method of eating/preparing veggies every month
• Keep reducing the amount of gluten I consume; exceptions including old fashion oats, whole grain pasta (limit), whole grain breads (limit), some cereals (Fiber One, Cheerios), whole grain rice products (quinoa, barely)

☆Make It Known☆

• Make an album on Facebook of Before/After pictures with my Starting Weight, Current Weight, and Goal Weight
• Write on the wipe board on Tom’s fridge how much I have left to lose
• Print out Before/Current pictures and put them around Tom’s house (as well as mostly on the fridge)