Still hangin' in

I think it's been 2 weeks since I checked in last. It's been a busy time for me. I needed to get some creative things out of the way. Next I wanted to spiffy up the house before my daughter brought her fiance home to meet us. I'll have my granddaughter for the next two weeks and I needed to get 'ahead' on some things. If you ever really do get 'ahead' LOL

Last week I dropped a pound and held steady through this past week. A full Thanksgiving dinner prepared in honor of meeting my new future son-in-law probably didn't help. I didn't over eat but there were a few carbs I don't have on a regular basis like fresh made dinner rolls and cinnamon rolls.

The house looks decent, our first meeting with Jeremy went well. He's a good fit for our daughter and he's already an awesome dad to my granddaughter and the child he and my daughter are expecting in October.

I reminded my husband today we need to regrease the treadmill belt. I've not been on it since the knee accident last July. Then I'm back on it at least 3 times this week.

In the mean time, I'm asking the Goddess for much warmer weather so I can be outside more.

Enjoy your journey!

Starting off right!

Yeah! I'm down a pound. Silly to be so excited over a pound, right? Not for me. My GOAL is one pound a week. So I'm on track with where I want to be.

I'm still having issues with the tooth but not as bad as it had been. I'm slowly being able to eat some things again that had bothered me before. I'm also trying to eat more regularly, even it it's just a serving of yogurt or cottage cheese. At least I'm feeding the metobolic furnace.

Today, once I'm caught up on the business end of things, I'm getting on the treadmill. I'm going to start out slow and let myself build up gradually. ANY amount of walking is better than no walking.

I'm also going to be searching for the Tuesday Recipe to share. I'm starting with each of my 'healthy' cookbooks and working my way through. Can't wait to see what's on the table tomorrow.

Enjoy the Journey!

More on Portion control

A few days late this week. Monday was Valentine's Day. And my ever uber-supportive husband DID NOT buy me chocolate. Bless his heart. He gave me a romantic pamper basket complete with a sleeping mask, terry cloth slippers for after my bath and a teddy bear for my bear collection. The whole week leading up to the day of Love, we'd been seeing commercials for the heart shaped box of variety chocolates. I KNEW he'd already purchased my gift so I didn't say anything about NOT wanting them. I just kept my mouth shut and hoped he'd been paying attention to me - not the commercials.

Ladies, don't hate me for what I'm about to say but he ALWAYS listens to me. He might not always REMEMBER LOL - but he listens.

Keep in mind, I'm not saying you CAN'T EVER have chocolate. Heaven for bid! Women more than men (in my opinion) REQUIRE chocolate. It truly is a food group to us. What I am saying is you can have ANYTHING YOU WANT in moderation. So unless you can stick to just 1 chocolate from that box, hand it off to that skinny little thing down the street who seems to be able to eat the whole cow without looking like one :-)

Which brings us to more on Portion Sizes. After hunting high and low for the tables I knew I had somewhere... I found one really good source - right in my 3-Hour Diet book by Jorge Cruise.

If you've not been to his website, I encourage you to do so. He really does give down-to-earth, easy-to-understand information. It's really the same thing we've been hearing from a lot of different 'meal-planning' sources over the years. He just puts it in plain English. You can find his books in most libraries.

Let's take a look at some basic measurement/ portion equivalents:

1 Cup = a baseball

1/3 Cup = 1 cupped hand (palm)

1/2 Cup cooked vegies or chopped fruit = 1 rounded handful

1 piece of fruit = a light bulb

1 tsp = water bottle cap or tip of thumb to 1st knuckle

2 Tablespoons of Peanut Butter = a ping pong or golf ball

1 oz bread or grain = 1 cassette tape (remember those?)

1 medium potato = a computer mouse

The key is to learn to equate the correct portions with things you KNOW in your every day life.

If ever you are not sure about a portion size, read the label. Then measure it with a standard measuring utensil. When you've done that, study it. What does the portion size remind you of. Learn to set your own gauge for what you eat. It will be easier for you when you're away from home. Whether it be in a restaurant or at someone's backyard BBQ. Watch your portions and watch the inches slip away!

Enjoy the journey!

Monday Musings

So, how'd you do last week? Did you get your notebook and track how you normally eat? If you did, that's AWESOME! It means you are serious about doing whatever it takes to put yourself on the road to Good Health! I'm so proud of you!

If you didn't, why not? Did you think it was silly? Were you afraid of what it might reveal? Either answer are legitimate reasons for * avoiding the issue *. But I can tell you avoiding the issue IS NOT going to make you healthier. So how serious are you about being healthier? How serious are you about losing weight?

This week we're going to talk about what TRUE PORTION SIZES are. Some of them may surprise you. I know the first time I told my husband that a 'portion' of mashed potatoes consisted of the ice cream scoop, he thought I was nuts! LOL

Carbs are most often a 1/2 Cup portion. A traditional ice cream scoop is 1/2 Cup... the same portion size for any of your starches such as mashed potatoes, white rice, pasta, etc. And an additional FYI - it's also the portion of Ice Cream. 1 scoop... sans toppings unless you want to count some pureed fresh fruit like strawberries or rasberries.

But what about Proteins? How big of a piece of steak or a pork chop or chicken breast is the RIGHT portion?

Think in terms of a standard deck of cards, or the palm of your hand - not the whole section from heel to finger tip - but from heel to where the fingers join the hand.

Although Cheese is a protein, it's also a dairy. A 1 oz piece of cheese is equivalent to a DOMINO.

Fats are easy. 1 serving of fat will fill a WATER BOTTLE CAP.

Sure doesn't sound like a lot of food does it? So what are you suppose to fill up on?

VEGETABLES and FRUITS.

You can determine the amount of these by the dimension of a DVD case - stacked 3 high

Jorge Cruise came up with a great *Portion Control* visual in his book The 3-Hour Diet.

First of, start with a 9" dinner plate. Most of us use a large plate - 12". Don't believe me? Go to your cupboard and get out the same plate you'll put on the table for supper tonight. Find a yard stick, a ruler, tape measure or your husband's shoe. What measurement do you get?

Studies show if you use a smaller plate, you'll eat less. Why? Because if your eyes transmit a picture of a FULL PLATE to your brain, it reads it as FULL ! It doesn't care about the SIZE! Your brain only comprehends what YOU TELL IT!

If you don't own a 9" plate, take thee to the Dollar Store, Thrift Store or local Discount shopping center (You know the one I mean. The one you do a majority of your weekly shopping at). Buy one for each person who sits down to dinner with you. If you use this plate as your guide, you won't need to worry about measuring QUITE so much.

Cruise plan calls for you to divide your plate into thirds. NOT equal thirds! Here's how the equation works:

Fill 1/2 the plate with your VEGETABLE and or FRUIT. You can combine it with a salad or fresh vegies. And remember that dressing you want to drench it in? Read the back of the dressing bottle for the CORRECT serving size. That label on the back we never pay much attention to is FULL of valuable information.

Okay so now you have 1/2 a plate full of good stuff. Now to the stuff you'd rather be eating. Divide the remaining 1/2 into 1/2 again. 1 side for your carb and 1 side for your protein.

Don't worry if it doesn't seem like a lot. You're going to be snacking on a piece of fruit in three hours and drinking lots of water. You'll be fine.

Will this be easy? NO

Can you adjust? YES - if you want to

Is it the best for you? ABSOLUTELY! What isn't good about being HEALTHY!

So give this a try for a week. Using the guidelines given, practice the portion control. Next week I'll try to have located some of the other portion guidelines I've come across. The more you know - the easier this will be.

Enjoy the journey!

Monday Musings

Well... you know what they say about the best laid plans... ? Well, in my case it's true. I won't go into detail about the issue. Just suffice it to say I had about 5 days where I didn't do much walking. I spent lots of time in a chair.

So I don't want to jinx myself by saying I'm all better LOL But maybe....

Despite being able to work out, I have still been watching what I eat and the portion control. I keep thinking back to an info card I got in a Prevention Magazine mailing once. What we consider portions sizes have changed drastically over the past 30 years... and NOT for the better.

Between becoming more and more dependent on Fast Food or quick meals and thinking everything is dispensable, we have stopped focusing on healthy. It doesn't have to be a trade off. We can still eat healthy. We just need to stop thinking we need MORE.

For the next week, I'd like you to do an experiment with me. Get a small notebook, about 4x6 (the dimension of a standard photograph)

For the next 2 or 3 days I encourage you to EAT NORMALLY. Don't think about what you should be doing... just treat every meal as you have in the past. BUT as you sit down to eat, make a note of the portion size. Come on... you don't need to get out the measuring cup for this. You can HONESTLY estimate. You know the size of a tennis ball, a deck of cards, a domino, etc. Write your portion size down in relation to an item you understand.

For the remaining of the week, give yourself the same portion BUT measure it. Again, don't worry about what you think you should be eating. This exercise is all about AWARENESS. We'll worry about fixing it next week. For now, take your 'normal' portion and be honest about it's ACTUAL measurement.

Why am I asking you to do this? Because if you don't know where you are coming from, you won't appreciate the journey near as much... or truly understand the progress you'll make along the way.

Come on the journey with me...

Kelly

A New Year - A New Start!

WOW!
I can’t believe I haven’t been in here since May of last year.

The blog title says Living Through Weightloss… Maybe it should have been Losing Weight Through Life.

The day of my last post I had a leg/ hip issue materialize, making walking on the tread mill impossible. Without the treadmill activity to report, I just stopped coming here until it had passed.

About the time it healed, I found out I only had a month left with my granddaughter before she would be moving out to live with her mom in Nashville. Rather than worry about me, I spent my days soaking up all the toddler love I could cram into a few short weeks.

The day she left, we tore into my office remodel. Four days later I blew my left knee cap and spent the next six weeks in the recliner. By the time it was on the mend, it was fall, time to harvest the garden, try to catch up on the things that had been let go while I had my grandtoddler all to myself and writers conferences to attend. Follow that all up with National Novel Writing Month then Christmas.
Before I knew it, the time had just vanished… and I had nothing weight-related to show for it. Not unless you count the fact I didn’t lose, nor gain, a single pound. I held fast at 181 pounds.

With the start of a new year, I feel as if my life has started fresh. I’ve had the house to myself and finding the routine I was comfortable with before my daughter and granddaughter moved in all those months ago. I’m injury free and ready to get back on track.

My internet use is on my time again so my postings will be regular. I’ll be trying new routines and as the weather improves, walking outside as well as using the treadmill again.

Please come back on this journey with me. I’ve lived through the distractions, now it’s time to Live Through the Weightloss!

Gaining Ground

I'm not quite where I want to be yet, but this morning I upped the peak speed to 3mph. From the result numbers, I'm thinking I'm going to have to be doing 3.5 - 4mph to meet the 1 mile in 15 min. The treadmill was throwing a bit this morning so need to have hubby look at the belt. It was enough that I don't think I'd want to try walking 4 the way it is. We'll have to see.

23min/ 1mi/ 172cal/ 3peak

And the journey continues