Well, I had my Chinese lunch and I was hungry for candy and went to the Dollar Tree and got what I wanted because I knew it would be smaller bags. Had what I wanted for lunch and put the rest in the freezer. I decided to do that because ever once in a while I get hungry for something in particular and I've learned if I get it and eat only as much as it takes to satisfy me and I'm through with it for months or longer. I have stuff in the cabinet that I've had probably almost a year that I need to ditch. Once I had it, I haven't wanted it any more.

While shopping at Walmart, I decided to just eat whatever I want and just count calories and not think about the carbs. While shopping, I started to get some chicken wings which DH and DGS and I love to have at least 1 x a week. I realized that some of the meat proteins that I really like, I would have to forget eating if I just counted calories only especially if I was going to eat grains. I talked myself into staying with low carb eating. I've had my temporary carby eating the past few days and now I am back to eating low carb.

I love kalbasah and decided to get the individual servings shaped like franks. After us talking about the cabbage wraps, soups etc, I decided that I could shop some cabbage with onions etc and add one of those sliced kalbasah links and have a nice light low carb dinner or snack. I bought a pork roast to cook either tomorrow or Monday. I like cooking a roast once a week because it makes a nice leftover lunch for DGS to take to school.

Whew, I've finally got my low carb head on straight again. I wonder why oh why do I keep going back and forth on this.

Have a nice weekend.

Spent all afternoon working in the yard at my MIL's house, the one being renovated. Her front landscaping had been growing wild for many many years. I dug up three shrubs not worth saving, moved/replanted another, pulled weeds, used the electric trimmer on all the shrubs (probably 12 or so), raked and bagged all the trimmings and leaves from the mulch. I am worn out. I did it all by myself while my husband watched my daughter, thought it would go faster/easier that way. Fortunately, while I was gone my husband mowed our yard so I won't have to worry about that this week while he is gone. The MIL's house is almost done and ready to go back on market. I'd say about two weeks at most. We are just waiting on granite install, carpet install and completion of all the molding around the floors. The new appliances have been delivered but won't be put into place til granite is done.

Our old house closes on Monday. The buyers really walked all over us this week with the few repairs needed. My husband was spitting nails. If we did not need to get out of that mortgage we would have refused it all and let them walk. We really felt they took advantage and were very difficult. I am going to be very glad to get both the houses out of my hair and finally only have ONE house to worry about!

Still off plan and sort of not caring, just need a break from the madness, lol.

I might as well jump on the "bad eating bandwagon" with the rest of you. LOL When my step son came and brought McDonald's I decided to make some eggs for myself. Then I decided to make 2 pieces of toast with it, with white bread. That would not have been too bad, but I forgot to take a Glimiperide to offset the carbs in the toast. By dinner time my blood sugar was 201. Took the pill right away and had a hamburger patty with lettuce and tomato for dinner, not bun. That is not going to help my A1c Coming up. Luckily my BS was only up for a short time before I caught it and took the meds. This is the first 200 I have had in a very long time.

My little Maltese doesn't like my grandson. Actually, he is afraid of him because he is so active. But when John was eating his McDonald's hamburger, the dog was sitting there right beside him, hoping for a handout. After John was finished with his hamburger, the dog came over and jumped up on my lap. They do not give their dog any "people" food, so John is trained not to feed the dog. DH gives our dog a little treat once in a while and hopes he doesn't get sick all over the floor. LOL

Trish, I used to buy a candy bar once in a while when waiting in the check-out line. The last time we were at WalMart I looked them over and none of them seemed to appeal to me. That's a good change. I still can't be trusted around Hershey's kisses. They are only sold in bags, and I have been knows to finish off those bags quickly.

You know, I was thinking about the Pam with Coconut Oil and also the Pam with Olive Oil. They both say they are fat free. How can they be fat free?


Shannon, I guess when someone is buying a house they are going to push for everything they can get, and hope that you are anxious enough to sell the house to go along with their demands. Soon both the houses will be sold and this will all be overwith.

{{{{hugs}}}}

Weight was up a little this morning, no surprise after eating Chinese and the candy. I cheated and took one of DH Glimiperide and fbs was 100 this morning. So I'm taking that as a wake up call to get going with weightloss and control.

I am using Livestrong again. It shows if I eat a little over 1400 calories a day that I can lose 2 lbs a week. Well, we know that doesn't always work for me, but I'm going with 1400 calories. I've been reading some on there and I was looking at carb cycling. Not ready to try it, but I just might think about it in the future. Printed out an article they had on there on how it works. It seems that you eat high carb 2 days a week and that when you eat a high carb day you always follow it with a no-carb day. That means you eat more of the lower carb veggies like greens, mushrooms etc. Info might come in handy for the days when we eat a higher carb day. On the low carb days you eat no more than 75 g carbs.

I had a low carb breakfast. Got a pork roast in cooking now with carrots and red potatoes. I'll have that with greens for lunch and I've got flounder and lots of low carb veggies for dinner.... greens and cabbage and a salad with EVOO and ACV.

Just checking in to keep me OP for today.

Y'all have a great Sunday.

Editing to say: Livestrong tracking isn't as good as MFP so I'm still using MFP to track. However, I like Livestrong for other things like articles and the suggested 1400 calories. I'll keep that and do research on there. I'm having a really good day eating more of a moderate low carb day.

Things sure have changed! When I was a kid, my mother went grocery shopping once a month, and she brought us one treat...usually candy. When that was gone, no more treats until next month. When my kids were growing up I went grocery shopping once a week. I brought home one treat each week, either cookies, ice cream, candy, potato chips etc. Just one. Plus I baked a cake or cookies most weeks. Today DH and I went shopping. He bought a big bag of cheese popcorn, a dozen donuts, a bag of miniature Kit Kat bars and a half gallon of ice cream! It's such a good thing that I have control staying away from that stuff.

Today he told me to quit asking him what he wants for dinner....just make something and he will eat it. Most of the time when I ask him what he wants it's because I can't think of something to make. Today I got 2 nice beef roasts because they were on sale, one for now and one for the freezer, and a big package of ground beef to make meat loaf. Other than that, I have chicken in the house and pork chops, so I guess I'm set for a while. Some days in between we will have things like hamburgers and hot dogs, or BLT or Tuna Salad sandwiches. When the kids were here I just cooked and they ate it. I used to post a menu for the week showing what I planned on having, so the kids could look at that and didn't keep asking me "What are we having for dinner." Sometimes I used to heat up a couple cans of Campbells Chunky Soup and serve it over noodles. Now Campbells has that in magazines as a dinner suggestion. They stole it from me! LOL DH would never eat that now. I also used to make liver and onions and they ALL ate it without a complaint. None of them would eat it now, except me.

Trish, I am surprised that you're going to attempt to eat 1400 cals per day. You usually can't make it to 1200. How are you going to reach 1400? Don't go back to trying to eat extra calories. Remember that didn't work before. Just keep a good balance and eat until you are satisfied.

I ate carbs today. I had a hot turkey sandwich with one slice of bread instead of 2 and a serving of mashed potatoes and gravy. It was good for a change, but not something I will do all the time. Took a glimiperide.

I checked my weight and I am still at 196. I guess I should change my ticker. There won't be a loss tomorrow...not with the dinner I had tonight.

Hubby is gone this week which means I should try to get back on plan (sometimes easier when he is gone and not eating sweets/chips in front of me all the time). I will let you know how it goes. Olivia has preschool tomorrow so I will survey the fridge and go shopping. I also still need to figure out what I'm going to do on the retreat next weekend. I only have a few days to make my mind up and get my fabric, patterns and supplies together. Gonna be a busy week. Oh, and I have a cold :-(

I ended up eating 2 slices of DH's pizza. I didn't check my BS at bedtime because I didn't want to know. I HAD taken the Glimiperide when I ate the turkey sandwich and mashed potatoes, so maybe it continued to work on the pizza. BS was 142 this AM, so I took another Glimiperide.The odd thing about it is, I am down another pound this morning. So 195, only 1 lb up from my ticker. When I eat low carb with lots of healthy veggies I don't lose. Eat poorly and lose. I am really craving some veggies though, because I haven't actually had any for a couple days except salad. I am going to saute some kale in bacon grease for lunch. This is my first time trying that. And I'm cooking a roast for dinner and will have broccoli with that.

Last week when DH bought donuts they were french donuts with a sugary glaze. I cut a 1 in piece out of one and popped it in my mouth and instantly spit it into the sink. It was sooooo sugary! This week he bought cake donuts with a bit of icing on them. I ate a 1 in piece of one of them and it was OK. Not good enough to make me want the rest of it. I love that. I think I am the only fat person who doesn't like sweets. LOL

Shannon, I hope your cold isn't too bad. I am still sniffling and coughing from mine, or it's my allergies acting up. I don't feel sick anymore.

At least with DH away and Olivia in pre school you will have some time to do things that you need to do. Who will watch Olivia while you're on your retreat?

Carol Sue I'm not going to try to eat 1400 calories a day, but I want to make that the limit instead of the 154? that MFP had me eating. I'm not going to worry if I eat only around 1100 to 1200 even if MFP gives me warnings that I'm not eating enough, but I really don't want to eat more than 1400 either.

It is amazing to me too how I can eat a little high carbs/calories one day and drop a lb the next day and then eat perfect one day and get on the scale and be up. These bodies are really complicated aren't they.

My weight was back down to 217.4 this morning and I think I probably need to up my ticker since I haven't seen the 214 in quite some time. My FBS was 129. I ate quite a bit of calories yesterday, but moderate carbs. I'm not doing Atkins low at this time. However, I am going for the formula of fat higher than carbs and protein and protein higher than carbs. It did seem to work before. I'm eating healthier fat like avocado, EVOO and butter. Although I use the whipped butter rather than the regular, just because I like it better. I use the Pam OO for the eggs, but I don't see how anything can be fat free either.

I intended to look and see what was in it. I remember looking at the ingredients in something one time that was called FF and found that it did have some form of fat. I always wondered how they could use some type of oil in some foods and call it fat free. That is when I decided to use real butter and to be sure that I use good fats. Then I learned that a lot of the fats they try to tell people are good fats are really omega 6s which I've since learned are extremely bad for us.

Shannon I sure hope your cold goes away so you can enjoy your retreat. I'm looking forward to hearing what you plan to make. I used to love doing crafts when my kids were young. I was always making things for gifts and to decorate my home. I stopped making those things after my daddy came to me and asked me to make a Mother's Day wreath for my mother's grave. I was glad to do it, but just didn't enjoy it any more. Up to then I had made heart ones for my hubby for our bedroom and made them for gifts and season ones for our front door. Have thought of doing the season ones again since married Tony, but just haven't been able to get back to it. Sad I guess to let a talent go by the wayside. Get to feeling better and have fun. :hug:

I've got a flounder fillet ready to go into the oven in a little bit so I can eat it with a salad with EVOO and ACV and take my Metformin then I'm closing the kitchen for the night. I never have seen this brand, but it is wild caught and they are nice long thin fillets. I'm baking it in foil and then I will just cut it up in my salad. Haven't tried the CO yet because I don't want to take the chance of having diarrhea. I thought maybe using the avocado and other good fats will be helpful. I did have an apple for a snack today with a slice of cheese. The rest has been greens and salads. I think the avocado keeps my BM normal and I also read that it lowers cholesterol and helps raise the good cholesterol which was one of the reasons I was using the CO. So as long as the avocado works, I will continue eating it for breakfast.

I'm rambling so I will close off and catch y'all tomorrow.

Have a nice evening.

Trish, I don't think Omega 6 is bad, but we are supposed to get more Omega 3s and less Omega 6.

I fell asleep and my dinner over cooked. It was terrible, but we ate it anyway. Didn't want to waste it. The roast was dry and the veggie casserole I made was definately over cooked! DH didn't like the potatoes I cooked in with the roast. The only good part of the dinner was the carrots. BUT DH told me to cook anything and he would eat it! LOL

Carol Sue You're right Omega 6 isn't bad, but we are supposed to have more Omega 3 which I understand that we have to work at getting enough of.

I've done well today. I ate a little over 1300 calories last night. I've really been hungry, I guess because I'm getting used to low carb again. I've ended up with 1468 Calories, but my carbs were 75, fat 99 and protein was 68. Protein a little low, but the carbs are considered low carb on the carb cycling. The protein may be more because I think the fish I had was probably more than 4 oz. maybe 6 or 8 oz instead. So I feel that I've had a good day.

Carol Sue or Trish have either of you ever looked into the Trim Healthy Mama way of eating? I know Donna has mentioned it but she checks in here pretty infrequently so I'm not sure if she will see this post. I looked into it before I started low carbing and I had decided I didn't feel comfortable with it because of the stevia in the recipes but that was before I completely overhauled and started using sugar substitutes including stevia. So, I'm wondering if I might be more open to it now? What I'm really wondering is if it would be okay for prediabetics. I know from reading it is supposed to be focused on keeping blood sugar stable so that sounds good but I also know there are recipes with some ingredients I had been attempting to go off completely (oats for example). I'm just researching because I'm having such trouble getting back on LCHF and wondering if I should try something else out for a while. I do not have a copy of the book but I understand that it is like 600 pages - Wowzers! I like to read the Money Saving Mom blog and have been reading her posts for many years. She has switched over to eating Trim Healthy Mama way for the last 5 months and says it has radically changed her sugar cravings. Since being mostly off plan lately I have been experiencing full blown binge eating again and if you've never been a binge eater you don't know how it is but it is a very miserable disorder. Being out of control around food is, in my opinion, one of the worst feelings and it makes me depressed. Tonight I ate an entire bag of chips. I hate feeling this way and eating without being able to put the food down. It is miserable. I'm also looking into other options because quite frankly, my husband seems to hate everything I cook for dinner and it is really wearing on me, spending so much time making food that no one seems to like. He works all day and it is not fair to expect him to cook his own meal - we need to be eating the same food. So, just looking at my options.

Still having cold symptoms but doing okay. Our house closed today - YAY! Still wondering what I'll be doing at the retreat, lol! I cleaned a little in my craft room today (instead of going to the grocery store like I needed to) - hoping as I clean I'll be inspired. With the house closing we now are deciding what to do with our equity. We would like to refinance our current mortgage (on new house) to lower our payment. When we financed it, because we had not sold the other house yet and had limited savings we decided to finance 100% so we could reserve our savings for moving costs and the upgrades on old house. So, we would like to take most of our equity to use for the refinance so we can get a better rate and lower our monthly payment. Unfortunately, the company we want to use for that is not running their "no closing costs" special right now so we might have to wait. Other possible things we might do with the money include putting some aside so I can upgrade my embroidery machine in preparation for a home based business next year when Olivia goes to kindergarten. But, we'll see....the refinance will take almost all of it and we also have to consider that my car is 8 years old and has not been behaving great.

Shannon, I have never looked into Trim Healthy Mama, mostly because low carb works so well for me that I don't really go looking for anything else. I will have to read up on it and let you know what you think.

What foods does your husband like? Maybe you could try building a diet for yourself working around what he likes to eat. Like with DH, when he wants hamburgers I eat mine without a bun. He is primarily a meat and potatoes man so I just don't eat the potato or starch portion of the meal.

I occasionally have a binge day, where nothing I eat satisfies me and I just keep eating trying to get satisfied. "I can't get no satisfaction!" One of my favorite Rolling Stones songs. LOL I noticed that this happens mostly when I have not had my eggs for breakfast, or I have them, but choose to eat toast with them.

Everyone is different, Shannon. You need to keep trying until you click on something that works in getting you back on plan. You started this because of your blood sugar readings, trying to avoid full-blown diabetes. I know that is still important to you.

Trish, I take fish oil twice a day prescribed by my cardiologist. I also eat salmon couple times a month. I recently read something about Omega 3 vs Omega 6. Maybe it was in Brain Grain. I will have to look and see. I do use Canola Oil, but I don't get much of it. I use it frying things for DH, but I rarely eat fried foods. I also use it for some baking, but that's something else that's for him that I don't eat. I know I will never convert him, so he's in charge of his health. If I said anything, he would say that he has far fewer health problems than I do, and he's right. Who's to say who's eating plan is better?

Well, my husband found a 10 needle embroidery machine today at a shop a few hours away, a floor model, practically brand new at a great price so looks like in a couple weeks I'm going to pick up my new baby!!

I'm having a difficult time staying OP of low carb all the time. I have good days and bad. My fbs was 129 again this morning. Sometimes I think I should just count calories and not worry about low carb, low fat or anything for a while, but I'm just so afraid of my fbs going up. And I do like eating some of the proteins that I can have on low carb.

Shannon I never even heard of Trim Healthy Mama, but I will be checking it out. Don't really want to buy another book just now though although I do need to get my eating under control which I seem to have a difficult time doing right now.

I think what through me off today is that the cable guy wasn't supposed to get here until between 1 and 5 this afternoon. I left early to go by the band and then to the grocery store. I'm standing in the store and DGS calls me and tells me the cable guy is here. He had to wake up DH and when I got home I couldn't fix breakfast. I ended up skipping breakfast which I've been trying not to do lately so I won't eat at night. I ended up eating more calories/carbs than I wanted too.

I made a new recipe that I saw on FB for crispy cheddar chicken made with Ritz crackers. I think that set me off and I ended up eating a donut for dessert. I had stopped eating them and cannot start eating them again. I think I could make a more low carb version of it my way without the crackers which I will try next time.

Carol Sue I only cook one good meal a day usually what DH will eat and then I eat what I want at breakfast and dinner. DH snacks on what he wants the rest of the day. There isn't any way he is going to change so I don't try. I figure if I can get that one good healthy type meal down him once a day that I am doing good.

Well tomorrow is another day and I will get up and start fresh and put this day behind me. Daniel Plan says not to expect perfection and I think that is my problem most of the time. When I mess up, I beat myself up for a while before I forgive me and move on. Guess I need to stop that. It does get depressing though.

See y'all tomorrow.

Shannon, YAY on the new embroidery machine! There's one of your problem's solved. Things are going to fall into place and your stress level will go down. You have really had a lot to handle lately.

Trish, I haven't been OP as much as I was before, but I am keeping it under control with the Glimiperide until I get past this. I don't want to use it, but I'm glad I have it when I need it. I know this isn't how you're supposed to take this med, but I absolutely refuse to go completely off LC. I want to be able to handle this with diet and exercise at least 80%. I feel much better when I do that.

I am starting to feel like I'm a new bride, just learning how to cook. After my over cooked roast I had an issue with cooking chicken last night. Actually, I had some leftover roast beef for lunch yesterday and it tasted better than it had for dinner the night before. Yesterday, I wanted to cook chicken for dinner. I eat thighs and drumsticks and DH eats skinless, boneless breasts. I like to cook mine with indirect heat on the grill. Takes a while, but it's delicious. Then I brown the white meat on the stove and then put them on the grill the last half hour of cooking to cook them through. It started to rain lightly right after I put the chicken on the grill, but DH said it should be ok because I cook it with the lid closed. I kept checking it and it just didn't look done. Finally, after 2 hours, I took it off thinking surely it should be done. I bit into a drumstick and it wasn't done. Yuk! I instantly spit it into the sink! DH's meat was done perfectly because it was browned, and white meat cooks much faster than dark meat. I turned the oven on and put the rest of my chicken in there for 45 min and it was perfect. What happened? My grill is on an open deck. I think the rain kept cooling down the grill so, even though it was getting heat from being lit, the rain was keeping the heat from building up inside enough to cook the chicken. So, lesson learned. No more grill cooking in the rain. But I ended up eating at 8 PM.

I am still sniffling and coughing from what I think is the remnant of my cold. I think that has a lot to do with my inability to stay OP. My body wants comfort food. Comfort food = carbs. I am going to postpone my blood work for another 10 days. A couple days before my DR appointment I'm going to call and reschedule, telling them I forgot to go for my bloodwork. I think the cold will affect my results. I should be feeling better in another week or so.

Anyone heard from Rennie lately? I wonder how she's doing? And the rest of the gang who are MIA.