Featherweights Planning and Chat Oct 15-21
 

Morning Featherweights!

Dagmar is off tripping the light fantastic in NYC! What's up with everyone else this week? Long walks in the fall leaves? Big pots of fall vegetable soup?

mmm vegetable soup. I should make some!!! And long walks in the fall leaves sound equally tempting!

I don't have too much to report yet today :) Rainy days like this make me so sleepy!

Have a great day (and week!) everyone!

No much going on here. I'm recovering from the Oktoberfest party I threw on Saturday. It was a smashing success, but I think I cooked more food in three days than I've cooked -- or could eat! -- in a month.

I have a couple of days to take it easy, and then my parents arrive for a 3-week (!) visit. Not yet sure how I'm going to stay on plan or find time to go to the gym, but I'm committed to finding time somehow! I refuse to go into the holidays carrying extra pounds.

Have a great morning/afternoon, everyone.

Kim

Hey All,

DH and I went for a two mile walk in the leaves this afternoon. The weather is absolutely gorgeous here. Tomorrow I head off to Conneticut for a few days. Also I have family members coming in town from TO on Thursday. They are not staying with me but I am sure they will want to visit. My mom's younger sister was just diagnosed with breast cancer so they are coming to lend support. She has surgery on the 21 st then she starts radiation treatment 1 week later. It's going to be a busy time.

Anyway, I am down 3 lbs from the 4 lb gain over my 3 thanksgiving day dinner weekend. I am feeling a little bit better. I am finally starting to feel back to normal.

Cat - I am training for the Atlanta Thanksgiving day half marathon.

Have a nice day everyone.

I'm pretty beat... just checking in to say hello.

Hope everyone is having a good week so far.

Hey everyone

rswlchick - Half marathon? Nice. :D Good luck with it. I love half marathons. But I need a running partner for the longer runs and sadly I don't have one. :(

susan- Vegetable soup... hmmm. My roomie is making some right now actually. Smells heavenly.

Nic - Rainy days do make me sleepy.

So I'm all prepaired for the next two weeks from ****. :devil: I have five exams... but I'm prepared food wise:
Currently I have frozen:
- pasta sauce
- healthy muffins
- lentil stew (which is delicious! Thanks so much Kim for the recipe :D)

And I'm already stressed even though one midterms down. I'm having boy and roomie troubles right now. And it's not even very complicated! I'm just in a rut of nasty feelings. Arg. Oh well, tis life. At least on a NSV I can say that the horrible feelings aren't affecting my weight loss efforts. So I am chaging my lifestyle, which feels great. :)

Anyway I'm off to do some school work. Hopefully if I get something done I'll feel a little less stressed.

Morning! I've got nothing new. I'm still struggling to come up with a nice even food plan. I either don't eat enough ... eat waaayy too much or ... pig out. I remember the days when I used to eat pretty much the same thing day after day and was quite happy. Maybe I should wander through my fitday from years ago.

Ugh, Susan, I'm struggling with the same thing. Half the week I pig out, the rest of the week I starve myself to make up for it. *sigh*

The good news is I'm finally going down again. I hit 111.5 this am!! Very exciting after over 2 months at the same weight...or fluctuating around the same weight. For the record, those two months weren't really plateaus, I fell off the diet wagon. Now I'm climbing back up by starving myself. Ugh, no lectures please, I know how horribly wrong that is. I'm starting to think I need extensive amounts of inpatient therapy to combat my eating issues. *rofl* Actually, I'm only about half kidding there. *grin*

So, still struggling with food, still working out and loving it. I'm on month 3 in my second week of my Push program and really enjoying it...and still running of course. I can't wait to see what my legs look like in the spring after doing this all winter!

It's a bit of a trap GFTGold, isn't it?
I know how to lose weight and the books all say that at the first sign of a gain, maintainers go back to what worked and 'nip it in the bud'. But I think they mean Christmas pounds or vacation pounds ... not I feel like eating for a few weeks ... I'll fix it later. Who cares ... I know how to lose weight.
But my sane mind knows that this is yo-yo dieting and there is sooo much wrong with that.
Maintaining means maintaining, not oops, fix, oops, fix, who the heck cares, fix, I want pizza and chinese and lots of it, fix. Grrrrrr

Hey Everyone :)

Yesterday I ate a little bit more than I wanted, but came in around 1500 calories, which isn't too bad. I went to the gym for about 1hr and 30 minutes, so hopefully that will help!

Cat - Don't stress too much...soon your weeks from **** will be over!

Susan and Gold - hang in there, you'll figure it all out soon!!

Have a good day everyone!

Good morning everyone. I've been lurking and not posting enough. I really need to get a handle on this. I've been trying, but obviously not hard enough, to lose. I'll go down 3 or 4 pounds and the next week, it all comes back. I guess the really depressing thing about it is I though that exercising would make it easier for me to lose. Last year at this time I was unable to exercise at all and I had an easy time losing.

So, you all give me your critique. This is my routine:

Run 2 miles 3 times per week plus a 4 mile walk on Sunday (rather leisurely).

Diet:
Breakfast: egg whites & 1 "sausage" patty OR small bowl of raisin bran with ff milk OR 2 slices ww toast (dry) AND (with any or all of these) 1/4-1/2 c melon

Lunch: salad with chicken and low fat dressing OR cold veggies and sandwich (no mayo, lean meats) (Friday is a restaurant meal, but usually a sandwich)

Dinner: protein (4 ounces) vegetable (usually roasted green beans or steamed broccoli and cauliflower--1 cup or so) starch (brown rice most of the time, occasionally 1/4 c mashed potatoes) OR sandwich (no mayo, ww bread, lean meat) OR a cooking light recipe entree (I always go for low fat and low calorie and it might be meatless, but not always)

Any suggestions? I know that if I could find the time, joining a gym and doing weight training would be a huge benefit, but my schedule is a bit crazy.

Allison: Your diet seems too high in carbs and low in fat and protein to me, but I tend to be skeptical about low-fat diets. Regardless, it's hard to see from your diet where the 3-4 pounds of regained weight are coming from. Unless you're way, way off in your estimates of portions (and it doesn't sound like it), there just aren't enough calories in your list for a 140 lb, moderately active woman to accumulate a 10,000-15,000 calorie surplus.

If the 3-4 pounds are coming from "cheat" foods and off-plan eating, then I think you have your answer and your solution. (Rats! :))

I understand your hesitation about joining a gym. However, weight training doesn't have to be done in a gym, nor does it need to be terribly time consuming. Check out Krista Scott Dixon's site (www.stumptuous.com, click iron, then training, then "basics of a home gym") for ideas on building an inexpensive yet effective home gym. She also has great suggestions for workouts for people who can't lift more than two times a week.

Kim

Kim~I agree carbs are my problem. I find that if I have bread or cereal in the morning, I crave it the rest of the day. I try to limit those breakfasts to only once every week or so (egg whites is the norm). I can probably forgo the carbs at dinner most nights, so I'll start there. I need to get back to salads 4-5 lunches per week rather than 3 which I've been doing lately.

As for snacks and things that creep in, I don't really snack that much. Here are a few that might show up:
3 triscuits with 1 ounce cheese
1/4 c cashews (I limit this to ONLY once per week)
I just bought some whole grain pretzels, but if I do eat any, it is only 1 serving a week--I don't over do them
cereal bar (various brands 120 calories)
I estimate that I'll eat a snack about every other day, and at about 120-200 calories per snack, it is reasonable.

Today I have had 2 hard candies (10 cals each per the bag). I won't get home until just before dinner so I won't have time for a snack. I don't eat dessert except perhaps once every 4-6 weeks. I just don't have that kind of a sweet tooth any longer.

I limit my alcohol intake to 1 glass of wine 2 times per week.

I just had my lunch, which today was a sandwich. 420 calories. I had about 1 cup of cut up carrots and celery with it. And water. So far for the day, I'm hanging around 650 calories. Dinner will be about 600 calories, unless today is a wine day, and then add 100 or so to that. And today was a 2 mile run day. Maybe what I'm doing is following a maintenance diet rather than a losing diet. I'm considering trying the South Beach phase 1 diet for 2 weeks to see if it jump starts anything.

Hey all,

I'm here from Waterbury, CT. New site. I am looking forward to visiting this location.

Allison- I agree with Kim regarding the carbs. Your snack choices are also heavier in the carb dept. Perhaps you may try snacks that are more protein based such as protein bars.

Regarding exercise, are you running the same route for your 2 miles? It's possible you body has adapted to the workout. Have you gotten faster but are still doing the same distance? For example if originally you ran 2 miles in 45 mins but now you do it in only 30 minutes you are actually getting less exercise. Maybe you could add some mileage or change your route so that it's different ie more hills. Just switching it up a bit could shake up your work out. Kim had a good suggestion regarding the website you could also try home videos for weight training. Finally, what about adding a class of some kind. Yoga, pilates, and bootcamp will help tone you up. The benefits are that you don't have to think about. Someone else plans the workout. I took a bootcamp class for 2 months last spring and had some great results.

Well I hope this is helpful.

Good Morning Everybody!

Sorry to hear you're having a rough time Allison :( Your diet seems really healthy to me... Maybe if carbs are a problem for you, you could try counting carbs? 1 serving of carbohydrates is 15g...to get the amount of carbohydrates in a product, subtract the fibre grams from the "net" carbohydrates. I don't know how many servings you'd need a day, but try checking out the food guide for an idea! Also, as a snack idea, I really like to eat 1/2 a Luna bar for a snack...its a protein bar that's about 180 calories for a whole bar, and they come in really yummy flavours!

Things are coming along for me...when I weighed myself this morning, the scale said 140.2, which is two pounds down from when I started counting calories, and only slightly up from my ticker weight! I'm not going to adjust anything until Sunday though, which is my weigh in. Yesterday I did pretty well on calories, coming in around 1250.

Hi everyone! I'm new here---I've posted a couple of introductions around forums. I'm 23 and an intern...ok, I'll just jump into chatting.

Vegetable soup sounds so good! I have my grandmother's recipe, although I haven't quite gotten it to taste just like hers yet(if that is even possible!). But fall is teasing us in Alabama...the leaves are changing slightly, last week it was just a bit cooler, but this week the highs are back in the low 80s. argh. I want actual FALL! I love the crisp air....you know, football weather!

I'm kicking it in the high gear this week. I want to reach my goal before I go back to Athens for the UGA/Auburn game on Nov.10th. I signed up for Fitday....I don't know if I'll be a full-fledged calorie counter, but I think it will help to at least track my foods. I did ok with it yesterday; I just find myself snacking and not watching those portions, so I don't know what to put it. They tend to be healthy snacks(Triscuits, Laughing Cow), but still. And then there was that little scoop of cookie dough I had...

Exercise- I swear, I'm committing this time to the 7 Weeks to a 5k plan. I really want to pick up running! And I'm growing bored on the elliptical. So yesterday, I did the 1st day of the training plan for 35 minutes and then did a BodyPump. I'm feeling that class today since I upped my weights. I think today will be a lighter day-elliptical and maybe lower abs, I don't feel like I worked them a lot yesterday.

I'm off to get ready for work. I'll be checking in throughout the day. Everyone have a great day!

A second welcome to DGAdDawg (I also did a welcome in the Maintainers forum). :welcome2:

Okay gals, I'm going to go for it. I am going to really watch my carbs for the next two weeks and see if it helps at all. As for running, yes, I am doing the same route at about the same speed (2 miles in about 20-25 minutes with the first half all up hill and the second half down hill). I'll try tomorrow to do it nonstop (I usually give out on the last hill and walk a block to the top) and I'll try to go an extra block (which will be all uphill!). These last 10 (or is it 11 now) will come off sooner or later!!!!

Hmmm ... I've been thinkin' too Allison. Thinkin' BFL actually. I can't seem to do the mostly veggie thing without ending up scarfing half the kitchen at bedtime. Let me think on that some more. Have you been to that site to see their minimeal suggestions?

Susan, I couldn't find any information on mini meals on the BFL website. Tell me more (although many of the meal plans showed a bit more in the way of carbs for the way I want to do the next 2 weeks).

I Kind of ignore the carbs. If I have some carbs ... I want all the carbs. Let me see ....

How about this page
http://www.bodyforlife.com/nutrition/week1meals.asp

or this one
http://www.bodyforlife.com/nutrition/mealplan.asp

For dinner tonight I had a dinner plate full of mixed lettuces, celery, carrots, mushrooms, cucumber, radishes and a half cup of ff cottage cheese ... but any protein would have done ... tuna, chicken, salmon ...

Hope that helps.

I just wrote a long post on my SF trip, so I'll make this short. Hello to all, and I hope everyone is having a good week. Mine has not been incredibly healthy, so I am hoping to maintain my recent loss when Friday weigh in rolls around. My eating has been fair, but I haven't exercised at all. I've been super busy and quite tired. I hope to get with it soon... definitely need to up my exercise after my SF trip (when things slow down for me).

Good morning everybody!

So yesterday I went out for dinner, but despite that I think I did pretty well...I wasn't too hungry during the day, so all I ended up eating was triscuits and peanut butter for breakfast, and then a sandwich for lunch. For dinner we went out for Thai food...I had about half of my veggie/tofu pad thai, and then BF and I split a cold spring roll. We also went out for Starbucks, but I had a London Fog (which is Early Grey Tea with some steamed milk and vanilla syrup) made with skim milk. Soooo...I'm hoping that I didn't really hit more than 1400 cal, but I'm not really sure where I came in. The scale was down again this morning (how is that possible??!) to 139.6...I hope that sticks until Sunday, because that's BELOW my ticker weight, finally!!!!!

Ohhh, and I almost forgot - Welcome to DGAdDAWG!! I'm also 23 :)

Susan~those BFL meal plans look good, but I think I'll prepare my own for the 2 weeks. I was planning on starting yesterday, but you have to PLAN ahead! I need to get to the store in order to really start, but I am being good in the mean time. I had a wonderful chicken dinner last night--I found the recipe here, on the Phase 1 recipe thread for SBD (basically you put taco seasoning on a chicken breast, cover it with salsa and bake it for 30 minutes at 350 and just before you take it out, you put some cheese on it. Wow, juicy and delicious).

I went on my run this morning and really tried to up the speed or distance, but hit the same "wall" as usual BUT I only walked for 30 seconds rather than the 2 minutes I usually do when I hit the wall, so I guess I did a little better. My speed does seem to be increasing--I can do 2 miles in less than 25 minutes.

We had chicken for supper last night too. And -by golly- I can get to sleep without a carbolicious bedtime snack! Who knew? Ugh!

Morning, everyone!

Coffee pot is on and my parents, awakened by the smell, will stumble down in a few minutes. Must go make The Boy's lunch in preparation for an early departure: it's Walk Your Child to School Day. Luckily, scooters are allowed!

Have a great day, everyone. Susan and Allison: good luck with your newfound resolves to shake things up in a good way. You can do it!!

Kim

Hi All!

How is everyone doing this fine morning?

I am thoroughly confused by my weight loss...I stepped on the scale this morning, and it said 138.6...which is fantastic, but it hasn't even been a week since I started counting calories! Is that possible? My weigh in day is Sunday, so we'll see what happens then!

Good luck Susan and Allison...you can do it!!!!

Good day everyone... I'm starting a new week. Last week wasn't terrible, but it wasn't so good, either. But I officially weighed today, and weight was the same, so I can't complain. Goal is to drop one by next Friday, by creating a 500 calorie deficit every day between intake and activity. Next Wed. is the day that we plan to take the next bathing suit photos and record the measurements, so that should be some incentive to stay on track!

I've just been using the calorie calculator on Facebook... does anyone else use that one? I think it's similar to FitDay et al.

Good morning! Thanks for all the well-wishes! I'm still not back to ticker weight, but am at 143, so it's just 10 to go from here.

DH and are going out to lunch today but I plan on ordering salad. I'm not sure what is in store tonight. We're going to a "Celebration of Life" for our business partner's father who died in July. There was no formal funeral--just this party tonight at a bar. I'm sure the food will consist of quesadillas and fried stuff and of course the alcohol will be flowing. I'll be careful, though.

Hello all! Joined 3FC yesterday and I think this is the forum for me. I am trying to lose 12 pounds to get down to 135 by Christmas. I think this sounds like a reasonable goal since I have recently started running again (though for short durations at pretty slow speed!) and have changed my eating habits into something approximating modified Atkins (avoiding bad carbs and sticking to mainly protein, fruits, veggies and dairy). I have been fairly lazy and maintaining for the better part of a year so I need a push! One of my big challenges it to start limiting my alcohol intake, which is usually accompanied by yummy food - especially during the upcoming holidays! Thanks for being part of this helpful forum and I hope I can be of support for you too!

:welcome: Canajun Chick! I think your goal sounds quite reasonable, assuming your calories aren't way out of whack.

As for alcohol, I had good success cutting it out entirely for a couple of months, then just added it back in on very special and rare occasions. The two months off lowered my tolerance enough that I feel like I've had enough to drink after far fewer beers. (I'm not a wine or liquor person, but I love an extra-hoppy IPA.)

It also helps to track the alcohol just like any other calorie. Once you convert beer to minutes on the elliptical, beer doesn't sound quite so enticing. :)

Again, welcome!
Kim

15-21
 

Doing great on my diet. Totally sticking to plan this time. Not one cheat.:carrot:

SW: 167
CW: 157
Mini Goal Weight: 149 ( hit this one and go from there ).

Way to go Thinnythighs :cheer2:

I just got back on track a few days ago myself and I'm doing pretty good too :D

We can do this!

Hi everyone - I'm brand new to the community, though I actually discovered 3FC a couple years ago and have visited quite a few times (though only the site, not the forums). I'm SO excited to find this featherweight forum! I don't have a lot of weight to lose, but I want to tone up my core especially, and it's frustrating when people tell me I don't need to lose weight or why am I trying to eat healthy/exercise.

Basically, I try to just watch what I eat in terms of calories/fats/sugars, though I'm not on any specific diet. I try to avoid really processed foods and chemicals, which can be a bit limiting when it comes to choosing low-cal/fat/sugar foods, but I love to cook, which definitely helps. I've been keeping logs of what I eat/drink as well as how much/when I exercise, and I find that that helps a lot just because I feel guilty if I do something bad! In terms of exercise, I try to do at least 20 mins of resistance training every day (alternating muscle groups of arms, abs, and legs/butt), plus 45-60 mins of cardio at least four times/week.

I work as a consultant, so I travel a lot, which makes it really difficult to stick to anything. I find that when I'm traveling, I can usually maintain, but can't lose any weight. However, I'm on an in-town project for the next 4 weeks, so I'm hoping to use this time to really knock some pounds off before my next assignment.

Anyway, sorry for the long post, but I'm looking forward to meeting everyone and getting/giving tips and support :)

Welcome Scenestealer! We're glad you're here.

You don't need to apologize for a meaty post. We like to read here.

:welcome3:to all the new comers!

We are excited to have you guys. You will find that these guys are a fun group. Laura, I travel a great deal as well and am familiar with the daunting task of losing weight on the road.

So yesterday was my longest run yet since training started. 11 miles in 1 hr 50 min. For those of you who don't know I am training for the Atlanta Thanksgiving day half marathon. :turkey: Surprisingly I am not sore at all. A little tight but not much muscle soreness. There was a fitness expo at the training location that was fun. We got some great freebies and informative information about other resources in the Atlanta area for runners. I actually signed up for another marathon in March. I must be crazy. :crazy: I haven't even finished training for this one and am already thinking about the next one. My fellow team runners claim the March race is a fun one so I signed up.

Well weight is still maintaining from previous week. I keep losing and gaining the same 3-4 lbs. I know what I have to do but I am just not in the mood to do it. It's completely about my eating. I just don't feel like dieting. All I want to do is eat. It's a good thing I'm running this marathon otherwise I would be huge. BTW, someone asked me if I was a tri-athlete yesterday.:rofl: I thought that was really flattering and funny since I haven't ridden a bike in years and I don't even know how to swim.

That's all for now. I am off to run an easy run. Looking for a flat 50 mins.

Hey all!

first of all :welcome: to Canjun chick and Scenestealer. (And anyone else I might have missed!!!!)

So I had a loss of 1.6lbs this week. :carrot:

I'm sort of shocked. :dizzy: I'm pretty happy with the loss. I can't believe it because it doesn't feel like I've been dieting.

I'm almost at my mini goal too!!! And so far this year I've lost 11.2 pounds off my fat ***. :lol: Not to mention the inches too! Although at the moment they're coming off my boobs. ;)

I'm just pretty excited.

thinnythighs -nice job! 10lbs down and only 8 to go. :D

scenestealer- sounds like a good plan. I totally agree on the as few chemicals as possible... And the cooking. I love to cook. My roommie and I spend more money on food for cooking and baking than we do on alcohol (and we're university students.)

rswlchick - nice run time! And totally go for that second half-marathon. Just wait until you've done a crazy number of them and you can tell people, "yeah I've down _____ half-marathons in the past year." and watch as their mouths drop open in awe. ;)

Good morning everyone! And welcome to the noobs!

What a weekend it has been! Whew. Friday night we went to a celebration of life and I didn't eat quite enough (but had more than enough wine). Saturday morning came I felt no desire to run. I imagine the running would have just accentuated the pounding in my head! DH and FIL went golfing and MIL, DS and I went to the street fair to pick up a few things (fresh fruit and veggies) and to look at a place that sells really nice patio furniture. DH and I are buying the in-laws a set and they want to go all cheap and we want something that is going to last and look nice for them. Afterward, we took DS for his Karate photos and then home for a nice lunch.

DH and FIL had a VERY long day of golf and didn't get home until almost 6 PM. By that time, I was so tired from shopping and what-not with MIL that we ordered pizza for dinner. Not the best choice, but I was too tired to move. I ended up going to bed at 8:15 and I slept until 8 AM!! DH's knee is hurting so he requested we skip our Sunday walk. Another bad choice, but it was nice to relax and read the paper with our coffee this morning.

I have done my grocery shopping and am waiting for the In-laws to come this afternoon. They'll stay for dinner.

DD took a solo trip to Long Beach Friday (getting lost on the way and ended up on the 405 at rush hour and that made the trip an extra 2 hours!!!). She's on her way home now and thankfully she called to get directions from ME this time! Why is it that kids don't like to listen to their parents?

Anyway, my weight is steady and almost back to ticker. I'll get back on the running track on Tuesday and perhaps I'll see ticker weight this week.

Congrats on the long run and what a great time, rswlchic! I haven't had the time to really go for a marathon/half-marathon yet, but I've read a lot on the subject, and I know that for marathons you don't necessarily need to run the whole distance to be ready to compete. I think for a marathon, you really only need to run 21 miles and the rest can come from adrenaline. Not quite sure how that translates to a half, but I bet you're almost there! Keep up the great work :)

15-21
 

Not ready to run yet. Have to work up to it. Started walking today.

One:running: for every mile completed.
:running: