couch potato animals
 

So I have two cats. Mudpie (my avatar) is the female and is approximately 13 years old. Mishka is the male and was 11 in April.

I was given a new cat toy as a small gift after spending a gazillion dollars on Mudpie's food at the specialty pet store.

Brought it home and put it on the living room floor. Mud pounced on it, slapped it into the hallway, ran after it up and down the hall, and then threw herself on it and started tearing at it (it's fleece) to get at the catnip. She then smooshed her face all over it and flopped around on it for a couple of minutes.

Mish watched all of this from the couch. I offered it to him and he put his head on it and used it as a pillow to go back to sleep on.

Misha weighs 16 lbs, Mudpie 11.

Dagmar

your cats are awesome.

i feel super fat right now because i had some popcorn at the movies (i saw Bolt, and it was really cute!). bleh.

i'm having grilled chicken for dinner, so that makes me feel a little better. and i figured out that someone had accidentally recalibrated the scale, which means i hadn't really gained 3 pounds.

and yet. i feel guilty.

It's been a horrific week!
 

Greetings, All!

First, a shout out to Dagmar. I saw on your ticker that you're only two lbs from goal. GO! GO!

This week has been a rough one. I am SO BUSY that I'm forgetting to eat. You would think that would mean the scale would go down, but no, no, it has gone up and up and up. I'm eating on program; I'm not eating enough. I've seen this happen before. It doesn't make sense, but it does happen for me. It's really aggravating! I have definitely been eating on program, but I am now 6 lbs above my red line and prefer to even be 3 lbs below that. I'm upset and stressed (which, of course, isn't helping my weight either). With less than 2 weeks until I have surgery, I barely have time to breathe let alone think about eating! My work outs have also become shorter though I am exercising at least an hour a day, so I'm still doing it. Maybe that too is contributing to the ever-increasing number on the scale.

Maybe I'm sticking my head in the sand, but I've chosen to believe...believe that my weight increase isn't because I'm eating on plan but is because of not eating enough and not exercising as I should. I am really, really, really frustrated, though. Fake gain or not, the scale still says the highest number I've seen in 11 months. Knowing I am going into surgery and won't be able to do anything but walk slowly for six weeks makes me even more freaked about this gain.

Though I think this is a stress gain, I've decided to take drastic measures on Monday and Tuesday and do my take off eating plan for two days. That should help me see a dramatic weight loss though I hate to do it. It will not be a fun Monday and Tuesday, but hopefully, it will work, and I can push my weight back down.

goalsuccess :hug: Good luck on Mon. & Tues. We'll be here for you.

Dagmar ( :o 133 lbs. now)

Good morning and welcome, Bobbi! We have a few gents who join in but it's mostly chicks around here. Not that we don't love our guys! When you have a few minutes, tell us a bit about yourself and your weight loss journey so we can get to know you better. We're all looking forward to hearing more from you! :)

It's ridiculously cold here this morning and all I want is WARM food. Salads and protein shakes are just not appealing so I need to rethink my usual food routine. Perhaps I'll pull out some soup and chili recipes and do some cooking for the week? :chin: A friend recommended the Barefoot Contessa's butternut-apple soup (but lightened), so I'm off to look that one up.

Good luck on your Monday and Tuesday eating plans, Goal! You can do it for two days and hopefully it will give you a bit of a cushion for Thanksgiving dinner.

Here's the recipe:

As for lightening it, I'd take out the butter and just use the olive oil, but what to do about all that apple cider? Any ideas? Use half cider and half water?

Ooooh, check out this butternut squash soup recipe -- it even has the nutritional info!

From the 11/20/08 New York Times:

Sweet Potato and Butternut Squash Soup
By MARTHA ROSE SHULMAN

This silky fall/winter puree tastes rich, though there is no cream or butter in it.

1 tablespoon canola oil
1 small onion, chopped
1 tablespoon minced fresh ginger
1 pound butternut squash, peeled and diced
1 pound sweet potatoes, peeled and diced
1 medium-size Yukon gold or russet potato, peeled and diced
6 cups water, chicken stock, or vegetable stock
Salt to taste

1. Heat the oil in a heavy soup pot or Dutch oven over medium heat. Add the onion and cook, stirring, until tender, about 5 minutes. Add the ginger and stir together until fragrant, about 1 minute. Add the squash, sweet potatoes, regular potato, and water or stock, and bring to a simmer. Add salt to taste, reduce the heat, cover and simmer 45 minutes, or until all of the ingredients are thoroughly tender.

2. Using an immersion blender, puree the soup (or you can put it through the fine blade of a food mill or use a regular blender, working in batches and placing a kitchen towel over the top to avoid splashing). Return to the pot and stir with a whisk to even out the texture. Heat through, adjust salt and add pepper to taste.

Yield: Serves 6

Advance preparation: You can make this a day ahead and refrigerate. Reheat gently. The soup freezes well. Once thawed, whisk well to smooth out the texture, and reheat.

Nutritional Information per Serving: Calories: 189; Calories from Fat: 29; Total Fat 3.2g; Cholesterol: 0mg; Sodium,776mg; Total Carbohydrates,38.6g; Dietary Fiber, 5.7g; Sugars, 3.6g; Protein: 3.5g; Vitamin A 163%; Vitamin C 61%; Calcium 7%; Iron 8% (Approximate nutritional information provided by calorie-count.com)

NY Times recipe - Yummo! I will definitely make that for myself while I house sit. DH is not a fan of squash and can find it in food, no matter how I try to sneak it in.

It's soup weather here too - made a good pea soup today from the ham bone that's been in the freezer since our Thanksgiving in October.

Mudpie taste-tested it. Apparently it's good - she wants more!

Have a good evening all! We're off to see a movie - without popcorn or diet cola. I'll grab a bunch of napkins for DH and I to shred while watching ;). I think we'll sneak in some water, rather than paying $3 per small bottle.

Dagmar :sunny:

Good Morning!
This isn't my first time around the block, I lost/met goal a few years ago on 3ff. Up and Down, a story of my life. This time around I pin pointed the reason I gradually put the pounds back on. CABERNET! My DH and I decided to stop drinking it, stop buying it. It wasn't a hardship giving up, the only time I miss it is when I see a cooking show that has the table set with a glass of wine. I've never had problems losing weight when I set my mind to it. This spring my weight was creeping up on me again and I kept putting off getting on the scale. June 2nd I bit the bullet on jump on the scale, yikes:yikes:
160 pounds and no where to go but down. June, July and August I took most of it off, then the last few pounds came off Sept/Oct. I'm at the point now where I need to stop losing but it's so hard to stop when I've weighed and recorded every morsel that went into my mouth since June 2nd.
What do you gals/guys do? How did you ease back into maintaining? Do you still watch what you eat, do you still record it? I'm a calorie counter and today I'm making up a chart for my refrigerator to mark off the most important things I need to continue. FIBER is the reason I took the weight off so quickly so that's one fact I'll keep track of. This is my plan which I'll put on my computer graph chart so I can print it out and use take advantage of the squares on the template: The top will have two weeks of days and along the left side going down:
Weight:
Fiber: 40-50 grams (I ate over 50 g per day for fast weight loss)
Fat: 25% or less
6 Water: (I've been drinking 8 a day plus gallon of coffee/Ice tea) unfortunately I run to the bathroom every hour so I'll cut down on the water)
Exercise: 6-8 Sets of 12 Reps
I had protein and carbs on this chart while losing but I'm not going to track that anymore unless I start gaining.
I used the Fitday program and haven't decided if I should still record everything, what do you all think? I'm asking all these questions because you've all done that, been there. No better advice than asking the pro's.
Now about myself, married for 43 years, 1 daughter & two grandsons (16 & 10 years old) and we're both retired. We live out in the country with many fruit trees (peach, pear, plum, apricot, apple, cherry). A large vegetable garden, raspberries, 6 Orpington Golden hens, a 16 year old pitch black cat and our beloved English Setter named 'Charlie'. I'll attach a picture of him, he's 4 years old and a clown. DH has to spell everything out to by pass the dog, like Ice cream, going to get the newspaper, going to let the chicken out, etc. Charlie still cocks his head to the side and runs to the door anyway. He's so smart.
I'll look forward to hearing from you, what works for you, what to watch out for. I will not gain it back this time, no booze period.
:dancer:

Hi Bobbi! Nice to "meet" you. :wave:

Hi Bobbi! :wave:

Dagmar

Charlie is so cute! he looks friendly.