I agree with Jac, that Moroccan Stew sounds yummy. So, about how much cinnamon do you put in it?

And could you do this in a crock pot?

And I have to look into the Coconut Oil, should it have a favor or smell or not, why would some and not others.

Well, today was an eye opener for me :> . If anyone remembers I never knew my starting weight because I forgot to get a weight when I started my lifestyle change May 1st. So, now I know that I have lost 7 pounds and 9 inches in two months. (the reason I now know this is because the last time I was weighted was at my yearly doctor appt in April of this year - I stopped into the clinic today and asked them to weigh me so I could compare it to what I weighed in mid April) I think I feel good about this, I love the loss of inches and the way I feel the most.

Jac, as you know I was struggling when I first found your thread on 3FC because I couldn't find support - thank you a thousand times and Carol Sue and Mars too (and Rennie). This is a good thread to come and read and add to, even if we aren't all following the same path, we have the same goal to find what works and stay with it. Thanks girls.

chickadeee
You've mentioned that your clothes are looser but isn't it great when you get that scale validation? : And officially noted at your doctor's office! I have been known to postpone checkups when my weigh is up. I admire the way you've worked a healthy lifestyle into a routine that sounds natural--it looks like a recipe for long term sustainability and success.

Re cinnamon Moroccan stew, the recipe says 1 tsp but I do it to taste, 1 TBS?. (I bought Ceylon cinnamon for a health reason that I've forgotten and it doen't have as much flavor as regular). Here is the official recipe, in case I've really veered off. I don't see why a crock pot wouldn't work. But I always add the cilantro after cooking--I'm not sure how if it retains the flavor if totally cooked in a recipe.

Looks like the chicken isn't in the recipe and I can't recall if I deleted it during a vegetarian phase, or added it in my tweaking!

Harira
1. Saute 1 chopped onion in 2 TBS olive oil (make that coconut oil)
2. Add 2/3 cup of raw garbanzo beans , soaked overnight (or 1 can)
3. Add 6 cups water & simmer about 1 hr till chick peas are tender--much less for canned beans
4. Add 2/3 C red lentils
1 Can chopped tomatoes or 1 lb fresh
1 TBS tomato paste
1 chopped red bell pepper
1 tsp cinnamon
Simmer for 15 minutes
5. Add ¼ cup long grain rice and simmer another 15 minutes until rice and lentils are tender
6. Add 1 bunch chopped cilantro

Re coconut oil, I think the more refined it is the less likely it will retain any nuance of coconut. I assume that that might mean some good micronutrients might also get lost in the refinement process, but I don't really know. The brand I have from Costco is Nutiva. In winter, shall we say on future Carb Days, I like to cube butternut squash and bake it in coconut oil, sometime sprinkle cayenne pepper or garlic powder.

Yay Chickadeee!!! That calls for some dancing things! You are so welcome! You ladies are all so great. I feel like we each contribute in meaningful ways, even though we all tweak this diet in our own way, and we inspire each other every time we post. I feel so lucky that y'all decided to join me! Thank YOU!

Mars, thank you for posting the complete recipe! It really does look wonderful! And I have to admit I can't wait to reach my overall goal! It has been a good 15 years since I've been in the "normal" range of weight for my height. I was close last time I did the slow carb diet, but I feel different this time. I want to be healthy more than ever before. I don't think that's ever been my MAIN priority while dieting, even when I thought it was. And this is the first time I've recognized that I need not to ever go "off" this diet. This is the way I need to eat, maybe with some few additional tweaks along the way, because it works for me. I don't know if it's just that I'm getting older and I think about my health more seriously now or what, but somehow I appreciate this journey much more now.

Chickadeee, good for you on the lbs and inches!! It does give you such a good feeling! You seem to be doing great staying on plan, and your tweaks seem to work in your favor.

Jacqui, I do a lot of reading on the ActiveLowCarbersForum and they post so many good links regarding how carbs are bad for the heart, not fat. I used to have a lot of them bookmarked but my computer crashed and I lost them all. But the links are all still there. I don't know if you've ever visited that forum. I can vouch for the fact that my bloodwork has greatly improved since I went to low carb. Numbers don't lie.

Mars, this past week I saw Ree Drummond on the Food Network brown cubes of butternut squash in a frying pan and add some kale to it and wilted it down. It looked really yummy, I guess if you like kale. It's a superfood!

I saw a recipe for Crock Pot Moroccan Stew, so it CAN be made in a crockpot. Cook for 9 hours on low, but they used canned chickpeas so they added them for the last hour. It is such a healthy recipe! DH is old fashion and would never let me use a crockpot when I was working. He was afraid of a fire with no one home to watch it. That's the whole purpose of a slow cooker!!! I recently started making hot sausage in the slow cooker and we did go out while it was cooking, but only for about an hour. It would have been such a help when I was working and everyone was sitting here waiting for dinner when I got home. I can honestly say I have never heard of a fire started by a slow cooker.

Same here re crockpot. I would leave it all day. I'm ok with kale but it irritates my skin when I eat it-go figure, I thought it was just cheetohs that did that, lol. I used to make baked kale chips and they were sooo good!

Scale up today, either from salty store-bought chicken or I just ate too much, moved too little. I slept late, a good thing. I've been getting only 5 1/2 hrs/night for a long time except on carb days.

In other news, I'm almost finished with my WF dressings and will need to figure out an easy recipe.

Jacqui, I just realized I didn't answer your question about my home gym. I enjoyed my work out. I did 1/2 hour on the treadmill and 5 min on the recumbent bike. Someone else said their knee pain improved with a recumbant bike and I seem to notice an improvement, too. I still can't see the TV from the bike so didn't stay on it as long as I should. I have a punching bag hanging from a beam and DH has to move it down a bit as it blocks my view.

Carol Sue, thank you for calling my attention to that forum. I've never heard of it before. Although the focus is definitely on ketosis and the number of carbs rather than the types of carbs, it does have a lot of interesting articles and I look forward to perusing them! And great job on the exercise! I loved my recumbent bike when I had it! Unfortunately, I stopped using it for a period of time (got lazy) and I forgot to take the old battery out and it ruined the battery compartment, so then I couldn't control the tension levels etc., so I sold it to someone who really wanted it and knew how to replace the battery compartment. I wish I still had one!

Mars, there are any number of reasons why you might be up a tad bit on the scale, but not getting a restful night's sleep is right at the top of the list! I think that was my problem last night. I exercised in the evening and felt kind of dehydrated even while I was at the gym. I've been having hot flashes this week so I don't know if that has anything to do with it, but when I got home I drank a lot of water and then of course, I was up all night between having hot flashes and running to the bathroom. This morning I thought for SURE, no doubt, with all those bathroom trips I'd be down in weight, but nope! I stayed the same and I think it's because my sleep was so disrupted. You lose the most weight while you are sleeping, and if you aren't sleeping well, then Oh, and I've stopped taking the 5-HTP. I just couldn't seem to take it at the right time to have it help me sleep soundly, and if I don't feel something helping me, I see no reason to take it. Today, I feel exhausted, and I have to get moving to clean the house since we're having the whole family over for 4th of July.

No change today! I didn't sleep well last night and have so much housework to do today. Ugh. But hey, I'll just turn the music up and I'm sure it will be done before I know it!

Week 9:
6/28--199.5
6/29--199
6/30--199
7/1--198.5
7/2--198.5
7/3--
7/4--

Today's Meals:
Breakfast:
Greek yogurt with Mio
2 eggs fried in coconut oil
3 link sausages
Mio water

Lunch:
Chicken leg
Greek yogurt with Mio
Mio water

Snack:

Dinner:
Leftover Manwich hamburger over steamed cauliflower and broccoli
Mio water

Today's Exercise:
Housework all day will have to do!

Jacqui, I got my recumbent bike at Goodwill for $20. It's an old one. I don't use the electronic read-out, I just pedal. There was supposed to be a plug to plug it in and it was missing. DH had a plug from something else that worked, but I was only interested in pedaling. I don't even know if there was a tension adjustment. What it has now is fine with me.

I did well today. It was supposed to be carb day but since I let a few carbs sneak in here and there through the week I'm not really craving carbs today. I wouldn't be surprised if I ate some on July 4th!!

B eggs with sauteed mushrooms

L leftover chicken leg that I split with the dog. LOL

D hot sausage and coleslaw

S carrots and broccoli

I'm a little hungry right now so I might be having another snack. Or maybe I'll just drink a lot of water and make the hunger go away.

Jacqui Housework definitely counts!!! Thanks for the scale encouragement--I needed it. I'm aiming for a detached interest in the scale, but sure like the down numbers! I hope you get some rest tonight--sounds like a busy busy weekend ahead, fun too!

I'm working on getting a handle on sleep. I never had problems with it before. I got into this routine of getting up really early to get my water in, and out, before driving to work. Sleep might be why I don't feel like exercising Better than having the doctor find something else. I hope you ge

Water is a great appetite damper but I've read that the minimum 8 cups is an overestimate, since our food contributes to that total. I once asked some urologists at work and they said the real measure of adequate fluid intake is--if I recall--2 liters or urine. I have meant to measure this so that I could maybe back on the water intake, but always forget. Project for the long weekend!

carol sue WTG on the exercise!!!! And on the food too--that's great that you didn't do the Carb Day 'just because'. It will still be there for you another day.

I'm bored. I finished the book I was reading and it's too late to start another one. There's nothing on TV that I want to watch. Guess I'll just go to bed.

Mars, there for a while my urine was so dark in the morning that I thought something was terribly wrong. The rest of the day it would be fine. Since I started drinking more water I don't get that dark urine in the morning. I don't drink 8 glasses a day. I usually have 2 bottles, which equals about 4 8 oz glasses, and sometimes I have more. And other drinks count, too. I have about 3 cups of coffee and an occasional diet coke. I think I'm good. They say that drinking more water helps with weight loss. Who knows.

Morning All,
Carol Sue Smart idea to go to bed--hope that worked out! I ate a lot and grazed yesterday, just the usual end-of-week unwinding. That behavior will be the next frontier to conquer. I ate according to plan, just too much, and all the calories did not help with sleep. Woke up wide awake and ready for the day at 220am. It's as if my internal clock is off--I feel as if it's 6am and time to get up. Work in progress!

Mars and Carol Sue, Interesting topic on the water. We have a water cooler for which we pick up big jugs of water at the grocery. (Our tap water quality is not wonderful here.) However, it started leaking 3 days ago and so until we can find where it's leaking and fix it, we shut it down, and we went to using individual bottles of water. Those bottles hold 16.9 oz of water. I use them to fill up my own water bottle and it takes one and a half of those to fill up mine (which is less than I thought my water bottle held). Normally, I drink 4 (101.4 oz) to 5 (126.75 oz) of my water bottles a day. For some reason in the last couple of days, I've only been drinking 3 (76.05 oz) of my water bottles a day, and yesterday and today, my scale has not moved. Coincidence? I'm going to make sure drink 5 of my water bottles again today and see if there's a change tomorrow. Of course, it's not exactly scientific, since I could lose (or gain) weight even without drinking 5 bottles today, but I still think it will be interesting! WebMD says each day you should drink at least .5 oz of water for each lb you weigh. I'm doing that in drinking 4-5 of my water bottles, but not if I drink only 3. Time to experiment, lol!