Morning everyone,

Annie i mean t ot get my recipes last night and forgot cept for one of them i have been making for so long I don't need the recipe anymore.
Banana muffins or loaf - whatever shape you like
half cup unsweetened applesauce
3/4 cup sugar
2 eggs
3 mashed bananas
mix applesauce and sugar then add eggs and mix then add bananas and mix
then add 1 3/4 cup flour - I often take half a cup of flour out and put in half cup of oatbran instead
1 tsp baking soda
1 tsp baking powder
then stir in the flour, oatbran and the soda and powder
I then add chocolate chips - you can add as few or as many as you want and I often add sliced natural almonds as well or you can use walnuts.
bake at 350 till done about 20 min I usually double the recipe as I give some away to my kids as well and they keep well in the freezer and these are a wonderful snack or breakfast.

Kittie good job on staying on plan and going to the gym.

Mirj - goood job also and staying on plan.

I need a few more ours to qualify for free gym use at my work, should be next week - you need 1000 hours, cause it may be too cold to walk today not sure yet. Then I can use the gym at lunch instead of walking. Have an eliptical at home I love but really like doing my exercise on my lunch as it is easier for me to not do it if I wait till I get home.
Hubby dug out the car yesterday and had it done by the time i got there, yay. They even had this on our evening news as so many people commute with the train to the university with staff and students the population of the university alone is over 60,000, or downtown that it is very popular and lots of people drive to the train it was odd for it not to be shoveled. Lots Quicker and cheaper to take the train then to drive. Anyways, winter deep freeze for now not enjoying this, my knee and elbow joints get a bit sore when it is so cold.

Ashley-Do you happen to know the calorie/fat count on that banana bread/muffin recipe?? It's gotta be better than my recipe, which uses butter flavor Crisco!! I use whole wheat flour and love the flavor/texture it gives my bread.

Hello! Eating a burrito bowl for lunch - took a while to prep last night, but came out good and spicy. Small amounts of black beans, hot chili beans, diced onion and peppers, salsa, corn and seasoned chicken over lettuce. I added a little sharp cheddar cheese, too. I always end up with more than I should have once I get it all added in there, so I brought a bowl to split it up. But with the beans, it's not bad. No good tomatoes here this time of the year, but I usually have them in there, too.

Think I'll go with breakfast for dinner - scrambled eggs with onion and peppers and turkey sausage link. Quick prep and quick cleanup

Driving in this morning was a snowy mess. UGH i hate it - don't know how you are so blase about it, Ashley! Heard someone honking and it was because they were about to slide into me! I luckily was able to elude them, but it stresses me out.

I've always thought about retiring in Montana but now think I'm not tough enough... but then think, well, I'm not having to get up early when I'm retired to get in to the office in snow. Now my guy keeps talking about us retiring there, and he didn't know I used to want to retire there - how's that for a weird coincidence? We both would love to build a log home, but think that's a lot of folks' dream until the cost rears its head...

Day three of WW and I still haven't lost that 30 pounds. Humph. HA!

I never thought of using whole wheat flour, that is a good idea, I dont know the calorie or anything about content, this is actually a revised version of the company's coming banana bread recipe so that might help some.
NP - winter is crappy but I guess one just gets use to it being I lived most my life in it, i can't change it so might as well go with the flow... Good job on eluding the bad driver, I have on 3 or 4 occassions just completely slid right out into the road and blew right throught the stop sign, like a skating rink, thank God though no one was in the road or that would have been aweful.

Ashley-I entered the basic ingredients on a recipe analyzer website and got the following values. I based it on 12 servings per recipe assuming it made one large-ish loaf.

*******************************************
Nutrition Facts

Serving Size 79 g

Amount Per Serving

Calories 156
Calories from Fat 9
% Daily Value*
Total Fat 1.0g2%
Cholesterol 31mg10%
Sodium 115mg5%
Total Carbohydrates 34.6g12%
Dietary Fiber 1.4g6%
Sugars 17.2g
Protein 3.1g

Vitamin A 1% • Vitamin C 4%
Calcium 3% • Iron 6%

Nutrition Grade A-
* Based on a 2000 calorie diet

1/2 cup unsweetened applesauce
3/4 cup sugar
2 eggs
3 mashed bananas
1 3/4 cup flour
1 tsp baking soda
1 tsp baking powder

*******************************

wow, thanks didn't know there was such a thing, I shall have to check it out. I would hope that with the oat bran substitution the fiber would be a little higher. I often play around with recipes that way.

I would think so, too, Ashley. It didn't change any when I entered whole wheat flour, but I bet the oat bran would.

Here's a link to the recipe analyzer that I used. It seems like I have used an even easier one in the past, but can't find it right now.

http://caloriecount.about.com/cc/recipe_analysis.php

Okay, one of the things I like about this group is that I can be accountable....so here goes...

Younger son and I went out to supper. I did great today, btw, before supper. I ordered a grilled chicken/black bean salsa wrap WITHOUT the bacon, cheese and sauce that normally comes on it. Dressed it with salsa and had them put extra lettuce and onion; tore off the excess flour tortilla. BUT...I ate some fries with ketchup AND we had chips and queso for an appetizer. Then came home and had a piece of the banana cake w/ cream cheese frosting that I made this weekend. That was the "icing" on the "cake"....

So first off, I have put a definite ban on baking any goodies for a while. No one needs them here, especially not me. Not even going to attempt "healthy" goodies. I am going to stick to my plan and get these last pounds off!! I've come too far now to get back into old habits.

Thanks for listening.

Don't stress Annie! This was just a higher-calorie day for you and I keep reading about having a few high-cal days to kick that metabolism up. Sounds like you did great - even having some fries works into the life plan - that's not too bad. And I'm sure if you think of how many chips/queso you had, it probably wasn't THAT many - just seems like a lot since it's fresh in your mind. Good choice to stop baking goodies for a while - you'll be back on track tomorrow with a three-mile walk and make solid choices and be set! good job for doing well before heading out for dinner, too!

Thanks, NP! I needed to hear that.

We just had a three day weekend {Sun and Mon are our normal 'weekend days' plus Hubby had Tues off} . It started off pretty good but went downhill eating wise. Today I ate lunch on Hubby's schedule {read: I wasn't hungry but ate anyway}. He wanted Chinese. I picked pork eggrolls over my usual Teryaki Chicken bowl because I thought I would eat less that way; which I felt worked. They were good too! I'll have to order them again. However we came home from shopping this evening and split a package of Poptarts {they come wrapped in two's}, but we both wanted another so split another package. Then I went back for two more. I loosely define a binge as 'willfully eating more than I should or need, just because I want more!" Add in the 3 glasses of milk and I didn't do very well, did I?

Looking for something positive about our weekend. We got a lot accomplished, even if it wasn't what we set out to do. Hubby hung towel racks and shelves in the bathroom {we painted a few weeks ago}. He hung a quilt rack and another shelf in the living room, and he moved the treadmill into the office. We also got to spend three days in a row with each other!

The roads are clear from our little snow, so life will proceed as normal tomorrow, when Hubby goes back to work and I go back to Bible study, with meetings Wed and Thursday mornings. I bought two of Bob Harper's kettlebell workouts. I don't like BL, or any of the workouts I've tried by Bob or Jillian but the clips looked good and they were on sale at Target. I also haven't exercised since last Friday, so I need to get back into gear.

Hubby is calling that the show is starting so I'll catch up tomorrow

Annie and Penguin, don't beat yourselves up about bad choices, just get back on the wagon (actually, that's cheating, you don't want to ride, you need the exercise, so walk behind the wagon ).

I noshed too much yesterday, and topped it all off by having chocolate cake for supper! I figured it might be okay, since I didn't eat anything else, and probably had less calories than I would have eaten in a whole meal. Got on the scale this morning, I'm the same weight I've been for the last three days. Not the best news, but at least I'm not going up.

All this talk of snow is making me jealous, almost. We're supposed to get some rain on Friday and Saturday and we're all looking forward to it. They're starting to talk about rationing shower water now, telling everyone to cut their showers down to 4 minutes. No way are my stepkids going to handle that. I don't know what they're doing in there, but they take showers that last forever and there's never enough hot water after they've had a shower.

Just had a big bowl of oatmeal with raisins and craisins for breakfast. Made it with soy milk. Let's hope this gets me through until lunch, I'm a big morning eater.

Mirj, Today I feel like I should be pulling the wagon, not just walking behind it, but thank you for your kind words. I've never been much of an oatmeal eater but today a big bowl sounds good.

Our current temp is 16* and the wind chill is 2*F. Just thinking about it makes me feel like the penguin I call myself.

Does anyone listen to KLOVE radio? Last week they had Lysa TerKeurst on and she's written a book callled Made to Crave. Its a devotional/overeating book. I've ordered a copy but there's a blog I've been following also. http://www.klove.com/blog/. Lysa has a lot of good insights as to why women overeat. I thought it was interesting.

Welcome to Wednesday.

Had a great workout at the gym yesterday, but didn't get to my second round of exercise after work. Probably just as well--I've been pushing it hard lately.

(It's not easy typing with a kitteh rubbing her face on your fingers as you type. I'm spending way too much time correcting typos.)

Down half a pound after eating to plan yesterday.

Ashley--Looks like a good recipe, but did you forget the salt to activate the baking soda? I have a banana bread recipe from my grandmother that is a family favorite--I will have to try the applesauce substitution, because as it is, there's a lot of fat in the recipe. Do you ever do sugar substitutions? Ever use stevia? I've never used it and wonder what other people's experiences with it are.

AnnieD--I will have to bookmark that recipe analyzer. Since I am trying to avoid processed foods, I make a lot of things from scratch, and then have to do some mental gymnastics to figure out the calories per serving. I hear you about the baking ban--I love to bake for people, but it is just too hard to not taste test ('cause how do you know if it turned out okay if you don't taste?).

NationalP--Interesting about having high calorie days to 'kick-start' the ol' metabolism. Where have you read about that? I'd like to learn more. It might be what I need when I plateau.

PPenguin--Poptarts are evil. And delicious. I've also fallen prey to their siren call.

Just got a call from work. Need to go in early, so I will be missing my morning gym session. Sigh. It's so much harder to be sure I exercise in the afternoon.

Have a good day, all.

Hi everybody!! So happy to see the scale going down..Albeit ever so S-L-O-W-L-Y!!

Major snow storm here....snowed in and hope I have enough discipline to workout at home today....