Good Morning,

BBL, got a meeting OY!


HUGS

Ring a ching ching, its Dominic the Donkey, la la la la la la la

Hi Leens and those to come,

Had a great weekend. Got my hair done and the white hairs have been banished for the next 8 weeks. I *think* I've finished my Christmas shopping. I *hope* I have but I suppose I could suddenly remember something else. I have a couple of emergency gifts stashed away , just in case. I plan on mailing out the gifts I need to today so I won't have to wait in tremendous lines in a week or so. This week also will be the dumping of my "fat" clothes". I've been adding to the pile(s) in the guest room all year, but haven't gotten rid of anything. I promised myself that I would do it this week so now that I've told the whole world, I have no choice. : There is a place here called the Career Closet, where I did some volunteering earlier this year. They give the clothing to ladies in need, instead of selling it in their stores. I am going to see what they want of my pile first, before taking the remainder to GoodWill.

I cooked a little this weekend. Made a Spicy Mango chicken, which I doctored up with more veggies and brown rice and also made a Thai Chicken Cabbage Soup, which I also doctored up with buckwheat soba instead of egg noodles. I haven't sampled the soup yet, but the mango chicken was quite good. It had a few too many calories for the portion size so this is another recipe I will monkey around with some more. Today I am going to make some spicy salmon and some thai lettuce chicken wraps. Later this week I'll roast some butternut squash. I made a spaghetti squash this weekend. yum.

Shooting for 100+ minute of exercise a day this week again. Made the goal last week. Oh I bought a new exercise toy. Let me try to attach the picture. Well I couldn't figure out how to embedd it, but I did manage to get it uploaded. I am having fun with this.


How is everyone else? No one wanted to share what they were baking over the holidays?

Hello ladies! Just joined up last night to be a Med Chick! Love this style of eating.

I had a great day today running errands and hitting the gym! I had my weigh in today there and for this month I've lost 4lbs, 6.25 inches, .5% body fat and .8 bmi! So I'm really happy about it. I know I didn't work as hard at it last month as I could have and still saw results so I'm thrilled to continue on this month with a positive start.

I'm having such a hard time right now eating properly. We are staying with my Mother right now till we head back to work on the road. She's a meat and potatoes woman, fried preferably in butter or margarine. So it's hard convincing her to eat like I need to. So far I've just made healthier choices of what she puts on the table in front of me. So as a result I've ate mostly salad and other vegetables since coming here, LOL. But she's coming around. I can't wait till I can cook for myself again!

Glad to have found this forum, can't wait to get to know you all more!

Wanda

Welcome, Wanda! Congrats on your loss so far! We're glad to have you join us
That must be difficult trying to eat right under someone else's guidelines, but it sounds like you're getting the hang of it. I probably wouldn't do as well. I'm not much of a meat eater, but I do love seafood. I'll eat potatoes if they are put in front of me, but that's usually just a couple of times a year.

Linda, where do you get those great recipes! Yum! I'm making spicy salmon tonight, too! My son's coming for dinner and that's one of his favorite recipes. It's marinating in pineapple juice right now. I'll roll it in seasonings and roast it till done, and I'm serving it with couscous with asparagus and tomatoes. My salmon seasonings usually call for a little brown sugar, grated lemon zest, cinnamon, and chipotle peppers. I'm going to make half of it without the brown sugar and brush it with a little sugar free syrup, and see if that is good enough. I try to live by the 10% added sugar rule, and usually experiement to see which recipes work without sugar, and which ones just have to have it. Oh, and I recently bought some sweet smoked paprika, which adds an incredible smokey flavor without the heat, so I may use that in place of the chipotle, or at least part of it. My old tongue can't handle the heat like it used to.

And trust me, you don't want to hear what all we made for our holidays But we stuck to our guns - small portions, no seconds, and leftovers went home with the starving artists in the family.

Good Evening Med Chicks,

Looks like everyone is busy with work and the holidays. I'm not busy with work but have lots to do at home to keep me busy.

Suzanne, you asked me where I got my recipes, so I'm gonna tell you. I have so many recipe that I try and everyone asking, I finally got my act together and put up a small page that keeps everything in one area.

http://www.geocities.com/lindat3fc/recipes.html Most of the recipes are from allrecipes, some from foodtv. Allrecipes let's me comment on my review page so I am able to list modifications there. The ones that I create or modify from sites other than allrecipes, I am listing on my page. I try new recipes every single week, usually more than one. I adore to cook, test and play around with things. I am like a kitchen Dr. Frankenstein. The salmon sounds yummy. I just adore it.


Hi Wanda, good going on the loss. As far as getting people to change their habits, I find the easiest way is to serve them yummy healthy food and then have THEM ask what is so yummy?. Any chance you could alternate cooking with your Mom and maybe introduce her to some new things?

Hi Leenie who is in the dead zone this week.

Tomorrow I am lugging off the fat clothes. I was heading down there today but they closed in the afternoon for their Christmas party. I am a little cheesed because they want everything on hangers and I have everything folded up and in like 8 shopping bags and a box in my guest room. I don't have enough hangers to hang everything so I'll only be able to take the ones I have enough hangers to hang. I have a lot of wire ones lying around so those will go. I'm not Joan Crawford, but I don't like wire. They multiply in the closet and get tangled.

Everything else is going okay. No jobs but that's okay. I can deal with unemployment for a little bit longer My completely idiotic last agency never terminated me in their system I found out today when I called up to find out where my COBRA paperwork was. Funny. They sent me all the termination letters, but never followed through. Wonder how long I could have gotten free health insurance if I hadn't opened my yap? I am not surprised, This place screwed up my hours, didn't pay me completely, didn't forward assignments to me and made me wait over a week to get any unemployment info. Can you say disorganized goobers? Anyway, that's my minor drama.

When I asked about holiday baking, I actually meant baking like for gift giving and things. Is anyone making food gifts, like cookies, candy, breads.. that sort of thing? I am making quick breads, which reminds me I need to add those to my recipe page since people have been asking. It's late and I've been at the computer too long... tomorrow.

Anyway, night night everyone!

Good Morning, HAPPY FRIDAY !!!

I'm sneaking a quick peek

Everyone is doing fine I hope, I will read up tomorrow.

LOVE YOU ALL !!!

BTW.......I met the deadline here at work, yesterday... GOD IS GOOD !!!




.

HI GIRLS !!!

Welcome Wanda

Suzanne, Linda is a walking book of information on the Med diet, she's been preaching to me for over what?? 2 years now Linda? about it. I just wish I could get my portions under control. I have a really hard time with over eating. I've been thinking of joining OA but I need to find one in my area. A friend from work wants to go with me b/c she is having the same problems as me. Its something deep rooted, mentally and I just can't seem to shake it. So thats where I am with that.

Wanda my mom is meat & taters too. She watches my DD during the day and at night when I go to pick her up, 99% of the time my mom has cooked for everyone else and offers me food the second my toes enter her house. With the stress I've been under lately its been really hard for me to say no, especially that time of night, I'm tired and just want a full belly and go home. I have ALOT of work to do, wouldn't you say LOL.

Today I have to make cookies and spinach dip for my sisters party tomorrow, but today's not the problem, I don't like cookies the same day I make them, its usually the next day that I go bonkers...so I'm gonna get them out maybe tonight while there still warm LOL!!! I am at the worst weight I've been in 18 years. The tide needs to change.

Linda sorry I've been MIA.... but work calls and a new boss to boot. My head's been spinning the past 2 weeks okay it always spins lolol

So whatcha all cooking this weekend ?

I think today will be that Annie Chun's black bean noodle mix and I'll just throw in a wad of veggies.

I dunno about being a wealth of info Leenie. I just know what the plan emphasizes and change recipes to fit it. It's not really hard.

As far as portion control, I do weigh my fish/chicken portions and I do weigh my grain portions. But my veggie portions? I usually eat as much of that stuff as I can eat. Of course, if the recipe has lots of calorie laden extras in it, I'll divide it into calorically reasonable portions. But some nights I may eat like 5 zucchini and a tomato with a couple of tablespoons of ff cream cheese stirred in. Low calories and it fills me up. Have you tried filling up on obscene amounts of veggies, Leens? Measure everything else, but stuff yourself on veggies. I couldn't have done it without Dietpower, though. Calories DO count, IMHO. Simple math. Burn more than you take in.

I think OA is a good start. Like I always say, it's usually not what we are eating that is the problem. It is what is eating US! I think I picked that up from Dr. Phil and it makes sense. I suspect you'd be a lot better off if you planned your meals, but I know that is tough with your schedule. You have to make yourself a priority because if you fall apart, who is going to take care of the little one? Why don't you spend a little time today while you are baking thinking up a menu for the week?

This weekend I am making a spicy tilapia, apple stuffed chicken breasts and a cabbage, chicken, barley and veggie soup for the week. Veggies will be eggplant. broccoli, spinach, zucchini and some butternut squash. I also am going to make some muffins of some sort, probably savory corn ones since I like them so much.

I got rid of a lot of my fat clothes yesterday and the lady there paid me a nice compliment. As she is going through my things she said, "You've lost a lot of weight since you bought these things." It was nice to hear that. Some days I look in the mirror and still see myself as the same size. Sometimes I see a getting toned bod and don't quite believe it. I had kidded myself for years that I wasn't fat, when I really was so my perceptions of myself are NOT to be trusted.

Not liking cookies the same day you make them? Jeepers. I like them the same day, the day after, the month after. Shoot. If I found a cookie a year later and it wasn't moldy, I bet I'd eat it. :lol

Good Morning,

Can you believe December is 1/2 over.

Nothing much is going on SOSDD. I took a big bowl of frozen home made minestrone soup out of the freezer for this week's dinners. I'm not sure what lunches will be, maybe veggie egg rolls or some ww pasta w/veggies. I think I'm leaning more towards the egg rolls, less work LOL.

Whats shakin w/you all today ?