Starting the topic. Be back after I come back from the library (taking a nice mile walk!)

Judy

Hi all,

Judy - I hope you enjoyed your walk to the library! Congrats on a great loss on Saturday. As for your dinners out, I'm sure you'll do fine. Can you bring up their menus on-line first? When I do that, I tend to get it set in my mind what I'm going to eat and it makes it easier to stick to healthy choice.

Dinner at my mom's was good yesterday. I managed to limit the potatoes I ate and stick to a lot of green beans and salad (although unfortunately there was oil in both of those). I've used up my flex points - and I'm having lunch out with a friend tomorrow. I'll just have to be extra careful. My cousin made Ana a batch of chocolate chip cookies, so I'm working really hard to ignore them. I'd put them in the freezer, but if I really wanted one, I'd just eat it frozen, so that's not going to work. My sneak peeks have had me up a couple of pounds. It may be a reaction to last week's loss, I don't know. I'd like to at least maintain. We'll see.

Have a great day.

Carla

Happy Monday!
It's summer again, and work has been stressful with both my trying to get back in the swing of things and all the young patients we have been getting with spinal cord injuries. Makes you realize how lucky you are to be mostly healthy and have working limbs.....

I don't weigh in until Friday, but my sneak peek this morning was 179, and boy will I be happy to get back down below 180 like I was before vacation! I think I am having that big loss you get when you first start the program, or at least I HOPE that is what will happen! Had to use a few flex points yesterday because I was craving a cheeseburger. I skipped the fries and got baked doritos instead (3pts). Today things are going great. Went to the gym this morning and had a yummy tomato sandwich for lunch (2pts total!). My family won't eat wheat bread so I have been buying them whitewheat forever and getting my own "healthy" bread. But I just looked at the label, and the whitewheat is only 1 pt for 2 slices! Who knew? No more buying double bread!
Good job Carla at your mom's. Potatoes are also one of my arch enemies, and if there is a roast to go with it, look out! I am sending good vibes in the hopes that your weigh in is better than your sneak peeks!!!

Sorry I've been MIA - I did get back from the library; just haven't had a chance to post.

Carla - Good for you for doing so well at your mom's! As for the oil in the salad and beans - well, ya' do have to count it but at least think of it as a "healthy fat!" As for the cookies - that's a tough one. I'd eat 'em frozen too (actually I LIKE frozen cookies). How about this? Is it possible to get a small piece of paper, write down a goal for the week and put it in the container with the cookies. If you go for one, seeing your goal just might make you think twice. I did bring up the menu for the restaurant tonight and I know I can have the striped bass - I'll see what the specials are. The biggest challenges will be to save a couple of points for a glass of wine at dinner (and not have a cocktail) and the bread - or whatever yummy Italian things they'll have on the table.

Rachel - yes, you are so right. We tend to forget just how lucky we are until we see those who really have a tough time. Sorry for all the stress at work - I hope it helps to know that you are one of the "good guys", helping people! I will be sending [[[[under 180]]]]] vibes your way. Good job passing up those fries!

Things have been OK on the food front although I realized that either I'm premenstrual or just stressed from the visit to the gyn yesterday (nothing terribly serious but not a fun visit) because last night (and the night before) I just felt very, very snacky at night - or as I announced to Tony last night, "I want to eat a house!" I managed to get off last night just using 2 flex points (thankfully I have good choices available) but I definitely feel that salty/sweet/salty/sweet thing going on.

On a positive note, I picked out an outfit for tonight and I'm actually going to wear a skirt with [[[[[[drumroll]]]]]] my shirt tucked in! I honestly cannot remember the last time I did that. I am always so self-conscious of what I call my "belly pooch."

Time to get a few things done before I shower and get dressed.

Have a great one!
Judy

Judy - I've been snacky too for the last half a week.. I'm lucky I don't get pms like most women, but my body does call out for all the wrong things in that time period!

My weighin was today.. another 1.2 pounds gone. Not too shabby considering my food was so carb and protein high yesterday, with not a lot of veggies. Definitely a healthy loss, so I should not be disappointed. This week will be my first week on WW without travelling, so I am hoping it will be much easier for me.

My main challenge this week is my oldest. He turns 8 on thurs and we're trying to make birthday plans, but he's changing his mind a lot. First he wanted to go out for pizza on Thurs.. now he isnt sure. This weekend we get my fiance's kids, so the main party will have to wait for then.... but I have cake dilemmas!! his kids are allergic to dairy. I've found some cake mixes that I can make, but my oven is on he fritz at the moment, so I'm at a loss of what to do. I might try to get a cake made for Thursday and try to think of some other kind of dessert for this weekend if I can come up with something that doesnt have to be bakes and doesnt include milk of any kind (ugh!)

Have a great week everyone.

Hey everyone,
Gina--I would just die if I had to deal with a dairy allergy! Does that include eggs? I am with you for just having cake when it's just your son home and doing something different with your stepkids. What about popsicles? It sure is hot here, maybe they would enjoy that . Or dairy-free sherbert. And no baking involved. And there is always jello. Good luck! And good job with the loss this week!

Judy--way to go with the shirt tucked in thing. My "pouch" is my biggest problem area, dont' know if I'll ever be tucking anything in---but there's always hope!

Yesterday evening I ate my way through most of my flexpoints---I have 3 left, but today is my last day of the week, DH is at work, so I think I can manage. We took the kids to see Monster House yesterday. It's good, and the kids win in the end, but my 8 year old was up until midnight unable to sleep because of the movie, according to her. Just a warning for the rest of you! My 10 year old had no problems, at least none she will admit to!
I have to take the girls shopping for back to school sneakers today. Hopefully there are still some left out there....

Dairy allergy is a pain to deal with and I only do every other weekend. They CAN have eggs so its workable. You'd just be amazed at how many items have milk in them.. even soy cheese has a milk protein, casein, in it!! I dont ever want to be blamed for anything as far as their health goes, so I am very strict about milk in the house then they are around. We don't have meals that include dairy and I don't let my kids have anything around them that they can't have either.

We went out for my son's birthday dinner last night to Chili's, but I got so frustrated with the waiter. I ordered one of their salads, but asked for the nonfat honey mustard dressing with it and a cup of soup as an appetizer while the boys had cheesesticks. So my soup never came.. oh well.. no biggie. Someone else brought out the food which is very typical for that type of restaurant. I'm halfway done eating my salad and the waiter stops at the table and asks if things are okay. then he stops by 5 min later and asks if everything tastes okay and he says to me "so you got the right dressing?" I'm looking at my plate thinking "um... shouldnt YOU be telling ME the answer to that??" I mean, as if I can tell if this is the fat free honey mustard or not. I don't have bottles to taste test and compare here. Isnt that his job, not mine??? Grr! So I wondered all the rest of the night if it was or not until I calmed myself down a bit. It was only a tablespoon. I never need as much dressing as they give me. Even if it WAS the full-fat version, no biggie.. I'll do better tomorrow. I even had 2 cheesesticks and a couple bites of dessert!

So I get on my scale this morning.. and it says I'm a pound lighter than yesterday!! Omg!! I was so ecstatic. I must've been retaining water or something because it was that time of the month for me. So.. think its ok for me to change my weight tracker, or should I only change it on my weighin day? lol.. I'm so excited because this is my first 10 pounds lost.

Gina - congratulations on the loss! I'm sure it will be an easier week not travelling. I'm with Rachel - get a cake made and have something else for the stepkids. Popsicles are a great suggestion. Great attitude about the terrible service at the restaurant and not really knowing what dressing they gave you!

Rachel - Sorry about going through the flexpoints. Sounds like what I did Tuesday night - some at the restaurant and some when I got home! Thanks for the warning on Monster House. My grandson is in your neck of the woods, visiting his father so I don't know if that's on the agenda for us. Good luck with the back to school shopping/

As I said, I used a whole bunch of flex points on Tuesday when we went out to (the first) dinner. I did have a cocktail - we had no traffic and got a parking spot right away so we were very early for our reservation and sat at the bar. I didn't do badly at dinner but ended up snacky later that night at home. I definitely think the PMS monster is stomping around my house and have snacked a bit more than I've wanted to although I do have something like 7 or 8 flex points left for the week (which ends tomorrow). I put a stop to the snacking last night with a glass of diet chocolate soda with a splash of milk. It helped satisfy my chocolate craving and I plan on having it again this evening.

Today was a busy day. PT very early in the morning and then into the city for my yearly mammogram. I sure am glad that's done! I'm almost through with my "week of doctors." I went to the orthopedist yesterday as a follow up; he wants me to see a neurologist since my right hand kees getting tingly and numb. I have an appt for next Friday - then it's just the dentist and that one I'll save until we are back from the beach (which is in two weeks).

We are going out to dinner with friends again tomorrow but we are going to a seafood place on the water and I had them fax me the menu. It looks like steamers for an appetizer (I hope they have them!) and some kind fish for dinner. If I eat low point tomorrow, have 1 glass of wine (no Cosmopolitan!) and stay away from the bread basket I should do just fine. My sneak peeks have not been encouraging. I'm still shooting to get to my 10% this week but will be very happy with a maintain.

Have a great one!
Judy

well I didn't quite make it to below 180---I am 180.4 this morning, which is a loss of 1.6lbs for the week, so I guess it's acceptable!
All week I have been doing both WW and the food/activity log on calorie-count.com. It has been kind of challenging to keep both going. Calorie counting I find much harder than point counting. But in the end, it's all the same. According to the website I should be eating 1650 cals a day to lose weight at a rate of 1.5 lbs per week. I stayed pretty much on target with that and that is exactly how much I lost. I don't know if I will keep doing both, but it is kind of addictive to look at the analysis and see how close I am to the 40-30-30 rule. (40%carbs, 30%protien, 30%fat). I am almost there!

I made it to the gym last night. This morning was meet-your-teacher day so the girls and I went out to breakfast this morning after. I now only have 9 points left for the day!! But it's okay, I will go to the gym and earn 4 more, plus I have a whole new week's worth of flexpoints. I doubt I will want lunch either so I'll just have fruit or yogurt. DH is working overtime today.