Boo!

You may think during this, the month o' Halloween, that the title of this blog has something to do with ghosts or goblins. Unfortunately, no. It has to do with yesterday's weigh-in. Plus 3 lbs. Ugh!

I was somewhat prepared for this - in the general sense that no one goes through a process like this without some setbacks, and in the realization that I was in Lincoln last weekend for a family wedding, back in town for a nap, and then off to my parents' for Dad's birthday dinner.

I tried to be smart and pack some food for last weekend's trek to Lincoln, but the cooler I had it in didn't exactly keep things cool. When you're dealing with eggs, that's a deal-breaker! So my good intentions for some meals were foiled by that. My good intentions with other meals...well...they might not have existed in the first place. I did try in the sense that I knew I was going to be out of town eating out, and at a wedding buffet, but I didn't try in that when said buffet had roasted fried chicken on it, I went for it! And man did it taste good! As did the wedding cake...and the prime rib at Dad's birthday dinner. And did I mention Dad's birthday cake?!

I think you're probably getting it at this point - yesterday's weigh-in was no big surprise. On the upside, my prayer as I stepped on the scale was "please God, less than 5 pounds gain...please!" So if I look at it from that angle, success! And overall I have still lost 7 pounds in 3 weeks. I've lost the advantage of that's first week's launch to success, but I'm still on track.

Now the tricky part. Tomorrow we are leaving for Nashville for 5 days. Another wedding, more eating out, more challenges. I have done some smart stuff in preparation - I bought lots of 100 and 200 calorie snacks and am prepping them to go with us. I've planned the snacks for every day so that even if I am eating my main meals out, I'm in control of the snacks. And, given last week's set back, I am more focused on being good. And I'm taking a better cooler!

The workouts will also be a challenge since there's no good way to pack my TV, DVDs, wave, weights, etc. So I have planned on treadmill or elipitical time each day we're on the road to keep me moving.

Wish me luck! This is going to be tricky!

XO ~
ColeyCook

Ready for the Weekend

Greetings! This week has gone pretty well, not bad by most measures. I haven't missed any workouts - although this morning I did Rock It Off Express instead of Rock It Off, Express Cardio - and with the exception of the frozen salad the other day, I have stuck to my food plan.

I have this lovely Friday off, but I did my morning workout and ate a cottage cheese parfait for breakfast (one of my favorites!) and I'm getting ready to head out of town for the weekend. Tonight we head to Lincoln for Tyler's cousin's wedding tomorrow (congrats Erin & Mike!) and will return to Omaha on Sunday just in time for Tyler to teach bass lessons, then we'll head to Audubon to celebrate my Dad's birthday. ...then back home for work on Monday. Phew! This is going to be a busy one!

But the real challenge is eating smart this weekend. I have a good start - when selecting what we want at tonight's rehearsal dinner a few weeks ago, I chose the sirloin and salad instead of the rainbow chicken (delicious chicken smothered in cheese). And I'm packing healthy snacks and nutrition bars to try to have smart foods along the way. The meals themselves could be tricky, but I have to learn how to do this as best as I can. Especially considering we will be spending next weekend at a wedding in Nashville and the following weekend on vacation in Branson! Man! This could get tricky! But I'm up for it!

Happy Friday, all! Enjoy the snow! (EEK!)

XO ~
ColeyCook

Pumpkin Squash Ravioli

FYI: JImmy John's does not have healthy meals unless you don't eat the bread and the mayo which are, in case you didn't know, the best part of Jimmy John's.

Good thing I had a frozen lunch in the freezer - Pumpkin Squash Ravioli. It has 300 calories, and I sliced up the tomato that was supposed to go on my now frozen salad, so I'm still on target calorie wise. However, now I've had pasta today, and I really wasn't planning on that as one of my carbs. Grr...I don't like when outside forces mess with my plans.

Also, this day is going faster than I would like it to. I don't normally say that, but I have a lot to get done, and time keeps on slippin, slippin, slippin...into the future! (name that tune!)

Alright - no more whining! Back to my regularly scheduled plan! I get 1/2 an apple and peanut butter in a couple hours - that will make me feel better!

Grrr...

I brought a lovely, healthy lunch yesterday but then gave in to Panda House temptation. Today I planned on the afore mentioned lunch, but my plans were foiled by an overactive refrigerator that froze my salad and garbonzo beans! Grrr....

I'm off to see if I have a frozen lunch in the depths of the freezer. If not, I am about to learn what kind of healthy options Jimmy John's has.

Even Keel

It has been a few days since my last update, but in reality, it's been a few days since I've been a part of the 'real world'. This weekend was our annual Reunion Weekend, which means 12 - 16 hour days. It also creates a real challenge when it comes to any sort of eating and workout regimen! But, I'm proud to report at yesterday's weigh-in, I was at the exact same weight I was the week before! Still down 10 pounds! Given the diet I had in the few days before, I think that's pretty damn good! Here's a recap of the last few days:

Thursday: I started the day with a good workout, and food went well, except I had my first major give-in to cravings. At lunch, my boss ordered pizza from Sgt. Peffer's for us. I didn't do too bad. I ate the salad that was supposed to go with my wrap for lunch, and then indulged on a half a slice of 5 cheese pizza. It tasted so good! But afterward, I could definitely tell that my stomach had not had anything that greasy in it for a while!

Friday: This is where it all begins...I started the day really well. Good workout, smart breakfast and morning snack, I even ate lunch before going to a lunch meeting so I knew what I was putting in my mouth. I ate my snack (hummus and pita) while driving from building to building running Reunion Weekend errands. I had brought a nutrition bar as my 5th meal, but as my coworker and I got in my car to run to another building (at 5:30 p.m.) she mentioned she had not had anything to eat since 10 that morning. So I gave her my nutrition bar to tide her over for a couple hours. So, dinner that night ended up being spanakopita, chicken satay in peanut sauce and artichoke dip with crostini...all snacks from the party I was working.

Saturday: Ugh...Saturday. I woke up with a headache and was looking at a really long day, so I went back to sleep instead of working out. But I ate a good breakfast and morning snack. That was pretty much the end of the smart foods for the day. For lunch, I had fried rice, hot and sour soup and crab rangoon. Leftovers of lunch made up my afternoon snack. Dinner? Oh, dinner! Nachos and 2 chicken fingers with a vodka/cranberry and 3 beers. Oh, dinner. Such are the pitfalls of Reunion Weekend! The only upside to this day was that I hiked the length of the campus a few times, so I feel like I still had more activity than had I skipped a workout and sat in the office fr the day.

Sunday: Time to get back on track! This was supposed to be my day of rest, but I skipped the resting and did Saturday's workout. Then I had a good breakfast, morning snack, lunch and afternoon snack. We had a good friend from out of town over for dinner that night - Tyler made turkey, pesto meatballs in red sauce with whole wheat pasta. I made a salad to go with that. I didn't do too bad with dinner - sensible portions, and only 1 piece of garlic bread. The 2 cookies afterward might have killed me a bit, but c'est la vie!

Monday: Weigh-in. Oh, how I was dreading this. I knew that given my last few days of eating, there was a better than average chance that I had gained. But, much to my pleasant surprise, I was even with the week before!

My workout went well, and the food for the day went exceedingly well, considering I had the day off and was around lots of good food all day that I could have easily snitched. But I didn't - not even once!

Today: eh. It's a gray Tuesday here in Omaha. I woke up in a funky mood, and could hardly get my feet to not trip over each other during the workout. Foodwise, I had one of my favorite breakfasts from the plan - blueberry cheesecake (ricotta cheese, blueberries, vanilla extract, almonds and a packet of splenda) - and had a favorite morning snack - hummus and pita. I also packed a delicious lunch - a 200 calorie pizza (DiGiornio now individually wraps 200 cal slices...how nice!) and a salad with garbonzo beans - a total favorite of mine! Unfortunately, I left the pizza at home. And then two of my coworkers were running errands and offered to bring Panda House takeout back to the office. Panda House may be the pitfall of this whole thing if it doesn't work!

But even at that, I tried to do smart portions. Half the steamed rice, half the garlic chicken (chicken, carrots and celery in a brown sauce) and 1 cup of the hot and sour soup. I also tried to order smart - the garlic chicken is a spicy item, which is a hint from Body-for-Life for Women. You naturally eat less of spicy foods because of the heat. So all-in-all not too bad. Could have been worse.

Tonight I am having lemon baked tilapia with steamed green beans and 1/2 a sweet potato - yum! And I'm about to go grab my afternoon snack - a 100 calorie yogurt! The best part of the yogurt? It's a Breyer's (aka, the ice cream people) product, and it comes with chocolate cookie crumbles! But it's just 100 calories!

Until next time!

XO ~
ColeyCook

Who's laughing now?!

I have decided my favorite snack is any one that involves reduced fat Laughing Cow cheese! I'm enjoying it right now with a tart, green apple - yum! It even makes rice cakes edible!

Lemon Baked Tilapia

By the way - I had a great meal again last night! Lemon baked tilapia - it was totally simple, but really yummy! Fish, lemon, olive oil, bread crumbs - how can you go wrong?! And to top it off, I had a 1/2 a baked sweet potato with it. My first taste of starch in a week...yum...

It's true!

Crazy, but true! I really did lose 10 pounds last week! I bought a new scale yesterday and then tested it out with the old one (the old one, by the way, had a crack in it...the question of whether or not it was broken was really more just me hating to spend money on things like scales).

The two scales are about 6 pounds apart - bummer because the new one is the heavier of the two - but that's not as bad as it could have been. I weighed myself last night and this morning, and they are consistently 6 pounds apart. The good, neigh, great! news is that I really did shed 10 pounds in my first week!!! TEN POUNDS! This week's new challenge has become to manage my expectations for next week's weigh-in. My new mantra is "one pound is progress."

The moral of the story is that this is a great way to kick-start my weight removal. I am excited to have lost that much weight, but am reminding myself that the vast majority of it was probably water weight. Not to mention that going from doing nothing to 5 intense workouts, measuring, planning and journaling your food intake is a big life change. I'm glad my body responded proportionately.

The next time I'm at the grocery store I'm going to pick up two 5 pound bags of flour to remind myself how I don't need to carry that weight around anymore.

XO ~
Nicole (minus 10 pounds)

An Unbelievable Weigh-in!

No, really. I'm not sure I trust this morning's weigh-in. Here's how my morning went:

5:00 a.m. - alarm goes off, I hit snooze.
5:10 a.m. - alarm goes off, I begrudgingly get out of bed.
5:12 a.m. - remember that it's weigh-in day!
5:13 a.m. - strip down to my skivys, and hop on the scale. Look with disbelief at the read-out.
5:13:30 a.m. - step off the scale, step back on. Same read-out.
5:14 a.m. - step off the scale, step back on. Same read-out. . . again.
5:15 a.m. - Conversation with Tyler (which you know he was thrilled about at 5:15 a.m.!)
Me: Ty...hey...wake up.
TC: (Opens his eyes, but says nothing.)
Me: I think three things this morning:

1. Our scale might be broken.
   
2. I might have kicked ass this week.
3. Our scale says I lost 10.5 pounds this week!

Is that possible?
TC: I kind of doubt it. But I'm still proud of you.
Me: Damn. That's what I was afraid of.

So...yeah. I guess I'm not sure where I am after the first week. I am sure I've lost weight; I can feel it in my clothes. I would be shocked if I actually lost 10.5 pounds.

Tonight I will be purchasing a new scale, and tomorrow morning I will be weighing-in again. We'll see where I'm at, and I'll decide how to move forward with gauging my weight loss.

C'est la vie!

XO ~
Nicole

Day 7 of 84

Day 7! One week (almost) over! Whoo hoo! I just sat down to update this while I enjoy today's lunch of spinach salad (spinach, 2 oz. chicken, 1/2 cup tomato, 1/2 cup cucumber, 1/3 cup feta, 3 olives, topped with 1 tsp. olive oil and 2 tsp lemon juice), which is quite yummy.

So...a few things of note in the last couple days:

Day 5, meal 5 - awesome! A pleasant surprise for me and Tyler both. That night we had roasted halibut steaks, baked with lemon juice, olive oil, chicken broth and cherry tomatoes. The tomatoes weren't necessary, but added nice color. The fish was great, and even Tyler thought so, which totally surprised me. His favorite part of the meal was the 1/2 cup of black beans we had on the side; he says it's his new favorite thing. The downside of this meal was that we didn't eat until 10:15 at night. Yeah...not so great. But we got home late, and we were hungry, so we went for it.

Day 6, workout - way to go, me! I woke up at 7:30 yesterday morning and wasn't feeling totally into the workout. Then I got to the living room (where I workout) and realized I had forgotten to throw my workout clothes in the dryer the night before, the living room needed to be rearranged, etc., etc. before I could work out. But I did it! And it kicked my butt! Afterward I cleaned the living room, including vacuuming, which all counts as activity for the day. Go me!
Yesterday was also a really hectic day, but I planned well, and pulled it off for the most part. I had a late breakfast (goat cheese omelet), so I didn't have a morning snack. I went straight for the turkey burger lunch, and made a smoothie to take with me for my afternoon snack. (Funny side note: I was at the church all afternoon, so to keep the smoothie cold, I put it in the fridge with the wine for Mass. That made me giggle!)

Dinner last night: I did good, all things considered. Not awesome, but good. This was my first venture to a restaurant for a friend's birthday. I looked up the menu beforehand since I hadn't been to the place before. I decided on either the grilled chicken or mandarin chicken salad. When I got there, I ordered a Diet Coke, which is a no-no. I had two glasses, and Tyler immediately noticed the influx of caffeine on my system for the first time in a week by the speed of my conversation when I got home! I also had 1 shot that was bought by the table next to us.

I ordered the mandarin chicken salad, and it was delicious! It had grilled chicken, almonds, mandarin oranges and mixed greens with a honey-orange sauce. I intended to get a low-cal dressing instead of the honey-orange sauce, but they were out of their only one (low-cal vinaigrette), so I went with the sauce. It was really yummy, and tasted totally decadent after the week prior.

The thing I'm most proud of is that I have filled out my meal and workout plan for this next week. I have also made a grocery list for the week to hopefully alleviate the nightly trips to the store. I'm a little nervous for two things this week: first, my weigh-in tomorrow morning. I hope to be down 2 pounds, but you just can't ever tell until you get on the scale. I am proud of myself for fighting the urge to get on there throughout the week. The second thing I'm nervous for is that I made my meal plan for the week. With the exception of a few meals, I am sticking to suggested meals from the two plans. I just hope I'm balancing everything okay.

A couple challenges I'm anxious about this week, but planning for:

1. I'm having lunch with a friend on Wednesday. But, I went on line and looked at the menu of the restaurant we're going to, picked out a meal, and put it in the weekly meal plan just like I would anything else. Now, we are going to Noodles & Company, so the goal is to keep Wednesday low-stress, or I could find myself with a heaping bowl of mac n' cheese and parmesean crusted chicken! No, no...I won't. I have a plan!
2. Next weekend is our big Reunion Weekend at work. This means super long days, and usually throwing down whatever food is left at the end of the events. I've planned for it though, and have even looked at my work assignments to see where I'll be on campus to see how often I'll be able to get to food, refrigerators, etc. I can do it, I just have to plan carefully.

That's all for now!
XO ~
Coley

Day 5 of 84

Greetings again! I have been a little MIA, but I'm finding a lot of time goes into planning executing this process, so I have set aside the blogging to make time to do things like talk to my husband. ;) It's very nice to have the first week all spelled out for me, but I feel like all I do is make food and eat food, especially since I'm eating every 2 - 3 hours. My plan to curb a little of this time is to cook a few chicken breasts (or something) at a time and live off them for a few days. While I appreciate the variety, I don't know that I have time for it. But I digress... Here's a recap of the past couple days:

Day 3 - my day of rest from working out. I had planned to take a walk that evening to still fit in some activity, but it didn't happen. I got home from work at 8, and still had to make and eat dinner and prep all my meals for the next day. But that's okay because I still got up bright and early the next morning to workout, and I'm on track for my 5 or 6 workouts this week.

What food did I eat day 3? Hmmm...well, let me just check my handy food journal!

Meal 1 was a protein shake, peanut butter smoothie. This was good, but I'm not sure how I feel about drinking peanut butter. I think that's a mental block though, so I'll keep with it.

Meal 2 was two corn crisps and 1 1/2 ounces of reduced-fat cheese. Okay, so technically the plan was just 1 crisp and 1 ounce of cheese, but the crisps are super thing, and the cheese packets come in 3/4 oz. pre-packaging, so...oops! But it's back on today's list o' meals, and I only brought 1 corn crisp with me, so improvement. I did still bring 2 cheese packages, but man, I love those little cheeses! I'll do my best to just stick to a third of the second package though.

Meal 3 - tuna salad on a bed of romaine and a tomato with 2 melba toasts. This was great! Just 6 ounces of water-packed tuna with 1 tablespoon of light mayo - no dressing or anything, but it didn't need it! I will confess to adding a little salt and pepper on the tomato though...this isn't a no-no, but it's not in the recipe. I took the liberty of saying it was okay.

Meal 4 - 2 celery sticks and 2 tablespoons all-natural peanut butter. Yummy, as always. I really dig the all-natural PB - it's literally just mashed peanuts, no extra oils or anything. Very thick and delicious!

Meal 5 - Turkey taco salad! This might be the winner so far! The only cheating I did was that it calls for 1/4 of an avacado, and I had 1/2. I realize this is fat, but it's good fat, and what the heck am I going to do with 3/4 of an avacado!? Those things are like $2/piece - I'm not throwing it away! The other half is my snack for this evening. And the salad itself was great - lettuce, tomatoes, baked corn chips, cucumbers, low-fat cheese, ground turkey with taco seasoning and ketcup. Yep...ketchup. I about did water instead because the idea of ketchup in my taco salad grossed me out a little, but I tried it and it was good. It added a little of the moisture that you would otherwise get from...in my case...sour cream.

I didn't do meal 6. I'm finding the 5th meal is really satisfying and I don't usually need the 6th one. Today will be the exception to that, but I'll get to that in a minute.

Brief pause...time for my a.m. snack...be right back...

And, I'm back! 1 ounce of almonds in hand.

Day 4 - I think this was the "if we don't give her some fat, she's going to quit on us day," and they might have been right! But yesterday's food was really good! Here's a rundown:

Meal 1 - "Devilish Eggs", 1/2 apple, 1 corn crisp. Again, I substitued the corn crisp for the rice cake that looks like some hippy baked it in his kitchen and threw it in a baggie to be sold at supermarkets, but other than that, I stuck right to it. Oops - I lied. I added a touch of horseradish to the eggs for kick. But other than that, I was really good!

The Devilish Eggs were regular deviled eggs, but instead of mashing up all the yolks, I hard-boiled 3 eggs, cut them up, and only mashed one yolk. The third egg, I mashed the whites in the yolk, added the horseradish and a tablespoon of light mayo. A dash of paprika, and voila! Devilish Eggs! You do throw away 2 perfectly decent yolks, but I am personally okay with that.

Meal 2 - strawberry smoothie/protein shake. So, I lied. This sort of sucked. But it wasn't horrible, and it was very filling, so... not so bad. Good enough to fill the need for protein and some calcium, and quick.

Meal 3 - Terragon chicken salad and whole wheat pita - in the words of Rachel Ray - YUM-O! This salad was great! Cut up 3 ounces of baked chicken breast, mix in 1 1/2 tablespoons light mayo, 5 grapes cut in half, 1/4 cup chopped celery and 1 tsp. terragon. Put this on a bed of romaine and tomato, and you have a great meal!

Meal 4 - 100 calorie yogurt and 3/4 cup high-fiber cereal. I only ate a 1/2 cup of the cereal because I was full after that.

Meal 5 - Lemon chicken, 1 cup steamed asparagus and a mixed green salad with 1 T low-cal vinaigrette. Again - yum! But this was an adventure. The Chambers family does not saute meat. We grill. Or we bake. We do not saute. But I did, and I filled the apartment with smoke, and made a horrible mess of the kitchen. I will say it made for some yummy meat! This is where they really kicked in the fat - I got to saute it in olive oil, which is one of my favorite flavors ever. And the lemon was real lemon (no lemon pepper here, folks!) and you added some capers in for salt, which were good as well.

Today's food looks pretty good - a second dose of the low-fat cottage cheese, berries and walnut mixture for breakfast, the afore mentioned almonds for a morning snack. We repeat Monday's chef salad for lunch, and the corn crisp/cheese snack this afternoon. I'm throwing my last couple meals out of order - usually I'd eat a bigger 5th meal, and then do a small 6th meal, but I am singing in a wedding this evening, which really cuts into that plan. So instead, I'm going to grab a 5th meal/snack before that (the 1/2 an avacado) and have my bigger meal later. The "big" meal is roasted halibut, which looks promising.

Yesterday's workout and today's were great! I really do enjoy The Firm programs. On the 4 DVDs you get with the basic package, there are a total of 8 workouts (and one instructional "don't fall off the wave video"). So far, I've only repeated one workout - score for variety! - and they're all somewhere between 20 to 40 minutes. Plus, they totally kick my butt, and if I'm going to go to the work of working out, I better get some results!

I'm not sure if it's the workout or the food (I'm guessing it's a combo of both), but I feel terrific! I have been sleeping like a baby (I haven't woken up once this week, which is unheard of!), my wedding ring comes on and off with no pulling (no seriously...my hands gain and lose weight like nobody's business), and I woke up at 4:57 this morning, 3 minutes before my alarm, feeling ready to go for the day! In fact, before arriving at work at 8:40 this morning, I had worked out, washed the dishes and cleaned up the stove from last night, ironed today's clothes, got the frozen fish out of the packaging and into the fridge for tonight, organized the music for the 2 weddings I'm singing in this weekend, put a load of laundry in the dryer and started another load in the washer! And I ate breakfast and got ready for work in there - not bad!

Now, this part might be crazy, but I swear my clothes are already fitting better. I think it's not that I've lost that much weight, or any for that matter, but I think it's that I feel stronger from the workouts, and thus, I'm holding myself better. Posture is a wonderful thing!

I'm feeling good with 4 1/2 days down. That's not a lot of out of 84, but it's better than I was a week ago!

XO ~
Nicole

**If you're missing the pictures, I'm sorry. I keep forgetting to take them, and they take forever to load. I'll try to get pictures of the really delicious looking meals though - you should have seen last night's!

Day 2 of 84: The Plan

So far, so good! The second workout went well - Rock it Off! Express - although I was pretty sure I was going to fall on my butt a few times. I am remembering as I do The Firm that you have to have at least a little coordination to do their programs . . . or a minor in dance might be helpful! Either way, I made it through, and it was fun. I can definitely feel it working, which is my favorite part of their workouts - the instant gratification of sore muscles.

Tomorrow I get a day of rest from the workouts, but depending on what time I get to bed tonight, I may get up and do some Wii yoga. At least something to get my mind awake for the day.

Speaking of getting to bed early - as I was heading to bed last night, I commented to Tyler that the way I think the way the BFL (Body-for-Life) plan actually works is that you spend your whole night planning what you're going to eat for the next day, and then prepping it so it's all ready to go in the morning, and you're just too tired to eat after 8 p.m.. Either way - I'm good with it!

And speaking of Tyler, he's pretty sure that the BFL people and grocery stores are in cahoots. I will be making my third trip in as many days to Hy Vee this evening. Although in their defense, the only reason I had to go last night is because the bag boy left my goat cheese out of the bag the night before and I needed it for this morning. Which brings me to . . .

Today's eating plan! Here goes:

Meal 1: Goat cheese omelet (1 whole egg, 2 egg whites, 1/2 cup of chopped tomatoes and 1 ounce of crumbled goat cheese) with a side of mixed berries.

Meal 2: low-fat mozzerella string cheese and carrot sticks (The Firm calls for sliced bell pepper instead of carrots, but bell peppers make me sick.)

Meal 3: Greek Salad (2 cups lettuce, 1/2 cup chopped tomatoes, 1/2 cup cucumber, 1/4 cup feta cheese, 2 ounces baked chicken and 3 olives) dressed in 1 teaspoon olive oil and 2 teaspoons lemon juice, served with a 1/2 of a 6" whole-wheat pita.

Meal 4: 20 almonds

Meal 5: Marinated flank steak (balsamic vinegar and olive oil marinade) with steamed spinach and a tomato/onion salad, 1/2 of a 6" whole-wheat pita.

Meal 6: 1/4 cup low-fat cottage cheese, sliced tomato (or berries...not sure yet...this 6th meal doesn't exist in The Firm plan, and it's optional in BFL, so I'm sort of planning for that one, but knowing it might not happen.)

Along with the meals, I'm supposed to drink 11 - 12, 8 oz. glasses of water each day. This is not really a problem for me - I'm a water drinker anyway. But I haven't been drinking as much lately, so I'm making more and more trips to the bathroom. I'm just thinking of them as extra movement in my day. =)

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

This is part 2 of this post - it's now 8:50 p.m., that was about 9:30 a.m. Today went well - my biggest realization the past 2 days is that I am desperately hungry after work! Days where I have anything after work before I can eat dinner (piano lessons, meetings), I am going to have to plan on a little later dinner and a second "snack" . . . or something. Anyway - here is today's progress and tomorrow's plan:

Meal 1: Goat cheese omelet and mixed berries - yum! I had a 1/2 cup less berries than they advised, but I wasn't hungry after the omelet and half the berries, so I didn't eat them.



Meal 2: I switched the plan up a bit and ate the almonds this morning instead of in the afternoon. They were almond-licious. Here's a pic of both of today's snacks because, let's face it, pictures of a bag of almonds, string cheese and carrot sticks aren't that exciting.



Meal 3: Greek salad - this was delish! Unfortunately I was in a meeting while I was having lunch, so I didn't get a picture. That's okay though - just trust me that it was scrumptious!

Meal 4: This is where the afore mentioned string cheese and carrot sticks come in.

Meal 5: Technically, I had a glass of skim milk to tide me over between work, piano lessons and dinner. Since this counts as a "Smart Protein", I am counting it as a meal.

Meal 6: Okay - speaking of delish! This was the planned meal 5 (steak, spinach, tomatoes, pita). Tyler just came home and commented that whatever it was I made for dinner smelled really good. He usually only says that about brownies. He's right - it smells (and tasted) great, and I'm thrilled that it's on the meal plan again Saturday night! Maybe they just threw in that bland chicken last night to throw us off. . . here's hoping!



Okay - tomorrow's plan:

Workout: Day o' rest! And I was going to get up and do yoga, but forget that - I'm sleeping in! However, I still want to do something active, so instead Tyler and I are going to do an after-dinner walk tomorrow. We usually walk from our apartment (83rd & Western-ish) to 90th & Western - about 14 blocks, or just over a mile. The intensity level will be lower than the other workouts, but that's okay.

Meal 1: Smoothie (1 c. vanilla soy milk, 1 T all-natural peanut butter, 1 scoop of vanilla protein powder, 1/2 tsp. vanilla extract and ice). This will be my first experience with the soy milk and protein powder. We'll see how it goes.

Meal 2: 1 corn cake (similar to a rice cake) with 1 ounce of reduced-fat cheese. I'm actually looking forward to this. A little salt, a little crunch, and I LOVE the laughing cow reduced-fat cheese, which conveniently comes pre-packaged in 1 oz. wrappers! The corn cake was supposed to be a rice cake, but the rice cakes at Hy-Vee looked . . . gross. Like some hippy had just thrown them in a bag and sent them off. I'm not so sure that's not the case. But either way, I love to support corn farmers, so this is a better option anyway!

Meal 3: Tuna Salad on a bd of romaine lettuce and tomatoes with 2 melba toasts.

Meal 4: 2 celery sticks with 2 T all-natural peanut butter

Meal 5: Turkey Taco Salad - I get chips with this! Baked tortilla chips - I don't even care that they're baked!

Meal 6: 1/2 apple and 1/2 cup grapes

Till tomorrow . . .
XO ~
Nicole

Day 1 of 84

Day 1 has come to an end. And so far, so good - I worked out and stuck to the eating plan for one whole day. So here's a recap of the day, complete with pictures, a la The Pioneer Woman (although my photos include far less cream):

Workout: The Firm Wave, day 1 workout - Ride the Wave and Speed Sculpt Express. This went pretty well. I was pleasantly surprised as I didn't have time to preview the videos and thought I might just fall on my butt the first time I tried to step on the curved step. And tonight I'm feeling a slight burn, which I actually enjoy. And in the spirit of first day photos, here is me on the first day of my new adventure:

Yeah...5 a.m. looks good on me! Food: This week The Firm has a detox plan. I'm using this as the main plan, and adjusting to fit the Body-for-Life plan as needed. BFL (Body-for-Life) teaches that you should eat 5 or 6 small meals each day. This way your body always knows that more food is coming and is willing to let go of the food you've already eaten instead of hoarding it in case you don't eat for a while. So... without furthur adieu - Meal 1:

For breakfast, I had 3/4 cup of low-fat cottage cheese, 2 tablespoons of chopped walnuts and 1 cup of frozen, mixed berries:

Mmm...yum! I love the colors that come with healthy cooking.

This is me mentally preparing for breakfast. I learned in the book that if you work out before breakfast you will burn more calories because your body will go on the fuel already there. So before the work out, I measured out the berries to thaw, and then lined it up - 1 cup of berries, 2 T walnuts and 3 (quarter) cups of cottage cheese.


Ta-da! It was surprisingly good! I'm not usually a nut fan, but I dug the crunchiness this gave the whole thing. Perhaps next time I should set the strawberries aside from the other berries though...they didn't thaw very well. Meal 2: Morning snack! For this I had 1/2 a green apple and 2 teaspoons of all-natural peanut butter. I forgot to take a picture of this at the beginning, but here's what it looked like at the end:

Note how every drop of peanut butter is gone from that dish? NO WAY am I leaving a drop of it if it's in the plan! Meal 3: Chef salad and whole-grain melba toast
Meal 4: The plan was for sliced tomato and sliced cucumbers, but work got in the way of slicing a tomato, so it was just the cucumbers, and there was no time for picture taking. But I did fit in my small meal every 2 - 3 hours, so mission accomplished! Meal 5: Well, the plan was for chicken breast marinated in orange juice, lemon juice and rosemary with a side of Brussels sprouts roasted in olive oil and salt, along with a mixed green salad with 2 teaspoons of feta cheese and 2 tablespoons of low-calorie dressing. But this meal wasn't going to be ready until 7 when I was done teaching piano lessons, and I was so hungry after work! So I skipped past that plan and sliced up the tomato I missed earlier in the day; there was no time for pictures. Meal 6: So meal 6 was going to be an apple, but since I messed with Meal 5, I made it meal 6:

Yep - that chicken only tasted as good as it looks. It was okay, but ...meh... not very happy that it's on the plan for a second time later this week. On the upside, I actually like Brussels sprouts! And the salad was good - God love feta cheese...

My biggest accomplishment today? Tyler's cousin, Damon, is in Omaha en route from Phoenix to St. Paul, so the whole family got together for dinner at Mama's Pizza. Because I had to be late coming from piano lessons, I quickly ate a healthy dinner before going to Mama's, and then didn't eat ONE BITE of pizza or fried mushrooms or anything at Mama's! I'm pretty proud of myself for that one.

It's late. . . I'm tired . . . and I just realized the local CW station is running re-runs of the first season of The Hills at night. How is it these posts always come back to trashy teen dramas at the end?!

Goodnight, all!
XO ~
Nicole

At the Beginning

"We are what we repeatedly do. Excellence then, is not an act, but a habit."
~ Aristotle

Today is the beginning of a new adventure for me. Hopefully, a new lifestyle for me. Today I am at the beginning of my first 12-week weight removal segment of the Body-for-Life for Women. This plan follows the original Body-for-Life book, which was geared toward men. After seeing how successful that program was, but how geared it was to men, Dr. Pamela Peeke developed the womens' program.

This is not the first time I've tried a healthier lifestyle plan (I really hate the word "diet", can you tell?). I've done Weight Watchers, and I have belonged to a gym and owned a couple different at-home exercise programs. Apparently just paying the membership to the gym and owning the videos doesn't help you lose weight. Who knew?! The gym was mildly successful, but I could never afford a trainer, and self-motivation has not been my strong-suit when it comes to working out. Weight Watchers worked, but I don't think I was scared enough. Plus, there are some things I just hate spending money on, and every time you turned around you were paying dues, buying this, being encouraged to buy that, etc. And add to that that I was younger than most the people in the room, and it all added up to the wrong environment for me.

One exercise program that did work for me was The Firm. I ordered this in 2003, shortly after graduating college and finding I was less active than ever before, and that I had never really learned how to work out. Believe it or not, it worked! It worked wonderfully! They said in the ads that you would see visible results in 10 workouts or less, and that by the end of 3 months you would feel like a new person. And they were right! I saw a difference in my body, and I felt stronger than ever! However, two weeks before the 3 month mark I took a vacation with friends (MVC 2003, anyone? Yeah...that was a good time!), and I never made myself get back on the fanny-lifter. (No, really...that was the tool that game with the program. And my butt looked great!)

I've used The Firm off and on since then (wow...I just realized that was 6 years ago...time flies), and it always works, but when I ordered it, it came in video format and they're wearing out. Plus, I've never really renewed my dedication to doing it every day.

So here I am again. This time, six years later, I'm married, 5 months from turning 30, minus a gall bladder and heavier than I've ever been. Generally speaking, I am a very happy person. But I've gotten to the point where I don't like to look at myself in the mirror, and I don't like the person I see in pictures. It's not the person I feel like I am on the inside. What to do, what to do? Make changes. That's the only option.

So - here's the scoop. On a trip to the bookstore about a month ago, Tyler, my loving husband, knowing that I was feeling badly about my body, pointed out the Body-for-Life for Women book. While he hunted around for other literary treasures, I sat down and started reading. I read about women who had been where I am - feeling badly about their bodies, and scared for their futures if they don't make a change. I was impressed by the approach - Mind, Mouth, Muscle - and encouraged by the fact that occasional set-backs are okay, as long as you get back on track as soon as you can. As Dr. Peeke says in the book, for women, sometimes the only thing that will get you to tomorrow is chocolate! I know that feeling, and I was thrilled to see a medical professional recognize it in writing! And in the midst of a diet book!

I also like that the goal of this is not to "lose" weight, but to "remove" weight. As they say in the book, you lose things that you want to find another time, you remove things you no longer want.

I encourage all women who struggle with weight, and who among us doesn't, to read this book. I am really motivated by the 3-fold approach and by how she honors those hormones and emotions that women face. Also, each section - Mind, Mouth, Muscle - is broken down into 4 phases of life ranging from the teenage years to the golden years, and she addresses the different social, physical and emotional demands you may feel in each phase of life.

I set a start date for myself - September 21 - and started to plan. The only thing that I kept struggling with was that I was again going to need to self-motivate to work out. I needed to join a gym, or figure out that one piece of weight machinery in the apartment gym. Then one morning as I was laying in bed, I saw an infomercial for The Firm's new program - coined "The Wave."

It's very similar to last time, except now you get a piece of equipment known as The Wave that you use to optimize the workout. It still works on the basic premise that getting your heart rate up, and then lifting weights will build more muscle, more quickly. And it comes with a day-by-day plan for which workouts to do when. And it's now on DVD. (Sing it with me - "I love technology... but not as much as you, you see... but I still love technology." I heart Napoleon Dynamite.) So I ordered it. (Insert mental image of Tyler groggily emerging from the bedroom to find me sitting on the couch, phone to my ear, spending our money on a new workout program, and all before 8 a.m. on a Saturday. God bless that man for putting up with me!)

The best news is that in the Body-for-Life for Women book, Dr. Peeke suggests a workout program, but also encourages you to do what works for you, so long as you're moving on a more regular basis. So - score!

Today I started. At 5 a.m. I started. I'm not sure how much weight I want to lose. For this first segment, my goal is 23 pounds in 12 weeks. It's ambitious, but I really believe I can do it. I can do anything for 12 weeks. (Brilliantly, she added a maitenance plan that you kick into when the weight removal section is over, so you don't just lapse right back into old habits.)

I'll post more details as I go, but that's the gist of it. I'm at the beginning, and I'm feeling good.

XO ~
Nicole

**XO is an imitation of my Mom's many years of signing cards to us with that, not Gossip Girl! Although, I do love the occasional trashy, teen drama. ;)