Food and Exercise 11

-about a cup of cantalope and honey dew melon chunks (60 cals)

-other 1/2 of my omelete and potatoes from yesterday (150 cals?)

-water (well over 100 oz) (0 cals)

-spicy sweet chili doritoes (250 cals)

-2 small turkey and ham wraps (445 cals)

-so delicious dairy-free neopolitan mini ice cream sandwich (90 cals)

-about a cup of pineapple (70 cals)

-pomegranate green tea (0 cals)

-organic strawberries, 1/8 cup organic tropical granola, plain ff greek yogurt, cinnamon (125 cals)

total= 1190 calories

Why yes, I do love fruit. LOL :). 

 omelet--veggies fell out on the side lol)

I kinda overstuffed them lolsquish!

It still amazes me how much you can eat at home and you actually feel good after you eat. I know that sounds like common

sense/second nature to most people, but again, as a (former?) restaurant whore it's still news to me! Forgive me if I sound like a broken record for awhile lol. I'm used to eating pretty healthy, but always feeling horrible after I ate. That still happens sometimes, but far less.

I went to Subway tonite for dinner, but they were out of the wraps. WTF? The bread I can sorta understand since it's freshly made or w/e, but I'm sure the wraps come prepackaged. I wonder why they couldn't just open a new one in the back? I was pretty frustrated b/c I'd been craving it all day. Instead of going to quiznos across the street (where I know the calories are pretty much through the roof) or another Subway, I just went to the grocery store and bought all of the ingredients to make my own. I didn't think it'd be as good since I feel like I never know the right ratios of what to put in sandwiches (or salads..), but it was better. SO good. AND because my wraps were small I got to eat TWO for only 100 (delicious) calories more than the Subway would have been. Woohoo. Plus I know my meat had no nitrites or other yucky, unncessary preservatives, my veggies were fresh, etc. SO THERE! 

I'm eating the yogurt bowl right now and it's almost 1 am, but I have a good 3 or so hours of studying ahead of me (bleh) and I'm hungry. You're supposed to eat when you're hungry, so...I am :). 

For exercise I took my dogs on a 40 minute jog/walk. Mostly walk. Once again it's CRAZY windy, so that upped the effort a little bit. Still haven't made it to the gym for weight machines, though :(. This is gonna be a semi-busy week, but I want to go by the weekend for sure. Sooner would be a bonus. Until then I'm gonna squeeze in any exercise I can.

XO,

Amanda

Food and Exercise 10

Yum Yum Yum

-a little less than 1/2 veggie omelet with egg whites only and a littttle avocado on top (100 cals?)

- 3/4 order of extra crispy pan fried breakfast potatoes and a little ketchup (200 cals?)

-black coffee (0 cals)

-water (crazy amounts, easily over 200 oz, about half with a little lemon) (0 cals)

-4 oz plain ff greek yogurt (60 cals), 1 organic granny smith apple sliced (80 cals), a few organic strawberries (15 cals), 1/4 cup REALLY DELICIOUS organic maple walnut granola (100 cals), and cinnamon (0 cals)

-about 1 serving of spaghetti marinara with 1/2 a giant meatball (about 400 cals?)

-2 small pieces of bread (tried to avoid it, but it was sooooooo good) (200 cals?)

-1 small piece lemon chicken with capers (275 cals?)

-2 plates of mixed green salad with a little prosciutto and gorgonzola (350 cals?)

-small sliver of red velvet cake (not worth the cals. too sweet) (150 cals?)

(very tentative) total: 1930

OUCH. LOL @ me thinking I did OK at dinner before actually thinking about the numbers. Oops. And I didn't even order wine or a cocktail or anything to drive the total up! But it was freaking delicious, especially the pasta. It was for our family b-day celebration for my Mom. Since it's a family-style place and it wasn't my birthday I just said I'd eat whatever everyone else wanted. I'm usually kind of controlling about that stuff and now I see why--if I'm not we all eat crap. Just Kidding. Kinda. But again, it was so good and it was a celebration. I know I keep making excuses, but I swear my life isn't usually so eventful lol. I did tell myself as long as my total doesn't go over 2,000 I won't beat myself up about it (as long as higher totals like that aren't an every day thing), but it's still nothing to be proud of. Damn restaurants! This is really teaching me how destructive they are to a "diet" (/healthy lifestyle) even when you try to make good choices. I know at most places it's POSSIBLE, but it's not easy. 

On another note: Organic strawberries are SO MUCH tastier than nonorganic. I discovered this last year, but this was the first time recently I could find organic strawberries and yummm. & as you can see, I got new granola to replace the hamster-y kind (lol) and wowowow. A little sweet, but still two thumbs up! 

I'm pretty pissed off, though. My Mom promised we'd go to the gym together today and then, like usual, changed her mind. About 10 minutes before we planned to go. I'm pissed off for me, but also for her. She always says she wants to get into better shape to feel better again, but doesn't do ANYTHING about it. Whenever she's at home she just lays in bed and watches tv or gets on her laptop. She even has me bring her water, food, etc. most of the time. No wonder she always feels like shit all the time! UGH. It's just frustrating to hear her say one thing and do another. And my Dad is the opposite. He works out a LOT, but eats like crap (and way too much) when he says he wants to change. Well, my Mom eats like crap too (mostly), but she doesn't eat very much. I know I can only focus on myself and my own journey, but my parents are older than most parents my age and I worry about them. They look and act younger, but I want them to stay that way, and to be healthy. *SIGH* 

Exercise I did do: went on a walk with my brother and two of our dogs for about 10-15 min, then I jumped on our (annoying, partially broken) treadmill for 25 min and alternated between running and speed walking. It didn't feel like I was overexerting myself, but when I was done I was dripping sweat and was bright red. I didn't get a headache after though, so that's good. That usually happens to me when I work out  like that. 

*fingers crossed for a better next week* not that this week was all bad. Or even most.

XO,

Amanda 

Food and Exercise 9

-2 blueberry waffles (135 cals)

-8 oz bolthouse farms vanilla chai protein drink (160 cals)

-water (over 100 oz) (0 cals)

-side chopped salad (guessing 300 cals?)

-About 4 oz of salmon with a honey dijon topping (guessing 450 cals, just b/c I assume they cooked it in oil?)

-part of a side of jasmine rice (100ish cals)

-snow peas that appeared to have oil on top (150 cals?)

-bowl of fruit salad (organic granny smith apple, organic strawberries, frozen pineapple) (150ish cals)

-3 vodka sodas (about 225 cals)

(tentative) total: 1670

Borderline terrible-ish. I almost did better when I went to a concert and had school all day and had 7 drinks! Viva la weekend? :-P I guess at least I got in some good nutrients, but also a lot of unnecessary stuff too and way too much oil at the restaurant. I only use a tiny bit of oil when I cook at home, so I always forget how free they are with it when you go out. Bummer. It tastes better without so much anyway!

I've got to start eating at home more or being more sure about calorie information/what they put in my food at restaurants. I have been improving, but I'm a perfectionist and it's not good nor fast enough progress! Plus it's just not good for you to eat out so much. Period. I can't believe the vast majority of my meals in my entire life have been eaten out. Not good. I was going to get the chopped salad plus soup, but their only soup was broccoli cheese and I thought fish was a smarter decision. Now I'm not so sure! I don't really care THAT much as long as I'm not eating crazy calories, but it does suck to say a specific goal number, like 1400, and exceed it. Especially when I really did actively try today! I'm also dying for some dark chocolate with peanut butter on top, but I spent those calories on the fruit bowl, so I guess I'll abstain until tomorrow. Sunday's usually my fave food day of the week anyway, since I get a proper breakfast with my Dad. Mmm breakfast.

OK, but ew, for a snack earlier I made a yogurt/fruit/granola bowl and I took a bite and...omg. The granola was purchased in January, but I had it tightly closed and everything, so it still seemed fine. But....I took one bite and it tasted the way hamster bedding smells! That woodsy blah smell. Grossss. Needless to say I threw that out right away :-P. 

On the plus side, I finally did a little bit of.....exercise! What? Me? Yes! I busted out one of my workout DVDs and did the 1 mile Walk from one of the Walk Away the Pounds series and I used 2lb hand weights for the arm stuff, since I don't have their fancy lil weight balls. I did it not once, but twice. Once in the afternoon and once at night for a total of approx. 40 minutes including warm up and cool down. I also did about 5 min of an am/pm yoga dvd (the pm version), but really didn't like it, so I stopped. I've done the am workout and I'm pretty sure I thought it was good, but either I'm v. out of yoga practice or it just sucks, but the pm workout was too confusing and boring for me. I'll have to play around with all of my yoga dvds again. 

Also, one last food rant: Looking at my calories kind of bothers me. My calories for the past week or so are SO inconsistent, which can't be good for health or weight loss. Even if I am staying around or below my goal calories for the most part, it seems bad to be so up and down with different caloric totals. I am still in the very beginning stages, so hopefully it will start to even out more naturally, but if not I'll have to be more diligent in planning. Right now my goal is more oriented towards staying in that 1400 ballpark without going hungry or feeling deprived or what have you, and I can say so far VERY good on that front. But eating under 1000 calories one day and closer to 2000 another is not right. In order to lose and maintain loss I know I'll have to find more stable patterns or my whole attempts will be futile. 

I think I'm going to finish Skinny Bitch tonite or tomorrow and sometime next week I want to pick up a copy of Naturally Thin by Bethenney Frankel. Can't wait to read that! Love her and it just seems like common sense. 

XO,

Amanda

Food and (no) Exercise 8

-bowl of tortilla soup from Saltgrass (can't find nutrition info, so I'll guess 350 cals since I threw away the cheese and tortilla strips they put on top..yuck)

-water (over 100 oz) (0 cals)

-large iced tea (0 cals)

-fat flush tortilla with pesto chicken salad and mustard (175 cals?)

-tofutti cutie mini vanilla-strawberry ice cream sandwich (not very good, btw) (80 cals)

-3/4 an order of moo goo gai pan with extra veggies instead of rice (275 cals?)

-1/3 of a strawberry cupcake (also not that good...) (100 cals?)

-organic skim milk (80 cals)

-a few organic corn tortilla chips (about 100 cals)

-salsa (10 cals)

(very tentative) total: 1170 calories

so, yeah, basically today aside from a few things, I have almost no exact idea how many calories I ate and I'm sure it was a ton of sodium :(, but I tried to make the best choices I could. We were going to go have italian at Maggiano's for lunch, but I couldn't think of anything very low-cal there, so we went to Saltgrass instead. Yeah, I probably would have been better off with italian, especially b/c I wasn't in the mood for a big slab of meat lol, but oh well. But again, even though a lot of it is crap, it seems like a lot of food for very little calories. 

I also had plans to exercise at 6:30 with my Mom, but I fell asleep from 5:30 'til 8:30. I set my alarm for 6:30, but I kept hitting snooze 'til 7:30 when I finally said screw it and just turned it off. WHAT IS WRONG WITH ME? Ugh. I am really NOT trying to get out of working out too, I actually (sort of) enjoy it, so why does all this crap keep coming up? Stupid body! I kinda had a bad body day besides that, too. Last nite I tried on a dress I bought recently that barely zipped up and now it does EASILY, so I was feeling good. But then today I tried on a few shirts and dresses at the mall and they all looked like ass, so it put my already fragile, tired mood into an all out bad one. No bueno. And for awhile I had a headache too. Awesome. I'm always tempted to say "there's always tomorrow..." but it's that kind of thinking that got me here in the first place. I need to do something TODAY and not always count on tomorrow. 

Le sigh. 

But for the record, I feel a lot better now. I really think I needed the sleep. I just hope I can fall asleep again and sleep through the nite...

XO,

Amanda

Food and (no) Exercise 7 (I ate too much I feel sick, wahh)

-hemp oatmeal (160 cals) with 1 tbsp cashew butter (90 cals)

-granny smith apple (80 cals)

-iced coffee (10 cals)

-strawberries (45 cals)

-organic string cheese (80 cals)

-10 cal per serving vitamin water (15 cals)

-3 spinach & artichoke veggie bites (190 cals)

-8 potato wedge fries with spices and a little organic ketchup (100 cals)

-6 oz tilapia (150ish cals) with lemon garlic seasoning (25 cals)

-lima beans (75 cals)

-water (only 35 oz so far :(-still drinking-Aiming for at least 65) (0 cals)

-organic fat free milk (80 cals)

-almond joy frosted vanilla cupcake (I'm guessing 300? cals)

total: 1400 (wow...I didn't even plan to make it exactly 1400! Guess it's becoming second nature. Sorta). 

It was all really good (I cooked dinner for my Mom's b-day and had my fingers crossed that it would come out OK), but I kinda wolfed it all down and didn't even need to eat that much. I feel kinda blah and weighed down now. That's what I get, I guess. But we were trying to hurry, so she could open her presents lol. Plus the dogs kept jumping on me grrr (I was eating on the couch in my parents room and the dogs are little and were sitting on each side of me lol..rude!). I still feel like I calculated wrong or something tho...can't believe I ate all that (granted it was only 2 full meals and a snack, but still...dessert too!) for exactly my planned calories. Awesome. Even though it takes some thought and planning, this whole watching calories business is so easy. I should know, I've done it so many times before, sometimes obsessively so, but it's been awhile since I took it seriously :-P. 

I don't go to sleep 'til around 3am (shuttup..), so if I get a little hungry later I'lll still prob only try to have more water and maybe some hot tea or something. My problems usually start when I eat late at nite...

It's been fun for me too to discover all these old foods (and some new) that I've always liked/been curious about, but kinda quit eating. Like the whole array of fake meat products and such. I used to (and still sort of do, but sort of not) hate most unhealthy foods (fried stuff and the like), and my main weakness has always been sweets, but the past 2 years or so I was trying things more like fried chicken, etc. and...why? There's really no need to "make" yourself like food that's terrible for you in the first place. So dumb. Especially when I KNOW I like the healthy options more anyway! What was I thinking? Clearly I wasn't...

I'm so pissed off too! I usually do the bulk of my grocery shopping at health food-type stores, but I ran into a regular grocery store (owned by Safeway) today and I couldn't find one bottle of pre-made cocktail sauce without high fructose corn syrup. What is that?! SO unnecessary and infuriating! I've also been buying these soy dreamer ice cream sandwiches, but my Dad and brother both keep eating them all before I get a chance to even have one grr, but anyway...I forget what ingredients they have, but today I decided to try the tofutti cutie brand and didn't look at the label 'til I got home..and yep, you guessed it...HFCS--WTF?! Ughhhh.

No exercise...AGAIN :(. I did walk in the CRAZY ASS wind throughout campus (and had to push through the wind...),but that's life...not so much counted as exercise LOL. Still, burned a few calories :-P. I REALLY need to step that up. Not to make excuses for myself, because I could have (and should have) done way more, but it was a somewhat different week with a birthday and a concert, but still. Not good enough! I expect more from myself. I feel really crappy now tho from eating a little too much, so maybe in an hour if I feel OK I might do a low-impact workout dvd just to say I did something. I'll edit this post if I do and let you know lol. 

I did weigh myself this morning though and I've lost 4 lbs this week, despite having 7 alcoholic drinks on Tuesday. Not too shabby! Hopefully it will keep coming off!

XO,

Amanda

Food and (no) Exercise 6

-Pei Wei Thai Mango chicken & tofu (400 cals? it's new/limited edition and they don't have the nutrition info out, but judging by their other similar entrees that seems about right)

-1/2 serving Pei Wei brown rice (50 cals)

-iced green mandarin tea (0 cals)

-1/2 serving pirates booty (65 cals)

-1 cup cheerios (100 cals) with 1/2 cup organic soy milk (50 cals) and 1 sliced banana (90 cals)

-pau de arco tea x 2 (0 cals)

-water (only about 60 oz, not enough, but sadly more than yesterday...) (0 cals)

-1 dark chocolate attune probiotic bar (80 cals)

total: 835 calories

I just wasn't hungry today. I had to force myself to even eat the cereal for dinner at 9pm. I'm so tired. Didn't work out either *sigh* No energy. I'm surprised I'm not already in bed to be honest. I do usually get a second wind at nite, though.

And ugh, my tongue is hurting again. It's probably from all of the yeast I had yesterday. It usually doesn't catch up with me that quickly though, dammit! 

XO,

Amanda

Food and (no) Exercise 5

For yesterday:

-hemp oatmeal (160 calories) with 1 tbsp cashew butter (90 calories)

-banana (90 calories)

-iced coffee (10 calories)

-1 serving snap pea crisps (150 calories)

-organic string cheese (80 calories)

-granny smith apple (80 calories)

-fat flush tortilla with pesto chicken salad, mustard, and spinach (200 calories?)

-2 double vodka sodas (240ish cals)

-1 dos equis (130+ cals--it was a draft, so it may have been over a serving)

-1 bud light (110 cals)

-1 shiner bock (140 cals)

-half chilis cheeseburger (about 400 cals)

total: 1880 calories

So, as you can see...not so good. HOWEVER, I have to be realistic and say that I did go to a concert and for the most part I did well, so I'm not too upset about it. A month ago I would have done WAY worse, so it's progress. It's not like I drink that much on an average day, so whatever. The burger was kind of a drunken idea too, which is why you're not supposed to drink in the first place heh, but I hadn't eaten dinner and it was midnite and it was being shoved in my face repeatedly, so I caved. And damn was it good, even though it was cold lol. I'm not a burger person, but chili's sure can make 'em. My only regret is drinking so much. I wanted a nice buzz for the concert, but since I gulped the drinks back so quickly it took longer to hit me than it took for me to guzzle 'em back and I got more on the drunk borderline which I don't really like anymore. At all. But at least I didn't feel out of control or anything and I had a GREAT time. I can't believe I used to drink TWICE that. No wonder I always got so sick. Not smart. It's been YEARS since I did that though. But yeah, I probably should have realized I didn't need another drink when I actually ordered a Bud Light. Gross. 

I didn't have time for "real" exercise, but I did dance around the entire concert. Another rarity for me, as I do not dance, but how could I not at Britney Spears?! :-P

XO,

Amanda