Brunch Experiments

  Today I had a good friend and her two boys (3 and 5) over for brunch.  What they didn't realize is that I was experimenting with them... testing out two new WW recipes.  Could I fool them into thinking that these were fully-leaded, traditional bad-for-you foods?  The game was on.

   I decided to make Bacon, Egg, and Cheddar Cups, along with Blueberry-Peach Yogurt Parfaits, then juice, milk, coffee and toast on the side.  Everything looked yummy and smelled yummy (at least to me), but what would my test subjects think??

   Here are a few pictures of my masterpieces:

 
   The parfaits turned out a little more... PURPLE than I expected, but I'm thinking that is due to the fact that I had to use canned peaches instead of fresh (because apparently you can't buy a peach in Minnesota in November.  Who knew?).  So I think the blueberries sort of had their way with the peaches in the saucepan, and succeeded in a hostile take-over.  Oh well.  It's not all about aesthetics.  Still looks pretty, just more in a purple-people-eater kind of way...

    And then the lovely egg cups.  I think these are adorable.  I actually went and bought these custard cups just for this recipe (they were less than $8 for four at Wal-Mart, so not a huge investment, but definitely huge rewards in terms of cuteness).  These have Canadian bacon, egg, cheddar cheese (reduced fat), sliced cherry tomatoes, and fat-free crushed Italian croutons on top.  I don't think brunch gets much cuter than this, folks.

    So how did the test subjects respond to such purple, cute, and tasty stimuli?

 Look at that smile!!

   A thumbs up!  I'd call this brunch experiment a success.  The test subjects responded positively to the experimental stimuli, and left the lab satisfied.

   Also, for an update on my progress, as of my meeting yesterday, I am down 7.8 pounds!  Yippee!!

Woah... Reality Check

   I was in a dear friend's wedding last weekend and I had a fabulous time.  I loved the dress I wore, I loved the way my hair turned out, I felt really pretty that day, and the wedding was a blast.  Today however, the photos turned up, and I started to feel less good about my appearance that day.  My entire feeling about the whole day changed drastically.  My formerly good feelings of confidence and pride about how nice I looked all gussied up were almost instantly replaced with a compulsive urge to un-tag myself in each and every one of those pictures on Facebook so that no one would see the embarrassing state I let myself get into over the past year.  However, I decided to refrain from the un-tagging party.  Those pictures will remain an active part of my profile.

   It occurred to me that defaulting to the cowardly act of un-tagging every time an unflattering picture of me surfaces, then I am going to miss out on having fun memories of special events that I was involved in.  The point is not what I looked like.  Instead, its about the fun time I had, and remembering those events for what they are, not what I looked like.  I need to learn to take the focus off of my appearance, and learn to enjoy things for the experience.  I can't let my perception of my appearance dictate whether or not I enjoy things.  I've spent too many special occasions obsessing about how I appear to others, rather than having a fun time with the important people in my life.  Right now, I am a work in progress and I need to remember that I am working toward a goal, but while I'm going through this process, I am allowed to have fun as well.

   I realized that there is a HUGE disparity between what I see and interpret in the mirror versus what I actually look like.  The photos are proof that my mental image of myself and the actual image are vastly different.  I'm chalking this up to the insanely fast weight gain that happened this past year.  My mind has not caught up to my body and I am still imagining myself as smaller than I actually am.  You might think that this would cause a problem, but I think it is a reality check that I needed.  When you imagine yourself healthier than you actually are, it is easy to become lax with the motivation to change.  With the reality check that these pictures provided, I have renewed motivation to keep up with WW and my crusade to get healthy because I am not happy or comfortable where I am right now.

   I've thought a lot about this, and I've come to a conclusion that I hope will keep me motivated throughout this journey: It is going to take TIME to get to my goal, however, every week that goes by that I am closer to that goal, is another week where I can look and feel better than the week before.  The concept of "baby steps" is incredibly frustrating for me (I am a big fan of instant gratification), but I need to embrace it.  Right now I am just going to focus on getting to the 10 pound mark (right now I am at 6.6 pounds lost).  And I am going to keep the wedding pictures up to remind myself to stay motivated (I'm also going to try to hang on to the good feelings I had about how I looked that day, and get rid of the bad ones).  Here are a few pics from the day.  I think everyone looked absolutely beautiful and I wish my friends Michelle and Barry a very happy future together!
 

   The bride is my beautiful friend Michelle.  The other bridesmaids are (in order left to right) the bride's sister, Mary, me, and the bride's daughter, Adrienne.  The flower girl is Michelle's niece, Madison.

   This is the whole wedding party.

  And finally, what has been dubbed my "Secret Agent 007" picture.  Bad ass.  You'd think my flowers could transform into an uzi...