Sooo... I'm Still Alive... Just Hiding from You...

   Yes.  It has been AGES since I last posted here.  This is for a variety of very legitimate reasons (moving/starting a masters program), but it has also been for one very bad reason.  That reason is that I have been a very bad WWer.  I haven't tracked in weeks, I haven't attended a meeting in weeks, and I have the resultant gain to prove it.  Ugh.  I feel terrible.  So in an effort to get my lazy butt back in gear, I am blogging here again to remind myself of what I need to do.

   First, EAT BETTER.  I have been a gluttonous wretch for weeks.  Seriously.  No holding back by this girl.  Everything deliciously bad for me has been consumed to excess.  Not pretty. 

   Second, MOVE MORE.  When simply painting a room can send my body into a fit of cramps and soreness, I clearly need to get my butt off the couch and out the door.  I am going to plan on taking a walk after work everyday this week.  I figure this will be a nice gentle way to get myself back in the habit of moving, without overdoing it with Billy Blanks water tae-bo-arding (that's a joke).  A simple walk is easy to manage and will definitely make me feel better.  We can up the intensity once I stop acting like an old lady.

   It is amazing the difference in how I feel now compared to how I felt when I was actually trying.  I have a hard time getting up in the morning because I don't feel particularly rested; I wake up really achy with tight muscles (which is new for me and not surprisingly unpleasant); and I just in general feel yucky.  I am hoping that within a week of paying attention to what I am eating, TRACKING, and moving more that I'll start feeling better.

   So here's to yet another re-commitment to being healthier.  Accountability is key for me, so thank you, lucky readers, for being the invisible kick in the pants that I need to point myself back in the right direction (yet again).  A new post in about a week (hopefully) will be forthcoming detailing the results of my efforts. 

The Greatest Recipe Site... EVER.

   So here I am home from work today with a wicked sore throat, so I finally have some free time for a new post!  I've been meaning to write this one for quite some time, but I just haven't gotten to it yet due to work/starting school/moving/life.  I'm always on the look-out for awesome new recipes that will work with Weight Watchers (a.k.a. low cal/low fat/high fiber/lots of protein).  While I have had some successes with the WW cookbooks/on-line recipes, I still find myself looking for something that doesn't use as many weird things (miso for instance... that crap is hard to find and EXPENSIVE), or has so many veggies that no matter how hard I try, I just don't like (mushrooms anyone?  Blech).

   So a few months ago, I was introduced to the "Emily Bites" website/blog by a good friend (love ya, R!).  She and I were going to be baking some Christmas goodies, and we tried one of Emily's recipes for Pumpkin Cupcakes with Cream Cheese Frosting.  Dear Lord, I think I died and went to heaven.  They were so delicious and moist and tasted completely sinful despite being actually pretty decent in the Points department.  I even took some to work to share with my co-workers and they received rave reviews). 

   Since then I have tried several other recipes with continued awesome success.  I made the Tomato and Sausage Risotto which pretty much blew my mind.  Again it tasted like 10 pounds of butter wrapped in cheese and fried, but was actually very point-conscious.  I'd also like to mention that before this attempt, I was convinced that risotto was one of those gourmet dishes that even the Next Food-Network Star candidates can't get right, so I had no business trying to create it.  But with the instructions that Emily provided and with allowing enough time for the liquid to absorb during the cooking process, I am now a risotto champ.  I was so excited about my conquest that I completely forgot to take pictures... oops.

   I've also made Emily's Taco Pasta, which AGAIN was a brilliant success.  It contained both pasta AND a generous amount of cheese, and it was still point-friendly.  Here is a picture of that yummy goodness:

  
   I added a pile of shredded lettuce to give it a little crunch and it was fabulous.  The other thing that is always awesome is that the portion sizes are hugely satisfying.  Look at how much pasta is on that plate!  I have yet to have a recipe turn out anything less than amazing.

   Needless to say, I am now an addict and will be trying the Chicken Alfredo Pizza this week.  I strongly suggest at least perusing her site (http://www.emilybites.com/).  She has everything from sweets to BBQ to soup.  Thank you, Emily for being the WW-friendly-culinary-genius that you are!

Resolutions are Stupid.

   Happy 2012 everyone!  I suppose now would be an appropriate time for a progress report on my WW journey and the past year (well, past couple of months anyway).  All in all, the holidays were not a total bust.  Yes, there was a several pound gain over the past month, but I am still below where I started, so I'll consider it a win.  I even attended my meeting and weighed in yesterday, despite knowing that I had gained and that my weight record card would forever memorialize my holiday indulgences.  But by sharing with the group my trepidation about coming to the meeting, and my victory over it by actually attending, I got a sticker from my leader.  So it was clearly worth it.  Stickers are awesome.  Hell yes to the BRAVO sticker for Megan.

   I don't know what it is about the new year, but it always instills in me a strong feeling of having a "fresh start".  I am not really one to make New Year's resolutions, so I'm not going to make any this year either, but I really am excited about the proverbial "blank slate" that the new year seems to bring.  So with that fresh start in mind, I am beginning 2012 with renewed resolve and motivation.  I have been sorely lacking in the activity department since re-joining WW, so I am planning on slowly working more movement into my week.  Starting today.  I am allowing that evil-genius-tae-bo-ing-freak Billy Blanks into my house this afternoon to kick my butt.  Billy and I had a great relationship once of regular butt-kickings, but sadly I have not invited him over in quite a long time.  So here goes.  I'll be hurting tomorrow for sure.

   I am also going to be making crock-pot lasagna this week, which I am very excited about.  Actually I had kind of forgotten about it until I was reading some of my past posts and saw the entry I had written about it.  BRING ON THE CHEESE.  See?  This blog just justified its existence to me!!  I am also planning on trying more new things this year (I think I'll tackle eggplant next), and I will try to not neglect this blog as much as I have lately... 5 weeks is too long to go silent. 

   Stay tuned for my account of the tae-bo induced butt-kickings.  I am not a crazy person, and I don't enjoy crowds (in fact I become homicidally angry in crowds) so I will not be buying into the cheap gym-memberships on offer this time of year.  My theory about new year's resolutions is that they generally do not last beyond the third week of January, so the initial wave of resolutioners at the gyms will probably be 95% gone by the first week of February anyway.  At that point I might consider taking advantage of my health insurance's partial reimbursement for memberships as an added incentive to work-out.  But until then, my host of home work-out DVDs will suffice to get my kiester moving again.  Happy New Year!!

 

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...

Spaghetti Squash Fail.

   I was seduced last week by several WW members that were singing the praises of the spaghetti squash.  They said it was an awesome substitute for pasta, would be a great way to incorporate vegetables, and just in general pretty much rocked.  A vegetable as an alternative for pasta?  Seriously?  I was skeptical, but decided to drink the Kool-Aid and give it a whirl.  What was the worst that could happen?

   So I went to the store, armed with a Google image of what this stupid thing was supposed to look like.  Fortunately for me, the Googling was not necessary because there was a sticker on the thing telling me exactly which one was the infamous and magical spaghetti squash.  I placed it in my cart, already feeling superior to those around me because I was making a decidedly healthy choice over their Doritos and TGI Friday's boxed, frozen appetizers.  Huzzah.

   I finished my shopping and brought my new prized possession home.  Behold:

   THE MIGHTY SPAGHETTI SQUASH.  Complete with idiot-proof label and cooking instructions.  I was ready to conquer this beast.  Step #1: it had to die:

   ... and have it's guts scraped out...

   GUTTTTTS....

 
   Thus far, this was turning out to be exceedingly similar to carving a pumpkin, one of my favorite fall activities.  Also, it occurs to me as I am writing this that the poor squash really was subjected to a medieval-style execution.  Clearly it was a treasonous squash to incur such a punishment. In any event, I was beginning to feel like a caveman that had just discovered fire.  This.  Was.  AWESOME.

   Next, I put  both halves in the microwave for 10 minutes, as suggested by the directions.  When the microwave was done, I brought out my glorious conquest and dove in to begin the fun part; scraping the insides with a fork to make the lovely noodle shaped pieces like I'd seen on the YouTube video showing how to prepare a spaghetti squash.  It was at this moment that my confidence began to waver... I wasn't getting the nice noodly shapes I was expecting, despite my correct fork-scraping technique.  Also, I tasted a small piece and it was unpleasantly crunchy.  I am not an al dente pasta fan, so crunchy noodles are simply not acceptable.  In the hope of fixing the crunchy texture and still achieving the perfect pasta substitute, I put the thing back in the microwave for another five minutes.  This slightly improved the crunchy texture, but I was still not seeing the result I was hoping for.

   My next step was to try to saute the not-very-noodly-squash-insides-that-were-actually-more-like gobs-of-wet-dryer-lint with some olive oil and garlic (as suggested by one of the WW members).  Maybe that would improve the consistency and magically morph this yellow glop into pasta...

   Still not pasta.  But I resolved to be a trooper and pretend anyway.  So I finished preparing the additional elements of my dinner to top the yellow crap I had just haphazardly prepared.  So I sauteed some sausage...

  ... added some tomato pasta sauce...

... and then topped my "spaghetti" with the sausage, sauce and some mozzarella cheese.  The end result looked pretty at least:

   I made a valiant effort to eat my creation in its entirely but I am sad to report that I failed.  I got through about a third of it, then proceeded to just pick out the sausage and cheesy bits and leave the nasty squash behind.  I suppose I should clarify that no, I did not expect a vegetable to taste and feel exactly like pasta, but I was hoping for a bit more of a similarity than what actually transpired in my kitchen.  Even though I am a die-hard squash hater, I still gave the icky spaghetti squash a try and now I can honestly say GROSS when someone asks if I like it or not.  My answer is a great big "hell no".  Oh well.  At least now I know.  On to bigger and better things.  I'm thinking my next experiment will be an eggplant.  Recipe ideas would be greatly appreciated.

Heck Yes.

So my first week back on WW and attending meetings yielded a loss of 3.2 pounds.  And that was even with 2 days in Wisconsin Dells that involved multiple trips to the "Sweet Shop".  Kick ass.