Just For Fun
The Easter Candy Challenge
I just have to brag up my day. I’m having a perfectly healthy food day and I’m just thrilled with myself. My sister-in-law came to town last weekend (hence not many posts happening), and we did a lot of eating out. I tried to make some wise choices, but I also made some unhealthy choices and was feeling a bloated belly and a deflated self-esteem.
One day of great eating can really bring it back!
HUGE (non-fat) salad, some nuts, no sugar oatmeal, sweet potato mush, apple, banana, tons of water and I’m on top of the world.
SO…
I have a challenge.
If your house is like my house, it’s already begun an Easter candy invasion. Chocolate bunnies are multiplying, eggs of all colors and flavors are abundant (the ones in the pic are my personal fav), chocolate, jelly beans, ahk, they’re everywhere!
My personal challenge to myself (and you can join with me if you’d like) is to not eat another piece of Easter candy until the actual day of Easter.
What do you say Mamas? Anybody in?
This will do wonders to kick start my will power all over again and I’ll still get to enjoy the actual Easter Feast, but only on the day of Easter and not all week.
Fitness Goals Anyone?
January has been here for one week….
Anyone want to share their fitness goals?
Last year I lost 60 pounds. This year I’m at a weight I like, I exercise 6 times a week (with weights), I eat well, but I’m sure there are ways to improve.
I know I don’t want to say something silly like I won’t eat any candy or pizza during the whole year, because I know that is something I can’t keep. I know I can’t say that I’ll maintain my weight all year because there are VERY good chances of a pregnancy coming along this year (which will set me up for plenty of new goals). So what to do?
For now my goal will be to improve my drinking (of water that is). I drink a HUGE glass of water first thing in the morning, but then I get busy and forget about drinking throughout the day. This is something my body will love and that I can keep up even if another bun should happen to bake in my beautiful-baby-makin’ oven.
For now the goal will be 8 cups a day, but my intention is to work my way up to a gallon a day.
Does anyone else have any awesome health goals they want to share? I’d love to hear them!
A Triumphant Moment in Shopping
I did a little shopping this weekend. A precious little. I was hoping to find a killer outfit for Jay’s upcoming work Christmas Party bash. There’s a rather snooty strip mall near where I live with a long string of higher-end clothing stores including an Ann Taylor.
If you know me, you’d know that the price tags in there would normally send me into a coma, but thanks to my Healthy Brother who loves to give Ann Taylor gift cards, I was trying my luck.
I found a shirt that I really enjoyed. It made me feel like a spunky new character on a girly TV show. This shirt to be exact:
Only the medium was too big.
A medium was too big at Ann Taylor! Yippee!
I grabbed a small and it fit, I was working it. I would have bought it too, except for a slight sleeve malfunction that made my unmentionables quite visable, and well, mentionable.
Darn the luck.
I left the store feeling blue, but also feeling proud of myself. As I walked by the store fronts of the rich and slender, I realized that there wasn’t a single store among them where I couldn’t find something that would fit me. Until I got to the Lane Bryant.
That’s the one store that would have nothing for me and yet at the beginning of this year I was thinking it was time to resign myself to only shopping there, that I was just a big girl and I’d have to just accept that.
I’m so glad I didn’t accept it. I’m so glad that I made the changes to lose weight and be healthier. I started this journey to be a better mom physically for Cee, but at this point the journey has been for me too. I feel better – during the activities of the day and about myself in general.
60 pounds gone. I can hardly believe it.
If I can do it, anyone can.
If you want to read more about how I lost the weight without diet plans or fad programs, click on the link for My Weight Loss Success Story under the Featured Articles section on the side bar.
Trying Silk Nog
I love egg nog. LOVE it. In my college town they would start putting it out pre-Halloween with a witch on the front and I would buy it.
Every week.
Till New Years.
But I did get the light version, since the full-fat kind makes me yak.
Apparently, that isn’t very good for you. But could I really make it through an entire holiday season without egg nog?
For those of you out there who are like me, I bit the bullet for us all – I bought Silk Nog (AKA Soy Nog). My investigation went as follows:
It kinda looks like egg nog.
It smells like egg nog.
It tastes like egg nog – winner!
If you want to try this for yourself here are my notes:
- Shake well! I had a sip or two that just tasted like soy milk, but when shaken the flavor comes through and is almost a perfect match.
- Don’t expect it to be the real thing – though the flavor is very close to real, the texture won’t fool anyone. This has the thin texture of Silk and won’t be leaving a big Nog Stach on your upper lip.
- Health benefits – less calories, fat, and sugar than even diet Egg Nog – 90 cal, 2 g fat, 12 g sugar per half cup.
- Dairy and egg free.
- Has a “Like it or Money Back” Guarantee on the box.
- It is a pleasant companion – just by looking the box over I found a delightful recipe for Nog French Toast, and learned that the origin of the term Egg Nog came from colonial revelers who added grog (rum) to their eggy drinks making for Egg Grog which eventually blended together into Egg Nog.
*I was not asked to do this review and have not been compensated for it. I do it for you readers! : )
Halloween Challenge Results
Hi Everyone!
I was so thrilled with how many people contacted me to sign up for the challenge! I was even more tickled when so many of you wrote back to say that you’d completed the goal. Everyone seemed so proud and many of you caused a bit of a stir on Facebook with putting the challenge on your statuses.
That was a big day for candy lovers and is quite the accomplishment. I hope you’ll keep this in mind throughout the rest of the eating-holiday season that we’re now starting into. If you can do that, you can do ANYTHING! (Well, health wise, I’m still working on the whole flying thing.) ; )
Thanks for playing along, and don’t worry, I won’t say no turkey on Thanksgiving. : )
The Halloween Challenge
Hi all!
Halloween night is right around the corner, but if your house is like mine, temptations are already lurking everywhere. I have an idea for a Halloween challenge – it will take will power, it will take determination, but as the other big eating holidays approach it will also GIVE you will power.
Are you ready to hear it? Don’t scream now…
The day of Halloween, don’t eat a single piece of candy!
It’s crazy, I know, but this is what I’m thinking – if you can make it through the BIGGEST candy day of the year without eating a single piece, then all other days will seem like nothing, insignificant, and beatable.
On Thanksgiving, when your mom asks you how big of a pumpkin pie slice you want you’ll be able to say, “Oh, just a sliver for me – I didn’t eat any candy on Halloween.”
At your hubby’s company Christmas party you’ll be able to look the chocolate fountain dead in the eye and say, “I don’t have to eat you, I didn’t eat candy on Halloween,” and then grab some carrot sticks and broccoli instead.
Now, don’t get my intentions wrong here – the rule is not to eat candy, you CAN:
- Buy candy,
- Hoard candy for later, or
- stay up until 12:01 am in order to have a piece.
Just don’t have any the day of. Let me know if you’re up for the challenge and how things go!
A Few Set Backs Can’t Stop a Health Train!
I’m back, well, sort of. I’m almost walking like a totally normal person, which means I have to head back to reality and start acting like my normal self. I’m slowly getting through the chores that have been waiting for me (I was actually thrilled to vacuum this morning, can you believe it?) and I’m even back on my exercise bike. Last night I rode for over 80 minutes – partly as punishment, partly for fun, and partly because the movie I was watching was so darn good I kind of forgot about the time.
What I really need to focus on now is kicking the candy habit. Being home all day with nothing to do that first week after foot surgery sent me into a candy spiral. I asked Jay to buy my favorites and I used them to entertain myself during the days when I had no entertainment. Now that I’m mobile again and Cee is back with me, I’m no longer bored, but the candy crave is still there.
This is a set back, and yes it’s a little discouraging, but this is no time to forget how far I have come, and it certainly isn’t worth throwing away my future health for. I got a great comment this week from my friend Annalise, she said:
I had the same feelings and concerns when I was laid up flat on my back when my neck went out. I had just enough time to run to the kitchen, grab the nearest box and run back to bed. I definitely did not eat well that week and didn’t get a lick of exercise either. But you know what? The next week when I returned to my normal routine it was only a day or two before I felt like myself again. A week or so of unhealthy eating and lack of exercise cannot undo months of hard work. So stop fretting, you’ll recover just as I did and the squishiness will disappear as quickly as it came!
I’m remembering back to the start of my decision to be healthy. I said, “Being an adult doesn’t mean just eating whatever you want, whenever you want. It’s about making a good choice to get good benefits.”
I’m resolved, I’m reborn, and I’m going to get back to good. I would report here on my weight, but I’m not quite sure what it is. Having a sick kid has thrown off my morning routine, but I will weigh in soon and let you know how I’m doing.
If you’re working on making a healthier life for yourself, you CAN do it! Set backs happen – something small like foot surgery, or something monumental like recovering from having a baby. The point is that everyday is a new day to start with and every choice is up to you. Do your best, remember that you aren’t a lost cause, and be healthy in whatever way that you need – the world needs you in it!
WARNING: They’re now making chocolate dipped bacon
This is a real sign that I saw in Seaside, OR during our beach trip.
I can understand the reasoning behind just about every item on that list, but chocolate dipped BACON? Eww! It has to be cold bacon to do that – cold, fat congealed, bacon.
Do you hear that whooshing sound? That’s all the members of the American Heart Association dropping their heads and letting out defeated sighs of how fast so many of us are trying to commit food-assisted suicide.
Please, just don’t do it. Don’t eat chocolate dipped bacon – the world needs you. Or if you do, please follow it up with a pound of steamed broccoli and a 2 hour run on the beach.
