Get off your butt and eat some Stewi

You'll have to read the whole blog to get the title...sorry. LOL

Tomorrow is Thanksgiving! I am so excited to see my family and eat good food. Josh and I may just be buying a flat-screen tomorrow too. We decided the deals on Black Friday for the tvs are really not that good. *shrugs*

I didn't photo-document everything I ate yesterday, but here's the gist of it...

Breakfast: Medium caramel latte with nonfat milk, an apple and an orange.

Lunch: 1 cup steamed rice and steamed veggies with a little teriyaki-ginger sauce.

snack: 2 pineapple spears and 1 serving of blue diamond almonds

Dinner: (see below)
I had one whole wheat La Tortarilla Factoria tortilla with cheese, salsa and a chopped up veggie burger and a side of sour cream.

Evening snack: I was still hungry so I ate 2 WASA crackers with cream cheese and chicken broth.

Today...

Breakfast:
Pumpkin pancakes! That's right. You heard me. This recipe was deliciouso and oh so filling. I switched out the white flour for whole wheat. White flour burns off too much. I topped them with peaches, a few walnuts and light syrup!
Thanks Martha Stewart for the recipe. :) Click here to give it a try.

Lunch: 1 whole wheat Thomas English Muffin with cream cheese, salsa and cheddar cheese, lightly melted. YUMO! This temporarily satisfied my salty-starch craving.
Dinner: I shall call it Chili Stew. I tried to come up with something more clever, but the alternatives were Stile or Chew or maybe even Chew-e. LOL Yeah this is one of my odd ball creations.
I threw into the pot:

• left over frozen bean soup (1 cup or so)
• left over frozen sloppy joes (1 cup or so) Made with 7% fat beef
• 3/4 cup green beans
• 1 small can of portabella mushrooms
• 1/4 cup or less of corn
• 1/4 cup of salsa
• a dash of chili powder and garlic powder

This creation came out surprisingly really well. It tasted really close to chili, but added the big chunks of veggies like I like in stew. I ate this with a flour tortilla on the side (I ran out of La Tortarilla tortillas)

Get Off Your Butt: My revelation:

If you're one of my regular blog readers (I think I have 2), you may have found my goals, hopes, aspirations and the outcomes of them to be rather flakey. I agree. It seems like I can't stick to anything. I can't.

*sighs* I googled "How to get motivated." I periotically browse the internet for solutions to my life's problems. I found an article titled: "Get Off Your butt: 16 Ways to Get Motivated When You're in a Slump."

I am really lazy. I see patterns of behavior starting to emerge from myself that are a mirror image of my father. He's a "when I get around to it" type of guy. Getting around to it rarely comes often. I can't live my life like that.

Anyway, the author of the article discussed how people who set goals for themselves set too many at one time. That was the biggest thing that stuck out to me. I listed out all of the changes I would like to see happen in my life. There are 8 daily habits that I have been working on impleminting in my life:

• Wake up earlier (at 5:30 a.m.)
• Spend quiet time with God (at least 10 min daily)
• Clean daily
• Exercise daily (1 hour)
• Cook dinner and prepare lunch daily
• Cut calories down to 1300
• Incorporate yoga (at least 10 minutes daily)
• Write my book (1 hour daily)

Each one of these daily habits should individually be goals. The author of the article talks about taking each goal one day and week at a time and breaking them down into obtainable goals.

For example waking up earlier: I'll start with 6:10 a.m and then each week I'll set the alarm back 10 minutes until I am at 5:30 a.m.

The thing is I can only work on one goal at a time. I broke down each of these goals week by week and getting through this would take me until July. But I am excited about it.

The big picture goals in my life are: lose weight, write a book, travel and start a family. I think that if I start working on these goals, I'll get there. I'll still be exercising and cleaning, but my focus for the first five weeks will be waking early, so I have some more time to do those things. If I lose weight in the process, awesome! If not, that's ok too. I want more than anything to be healthy and happy. I think this is a way to achieve it. I am going to give it a try. I'll start waking up at 6:10 on Monday morning. Until then I am going to work on waking up at 6:30 a.m.

Right now, I am going to have some dessert: vanilla yogurt and granola.

HAPPY THANKSGIVING EVERYONE!

Wonderful Weekend

This is going to be a quick post, as I'm tired and am planning on hitting the sack here shortly.

Weekend Eating Recap

Friday:

Breakfast: Pumpkin oats w/almond butter and cranberries. 1 egg w/ ketchup.

I only ate about 3/4 of the oats, it was just way too much! I was really craving an egg.
Thought I should take a picture of the last of my fall decor. This is a day before I took them all down. :( I love fall.

Lunch: Whole wheat La Tortarilla Factoria tortilla, w/ cream cheese, spinach, craisins, walnuts and a dash of olive oil and balsamic vinegar.

I also had an apple, an orange and a banana throughout the day.

Dinner: Homemade whole wheat Pizza w/cream cheese, a sprinkle of cheddar, and tomatoes. I dipped it in a cup of red roasted pepper and tomato soup by Pacific Natural Foods (My favorite!).

Saturday:

I was craving salt and starchy foods really badly. The thought of downing more oatmeal made me not want to eat.

Breakfast: Whole wheat tortilla stuffed with homemade hashbrowns, 1 scrambled egg, cheese and salsa! Mmmmmm.

Lunch: So I was feeling a little guilty about my salty breakfast (though it was not that high in calories), so I had a light lunch. 2 honey bran muffins (150 cal. each) and...

...a pumpkin smoothie...

• 1 banana
• 1/2 cup canned pumpkin
• 1/4 cup natural vanilla yogurt
• 1/2 cup vanilla almond milk
• cinnamon, nutmeg and ginger. YUM!

Dinner: I ate out with my friend before going to "State Fair" the musical. I had a cup of barley beef soup, a side Caesar salad and corn bread.

Sunday:

Breakfast: I skipped breakfast 'cause I didn't feel like eating.

Lunch: 1/2 a baked potato, 1 cup bean soup, a little sour cream, and salsa.

Dinner: 1 can of chicken noodle soup and a corn bread muffin.

Snack: I slipped up on this one. :( I had 6 pizza bites and two chicken nuggets. Yeah, I got into Josh's junk food. But hey, I skipped breakfast.

Today:

I didn't take any pictures as I was running late and nothing was that interesting anyway.

Breakfast: Two bran muffins, apple and an orange

Snack: 2 cookies at work. Someone brought them in :( There were two varieties.

Lunch: 6 inch sweet onion chicken teriyaki sandwich, personal size bag of sun chips.

Dinner: 1 cup of chicken broth and two WASA Crackers with cheese.

Snack: five walnuts and a fruit leather.


My Assessment:

I had a couple of Kath worthy meals in there. I kind of lost it on Sunday with the excessive snacking, but over all I think I did ok. I am upset with myself for today though since I only got 5 hours of sleep and I didn't wake up in time to make breakfast or lunch. But I think I made up with it for dinner.

I decided that I really need to cut back on calorie consumption as I have a sedentary job. :( I really like to be full.

Held my own

I couldn't sleep last night. I haven't been able to for a few days now. I think I've been coming down with a cold and that on top of everything I having going on...

So I took some NightQuil. That stuff is good. It knocked me out fast, which means I slept in. Needless to say, because I was running late I deviated from the "Kath" meal plan (see previous posts x 3).

But I held my own. I think I did pretty darn good. For fun, I think I'll list my meals in descending order.

Dessert: 1/2 cup of natural vanilla yogurt w/ 1/2 a pear, tsp strawberry jam, and a sprinkle of granola.

Dinner: 1 cup of mixed whole wheat pasta, on top a bed of spinach and topped with freshly made bruchetta, walnuts, and a dusting of cheese.

This is one of the best meals I've made in a while. I could have eaten a ton! For my fresh bruchetta, I used tomatoes, fresh basil, olive oil and balsamic vinegar.

Snacks throughout the day: Apple, oranges, fruit leather, piece of pumpkin/ginger bread

Lunch: 1/2 can of split pea soup (left over from yesterday),1 WASA cracker (crumbled in the soup), 1 whole wheat tortilla with cream cheese.

WASA crackers are delicious crumbled into soup!

Breakfast: Whole wheat English muffin, peanut butter, jam, 1 banana and a cup of coffee.

I'm starting to get anxious about Thanksgiving! My favorite dish is my aunts stuffing. She packs it full of, get this, pine nuts, and Italian sausage.

What's you're favorite Thanksgiving dish?

Eating less = fuller longer? No way!

I am perplexed. How is it that the last two days I've been eating less and yet I am staying satisfied longer? I guess Kath does know what she's doing (see the last two posts).

Breakfast: 2 WASA crackers w/ tomatoes, basil, a drizzle of olive oil and cheddar cheese baked in the oven. I also had a small glass of milk. I ended up saving the banana for a mid morning snack. I also had 2 cups of coffee today! I shouldn't drink that much, but I was sleepy today.


This was amazing and oh so filling. I love the whole wheat WASA crackers. This meal idea was taken off of Kath's page, but it was from a guest post.


Lunch: 1 Whole Wheat Thomas English Muffin, 2 tbsp cream cheese, tomatoes, spinach and basil. I heated it up for a few seconds.

Delicious! I also had some carrot sticks and celery with peanut butter. I was s-t-uffed by the end of this. I also ate an orange, but forgot to take a picture of it.
Dinner: 1/2 a can of Progresso (without added MSG) split pea soup and 1 whole wheat La Tortarilla Factoria tortilla. I added some left over white beans to the soup. The soup was pretty thin and I think the beans helped. I ate half of the tortilla with the soup and the other half with a little cream cheese and strawberry jam.

Dessert: Fruit leather, a small serving of walnuts and a few raisins and craisins.

Dinner was supposed to be gnocchi, but I was too tired to make it. I think I'll save it for the weekend. I am excited to try it.

A good day over all in the eating department. I didn't exercise though. :( I think I am coming down with something. I've just been so tired.

Well, I'm off to finish my show and do some packing. We're hoping to have signed the papers by the end of the month. We have a lot of work ahead of us!

WWKE?

This is day one of my WWKE (What Would Kath Eat) meal-stalking diet plan. If you didn't see yesterday's post, I've document two weeks worth of meals that Kath has eaten. I've adapted them slightly to fit foods I can afford and foods available at my grocery store.

Today's breakfast was pumpkin oats with mashed banana, craisins, walnuts and almond milk. To make the oats, I mixed 1/2 a cup of pumpkin, 3/4 cup of almond milk and a 1/2 a cup of oats. I cooked them on high in the microwave for 3.5 minutes. I also added a dash of ginger, nutmeg, cinnamon and brown sugar.

Lunch was 1 cup of natural vanilla yogurt, with a 1/4 cup of granola, pears, and a spoonfull of strawberry jam. I also had 2 celery sticks cut into halves with 1 tbsp of peanut butter. For snacks throughout the day I had a tangerine and an apple.


Dinner was a small romaine salad with a 1/2 of a tsp of ranch, and a quesadilla. I used whole wheat La Tortarilla Factoria Tortillas. I highly recommend them. They're soft and they don't have any hydrogenated oils!

Inside:

• Sour cream/white bean mix (see below)
• 1 serv. shreaded cheese
• 1/2 chicken breast w/taco seasoning
• 1/2 cup chopped spinach
• Topped with salsa (I used about a 1/2 cup)

For the sour cream/white bean mix, blend in a food processor, 1/2 a cup of white beans and 3/4 cup sour cream. I am sneaky sneaky. I did this so my hubby would get a little added fiber. He's none the wiser. :)

I'm really surprised in how full and satisfied I was all day long today. I couldn't finish all my breakfast and lunch actually filled me up! I was really worried with lunch. But I ate the yogurt and two of the celery sticks and didn't get hungry again until about 4 p.m. At that point I at the rest.

It was a good day today. I also woke up this morning and worked out on the wii fit for a 1/2 hour. I did free step and lifted weights.

Well I'm off to bed. I'm hoping to wake up at 5:30 again tomorrow morning and actually begin exercising earlier.

Maybe you'll see me again tomorrow night. Ciao!

I'm a meal stalker!

It's a sickness I tell you. A disease. You see it happened over night: this unnerving desire to take over someone else's meal plan. I couldn't control it. I couldn't help myself. It was like an out of body experience. One minute I was eating a slice of pizza. The next, I was searching over two weeks worth of what Kath Eats!

I'm ashamed. But if feels so right, why is it so wrong?

Seriously though, all this weekend I kind of felt at a loss with my eating and exercising habits. I figured Kath lost weight, she's super healthy AND she's studying to be a nutritionist. She must know what she's doing. So, laying on my counter is a print out of all the meals she's eaten in the last two weeks -- somewhat adapted to fit foods available in my local grocery store. And after a grocery store date with my husband, my fridge and cabinets are stocked full of healthy Kath worthy foods.

Tomorrow is day one of my WWKE diet: What Would Kath Eat. The day's meals look like this:

Breakfast: pumpkin oats w/ craisins, walnuts, flax and almond butter

Lunch: Yogurt w/ fruit and granola and a romaine salad w/ a homemade vinaigrette dressing

Dinner: Qusadilla w/ chicken, beans, salsa, spinach (my addition) and tomatoes and a small salad.

We'll see how it goes.

Recipe Review and New Creation

Check this recipe for homemade poptarts from Genesis of a Cook.

I've made these beauties one time before with my beautiful best friends, Michelle and Brittany. We didn't quite follow the directions though. Both times I made these, I made them without shortening or butter. Basically, I followed the directions with the amount of flour and slowly added applesauce (starting with a 1/2 cup) until the dough became pie-dough like.

It worked too, despite the fears of Michelle. Now, without fat they are a little chewy and are best heated up in the microwave rather than the toaster. They don't taste anything like real pop-tarts, but they're an amazing alternative to those of us attempting to be healthy.

I made a batch of about eight of these yummy treats and had some dough left over, but ran out of jam.

So I came up with dinner...I shall call it a Mexican Turn-Over!


I stuffed this bad boy with black beans, left over enchilada sauce, vegetarian cheese, and vegan sour cream (don't even ask why I had those in the house).

It turned out softer than the pop-tart, rich and so incredibly filling!

I think if you want a good no-fat pie crust, follow the recipe for the pop-tarts, but exclude the fat and just add applesauce. It won't be perfect, but it will be pretty darn good none-the-less.

I'm not making promises but...

I really miss blogging. I think I've been hiding in a cave these last few months and denying the fact that I am a terrible eater and I am incredibly lazy. I am going to try blogging daily again. It keeps me honest.

But, even if I don't do it every day, I'll still do it once a week. On the up side, I have three amazing giveaways coming up soon. One will be the week of Nov. 30 and then one for December and one for January! So look forward to those. :)

Well, many blessings everyone. I hope to see you here tomorrow.

Is Chick Lit Hurting your Mariage?

Hi all. I have been so super busy this week, at both work and home. The house stuff is going well. We had 1/2 of our inspection yesterday. We would have had the full inspection but the power guy never came out and turned the power on. GRRRR. So we'll have it finished tomorrow. After the inspection we'll just be waiting on it to close. We're hoping to close by the end of the month.

So I can't really weigh in. :( My scale went nuts. It gave me three different weights in less than 30 seconds. Maybe I'll start weighing in on the Wii Fit.

Halloween was really good. I handed out lots of candy and had a great time. Also that week I created an amazing recipe! I'll share that later.

Finally to the question... "Is Chick Lit Hurting your Marriage?"

Find out at Justbetweenus.org. And read my latest published article. It should be coming out in hard copy here in the next few days or so. I am really excited, even though the editor batched it. Editors, can't live with them and can't get your articles published with out them.

The editor cut out my favorite line..."Michelle and I shot back our macchiatos like a shot of something strong." I loved that line. It is so witty and gave such a strong image of how we were both feeling. However, it is a Christian magazine and apparently Christians cant handle wit! I am a Christian and I can.!? The editor also made me take out (before she got her hands on it) that I read both a secular Chick lit book and a Christian one. I read it for educational purposes. She thought reading a secular chick lit book it "wouldn't go over well with her readers."

Oh well, I am still really excited to finally have it published and very grateful they even took it.

Hope you are all having a wonderful week.

Shawnee