Down 29.9 and a little inspiration hopefully.....

I bet you that that .01 of a pound will mess with for at least a week, but that's okay because when it goes, I will be past 30 pounds! Yahoo...

Now, I have had some thoughts on my mind for awhile now about losing weight.... I mess around on Facebook a lot. The stuff I see going down the newsfeed is just ridiculous. If you want to lose, you should be able to lose. I realize there might be some with medical reasons that keep them from losing, but mostly, it just takes determination. I don't even put forth that much effort other than cooking differently from the way I did before and cutting out all the excessive "goodies". I am a certified chocoholic and I freely admit it. I will never completely give up chocolate and I eat a little bit daily.

The miracle foods that are posted on the newsfeed of Facebook? I don't know if they are miracle foods or not, but I do know that you don't need them. You don't need a program that you have to pay for either. You need determination that you will change your lifestyle.

I cook low or fat-free. I used very, very little oil and when I do, it is canola oil. I buy the leanest meats and if there is fat on the cut, I trim it off. I am a beef eater. My dad raised cattle and I have eaten beef all my life. The only change is I don't eat rib-eyes anymore...they are delicious but the reason they are is that they marbled with fat. Besides not being desirable for weight loss, it is not good for your heart. I buy meats that have loin in the name because they are the leaner cuts. Sometimes, they cost a little more, but if you think about it. The lack of fat means you are paying for meat, not fat. I also buy boneless because I don't want to pay for the bones. I still eat from the Golden Corral, but I fix my takeout in the small container because you can't fit a huge meal in that itty bitty thing.  I am more careful what I get from there too. I do not get the things that are full of cheese.

I will be getting my Thanksgiving dinner to go from there. I get enough for a meal for my husband and myself and enough to snack on that night. No leftovers to put on my hips.  Hahaha. I usually make my own creamed potatoes at home and just get turkey and ham, maybe a little veggies.

The point is that it can be done without surgery for most people and without special programs. Pay no attention to calories...just reduce your fat content and much as you can. You want to lose slowly so that your skin remembers to go back where it belongs! On parts of my body, that skin has to travel a bit, but it did it when I lost the 100 pounds a few years ago. I believe it will this time too. I hope this maybe inspires someone with a great desire to lose to just do it. I am already starting to feel better and its only been 29.9 pounds...

Good luck....

15.1 POUNDS DOWN!!!

Ha! First of September and down that much already. I am a happy (not camper....Oh, I got it!) stay-in-the-house-and-hide person!! I was a bit concerned this week when the time to weigh came because I had some extra take-out. Two days I was out past noon and starving, so I got something from town on the way home. Waco, TX is the home of the slowest drive-thrus anywhere. That is true at off-peak times, so oh Lordy, I would rather be shot thango through one at meal times, especially noon when people are buying lunch. Thankfully, we have Taco Bueno. My daughter says it's because nobody eats there, but I think it is because their employees are fast. I believe they understand the concept of "fast". Sooooo, I went both days to Taco Bueno. I got the Big Ol' Beef Burrito both times(because it was good the first time) and it had lots of lettuce and tomato on it. It was delicious. Why did you not go to the Corral, you ask? Hahahahaha.....I didn't want to get out of the car again in this heat!

We are having an unseasonable heat wave. Pbbbbbbbbbt! 104 yesterday. Hubby is a wonderful, wonderful man. He said the other night that since it is so hot, we can just eat leftovers or sandwiches. What a guy! I have had a ham sandwich two nights in a row. Last night, I made a few French fries to go with it. I woke up this morning with chicken salad on my mind. Sooooo, making that later with fat-free salad dressing. I have an egg cooker that makes boiled eggs, so I don't even have to heat up the stove for that. ( I adore my garage sale finds...paid $2 for that egg cooker and I love it!) I bought this little contraption for making an egg in the microwave a couple of weeks ago. I am going to try it out and see I can make it work without killing the egg.

I am a little bummed because I am out of Claussen mini dill pickles. I forgot to replenish my supply yesterday. That is because I had to get up at 4:30 am and the brain just wasn't working right when I got to the store. I use the pickles to signal to my body that I am through. They are my substitute for dessert at lunch. Eat the meal and finish with the two little pickles. It works.For me. You can find something that signals that you are finished. Now, at night, after dinner, it's my 3 Musketeers bar. Hahaha!! Hey, don't judge. I have said all along that I will never give up chocolate completely. I just downsized and have it less often. A LOT LESS OFTEN!! I have passed the bakery clearance rack consistently since the first week of July, so I am good.

I welcome anyone who wants or needs to lose weight to join me on my blog. It's sorta fun to have company in this sort of endeavor.

Well, here it is the 25th of August already. Today was a weigh day. I weigh when I first get out of bed, so sometimes I am a little bleary-eyed. After not losing any last week, I was a little scared of stepping on that scale today. Shoot, I stepped on that sucker 3 times in a row because I couldn't believe what I was seeing. I am down 13.6 pounds since starting the second week of July.
 I had to switch flipflops today. I believe that I mentioned before that my feet were so swollen from the way I was eating(waaaaaaaaay too much salt) and I had to search really hard to find a pair of flips that didn't attempt to cut my feet in half. All swelling is gone and my feet are as skinny as when I was young. I had, at least, a half inch of room between the straps and my feet. Yay, me!
 I bought 2 jars of pickled beets this week. (Yes, I really, really like them.) They have no fat in them!! I also loaded up on cucumbers again....I really like them sliced with onion and the Mediterranean Vinaigrette on them. (The tomatoes get soggy, so decided to eliminate them from future cucumber salads.)I will just eat them plain.
 Today for lunch I had, a small pork chop, a few French fries, cucumber salad and pickled beets. That meant that half my meal had absolutely no fat. It was delicious and filled me up.
 Tonight, I am thinking of something with hamburger and noodles done in the skillet. It will be my version of Hamburger Helper. I will be making more cucumber salad, but I think tonight calls for pickles. I love pickles, but try to limit them a bit because of the salt. Mostly, I eat one at the end of a meal...it makes it sort of like dessert and tells my mind that I am through. You have to trick yourself any way you can.
 Well, that's it for today. Anyone wishing to join me in my loss is more than welcome.

Something new from the grocery store....

Hi, everyone! It's still hot as the devil in TX. Cold meals become more appealing daily. Today, I had a little cold ham, a few French fries(remember...homemade and fried fast...less time in oil...less oil absorbed, pickled beets(no fat at all), and Tomato-Cucumber Vinaigrette. I got the idea for adding tomatoes to the cucumbers from Facebook. I also added sliced onion. Well, I love this 3 Gyros SlimFitt stuff. Convenience is my middle name. No mixing the vinegar and stuff...open lid and pour it out. I just love it. If you cannot find it anywhere, they have an online store. I found it at HEB in TX. I chose the Mediterranean one. This is now a regular part of my diet. All in all, this was a great lunch for a hot day.

Homemade Taco Salad for Lunch!

Greetings!!Today is a good day! It is Weigh Day!! I am down 9.8 pounds in less than a month!! Yay, me!! I love it when a plan comes together! Lots of baked potatoes this week with FF sour cream. A few French fries(homemade, of course). Rice one night. Lots of turkey breast from the grocery deli.

I didn't think of taking a pic of my lunch until I had already stirred it up. Hahahaha...it still tastes terrific. Mostly lettuce and tomato. A few tortilla chips crunched up. 2 T. taco meat and 2 T. refried beans(they came from Rosa's, by the way). Pico de gallo and the squeeeeeeeeeeeeze jalapenos!! Delicious.

I am thinking on leftover roast beef with gravy on rice tonight. The best part is that the roast beef is already cooked. ;-) If you haven't been to my blog before, check out the recipe link on the right!!! Lots of low-fat good eating in there.

Not a bad lunch for a hot August day.....Saw the cucumber sandwich idea on Facebook. It is pretty good. Hollowed out cucumber, shaved turkey, Colby cheese and Tony Chachere's Zesty Sandwich Sauce. Rounded out with sliced grape tomatoes and 5 olives.

Sorry I slacked off last week. I just got busy with other things. Plus, it is hot and that tends to make me procrastinate. I will strive to not let it happen again.

I cooked the Miracle Rice this week. I could hear screaming in my ears. At first, I thought it was the pounds screaming to get away from the jalapenos that I put in it, but on second thought, that could have been my mouth screaming in pain, just as easily.  Whichever it was, hot peppers are good and if you can stand to eat them, they help the metabolism. Milk will stop the burning afterwards. Whatever you do, don't drink water!

Speaking of peppers, I was in the canned peppers section of the grocery store and found squeeze jalapenos. There was also squeeze chipotle and squeeze habaneros. I got the jalapenos and will work my way up to habaneros because they will totally set you mouth afire!! I am going to try jalapeno on a sandwich....possibly a homemade hamburger. Always looking for things to which I can add peppers. Scrambled eggs and jalapenos, anyone?

Well now, not bad for a nice lunch with which to lose weight. My homemade chicken salad, crackers, light potato chips, tomato and cucumber.  It's just as delicious as the ones a few weeks ago from the Corral too. Oh, don't contradict me on this. A whole lot of the success is your mindset. Make up your mind that you will do it and then get on it and do it!

This plate is about half the size of my regular dinner plates. That helps too. You have a full plate. Therefore, your mind says that you should not be hungry afterward. I switched to smaller forks too. You need to eat slower so your stomach knows that you are full. Smaller forks keep you from shoveling it in like a linebacker. Well, at least, it does me.

So this morning, I go to the grocery store, which I hate doing, but it is necessary. I flew through that store even faster than I did Saturday. I just love it.  The more I lose, the faster I walk. ON my quick trip through though, I am replacing things from regular to fat-free. I never switched back to regular Miracle Whip for the chicken salad nor the Fat-Free Catalina dressing. We kept using light margarine and fat-free milk, but there were a few things that I need to switch back from regular. Cheese is now from 2% milk again. OH and I now use fat-free sour cream. Gotta love the baked potatoes. Anyway, another successful day, it looks like it be!!!

The Start of Week 3.....

First of all, I just love breakfast! When you reduce the amount you eat, it seems like last night's dinner was an eon ago. You know what though? I am not missing the Earl Campbell hot links. Oh no, I am absolutely not. (Earl DOES know how to make hot links though!) I am back to the breakfasts I had when I lost the weight the other time.

Scrambled egg (Sunday is fried)
2 Jimmy Dean(he knew what he was doing too) turkey sausage patties
1 English muffin spread with peach fruit

Absolutely delicious.Now on Friday, I still hit the Golden Corral.. Hahahahaha! Oh, pooh, it's my reward for being good all week. Besides, I have to get out the door on Friday to hit the garage sales. BUT, Friday when I went to get my take out breakfast, I didn't get a third of what I got before. Let me tell you I am moving through there too cause all those choices are very, very tempting.

Then you have mid-morning snack....usually watermelon or something like that....sometimes a small piece of cheese. Lunch is a baked potato (light butter and light sour cream) or maybe a few french fries that I make myself, a serving of turkey breast or something similar and a cucumber and a tomato(sometimes with a sprinkle of salt, sometimes with  Fat-Free Catalina dressing). I adore cucumbers and tomatoes.

Afternoon snack is just something small. For instance, today I had a small piece of cheese, 6 light potato chips and a pickle (cucumber, in any form is good). The snacks are important to keep that metabolism going and so your body doesn't think it is starving.

Now, you should have seen my *ss flying through the grocery store this morning.....hahahaha.....I can do that again because I now have skinny feet.   I had to stop to get more watermelon. I still had some cantaloupe, but I don't think I am going anywhere tomorrow, so just to be safe, I added more watermelon. I need to get the hubby to help me rid the freezer of the chocolate ice cream in the freezer because it is regular  and I bought some Lovin' Spoonful today to replace it. Remember I said I have no intention of going without.Now, this stuff is sooooooooooooooo good. I think it may be better than regular ice cream. Flavors are limited though. At least, at my store they are.  I also have Skinny Cow cones in the freezer. I love those.

Well, let me go contemplate my dinner.....hmmm...possibly some cold turkey (it's 100 degrees here) and a few French fries and the tomato and cucumber!!

Hi! It's been awhile since my last post. I am now 58 years old with 59 creeping up much faster than I would like! I have a definite penchant for the cupcakes and other goodies and I have been enjoying them immensely. I make no apologies. I freely admit to this and the choice I made to go off the low-fat life. I also have a thing for the Golden Corral! Hahahahaha! I absolutely looooooove that place.

Anyway, I woke up a couple of weeks ago and said to myself that it was time to get serious again, so I got up and weighed myself. Oh, Lordy. Although I was relieved to find that I had NOT gained back all that I lost, but it was still too much. I was back a 290.2, so time to do it again. This time, I believe I am truly at the point to make this a lifetime commitment. The weight is affecting my knees again and I DO NOT like it.

I know I have the ability to cook just about anything I want and make it low-fat. I proved that when I lost the 100 pounds. My problem is that I just mostly don't want to cook. Hahahahaha! That Golden Corral is just handy. Which brings me to the next thing....restaurant food, besides being mostly very, very NOT low-fat, is also extremely salty. The fat and salt are what make them sooooooooo good, but also not good for you, so it is back to my recipes for me. Back to half the meal being veggies and correct portion sizes. Now, I  didn't really deviate from the correct portions, but I did  some of the time.

The salt is a tremendous factor too. I was walking on two hams. Seriously, my feet literally looked like hams! Now, I like ham, but NOT on the ends of my legs!!! I changed my diet 2 weeks ago and I now have skinny feet again!!!! There are actually ANKLE BONES between my feet and legs!! OMG! Did you know that 58-yr-old toes have some wrinkles in them??? I will take the wrinkles over the hams any day. It took less than 2 weeks to get my skinny feet back!

Start: 290.2
1 week:  287.9 (down 2.3)
2 weeks:285.0 (down 5.2)

Oh yea! I am very happy with the start!!  Please feel free to read my blog and if anyone wants to join me in changing your lifestyle, I would love to have you.