A welcoming gesture…

Today, Coco and I were sitting around the house with nothing to do.  We had gone to church, eaten lunch - grilled burgers (more on that soon!) - and the boys had left for the afternoon.  We gave our dog a bath and brushed his teeth, painted our nails and had been coloring the majority of the afternoon.  She wanted to make cookies, I did not.  The main reason I didn't want to was because of this low carb diet Nater and I are doing.  I told her "if we make cookies, mommy and daddy will eat them all."  Then I remembered that we have two sets of new neighbors.  We could make cookies and be all hospitable and neighborly and bring them some homemade cookies… which is a bit outside of my comfort zone, but a totally fun idea.  So Coco and I started mixing and stirring and getting flour everywhere… baking with little ones takes patience, something I sometimes lack!

Coco LOVES to lick the beaters… and yes, I let her!  I can hardly say no when I eat about two whole cookies worth of raw dough myself! :)  Don't judge. 

(Recipe is below)

The perfectly done little morsels of heaven! These cookies are my absolute FAVORITE!  I could eat at least 10 of them in one sitting.  I have been making these cookies since I was in high school… same ol' recipe.   

Here are our finished plates of cookies…. "Welcome to Apple Tree Village.  A sweet place to live.  Enjoy the sweet treats!"  It actually worked out really nice and Coco and I got to meet some really nice people.  Hopefully as the weather warms up and more people start spending time outside we will get to know them even more!  Glad Coco talked me into doing this :) 

We call these cookies "Ida's VERY SOFT cookies" simply because the cleaning lady at the restaurant we used to own, named Ida, gave us the recipe.  The funny story behind these delightful cookies is that one day my husband asked me to make my "great grandma's cookies".  I just stared at him, a bit of blank look on my face I am sure… (I have no recipes passed down from my Great Grandma) and he finally says, "Grandma Ida's cookies?!"  I laughed SO hard at the mix up, but could totally understand how he came to think they were from my grandma.  So although this is not a passed down from generation to generation recipe… I have no doubt it will be! I hope you LOVE them as much as we do! 

Ida's Very Soft Cookies

(wet ingredients) 

1 cup margarine (I use butter)

1 cup sugar

1 cup brown sugar

1 egg

1 Tbs milk

1 cup oil

1 tsp vanilla

(dry ingredients)

4 cups flour

1 tsp cream of tarter

1 tsp baking soda

3/4 tsp salt

12 oz. chocolate chips

Cream first three ingredients then add egg & milk - mix. Add oil & Vanilla - Mix

Meanwhile, combine all dry ingredients, sift slowly into wet ingredients.  Stir. Throw in Chocolate chips and stir.  Bake at 350 degrees for 12-14 minutes. 

I don't really know how many cookies this makes because we usually make 2 dozen and put the rest of the dough in the fridge.  Then we make 4 - 8 cookies whenever we feel like having a sweet treat!  I hope you like your cookies!  

Drinking on a low carb diet…

Finding a drink that isn't going to ruin your diet can be tricky!  If you're a beer fan (like me primarily) here is a list of beers and their sugar calories (total carbs X 4).

Blue Moon (personal fav!): 12.5 carbs = 50 sugar calories.  YIKES!
Bud Light: 6.6 carbs = 26.4 sugar calories
Coors Light (another fav of mine): 5 carbs =  20 sugar calories
Michelob Ultra: 2.6 carbs = 10.4 sugar calories

As is evident by the numbers, drinking beer on a low carb diet isn't necessarily the best option.  I suppose in reality the best option would be to drink no alcohol but lets face it… I like to partake in a beverage every now and then too much to give it up… even for optimal health!

I have found a substitute drink that doesn't ruin my diet and it still taste good!  Vodka Waters! Yes, you read that right.  Vodka, mixed with water.  Sounds horrific and it is nasty on its own, but mix it some Crystal Light and you've got yourself a carb free drink!  Low calories too…

There are a ton of different liquid Crystal Lights out there now-a-days and most of them taste pretty good.  I throw one in my purse prior to going out and I am set.  The nice thing is I can adjust the amount of syrup that I put it, so I can make it stronger or weaker with just a squeeze of the bottle! 

My favorite are the Black Cheery Lemonade and the Blueberry Raspberry flavors.    My only piece of advice is if you are not use to drinking vodka, you can get intoxicated very quickly, so pace yourself.  They taste like juice, so they are dangerous that way too.  Also,  I find the hangover for hard alcohol drinks to be worse than simple beer.   With that said, ENJOY your carb free drink! 

Day 2… the 100

The house smelled great when I got up, I am not the biggest fan of coffee, but I always LOVE the way it smells… I actually kind of have an addiction to creamer.  My coffee is usually a beautiful tan color and is more like a flavored latte than coffee.  On this plan, I get to add half-n-half for free, but I still miss my creamer. 

I was anxious to see how the scale weighed in today and I wasn't disappointed to see it moving in the right direction! That is a good felling and helps to motivate me for the day! 

Todays breakfast was MUCH better than yesterdays… thank goodness.  I was worried it would be hard to convince Nate to keep trying this when our breakfast tasted like dry cardboard. 

Bacon?!  Yes please! 

(yes, I often eat off children's plates) 

Breakfast:

Two eggs, scrambled with 1/4 red pepper, 1/2 cup spinach, 1/4 grated cheddar cheese served with a side of 2 strips of bacon and coffee & half-n-half. 

O sugar calories

Snack:

Walnuts 

(I don't like walnuts at all, so I had a string cheese again)

0 sugar calories for either one

Lunch:

1/2 head of lettuce with 2 strips chopped bacon, 1 hard boiled egg, 2 Tbsp chopped toms, 2 Tbsp chopped cucumbers, 2 Tbsp blue cheese crumbles and 2 Tbsp of blue cheese dressing. 

6 sugar calories

Snack:

1 hard boiled egg

0 sugar calories

Dinner:

1 chicken breast rubbed with 1 Tbsp Dijon mustard and 1 tsp black pepper, panfried in 1 Tbsp olive oil, served with a side of 1 cup spinach, 2 Tbsp chopped red pepper, 2 Tbsp chopped green onion and 1/4 cup chopped zucchini, drizzled with Blue Cheese. 

6 sugar calories

** I should mention that we are allowed to have two glasses of red wine each night.  I just don't like to drink alcohol during the week…  So I kind of cheated and drank a little bit of milk.  

How interesting….

Exhibit 1

While I was eating supper last night, I was looking at the dressings I had placed on the table.  I have always purchased light or low fat dressings. The lower the calories, the better. Right?! While I was looking at the back of the bottles I was surprised to see the difference in the two…

Take exhibit 1, the bottle on the left is the Light Ranch.  

It has 70 calories.  Not bad for 2 Tbsp.  

It only has 4.5 grams of fat

It has 10 mg of cholesterol

370 mg of sodium!

7 carbs

It has 28 sugar calories

(total carbs X 4)

bottle on the right is Regular fat, Blue Cheese

It has 120 calories… 

the old me would be freaking out because calories are ALL THAT MATTER? RIGHT?! Isn't that what we've been lead to believe? 

It has 12 grams of fat.  

It has 0 cholesterol 

250 mg of sodium

1 carb

It has 4 sugar calories

Now… again, if all you are looking at it calories, clearly you would choose the dressing on the left.  However, you might be sacrificing your health… I guess I'm not going to try to pretend that I actually know anything about Cholesterol and Sodium, but there is a lot more of that crap in the light (supposedly more healthy) dressing.  Than we all know carbs and sugar are the culprit to weight gain, so in comparing the two… there is a clear winner here.  I think my days of "low-fat" and "light" might be over!

The other day I found a great article about the truth behind the dreaded "fat" in our food!  It's totally worth a read!

Rethinking Fat: The case for adding some into your diet

Day 1… of the 100

Today we started the 100.  So far I am feeling good.  I am not hungry nor do I feel like I have deprived myself.  For me personally, I can't do a traditional diet because I don't have enough self control to starve myself or restrictive myself completely.  It's just not in my DNA… I have to have some balance. 

Out breakfast: 

1 skinny muffin with butter, with coffee and half-n-half.  

* The skinny muffin is interesting.  I tried to convince myself that it was good, but I am afraid it isn't. 

The Skinny Muffin

1/4 cup ground flax

1 tsp  baking powder

2 tsp cinnamon powder (we used ground cinnamon)

 1 tsp coconut oil

1 egg

1 packet Stevia/Truvia

Mix all ingredients together in a coffee mug.  Microwave for 50 seconds.

Snack:

1 string cheese

Lunch: 

2 cups lettuce tossed in 2 Tbsp Caesar dressing with 5 grilled shrimp and 1 Tbsp grated Parmesan cheese

* This salad was AMAZING!!  I have eaten low calorie or low fat dressings for years, I did not know what I was missing!  SO GOOD!! I actually licked my bowl… gross I know.   I did turn my office chair so no one would see me!  :) 

Snack: 

(wasn't even hungry, but wanted to stick to the menu)

1 slice deli turkey & 1 slice America cheese

Supper (Dinner):

1 grilled flank steak, cut into strips, tossed with 2 cups spinach, 5 cherry tomatoes and Blue Cheese dressing. 

* I shop at Aldi, so I often don't have that large of a selection… instead of flank steak, we used top round, seasoned it with 'steak seasoning' and it was TO DIE FOR!!  SO good! 

So here I sit, snuggled in my bed and feeling really good about the day.   I have the coffee pot set to brew at 5:05, I have the red pepper chopped for tomorrows breakfast and Tater and I got our lunches ready to go.  It is so much easier to something like this when you have a partner to do it with!  THANK you Nathan!  :) 

Giving this journey a reboot!

Driving up to the MOA (that is the Mall of America for anyone not from Minnesota) after my discussion with Tater (that'd be my husbands nickname), I decided to bring along a book I had purchased awhile back called The 100, by Jorge Cruise for some light reading.  I had previously read portions of the book and liked his general concept, but had yet to put any of his practices into place.  After re-reading the 'important looking' sections of the book again, Tater and I decided to give it a try starting on Monday (March 31st).  

I was super excited to start this journey… I hate to use the term diet because diets always fail and I have no intention of failing.  Calling it a journey better describes the ups and downs, screw-ups and good days.  That is more real-life for me!

So… heres the gist, instead of counting overall calories, you count only SUGAR calories.  How do you determine sugar calories?  You take the total carbs x 4.  If your at all quick with math, I think you're probably saying, 'holy smokes batman' that adds up quickly!' YEP! It does.

Here is an article I found and wanted to share it.  I think it probably does a better job explaining than I can.

Redbook, The 100 with Jorge Cruise

How does the plan work?
 The old way to look at a nutrition label is to see 0 grams of sugar. The new dietary science has shown that not all calories are the same. That means nutritional labels are written in a way that doesn't really matter. It's not about grams of sugar because carbohydrates are sugar — you need to consider the total amount of carbs. If you look at the average piece of whole-wheat bread, it will have at least 20 grams of carbs. You take number and quadruple it to find out the sugar calories. One slice of bread has 80 sugar calories, putting you almost at your daily limit. If you want to lose weight, whole-wheat bread, couscous, and quinoa are evil.

What happens to your body when you consumer sugar calories?
 Eating carbohydrates — which are sugars — increases insulin. In our world, 80- to 90-percent of women's weight-gain comes from overindulging in insulin-stimulating food. And it's not hardcore, straight-up, I-can-see you-in-the-face sugar. They're eating whole-wheat bread. They're eating ancient grains. They're eating black beans. That stuff is horrible.

You claim that women can expect to drop 18 pounds in two weeks. Most nutritionists recommend on or two pounds per week. Is so much weight loss healthy or sustainable?
 I think in America we've lowered our standards. If you have four pounds to lose, one or two pounds a week is great. But if you have 30 pounds to lose, and you're losing one pound a week, you're doing something wrong: you're eating carbs. You're eating whole-wheat bread and whole-wheat pasta. You're eating oatmeal with agave nectar and blueberries. It's all sugar.

When I designed this program, the average woman lost 15-to-20 pounds in two weeks. Is it healthy to lose that weight? The more important question is, is it healthy to keep that weight? No!

Since so much of the diet is about cutting carbs, it sounds a lot like Atkins. How is it different?
 Dr. Atkins was brilliant, and he had a lot of good ideas. But, there was too much protein and not enough vegetables. You couldn't cook or bake with coconut or almond flour, which are vital parts of my plan. He recommended artificial sweeteners that we now know are dangerous. His plan was the iPhone 1. This is the iPhone 5.

Exercise is notoriously absent from The 100. Are you against it? I'm not against working out. It's just not effective for weight loss. I like strength training to tone and firm the body so you look tight. But working out just makes you hungrier.

You present a list of "freebie" foods, which includes most meat, eggs, some vegetables, oils, cheese, and nuts. Can you really eat as much as you want of these things?
 You have to be a mindful eater. There has to be intention in what you do in your life if you're going to be happy and authentic. Food isn't supposed to be entertainment in the way that your kids, your work, and your relationship are. Things that are fatty — like half-and-half or cheese — satiate hunger. A slice or two should make you full.  If you're eating beyond that, it's probably more about reacting to boredom or stress.

Okay, we're not sure we can get behind never eating comfort food again, but we think we get it. This plan isn't about getting to indulge in all your cravings and still lose weight, but it will get you fast results and offers KISS methodology that most anyone could follow.
 Yes, people have it totally wrong about what's making you fat — that every single calorie has to be counted — but we now know that science has proven that wrong. All that matters is the sugar.

Comfortable in this skin…

After loosing my youngest son, I became painfully aware of the lack of control I had over this life of mine.  I struggled, not just with the overwhelming sadness of living life without my son, but also with accepting this new life I was forced to life.  I lived with a new outlook that 'whatever is going to happen, will' and what could I do about it?! I had no control. It was defeating. 

Ten months after our loss, I realized I could not function within the parameters of the way I was choosing to live.  I could not regain some of who I had been while struggling with coming to terms with my inability to control my fate.  I finally began to realize that even though there are definitely things I can NOT control in this life, I can choose to control the way I live.  I've never been one to care about living 'healthy' but it was easy for me to identify that I also had never felt comfortable in my skin.  I have always felt overweight and never certainly never cared to exercise.  After examining the events of my life, I decided that I wanted to take control over my health… for myself and for my son.  I wanted to live this life to the fullest because he never had the chance. 

That was a year and a three months ago, since than I lost 40 pounds, have energy to spare and have completed several 5ks (however, haven't reached my goal of RUNNING a full 5k).  I strive to raise healthy kids who understand the balance of eating healthy and allowing themselves the pleasures of eating brownies.  As of late, I noticed that I was struggling to stay focused on healthy habits and was slowly reverting to my old ways. I am up 10 pounds and my clothes were getting tight.  I sat down with my husband yesterday, explained how I was again feeling uncomfortable in my skin again and we decided together to recommit to obtaining optimal health.  He was going to do this with me, which is amazing!

That is where this blog comes into play… for me, blogging is a great outlet to express myself.  I like to write and share my experiences because I don't think my unique in the way I see this life.  My goal is to redefine this life I live and to potentially help others while they become comfortable in their own skin.