A Milestone

Sorry to have missed the Monday post. With it being Memorial Day, S4L was closed, and I didn't get to weigh in at my normal time of day until Wednesday. I lost 0.6 pounds last week, so it wasn't too exciting. The good news, though, is that while I was out of town Friday and Saturday, I was completely off plan, and managed to get back down quickly after coming home. I'll have current pics and a weight update this Monday. I'll probably post our menus for the last 2 weeks then too...

It is hard to believe, but I have finally made it down to my first pregnancy checkup weight! I have yet to post about my pregnancy weight gain and all the fun we had staying off-plan and eating what we wanted, but as of yesterday morning, I am officially down to what I weighed at my 8-week appointment!

While it's not my absolute lowest since starting Slim4Life (249 the week before I found out), I am proud that I've finally managed to lose all of that. I still don't look as slim as I did, since I'm convinced I lost a ton of muscle tone over the last year, but as I lose more weight and get out more this summer, I hope to gain some of that back, while I'm burning the fat that replaced it. Here's a photo of me the week of our appointment, and a photo of me 2 days ago in my (gasp!) bathing suit:

April 15, 2013; Weight: 255 8 weeks pregnant

May 29, 2014; Weight: 255 7 months post-partum, but it was totally worth this little cutie and his brother!

Day 17: Monday, Three Weeks In

I know it's not Monday, but yesterday was so busy, I didn't even have time to think about posting.

I am thrilled to reveal that I've already lost 18 pounds! And I'm partway to one of my short-term goals of being able to wear my summer clothes. I had a pair of capris that I bought for our honeymoon 3 years ago, and I am able to wear them again! Yippee!

Week: 3 Weight: 260 Size: 18 Pounds to Goal: 75

Our kitty thinks you need to see how she looks as well...

Week 2 Menu

This week we've been a little more experimental with our menu, and it has definitely paid off!

Monday:
melba toast breaded chicken with broccoli and salad; just as good as last week! This is going to be a new staple of my diet...

Tuesday:
leftover Mexican ground turkey taco salad with green pepper and romaine and tortilla bits; I did a good job of seasoning the meat, so that you couldn't even tell it was turkey

Wednesday:
shredded chicken stuffed mushrooms with celery; this was outstanding! I based it loosely on this recipe, using shredded boiled chicken breasts instead of ground chicken. I mashed up the melba toast, added a lot of dill (my new favorite herb!), Miracle Whip Light, egg white, and some garlic and onion powder. There was a lot of chicken, so the giant white mushrooms from Costco were a good investment, and even with 4 of them, they were overflowing. It was a little bit dry after baking, so perhaps a little olive oil or a little more Miracle Whip next time, but definitely a keeper!

Thursday:
sage chicken with green onions and mushrooms, and a rice cake for dessert; this may be my new favorite chicken recipe ever! My hubby made it, based on this recipe, and it was soooo yummy! I think all it was was sage and minced garlic, but it had so much flavor! It will be hard to top this.

Friday:
shrimp stir-fry with green onion and green pepper, with brown rice; should be tasty, although with less ginger this time

Saturday:
We'll be out of town this evening, so I don't really know what we're having for dinner. I will try my best to stay on plan, because I've done so well so far, and don't want to sabotage myself.

Sunday:
ground beef burgers with green onion and mushrooms; should be yummy, cooked on our George Foreman grill

Day 10: Monday Again

It's another Monday, which means a weight loss update! I look forward to this day of the week, unlike many other people, because I get to see how my hard work and sacrifice is paying off.

Even after having Mothers' Day lunch (mostly) off-plan, I still managed to lose 1 lb since last Thursday, and this week (since Monday), I've lost 5 more pounds! I can tell my stomach fat is getting a little less prevalent, and my jeans fit a little better than they were. I've got a looooong way to go, but I feel like I'm off to a good start.

I told my husband last week some time that the thing that makes staying on Slim4Life's plan this time is that I know what to expect. Last time, I had so many expectations that were not met when I signed up, it made me very resentful and made me feel like I was tricked by not knowing exactly what I was getting into. This time, I already know what foods are allowed, what the portions are, and many of the little tricks that I felt like weren't communicated until after they were causing me to keep the weight on. I know it's hard to stay on the plan, and I've had to change my habits quite a bit from before, but what I was doing before was not working.

I had a wonderful first "real" Mothers' Day (I celebrated while I was pregnant last year) and got to enjoy a couple of treats, like pasta, banana, and ice cream, but now it's back to work! I'm ready to be able to fit into my summer shorts and pants again! 5K training again tomorrow!

Week: 2 Weight: 265 Size: 20 Pounds to Goal: 80

Week 1 Menu

I would like to keep a record of some of our favorite meals while on plan, so I don't have to remember every little thing about what was good and what wasn't.

Here is our menu for this past week:

Saturday:
shrimp with broccoli, cauliflower, and brown rice--steamed everything; it was a little bland, but filling

Sunday:
tilapia with broccoli, spinach salad and bread--I already reviewed the fish this week; still not a fan

Monday:
chicken fajitas with pepper, green onion and tortilla--I added a little salsa and it was pretty tasty, although half of a 6" tortilla doesn't go very far...

Tuesday:
tilapia leftovers from Sunday

Wednesday:
shrimp with pepper and green onion stir-fry, brown rice--without the sweet and sour or teriyaki sauce, it was a little off on flavor, but we tried lots of different spices; I think less ginger and more garlic would be better

Thursday:
grilled chicken open-faced sandwich with grilled mushrooms and spinach salad--probably the best meal all week! I used Pam to grill the mushrooms and added a touch of garlic. It was pretty tasty!

Friday:
ground turkey with Mexican seasoning (no salt), spinach, and green onion, tortilla--should be good as well

Saturday:
melba toast breaded chicken breasts with broccoli and cauliflower, with Miracle Whip Light as the glue for the crumbs; I don't know what I would do without Miracle Whip on this plan...

Sunday:
Costco pre-cooked turkey breast with spinach salad and broccoli, rice; checks off all the requirements, although probably not the most delicious

We may have some leftovers from the ground turkey for tonight's dinner that I can eat for lunch next week. I also enjoy tuna salad sandwiches with cucumber slices for lunch once a week. Tuna, ground turkey, and ground beef are restricted proteins, so I have to watch when and often I have them.

I've been eating the Costco pre-cooked turkey breast with my spinach and cucumber salads for lunch this week, and it's pretty good. We sliced it into pre-measured servings, so it's very easy to throw together. I added some dill to it today, which kicked it up a notch! Morton Light Salt goes on nearly everything, in every meal, even breakfast.

For breakfast each day, I eat 1 hard-boiled egg, 1/2 c of oatmeal mixed with 1 c skim milk, and 1/4 c of Costco frozen berries (raspberries, blueberries, and blackberries). I was adding 1 tsp honey, which is not on plan, until I was able to get to the store and buy some Splenda. It is filling and pretty tasty every day.

Once I am done nursing the twins, I will be back on my original plan, which will change some of these things, but for now, we're finding what works for us. I'm down over 10 lbs for my first week, so I'm happy with my progress so far! I'll have new pics for Monday!

Day 3

Monday is here, and so are new pics! I had a great weekend with my hubby, and we got a lot of our meals prepped and the meat pre-cooked for the week, to make eating on-plan so much easier.

We had tilapia last night, which, not to discount my hubby's cooking, was about the most bland protein I could have. I'm just not a fish person. Never have been, probably never will be, unless I find the right kind cooked the right way. That was not it. I appreciate his effort, but, aside from leftovers tomorrow night, I don't mind not eating that again. I am proud of myself for trying it, though.

Another protein I'm not fond of that I had to try this weekend was plain Greek yogurt. I know I can't just have eggs, chicken, and turkey all the time, so I'm trying to branch out to these other options. Since I can only have ground meat every other day, I figured I would try the new yogurt option. I have sampled it before at Costco and remember not caring for it (I have an issue with regular yogurt's texture sometimes), but I thought I could make myself like it if I had just a little more and it was one of few options. It tastes like thick sour cream to me, but not as sweet. I'm glad we just bought 1 6 oz package to try, instead of the big 30 oz or whatever Costco has. If I do have it again, I'll have to add some Splenda and fruit. That might not trigger my gag reflex as easily...

I weighed in this morning and am thrilled to say that even though we went out to eat Saturday (where I overate a little), and pigged out Wednesday through Friday last week before I got back on plan, I am down 8 pounds since Wednesday! Yippee!! Turns out the water intake is not hindering my weight loss. We are celebrating this success and Cinco de Mayo tonight by cooking chicken fajitas with bell pepper and green onions.

I also found some great recipes on Pinterest that are from another weight loss plan (slimgenics), but many of the recipes incorporate ingredients that I can have. It gives us another resource for finding some variety for our meal planning. I'm excited to try these ground chicken stuffed mushrooms next week!

Week: 1 Weight: 270 Size: 20 Pounds to Goal: 85

Day 1--again

S4L Plan #4
Breakfast: 1 egg, 1 starch, 1 fruit, 8 oz milk
Lunch: 1 protein, 1 starch, 1 fruit, 2 veggies
Dinner: 1 protein, 1 starch, 1 fruit, 2 veggies
Other: 1 fat, 1 protein drink

Menu
Breakfast: 1 hard-boiled egg, 1/2 c oatmeal, 1/4 c raspberries, 8 oz milk
Lunch: 5 oz chicken breast, 1 c brown rice, apple, 1/2 c broccoli, 1/2 bell pepper/mushrooms
Dinner: 5 oz shrimp w/ lemon, 1 slice 45 cal bread, 1 c strawberries, 1/2 c broccoli, 1/2 c cauliflower
Other: 1 T Miracle Whip Light, 1 S4L protein drink, 2 c unsweetened tea, 16 oz Crystal Light

I wouldn't call today a resounding success, although I didn't purposely eat off-plan. We went out for a scheduled meal at 54th Street with my parents, and I did try to do the responsible thing. I ordered the grilled chicken with wild rice and mushrooms, which came with seasonal veggies, and I did ask for no cheese, which is such a waste to me... I didn't have to eat all the rice, but it was so tasty, I couldn't resist. I am sure that everything had more salt on it than I need, but I ate it anyway. It was delicious, and not something I would normally have even considered ordering there.

I did weigh in this morning, just because of all the overeating we've done over the last couple of days. I wanted to have an accurate measure of my weight for starting out, and even though it was a slightly different time of day, I was surprisingly down 3.6 pounds since Wednesday! Yippee!

I am going to have a difficult time with the water intake. No, not drinking enough. Drinking too much. Way too much. Since I've had the boys, I've been worried about my milk supply diminishing due to dehydration, so to be safe, I automatically forced myself to start drinking a gallon of water a day. That's 128 oz. Then, just to be safe, I added an extra 28 oz to that, just because. I know there was a reason at some point, I just can't remember why now. Now, on days that I work out (which I would like to be every day, in some fashion), I drink an additional 28 oz, so that what I sweat out can be replenished.

Well, with S4L, I was told before that I drank too much water with 100 oz. I'm sure they would go ballistic if they knew how much I was drinking now. I go through it, though. I get thirsty, surprisingly, even with all of that liquid flowing into my body. Fortunately, I have figured out a way to keep up my fluid intake and still make them happy with the 80-ish oz rule: I can have my 80 oz, and then the rest I just have to add something to my water to "change the electrolytes" (their words, not mine). So, I can add lemon to a glass. And Crystal Light. And I can have tea (which must have Splenda--yick!). And my protein drink. With all these additional drinks, I should be able to maintain my regular fluid consumption and still be on plan. We'll see.

I don't plan to post every day, but I did want to get these thoughts out. I plan on posting our menu for the week pretty regularly, and then I can comment on what I liked and what I didn't, so I can use those recipes and meals for later reference. We're in this for the long haul, and I hate to use the same meal plans over and over.

Last Hurrah

It is a shame that I will be starting my new lifestyle of healthy eating on the S4L plan tomorrow, since I just discovered my favorite thing (almost) ever: Zio's tomato florentine soup is the most delicious thing I've had in ages, and it is definitely not on plan.

My hubby and I were there celebrating his birthday yesterday (like many other days this week...), and after our delicious celebration Wednesday night of pizza and tater tots (we're trying to clean out the freezer!) and S.H.I.E.L.D., I was looking for something a little lighter. Their lunch menu has many great choices on it, and even though I probably should have chosen a salad, I picked the manicotti, which also came with house salad or a soup. My brain was in "celebrate" mode, so I picked the soup that was pictured, and it was so good!! I considered cancelling the manicotti for the unlimited soup and salad lunch, but didn't want to make our server mad, so I just savored ever drop of the most delicious soup I've ever had.

I will definitely be going there for my birthday in November. I'll have 2 meals off plan to celebrate at my favorite restaurants, and Zio's is now #1 on my list! I found this copycat recipe online that I might try, if I can find a way to make it on plan.

So excited to start S4L again tomorrow! We planned our meals and are stocked up on groceries and purging the last of the non-plan items from our pantry. I'll let you know how it's going on Monday!