Food

Ha–I’ll bet you were really surprised to check out Debby’s blog and find a post about food!  (I need to figure out how to put some of those funny faces on here that Lori uses.)

Anyways, I was just settling down to watch the movie Julie and Julia–already watched the special feature about the making of the movie–and I thought, I need to write a blog post about food.  As you all know, I have eaten a bit too much this week.  It has gotten better the past two days at work, actually, and today was a stellar day.  But there were some times in there where I really was worried that I was sliding down a very slippery slope.  I wanted to eat everything.  I didn’t particularly care if it was ‘worthy.’  On the one hand, I was upset because I knew I would gain weight, and on the other hand, I just didn’t care.  I KNOW.  It was very close.  I thought today was going to be another bad one.  But somewhere in the middle of the day, something changed.  I’m not sure what it was.  I did go to the gym after church and had a short, but intense workout.  And I had picked up one of Vicky’s excellent small meals.  At the last minute, I decided to warm it up in the microwave in the gym and eat it on the way home so I wouldn’t have to waste time cooking when I got home.  And her food is small, but very satisfying.

I started working on some quilting stuff when I got home.  Sometimes I forget about food when I am quilting (not all the time, unfortunately.  If that worked all the time I would weigh 100 pounds!)  So whatever caused the ‘click,’ I am relieved and happy about that.  Tomorrow will be my workout with Vicky, and then meeting my sister in Stockton for lunch.  I have already pre-planned what I am going to eat, so that will be okay.  And then my four week food plan with Vicky starts.  It was important to me that I had a good day on my own before being ‘forced’ to control my food choices.

Other food topics of interest.  I watched Food Inc. last week.  Very sobering views of food.  Reminded me again that I want to buy meat that is free range, grass fed–whatever I can do to make sure the animals have been treated kindly during their life.  Old habits die hard, though.  I still buy food that is a bargain at the store without thinking about where it came from.

I also read a book a while ago that I never mentioned.  This guy lost a LOT of weight eating whole local farm-fresh foods, and he did not particularly limit his fat intake.  He is where I got the idea of buying and using raw milk to make my homemade yogurt.  And interestingly enough, I first read about him on Polyface Farm’s website.  I don’t know how I first happened on their website, but they are prominently featured in the movie Food, Inc.

Back to Julie and Julia, Meryl Streep mentioned that she gained 15 pounds making the movie, and it took her a year and a half to get it off.  That made me feel good, for some reason.  And watching this movie does not particularly make me want to eat too much or the wrong food.  A movie like this just motivates me to live my best life, and to be passionate about what I am doing.  It makes me want to quilt beautiful quilts, and work out more, and travel!  Oh, and to write a better blog.  Check back tomorrow–I’ll try to do better…

Examining the Sweet Tooth

I’m afraid this post contains no scientific data, and might not apply to anyone else.  The only sweet tooth being examined is mine.  Its a really big tooth, and I’m afraid its been acting up lately.  Tuesday (yes, at a quilting class) there was a gooey cinnamon pull-apart.  I even knew it was going to be there ahead of time, and I brought ammunition, but I’m afraid I succumbed.   And I thought about all the times over the past five years that I have resisted the cinnamon pull-apart.  But I also thought about how the last big time I lost weight (in my 20’s) I really stopped eating sugar all together.  And I remember saying that stuff was ‘too sweet.’  But as we all know, that weight loss effort was a failure.  I gained it all back plus some.  So this time I decided that I would not say ‘never’ to any particular food.  I would just allow myself the occasional treat, or have smaller amounts (like in the book ‘French Women Don’t Get Fat.)

In the past year, I have been learning that eating the sugar/fat/salt combo really does lead me to want more, and I have again toned down the regular consumption of sweets.  But I still like them.  I have never once thought, ‘that’s too sweet.’

Then yesterday, eating lunch out with my friend, I had, well, WAY TOO MUCH FOOD.  I am not going to describe it all here, because sometimes I think that it is not helpful to other people to read about VERY HIGH CALORIE FOOD.  I ate so much that I wasn’t hungry for dinner, and in fact, I didn’t eat dinner. I just had a little yogurt before I went to bed.

So I’ve been thinking about it today.  Is it just that one indulgence led to another?  Is it the proximity of the food?  Was it an underlying ‘emotional’ problem?  Or was it a combination of all three?  I do know that one indulgence leads me to WANT another.  I can fight that a little.  And I do think for whatever reason, the proximity of the food is a factor.  If I am in a very large room and can stay away from where the food is, I seem to be able to resist it more.  The emotional factor  I usually tend to discard.  I have examined and examined myself.  There are specific instances of stress eating, of course.  But I don’t think I eat instead of loving myself like Oprah says.  I don’t think I have any hidden deep-seated emotional scars.  I do think I really really like food (too much) and I really really like sweets.  BUT….something did occur to me this afternoon.  (I was much better today, but I have still eaten too much.)  I did realize that my stress about my job, and examining retirement is probably a giant factor here.  (sigh of relief.  I don’t like having ‘unsolved mysteries.)

Just so ya know.  I still like what I do.  It is a little more stressful than I would like it to be. But the biggest factor is the long days.  I just can’t seem to get over that.  Retiring now is a big decision.  It is permanent, you know?  Yes, I know I can still be a nurse.  But I could never go back to exactly what I am doing now.  And there is a financial aspect to it too.  If you retire at this age they don’t give you as much.  I have never believed in working just for the money.  But I don’t want to be an idiot either.

So I have a lot to think about.  Here’s hoping I can think and not eat at the same time.  Yesterday during the boring class I did come up with a plan that I’m kind of excited about.  Vicky (my trainer) has her ‘Quick Fixx’ food business.  And she does meal plans for people.  Which I have done before.  But I like to cook, and I like plain old vegetables and fruit and my homemade yogurt.  So I came up with a plan:  five days a week, I will get 1000 calories worth of meal food from Vicky, and I will add in 2 servings of vegetables, one fruit, and one serving of my homemade yogurt–1300 calories total for the day.  The good part about this (besides the fact that Vicky’s food is delicious and I don’t have to cook) is that my choices are limited for a while.  It is not a permanent solution, but it is helpful sometimes.  I am going to do it for four weeks.  The other two days of the week I get to cook, and my calories will be a little higher–about 1600.

That’s all for now.  Back to work for a couple of days.  You all have a good weekend and stay warm.  Seems like storms are blowing in all over the country!

The little 'watercolor' quilt made during the cinnamon pull-apart incident.

Everything’s All Better

I was okay yesterday.  And okay this morning.  But not primo…  then this afternoon, after cutting out early from a boring class at work, and having a great time shopping for fun but necessary stuff at Trader Joe’s and Costco (can you believe I got in and out of Costco in less than 30 minutes and managed to get almost everything on my list AND spent $230!!!) and then meeting an old friend (former charge nurse) for lunch, eating too much, and having some great conversation, including the feasibility of my retiring, I was on my way home, and I listened to this song for the zillionth time, and the words just ENERGIZED ME:

Joy unspeakable that won’t go away

Just enough strength to live for the day

So I never have to worry what tomorrow will bring

Cause my faith’s on solid rock I’m counting on God

Okay, that is all for the day.  Tomorrow we will talk about that little phrase I slipped in there–’eating too much.’  But tonight ‘I feel good–ooooowwww,’* I have plans for tomorrow, and ideas for the rest of my life.  I am energized!

*(think James Brown, which BTW, I forgot to recommend a movie, Young at Heart.  It is a documentary about a guy who takes senior citizens and teaches them to perform rock songs.  It is a great story.  And you haven’t lived until you’ve seen an 80 year old man with spinal degeneration sing ‘I feel good—ooowwww.’)

Tired of Trying

I know this never happens to any of you.  First, I was just tired.  Really tired.  After a long day Saturday, my thoughts get very VERY negative.  And then that negativity carried over to Sunday, which usually doesn’t happen.  One good night’s sleep usually gets me back on track.  Maybe its because my sleep has been interrupted the past few nights.  Maybe its a cumulative tired.  And Sunday morning I weighed myself.  Even though I know better than to weigh myself after my 12hour workdays.  And my weight was up two pounds (Two Pounds, that was the alternative title of this post.)  And that did not help my mood.  Which ended up with me thinking,  ”I’m tired of trying.”  I’m tired of writing down every single thing I put in my mouth.  Or not writing it down and then obsessing over that.  I’m tired of thinking about whether or not I should eat something today, or maybe that would be too much and I shouldn’t eat it until tomorrow.  Or eating something ‘white’ and worrying about the cravings that will hit and the hard work of trying to resist.  I’m tired of always always trying to lose weigh and always staying the same.  I’M TIRED.

And unfortunately, that did not end Sunday night.  I woke up Monday morning feeling old AND tired.  My eyes feel like they do after you’ve cried for way too long.  Only I didn’t cry.  Maybe I should have cried and gotten this over with.  My food choices have not been stellar for the past two days (I even bought and ate some of those stupid gummy cinnamon bears in the grocery store today.  They looked sorely out of place among all the fresh fruits and vegetables and fish that were in my basket.)  But my food choices have not been horrible either.  And I still wrote everything down.

Today was my workout with Vickie.  And I went.  But not with the enthusiasm that I usually have.  Earlier in the week I had been thinking about how much I LOVED working out with Vicky and how I was never going to stop no matter how much it cost.  And the workout was a really good one.  Very hard and challenging, and I did pretty good.  AND I took two walks with Noah.  Fortunately, his energy level pretty much matched mine.

Well, if you’re still reading, here’s my takeaway from this.  Whatever this ‘I’m tired’ state is, it has nothing to do with my diet or my food journaling.  It has very little to do with my lack of weight loss.  I would have times like this whether I was fat or thin.  That’s just the way life is.  Just keeping on doing the best I could with food choices, taking Noah for his walks, going for my workout with Vicky, and going to the grocery store to stock up on fruits and veggies and fish, in spite of how I felt, will help it to not get worse.  And when I pull out of it (planning for tomorrow!) I will be none the worse for wear.

Here is a pretty little ‘crazy quilt’ block that I managed to do even though I was tired!

Good Morning

Hi all!  I gotta write fast–I am off for another grueling six hour workday–HA!  Thanks for all the nice comments.  To answer one question–I still will have to work some 12  hour shifts.  And of course, this will mean that I have to commute more days per week.  But for now, I think it is worth a trial run to have more of my life be a regular rhythm.

Yesterday I met a friend for lunch.  We had a plan.  Share a salad (BBQ chicken, Lori!) and then go for a frozen yogurt!  In between we stopped at the thrift store where I scored a brand new jacket and two springtime tops.  I like checking the thrift store to see if my size has changed–a cheap way to get a little treat for my hard work.  The yogurt place had my favorite ‘original tart.’  This stuff is only 60 calories per half cup!  Yes, I had more than 1/2 a cup.  My toppings were walnuts and carob chips–simple and classic.  Only thing was, we sat and talked so long, we decided to get seconds.  Oops.  Fun, though.  And I was not that hungry for dinner, so just had some eggies mixed into that cauliflower-potato bake (this is EXCELLENT, BTW) and a small piece of pineapple.

After the yogurt, I hit the gym before going home.  And this is mostly what I wanted to write about.  I tried the ‘super slow lifting’ that Miz wrote about the other day. Hey, this stuff is hard.  But in a good way.  I wasn’t sure, but I chose to go about 10 pounds lighter than I usually do on the machines and did two sets.  The second set was always less than 10.  And I am sore today.  But good sore.  It was a little hard to make myself go that slow.  One man commented that I had ‘done that well.’  I don’t know if he had heard of the super slow or not.  But at least he didn’t think I was crazy.

I’d better run.  Gonna try to get in a little walk with Noah before I leave.   I am getting plenty of exercise these days, trying to walk Noah twice a day to make up for his lack of ‘house time.’

Heaven

Is this what it feels like to work regular hours?  Its 9pm, and I would usually just be arriving home, exhausted and depressed, having left my house at 5:15am.  Today I started something new–splitting one 12 hour shift into two 6 hour shifts.  So I got up this morning at 6am WITHOUT an alarm clock, enjoyed a nice cup of coffee and breakfast, and a little quiet time, and left for work before 7:30.  I was in the parking lot and on my way home by 3:20.  HEAVEN!!  I came straight home, and got in a really long walk/run with Noah (he’s getting faster!) and still had energy for a little house work.  I fixed a real dinner, watched an episode of Monk, and checked out a few blogs.  Now I’m tired, but NORMAL tired.  Not feeling like the world is going to end tomorrow tired.  Not shaking my legs to stay awake because they are insisting on going to sleep (does anyone else experience this?  It is the weirdest feeling–like your body is going to go to sleep no matter what your mind tries to tell it to do.)

Oh, and to get back to the normal topic of this blog–food–here is another little bit of heaven.  I try to make most of my ‘desserts’ healthy mini-meals.  Have I told you guys about this combo?  Just take about 1/2 cup of your favorite yogurt and 1/2 cup of frozen blueberries and stir them together until the yogurt is a little frosty and the blueberries are a little softened.  I add in about 50 calories worth of walnuts–HEAVEN in a bowl!

Recipes

Hi all!  Hope you had a good weekend.  Work was hard for me this week–mentally and physically.  What’s new.  I did run a little more on the way from the parking lot to the unit and back out, and I even got in a good run when I had to take some stat labwork to the other side of the hospital  (its a BIG hospital, and I know which floors are mostly empty!)  AND,  ta-da!  Today I checked my 10-minute mile challenge time, and I came in at 11 minutes flat!  I was really so excited.  Because every time I start out, I think,  Oh, today will not be a good day.  Its cold.  My knee hurts.  I am really tired from yesterday.  I shouldn’t have worked out at the gym before I checked my run time.  How far is that telephone pole*–I’ll never make it.  I’m gonna have to walk.  Etc. etc. etc. (*telephone pole is at the quarter mile mark.)

Okay.  On to the good stuff.  Recipe news!  First, here is a picture of the roasted tomato soup.  This is when I added rice to it.  You can see that it is pretty thick and chunky, which I like.  But you could make it smoother by processing it more in the blender.  I might do this next time.  That is the ham and cheese breakfast muffin next to it.  Those are as good as they look.  They are a great addition to lunch or breakfast!  I think this recipe was originally Lori’s.  Thanks, Lori!

Next up is the quinoa breakfast recipe.  Sorry I didn’t take a picture of this.  But it was absolutely delicious, and quite decadent.  I ate it three mornings.  The first two mornings it really held me for 3-4 hours, but the next morning, I was hungry after two hours.  Don’t know that its the quinoa’s fault…anyway, keep in mind that you can make a serving any size you want.  If 330 calories sounds like a bit too much for you, then split the recipe into 4 servings and it will be about 250 calories/serving.

Next is the Pumpkin Oat dessert.  If you look at the ingredient list, this would also make a very nice breakfast snack.  I am not 100% sold on this recipe.  But I keep eating it, so I guess that is a good recommendation.  I like it enough to share with you.  I’ll be interested to hear if any of you try it.  The part I am not sure about is the ‘oatmeal effect.’  I added the oatmeal on purpose to bulk it up.  But with the high liquid content in this recipe, the oatmeal turned into…well, oatmeal.  I think you can even see this in the picture.  It also is not super sweet.  As you can see, I am trying to use real sweeteners (agave and maple syrup) and depart from my dependence on splenda.  And also challenge myself to be satisfied with something that is lightly sweet.  Anyways, there you have it.  It needs a better name.

Today I tried a recipe that has been hanging around the house forever–a Cauliflower-potato bake.  Do you guys do that?  Cut out a recipe from a magazine or whatever, and then have that paper floating around in the kitchen/bathroom/bedroom?  You really want to try it but are missing one ingredient?  Well, I finally remembered to get the one missing ingredient–a red bell pepper!  I am not a fan of green bell peppers (I will pick every last minute shred of green bell pepper off of a slice of combo pizza.)  And so that hate transferred over to the poor red peppers.  But I have noticed recently that I like the red peppers okay in certain foods that I have tried–they add a nice flavor.

The recipe was one that came in a flyer from my health insurance company!  I followed the recipe exactly, and it was just scrumptious!  So scrumptious that I had a second serving for my dinner tonight!  And yes indeed, that is a steak on the plate there.  I probably have one steak every 3 months or so.  It was just wonderful.  BTW, at our local market, if you buy a whole filet, they only charge $6/lb instead of the normal $12-15/lb that we see around here.  So even though I am only one person, I will buy this once in a while, and then slice it into just the size steaks that I want, and wrap and freeze them.

BTW, I plan to use some of the leftover cauilflower-potato bake in an eggie scramble.  Doesn’t that sound delicious?  I love re-purposing foods!

I was looking around the blogs tonight, and Sybil linked to this new recipe blog, and her first recipe sounds fascinating and quite worthy, especially for some of you vegetarians–Garlic and Rosemary Roasted Cannellini Beans!  Doesn’t that sound fascinating?  And healthy.  She says they are crunchy and taste like crispy garlic bread croutons–great for salads, eh?

And finally, the Noah shot.  He is getting almost too heavy for me to pick up!  Unbelievable.

Just a Tidbit

Rain.  Rain.  More rain.  I know.  Shut up you stupid spoiled Californians.  Will you never be satisfied?  You cry because there is not enough rain, and then you complain when it finally does rain.  Hmmm. Reminds me of a certain group of people in the desert who didn’t like eating manna any more.  Which, BTW, I have always wanted to try.  It just seems like it would be so yummy.

Well.  That was not what I intended to say.  I have been experimenting with food today.  And I think I have come up with two new recipes that are blogworthy.  I wish some of you lived close by so I could have you test them out and let me know if my sense of taste is still on target.  I guess I’ll eat them again tomorrow and then post them.  One is a quinoa breakfast blend.  I did get the idea from this blogger, but I made mine a little differently.  And the other was a pumpkin dessert–a heartier healthier version of my pumpkin custard.

In spite of all this rain, I have really done well in the exercise department.  I got out this morning for a walk with Noah and then a run by myself before the rain started.  I was pretty pleased with myself that I got out there before the rain because I do still have the tendency to procrastinate when it comes to the exercise.

In less than 3 weeks, Noah has gone from 23 pounds to 35 pounds!  Yikes.  Kind of reminds me of ‘Clifford the Big Red Dog.’  Did Clifford chew on EVERYTHING in his line of sight?  We have a LONG time to go before the teething/chewing thing is over.  Maybe I’ll lose some weight chasing after him…

A day like today is so interesting to me.  Because I ate really heavy early in the day.  So at 4pm, when I took a planned break and had some coffee and lobars, I was not hungry, and in fact I was too full to eat the second lobar.  THEN I was not hungry for dinner.  At 7pm I finally had another small piece of salmon and some broccoli.  Of course I saved room to try my pumpkin dessert.  I really thought I was going to go over my calorie allotment today, but I came in at 1305.  Having a big breakfast really does decrease your total intake for the day.

If any of you are still wondering about yogurt making, Vickie has written a wonderful post about her experience in making yogurt.  Quite scientific, and full of wonderful pictures.  She makes all of her yogurt Greek yogurt.  I am still quite enamored of yogurt making, and am finding more and more ways of using it.  It really works well in a lot of recipes.

I can’t remember if I updated you on my car thing.  The insurance company approved the repairs.  I was afraid they were going to say it was totaled.  So I am quite happy that I will get my car back.  I will appreciate it a lot more from now on.  In the meantime, this little Kia that they gave me is not all that fun to drive in stormy weather. But it does the job.

Have a great weekend.  I am back to work.

P.S.  I keep forgetting to ask:  has anyone tried those MBT shoes?  I am very interested in them.  But a little reluctant to spend a lot of money on them if they are not going to be comfortable.