May 2008

My numbers are all over the place today; I was up to 226.2 lbs on the scale this morning and my BodyBugg reported about 100 less calories for my walk to town today. When I compared it to the data from my other walks, it said I took anywhere from 600-2000 less steps than my walks on days prior. So the reason for burning less calories on today’s walk was because I somehow took less steps? *shrugs* I guess so! lol How does it know how big my stride is? I haven’t set it anywhere. I don’t think it’s even an option. Ah well, it’s never going to be the same exact result everyday, but I am curious how it was about 100 calories less than usual, especially because my weight went up not down lol!

So it’s after midnight right now but I’ve only eaten about 900 calories! I’m going to finish my menu in a little bit, but I wasn’t that hungry today. Probably because I ate so much yesterday. I did a great job staying low on sodium today. I’m going to try to aim for 1500mg or less for the next few days. That’s what I usually do on my menus anyway, but I’ve been a little too lenient with sodium in the past couple of months. Tsk, tsk!

I drank my first meal of the day:

I made a big smoothie in the blender that I planned to drink half of today and the other half tomorrow. I used:

1 Fage Total 2% plain yogurt (small container, 130 cal)
1 medium banana (110 cal)
1 cup (144g) fresh strawberries (50 cal)
1 cup skim milk (90 cal)
2 TBSP flax seed (60 cal)
30g Bear Naked Heavenly Chocolate granola (130 cal)
5-10 ice cubes

= 570 calories; 2 servings; 285 calories each

It was REALLY yummy! It could have used a bit more sweetness; I probably should have added a few drops of liquid Stevia, but it was still awesome and FILLING as is. I really liked the flax seed and granola in it. It gave me something to chew on after each sip lol. It was awesome. I need to have smoothies more often! They’re perfect for the warm weather and making them ahead of time. Yummmmmmmmy!

Can you tell I like ground turkey breast burgers? lol I LOVE them! I could seriously eat them morning, noon, and night. For only 325 calories, I had a complete meal with dessert:

I made the 3oz ground turkey breast (90 cal) burger really thin and cooked it in a nonstick frying pan. What’s nice about lean meat, is that when you make it thin, it stays that way and doesn’t “bunch up” like fattier meat does when you cook it. I sliced up 106g Granny Smith apple (55 cal) and weighed out 14g Snyder’s unsalted mini pretzels (55 cal) that I had along side my turkey burger on 1 Martin’s 100% whole wheat potato roll (80 cal) with ½ Tablespoon Heinz no salt added ketchup (10 cal), 1 cup Bibb lettuce (5 cal), 30g red onions (15 cal), and 1 plum tomato (15 cal). DEEELISH!

Working with only 1500 calories doesn’t allow for too much wiggle room when it comes to dinner. Well, with an appetite like mine anyway lol. Good thing I wasn’t too hungry today! I made a pretty little plate of whole wheat pasta with veggies and a few beans, which only came to 270 calories, but it was quite satisfying:

I steamed 84g frozen butternut squash (40 cal) in the microwave while I boiled 1oz whole wheat penne pasta (105 cal). In a nonstick pan I added in: 1 teaspoon olive oil (40 cal), 1 minced garlic clove (5 cal), 30g red onions (15 cal), 1 diced plum tomato (15 cal), 3 cups (84g) fresh spinach (20 cal), 2 TBSP no salt added Cennellini beans (25 cal) and the butternut squash. I let that all cook together, then drained the pasta and added it in. With 1 TBSP grated pecorino romano cheese (20 cal), this was a great, low-cal meal that could work with more beans, no pasta, more veggies, more pasta, or with just veggies and meat. Maybe even tofu? Not sure. I’ve never had tofu before!

My BodyBugg results for 5/30/08:

Went to sleep at 4:30AM
BodyBugg reset at 12:00AM
Woke up at 12:00PM
12:20PM: 1116 calories burned
2:14PM (before walk): 1291 calories burned
3:24PM (after walk): 1680 calories burned
4:15PM: 1755 calories burned
5:39PM: 1898 calories burned
6:04PM: 1934 calories burned
7:12PM (before elliptical): 2037 calories burned
8:52PM (after elliptical): 2401 calories burned
10:34PM: 2616 calories burned
11:18PM: 2686 calories burned
End of day: 2745 calories burned

More than yesterday, but still not giving my elliptical as much credit as it should. I know it never will, but I still like to whine about it. LOL I have a lot of cardio planned for tomorrow (60 mins), plus strength training and a walk. Busy day. I better rest up!

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First off, I didn’t do my usual menu today. I ate horribly and drank a lot. And not water; vodka mixed with Italian ice. I don’t know why, maybe it’s Aunt Flo driving me to the brink of madness or maybe I’m just drained, but all I know is that I was craving the greasiest food today, so I ate it and I don’t feel bad about it. Just wanted it and didn’t care about my menu at all. It happens. Several times in the past week actually, but oh well; life goes on! I think I’m feeling a bit anxious to be honest. I have my one year “diet” anniversary coming up next week and between Aunt Flo being in town at the beginning of May, several “free days” the past month, increasing my activity which always makes me retain water, and Aunt Flo’s return this week, I only lost 3 lbs the entire month. I’m hanging onto at least 1 or 2 lbs of excess water weight from her current visit and my free days still, but overall, I feel like any loss is good, even if it was just .0001 lb. A slow-down in weight loss is to be expected under those circumstances and I honestly don’t feel bad about any of it. There will be days, weeks, and months like this all throughout my life and I feel so much better knowing that I have the knowledge and drive to balance it all out.

The only thing I’m disappointed about is knowing that I won’t hit my 100 lb loss before it’s officially been a year, unless of course I drop several pounds of water overnight lol. It’s happened before. I’m going to try to stay as low on sodium as possible over the next week. Maybe I will “deflate” and get there unexpectedly lol! If not, no worries. I must admit I am tired of feeling “puffy.” This entire month I’ve felt nothing but bloated and yucky; half from my free day splurges and half from Aunt Flo’s wrath. I’m looking forward to avoiding sodium as much as possible for the next week. I can’t stand feeling so puffed up all the time, even though my weight stays the same or I gain a couple of pounds.

I did exercise today, even though today wasn’t a planned exercise day. I’m SO annoyed by BodyBugg though. I did 60 minutes on my elliptical, varying the speed and resistance and I was drenched in sweat, my heart rate was up; it was a really good workout. So I got done and uploaded my BodyBugg results and was appalled to see that it says I only had 11 minutes of activity for the whole day, 2 of which were already on there earlier from riding my bike around the driveway for a few minutes. Ugh! I know that couldn’t be right. Obviously it wasn’t detecting my elliptical workout the way it was supposed to. When I go shopping it says I have more activity and steps than my elliptical and I know I’m not out of breath and dripping with sweat in the middle of the store. It also gives me an accurate reading for the walks we take to town and those are pretty light effort compared to the way I push myself on my elliptical. I was so upset! It usually gives me a little better accuracy for my elliptical sessions, but not today. I don’t know what happened. I know that I didn’t suddenly stop burning as many calories as the day before or the days before that, but sheesh, talk about being disappointed. I usually stop every 15 minutes on my elliptical to take a break, but today I went straight through the 60 minutes without stopping and it gave me the worst results ever. Go figure!

*sigh*

Knowing that it warns about not detecting certain movement like elliptical trainers makes me feel a little better, but I still like to see the numbers, even though I lost most of my weight not having a heart rate monitor or a BodyBugg. My husband thinks its making me second guess myself too much, but I’m just a stats junkie and I like data mining LOL. Ah well, no worries. I’ll go for a walk tomorrow to lift my spirits… (and my BodyBugg burn rate ) !

I had a decent menu planned for today, but I abandoned it and ate McDonald’s. They have this new mushroom swiss burger that’s really good. I think it’s new, I’ve never seen it until recently.

So after that greasy (delicious!) meal, I did 60 minutes on my elliptical which could have been done in just 9 minutes according to BodyBugg LOL, then I showered and we went for ice cream. I was really sad about my BodyBugg and worried that it wasn’t working right, but I think I was just hormonal at the time. Aunt Flo really makes me crazy at times. It seems like my cravings don’t kick in until she’s about to leave. Ice cream always hits the spot:

Just a small vanilla cone with rainbow sprinkles. It was very good and totally worth the 10 billion calories LOL. That’s probably not even a joke!

Then we went shopping. I bought an ice cream maker and an ice shaver. I’m going to try to make fruit sorbet and other yummy stuff. I say that now but I’ll probably end up using it once before it ends up in my appliance graveyard lol.

Oh, and it said I was just as active walking around the store as I was on my elliptical. I don’t believe you BodyBugg! LIES!!

*giggles*

Then we came home and hubby decided to be the bartender and made Italian ice in the blender with vodka. It was very good, but alcohol doesn’t do much for me when I’ve eaten beforehand. I’m one of those people that can eat OR drink, I can’t do both. I’m weird I guess! lol

After drinking 2 frosty alcoholic beverages, I was hungry, so I made a turkey burger and Nathan’s fries in the oven:

I didn’t measure any of it, but I imagine it was around 700 calories for this, maybe a bit less. It was really yummy but I feel so full right now. I could explode! lol I hope I don’t. hehe

I need a good night’s sleep. Hopefully I’ll get one so I can go on a nice, much needed walk tomorrow. I’m sure Dustin will have a hangover and will be looking forward to being woken up to walk to the post office!! hehehe

My BodyBugg results for 5/29/08:

Went to sleep at 4:15AM
BodyBugg reset at 12:00AM
Woke up at 12:30PM
2:25PM: 1253 calories burned
4:01PM: 1398 calories burned
4:56PM: 1511 calories burned
5:32PM: 1575 calories burned
6:05PM: 1628 calories burned
7:17PM (after elliptical): 1926 calories burned
10:16PM (after shopping): 2283 calories burned
End of day: 2490 calories burned

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