Wonderful Visit

Our five whirlwind days with Lowell and Emily were fantastic.  We went to Universal Studios, the Giraffe Ranch, Magic Kingdom, and Hollywood Studios.  We also rode an airboat and ate at several very fine restaurants.  Oh, so much delicious eating!

Now they are home, safe and sound, and we are trying to get back to normal. I have blisters between two toes on the left foot and on the right heel.  That proves how much walking we did in the last five days.

Mark and I went to see Monsters University today.  it was really great.  Now we are home, recovering from all the fun!

Enjoy these pictures from the past few days.

After we picked them up at the airport, we went to the Beach Club for dinner at Cape May Buffet.  We also had a lovely walk completely around the lake.

Mark and I had a chance to meet two famous people!

Naturally lunch had to be here!

Lowell is just hanging out at Moe's Tavern in Springfield.

Time for some hugging.

This place is in Dade City.

First, we had a talk about hoofed animals and got to hold some antlers and various bones.

We fed ring-tailed lemurs!  Awesome.

And we fed rhinos!  These guys were so gentle.

You've got to admit this is an adorable face!

Watching the animals on safari.

Emily was very excited to feed a giraffe.

Lowell enjoyed it, too.

A tortoise encounter!

The Fennec Fox was Lowell's favorite critter of the day.

We saw two different nesting female alligators on the Air Boat ride.

The next day we headed into Magic Kingdom very early. 

Mark and I took the time to ride the trolley to the castle.

They saved the world from the evil Zurg in the Buzz Lightyear attraction.

Lunch in the Be Our Guest restaurant.

So cute.

Having Le Fou's Brew in Gaston's Tavern, where he uses antlers in all of his decorating.

At the Hollywood Studios, Lowell had to comply with his shirt!

YUMMY!

We ended the night with the Fantasmic show.

Fantasmic is fantastic!

Watching some TV while Mark makes pancakes for breakfast.

Mark and I wore our pirate shirts because we had planned to go to MK for the new pirate adventure game, but it got too late and there was too much rain.  We will have to do that another day.

Saying goodbye to Emily and Lowell at the airport. 

Weigh In Wednesday

First things first.  I am down three pounds for the week to 264.6.  That's an excellent week.

I did very well almost every day, and I certainly exercised a lot.  Yesterday, I had 160 calories in Morningstar sausage links for breakfast in the car as we drove to Universal Studios.  For lunch I had a margherita pizza, but then I slipped up a bit. Okay, a lot.  I got hungry around 4 p.m. and had two scoops of excellent gelato.  For dinner we ate at Lombard's where I had the baked cod dinner that came with broccoli, corn on the cob, and a small amount of fingerling potatoes.  All would have been well if that's all I ate, and I should only have had one of the two pieces of corn on the cob.  Hm...NO, that's not all I ate.  I also ordered a glass of white Sangria and ate one and a half sourdough rolls with butter.  Yeah, restaurants are still not my strong point.

Even so, I logged it all in and tried to account for it.  I ate about 2200 calories yesterday, but we walked well over 4-5 miles.  Since my phone ran out of battery and I couldn't use the RunKeeper later in the day, I can only estimate the total miles and calories.  I burned up over 500 calories in walking, so it still made the day reasonable.

Today we will pick Lowell and Emily up at the airport at 4:30 and the fun begins!  Tonight's dinner will be at the Cape May buffet in the Yacht Club Resort at WDW.  Mark and I celebrated our anniversary there.  It's fantastic, but it's also possible to make good choices there because there were plenty of vegetables and baked fish.  Breakfast and lunch will be at home and very normal and low calorie. When I get to the buffet, I will have 1000 calories to spend there.  I'll do my best.

Meanwhile I had a bad night.  We didn't get home until nearly midnight, and at 4 a.m. I got up with a horrible inner thigh leg cramp. I haven't had a leg cramp in a long time.  I dealt with it the best I could, but it was after 5 a.m. before I laid back down in bed.  I also am upset in my gut today.  Maybe that food I ate yesterday with all of the walking just didn't agree with me.  I feel tired and kind of light-headed and dizzy this morning.  I decided not to go out to do my early morning walk. I have a mani/pedi at 10:30, and then I hope to take a little nap this afternoon before we head up to the airport at 3 p.m.  I hope I feel better by then because there is no time to feel out of sorts after the kids arrive!

Meanwhile, here are a few pictures from Hollywood Studios and Universal Studios.

Lovely days

The special extended preview/making of film for The Lone Ranger at Disney's Hollywood Studios was fabulous. I think if we had had the time, I would have gone to see it again.  Attendance seemed light in the morning at the Studios, so it was easy just to walk in and get a seat. 

The Pumpkin Riccotta Pancakes with orange honey topping that Mark made for breakfast yesterday were spectacular.  I hope he makes them again sometime!

I screwed up my lunch at the Commissary because I forgot to say no dressing.  UGH!  Not only did I add an extra 140 calories that I didn't want to my day, but I also had to EAT salad dressing, which I HATE!  I had already made the decision to add the salmon onto the salad because I thought my calories were low enough.  I estimated it was about 5 ounces, so that was another 211 calories on the salad.  Instead of a 220 calorie lunch, I suddenly had a 571 calorie lunch. 

Even so, my final total for the day was 1432, not terrible, and I walked two miles around the Studios, burning up 191 calories.  Hopefully that was still a good day.

We loved Joss Whedon's Much Ado About Nothing.  It was very funny!  The Enzian Theater in Maitland was a delightful surprise.  There is a restaurant open for lunch and dinner every day, and inside the theater is an extensive menu of food and drinks that can be delivered to your table while you watch the movie.  Lots of fun.  The only thing is that it's about an 80 minute drive from our house.

Today I walked at 6:30.  I went a full mile in 22 1/2 minutes, burning 85 calories.  Pretty good!  Later in the morning I will be at the pool doing some sort of water aerobics/lap swimming for at least 20 minutes.  If I can make myself do a full 40 like the class did, that would be even better. 

Breakfast and lunch will be my usuals.  Dinner is going to be at the restaurant Sweet Tomatoes over by WDW.  We are meeting friends there at 4:45 for the senior price.  Sweet Tomatoes (also called Souplantation in some places) has an excellent website with nutrition information for all of their foods.  That helped me plan what to eat and keep the total calories under 750.  Tonight I just need to be sure I execute that plan and don't pick up something extra!

Today's meal plan:
B'fast:  usual Fiber One, Lite Greek Yogurt, fresh blueberries   182 calories
Lunch: usual  tuna, salad, fresh cherries    310 calories
Dinner at Sweet Tomatoes:  4 cups green salad (88), 1/2 cup poppy seed coleslaw (120), blueberry muffin (140), 1 cup four bean Minnestrone soup (130), 1/2 cup sugar free mousse (40), 1/2 cup frozen yogurt (100)  total calories 618
Snack:  Mark's Cherry Fool  143
Total calories 1253
Exercise calories burned between 212 and 340

I could actually have a second bowl of soup or a second muffin and still not go over my 750 outside limit for dinner.  What I can't have is a lot of desserts or too many of the other yummy carbs that are on the buffet! 

Tomorrow Mark and I are heading out to Universal Studios to use our second day of the three day pass.  We are going to try to be in line before it opens to get on Despicable Me and/or Transformers first thing in the morning.  We also plan to stay until after the park closes to see the night time show over their lake.  I'm only saying this right now because there will probably be no time to write a blog tomorrow. 

Perfect Afternoon

Yesterday was a perfect afternoon.  Finally, there was NO afternoon thunderstorm.  Around 3 p.m. we went to the pool and stayed until 6.  It was so beautiful.   I even joined a table of Mah Jongg ladies!  I saw they were only three and asked if they would like a fourth.  They had an extra card, so I played four games.  The lady to my right won the first one, and then there were three wall games (no winner) in a row.  That's unusual.  After four games, I felt ready to jump in the pool to cool off.  It was just a perfect afternoon.

I also ate what I said I would with one exception.  (There always seems to be an exception!)  I skipped the banana in the evening in favor of more watermelon.  That delicious watermelon that Ken brought over is now gone! My total calories for the day were 1366 and 266 burned in exercise.  Nice I hope I'm losing, but the scale is hidden so I can't tell.  Yes, that's a good thing.

This morning Mark is trying out a new breakfast recipe called Pumpkin Ricotta Pancakes from the Diabetic Living magazine..  I think they will be fantastic.  Then we are heading to Disney's Hollywood Studios to see an extended trailer for the new Lone Ranger film.  We'll eat lunch at the Commissary.  In there we always have the Asian Salad, which is essentially greens, edamame, and some Chow Mein noodles.  You can now get it with grilled salmon, but I won't do that for lunch.  After lunch we are driving north to Maitland to see Joss Whedon's film Much Ado About Nothing.  It's only showing in a specialty type theater up there.  We really want to see it because we like everything Whedon does and it has a great cast, including Nathan Fillion (Castle!).  After we get home, Mark is trying out another new recipe for dinner, Asian Chicken Wraps, that use lettuce leaves for the wrap.  With all the walking we will do to get in and out of the Studios, my day is going to be GREAT.

Today's Meal Plan:
Breakfast: Pumpkin Ricotta Pancakes   277 calories
Lunch:  Asian Salad with Edamame  (no dressing, no salmon)   220 calories
Dinner: Chicken-Ginger Lettuce Wraps, salad, green beans    305 calories
Snack:  large banana   135 calories
Total Calories:   937
Exercise:   ??????  Just from the walking in and out of the Studios, but it could be a lot

This day's calories are SO LOW that it would be a good day to add a Mickey Ice Cream Bar as a snack before leaving Disney!  LOL!  I know they are 330 calories and a major indulgence.  We'll see.

Good Day and Wedding Announcement

First the big news!  Lowell and Emily have a DATE and a VENUE!  I saw it posted on Facebook Thursday evening, but I forgot to mention it in yesterday's blog!  I called and talked to her for about a half hour because it's such great news.  As she said, she now has a dress, and a date, and a venue, and OH YEAH, a GROOM!  LOL!  She has a great sense of humor.

Their wedding will be at the Morningside Inn in Frederick, MD on July 12, 2014 at 6 p.m.

There's a website for the venue, so you can google it and see how beautiful the place is.  It's set in the rolling hills of Western Maryland, very gorgeous! 
 
Yesterday was the last day of our water aerobics class until September.  The instructor is a semi-snowbird.  She's going up north for the next two months!  Oh, well...

Mark has discovered a Line Dancing class that is for beginners on Tuesday's at the same time.  It also runs on Fridays, but it's not listed as Beginners then.  We will probably give it a try the week after next.  We can also go do our own water aerobics and swim laps any time we want, of course.

Mark used his new six quart slow cooker to make Pepper Steak, and it was PERFECT.  He is IN LOVE with the slow cooker, so we may be experiencing a lot of those meals in the future, as long as they are low calorie and low carb.

I never got to the weights yesterday because the weather got bad.  We didn't feel like going out in the bad weather, so we just watched TV instead.  Haha!  Not necessarily a good swap.  I also read a lot more in Game of Thrones, which I'm really enjoying.

I ate what I said I would for breakfast and dinner, but the lunch and snacks changed.  At lunch, we ate out at the pool bar.  I was a good girl and had a grilled chicken salad, so the calories were about the same as my planned lunch.  I also ate the cherries.  For a snack I had a nice piece of watermelon that our neighbor Ken brought over.  Thanks, Ken!  It was a really juicy, sweet half of a watermelon.  Delicious.  I will finish it tonight.  I also had a shot of whiskey with Mark for a Happy Hour.  My total calories yesterday were 1352 and exercise used 367.  That's a good day.

Ken also came over this morning with his "loppers" and lopped off a bunch of branches of palm trees and another plant that were growing across the front walkway.  I had sent an email to the ProScape people this past Monday asking for that to be done.  Apparently, they came and lopped off some dead branches, but not the ones I wanted gone.  When Ken came to deliver the watermelon, he noticed right away that you can't walk up our front walk to the door without pushing the jungle out of your face.  He volunteered to bring his tools over and take a few things down.  So he just finished that, and it looks SO MUCH BETTER.  Thank you, Ken!  I really appreciate it. 

In general, our neighbors here in Solivita on Barcelona Drive are about the BEST neighbors we have ever had.  We feel very blessed that we picked this house on this street.

Notice that I'm not recording my weight?  That's because Mark hid my scale yesterday afternoon.  Thanks, Mark!  I needed that. 

Today's meal plan:
B'fast: same as yesterday: cereal, yogurt, blueberries   182
Lunch: the one I fixed yesterday but didn't eat: tuna, salad, cherries   354
Dinner:  Mark's Marguerite pizza, salad, green beans 470
Snacks: Watermelon, banana   226
Total calories:   1223
Exercise:  weight lifting and either swimming laps or walking on a treadmill (if the weather is bad)
                 calories burned  150-300

Should be another great day!

Evey and Eric flew to Newark, NJ yesterday.  They got to stay overnight with his parents and then today they are driving up to Connecticut to attend the wedding of one of Evey's good college friends, Lyndsay, who was also one of Evey's bridesmaids.  Congratulations, Lyndsay and Tim on your wedding and beginning your married life together.  I'm sure your wedding is going to be beautiful.

Biting off more than I can chew?

No, that title does not reflect a food item.  LOL!

Mark and I went to the NARFE Board Meeting in the Tampa area yesterday.  There were 15 people in attendance at our president's lovely home.  For lunch I ate half of a vegetarian wrap that had some cheese in it and some of the tossed salad that I brought.  That was it.  We ate dinner at home because the weather was HORRENDOUS around the time we would have gone out to The Port.  Mark grilled some wahoo with a few French Fries and green beans.  I had an excellent day, only 1330 calories, but there was absolutely no exercise, mostly due to the weather. 

No, the title is about a job I volunteered for at the meeting.

They were creating a nominating committee of three people, and after the first two volunteers, no one else was stepping up.  Yeah, I should have kept my mouth shut, but somehow my hand shot up.  Then due to the fact that I'd have no luck at all if I didn't have bad luck, I lost the drawing and got appointed as the Chairperson for the nominating committee.  I also only volunteered because all five of the positions seemed to be filled.  The president is leaving but the immediate past president said he would do it.  All the others seemed to indicate they would continue.  Easy peasy lemon squeezy! 

Hahaha!  Fate is so funny sometimes!

Right after I volunteered and became chairperson, the Exec VP and the Treasurer both indicated they might NOT continue due to family issues at home.  What?  Well, isn't that something.

So now I'm chairing a nominating committee and I might actually have to do some work!  LOL!

Oh, well...

That pesky scale is still in the bathroom, so of course it made me get on it this morning.  I was down that one pound that I gained yesterday, back to 267.5.  I am eating all my meals at home today and tomorrow, so maybe I can finally get somewhere.  Next Wednesday Lowell and Emily arrive at 4:30 for a five day visit. I never planned to diet during that time. I will be eating most meals out and want to have some fun with them.  I am counting on a lot of walking at the parks to keep the gain to a minimum. If I could drop another one or two pounds for this week's weigh-in before they land, it would help a lot.

I already did my 20 minute morning walk.  At 10:30 we will do our water aerobics. Then if the weather cooperates, we will do our weights later this afternoon. 

Here's today's meal plan:
B'fast:  Fiber one, Dannon Lite Greek yogurt, fresh blueberries  182 calories
Lunch: tuna, salad, cherries   354 calories
Dinner:  challah, wine, salad, slow cooker pepper steak, low sodium green beans  612 calories
Snack: banana, small plum, sugar free jellos  206 calories
Exercise calories burned: 453
Total calories for the day: 1354

Should be a great day!

Less kosher food opportunities in central Florida

Yesterday Mark and I had our usual morning: walking, TV news, blogging, emailing, and water aerobics.  Then it kind of went down hill.

We left the pool and headed to BJs for a semi-annual stock up of paper products.  We got napkins, paper towels, toilet paper, and two different sized boxes of tissues.  A few other items were thrown in the cart, and off we drove to our next store.   So far, so good.

We drove a long slow drive up John Young Highway to the Super Target at Millenia Mall because they have fresh kosher beef!  That's a RARE commodity in this area.  There is a lot of construction on the road, so it was a very slow drive. Then the horror started.  NO MEAT!

Yes, the Super Target has decided to drop its entire line of kosher food, not just the fresh beef.  Nothing.  We were shocked and dismayed because this was the closest place to go for it.

So has we faced over an hour drive south on the slow road under construction, Mark decided to see if Cohen's in the Disney area had opened their store yet.  When they moved the deli and butcher shop from Clermont to the WorldGate Hotel, the restaurant opened right away, but the store was planned for the future.  That was in October.  Right before Passover they told us the store would open in the late spring or early summer.  So Mark got on their website to see if it said the store was open now.  It would only be a 45 minute drive from our house to get fresh meat if that store opened.

NO.  Not only is the store not opened, Cohen's is GONE!  They have left the WorldGate hotel, so their excellent kosher restaurant is also gone.  Geez! 

The website said they have left the WorldGate hotel and are planning to reopen somewhere else in Orlando, but there was no word as to where or when.  What a bummer!  Just one more reminder that we do NOT live in a very Jewish area.  We would have had to move much farther south, like two or three hours south on the coast, or over an hour north in the Longwood/Maitland area to find more kosher options.  Sigh. 

So now we are just going to go back to our original plan that worked the first year or so that we were here, ordering from NYC!  The $25 shipping fee was looking good yesterday as we spent over two hours in slow traffic with nothing to show for it.

We can still get fresh kosher chicken and turkey at Whole Foods, only about a 50-60 minute drive away.  The Publix near WDW has a lot of kosher frozen products, including Meal Mart brand, about a 45 minute drive away.  Our two local Publix stores offer a few things, and both offer different things, so that's our closest option.  Still, it is slim pickins in this area.

As for food yesterday, I made great choices for breakfast and lunch, eating my usuals.  Dinner?  Not so great for either Mark or me.  We were trying to earn some more points on our Landry's card in order to get a $25 off coupon for the future.  Hm...on second thought we should have said forget it.  We went to Landry's for bar food at Happy Hour.  Mark had a cheap Cabernet, which he liked, and I skipped alcohol, the one good thing I did.  Then we ordered a plate of fried zucchini and the fish tacos.  The tacos were two on the plate along with a moderate amount of french fries for each of us.  Of course, we both ate every bite.  Mark's sugar is ridiculously high this morning and I'm up a pound.

Why do I know I'm up a pound?  Because Mark never did hide the scale from me.  If that scale is on the floor, I step on it.  No getting around that.  It's all the will power I have to avoid eating the types and quantity of food that I want.  There's no will power left over for staying off that scale.

And how about that news that obesity is now classified as a disease?  I guess that's for a future blog.

This morning we have a two hour drive ahead of us to the home of the president of our NARFE chapter. Mark and I are both on the board, so off we go to the board meeting.  She is buying sandwiches to serve for lunch after the meeting.  She did ask about our food restrictions, so at least there are going to be fish and cheese options. I told her I would bring a tossed salad, so Mark and I can put the tuna salad and/or cheese on salad and throw out the bread.  One good decision that I made.

Tonight's dinner is at a restaurant about 20 minutes from here called The Port. I went with the Mah Jongg ladies for lunch last winter shortly after it had opened.  It's right on a lake and just beautiful.  I think Mark is going to love it.  It serves all kinds of fresh fish, so I am hoping we can make reasonable choices there.  We don't even have to rush because we have already seen the movie at Solivita tonight.

I just noticed that no exercise was mentioned here today.  No, I didn't go out walking because we have to leave at 8 a.m. for this board meeting.  We do hope to hit the weights in the gym before going to dinner because we never got to them yesterday.  So exercise is a little light today.  That happens.

Down and Out

This morning I am DOWN, weighing 267.6 for a weight loss this week of 2.5 pounds.  That's a good week!  I'll take it.  And the scale is OUT of the bathroom now until next Wednesday morning.

I have to stop weighing every day or even multiple times a day.  I'm not alone. I've googled it.  Many people struggling with weight do it.  There are even some articles saying it's a good thing because you can make immediate course corrections if you see it going up.  Other articles say it's a bad thing, including plans like Weight Watchers, because weight loss doesn't happen on a regular schedule and daily ups and downs are not indicative of the bigger picture.

I really believe the latter, and I drive myself crazy checking too often.  A 2.5 pound loss in one week is an excellent week, but it frustrates me knowing that I dropped five pounds by last Friday and then slowly put back half of it by this morning.  Every day, starting on Saturday morning, I was either the same or up a little.  If I didn't get on every day, I wouldn't know that!

Yesterday was especially crazy.  I was 267 first thing in the morning and also the SAME at 8 p.m. when we got home from Universal Studios.  I was thrilled because it meant staying the same all day even though we ate lunch out.  We walked 6 miles and I drank 10 glasses of water due to the heat.  I figured that it was a great day.  Then I made the mistake of getting back on the scale at 11 p.m. just before going to bed.  I was up three and a half pounds to 270.5.  What?  In three hours, I gained over three pounds?  How is that possible?  I ate an excellent, low calorie, low carb dinner that Mark prepared.  Please, REALLY?  3.5 pounds in 3 hours.   I guess I should be thrilled that I lost three of the three and a half by this morning. 

Just another reason why I needed to put that scale away this morning.  I do NOT want to know these crazy things.

Short version:  Universal Studios was GREAT! 

We have been to Islands of Adventure three times since we have moved down here, but we had not been to the original Universal Studios park in decades.  Well, everything has changed over there and in a really good way.  We liked it MUCH better than I of A.  We are even considering getting a Florida Resident Annual Pass to that park now, so we can go back whenever we want to ride some favorites over and over.  For die-hard Disney fans, this was a huge revelation to us.  We also thought the restaurant Finnegan's was fantastic, and that the actors in the shows and attractions were even BETTER than a lot of the ones we have been seeing at Disney lately.  I would not have believed it!

Universal Studios

Last fall we bid on and won 2 tickets to Universal Studios or Islands of Adventure at an American Cancer Society dinner.  When we took Evey and Eric to the park to use those tickets, the tickets were rejected, so we bought tickets for them and went on it. Later,  I called the woman who was in charge of the event; she called the man who donated the tickets; and they made good on it. In fact they made it BETTER.  They mailed us two 3-Day Park Hopper tickets to both parks.  They are good for 14 days after activated and expire June 30.

So today is Day One of those three days, and next Thursday will be Day Three, with Lowell and Emily.

We have not been to the main Universal Studios park in over a decade, maybe 15 years.  NONE of the rides and attractions that we saw then are there now.  It will be like a completely new theme park.

Meanwhile, I had a perfect day yesterday. I did all the exercise and ate almost exactly what I said. I actually ate less because I only ate half the green beans (helping the sodium!) and ate a small peach instead of the Popsicles and Jello, making it 1187 calories for the day.  My sodium was the best in several days, only 2,057 mg. You'd think I'd be rewarded with dropping some weight, but NO.  That's not how my body works.  I was UP another pound today.  Yes, I can starve my body at under 2k calories and gain weight.  I ought to go into the Ripley's Believe It or Not!  Whatever.

Today we are eating lunch out at the park for sure.   If we get too tired, we might just come home early and have dinner at the house.  Probably a good idea, but after yesterday, I'm getting a bad attitude about calories.

Okay, the whine is over.  Eye on the Prize!  I want to lose weight, so I have to stick to it.  Sooner or later something will happen.

I had a goal of losing 20 pounds in 8 weeks before going to California.  Two weeks are gone as of tomorrow.  I will report that loss, and it should be a loss of one or two pounds for sure.  Then I will proceed to the next week.  That's all I can do.

I am changing one thing tomorrow.  Tomorrow morning the scale is getting put up for the week.  No more checking every day.  That was another trick that I used back in 2009, so I am going back to that.

The other small annoying thing is my Keurig machine seems to be dying.  I had my original one for three years until it died.  I replaced it about 8 months ago with this one.  Geez.  It couldn't last  a year?  And no, of course I did NOT register it or have any warranty on it.  The pump doesn't seem to work. I put water in, but only about a third of that water comes back out.  Didn't work last night.  Didn't work this morning.  I have already charged a lot this month on Father's Day presents and a splurge at All Star Sports last week, but NEXT MONTH, I'm probably buying another Keurig.  I may splurge this time and get a big one with a well of water like Cindy's.  Hers has worked for nearly three years now and it brews the coffee in only one minute instead of the three that the small ones take.

Well, time to hit the road!  Universal Studios, here we come!

We did it ALL!

Everything that I outlined yesterday came to pass exactly as planned!  It was a GREAT day for Mark.  And we even added one more fun thing.  Instead of driving from Downtown Disney to Epcot to Port Orleans Riverside, we took buses to Epcot and Port Orleans and then the BOAT down the Sassagoula River to the Disney Marketplace at night.  It was so beautiful to ride that boat at night and get a beautiful view of all of Downtown Disney as we entered the lake.  We can also see the Treehouse Villas on the left as you go down the river.  When we did that years and years ago, we were so thrilled with those Treehouses that we stayed in one the following year with Grandma B.  Good memories.

Mark was a little concerned about his sugar levels after eating about 2 cups of jambalaya, some corn bread, some grit cake, some no sugar added lemon pound cake, and some wine as part of dinner.  No worries.  When he checked it later at home, it was just right!  Must have been the size of the portions, the large amount of walking, and the shot of whiskey!

When we got home at 11 p.m., he opened his presents.  I had bought him two pieces of new Disney luggage at World of Disney earlier in the day.  At home, he got two bags of 100% Kona coffee from Starbucks Limited Reserve, also from me.  The kids chipped in together and bought him a magnificent Hamilton Beach 6 qt. programmable slow cooker AND an extra LINER so he can do meat and dairy!  He has really been wanting this for awhile because he has a lot of recipes he couldn't do. 

As for me, I ate what I said I would except that it's really hard to estimate things like the grit cake (couldn't find any calorie count for that) or the exact jambalaya or veggie chili recipe.  Very hard.  I guessed most things.  Then I had some corn bread and some of Mark's pound cake.  So my total calories yesterday rose to 1579 for my best guess using the app.  On the other hand, I used the RunKeeper program several times during the day and found that we walked well over 3 miles, burning 463 calories.  That means my LoseIt! app thinks that I only ate 1116 calories.  Right now this program allows me to have 1549 a day, so according to the app, I did very well.  I never go for that high an amount, but theoretically I could and still lose 2 pounds per week.

The sodium content yesterday was even worse than the day before.  Of course, it's based on the estimates and choices I made for those restaurant foods.  According to the app, I had 5,050 mg of sodium.  Just crazy!  Restaurant foods are SO high!

Bottom line for me is that I'm essentially the same this morning.  I had  hoped all that walking would counteract the calories, but now I'll blame the sodium for everything! LOL!

Today is all at home and all normal.  I went out to walk at 6:30 and completed .88 mile in 20 and 1/2 minutes, burning 77 calories.  At 10:30 I will do the 45 minute water aerobics class and then around 4:30 we will go to the gym for our weigh routines.  I also get to play Mah Jongg at 1 p.m.  Nice.

So here's today's food plan:
B'fast:  Fiber One, yogurt, blueberries   182 calories
Lunch: tuna, salad, cherries       354 calories
Dinner: salad with Parmesan cheese and Bacos, green beans, fish tacos  535 calories
Snacks: banana, SF jello, SF Popsicles     155 calories
Total calories: 1226
Exercise calories burned: 429
Sodium: 2,927  Not great, but getting better.  As soon as I buy low sodium green beans, it will improve because they are 1560 of that total.  Crazy. I have to get Mark to buy the low sodium ones from now on and add some Mrs. Dash to flavor them.  Shopping day is Thursday!

Happy Father's Day, Mark!

Today will be a wonderful Father's Day for Mark, I hope.  I'm taking him to the new Superman movie, treating him to a veggie chili lunch at Downtown Disney, buying him two new WDW suitcases at World of Disney, going with him to the hear the Eagles Tribute Band at Epcot, having dinner on me at Boatwright's in Port Orleans Riverside (a WDW resort), and finishing up the day with more presents from me and the kids.  Should be awesome!

The day is starting off with him cooking me (something wrong with that picture?) a new breakfast recipe.  He's making a "Mexican Breakfast Pizza" from the Diabetic Living Cookbook.  There's a low carb tortilla, with salsa, egg, green chillies, red onion, cheese, black beans, and avocado (for him only.  I hate avocado).  It's supposed to be 204 calories, but I'm subtracting 29 for no avocado.  So that's 175. 

I'm glad breakfast is going to be low because both of the other meals are going to be out.  I have no idea how many calories will be in the other meals.  I'll do my best to guess them for the LoseIt! app, but it's really very hard to do that.  Lunch will be a cup and a half of a 3 bean vegetarian chili at Pollo Campero. I am guessing there is plenty of sodium in that, too.  I usually add some onions, pico de Gallo, and chipotle salsa from the fixins' bar to it and get a fruit cup.  For dinner at Boatwright's, we are splitting two entrees, the vegetarian jambalaya and a Cajun blackened fish that comes with stewed green tomatoes and a fried grit cake.  That might change, but so far that's the plan based on what we saw on the menu online.  We will NOT have appetizers or desserts, and I don't plan to have alcohol,  although I don't mind if Mark wants to have some. It's Father's Day!

This morning proves once again why a serious dieter should NOT get on a scale daily.  I am UP one pound this morning to 266.5.  I am POSITIVE that it is water retention because I had 4,000 mg sodium yesterday, much to my surprise.  2 dill pickles accounted for 1500 of that.  Another 1000 came from a can of green beans.  Who knew?  I don't eat pickles that often, so I'm not worried about repeating that every day.  I do eat a can of green beans frequently at either lunch or dinner.  I guess I could try a low sodium brand next time.

I usually don't look at sodium content because I don't have high blood pressure, but I happened to notice it last night on the app.  I wasn't entirely surprised by the weight gain this morning because of that.  Still, I hate seeing a higher number.  I actually expect an even higher number tomorrow because of eating two meals out today.  Of course, we will be doing a lot of walking today.  It's about a two mile round trip from the car to the concert at Epcot alone, plus walking all around Downtown Disney adds about another mile.  I will also be careful to drink LOTS of water while we are walking all around.  Then tomorrow it's back to the new morning routine of an early walk, weight lifting, and water aerobics.  I just hope to force a two pound loss for the week by Wednesday when it's official.

Except for the high sodium yesterday, everything else went as planned.  I did the weights and I swam 15 minutes of laps.  It started to thunder and lightening, so we had to leave the pool before I did 20 minutes.  I ate exactly what I said I would except I ate 4 jellos and no Popsicles and I added a shot of whiskey on the rocks, bringing my total calories for the day up to 1287,  an excellent day.  That should not mean a gain in actual weight, but 4,000 mg of sodium definitely can mean a gain in water retention.  Because I don't usually monitor sodium intake, I didn't even know what is normal.  I checked a few websites and most say the average American gets about 3500 a day, but that the recommended amount is around 2,000.  One website said for people over 51 it should be only 1500 mg.  I will try to be more aware of it in the future because it's easy to check on the LoseIt! app.  It tracks fiber, fat, sodium, carbs,  and protein automatically along with the calories if the food is a brand name that it knows or a food pre-programmed into it.  If you throw something new at it, it just ignores everything except calories.

Happy Father's Day to all the fathers out there who might be reading the blog today. I hope you are going to have a wonderful day.  Being a father is a fantastic experience, I'm sure.  (that's based entirely on how great I think it is to be a mother.)  I think of my own father today, as well, as I'm sure many people do.  He passed away in 1988 and rarely a day goes by when I don't think of him or talk about him or quote him.  He had many quotable moments, for sure!  One of my favorite Bill Meese quotes has been how I lived most of my life, unfortunately.  I'm trying to change that idea now, but I still quote him on this many times.

When asked if he wanted to eat, he once said, "I'm not hungry, but I'm always delighted to eat!"

Yeah, that's an attitude I need to change!

More loss

Down another pound and a half!  I could hardly believe it.  This morning I was 265.4.  I am ecstatic.

It proves that what I do works.  Of course, I knew that because it allowed me to lose 117 pounds in a year in 2009, but I had strayed so far from the course that I had forgotten.

Eat right.  Exercise.  That's really it.

Yesterday I did what I said and ate what I planned with one exception.  I didn't eat the Bananas Foster. I ate a regular banana instead, so the calorie count was actually slightly less.  I did all the exercise and drank 8 glasses of water.

The really good news is that Mark is sticking to HIS plan, too, and is being rewarded by good blood sugars.  If he eats what he should, keeps his fiber up, and drinks his water, his whole body thanks him for it.

I did notice that I have been way too low in the fiber department.  The LoseIt! app tracks fiber and other nutrients if it's something in its programming.  Even if you create your own food through a recipe, you can also program the other nutrients besides calories.  I began to notice that I wasn't getting even half the fiber that I should.  Mark is being very careful to get 30 grams a day, but I was getting less than half that most days.

Easy fix: change up breakfast.  Yesterday I substituted a half cup of Fiber One cereal (14 g of fiber in 1/2 cup and only 60 calories) for the sausage links.  This lowered the calories, lowered the sodium, eliminated some more soy (not good for my breast cancer), and doubled my fiber content for the day.  Win, Win, AND Win!!  On top of it I added an 80 calorie container of Dannon Light and Fit Greek Yogurt (80 calories) and 1/2 cup of  fresh blueberries (42 calories).  It was delicious, filling, high in fiber, and lower in calories than my usual sausage and yogurt breakfast.  No reason not to eat that every morning.  So that's what I'm going to do today!

We are going to shul pretty soon.  Mark is reading haftarah today.  When we get back, we'll eat an appropriate lunch in the house, go to the gym to do our weight routine, and if the weather is good, go to the pool so I can swim some laps for exercise.  I'm looking forward to it.

Here's today's food plan:
B'fast:  Fiber One, Greek Yogurt, blueberries 182 calories
Lunch:  tuna, salad, and cherries  374 calories
Dinner: Deli flat, veggie burger w/cheese, salad with Parmesan cheese and Bacos, green beans 466 calories
Snack: banana, SF jellos, SF Popscicles 155 calories
Total calories: 1177
Potential exercise from weights and laps: 275 calories burned

You may notice that once I have a meal that works, I use it over and over.  This is the same breakfast as yesterday, the same lunch as the last two days, and the same dinner as every Saturday night that is in the house.  I'm okay with that. In fact, I read an article somewhere that said people dieting do better with less choices and more routine.  I can definitely relate to that.  I used to stand around the kitchen and wonder what to eat, or stand in the 7-11 and wonder what snack to buy, or go in a restaurant and be unable to decide.  So what would I finally get?  EVERYTHING.  Instead of making a reasonable decision, I'd start to order, or buy, or eat everything!  Or at least too many somethings.  I am WAY better off NOT having a lot of choices and just sticking to what works.  Plus, I have found that I don't get bored or mind the lack of variety at all.  Even when I was re-gaining this weight, I ate the same breakfast every morning unless I was in a restaurant.  Every Saturday we have had this same dinner for over a decade.  Neither Mark nor I ever tire of it.  So if you look at my food plan and think she's going to get bored, don't worry.  I won't.

Sun for me; Storms for them.

Yesterday the weather in the mid-Atlantic was very scary.  Tornadoes touched down near my old hometown of Laurel, MD.  Heavy rain and winds knocked trees and power lines down everywhere, and flash flooding affected many people between VA and CT.  Very scary.

Down here it was hot and sunny, just perfect.

I walked my 20 minutes this morning, and it was the fastest yet.  Today I walked .9 miles in 20 minutes and just last Friday I only covered .74 miles in the same time.

Mark and I also went to the water aerobics class for 45 minutes. It's a nice workout, but yesterday the sun was strong.  I got a bit red.  The class is 10:30 to 11:15 and then I paddled around and talked to people until noon.  Of course the pool doesn't want any lotion on your skin when you're in there, so I had showered first, as always, so 90 minutes in the strong sun definitely turned my shoulders, upper back, and arms pretty red.  I plan to do it again this morning, so I may ignore their signs about no lotion and put a little bit on anyway.

I ate lunch and dinner out, but I packed my lunch.  I had a salad with a can of tuna on it and a cup of fresh cherries, eaten poolside.  Dinner was at Lakeside.  The special was grilled wahoo.  We had to google to find out what that was!  It's related to mackerel and tuna, a huge, dense fish with a texture like a fresh tuna steak, but white and mild.  It was grilled to perfection.  Wahoo may very well be my new favorite fish! For my two sides I said no to the potatoes in butter sauce and chose a small side salad and creamed spinach.  I splurged with 5 ounces of white zinfandel.  My calories for the day were 1279 and 467 calories burned in exercise.

I am still getting on the scale every morning, so I was VERY HAPPY this morning!  I lost three pounds since yesterday morning, coming in at 267.1.  YAY!!  Sometimes the weight just comes off in chunks like that, so that's a good reason to check only once a week.  I hope to put the scale away and weigh only once a week, but I'm not ready to do that yet.

Now for today.  It's Shabbat tonight, which usually means extra calories because of the wine and challah. Here's today's planned menus and calories:
Breakfast: 1/2 cup Fiber One cereal, Dannon Light Greek Yogurt, Blueberries  182 calories
Lunch: can of low sodium tuna, tossed salad, 1 1/2 cups fresh cherries  374 calories
Dinner: 2 ounces Moscato wine, 2 ounces challah, 4 ounce hamburger patty, 1 ear corn on the cob, 7 steamed asparagus spears, 2 cups tossed salad   605 calories
Snack:  Mark's Bananas Foster cup  165 calories
Total calories: 1326
Exercise calories burned: 368

Should be a good day!

I hope everyone up north is finally getting some nice weather today.

Mark's Results

I'm back and there is so much to tell.

Tuesday morning went very smoothly.  Mark's new prep, which seemed very harsh, WAS actually very harsh, but it worked.  The Kissimmee Surgery Center was great and right on time.  He was scheduled for 8:30 and that's when he was taken back.  By 9:15 they called me back because he was already awake.

Results:
1. internal hemorrhoids: We think that was what the CT scan at the ER showed as a thickening of the rectum wall.  We also think he may have caused them by long term chronic constipation.
2. diverticulosis: Welcome to the club. I've had them for years.
3. hiatal hernia: This one caught us by surprise.

They also took biopsies from the colon, small bowel, and stomach.  Once those results are back, he will have an appointment with the doctor to go over everything.  When the doctor came in to talk to us in recovery, he said none of these things are too serious and won't require any further surgeries or major treatments.  Yay!  All good news.

As one of our FB friends said (yes, Saul, I think it was you), this is just all part of getting old!

It also explains how by changing five things in his diet, he has been able to get rid of all his pains and symptoms.  This is what he did:
1. Take lactaid consistently when eating dairy since he is lactose intolerant now.
2. Increase fiber to 30 mg a day.
3. Increase water to 8 glasses a day.
4. Decrease amount of cruciferous vegetables eaten.
5. Take Prevacid daily for GERD/heartburn.

Once he started doing those five things, he felt fine.  We are sure he never had just one problem, but several small ones all acting at the same time.  He has felt great ever since.

All Star Sports was as great as we anticipated.  The new club HEAL (Healthy Eating Active Living) was also great.  We liked the people and got some new recipes. 

As for my weight, I weighed 270.1 this morning, making my loss for the week 3.5 pounds.  It's deceptive because I had gained several pounds on the train trip south, as I reported in an earlier blog.  Still the official drop is 3.5. 

Since I do get depressed about weight, I have to admit that I'm disappointed.  I wanted to be in the sixties already.  Next time.

This blog is already long, so I won't go into details about what I ate the last two days.  I tried to make good choices and do some exercise every day.  I logged everything into my LoseIt! app as best as I could.  I will report those results.
Tuesday: calories eaten 1550
               calories burned in exercise 294
Wednesday: calories eaten 1426
                calories burned in exercise 168

On paper that looks pretty good, but I know my metabolism is as fast as a snail.  Whenever I am in the 1500 and up range, I usually just maintain.

Still, I was proud of myself for eating lunch, dinner, and breakfast at the All Star Sports food court, and NOT gaining.  That's an accomplishment.  I made good choices for every meal, at least as good as was possible in a place like that.  I had salmon salad for lunch, grilled salmon with vegetables and mashed potatoes for dinner, and a veggie-cheese-broccoli omelet for breakfast. 

Today I have walked my 20 minutes at 6:30 a.m. then at 10:30 am. Mark and I will be doing the 45 minute water aerobics class again.  I am packing my own lunch to eat out today, can of tuna on salad.  We are eating dinner out at Lakeside, but I'm usually pretty good there.  It will be fish and whatever two sides they have for the day, usually a potato and a cooked veggie of some kind.  I think I can substitute a side salad for the potato. Thursday is free wine night, so there WILL be five ounces of white zinfandel.  Then we will go to the free movie at Solivita.  Tonight it's Gangster Squad, which should be fun.

Stay safe if you are in the mid-Atlantic.  The news down here is making it sound like you could have some tornadoes and severe thunderstorms.  Hoping you all survive safe and sound.  We are going to be in the 90s and very humid with a low chance of rain, perfect for a day by the pool.  Oh yeah, that IS going to be my day today. 
               

Off to a good start this morning

I'm down another half pound.  I know my scale is not all that accurate, but I like seeing it anyway.  It was good to see a 6 in the middle of the group, 269.9.  I know that could change if I got on again, so I didn't get on again!  LOL!  (I'm so stupid sometimes.  I had to interrupt typing the blog to go shower and dress so Mark could wash the towels.  Of course, I got on the scale and it was 270.5.  I knew it.)

I swam 40 minutes yesterday in two sets, 25 and 15.  I wasn't swimming fast, but I was constantly moving.  We had a lovely day poolside because the weather was delightful.  It never rained here, or in Tampa when the game let out, so I guess we could have gone to the game.  Didn't matter.  Mark and I both agreed that we were very happy we had not spent over four hours in a car.  We spent those four hours at the pool, reading in the shade, swimming, and hot tubbing.  When we went home for lunch around 2:30, we watched the rest of the game on TV.  The Orioles won!  Nice.

I made only a few adjustments to the food I said I would eat.  Mostly in the dessert category because I hadn't realized that Mark made 8 servings of the Bananas Foster recipe.  I skipped all the evening snacks planned that came to 155 calories and substituted Mark's dessert for 165.  I also added a little Bacos to the zucchini at lunch and some Parmesan cheese to the salad at dinner.  All in all, my day's calories yesterday came to 1343 and I burned 439 in exercise. 

My LoseIt! program calculates calories burned in exercise, and I really don't believe the swimming calories.  It claims that "leisurely swimming, not laps" burns 439 calories in 40 minutes.  That really seems too much since "walking, 2 mph, very slow" for 40 minutes only burned 158, but I feel like I worked much harder walking than swimming.  Weird.

Today is a BUSY, BUSY day!  I just finished my 20 minute, 3/4 mile walk fasting.  That's supposed to get your metabolism going for the rest of the day, and it burns 80 calories.  Once I finish this blog and eat breakfast, I'll shower and dress and head up to the ballroom with Mark for a 9 a.m. lecture on hurricane preparedness.  We have attended it every year, but...be back after I shower and dress.

Okay, I'm back, all showered and dressed.  As I was saying, we have attended it every year, but it never hurts to hear it again.  At 10 we are running to the pool for a 45 minute water aerobic session, then lunch at home and Mah Jongg from 1- 4.  Then I can settle down and relax!

Mark's next two days will not be fun.  If you remember, he was having terrible gastrointestinal problems for months, so Tuesday morning he is finally having his colonoscopy and endoscopy.  Today he has a clear liquid diet and starts the prep in the afternoon.  Every time one of us has had a colonoscopy prep it's been different.  This one is the strangest of all in that he doesn't take the first dose until 5 his evening and then the second at 4 a.m.  This prep is mixed into 16 ounces of water to drink all at once and another 32 ounes of plain water over the next hour.  That's 48 ounces of water in one hour.  OUCH.  Then he has to do that AGAIN, all that liquid, starting at 4 a.m. His procedure is at 8:30, so they want him in there at 6:30.  That means we have to leave the house at 5:45.  He's very concerned that taking a second dose of the prep just an hour and a half before he has to sit in a car for 45 minutes is a BAD idea.  I hope for his sake that it works out okay, but I'm not sure I could do it.  That seems like way too much liquid to put in your stomach in one hour.  

If you've ever had a colonoscopy or similar procedure, you know that the rest of the day you feel a little tired as the anaesthesia works its way out of the system, and they tell you to take it easy.  Unfortunately, for us, tomorrow afternoon is the day our cleaning lady comes sometime between noon and 3ish.  She's usually here about 2 hours when she arrives, and she doesn't like us to be home while she's working.  We thought maybe he could lay on a chaise lounge by the pool all afternoon, but the weather is always iffy around here on summer afternoons.  So, what do two die-hard Disney fans do in this situation?  Book a room at All Star Sports!  LOL!

Yes, we are leaving the house at 5:45 a.m. Tuesday and returning Wednesday afternoon in time for the 2 p.m. Vegetarian Club at Solivita.  We joined but haven't attended any meetings yet.  Should be fun.

I'm not going to take my computer, so there will be no blog tomorrow morning or Wednesday morning.  Stay tuned for Thursday's blog.  For those on Facebook, I will be posting updates on there.

As for food, I'm a bit worried.  I've had three perfect days, and today will be the fourth.  Then I've put myself in a situation where I don't usually do too well, eating out.  We will eat lunch, dinner, and breakfast at the food court at All Star Sports.  It's entirely possible to eat well in that food court, but the question is will I?  I'll let you know on Thursday morning. 

Hey, Hey, Hay! Two Good Days!

Yesterday went as planned and went very well with only one change.  It POURED and thunderstormed about the time we were heading to the gym and the pool.  We did not swim, so after I did my weight routine, we walked 20 minutes on the treadmill.   When I do the treadmill, I tend to start at 2 mph and raise it to 2.5 about 8 minutes in.  Then I raise the incline to 1 and then 2.  I burned 110 calories in 20 minutes and got my heart rate up to 120.  I like that the machine can calculate that for you.

I ate what I said I would with a few adjustments.  I added a little Parmesan cheese and Bacos to my dinner salad and had almost three times the calories in blueberries.  Dinner was 466 instead of the predicted 275.  That was due to the extra stuff on the salad and a can of green beans that I also had with dinner.  My snack was totally different.  Mark made a diabetic dessert from his magazine, Bananas Foster.  Amazing.  It was 165 calories, so I had that instead of the ice cream and Popsicles.  My snack count came to 292 instead of the predicted 310.  So my day yesterday was 1206 calories eaten and 171 calories burned in exercise.  Not bad.  My reward is another pound gone this morning.

I am really looking forward to being in the 260s tomorrow.  It might happen.  I hit 270.5 this morning.  Once I am established on the right track again, hopefully by Wednesday, I am going to put the scale away for the week.  When I weighed in only once a week, which is recommended by lots of diet plans including Weight Watchers, I didn't obsess about it as much.  Then I was almost always pleasantly surprised by a weekly loss, even if it was just one pound.  One to two pounds is all anyone should reasonably expect to lose once the first week is over.  If I get on it every morning, or even multiple times a day, I start to obsess over every little up and down. I drive myself crazy, so that is NOT going to happen this time.  Back to the Basics!  Weekly weigh ins.

Today Mark is making our special Sunday morning breakfast.  It consists of either low carb pancakes or biscuits.  Today it's pancakes, plus 2 scrambled eggs and 2 of my links.  That means the rest of the day has to be a little lower somewhere to account for the bigger than normal breakfast.  I have programmed it in and hope it works.

Here's today's menus:
B'fast: Mark's special Sunday morning  (395 calories)
Lunch: can of tuna, 1 cup sweet fresh cherries, 1 steamed zucchini (292 calories)
Dinner: Mark's Spinach Alfredo from the Diabetic magazine and a can of green beans(342 calories)
Snacks: banana, SF jello and popsicles (155 calories)
Total planned: 1184

It's predicted to have massive thunderstorms this afternoon again, like yesterday.  So our plan is to head to the pool between breakfast and lunch for some sunning, swimming, and reading.  I'm reading Game of Thrones and can barely put it down.  Sitting on a chaise in the shade by the pool to read that book sounds like heaven.

Once it's lunch time, we will come home for a healthy lunch and watch the Orioles play the Rays on TV.  We were going to go to St. Pete for this game, but we don't want to drive over two hours in the thunderstorms to get home.  Nicer to watch it from the safety of our house.

It's going to be a great day!

One Good Day

Yesterday was a good day for many reasons.  I did all the things I said I would do in terms of food and exercise and was rewarded with a five pound drop in weight.  I know it's water, but it looks nice on the scale anyway.  It was also a good day because it was just SO NICE to be home and see people from here and just enjoy Florida. 

I started a new weekday morning routine yesterday, and I liked it.  I set the alarm for 6:10 a.m., snoozed once, and got up at 6:20.  By 6:35 I was out the door, with my RunKeeper and Pandora going on the phone. I walked 3/4 of a mile in 20 minutes, which is a horrible rate, but I was proud of myself for doing it.  When I returned, I had a few cups of coffee, ate my 3 links, played on Facebook, wrote yesterday's blog, all while watching Good Morning America on TV.  Around 8 I sat on the lanai for awhile because it was just so darn pleasant.  Mark had the iPad set up to play Good Morning America out there. I sipped a third cup of coffee, just enjoying the beauty of our back yard.  At 8:30 I went in and showered and dressed.  9 a.m. is time for the yogurt and Live with Kelly and Michael on TV.  We usually only watch the first 20 minutes. 

That means that by 9:20 or so, I'm ready to do anything else for the day that I like.  This time, at 9:30 I headed out to the salon for a pedicure and a haircut.  Mark had a haircut scheduled there in the middle of my appointment.  We finished up together and had lunch at the bar, where I was a very good girl, eating the grilled chicken on greens salad that I had planned to have.  The rest of the afternoon was spent around the pool in pleasant conversations and swimming.  Later we did some errands at the bank and grocery store and before going home.  Mark made an excellent dinner, TV time, then bed.  Beautiful day!

Now for the food diary.  I ate almost exactly what I planned yesterday.  I ate one ounce more of the challah with some margarine, forgot to eat the blueberries and popsicles, and underestimated the calories in the main dinner dish.  According to the LoseIt! app, I consumed 1419 calories and burned up 298 calories in walking and swimming.  That's a good day.  One day at a time, right? 

Today is Saturday. I'm not going to set the alarm on the weekends because I want my morning walking routine to be for the weekdays only.  I'm going to try to make the weekends a little different from the weekdays.  So I woke up naturally at 7:15, not bad. 

We will go to shul this morning, and there's a Bat Mitzvah today.  That's always a big trigger for food because there will be a sit down buffet luncheon.  A few months ago, we just left after services and did not stay for the lunch.  That's going to be our plan for today as well. It would be nice if I could control my eating at places like that.  Maybe someday I'll learn how to do it, but right now I have proven over and over that I can NOT do it.  Since I'm still at the early stages of this round of weight loss, I think it's best to walk away and go home for lunch.  If the weather stays nice, we might go to the pool later, and we are definitely going to the gym to do our weight routines.  The rest of the evening will be for TV.

So here's today's meal plan:
Bfast: same as always, 3 links and a yogurt (200 calories0
Lunch: baby carrots, string beans, can of tuna (240 calories)
Snack: blueberries (50 calories)
Dinner: veggie burger on 100 calorie flat bun, slice of fat free cheese, salad (275 calories)
Snack: banana, low cal ice cream, SF popsicles (310 calories)
Total estimate is 1.075. 

I'll report tomorrow how close I came on this.  I will do my 15 weight routine and hopefully either walk or swim in the afternoon if the weather is good.

One Good Day at a Time!

Back to Basics

The train trip home was great.  There's something exciting to me about boarding a train. I got that feeling just driving up to the station.  We had dinner and breakfast on board and watched the animated movie Hotel Transylvania before bedtime.  We couldn't afford the sleeper car this time, but we both felt that we slept pretty well in coach.

When we got off, it was POURING!  Thank you, tropical storm Andrea.  By the time we got to Kissimmee, the rain was lighter.  Mark picked up his comic books, and then we had a Subway lunch and did the week's grocery shopping at Publix.  Once we got home at last, around 2:30, it took NINETY minutes to empty the car and get everything put away.  We were EXHAUSTED.  At 4 we took showers, a short nap, and then went to Stonegate Grille for a salmon dinner before heading to the free Thursday movie.  This week's movie was Argo, something we had been wanting to see. It was really excellent.  The audience applauded when the plane was safe and when the movie ended. 

Now it's a new day and a new set of rules:  Eat right.  Exercise regularly.  

So the blog is going back to basics.  It started out as a way for me to keep myself on track when I was dropping the 117 pounds in 2009.   Around October of that year, I was drifting off track and started the blog to have some sense of accountability to someone.  I guess that was really just me needing to talk about what I was doing.  It worked and I got back on track. 

But anything can get too comfortable.  Lots happened, including the breast cancer.  The blog became a way to help cope with the scary details of fighting cancer.  Then it just became a daily travel diary sometimes.   I'm just using it as a diary of what I did.  Not what this was supposed to be about.

So here it goes.  Back to Basics.  Back to weight loss. 

I have to do it.  This morning I am up yet another three pounds.  I got on the train at 273.6 and this morning I was 276.3.  Just unimaginable. This morning I looked over my weight log that I keep in a notebook by the bed and realized that I have been in the 260s since last November and the 270s since January.  There has been a steady increase for an entire year. 

This stops NOW.

Last night I set the alarm for 6:10.  By 6:30 I was outside walking 20 minutes with my RunKeeper on and music playing on Pandora.  It was sunny and 70 degrees, perfect for a walk. 

Today I will eat the following:
Breakfast: 3 Morningstar Links, 1 yogurt  (200 calories)
Lunch: Grilled Chicken on salad greens, no dressing  (200 calories)
Snack: blueberries (50 calories)
Dinner:  Fish recipe Mark got out of the Diabetic magazine, salad, string beans, challah, wine (600 calories)
Snack: banana, 2 sugar free jellos, 2 sugar free popsicles (180 calories)
Total calories: 1230.

I have walked 20 minutes already.  Later I hope to swim 20 minutes in the pool in the afternoon if it doesn't rain.  If it's raining, Mark and I will probably walk in the indoor track instead.

I have to admit that walking is getting hard.  When I weighed 210, I could walk a 5k in a bit over an hour.  Now that I weigh 276, I can barely do 3/4 of a mile in 20 minutes.  My back was hurting after the first five minutes.  In ten minutes both hips were hurting and my left knee was screaming.  Not good.  This is how it used to be.  I thought those days were over.  I have to bring them back, starting today.

We are heading home and back to healthy eating.

Let's start with weight.  It's Weigh-In Wednesday after all.  This morning I was 273.6.  That's down a bit under two since I left for Herkimer.  Not great, but at least not worse than when I left Cindy's last Thursday.  Of course, for this whole trip up north, it means I've gained from 266.8 to 273.6, a gain of 7.2 pounds in six weeks.  Hm...a bit over a pound a week.  Too bad that didn't go in the other direction. LOL!

Well, once we get home tomorrow, we have exactly 8 weeks before our next big trip to California and Arizona.  Except for the five days when Lowell and Emily visit us, there are no big events or reasons to eat out or do anything to disrupt a healthy eating and exercise plan.  So...my plan is to get it together and start doing what I know I need to do. 

My goal is to lose 20 pounds in 8 weeks, which is a bit lofty.  A two pound a week loss is considered good, so 16 is what I should expect.  Often the first week or two will produce a bigger loss, so I'm counting on that to make that 20 pound goal.  It is a reasonable amount to expect if I don't backtrack too badly when Lowell and Emily are there.  The good thing about that is we will be very active and do a lot of walking, which always helps with the calories from eating out.

Mark and I both want to get back to the weights in the gym three days a week. I also want to make a commitment to walk every day.  Last summer I started walking 20-30 minutes first thing in the morning, before breakfast.  I had read that a morning walk before breakfast can ramp up the body's metabolism for the rest of the day.  I did it for about a week, which was my goal at the time.  This time I'm hoping to do it 5 days a week for the entire 8 weeks.  We also want to get to the pool several days a week or even get over to the morning water aerobics class.  Mark likes to walk in the afternoon, so if he does, I will go with him and walk twice on some days.  In the summer, it's too hot and humid to walk outside in the afternoon, and it's often raining, but we have the air conditioned indoor track.  We can always go there for an afternoon walk.  There are no excuses in Solivita for not exercising!

Also, when I eat all three meals at home, the calories are controlled.  As long as I get my evening snacking under control, I should be able to do okay.  (That IS a challenge for me!)  Mark still wants to eat out every Thursday night, but if we only go to one of three local restaurants where I know the menu well and can make good choices, we should be okay.  Often on Sundays we eat lunch out at Disney somewhere.  There are definitely places where I can eat an appropriate lunch at the parks or at Downtown Disney.  I have to be sure those are the places that we go.  There will also be some times when we get together with local friends to eat in restaurants.  Those will be the risky times.  They won't come up every week, but I will have to be very strong on those days, for sure.

Losing weight is hard and yet easy.  That sounds weird, but it's what I've learned to be true over the many, MANY years that I have gained and lost weight.  Of course, gaining is ALWAYS easy, NEVER hard, at least for me.  Here are the things that work for me to lose:
1. Count the calories.  Write them down in a food diary or log them on the Lose It! program.
2. Drink 8 glasses of water every day
3. Exercise 5-6 days a week: Walk, Swim, Lift Weights.

Seriously, that's all it takes.  Of course there are a million ways for those three simple things to fall apart every day.  Obviously, 2009 was a year when I pulled it all together for the entire year.  Then it's been on and off for the next three years until today when I've gained back a significant amout of what I lost.  That's my pattern.  I gained in my childhood, starved until I lost a lot in my senior year of high school.  Gained a lot in college, took diet pills and checked in with a doctor until I lost it in my first few years of working.  Got married and gained a lot slowly up until I had Lowell in 1979.  Didn't lose it and gained a lot more until I had the first kidney stone.  Joined Weight Watchers and lost a lot, got pregnant with Evey and gained it all back.  Gained some more until I got disgusted, joined Weight Watchers again and lost it again.  Got hit by a giant wall in the mall and gained it all back plus a LOT more, topping out at 322 over an eight or nine year period.  Got scared about the hernia surgery and lost 117 pounds in 2009.  Then I started chemo, gained more than half of that weight back in the last three years. How many times have I lost and gained a lot?  A LOT!!  Too many times.  Now it's time for the pendulum to swing back to the lost column.  I really thought that when I did it in 2009 that it was going to be the LAST time I had to lose any significant amount of weight.  Guess I was wrong.  Didn't count on getting breast cancer and losing control again. 

OKAY, that excuse is OVER.  Now I'm just allowing myself to be out of control.  That must stop NOW!  Time to get on the losing cycle again.

We are heading to the autotrain in about an hour.  I will be sitting on the train, no exercise, and eating dinner and breakfast on the train, not too controlled.  Okay, I can deal with that.  I really didn't plan on my healthy regimen beginning until Friday when we are home.  I will weigh myself Friday morning and then report it.  Maybe I'll make Friday my new weigh-in day.  Who knows? All I know is that I am starting to feel motivated and actually excited about going home and getting back on track. 

My 20 pound goal before leaving for California will put me in the 250s, which is about where I was when I went out west for our convention and vacation last summer.  The trick will then be staying in control on another four week road trip and keeping that motivation up when I return in the fall.  My overall goal is to get back to around 200, 73 pounds to lose.  That will take most of a year.  Wouldn't it be great to drive up here next June for Lowell's wedding at 200, size 20, instead of 273, size 26?  Yes, it WOULD! 

Visiting Jackie

On Monday we drove from Buffalo to Weston, WV to visit Jackie.  Although she has lived in that house for 20 years, Mark had never been there. I went out there 13 years ago with Evey.  It's a shame, but it's sort of out of the way.  For all of those years, Jackie drove into Baltimore for holidays with the family.  Still, the last time we saw her was a year and a half ago.

It was lovely staying at her house and having time to catch up on everything.

We also had time today to visit the graves of my parents.  My dad is in Weston and my mother is in  Cumberland.  It's so hard to believe that it has been so many years since I have been to those graves.

Now we are safe and sound back at Cindy's house.  So much fun here.  We will miss her!

Tomorrow the Auto Train and home to Florida.