inches be gone! don't you wish we could say that and they would all be gone? i'm starting week 4 of Phase 1 on the SBD. i wasn't strict with myself this weekend, but i didn't go crazy either. i had some pita chips, some dark meat, and a tortilla wrapped around my breakfast burrito yesterday morning.

this morning, i attempted to put on a pair of pants that have been sitting in my closet. a pair that is my size and should already be bigger (or so i thot). they are not bigger. they were actually quite tight and i didn't feel like fighting with them to get them zipped. WTF?!?!? this was the first time i actually veered from the norm of Phase 1.

i wish i could say that i'm going to start walking today, but after this weekend, i am whooped! i know, excuses, excuses. but i am dead ass tired! i'm still in Phase 1 and i'm feeling good. i just wish the inches would go away with the lbs and without me suffering this god forsaken texas heat!!

T~  ¶ 7:29 AM 0 comments

  recipe cheesy baked artichokes (nice side to the pinwheel steaks)

2 packages (9 oz each) frozen artichoke hearts (i used jarred)
1 tablespoon lemon juice
3 tablespoons ground pecans
2 tablespoons grated Parmesan cheese
1 teaspoon dried Italian seasoning, crushed
1 clove garlic, minced
1 teaspoon extra virgin olive oil

Preheat the oven to 375d. Coat a 9" glass pie plate with cooking spray.

Place the artichokes in a colander and rinse well with cold water to separate. Drain well, then pat dry with paper towels. Place in the prepared pie plate and sprinkle with the lemon juice.

In a small bowl, combine the pecans (i love my magic bullet), cheese, Italian seasoning, garlic, and oil. Sprinkle the mixture evenly over the artichokes.

Bake for 15 minutes, or until the topping is golden.

Makes 4 servings. per serving: 110 calories, 6g fat, 1g saturated fat, 5g protein, 12g carb, 8g dietary fiber, 0mg cholesterol, 170mg sodium

Enjoy! T~  ¶ 11:19 AM 0 comments

  the 10 spot so i hit the 10lb weight loss mark, yesterday! YAY! i'm so proud of myself...but still not feeling a big difference in my clothes. T~  ¶ 7:24 AM 0 comments

  weighing in well... i weighed this morning. no, i didn't reach my goal of 10lbs. i did, however, lose 9 1/2lbs. it wasn't quite to the ten mark and it wasn't just at nine. it was right in the middle of the two. i'm staying in Phase 1 for another week or two, just to jump start me. within the next week, i'll be walking and working out with the excercise ball so when i DO move to Phase 2, i think i may lose more than the usual 1-2lbs per week... hopefully.

tomorrow is manny's birthday. we're going to treat ourselves to a dessert (the one you see below). i think we deserve it. T~  ¶ 7:20 AM 0 comments

  i've been a good girl i was so good this weekend. i went to the cook-off and didn't eat or drink anything i was supposed to. YAY! i gotta say... it's not the same when you're not as drunk as everyone else. it's just not as much fun.

i weigh tomorrow morning. my official first two weeks of phase 1 are over tonite. i will be staying on phase 1 for a bit longer, tho. handyman has decided he will start next monday. i'll be helping him along. i can't eat things in front of him that he can't have.  ¶ 6:44 AM 1 comments

  how's everyone else doing? i'm not going to weigh again until next tuesday morning. i pray i can be good this weekend. handyman will be gone and the yaga's wild game cook off is happening this weekend and i have one of the cooking teams hanging out at my place all weekend. i also have a wedding reception on sunday. i'm not even gonna LOOK at the cake!

p.s. if my clothes are not loose by next week (post-bloat) i will be SO upset.  ¶ 8:22 AM 0 comments

  DAY 9 so we're a week and a day into the SBD. i think the three of us (manny, pollie and myself) have managed to stay on pretty good. even handyman said he lost 3lbs. and he's not even trying! he is, however, cooking me good meals so i try not to give him dirty looks when he cracks open a beer right. in. front. of. me! i miss beer. i really didn't think i would. i'm not a HUGE drinker, but i do like my beer.

also... i cheated. not on eating. but on weighing in. i wanted to wait until the two weeks was up but i couldn't stop myself. so far, i've lost 7lbs. of course, this is early morning weigh-in. isn't that the best time to do it? i'm really proud of myself but i know it would be better if i was walking. no, i still haven't started up again. i will. i am. i have my mp3 player to assist me, but it's still not the same as having someone call you and say, "let's go". that really does help. plus the fact that i feel really self-conscious about how i look out there. i know it shouldn't matter, but it does to me.
i'm thinking of ordering www.coresecrets.com just for toning purposes. any thoughts or ideas on that? T~  ¶ 11:24 AM 0 comments

  picnic in the park or on the seawall...whatever. today is friday. normally, the day reserved for "going out" to lunch. today, manny, bttycrkr, and myself went on a picnic. we all brought stuff for chicken wraps. all SBD friendly. pollie (aka bttycrkr) even brought me a splenda-blessed hawaiian punch. that stuff was YUMMY. i highly recommend it. manny had a splenda-friendly diet coke. tastes just like the real thing.
i'm doing good with the water. three days in a row i've filled my 2.2 liter jug and three days in a row, i've finished it. i'm on my way! T~  ¶ 11:00 AM 0 comments

  okay. i'll say it... i weigh 200 lbs. there. i said it. i think i feel better divulging that information to you. it's not my all time high (i think that was 202 a couple of years ago) but it's still enough to get my butt moving. i'm not giving that information to encourage others to give theirs. unless they want to, of course. i just wanted to get it out there. i'm not going to weigh myself again for another 2 weeks. i dread the morning weigh-in.
the only reason this comes up is because we were at work trying to figure out our height-to-weight ratio. we found a chart but then didn't exactly know how tall/short we were. we had ideas from past history. i haven't been measured since 7th grade basketball and they told me i was 5'5". and, of course, i rounded up which over the years, eventually became 5'7" in my roundings. my co-worker said, "surely you didn't stop growing then". so we had our maintenance guy come up with his trusted measuring tape.
sure enough, my ass is short... 5'5" and that's a BARELY 5'5". this, i thought, only meant that i had to lose more weight than originally intended. my LIFETIME goal is140. i don't know why 140. it just sounded like a nice round figure. i remember being that weight back in '95. i was a size 9 and still felt like a cow around my 3 MUCH thinner friends (one being a member of this blog). although i felt like that 10 years ago, i think i'd feel better now. i mean, c'mon... it is 10 years later and i am that much older.
the point of this entry being... well, i guess there is no point. other than i'm still short but my goal weight is still within my height range. oh... and i'm not a large frame, either, like i thought i was. i'm medium. that means if i weigh between 137-148, i'm all good. =) T~

UPDATE: since my post i've been looking at other charts. i found the "revised" version of the first chart i looked at. it says i should weigh anywhere between 127-141. are these people kidding!?!?!? apparently, that's the national standard because it's been on every. chart. since!
i also found a chart on some uk site that said i could weigh between 117-156 (much better). isn't there some allowance for age?  ¶ 1:03 PM 1 comments

  Snacks Popcorn. It's my new favorite snack food.

In case you didn't know, I'm on Weight Watchers. And we don't count our carbs. We count calories, fat, and fiber. And it's a successful program for me. I've lost 23 lbs, which I got to my lowest weight during my mother's funeral. So grief is an understandable weight loss program. And I've gained 10 lbs since December. And while I haven't gained my 23 lbs back, I'm only 13 lbs away from my weight goal. And, let me just say that at my lowest point, I hadn't been that weight since high school. Amazing.

But, I am digressing with my history. Popcorn is the issue here. As a kid, I never liked popcorn. And then when I got to school and lived in the dorm, I smelled more burnt popcorn than I cared to. It's disgusting and I will become your mortal enemy if you ever burn popcorn in my house. But, lately I've become this SNACKER. It's not like me. I get low blood sugar pretty regular, and about 3:30pm I get hunger pangs as if I never had lunch almost 3 hours ago. So I've encountered Light Butter popcorn. The whole bag is just 2 points for us WW folks. AWESOME! And keep it poppin'.
Because when you're hungry, you'll eat just about anything!   ¶ 7:39 PM 0 comments

  new invitee after discussing my weight issues with my co-worker/friend, brandi (who always has advice for me), i decided to "let her in". after all, she's been through this before, as well. who hasn't, right? brandi is on the Atkins diet. which has worked for her in the past. hell, it's worked for me, too. i just didn't stay on it long enough.
so, welcome brandi! T~  ¶ 10:47 AM 1 comments

  Recipes Oh, and I wanted to put in my 2 cents about recipes. It's all fine & dandy when somebody hands me a recipe and says "this makes a great dish!" Well, what else am I going to eat with it? Cuz a girl's gotta eat, and it's gonna have to be more than just one serving of that!

But, one of my favorite fool-proof (idiot-proof?) dinners is an easy one. Because I've learned from my mother - keep it simple, for stupid. And she's right. The easiest ones are the ones I remember, as well as make again.

So....here's my favorite tilapia dinner night:

Tilapia - I just take a casserole dish and spray with Pam. Lay the tilapia inside and squeeze lemon juice and put Cajun seasoning on top (I like Tony Chachere's best).
Cover and bake at 350 deg. for about 10 mins. Uncover and bake another 5-10 mins until done.
Serve with couscous - my favorite is the toasted pine nut version. Or, if you can find it - shiitake mushroom risotto.
Add a steamed veggie like broccoli or squash, and you've got dinner, honey. ~A.  ¶ 9:25 AM 0 comments

  Motivation Well, have to say I'm pretty impressed of Ms. Wonder Woman, Sweet T, whatever she's calling herself these days. Weight loss is a HUGE DEAL. And by the way, if I'm so effin smart cuz I went to BAYLOR, how come I didn't know better and not stuff my face so much so that I gained 25 pounds? And if I'm such a genius, how come I can't lose these last 10-13 lbs? Riddle me this, Riddler!?!

But, my oh so inspiring words of wisdom to Tari were "Get a support group." And since she sent me that link to an on-line group counseling confession, I knew that she was aching for a group hug. So here we be. Because it is the group that will help keep you motivated. My support group in Austin inspires me to keep on going, even though those last lbs are not easy.

My favorite quote from Destiny: "Minor adjustments lead to Major Achievements." well said. It's on my white board at the office for me to remember that it's the small changes I'm doing like drinking 6 glasses of water and walking around the 'hood for 30 mins that will make that "last 10 lbs fall off" achievement.

So, every day is a new day. Don't dwell on the days that you "fell off the wagon". The days that you are doing SOMETHING is always more than what you would have been doing.

Is that enough motivation for you today? Hope so.

~A.  ¶ 9:20 AM 2 comments

  feeling good about myself no, not because i've actually been excercising. and certainly not because i got up right when the alarm went off. but i did get up. and i did make breakfast. i think it was all the more cheerful just because i had molly ringwald and duckie right along with me. yes, pretty in pink was on. i love that movie. for no other reason than, i'm a dork and i love duckie.
anyways, i'm going to try and make it a morning tradition. we'll see how that pans out once i actually DO add excercise in the morning. wish me luck. T~  ¶ 6:01 AM 0 comments

  DAY 1 so it's day one and i've screwed up already. not entirely, but a bit. this morning, my plan was to get out of bed when my alarm actually went off and do a little excercise. not making excuses, but since i didn't get to bed til almost midnite (because i was talking to another friend about dieting) i was a bit tired.
handyman (my b/f), being the sweetheart that he can be, made me breakfast and lunch for today. the breakfast was more atkins geared - eggs and bacon. i ate some of the eggs and 1 piece of bacon. i didn't want to over-do it. for those of you who don't know, i'm doing the South Beach Diet (SBD). it's almost like atkins only it's low-carb AND low-fat. for dinner, last nite, he made a really good SBD steak and sauce with green beans that i packed up for my lunch today. so i'm back on track. T~  ¶ 7:23 AM 1 comments

  weighting for you this is a blog created as a support group for a few friends attempting to shed some lb's. while some of us only have 10 or so lbs to lose (it's okay...she helped create this blog so we won't hurt her too terribly) others in the group have A LOT MORE to get rid of. hopefully, we can help each other. give advice. share ideas, recipes, workout tips...anything. just offer support.

one of my best friends, addie, says that a support group is essential while trying to lose weight. she's a pretty smart girl (i mean, she. went. to. BAYLOR) so i don't take her advice lightly. she's part of this group and she'll offer up her advice from time to time, i'm sure, because she's been down this road.

use this blog for whatever information you want to share. track what you've eaten or what you did for excercise. if you get off track, use the blog for help to get back on. addie said something about "if it goes in your mouth, put it on paper". use this blog as your paper. we're just letting each other know how we're doing.

i think it's gonna be great and i'm really looking forward to not having to do this alone.  ¶ 7:17 AM 0 comments