Look What I Lost!

Okay, I didn't exactly lose Cavan... but he does weigh 22lbs which coincidentally is how much weight I had lost when I weighed myself on Friday. It was such an exciting moment for me as I also made it under 300lbs (cannot believe I am sharing that number on here!) and breaking that barrier was such a relief.

I had been stressing quite a bit over the last two weeks because I had been unable to make it to the aerobics classes that are offered here. Between a trip to Whitehorse, sick kids, sick adults and Matt on-call the timing just hasn't been working. Plus our kids have been sleeping so poorly that I am heading to bed before 9pm now just so I can nab a few extra hours when possible. After seeing that the weight is still coming off just by managing my eating, I stopped stressing about the aerobics. I am still active because I am chasing two little boys all day! We usually spend time outside each day so I am always on the go.

The focus of this meal plan is measuring serving sizes. I bought a digital kitchen scale in January and it has become my best friend. It looks something like this and was about $50 from Walmart:


I weigh out most everything that I eat and some days it sure is surprising what I would have considered a serving size. Cheese is always the one that makes me sad. I could eat a whole round of brie if you let me. Anyone out there working on losing weight, go out and buy a digital scale and make it your new best friend.

Lots of people have been asking what a day of meals looks like for me, so here is a sample day:

Now where it repeats an item in a meal, what that is allowing is for me to switch out half of something with an alternative if I want more variety. The website also allows me to swap a meal out for something different if I don't like it or don't have the ingredients. It gives a list of alternatives that have similar total calories.

Most days I am not hungry and am finding some of the meals too large- especially the salads. On days when I am craving something sweet I have some of the ready made jello in the cupboard that is just 5 calories a portion. That seems to help me through the day!

Weekends seem to be my downfall right now. The week allows for structured days whereas the weekend has zero structure to the days and we are on the go a lot. I readily admit that for supper on Saturday night I ate homemade chocolate chip cookies. Yep, that was my entire meal. I was making them to donate to a couple of groups raising money around town and they are just so good! I definitely need to keep working on my binge eating episodes, although they are occurring with diminishing frequency, so I am not going to beat myself up over it.

I have now lost 2/5ths of my yearly goal and am almost to the half way point. With ten more months left in the year, I have high hopes of smashing that goal! By the end of March I would like to be down another 8lbs for a total of 30lbs.

As I have said before, and I have to say it again- THANK YOU SO MUCH to all of the people who have been offering encouragement, support, personal stories, recipes and so much more. Most days those little words from people are just what I need to keep going at it and I appreciate it so much.