Well, this new year come-back was a bit on a slow pace until yesterday.  Yesterday was the first day this year, where I truly (enough to follow through on) had an urge to really analyze my diet or make healthy choices.  Many days this month, I felt like I needed a "bar atmosphere" in my kitchen.  I need a bouncer at the door, forbidding me to enter unless I have proper clearance...and I needed a server to cut me off when appropriate.  

I actually went back into memory lane over this idea, when I was twenty-two years old...One evening, I joined a friend at a club and we enjoyed a couple drinks called "long island iced teas".  That is really the last detail of the evening I recall.  To this day, I will never forget the astonishment of seeing large sharpie type "X's" on the top of my hands when I awoke.   Apparently, I was "cut-off!"  Where was that bar tender last week?!  Do they do house calls??? No need to bring alcohol, just a good large point sharpie marker!
Well, sadly there's not one coming and I am going to have to moniter myself.  So here is my menu today:
Breakfast: 3/4 peanut butter toast (I had to share with my little one)
Snack: 1 orange
Lunch: half veggie sandwich and protein shake
Dinner: Bowl of italian garden soup (with kidney beans added- and I can have up to two cups of soup) and a slice of homemade bread.
Total Calories: 1045...right where I need to be in order to start losing some of those festive holiday cookies I'm still packing around.

Here is my lunch...delish!  The chocolate protein smoothie is always good.  Also, veggie sandwiches are my favorite!

 Nothing like dinner done early!  This is essentially the zero point garden italian soup from weight watchers, but I added kidney beans.  It smells like the "Olive Garden" in my kitchen.

January 4, 2017

Happy New Year!!! My last post in this blog was exactly two months ago today.  Incidentally, it was the two months of the year that represent complete dietary mayhem for me, that I quit blogging about striving for a healthy BMI.  Why?  Well I guess I did not feel like announcing that I was making holiday cookies and eating them as if there is no consequence…making homemade pumpkin and apple pies and eating a slice or two a day.  Yes, folks I have skills in the kitchen that are fully utilized in the months of November and December.  Besides, have you heard the expression “never trust a skinny cook?” 

This all may very well sound like regretful words that I have spouted out throughout last year of this blog (camping diet blunder ring a bell)?  However, it is definitely not!  I have grown confident in my healthy lifestyle and know that I have truly enjoyed eating all the delicious foods while getting closer to an overall better health status.  Being ready to lose weight for your health, does not have to mean you will never have birthday cake, or Christmas cookies again.  In fact, that is a large part of why I am working on my BMI now…before I have to manage health conditions which do not permit eating certain foods at my own free will. 

Therefore friends, I invite each of you (if you are like me and have to work at dietary health) to join me in facing the post-holiday music.  Because I am buying what I’m selling, I have already done this.  The morning of Thanksgiving I weighed 138 pounds.  I currently weigh 144, a gain of six pounds to show for all my effort.  Also, I have stopped running because it turns out, I am a fair-weather fan of running and plan on resuming my hobby in the late winter/early springtime. 

Honestly, I am happy about this.  Last year, I began this blog twenty pounds heavier than I currently am.  My goal this year is to lose ten pounds, with a healthy BMI category only eight pounds away from my grip.  I hope each of those struggling to be healthy because of dietary or BMI related behaviors will take care of themselves to the best of their ability in 2017.  We all deserve the very best.  It is time to begin viewing our food for what it really is, a substance that has the potential to make us very healthy and happy!  Choose wisely!

Today’s dietary outline for Krista, complete analysis in supertracker.gov below:

Breakfast	Lunch	Dinner
Oatmeal w/ brown sugar & banana	Garden salad w/ goddess dressing and peanuts	Open faced lentil based “snobby joe” with baked potato on side

As you can see, I am not getting overly strict on basically the first day of counting calories in a while, also some people would critique my protein for the day, or lack there of...

My last post consisted of my saying I had one pound to lose and some successful "after" pictures to take...then all you heard was crickets.  Why?  You know why!  October gets me everytime!  It is a bit of a struggle because my family has two birthdays this month to celebrate- and I like a good birthday cake of course.  Then there is fall comfort food.  YUMM!  Soups, breads, latte dates.  Yikes!  Sometimes I wish I could be in January when everyone's focus is to live healthy and make good choices, but instead we American's like to sign out the year with poor dietary and financial choices.

In my big attempt to stay focused on God throughout the holiday season, I was reminded to keep focused on healthy choices as well.  It always makes me happier when I do!  So today is a new day!  I am weighing in at 139 and hope to work my way back into the upper bracket of "normal" categorical weight.  So for lunch I almost had a burrito when I remembered I could take that burrito filling (lentils, quinoa, and taco seasonings) and put it over a bed of lettuce.  Brilliant!  Why didn't I think of that before?!  It saves my about 120 calories, and I can say I had a salad for lunch instead of a burrito. Here is is:

Lunch today: lettuce, lentil & quinoa taco filling, olives, and homemade salsa.  Don't forget the water!

Honestly this whole refreshed attempt was inspired by discovery an oldy NOT goody picture of myself when I weighed much more, but I cannot even be sure because I tried not to weigh myself regurlary or at all.  I knew it was bad news.
Luckily, I am not stuck in the past, and even though I do love naughty varieties of fall foods, I also love the fact that I can get local fresh apples, pears, and squash.  So here is to a new chapter in this coming up on year long quest for a healthy BMI status.  If you are feeling like a lost cause in holiday diet blunders, just keep your eyes on the prize...and fruit basket!

 May each of your fruit baskets at home resemble this.  Don't be afraid to snack and enjoy these fall foods.  Go ahead and indulge!

Today is a pretty exciting day, as I am only one pound from my goal (I'm at 137), and technically if you add my half inch of height I usually exclude, I do have a BMI within the normal range.  I have worked so hard this year and I have been thinking about what I would say if I was to describe the secret to my success.
Overall, my success in weight loss has come down to reducing calories.  For others, maybe changing some choices (candy bars, chips, soda, or other junk food) would be a crucial change.  In terms of bad choices outside of portion, I have changed my policy on keeping ice cream in the house.  If ice cream is in my freezer, it tempts me and gets me all off track.  I love it, and I will eat it sometimes on a special occassion, but it will not be a staple in my house anymore.
This week I plan on making good choices dietarily and losing the last and final pound of this mission. As for this blog?  Well, I am going to take some "after" pics and post them.  From there on out I plan on making occassional posts about healthy meals I prepare or come accross just to keep myself and anyone else on track for a healthy BMI.
Ultimately my plan is of course to keep the weight off!  The whole reason I became inspired to obtain a healthy BMI was to take better care of my health and happiness.  If I am not doing that then I cannot expect much in return.  God has blessed me with good health, and I intend to honor it with good choices.  It can be hard to do because this world is filled with social norms that contradict healthy behavior.  Also, we each have individual needs that vary from one another.  Some people can eat freely without biological consequences.  Others do not have that luxary (like me).  I urge you not to let your individual differences become an excuse to be unhealthy.
Whoever you are, a person with a naturally fast metabolism, a person with obesity, a person managing health conditions, I hope you can love and honor your body.  Before I began this journey last year, I started to appreciate my body and realize I was holding myself back from my own greatest potential of good health and happiness.  That is insane, actually because I am quite passionate about healthy lifestyle habits.  I am guessing that I was not alone in doing this.  I hope my blog has opened some eyes to the fact that the greatest success is going to come from love and not negative feelings.  Do not talk about your body being doomed.  Recognize your actions, and take care enough to change them if need be.  Ultimately I wish each of you the best on your own journey.  

So it is a happy happy weekend post!  This weekend I was happy to honor a friend's request for German Chocolate cake for his Birthday.  I am always happy to bake!  I am happy to be in a kitchen creating my miracles.  Then I'm not always happy afterwards because I eat too much of my homemade goodness.
This weekend was different then the usual.  Saturday I went out to a sushi restaurant and since I was very hungry I went ahead and ordered an appetizer in addition to my avocado california rolls.  I topped off the evening by heading home for the German chocolate cake.  So I did not expect any progress on the scale today.  Much to my pleasant surprise, I was down to 138 pounds.  Only two pounds away from my minimum goal!
I also had an amazing run Friday evening.  About 4.25 miles of sheer happiness.  I came home feeling so rejuvenated and happy, it was amazing.  There is amazing feeling associated with taking care of your body, and I am feeling it!  Don't forget that working towards your goal is not worth missing out on special occassions and yes, cake with friends and family.

 Yes, vegans make darn good cake.  This German chocolate was delish, and the best part was sharing it with others after I enjoyed a slice.

 I highly enjoyed today's dinner: salad of spring mix with cucumber and toms and savory tomato soup made from roasted toms out of my garden.  Yumm!  Don't forget the full glass of water and that is one measured cup of soup.  

Fall is upon us.  I am sure I am not the only one to feel a slight bit of defeat in the dietary department.  Something about fall!  Homemade applesauce on my stove...soups...and there is my beloved bread and desserts that seem to taste better this time of year also.  Oh man!  My original plan to lose thirty pounds this year had me set to succeed by June.  I had no idea I would still be plugging along towards my goal in Fall, when I still have to obtain my objective, not just maintain.  What a deal!
Sunday I woke up pleased to see I weighed 139.  That's all I wanted, was to focus on losing one pound and I did it.  But of course I woke up Monday and today weighing 140.  I have to get re-focused on eating sensibly.  Today took me down an old familiar road, called I love to prepare food and eat it.  My stomping grounds!  I have no idea how many calories I had, and I know that while I didn't do anything dietarily BAD to my body today...I can also tell you I did not get any closer to my short term goal of losing one pound and getting in the thirties, where a healthy BMI awaits me.
I made applesauce and ate my weight in apples lightly sprinkled with cinnamon and sugar, took all the ripe toms out of my garden, roasted them in my oven, and made a delish tomato soup inspired by this web page: http://blissfulbasil.com/2014/01/08/dreamy-vegan-tomato-soup/ and basically snacked all day on celery and peanut butter or cauliflower and hummus.
Here is where the blessing was: I turned on my laptop to find inpiration for tomato soup and I saw my bookmarks included a link for this totally amazing tofu-free vegan pumpkin pie I found last year.  My kriptonite!  So of course I clicked on it and thank goodness the link to that webpage was unavailable. Blessings like this come to us.  I for one plan on taking the hint!  Hold off on the pie and do enjoy the applesauce or soups, but don't snack all day!

 Maybe my all time favorite fall food: homemade applesauce!

Today!  It finally happened today.  Last Sunday I indulged in a beautiful spread of food and watched Seahawks win.  It took all week to lose the two pounds I gained from my game day diet, and finally I am back down to 140.  Back down to one more pound to go until I'm in the 30's.  I can't wait to say goodbye to the 140's!
  I learned years ago from some class I took how important it is to focus on short term goals, in order to ultimately achieve an long-term goal.  I can't get all focused about the fact that I have lost 26 pounds this year and I'm trying to lose 4-6 more.  It feels tiring!  I feel like I am at the end of a long, challenging run and I'm tempted to start walking and congratulate myself for what I have accomplished so far.  I am tempted to quit and give myself an excuse.
I can't do that!  I have to ignore the big picture.  I am looking at one pound right now.  It is crucial that I just think about losing this one pound this week.  Even though the Seahawks play tomorrow. Even though I have already came so far and a friend of mine said I look great and don't even need to lose anymore weight.  I have to block all that out, and lose this one pound this week.  Short term goals are the key to a healthy BMI!
Good luck to all my fellow sports and food fans out there this weekend!