Slow Loser Status

I ran early this morning and am happy to report that I ran 30 minutes without stopping! C25K called for 28 minutes, but when I reached the 28 minute mark I felt good, so I ran on for a couple more minutes. I'm so lucky that my knees don't bother me at my age (knocking on wood!). All my bumps and bruises from my accident two weeks ago are mostly gone and the bruised rib feeling is much less bothersome now. I have to say that on my bike ride Monday night (the first since the accident) I was a little apprehensive about falling or another accident, but things went well.

Today is Wednesday and Wednesday is my WI day. I was feeling good about staying OP with eating and exercise and my morning visits to the scale indicated I might lose two pounds. I've told you before that I'm a slow loser. Always have been and I've got that hateful slow metabolism that comes with the fifth decade. When I stepped on the scale, I was amazed and delighted when the scale showed 3.2 pounds lost. 3.2 plus 3.6 from last week plus 2.8 from the week before =9.6 in the past three weeks. That doesn't sound slow at all. I'm definitely NOT complaining. I'll happily exchange my slow loser status for something more like DH's seeming ability to think about losing 5 pounds one day and achieving it the next.

It seems almost too obvious, but maybe my good losses have something to do with my newly revised exercise and eating habits. One major food change over the last several weeks is that I've really scaled back how much I eat at lunch time. I used to regularly have a leftover portion of my previous night's dinner. The dinners were pretty thoughtfully planned, but usually included some sort of whole grain pasta, brown rice or potato. When I re-read the CORE (WW) guidelines, they allowed you to eat all those things, but suggested you limit it to once per day. I did lose before while not limiting whole grains, but I lost more slowly. I've also tried to be more intentional about not "super-sizing" my portions, even of nutritious, low point foods.

Are you a slow loser?

194.8

So far, so good.

So far, so good on the exercise every day goal. Yesterday I ran 3.5 miles in the morning and then, last night after dinner I took advantage on the mild weather and late sunset and went for a 70 minute (14 mile) ride with DH. Today I watched E & J during the day, but am going to the gym to work out in about half an hour.

I tried a new recipe for Avocado, Mango, Tomato Salsa tonight and it's a keeper! I served it with baked Alaskan Cod, and we had corn on the cob and broccoli to round out the meal.

I'll post the recipe and a picture at the end of this post.

Tomorrow is my WI day and things are looking good to weigh in at least a couple "sticks o' butter" lighter. They are forecasting light rain for early morning, but I'll be out there for my regular "last chance" run before the weigh in.

I read something interesting last night in the book Eat, Drink, and be Healthy, by Walter Willett. He encourages people who are watching their weight to "spoil their dinner." Remember how your mom always warned you away from late afternoon snacks because you might "spoil your dinner?" Well, Dr. Willett, thinks that it's not such a bad idea to take the edge off your appetite before dinner. A healthy snack an hour or so before dinner might be a good strategy to moderate over-eating at dinner time.

How about you? Do you "spoil your dinner" with a healthy late afternoon snack?

Avocado, Mango, Tomato Salsa

Ingredients

• 1 mango - peeled, seeded and diced
• 1 avocado - peeled, pitted, and diced
• 4 medium tomatoes, diced
• 1 jalapeno pepper, seeded and minced
• 1/2 cup chopped fresh cilantro
• 3 cloves garlic, minced
• 1 teaspoon salt
• 2 tablespoons fresh lime juice
• 1/4 cup chopped red onion
• 3 tablespoons olive oil

Directions

1. In a medium bowl, combine the mango, avocado, tomatoes, jalapeno, cilantro, and garlic. Stir in the salt, lime juice, red onion, and olive oil. To blend the flavors, refrigerate for about 30 minutes before serving.

Off and Running

I love that first day of school, new notebook, brand-new-sharpened-pencils feel that comes with Monday morning. It's full of possibilities and so appealing to my optimistic soul. So this morning I got up before the alarm and had finished breakfast and was on the running trail before 7 o'clock. What a great way to start the day and the week.

When I got back, I took a quick tour of my garden babies. Here are a couple pix of some of the current

stars that I promised to show you.

That's a knockout rose, my day lily bed, and some hellebore (the green flowers) and a coral honeysuckle.

My Spring Focus goals are going along swimmingly. I wanted to lose 12 pounds between May 4th and July 4th and so far I've lost 9.8 pounds (as measured at my 'official' WW weigh ins). I set a goal to drink 8+ cups of water daily and, except for a couple of days where I knew I wouldn't be able to get to a "facility" easily, I have done this. I think this is a keeper. Having this habit keeps me feeling full. If I get the urge to munch before meals, I have another glass of water and lose the urge. It also does a great job of flushing extra sodium (like from our splurge dinner out at P. F. Changs!). I've also been keeping better track of my portions for a couple of weeks. This has gone okay, but I think the exercise has served its purpose (to make me more aware of the correct portions) and will go back to using my best judgment.

My new short-term goal will address exercise. I want to do some intentional exercise every

day; something over and above the normal exercise I get going about my everyday routine. I'll continue to do my running (week 8 of C25K) 3 or 4 days a week. I'll also bike 13-15 miles a couple of days a week, go to the gym to lift weights 2 or 3 times per week, and do exercise on my Wii Fit as a last resort if I have not managed any of the other three options in a day. I enjoy the Yoga and the Tennis (the Grand Slam Tennis is miles better than the Tennis that comes with the Wii console). I think I can manage every day. I have previously tried to exercise five times per week, but I want to ratchet things up a bit.

My darling grand babies are here (not the garden ones, the human ones). E, dressed in a sparkly, Disney Princess costume, is sitting on her little green potty and watching Sesame Street. J, is in his high chair attacking some chopped strawberries with gusto. I'm going to sign off and play now. Bye!

Home Again

We got back from our fabulous Colorado trip last night. There is nothing like sleeping in my own, comfortable bed. Oh, and my scale and I had a good reunion. It agreed with the WW scale at a Colorado meeting that I'd lost last week. Somehow, I started fearing that maybe it was the high altitude that made the scale number lower at my WI. LOL I set my alarm to get up early and run, but instead turned it off to sleep later. Finally, when I got out the door, it was 10 am and heading toward a very humid 80 degrees. I appreciate the extra oxygen available here, but the muggyness is awful. Note to self--next time, get up out of bed and run, early.

I decided to repeat C25K week 8 as I mostly hiked rather than ran last week. I had to walk for a couple minutes in the middle of the run section, but I'm happy with having gone out to do it. I'll just have to be smarter about getting out earlier.

I love my garden. I went outside, barefoot, in the dark last night to check on how my babies were doing. Fortunately we had rain while we were away and it all looked good. I'd planted a new garden bed just a couple days before we left and it's thriving. Mostly herbs and perennial flowers, but I did put in a couple tomato plants. The orange day lillies have started blooming and look great near the blue catmint and the purple phlox. I'll post pictures later.

The fridge is pretty bare. I need to get to the store to replenish my staples. I'm actually almost craving my go-to cottage cheese and fruit lunches after a week's hiatus.

I wasn't quite ready to do this yet, but I joined a body fat% challenge on Greta's blog that required me to post my current weight. As of my last WI, I'm officially in "onederland." My weight this morning was 196.4.

Temptation

I grew up knowing those familiar phrases from the Lord's Prayer: " . . .lead us not into temptation, but deliver us from evil . . . ." Those phrases really spoke to me today.

You may know that DH and I are wrapping up a trip to Colorado. He had a business conference Wed pm through Fri, but we came on Sunday and have been having a marvelous time exploring this beautiful state. You may also know, that DH (who is a WW lifetime member) and I planned pretty well so that we could stay on plan with diet and exercise during this trip. And, you may have read, in my last post, that I found a WW meeting and bagged a 3.6 pound loss yesterday.

All well and good. So today was the first full day DH was involved with his conference. I slept in and enjoyed my strawberries and cereal breakfast on the deck outside our room overlooking a lake and a mountain. (Cheyenne Mountain Resort gets 4 stars in my book!). Then I spent some time reading in the blogosphere. And then I got my wonderful day. I drove to a very nice mall I'd spotted and got a pedicure (my very first, but surely not my last!). By then it was near lunchtime and I went to a California Pizza Kitchen and (despite nagging temptations from the pizza pages of the menu) I managed to order a nice grilled chicken salad (the Moroccan) with roasted butternut squash, cubed beets, dates, and sliced almonds . . . dressing on the side. When the waitress asked if I wanted a half portion, my immediate thought was "NO!," but I asked how big it was and she said the half portion was plenty. And it was. Victory. I firmly closed the menu on the dessert section (this was lunch time, after all). Then I had another treat. I went to the movies. By myself. I saw a chick-flick (Letters to Julliette) that I'm sure DH would have politely watched, but not enjoyed. There were about 100 people in the theater, all women. And I walked right past the popcorn/candy counter that had the not-so-subliminal suggestion in screaming huge letters, "Buy some goodies! Eat while you watch the show!"

DH and I rendezvouzed at the hotel about 4:30. He wanted to go work out in the gym. I should have gone too, but I didn't wanna. I like my own gym, where I know the machines and the right settings. [Whine] So I stayed in the room while he went to work out. Bad decision. I was leafing through the info in the hotel notebook and noticed the gift shop. I also noticed that it stocked "goodies." What is it with 'goodies' today??? I lied to myself that I might buy something for the grandbabies and went to check out the gift shop [read 'goodies']. I could use a walk, right? I made a show of looking at the t-shirts in the small sizes, but I was really looking for the candy. There it was, they had Snickers, M&Ms, Reeses PNButter Cups, and bags of chips, my favorites. WHAT was I doing?? I threw myself out of the door and walked back to the room. Why is it that I was feeling on-top-of-the-world yesterday with my weight loss, my rediscovered self-control, and today I'm flirting with devil-candy??? And the day was not yet over.

At dinner, DH had an official dinner (to which I was not invited). I knew from the beginning that this was true and tried not to feel left out. I'd had a great pamper-myself day. I made plans of my own for dinner. I'd go to Macaroni Grill. I knew I could get an OP dinner there and there is one close to our hotel. I got there, got seated, and managed to stave off the (mouth watering) warm bread with olive oil. I nipped it in the bud when the waitress started to pour the olive oil into a dish on the table. "I won't be having any bread." Yay me. Bread is NOT my friend. I feasted on the menu discriptions and flirted with the idea of throwing my plan away, just for the night. They have pizza on their menu, too. I had asked for a make-your-own pasta form when the waitress brought the menu. That was my go-to, safe plan. I did it. I ordered a whole wheat pasta dish with veggies & chicken, and a green salad. Hold the croutons, hold the cheese, EVOO based dressing on the side. The waitress asked if I had allergies. "No, I'm a weight watcher," I answered. After that, there was no way I could give in to the desserts. I escaped! I think I've made it through the day. I'm home. DH is watching the end of a playoff game while I write this, then we're going to the heated pool (overlooking the mountain and the lake) and the pool-side hot tub before we sleep.

I hate temptations. I'm not good with temptations. I'm weak. Thank you Lord, for seeing me through today. Please, don't let me fall prey to temptations tomorrow. Or the next day.

Wordless Wednesday, WI

WI today: - FOURTEEN Sticks o' Butter!

(maybe it was all the planning for success, drinking water, and exercise!)

Coming Down from the Mountain

I'll try to keep this short(er) today. We slept late-ish today and, after our Starbucks lattes and strawberries & cereal breakfast, we headed up to Rocky Mountain NP. Both of us finally felt that we'd overcome the lack of energy caused by the high altitude. We consulted with a ranger and decided to do a 6 mile hike, with a 560 elevation gain, to Cub Lake. The climb happened in the first 2.3 miles of the hike and took us a long while. Once we reached the lake, the downward 3.5 miles went fairly quickly. Great views, some new (for me) birds, including the mountain bluebird, and a fun time. We again had our picnic lunch along the way and had lots of water. It was a challenge, but I felt great afterwards and am glad we did it. I'm in love with the Aspen trees. We don't have these birch-like trees in Virginia, but they are graceful and beautiful to look at. The other predominant tree in RMNP is the Lodgepole Pine. Unfortunately, in the park, as well as in several other western states they are under serious attack by a pine bark beetle which is fast killing great numbers of them.

Tomorrow we will drive across the park and head on down to Colorado Springs. DH's conference starts tomorrow evening and I'm sure I can find ways to entertain myself for a couple of days. I seriously need to get a run in--my running shoes are going to sue for abandonment. Tomorrow is supposed to be my WI day, but it looks like I'll probably go on Thursday, instead, because we won't roll into town until mid afternoon. I'm really hoping that I lose well this week. I miss having my scale along to keep an eye on things. For me, when I stop weighing myself every day, it means I'm avoiding acknowledging gaining.

I know people have different approaches to weighing. Do you weigh yourself every day?