Tracking Day 7

Wow, a full week of tracking. A big thank you to Jen for issuing a personal challenge, that I took on myself as my own challenge. I really needed this wake up call. I have a lot of resources at my disposal that I wasn't using to it's fullest potential. I am paying for weight watchers and I hate paying to gain weight. So I need to use all the tools that others have proven are successful.

Moving forward I am going to continue tracking, obviously it's working for me to keep me mindful and stop the mindless munching!

I love ice cream, really it's my biggest weakness, as of late, I've been craving coffee shakes. Those are not very point-friendly. While I was at the grocery store, I saw that Bolthouse has a Mocha Cappuccino drink, it actually tastes pretty good on it's on, however I blended it with a couple of ice cubes and voila! It tastes very similar to a coffee shake! And 8 ounces is 4 points. Not a bad snack or after dinner treat! It's also got a lot of protein in it, which would help keep you satisfied longer.

My Gruve has been green for 3 days straight. It seems that I don't have a problem when I am off from work, but when I am at work, it's very difficult to get my Gruve to green. I am going to have to work on some solutions to help with that.

Today, I ate 30 of my points. So technically, I still have 4 points left for the day, but since it's late in the evening, I highly doubt I'll be using them.

While at the grocery store, I came across this juice and thought that I would share it with you. I love watermelon and this is actually a light flavor. I think it would be good as maybe a slushy or as a base in a smoothie. It's ok by itself. Satisfies that juice craving for only 2 points a glass!

 I am going to weigh in tomorrow, not sure what to expect, it's a little short since I just weighed in on Friday. However I'd like to get back on track with my regular meetings/weigh in day.

Tracking Day 6

Another full day of summer fun! DBF and I got up early and headed to Hampton to see my parents for breakfast while DBF helped out with a couple of computer problems they were having. Dad and I were able to talk and he showed me his garden, my goodness it was overflowing with vegetables. Ben and I went home with a grocery bag full of cucumbers and big tomatoes and cherry tomatoes.

After Ben had finished with the computer issues, we went to my work to help volunteer for the MDA Boot Drive. A cause that my union local is very passionate about, every summer we do a voluntary toll where vehicles can donate to the MDA fund. It was a great day to be outside, both Ben and I agreed that traffic was a bit slow, which led to donations being a little down. However we were there early to help out, hopefully at the end of the day it was a successful event. Every little bit helps!

Before leaving Hampton, we tried to stop in to see my grandmother (she loves Ben) however we went into her room she was asleep, so we decided not to wake her up. And off to Newcastle Commons we went. We met up with his mom for a late lunch. What a great day out! With the sea breeze it was just a little too cool for me, but perfect for Ben. We had a great time just relaxing and talking and enjoying everyone's company. Then we said our goodbye's and headed into Portsmouth to go see "The Expendables" at the movie theater. It's defiantly a guy's movie. I got good girlfriend points for going.

Then finally headed home. Two long days, but both packed to the gills with fun! I was out enjoying my life and everyone in it.

Food wise I was trying to be smart and make good choices throughout the day. Although I didn't meet the good health guidelines, I still tracked. Which at the end of the day is what is important to me.

Today I used 36 points, taking 2 more points from my WAP allowance. I am pretty excited about how successful I've been tracking. Especially how much more conscious I've been with my eating and the types of food I've been eating.

Tracking Day 5

Sorry for falling behind in my posts. I promise, I've still been tracking, but I haven't been a good blogger and posting such here. This weekend was kick a$$, full of great weather, good friends and fun!

Saturday I got off from work and headed to Patch Wood Farm to get the animals ready for the Sandown Old Home Days Parade. This is the second year that the farm (and I) have participated. DBF brought out the "other woman" his 1970 Mustang to lead off the farm. Then it was the goats, horses, Sal the donkey and all of the dogs! We ended up being the tail end of the parade (on purpose? since we had the horse waste to deal with) but all the kids seemed to love seeing all the animals. We were the only animals in the parade. The parade was well attended this year, both in parade attendees as well as people in the parade itself.

After we finished putting away all the animals, we went and grabbed a bite to eat and then parted ways. DBF and I went home where I promptly took a nap! (I guess the night shift and the parade took it out of me!) After a few hours, I woke up and was able to get myself cleaned up and off to a friend's for a bonfire get together. It was great to see this group of friends as I haven't seen them in awhile. It was a late night for DBF and I but well worth it.

I love summer!

As far as tracking, I used 36 points. So I used 2 of my WAP points, but that's what they are there for!

I am feeling really good about tracking my food and getting my Gruve green. These are all positive changes. You can still enjoy your life and loose weight.

Tracking Challenge Day 4

Well day 4 and I am still going strong (over halfway!). Still tracking. I had a bad day, still tracked, but I wasn't making good food decisions. I do well when I'm not at work. I can identify that work is still a big weakness for me. I do strive to be better while I am at work, it's just going to take some hard work and dedication on my part. (Read: fried dough for dinner is NOT acceptable - but tasty)

I still managed 33.5 points total for the day, leaving me .5 points left over of my daily allowance.

What I am also impressed with is that I've managed to be consistent with my multi-vitamin and other medications, I've been very lax about taking them (obviously none of them are for chronic illnesses) but when I am tracking, I enjoy checking off those little boxes and seeing that smiley face, like I've done something good! (which I have) I am sure my doctor's will also be happy that I am more compliant with my medications.

All in all not a bad day. I weighed in today, but that will be in a separate post. Tracking works folks! I am so happy that I found Jen's post about her goal to track and that I piggy-backed on it and made it one of my goals this week!

I am obviously going to try and attempt to continue tracking my food beyond this weekly challenge, but probably won't be posting it like I am for this week.

Tracking Challenge: Day 3

So just to catch up, I will go ahead and post today's results (Wednesday). I woke up this morning in Boston and was able to make my way home, back to New Hampshire; before coming into work tonight. I love using Boston Transit. (MBTA) it's really wonderful and convenient. My friend's place that I crashed at is about a 10 minute walk to a T-stop. So it was nice to have a chance to chat with her. I rode with her to her work, and then got to see her office before saying my goodbyes and heading north. BTW, how she can work THERE is beyond me! I'd be so tempted!

I was able to get home at a reasonable hour, since all the traffic was heading into Boston, it was easy to get out of Boston. So happy when you go the opposite way of traffic! Once home, I grabbed a salad from a local pizzeria and checked my facebook feeds, grabbed a quick shower and headed into work. Of course once I got to work, I realized that I didn't pack anything for dinner, so after looking at the take out menus at work, I decided on some ziti and meatballs with another salad.

Salads are my go-to meal to get some veggies in. I don't ever get sick of salads. DBF on the other hand, doesn't like them as much as I do.

So how did I do today? Well I used 33.5 points, out of a possible daily of 34. I am happy about that!

I am going to try to go to my WW meeting tomorrow and weigh in. My typical weigh in day is Tuesday but with my work schedule, I haven't been able to go on my usual day. I am not sure what to think, whenever I weigh in around my night shifts, I tend to be up at the scale, a day or two later, I am back to normal or even losing. I've also had two nights in a row of late eating (due to schedules) so I am sure that doesn't do well when weighing in!

So I am not sure what my "official" weight will be tomorrow, but I know that I've been tracking and I'm pretty proud of that fact. And hopefully next week, I'll be back to my regular WW schedule!

Tracking Challenge: Day 2

So I did ok today. Out of the week, today (Wednesday) was the day I was most concerned about. I was heading down to Boston for the night, and I didn't know what my food options were going to be so late at night. I had a late meeting (it didn't get out till 10pm) so there wasn't much open in the way of food and I wasn't too keen on the idea of eating that late. However, by 10pm I was starving.

Again, a peeve of mine is trying to support local businesses but still trying to find nutritional information, this again happened today since I was trying to get information about my smoothie this morning. I guess-timated as best I could and again felt that I over-estimated just in case.

I did manage to find a place to eat in Boston at 10 pm at night, McDonald's, oh those golden arches.... Still trying to keep my soda free status in place, I opted for water. But man, the staff was really trying to push the soda on me, no wonder it's a no brainer for anyone else, but hey, I am trying to be conscious about this!

McDonald's put me way over my daily points and I had to dip into my WAP, but that is what they are there for as Roni reminded me on twitter this morning. I guess I've just always told myself that I shouldn't use them, but there are occasions that they are practical.

My total points for today was 54.5! So I used 20.5 of my WAP and I have 14 WAP remaining for the rest of the week.

One side note, my Gruve was glowing green that night for sure! I had a little time to kill before my meeting so I took my time and walked around some parts of Boston (I had enough time to walk, but not enough time to eat. I was also in a part of Boston where it was all sit down restaurants.)

Tracking Day One

So day one... well it went fairly well. DBF and I took a late evening walk (3 miles) and we didn't get back home till about 9:30. We were both starving for food and didn't feel like cooking anything, so we ordered pizza, but I didn't feel guilty, I had eaten well all day and I was tracking my food.

I always do well tracking for the first few days, and then I loose interest. I am hoping that Jen will call me out if I am slacking. I'd really like to get a full solid week in.

So how did I do? Great, I thought! I have 34 points a day to eat with. yesterday I ate 34.5 worth. (thankfully I have those weekly allowance points) I also did track my activity however I am going to try and refrain from using those in calculating how much I can eat.

One note of minor annoyance is whenever I go out to eat or do take out. I try to buy local. I try to support the local economy. However it's difficult to track points when they don't have their nutritional facts either on their website or in the business itself. I had to guesstimate and even then, I tend to go heavy, just in case.

This challenge stemmed from Jen and her weekly goal to track her food and try to hold herself more accountable for her food intake. Tracking my food for at least one week has been a monthly goal in both July and August for me. I am looking forward to crossing that one off!

I do feel more aware of what I am eating. I don't want to track it so I don't eat it. But I am eating my points.

Technology note... if anyone knows how to get a full screen shot of the WW tracker, I'd be more than happy to post it here. But the print screen option doesn't work since there is a scroll bar involved. Or even take a screen shot of my WW iPhone app.

Do you know the weigh...

Sorry everyone. If you've followed me for any length of time, you know that I work shift work. My schedule is a 8 day week on an 8 week rotating schedule. So there are times when I am working when I have my Weight Watchers Meeting. My meeting is currently the Tuesday at 9:30am. I wasn't able to go last week, or this week. I should be back on track though for next week.

However, last week I wasn't able to weigh in till FRIDAY! It seemed foreign to me and screwed my week all up. I did enjoy the meeting although there wasn't much participation from the group, I kept talking and they all listened, but part of why I enjoy the meeting is to hear other people's successes/struggles.

Any who, here is the stats:

Last week's weight: 294.8
This week's weight: 296.6
Gain: +1.8

Total loss -17.2

Ugh, probably part of the reason for my delay in posting is that I was really upset to see a gain this week. I had a mini goal that I set to get my gruve to green at least 5 days this week. In fact it was the opposite. I only achieved green twice this week. My sedentary job sucks. Since I work for a tourist community, summer is our busiest time. The past 2 or 3 years have been very wet and cold for the better part of summer. This is the first summer of great beach weather. And it shows, everyone is coming to the beach! Which is great for the local businesses, who could use the boost in this slumping economy.

However, since the beaches are packed, my job gets busier, and when there are emergency calls going on, I have to sit at my desk and be attentive. There will be times I don't move for at least an hour. Ever since I've been more conscious of my health and lifestyle I've been moving more, this is the one aspect I've struggled in, the one season I struggle with. I've started pacing in my dispatch room to help at least get the blood flowing. But it's literally 5 steps one way, turn around 5 steps back. (Read: my room isn't very big)

Last week especially didn't help as I worked 2 extra shifts (20 hours) on top of my normal 48 hour. So it just made for a long week. Not that it's an excuse, but I like to track my weeks and see if there is anything I can do to help.

I am not sure when I will get a chance to weigh in this week, although the Friday meeting would work again this week. Who knows. However, I do know one thing, I will go to a Weight Watchers meeting this week... got to work on those August goals of mine.

Speaking of my goals, as I was reading through my google reader a post came up that inspired me, Jenny from Diary of a fat girl on her way to being a healthy girl, posted about her weekly goal to track her food. And since one of my goals this month was to track my food for at least one week, I thought, hey why not join her. My purpose is two-fold. Not one would I like to help Jenny reach her weekly goal, but also I could use the motivation (kick in the ass) to get my tracking done. I've become so lax with tracking and it's only hurting myself. I mean look at my numbers, obviously something is wrong. I need to be more conscious of everything I am eating/drinking.

This past weekend, DBF and I had a wedding to go to. I was slightly nervous about food, turns out it was family style service for dinner (one big bowl in the middle for all to share) and after everyone had their servings, the staff came around with seconds... DAMN, people, don't you know! Of course the bread basket was placed right in front of me. These were homemade biscuits people... delicious. I only had one, I had my piece of chicken (which had the skin cooked on it, so I removed it) and some potatoes and green beans. But only one serving of each!

I am still going strong in my Soda-Free Summer Challenge. I haven't drank soda since June 21st. Shrinking Amber asked me if I would continue to not drink soda, even after the Labor Day end date. While at said wedding this weekend, I had a bud light, and I didn't care for the carbonation. So I think that carbonated beverages will be a rarity for me from now on. I have my love for my water and my crystal light! The only place that I always drank soda was at restaurants. But now I enjoy having lemonade (and most places do carry it). I don't seem to be missing it. The only side effect I've noticed is that I have been more tired recently, and I've been drinking more coffee lately. But since I am not getting the caffeine from soda, I am sure that my body has just been craving it in another form.

My goal this week (in addition to my monthly goals) is to get my gruve green at least 5 days this week!

So on that note, it's time for me to refill my water bottle!

Have a great week folks!