I'll take it!

Down 1.6lbs this morning! I saw a better number yesterday morning but I'm fine with that! I would have been OK with any loss actually! Last night went well. I had 14 points still when L came over. We had this yummy chickpea/feta recipe that L made on pita bread. I had 2 of them so that was 6pts. Then we also had 2 caesars (hello Mr. Sodium!!) = 6pts. Some veggies and dip (1) and a cravings cheesecake (1). So I stayed within points. Just probably went over on the sodium. But it all worked out!
Today's food (for my last 12 hr. DAY shift):
2 WW toast with Cheez Whiz (2)
8 Melba toast with leftover chickpea/feta mixture on top (4)
Mushroom cup of soup (1)
SF pudding (1)
Apple (1)
Snack : cottage cheese (2) and a cheesecake (1)
Dinner: ???
Happy Friday to all!!!!

Potential...

So I peeked on the scale this afternoon when I got up. Wait a minute, let's be honest here - I weight myself EVERYDAY. But today, I was pleasantly surprised at the number. I have the *potential* to have a pretty good damn week.
BUT, the challenges???
1. I'm running my medium run today (4.8K) - ? water retention due to sore muscles.
2. My sister is coming over tonight for TV night (with little P of course!!!!) and I know there will be snacking involved.
3. Snacks usually involve sodium!!!
Solutions:
1. Water, water, water and MORE water!
2. Luckily I've slept until now, therefore, no points consumed yet.
3. Life goes on! I could choose not to have TV night or snacks but in the grand scheme of things, who am I kidding? Life happens and it's not the end of the world if I have a bit of water retention! (remind me of this statement tomorrow if I'm disappointed!!)

As for my last nightshift - it royally sucked! I was very busy with one patient and said patient was very sick which made me feel sick and I didn't eat a quarter of what I had planned to! There was an incident with chips and dip though so I think that made up for the points I had counted for the night!

My Sweet, Sweet Jen :)

THANK YOU, Jen for the card and encouragement and of course, the new Crystal Light flavours. You're such a sweetheart! Your support means the world to me!!
Had a crappy sleep last night so I'll need to go and nap soon before nightshift rolls around :( I went to the Dr.'s this morning and got some bloodwork done. I'm interested to see the results as she is checking out my B12 and iron levels (due to the fact that I'm a veggie). It's so nice to have such a young, FEMALE, easy to talk to Dr!! It's been a while.
Food today is looking like this:
2 pieces WW toast with light Cheez Whiz (2)
Salad with cukes, tomatoes, red pepper, salsa, cottage cheese and 6 crushed, baked Tostitos (3) - sounds really weird but was really good!!
Little cravings raspberry cheesecake (1)
Pita pizza (4) with veggies and dip (1)
Nightshift snacks:
Butterscotch pudding (1)
Cottage cheese (1)
Veggies and dip (1)
Apple (1)
8 Melba toasts (2)
100 cal. popcorn (2)
Bagel and cream cheese for breakfast (3)
I think that should keep me going!! Plus I'm going to have some wild strawberry crystal light, courtesy of Jen!
Mmmmmmmmmmm..........

Breakfast Day is here again!!!

So, I confused J yesterday. He said he was bringing home McD's but might not make it there for the breakfast menu. I said that was OK and I just wanted a fruit and yogurt parfait. Turns out he did make it there for breakfast and thought I would want my regular breakfast and that it was only if he didn't make it there for the breakfast menu that I wanted the parfait. Does that make sense?
So there I was this AM, faced with a hashbrown and McGriddle. I took off the sausage and the cheese, which made it 7 points (McDonald's has a surprisingly great nutritional info site where you can take stuff off the sandwich and recalculate). And of course, I ate the hashbrown too...for 3 pts. I haven't really been hungry since.
Planning to have some cucumber and vinegar later. Then possibly a veggie burger (5) and spicy green bean stirfry (1) for dinner.
Activity today = short run (3.2K). Hopefully my cold will allow me to breathe while running!
And that's it for today. I think I'll go paint my toenails now.
Doctor's appt. tomorrow and my (for real!) LAST nightshift!!!!

Help me, Dr. McDreamy!

So I'm having a bit of a sick day today. Sore throat, stuffy nose, nausea so bad that I couldn't stand long enough to do my hair! Went to work and came home an hour later and slept. But then had to go back to work for a stupid meeting. Overall, quite the sucky day so far. Looking at McDreamy makes me feel a BIT better though :)
On top of all this, I can hardly move due to muscle soreness from baseball and running! Am I getting old or what???
Food wise:
Just managed to get down 2 WW toast with SF jam (2)
We'll see how things go. I'm hoping to eat more later!
***Update: Managed to get in a cup of soup (1), 1c. grapes (1), treat size coffee crisp (2). Then J came home and I got a Wendy's frescata sandwich (removed the turkey) for 10 pts and mandarin oranges (1). It's weird what you feel like when you're sick! The soup didn't sit so well and I just felt like a sandwich (but didn't want to make it, of course!) So that's 17 pts. We'll see what else I feel like later! Nausea is better, thankfully!***
And NO exercise today!!!!!
Hope everyone is having a better day than mine!!!
Drink up!

MIA blogger!

Sorry I've been out of the loop this weekend! It's been busy! I've done OK with my points and exercise though. However, I've used all of my 35 weekly points already! Between some drinks and eating out twice, there wasn't much I could do. Well, actually I could have NOT drank, but that's just silly :)
On the exercise front, I played 3 baseball games on Saturday and then just got back from our long run - 7.2K this week. So, needless to say, I'm HURTIN'!!!
I'm thinking that part of my problem last week was not eating enough. I didn't end up using all of my weekly points and I didn't really use too many activity points. I think when I'm running 15-20K per week that I have to make sure to eat some of those extra points so my body doesn't think I'm starving it. Just a theory...we'll see how it works! And it shouldn't be a problem this week anyway as I've already used those 35 points :)
Anyway, that's what's been going through my head this weekend!
Food today:
1 piece WW bread + peanut butter (2)
300mL Gatorade (2)
Veggie wraps (3)
And that's it so far!
Hope everyone had a great weekend!

Maybe...

...running 3 days in a row, prior to weigh, makes me retain water? Maybe I ate too much salt for dinner last night? Maybe I didn't drink enough water? Maybe I shouldn't have weighed in early? No matter what excuse I may have, I am UP 0.8lb. As you may have guessed, I am VERY frustrated but what can I do? Nothing. I did everything this week, including keeping a very close watch on those sneaky, little 35 weekly points and what do I get? A GAIN!!! I know I have to keep going and stay OP but it's weeks like this that make you wonder. These 5 lbs have been so frustrating and I don't know what else I can do to get rid of them.
Anyway, depressing post over. I WILL keep working, I WILL track my food, I WILL keep blogging to keep me honest :)
Go WW and go Jen at your weigh-in tonight :) I will send some skinny vibes your way. There must be some around here somewhere!

*Please excuse my ticker, I don't know what's up with the 0.400000001 business!*

Hmmmm, dilemma...

So I'm off Thursday and Friday. J goes away on Thursdays for his overnight for work. So I'm going to my sister's and staying overnight there. Problem - weigh in on Friday. I will be at my sister's without my scale. I think that I'm going to weigh in tomorrow morning instead and call it a week. The bonus to this plan? We can probably have a few drinks and a hot tub once my nephew goes to bed! Yay!
Today was a short run - 3.2K. Then I went and walked around at the fair!! It's at the new fairgrounds this year and just doesn't seem the same. Had to check it out though. Sister and nephew came with me. Then we had a good dinner and then J and I went and tried to play baseball as I'm being conned into a tournament on Saturday, I think. I really do suck though so maybe they'll change their minds!
Food today:
Pre run:1 Eggo with SF jam (1)
Post run: 2 eggs and toast (5)
Snack: WW cake (1)
Drink: A Caesar (3)
Dinner: Tacos made with veggie "meat" on WW tortillas (5) + Rice with salsa and black beans (4)
And somehow I have points leftover...I'm SO full right now though.
Will have some dessert later!
So, wish me luck for early weigh in tomorrow :)

Not much to report

It was a crap day at work and I have never been so glad to get outta there. I think I've just been working too many screwy shifts lately and I'm bitter. But anyway....
Food wise today was a lot the same as yesterday except after work I had a preztel and cheese thingy for 2 pts. and then went for a 6.4K run. Then for dinner, we had subway! 12 inch veggie sub for 10pts. So my points for the day are gone but I know I'll be having something else tonight. Probably tea and a WW cake and maybe something else. Will use a couple flex or maybe use half of my activity points. I have been using them when I do my long runs as I get extremely hungry.
Anyway, boring day but OP nonetheless.
Biggest Loser tonight...YAY for motivation!
Cheers! (with water, of course!)

I almost cried!

So last night after making 4 tortillas into chips, I divided them up into ziplock baggies but left them unzipped as I wanted to make sure they were cool before they were zipped. Makes sense, right? Well fast forward to this AM when I was in a hurry to pack my lunch and was randomly throwing things into my lunch bag, including the unzipped tortilla chips, all the while forgetting their unzipped status. So there I am at work, all excited about my hummus and chips at lunch time and I pull the bag out and HALF of my chips fall to the floor. Wouldn't be so bad if I was at home or if I worked ANYWHERE other than a hospital :( It was so very sad!!! Half of my beloved chips scattered on the hospital floor! Boo hoo!
Anyway, other than that tragedy, a not so bad day.
Food today:
25 Vanilla Miniwheats (3) + 1/2c skim milk (1)
Tomato sandwich on WW bread (1)
Hummus and chips (2)
Sugar free Jello chocolate pudding (1)
Strawberry cottage cheese (1)(only ate half as cottage cheese with fruit is not for me!)
Veggie sausage on WW wrap (4)
3/4c. peas (1)
1/2c. Lipton noodles (3)
Hot chocolate (1)
WW cake (1)
Hummus and chips (2) (this time I had ALL 8 chips!)

Activity: 4.8K run (then a bubble bath!)

That's it for today!
Here's to a relaxing evening and good sleep!

I was so excited about my snack, I didn't give it a title!

So here is my snack tonight in various stages of "done-ness". I've been looking at hummus recipes for a while and finally had the motivation to try it tonight. It turned out awesome!! I also cut up some WW tortillas and sprayed them with Pam spray + garlic powder + coarse sea salt and baked them in the oven and now I have chips!! Each tortilla made 8 chips so that is just 1 pt. Then I had PC "V8" juice for 0pts and I'm full! Oh, by the way, the hummus worked out to 1/4c. for 1 pt. So it was a nice little 2 pt. snack!. I think there will be more hummus and chips being made in the near future :)

The more I think about it...

...the more I think that I may have underestimated how many flex points I used on Friday night. I *may* have had more drinks than I originally thought :) I think I will up the flex points used to 18 to be safe. It couldn't be more than that but I at least feel better overestimating rather than the other way around. Afterall, I am supposed to be tracking those darn flex points better!
So I slept until 2pm today which wasn't so good as I have to switch back to day mode for tomorrow! I should never have been so nice and switched this stupid shift as nobody ever returns the favour :(
Food today has been:
2 eggs over easy (4pts) with WW toast and becel spray (1)
100 cal chocolate fudge brownie ice cream (2)

We'll see what the rest of the day brings...

Some Diet Staples

I'm on nights and looking for something to do, so I thought I'd post some of the food I've been hooked on lately! Here's my Top Ten:

1. Wheat and Blueberry Eggos with SF syrup

2. No name 1% cottage cheese in individual servings

3. WW bagel

4. Red Grapes - NOT green which I made the mistake of buying this week...they're just not as crunchy!

5. Healthy Choice Tapioca Pudding

6. Light Feta Cheese - it goes on everything!

7. Lipton White Tea To Go - Raspberry

8. Diet Pepsi Jazz - Caramel Cream

9. WW lemon and carrot cakes

10. Grilled Veggies!! Zucchini, Peppers, Onions and Tomatoes on the BBQ are awesome!!!

*Please excuse the randomness of the photo placement...I'm just learning :)

Friday Night Off = Fall off the Wagon!

Well, where to start. After a good loss this week, and getting up after night shift and going for a run...I decided that J and I should go out to dinner. And in this town, there really aren't many options. So off to East Side Mario's we went. I didn't do horribly. I got the veggie individual pizza with veggie soup and it comes with a little mousse cake for dessert. I ate half the pizza (6pts?), soup (2pts - which I looked up before we left. Apparently garden salad - my fav there, is 4 pts - full fat dressing = bad!) and I shared my dessert with J. OH YEAH, I also had 2 big draft beers. But only because there was a contest on and I could win a trip out east...that's what I'm telling myself anyway! Then to top the night off, we went "shopping" at the liquor store and went home and had some drinks. Then my brother stopped in, so we had more drinks!!!
All in all, not too bad as the only thing I had eaten so far that day was a smoothie before my run. So I've also counted 12 flex points (in addition to all my daily points!) and I think I'm in the clear. My goal this week is to try and keep track of my flex. Usually, it's just a free for all on the weekend and then come Monday, I just tell myself that all my flex are gone and I have to be good for the week. In reality, on most weekends, I probably use more than 35 flex pts. so it should be interesting to keep a better eye on them.
So that was my Friday night. I've been good today so far and have packed my food for tonight's night shift, so there's not much chance of going off track tonight.
Drink up :) (I'm referring to water!!)

Such hard work this week....

....and it was worth it!! I lost 1.2 pounds this week. It's the first time in months that it's been more than 0.8 up or down. I'm thrilled!!! And that's after 2 nightshifts as well!
Just drinking a protein shake now (1/2c skim milk -1pt, 1/2 c minute maid light- 0pt, 1/2 scoop vanilla protein powder - 1pt, 1/2 c berries- 0pt.) Yum. Then I'm off for a run.
Post run - maybe we'll go out for dinner tonight????
Happy Friday everyone :)

Looonnnng Night!

Well, it's almost over! It's 6:30am and I'm just waiting to go home and go to bed! Just wanted to say that I did it! I survived and stayed OP which is a first for me on nights. It wasn't much fun...I was pretty hungry at times during the day but I did it! Yay. Now I'm off to sleep so I can do another night when I get up! THEN, only 2 more nights in September before I start my day job in October. Wooohooo!!
Goodnight :)
PS. I lied, I had a handful of jellybeans...I wonder how many points that is???

Running and Dinner and Nightshift, Oh My!

My run last night went well. 6.4K. We started running just after 7pm and it was actually a little chilly. Was a bit nervous as we haven't run over 5K in a while! It was good though. It had stopped raining so we didnt's get wet. Felt great but we did go a bit slower than usual. But that's what training is for I guess!
Pre run dinner ended up being a veggie burger and bun + salad with light bocconcini cheese (if you haven't tried this stuff before I highly recommend it! - it's a mozzerella cheese that comes in little "balls". You can have 2 "balls" for 3 points or 1 and 1/2 for 2 pts.) So I had romaine + tomatoes + cheese + salad spritzer for 2 pts. Quite tasty. Then after the run I had some Eggos (3) and then some Ryvita pizzas (3) while watching Biggest Loser. Oh yeah, Biggest Loser...I love the blue team. Especially the old guy that lost 31 lbs...too cute! And of course, BOB!
Ok, now on to the one thing I've been confused about since I started following WW. Nightshift. I never know how to manage my points on my first night. I'm usually up for most of the day before I go in, therefore I'm eating points...then I'm up all night too and WANT to be eating MORE points! So I'm usually over points that day. Do I use flex? Do I use the next days daily points once it hits midnight? My usual: just ignore as I'm up for 21 hours so I MUST burn more calories and it all equals out...stupid, I know but as I've said, I never know how to handle it. What do you think??? I'm thinking I'll try and eat light today so I have some points left for tonight. We'll see how that goes!
So today's yumminess:
Breakfast: Egg beaters (1) and WW toast (1)

Lunch: Zero point soup and salad with feta (1) + grapes (1)
Oops! Change in plans for lunch. J brought Pizza Nova home - Veggie slice (I ate half, I'm counting it as 4 points based on their website nutritional info) Still had some zero point soup for filler! No salad or grapes though!
Lunch = 4!
Snack: WW cake (1) + tea

Dinner: Pita pizza (4) + something!

Nightshift: mostly snacky stuff. Will fill you in later!

Hope everyone has a super OP day :)

McDonald's for Breakfast...COULD have been BAD!

So on Tuesday mornings, J (my BF) works in town and brings home breakfast from his favourite place (yes, McD's!). If I'm not working, he brings me some too. My usual order: VERY bad...a sausage McGriddle (but I do take off the sausage) combo. So last night, J asked if he could bring home breakfast. Off I went to research and my usual breakfast is...wait for it...15 points!! And that's without the sausage on it! WOW, I've never looked it up before. Glad that I did because that's the end of that. This morning I got a McDonald's breakfast for 6 points. I had a hashbrown (3) and a fruit and yogurt parfait (3) and it was GOOD!

So today consists of a lovely day of cleaning, then hopefully a visit with my nephew...his mommy is signing him up for mom's and tots swimming lessons here in town and is going to drop by. And then I'm going for my long run for the week this evening. 6.4K. So that's the excitement!

My food today:

McDonald's breakfast (6)

Lunch: Zero point soup, grilled cheese (2), tapioca and strawberries (2)

Snack: Cucumber and vinegar, grapes (1)

Dinner: ???

Snack: probably something substantial post-run. I'm usually starving and will use half of the AP's I earn plus whatever daily points I have leftover.

So that's it. Will fill in the blanks later.

Hope everyone has a great day :)

Super Veggie Dinner!

So here's my dinner in progress....and then the final product! It was super yummy!! Grilled portabello mushrooms, grilled veggies topped with light feta cheese, and a baked potato with ff sour cream and salsa! SO good and low points! 7 points total...most of it for the potato and feta cheese. For dessert : Tapioca pudding (2) with 2 sliced strawberries on top.

THEN, I made some zero point soup to have for the week. I'm in the groove and planning to stay there!

Hi All!

Hey everyone! I've been super inspired by some bloggers out there and decided that I would try it myself and see if it would help me stay on track to get over my last hurdle.
You see, I've been following the WW plan @ home since March/06. I lost 25 pounds but CANNOT get rid of "the last 5 pounds" to get to my goal. I've been hovering at the same weight since January and have decided that I need a kick in the butt. I just need to get my head in the game and get'r done!
So here goes nothin'!
My food today is looking something like this:
AM: Wheat and Blueberry Eggos with SF syrup (3)

AM snack: 1c grapes, maybe some watermelon (2)

Noon: Egg beaters, WW bagel, Tomato + Salad + 100 Cal pk of Cheetos (6)

Snack: Cucumber sliced up with vinegar (0)

Dinner: Not set in stone yet. I'm thinking Grilled Portabello marinated in balsamic vinegar, olive oil and garlic + baked potato + grilled veggies/salad. (7?)

So yeah, that dinner sounds good...maybe it IS set in stone. Will just have to get to the grocery store for some supplies! Then I'll have 4 points left for a PM snack.

Anyway, welcome to my blog to anyone that finds it. Will post more about myself later!