Clean Eating Challenge

Starting tomorrow I will be starting my 30 Day Clean Eating Challenge.

I suffered a running injury and had to stop running in October. The cold winter weather soon arrived and I was hardly working out. Between the lack of physical activity and the influx of heavy winter meals, the pounds have slowly added up. 

My clothes were a little baggy to begin with and the weight gain was happened so slowly, I didn’t realize I was gaining really until I tried on my summer clothes a week or so ago.

The clothes are tight. I can get them done up, but it isn’t pretty.  I realized that as much as I didn’t want to, I had to weigh myself and see the damage.

I suppose I was in denial for awhile, but I have gained weight. While trying to enjoy everything in moderation, I have enjoyed a little too much. I lost almost 40 pounds and I did slowly while enjoying treats every once in awhile. Now I’ve gained some of that back and need to nip it in the bud before it gets to be anymore.

I’ve also been plagued by stomach problems since I was a child. I’ve always thought that sugar, fried foods and perhaps dairy are the culprits for my stomach problems. I really hate the idea of completely cutting anything out of my diet, but if it clears up my stomach problems, then I am now willing to cut out whatever it takes.

This has made me decide to try clean eating. When it comes down to it, clean eating is what most of us try to do on a daily basis. A clean eating diet consists mostly of fresh fruits and veggies, whole grains and lots of water.

I’ve never been very good at completely cutting out any type of food from my diet. I always end up feeling deprived and going overboard. To help, for the first week, I am going to be following as closely as possible the 7 Day Meal Plan from Clean Eating Magazine. I think this is a completely doable diet and I even get 1 glass of wine!

I think it will take the first week of clean eating to see exactly what will work for me. I need to remind myself that the challenge is only for a month. Gina had a great tip on her blog about not wasting calories on treats that you have had many times before or could have on a regular basis. I am going to keep this in mind for the next month as I hardly ever eat treats that are new or unusual. I usually end up indulging in food that I’ve had lots before.

I also think it may be hard to not have any alcohol, as I enjoy having wine with meals and going out for a beer with friends. I’m not going to abstain completely, but will be limiting myself to one drink a week.

I’ll be posting my meals as always and will also do a weekly post on Sunday on my thoughts and musings from the previous week. Anyone else that wants to take part can just leave a message on that post and let me know how your week went too!

I will also be posting about the exercise I complete. I no longer belong to a gym and running is stil out of the question, so workouts will consit of walking and riding my bike. I will be aiming to do at least 30 minutes a day, as well as my knee exercises every day and the 30 Day Shred. I will be doing the video without any squats at all due to my knees. I will be like Caitlin and will do jumping jacks or something instead.

I’m so excited to start this challenge!! Wish me luck

Much love,

Meg.

Happy Easter!!!!

This is our cat Blu in his Easter hat. Doesn’t he look cute?

Oh how I love Easter and family time!!! 

I was awoken just before 8 by two very cute excited girls. We headed downstairs and they had lots of fun doing their hunt!!! I  may of eaten some candies this morning. Too good to pass up!

For breakfast, I made the family heart shaped pancakes.

My brother-in-law said these might have been the best pancakes he’s ever had!

I had a bowl of Kashi Go Lean Crunch and All Bran Guardian with milk instead. I`m not the biggest fan of pancakes!!

My sister and brother-in-law gave me some cute Easter presents:

I then took some pics of Blu looking so cute.

I think the rest of the day is going to be just hanging out with the family until it`s time to start on dinner. I bought a Quorn `turkey`roast to have for dinner tonight. My sister, brother-in-law and nieces are vegetarians and I thought this would be a good change from the Tofurkey they always have.

How was your Easter morning? Did it invole an easter egg hunt?

By the way, head on over to Zesty’s blog to check out his great line of Zesty Clothing All proceeds go to the local foodbank, which is such a great cause. I know we have all felt the impact of the recession, but food banks need our help now more than ever. People who have never needed help from food banks now do and those that used to be able to help out now simply do not have the means to do so. Anything we can do to help is great. I had actually never been to Zesty’s blog before this, I know where I have I been? I love it though!! And he’s a Canadian boy to boot!!!! So, let’s all get Zesty and support a great cause!!!!! He has a giveaway too.

Much love,

Meg.

Treats, cat naps, treats, cuddles, treats, eggs, treats.

That pretty much sums up my day!

I’m going to try to make this quick as it’s almost midnight and I’m exhausted!!

Work was okay today. It was really slow. I had some semi-frozen mango at work and some vegetarian spring rolls and vermicelli for lunch. I know I said I wasn’t going to eat, but while at work I decided that since I had breakfast at 9:30 and wouldn’ t be getting home until about 4:30, that it was way too long to go without eating.

It was one of the girls birthdays at work and one of the kitchen guys bought her a brownie caramel cheesecake. I had a small piece and it was devine. So smooth and creamy!!

When I got home, dinner was a ways to go still so I had 1/2 c. balkan style vanilla yogurt and 3/4 c. Kashi Go Lean Crunch.

My mom, my sister and I then got to making homemade Spanakopita.  My nieces helped out too. Addison Blue, who is almost 5, made so many. She was so good at them, working with the phyllo pastry. It was amazing watching her! We might have a little chef on our hands!

These are the some of the ones my niececs made.

These are just some of the rest of them. I think we made 3 cookie sheets of them.

They were so good. Homemade is so much better than store bought frozen ones. I think I ate about 5 for dinner.

Bruschetta made by my mom.

To go with the garlic bread

I had 3 pieces I believe.

And steamed artichokes with brown butter.

I had a half an artichoke and some butter.

After dinner I curled up on the couch with my two best girls and watched Muppet Family Christmas (yah that’ s what they picked). That is my favourite Christmas movie, so I was so excited to watch and have a cuddle with my girls!!!

Dessert was a skor bar trifle my mom made to congratulate my brother-in-law on finishing his Phd!!! I had 1 1/2 servings, but forgot to take a picture which is too bad because it looked so pretty!

My sis catching a cat nap… with our cat Blu.

Then we dyed Easter eggs.

These are the ones that I dyed in my little egg dish I bought this year.

Then the girls put out treats for the Easter Bunny.

Summer Lily with the carrots and lettuce left for the Easter Bunny.

This is the cute letter she left for him.

I ate one of those carrots and nibbled the end of the other to make it look like the Easter Bunny ate it.

I think the Easter Bunny has arrived.

I ate a bunch of candy while I was playing Easter Bunny. I don’t think I’ll be having any tomorrow. I’ve had my fill.

Time for me to hit the hay. I have an early morning of watching two excited girls find eggies!!!

Much love,

Meg.

It’s almost Eastery Bunny Time.

I have to make this quick today because I have to be at the restaurant for 11:00 am! I thought it was 12, but it’s 11, so that puts me in a bit of  a time crunch.

Last night before I went out, I was feeling super hungry around 8:30, so I made a little snack. It looks gross, but it was pretty tasty!

This is about 1/2 c. pumpkin, 1/4 c. cottage cheese, cinnamon, smidge sugar and about 1 tbsp. of choc chips. I think if the pumpkin and cottage cheese were blended, it would taste even better!!!

Date wasn’t feeling well, so we stayed in and watched a movie. I put a frozen pizza in for me him because he was starving. The only choices were pepperoni and 3 meat. Being a man, he chose 3 meat. I had 2 small pieces that were unphotographed and promptly made my stomach a little upset.

This morning for breakfast I ate the rest of my oatmeal brule from yesterday (maybe 1/2 cup, my dad kept nibbling) while I was trying to decide on breakfast.

I went with a whole wheat english muffin, a scrambled egg and  2 Morningstar sausage links. I put a bit of maple syrup on the sandwich. Delish.

Hopefully this will hold me over. The days I work at the restaurant are often the days my eating gets all out of sorts. I either am afraid I’ll get super hungry while working and eat too much before I go in, or when I’m done, I’ll go overboard on food because I think I haven’t eaten enough that day. I’m going to attempt to get  by with just eating some mangoe today. We are going to have lots of decadent food in my house for the next two days, I need to keep that in mind!

Enjoy this beautiful day!

Much love,

Meg.

Double Pooped.

Phew! I just came back from a 20 minute bike ride and I am really pooped now! I haven’t ridden my bike in so long and I forgot how much work it is! I absolutely loved it and can’t wait to go again, but boy was I huffing and puffing by the end! The ride combined with the 2 hour walk makes me one tired girl tonight!

I had a truly summer dinner tonight. Hotdogs and fries!!!

Except I made it  a bit healthier.

Veggie dog with tomatoes instead of ketchup and sweet potato fries!!! With a side of salad.

This salad has cucumber, red pepper, grape tomatoes, about 1 1/2 tbsp. of feta and a sprinkle of balsamic vinegar. This is one of my favourite salads to eat. I love salads but sometimes I don’t love having lettuce, I just want tons of veggies. This is always prefect and so easy to make!

This was an awesome dinner!!!!

I’m thinking about making some rhubarb crumble muffins tonight with some of the rhubarb I have in the freezer. It’s almost rhubarb season again and I still have tons to use up from last year!

Other than that I have a pretty low key night planned. I have to get up early tomorrow and do some grocery shopping before my lunch shift at the restaurant.

Than family time!!! I’m so excited to have my sister, brother in law and nieces here!!!

The only downside of them coming is we always have tons of food and numerous desserts! It is very hard to say no. Especially when the desserts just sit out all day long to be picked at. I just have to remind myself how horrible my stomach feels when I eat too much dessert!!!

Much love,

Meg.

Housesitting and Power walking.

I don’t think I’ve mentioned it yet, but for the next two weeks I’m housesitting for my bosses while they are on a cruise. They live in this amazing old house! I went over today to see what food they have and what I need to buy at the store. Besides a few fruits and vegetables, they have all the food that I need! My boss even has wheat bran, so I’m going to try some with my oats since Tina had such good stuff to say about it!

I was going to go for a walk, but knew I’d be starving by the time I came back so I made some toast with raspberry jam to hold me over.

That is Eziekiel toast by the way!!! I always almost buy it, but it’s so expensive! I’m glad I got to try it for free because I honestly don’t see what all the hoop-la is about! Tastes just like other tasty whole grain bread to me! It was a nice snack though.

Then I went on my usual almost 2 hour walk with the big hill half way through. It kicked my butt as usual. I am pooped now!

I was starving by the time I got back. I found some leftover salmon in the fridge and was excited to use it for lunch.

This wasn’t all that good. It was leftover salmon that I microwaved. I’m new to eating/ enjoying salmon and this just didn’t do it for me.

I also made an amazing salad though that I can’t wait to have again!

Before I left for my walk, I grabbed 1/2 c.  frozen blueberries from the freezer and left them on the counter. When I came back they were defrosted and had given quite a bit of juice.

The salad is 3 c. spinach, 1/2 c. blueberries. 1/2 c. mandarin oranges, about 1 1/2 tbsp. slivered almonds and dressing.

The dressing was just the blueberry juice mixed with some balsamic vinegar and a smidge of honey.

This salad was so delish, but not as filling as I would like. I thought about it for a bit and then I had a 1/2 c. cereal with some milk. II can’t remember what the name of the ceral was. It was either All Bran Crunch or Total Crunch. Either way, it was really good. I would use this as a topper for Kashi Go Lean Crunch (my one true love).

I’m going to watch last night’s Greys now. It’s still so nice outside, but I’m pooped and just want to veg!!!

Edited to add: Ugh. I just found out there was no new gery’s last night. Oh well, I have two more episodes of Lost to catch up on.

Much love,

Meg.

It’s a Good Friday for sleeping in.

 So it appears that I can’t save drafts on one computer and pick it up on another to finish off. I spent the last little bit of my day yesterday writing a post at work, saved it to add the pics when I got home, and then it’s just empty!!! Oh well. This just means I have a lot of chatting to do now.

For a morning snack yesterday I had a banana. I  was feeling hungry for awhile , but held off until 11. I have no idea why oats doesn’t keep  me full for long!

At 12 I was starving and headed to the farmer’s market to get a grilled veggie sandwich from a vendor there. The sandwich is made on this awesome foccacia like bread with just a little bit of cheese, spinach, onions and roasted red peppers. It is so good. I think grilled sandwiches are  one of my favourite things to eat!

I also got some eggplant salad from the Lebanese restaurant. It’s cousous, eggplant, chickpeas, peppers and onion. There was a little pool of oil in the bottom of the container. I don’t even want to think about how much oil I consumed!!! The salad was okay. I won’t get it again.

My boss bought some bakalava from the Lebanese restaurant too. I had a small piece and it was the perfect ending to my lunch. So sweet and delicious! I was then very full until about 4:00.

My afternoon snack consisted of a Fage 2%, some strawberries and about a third of an oatmeal raisin cliff bar.

This held me over quite nicely until it was time for dinner.

Date made a delicious dinner for me last night!!! It was a very spring-like meal and was really nice. It was a pasta primavera with rigatoni pasta, asparagus, artichoke hearts and cherry tomatoes which were sauted with lots of garlic, basil and some chicken stock. When the pasta was ready he added it to the veggies and then added brie and romano cheese and mixed it all up.

This was so good!!! He told me he forgot to put black olives and red onion in but it was delish anyways! It wasn’t heavy at all, but the brie gave it a nice, light creamy taste!!

He also made garlic bread which I was informed had half a stick of butter  after I had already eaten 3 pieces!!! It’s funny how differently guys cook than girls!

For dessert, we went to Pow Wow, a local restaurant. Dessert was amazing! We split two. The cheesecake of the day which was a Reeses cheesecake that was unbelievable creamy. I consider myself a bit of a cheesecake connaisseur, and this was so good! We also had the warm apple crumble tart that came with two small scoops of vanilla ice cream and a shooter of creme anglaise. We each had a B52 coffee which was amazing.

After dessert,  I had a glass of Cabernet Sauvignon from Chile and date had a Grand Marnier on the rocks.

It was a lovely evening. I definitely need to tell him about the blog so I can start taking pictures of some of the amazing food we’ve eaten!

This morning I slept in!! The alarm went off at 8, but I didn’t get up until 9! I promptly made my way downstairs and made Kath’s Oatmeal Brule.

I think I left the walnuts out last time I made this. I put them in this time and it is definitely better with the walnuts. It gives it even more of a banana bread taste!

It’s a beautiful day in sunny southern ontario today and I think I will either be going for a bike ride, a walk, or both. I wore my stilettos last night and we walked, so my feet are a bit sore today. We’ll see how I make out!

I hope those of you that have today off are enjoying it!

Much love,

Meg.