Fail to Plan, Plan to Fail

This is not a post about falling off the wagon, so have no fear.  This IS a post about the success of planning.  As I have mentioned in many previous blog posts, I am a planner.  I am slightly type A, I like organization and I appreciate having a plan and sticking to it.  This weekend my goal was to simply plan ahead and try to stick to it as much as possible.

Friday: I stayed well within my calorie goals for the morning and night and I reduced my amount of carbs before dinner because I knew that I was going to a pizza place with friends.  I looked at the menu before I went and decided on their special which was called, "Fresh tomato pie" and it boasted, "local tomatoes, garlic, mozzarella, pecorino, basil and truffle honey."  The honey part threw me off, but I got it because she said it was drizzled and very subtle. 

I purposely chose this pizza over some other ones for a few reasons. The first one is because it didn't have a sauce base, which meant less sodium.  Tomato sauces can be really high in sodium and I try to watch that.  The second thing I did was choose a pizza without meat to keep the calories and fat down.  I am not a vegetarian at all, but forgoing the meat sometimes means I can eat more pizza.  The food was amazing and the company was even better.  After dinner we did some shopping and we stopped at McDonald's to go to the redbox.  Some of the girls went and ordered McFlurry's and I stayed by the redbox machine.  I knew that if I stood in line I would buy something that was not a good choice, so I stayed back.  When I got home I ate a 100 calorie pack of chocolate covered pretzels and was completely satisified.

Me and my 6 best friends.

Saturday:  I had a bridal shower on saturday in Stillwater, which is kind of a drive for me, but it was for a good friend and it was a lot of fun.  The decor was lovely and it was the perfect length of time at 2 hours.  I didn't eat breakfast because I knew I would eat a big lunch.  I tried to stick with mostly veggies, fruit and salad.  I did have a little of the cream cheese spread with crakers and a cupcake with half the frosting taken off.  It was a great afternoon and made me excited for my showers next year.

That night we went to dinner at a new noodle place in Uptown with some friends and I ordered the Spicy Udon noodles with lots of veggies and chicken.  It was awesome!  We went out with friends and I had a few drinks.  I wasn't planning on drinking at all, so that was a change, but I had a lot of fun and worked out extra hard on Sunday.

Gorgeous purple hued cupcakes

Sunday:  I went to visit my mom in St. Cloud and to meet with a potential "day of wedding coordinator".  We talked for 2.5 hours and it was a lot of fun.  I have most of my ideas already decided, but it was nice to talk them through with someone to see what their thoughts were.  My mom made a healthy and delicious flatbread pizza that we shared along with veggies and fruit and then we went on a very long walk.  I love spending time with my mom.  It always gets my week started out o the right foot.

My family dog Gabi.

So that is my weekend in a nutshell.  I think I did pretty well.  I got 2 full workouts in and a long walk.  I think the worst choices were maybe a cupcake and some cocktails.  So far this week everything has been trucking right along.  My close are starting to feel looser again, thank god!  I am on a roll and it feels good.  I have started to write down everything that I eat again and it is really helping.

This week's posts will feature... a post about fitness tips, what I hate about wedding's and a post about making your groceries stretch.

Stir Fry Beef and Asparagus

This is not our first attempt at meal planning our meals for a week and grocery shopping for only those items.  It is, however, going to stick this time and become a habit.  So, as my earlier post indicated I went grocery shopping last night and got a lot of good food.  I looked on our handy chart to see what delicious creation was slated for tonight and was happy to see that it was Stir Fry Beef and Asparagus.  I was already craving chinese food, so this was a step in that direction.

Our handy meal planning dry erase board

The recipe is from the Weight Watchers Momentum Cookbook.  I know that WW is doing Points Plus now, but there are still alot of great recipes in it and I got it at a garage sale for .25 cents. 

Here is the handy cookbook.  If you don't have it you should get it.  I really like it!

I can't tell you the recipe, because you should buy the book, but here are the ingredients.

Here is the end result.  It was pretty good.  Not as salty as regular chinese food, but still good.  Ron and I are rating each of the recipes and we both gave it a 3 out of 5.  It may have more to do with the fact that we were craving wontons and sweet and sour chicken than the recipe not being good.    

Happy Friday Everyone!  What are you doing this weekend?  Celebrating Father's Day?

Weekend Posts: House Decorating Updates and Lawn and Garden Landscaping

Girl's Night, Grocery Shopping and New Food

So, Tuesday night was one of our first girl's nights in a long time.  My friends and I have been really busy moving, traveling and working so it has been hard to get together, but somehow all 7 of us were able to get together on Tuesday night.  To say that we had a blast is a complete understatement.  We laughed until we cried and laughed some more and drank too much wine (okay not me because I didn't want to waste the calories).  My girlfriends are amazing and I love them all!  Some of them I have known since I was 7 years old!  They are all great in their own unique ways, but we all get along so well as a group.

What is the other great thing about hanging out with my girlfriends?  They are all a healthy weight and for the most part they make healthy decisions, so hanging out with them doesn't leave me with guilt.  In fact I am surprised I have gone on this long with skinny friends and I haven't started losing weight sooner.  Anyway, we made veggie and chicken kabobs and fresh corn on the cob and it was amazing!

This was before cooking, but don't they look great!?

After having this fresh, healthy and satisfying meal on Tuesday I was inspired to pull out all of my healthy cookbooks and do some meal planning.  My fiance and I each took a book and looked for 4 recipes that we wanted to add to our list.  I went out grocery shopping yesterday and I got everything on the list and nothing that wasn't on the list.  This is normally hard for me.  I used to go grocery shopping and buy everything that looked good to me (which was pretty much everything salty, fatty, cheesy and not healthy).  This time I avoided all of the bad foods like a pro. 

I got to the check out and the person in front of me was extreme couponing.  I have seen the show, so I know how it goes, but to actually see it happen in front of your eyes is surreal.  This woman bought $600 worth of groceries and paid $23.42 for them.  I was SHOCKED.  My shocked feeling quickly turned to bitterness after I checked out and spent $143.00  Blah.  I packed up my food and drove home crabby.  I got home and set out all of my food and then it hit me. I got a lot of good food!  I have tons of healthy options.  I remembered some of the woman's order in front of me and it was at least 10 bags of chips, 6 packages of cookie dough, 20 frozen pizzas, frozen fries, donuts and about 10 packs of pop.  So, when I think about it like that it is easier for me to think,

"I would rather spend $143 for healthy food, than $23.42 for WAY more food than I could eat or need to eat that will not help me get to my goal!"

Having said all of this, if you know a way to healthy extreme coupon I am all ears.  I am not knocking couponing in the least, but it just doesn't seem beneficial for me to extreme coupon since I only have two people to feed and healthier options don't seem to be as cheap as the other food.  Check out my haul below. 

I think I did pretty good!  What do you think?  I had to take two seperate photos because I couldn't fit it all in one photo.  A lot of the things that I got are items that I normally buy when I am eating healthy, however there are some new things that I have heard about or that I saw in the store and wanted to try.

Shantal over at My Journey talked about Veggie Straws the other day, so I had to try them.  They were not disappointing and perfect for someone who misses her crunchy salty chips.

A couple of recipes call for this.  I have to admit I am a little scared of it.

A couple of recipes call for this.  The word germ is kinda of gross, but I am willing to give it a shot!

Some fresh herbs and some deliciously hot jalapenos.

Do you have Salsa Lisa by you?  If you do go and get it!  It is a local MN company and I always try to buy local.  Even better than that though it is freshly chopped, with limited preservatives and thus less sodium (only 80mg per serving rather than like 200+ in other salsas.

Hmmm, Ginger.  Will I like eating you?  I like ginger ale, but actually ginger is up for debate. 

Stay tuned to see what I use this in later tonight when I post the first recipe from our weekly meal planning. :)