Meal Planning

Greetings Friends!

It's weight loss Wednesday yet again and today's topic is food glorious food! I've recently started back trying to really watch what I eat. From the different things that I've read, quite a few recommend not counting calories and that there's no need to if you are eating healthy whole foods. Let's be real here... That's all great in theory, but in this food obsessed nation that's all a magical magical lie!

Losing weight is all about expending more energy than calories consumed, right? Right.

And what's that called?

Math!

What do you do with math??

You count!

Now were back to counting calories...

Now don't get me wrong, that might be the way to go once you've mastered adding those 5-6 fruits and vegetables and 8 glasses of H2O into your everyday diet. As for my beginner ass, that's not gonna work so much.. My mind says, "Oh! We're not counting calories? Okay.. Let's not count that foot-long chili cheese dog and fries, because it's okay. We're not counting anyway. Bwahaha!"


I will admit something to you. Just like an adolescent boy that thinks about sex every other minute, I too do this... but with food! The hamster wheel goes something like this:

• 7 AM ~ I should eat breakfast, although I'm not hungry. It is the most important meal of the day after all.  
• 8:30 AM ~ Hmm.. is it time to eat again?? They say your body goes into starvation mode after 2-3 hrs. Oh! It's not 9:30 yet? I'll wait till then.
• 9:25 AM ~ Well, it's close enough to 9:30. I'm gonna snack now. Nom Nom Nom.
• 11:00 AM ~ Damn! Why didn't I pack another snack??? Lunch isn't until 1 PM and I'm starving! I'll just grab one fun size Snicker bar from the candy lady. It's only 50 calories. It's fine.
• 11:30 AM ~ Aw, man.... I ate 3 fun size Snickers. Probably shouldn't have done that.
• 1 PM ~ Whoo Hoo! Sweet freedom it's finally lunch time! Whaaaaaaaaaaaaat dooooooo IIIIIIII eaaaaaaaat!?! I can't decide on what to eat and my precious lunch hour is whittling away. I'll just grab some Wendy's since it's close by. I should get a 'healthy' sub from Subway, but I really don't want that. I want that burger I saw on tv last night! Yes... that will be really good.
• 1:45 PM ~ WHYYYYYY? Why did I eat that big burger and fries. Now I feel sleepy and heavy and bloated. Okay. Let's just get some coffee to make it through the afternoon.

Etc, etc, etc.. on and on it goes! All day. Every day. Sounds exhausting, no? This is the plight of the emotional eater. :) So what can we do to fix this problem?

Meal Plan

It's comes down to that old saying of "Fail to plan and you plan to fail". It's so much easier for me not to obsess about food when I already know what I'm eating throughout the day. If you're like me, here are some great links to help you get started! 

Wiki-How has a very detailed process on how to meal plan.

Loved Parade's explanation of meal planning. They make it like a smooth and easy process.  

Eating Well tells you what to eat, if you don't want to have to think about it.

You can be walked through it in baby steps with Organized Home.


So do you do meal planning? I've found that I really like it, because all I have to do is follow the plan. 


Ciao! 

Food Experiment: Healthy Stir Fry

Greetings friends!


I hope everyone is having a great week! Mine has a good stride going to it so far. Classes have been going well and I'm exciting to be getting into the 'meat & potatoes' of things. The class project is creating a blog from scratch, (which is right up my alley) and it's nice to see the fruits of your labor. :) Anyway, we're not here to talk about class, we're here to talk about foooooooood. Yummy glorious food! (I always think of the song Food Glorious Food from Oliver Twist)

I got it in my mind that I wanted to make a stir fry. I was inspired by my friend Stacie to cook more, since she had been posting food pictures of what she cooked all over the place. I thought it the desire for stir fry would go away, but it didn't and so I knew that I had no choice but to make it. I wanted it to be healthy, so I went to SkinnyTaste, my go-to website for yummy healthy foods. There are a couple of stir fry recipes on there, but the one I chose was the Thai chicken & pineapple stir fry. I like Thai food. I like pineapples. I figured it couldn't be too bad! :)


Ingredients: ~ Corn Starch ~ Fish Sauce ~ Sweet & Spicy Sauce ~ Bell Pepper ~ Pineapple ~ Garlic ~ Olive Oil ~ Chicken ~ 

Even though raw chicken makes me squeamish I figured if I was trying to be healthy, I may as well use the real thing the recipe calls for instead of the super processed kind. ::: shrugs ::: 
I started by cutting up the chicken first to get that out of the way, then I chopped up the peppers and pineapple.

The whole cooking processed didn't take that long which is a total plus in my book! When I want to come home from work I want to relax and eat dinner. Not stand in the kitchen for two hrs cooking and then be able to relax. I chose to make this dish with pasta because I already had some made up and ready to eat. Normally, I would've made it with rice.

The sweet spicy sauce I got was HOT!!!!! I'm talking about the heat is so much that the tip of your tongue becomes numb and you literally can't eat anymore!! Despite the spiciness I did enjoy the dish and it's one I'll make again. Have you been cooking anything as of late? Do you like or have a favorite stir fry recipe? Let me know!

Ciao!

Weekly Wishes #17

Salutations All!

Its that time again for weekly wishes! Did you set any goals for last week? If so, how did they go? Are you just joining me? Let me explain what happens for Weekly Wishes..

The Happenings: You share your weekly, monthly, or yearly goals/wishes/achievements and you get to be a part of this big group of people that are doing the same thing. Yay! Wanna join in? Check out The Nectar Collective and add a link to your blog!

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Happy Monday all! I hope everyone is having a great day. 

      Last Weeks Wishes

* Use the Singing Bowl - Done! Most days last week I would come home from work and practice making my bowl sing. Some meditation happened with it too, but I was mostly playing around and enjoying my new toy. This week, I really want to meditate at least 3 days this week. I will consider it a warm up for next week when The Deepak & Oprah meditation will start on the 11th. You can sign up here, if you want to try it out too!

* Eat.Sleep.Drink.Coding - True to my word, I did just that! I swear every Single night I dreamt about coding and when I wasn't actually coding, I was thinking about coding freaking out about coding!! Hopefully this week I can not freak out and just be open and receptive to what I"m learning. :)

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This Weeks Wishes

* Faster Homework - When I tell you that I studied alllllll daaaaay loooong on Saturday I'm totally not kidding. I really want to start using my time more wisely and get the homework done. It will be a little easier now that I have the know-how to get help when I'm stuck.

* Track Food & eat Better - I've been eating really poorly for probably the last two weeks and now my body is making me pay for it, by giving me stomach problems. If you've ever had those problems, then you know they aren't fun. At.All. So, my action plan is to track my food in my handy phone app and make sure I'm getting some more fruits and veggies into my diet. The biggest way I'm gonna obtain the fruit & veggies is by putting them all in a blender and then Ta-Da! drink them all down all at once. So I'll have that in addition to whatever I eat. :)

It's gonna be another short-ish week of wishes for me. Good luck with your goals this week!

Ciao!

The Vegetarian Life

Greetings! 

Happy Friday!

Last week I decided to eat absolutely NO MEAT!! It's a big deal folks! I'm a total meat eater. I'm talking about I could have only a meal that consists of meat (and most likely cheese) and be just fine. Every now and then though I believe that we must push ourselves past our comfort zone. It allows you to grow and learn many things about yourself as I did this past week.

So you ask, why did I decide to ditch the meat AND for only one week? 
To be honest I've been fed up with trying to eat healthy and just wanted to commit to eating healthy! I chose to do only one week, because quite frankly it seemed like a lot and I couldn't imagine going longer!

What was it like and what did you learn?
When I went grocery shopping to prepare for this meatless week, I actually became very panicked. Even though I had a list of what I wanted,  it still felt like ALL MEALS EVER MADE required meat! It was almost like I was afraid I would starve to death if I didn't have meat, which of course I know isn't true...  At the time though it was a #shitjustgotreal moment. Lol!  In all actuality, it wasn't as hard as I thought it would be. I'm a total emotional eater, so when I'm stressed out I just want a warm fuzzy hug and a nice juicy burger with cheese and bacon! Of course when I was having a hard or long day,  the first thing I wanted to do was comfort myself with a savory treat, but I didn't. For the most part I didn't even miss the meat. What this showed me was that even if from time to time I get frustrated with my weight journey, I do actually have willpower and commitment power. That in itself is priceless. Now, when I'm struggling I think back to that week and I know that I can have good eating habits, because I proved it!

What kind of foods did you eat?
Well breakfast was easy. Bowl up some cereal or some oatmeal and call it one. Lunch was somewhat difficult if I didn't have meatless leftovers and sometimes I just didn't feel like having leftovers. On those days I went to Subway and got the veggie patty (which is actually very good) sub and some chips. Having the chips made it feel like a normal meal. Here are some of my lunches:

For dinner The Boo and I made spaghetti with bell peppers, onion, and zucchini. Before last week I would've sworn up and down that I didn't like zucchini, but now we've become fast friends.

We also made pizza which was fun! We got some pizza dough from Publix and smashed it down with our hands. I sauteed some bell peppers and onion and sprinkled them all over the sauce. Then topped that off with baby spinach leaves, Basil, oregano, S&P, and lots of cheese!
So.Freaking.Good.

The best meal though were the veggie enchiladas with fajita rice! I found the recipe on none other than Pinterest! Isn't Pinterest amazing for food ideas? I've pinned so many and cooked none until now. I went in search for a zucchini recipe and found it that way. The green chili sauce is what you'll see in the blender below. It had just the right amount of spiciness! 

Speaking of Pinterest, I'm totally going to do a Food Challenge in the month of June. One new recipe per week and I'm thinking maybe have some kind of theme. Wanna join me?? :)


So those were my foods for the week! All in all I felt a lot lighter and did't feel the need to eat as much. I'm thinking that I will plan more meatless meals from now on and I will definitely have that veggie patty again from Subway. Are you a vegetarian or vegan? What recipes do you like? Do you have any struggles or miss meat?? Let me know!

Ciao!

Weighting In: Health vs. Weight-Loss

Greetings!

As always, it seems to be that I've found a new book to read. Nevermind the fact that I currently have at least five other books that I'm in the middle of. I really should add 'Finish a freakin book' to my Weekly Wishes next week! Ha!

I was watching Oprah Prime and she had Sharon Stone and Cameron Diaz on there talking about getting older. Did you watch it too? I loved it. Why? I'm 32 and I'm seeing little signs of age and I don't like it! I just gotta tell ya that getting older is no joke!

No one tells you that you will start to get rogue old lady chin hairs like your 5th grade teacher had, or that after the age of 25 you.will.never.get.rest.ever.again., or that you can't stay up 24 hrs without feeling like death warmed over the next day. You have to take care of yourself, which brings me to the new book I'm reading.. See how that went full circle? ;) I'm talking about The Body Book, by Cameron Diaz.

Here's the thing about me and my weight-loss journey.. (and I'm gonna be really honest here) I simply want to lose weight so that I can wear the clothes that fit my personality and NOT clothes for an 85 year old woman that likes to wear tiny flower prints, boxy shirts, and sweats and/or wind suits all the time. (No offense to older ladies out there) I want to be able to shop in more than 3 major stores for 'somewhat' stylish clothes. And let's not forget the benefit of not being discriminated against for not being skinny. Maybe you're thinking that the last statement is a little dramatic, but I've experienced it myself at my own job. People are a lot nicer to me, men AND women when they notice I'm losing weight. It's crazy!

I digress though...

 

So the book talks a lot about eating "whole foods" or foods sustained by mother earth. That means no foods with preservatives and definitely no fast foods! (perish the thought!!) Her whole angle in the book is to be healthy. I can dig it. Although, I must say that it's much easier to grab the hamburger helper box and throw some ground turkey in it and call it one than to go to the grocery and buy all the many ingredients it's gonna take to replicate and cook that meal. I figure it's a baby steps kind of thing. Maybe cook one major whole food meal on the weekend when I can enjoy taking my time and not have to rush. 

She talks about how to take care your body and skin and all that jazz too, but I haven't gotten to that point in the book yet. I like this book and it's making a lot of sense so far. So, good people of the land, do you eat for taste, to be healthy, or to just lose weight??

Oh by the way..... and this blew my mind.. It also says that just because you are overweight, doesn't mean that you can't be malnourished. Whaaaaa? I know! The gist is that if you're not feeding your body real nutrients (or eating empty calories) then you can be malnourished. Bam! Did you know this little fact? Let me know!

Ciao!

Weighing In..

Greetings!

 

I haven’t written a post about how the weight-loss was going in a while so I figured it was about time! If you’ve been following along, then you know that I’ve been reading Eat Q, by Dr Susan Albers. I was trying to go the whole ‘no dieting’ and ‘eating mindfully’ route and was getting frustrated. So after a while I was like, ‘Hm.. this crap doesn't work!’ and I put the book down and haven’t picked it back up.

After much thought though I realized that I was doing what I always do. Read half of something, get bored, and go off and do my own thing. What I started doing was going back to what had worked for me previously in losing weight and that was doing my Leslie Sanstone workout dvd and counting calories. I’ve also started taking some supplements, where I hadn’t before. I wanted to do something I knew would work, because eating all willy-nilly and trying to be mindful wasn’t doing it for me! I’ve only been doing this for a week and so far I’ve lost four pounds! Yay, for me! ::: fist pump ::: Can I just say that four pounds makes a huge difference in how your clothes fit..

So while I was doing this, this past week I realized that I had learned something from Eat Q after all and it was helping me to make better food choices and handle my cravings in a different way than I had before. Now when I was tempted by a muffin in the break room or I wanted a Baconator combo from Wendy’s, I knew that I wanted it and I accepted that. Then I thought about my end goal and it helped me to not act on my craving. Or if I really wanted it, I would ‘budget’ my calories throughout the day, so that I could splurge later.

All in all I’m pleased with combining the powers of my old methods and the new methods of Eat Q. I will continue to read the book that way I’m fully informed and know the process in it’s entirety and then maybe someday soon, I will be able to stop counting calories and just naturally make good food choices.

Anyone else in the fight with me?

Ciao!

 

A. Sparkle

Weight-Loss Wednesday #3

Greetings... 

I hope everyone has had a great week so far! Mine is moving right along and I'm just waiting on Fridaaaaay to get here soon! I'm super excited to be going to the Honda Battle of the Bands here in Atlanta, GA! I haven't been in quite a few years and although my glorious Alma Mater will not be there this time, it will not stop me from wearing my sweatshirt and representing them in their absence!

So I've been going with the whole concept of not 'dieting' or counting calories, because the book called Eat Q recommends not to. A world without dieting?!? Yes I know. The whole idea is that you want to live life like...... well normal I guess. I don't know what most thin/skinny people do, but I'm sure they don't always go around counting every little calorie they put into their mouth, right? At least I hope not.. In any case, that's not how I want to live my life. I just want to know what I should and shouldn't eat, make sure it still tastes good, and doesn't require for me to starve myself and deny my body of nutrients. So with that being said I thought I'd share more tips on what the book says that can also help in the mental warfare that occurs when choosing what to eat and when to stop eating.

P.A.U.S.E 

Perceive * Recognize that this is the moment you chose what you’re going to eat

Allow * At least 10 mins for that thought to sink in

Understand * what your feelings are in the moment and why as well as pay attention to your body                               language (i.e slumped shoulders, clenched fists)

Stay * In the moment and lean into the feelings instead of away from them

Entertain * the options you have to either stop eating or keep eating

This method was probably created for me. I find that I have the mindset of needing to finish everything on my plate, so as not to be wasteful. I hate wasting food. Whenever I'm leaving food to be thrown away, I hear that little voice in my head that says, 'Um, what are you doing? Don't you know there is someone starving somewhere right now?!? You better eat it!' Then I feel guilty for not eating it, but then if I eat it I feel guilty for getting full. Oh what a catch twenty-two! Guilt is a sneaky little unwanted mistress, no? 

The great thing about reading this book is that it’s forcing me to become aware of my habits, that way I can stop them. Such as, it just now occurred to me today that I've been treating eating healthier like a job. I can generally do great for breakfast and throughout the day at work, but as soon as I get home I feel like I'm finally on my own time and I can do what I want. I stop drinking water or anything for that fact when I get home and I tend to have a bigger portion of food for dinner. Now that I know that I can watch for that! 

Okay, that’s all for now. Give me your thoughts on the P.a.u.s.e. method and tell me about your struggles or successes! Until next week..

Ciao!

 

 A. Sparkle

Weight-Loss Wednesday

Greetings!

 

 

So one of my goals for this year is to live a healthier lifestyle. Does that mean I'm going on some extreme nonsensical diet where I starve myself and deny all the wonderful foods that life has to offer? No! What I am doing however is reading this lovely book called Eat Q, by Susan Albers, Psy. D. So as not to bore you with all the details, the short version of what this book is about is giving you tips and tricks on how to handle emotional eating, eating when bored, and stress eating.

 

 

Truth Moment: I'm a total emotional/bored/stress eater!

I'm about halfway through the book and I’ve already had success. The whole idea is that you don’t have to count calories or completely restrict yourself from the things you love. You live as a normal person making smart food choices. The biggest thing that stood out to me was that people that have a low ‘Eat Q’ or low emotional intelligence are more concerned about instant gratification instead of looking at the long term effects. When I read that I knew it was especially true for me. Let’s say, doughnuts were made available to me (one of many weaknesses), I knew automatically I was going to eat it because it would give me a pleasurable taste. However I wasn’t thinking about how I would feel after I ate it or how I would be eating a big meal for lunch and dinner therefore causing weight gain as an end result.

Just taking time to think about what I’m choosing to put in my body and how much of it I eat has made a difference so far. I’ve already lost 2 lbs just by changing how I eat and increasing my water intake. So as I learn, I’ll share you with you. I’ll share my struggles and success and you can do the same. Leave me a comment or shoot me an email at eclecticoasisart@aol.com!

 

P.E.A.C.E

A. Sparkle



Vision Board 2014

Welcome to 2014!

I love the start of the New Year! It’s almost as if everything from the past year just gets cleaned away and you get to start anew. I know it’s all in people’s mind, but it does provide some comfort and hope knowing that the new year can bring new joyous beginnings. Speaking of new beginnings, why is it that making resolutions seem to get a bad rap nowadays? I wasn’t really into the whole making New Year’s resolutions for most of my life, because let’s be honest.. most people (including myself) have just broken them. I do like the idea of setting goals that you’d like to achieve though. It’s the same thing as making a vision board, which I’ve been told by my friend that I must join in on this year.

I’ve decided to create one on Polyvore. If you’re addicted to or even remotely like fashion…. you need to be on Polyvore. You get to make a collage of outfits, themes, and your personal style. For me it’s like going on a carte blanche shopping spree and everything fits perfectly! Warning: It can be very addictive.

Vision Board 2014 by ptyfashvic featuring Kate Spade

Strapless dress
sincerelysweetboutique.com

Tom Dixon black light
$695 - madeindesign.co.uk

Vintage Marquee Lights wall lamp
purehome.com

Kate Spade home decor
amazon.com

RoomMates Decor vinyl wall decal
target.com

My Official Goal this Year: Discipline!

It encompasses everything that I want to accomplish or work on, (i.e. living a healthier lifestyle, keeping up with chores, really setting up a schedule for my Etsy business and taking inventory, learning how to let my light shine, writing and blogging more consistently, etc, etc, etc.) So what are your goals or resolutions? Let me know!

Ciao!

A. Sparkle