Bravo! So glad to heave the successes of both of you today. Maddy 2 miles is so great and IAK I'm glad you are at a place where you know the difference between wants and needs. ((hugs)) Congrats ladies!

maddy and Lil you are both much stronger then I .... if I had cookies ... especially girl scout cookies ... I'd eat them til they were gone ... I'm like that with foods that are in my problem areas ... I have no control over myself whatsoever, that's why I've pushed myself to stick strictly to my calories and not include any high sugar type foods in my mix at all ... it's the only way for me to be able to stick it out .... I know that somewhere down the line I'll have to learn to have those kind of treats, but I want to have a lot more progress before I even try it ...

maddy great job with the 2 miles and with managing the change in your lunch plans at the last minutes!! Well done!!!

IAKG .. congrats on the goal achievment and the additional 2 1/2 pounds lost! Wooo Hooo ... hope you do go shopping for a VS type treat!!!

osuche ... hope you are feeling much better now ... I know what you mean about no appetite when feeling that sick ....

Congrats to all of us, most of us will hit that 8 week marker sometime during this weekend ... I think that is soooooo great!

I got off the treadmill a bit ago and did 2 miles again tonight while watching RENT. I picked the DVD up today as it was on sale - hadn't seen the movie as of yet, but really enjoyed the play on stage.

I did my grocery shopping today too. I picked up some new items and am hoping the change and variety will help to keep me going. I picked up turkey burgers after IAKG's rave reviews and I also thought I'd give Boca Burgers a shot too.

LOL @ the turkey burgers, maddy!

I actually "make" my own--buying the ground turkey and adding the same congomerate of 4-5 seasonings I usually use with ground beef. But the pre-made ones are an easier way for portion control, to be sure.

(I'm going to sheepishly add in here that I had three of them yesterday, including the one I had for breakfast. :rolleyes:)

As for me, I *did* do some VS shopping--online at least--last night. I'm not sure I can fit into what I ordered right this minute, but they're saying the estimated delivery date is 3/13, so that gives me a few weeks--plus I was right at the "hump" between sizes, theoretically, anyway, and I didn't want to get it on 3/13 and have "outgrown" it, so to speak, within a few weeks. We'll see.

I took my children out for a nice, nice lunch today to celebrate my daughter's new karate belt level and because I will miss their February school break, as they're now somewhere over Ohio or Illinois, probably. Of course, we went to my favorite restaurant here, and I ate about 85% of my points at one sitting. I also had dinner tonight, so I'm already over four points for the day. Because, in general, it was a stressful, long, exhausting day, I'm not motivated to exercise at all, and will just take a hit on my weekly flex (extra) points and move on.

maddy, we eat all the items from the Boca line as well as Morningstar. My son really likes the Boca chilli. He's a vegetarian while the rest of us are not. There are some buffalo chicken patties that are good as well as one that tastes almost veal like. I have these when I am trying to get in some protein but not the fat. For me the trouble is that often they have a lot of carbs.

I've run about 200 calories over my goal several days this week. I keep trying to tell myself it's this hut thing but I also don't want to make excuses. I have to tighten up.

Lil posted that link in the "tone your ass" thread, but I found a paragraph on the site I thought might be applicable here.

"The best type of exercise for reducing body fat is low-intensity, long-duration aerobic exercise. Aerobic exercise allows your body to breath in plenty of oxygen as it burns fat for fuel. Fat can not burn without this oxygen. Walking is probably the best exercise around to lose fat while sparing muscle. Walking a mile burns as many calories as running a mile— it just take longer to walk. Most people can walk farther than they can run, so they wind up burning more calories by walking!"

maddy .. great job!

Lil .. I feel your pain .... unfortunately, I really "feel" it ... yesterday I was as out of control as I could be without actually leaving my place to go and pick up "goodies" kind of food .... I gave up trying to count calories by early evening last night and just hung on as best I could .... exercising as much control as I could muster, but gratefully my period started during sleep time last night and for me, that day before is always the very worst day of the month, so hopefully it was just one day with a lot of extra calories consumed and now I can do the next 29 following my plan.

Great info IAKG and Lil on the veggie protein options. When I get to the point where I trust myself to actually do meal preparation, I'm going to try some of those items.

fzzy, just remember that it's one day. The important part is that you woke up this morning with the same resolve as you've had the last two months. Me, I ended up 11 points over yesterday. Granted, I had a pretty stressful day, but that's an excuse and not a reason. This morning I've been able to focus on long-term goals and just consider yesterday a "bump" in the road.

I thank my lucky stars that I don't have to suffer the hut monthly (thanks to Seasonale) - I'm glad you are back with your resolve to stay on track today fzzy.

Until the rest of society stops tempting us with all the wonderfully tasteful (or not so tasteful but highly convenient) foods we will have days were the circumstances lead us to indulging a bit more than we might like. Right now it's about letting it be one day, rather than 30 days... and everyone has done well with keeping it in check - I think.

Keeping up with my accountability - I did 2 miles on the treadmill again tonight.

I also had a turkey burger for dinner - premade by Butterball. I seasoned just as I would have a beef burger and then had it with a slice of 2% sharp cheddar and a wheat hamburger bun - all for 6 points. It was quite tasty!

Thanks maddy and IAKG ... and everyone for your positive thoughts and examples .... I've made it through today with a couple of hundred calories to spare, so I'm back on track and ready to start another week. Good luck everyone on the coming week!!!

Just a warning on the turkey, unless you use the stuff with 100% white meat it's not lower in fat than lean ground beef. Regular ground turkey can run as high as 15% fat.

This week has been a doozy. My students and I will suffer through state assessment testing over the next two weeks. I am down 1 more this week. So far 17 altogether. Slow and steady wins the race, right??????

Here's something, following Lil's lead, that might interest you on turkey v. ground beef:

http://experts.about.com/q/Nutritio...nd-turkey-2.htm

From that and some other things I've seen on the 'net, it seems like the basic advantage to ground turkey is less saturated fat. I have simply found that I ENJOY the turkey better than the beef a good percentage of the time.

As frustrating as it is, slow and steady is the way to go. I know I'd like to be at the end of the weight loss journey and be in maintenance mode, but I try to focus on day-by-day and not the road ahead too much. ((Lil)) for your week ahead--I'll send positive thoughts your way.

I would also have to add that you can't get mad cow from a turkey...











yet :p

I must admit I learned all this about turkey yesterday as I was attempting to determine the point value AFTER I ate it. I found that the package did describe it as lean and there was no mention of it being specifically ground turkey breast but there was no mention of it containing dark meat and skin either. So I resorted to the NI on the back of the pack and found each pre-made burger to be 180 calories with 8g of fat. That's about the same as the lean black angus ground sirloin (173 calories, 9g of fat) that I use when ever I'm going to have beef. Next time I will be more attentive to the content of the turkey - but all in all I did enjoy the turkey burger and will be adding to my mix of things to eat. And at a minimum I can say it's at least as healthy as the beef I'm eating.

Now on to other things - the scale. I suspected it would not be a good week for me only because I watched the scale be less than kind all week, but I kept moving on doing the same things. I lost .5 lb this past week. I think it's because of my intake. I was below points everyday but two (2-4 points - plus 2-3 APs). I'm going to be striving to get my point intake up this week (how funny is that? I need to eat MORE!). I've been doing a lot of reading on this and think I've found some solutions that will work for me.