Hindsight is 20/20

The subject of this entry is the theme of the week. I'm always learning something after I do it, because I didn't take the time to learn it before. Lesson learned. I posted an article on FB today about healthy food choice options at fast food restaurants. There are actually some not so awful choices out there! Here ya go if you missed it: http://health.yahoo.net/experts/eatthis/7-fast-food-meals-under-350-calories

One of the ironic choices is a grilled chicken wrap from McDonalds. Which was actually my first choice yesterday, then I thought "noooo, Arby's would be a much better choice if I have to do fast food. A nice turkey sandwich." HA. Turns out McDonald's wrap is a full 500 calories LESS than that turkey sandwich. Who knew?

In other new, I had a very late night last night that was sparked by a very loooong day. The Mark Lowry concert was FANtastic. He was sooo funny, even though he was sick. I was talking with Mark after the concert and he looked like he was going to pass out any second. He just got back from South Africa and was exhausted and sick. His manager tried to talk him into not signing autographs, but he went out anyway. I grabbed a fan from my office to give to him, but then we couldn't find a plug anywhere near where he was going to sign. Oh well, I tried.

Funny story: I was wearing my staff backstage pass/badge during the concert stuff. Afterwards, when i was talking to Mark he was staring at the badge, which happened to be hanging at my chest level. And he said, "Wow, that looks good!", then his face froze in horror and he looked at me and said, "I'm looking at my picture on your stage pass - NOT at your chest!!!!!" bahahaha Then he said he wanted a closer look, but didn't want to lean in, for obvious reasons, so I held the pass out so he could look at it. He is so funny, even off-stage, and even having the plague. Overall, it was a great night. We sold just over 1300 seats, so it was almost a full house, and the audience had a ton of energy. A ton. Loved it!!!

Anyway, needless to say I feel sooooo tired this morning. I had worked 40 hours as of yesterday. I'm somewhere close to 50 now. I lost count. Me, Ethan, and a couple other gals from work went to Starbucks this morning for a nice lil' pick-me-up, but it doesn't seem to be helping now. Which reminds me of my other hindsight lesson: I ordered a tall (aka, small) white chocolate mocha. I figured it wasn't healthy, but wasn't evil. And I was right, it wasn't evil. BUT, when I looked up the nutrition info AFTER I drank it, turns out its 410 calories for the regular with whipped cream. But if you order it with non-fat milk and no whip cream? Its only 258 calories. Almost half! I didn't have whipped cream, but had regular milk, so I figure I was around the 350 mark-ish. Not too shabby. And totally worth it. Look how little it is (I am SO used to getting a venti, aka Large, in everything at Starbucks that this just looked abnormal to me. haha).

Anyway, I think my energy level is about a -2 right now, so I feel a nap coming into my future today. My parents are moving tomorrow, so I will be lugging boxes and furniture and who knows what else tomorrow. I'm guessing I will both get a good workout and be sore. Not too bad. Oh, and for those of you who are wondering how did I work off that Arby's tradgedy yesterday? I didn't stop walking and/or moving from about 3:30-7:30 last night prepping for the concert. Pretty sure I burned something! ;)

Tall is Small,
Micha

Arby's Fail

So today is a super busy day for me. We're hosting Mark Lowry in concert tonight and there are lots of things to do to get everything ready. Plus I went on a mini field-trip this morning to play for the senior adult choir. And I'll probably be here until 11-12:00 tonight. So I was worried about food, because the day of our last concert I was so busy I ended up not eating anything at all and wanted to pass out and die afterwards. So I thought I would do good and make sure I got my three meals in today and still eat healthy. I had a small piece of a sausage/egg casserole for breakfast (by far the biggest breakfast success for me yet!). I drank my water and took my Zija vitamins, and drank more water. And tonight my parents are coming to the concert, so they're going to come an hour early and bring me a turkey sandwich on wheat and some light chips and a bottle of water, all from Subway. So that left lunch. And I didn't really have time/need to go home, but didn't bring anything with me, so I decided to eat out, but eat healthy. Big fail. MAJOR fail. And thus begins my rant:

I chose Arby's because less things are fried there. I decided upon a Market Fresh Sandwich, NO fries, no side at all actually. And ordered a small ice water. I asked for no tomato or onion, per usual, and came back to my office to eat my sandwich. Its turkey, bacon, cheese, lettuce, and ranch on wheat bread. So I knew it wasn't a total health nut meal, but also figured it was better than a cheeseburger. WRONG WRONG WRONG. DO NOT order this sandwich at Arby's!! Half-way through my sandwich, I got on their website to look up the nutritional value. The result? This sandwich is a whopping, and I mean whopping 810 calories!!!!! 400 of these calories are in the BREAD.

 So at this point, I'm half-way through this beast (as you can see) and am in shock. So I decide to go through the rest of the Arby's menu, and to my horror discover this so-called healthy sandwich is one of the top 3 highest calorie items on the ENTIRE menu. I could have had a large Beef & Cheddar Melt and curly fries (which to be honest, I totally wanted) and had the same caloric intake as this "wheat" bread. I say "wheat" because obviously it is glorified bread. I could have also had a FRIED chicken, bacon & swiss sandwich with curly fries. What the hell? I mean, don't get me wrong. I understand that fast food places don't exactly make their living by selling lettuce and wheat and grains. And I don't expect to go through a drive-thru and eat for less than 500 calories. This much I know. But to order a turkey sandwich and have the bread alone be 400 calories? I mean, hell - the ranch dressing and bacon COMBINED were only 200 and I was thinking those were the bad part about this sandwich. In fact, I picked off half the bacon so that I wouldn't eat it, only to discover its contribution was only 90 calories.

Moral of the story kids? Read the nutrition info first, not half-way through eating. Also, restaurant menus are deceiving, and that irks me. I mean, I'd rather just know that I could have had a cheeseburger than to fool myself into thinking I made a smart decision.

So I'll be having my Subway version of a turkey sandwich tonight, which will be like 300-400 calories at best. And I'll still, at the end of the day when all is said and done be at or under my daily caloric intake needs. But nonetheless, I feel like I just ate a cow. Boo.

Eat it, Arby's.

Micha

Busy Bee

Today is one of those days where I can't decide how I feel. Ever have one of those? I am literally going between thinking this is a great day all the way to thinking this day will never end. Wednesdays are typically very long days for me. I work 12 hours on Wednesdays because we have choir and orchestra rehearsals, children's programming, etc. I stay until rehearsals get under way to make sure everything is all set. I spend most of my day on Wednesday copying music, making music packets for the band members and pianists, making TONS of powerpoint slides, making rehearsal orders/announcements, etc etc. Today we had the baby grand and the grand pianos tuned for the Mark Lowry concert tomorrow, so I had the piano tuner here. Plus I am going on a mini-field trip with the senior adult choir tomorrow to play the piano for them at a few small gigs, so I've tried to brush up my fingers a bit today. And on top of my usual Wednesday activities, I am working back and forth with Mark Lowry's promoter all day trying to get invoices set, volunteers final coordination, facilities set up, police, etc etc. Annnnnnd, I also work in the Discipleship/Education department now in addition to music, and there is a business meeting tonight so I have to run reports for that,too. For the education department I take care of attendance, church records, membership, and a looooot of time with Excel spreadsheets calculating attendance totals. So um, yes. I stay very, very......very busy. Woof.

In exercise news: I went to the gym last night!! Woowoo! And I have an announcement: I ran, not walked, I ran on the treadmill. Now granted, I only ran for 3 minutes straight before I took a mini-break. But for me, three minutes running is a HUGE deal.  I only ever power walk on the treadmill, and then of course do the Ellyptical, which continues to kick my ass on a regular basis. But it felt good to run!! I turned on the Glee soundtrack, found my fav song, and just took off. For someone my size, with a bum knee, and completely and utterly out of shape?? I was pretty pleased with that 3 minute run. One day I will make it up to 20 minutes and look back at this 3 minutes and think how pathetic it was. But today? 3 minutes is a rockstar to me.

I made lunch today. I tried to eat a larger lunch since I know I won't get out of here until 8:30. I made the mistake last week of eating my normal lighter lunch and afternoon snack, and was completely famished by the time I went home. The result? On the way home I stopped and got a pizza. I felt so guilty afterwards!!! ahh! So today I made a bowl of wheat pasta with peas and some low cal/low fat cheese and light butter on it. Again, baby steps. In the past I would have:

1. Made regular pasta
2. Used at LEAST 7 slices of cheese, minimum
3. Cooked the entire box.
4. Eaten at least half of what I made, which is WAY too much.
5. Used real cheese and real butter.

But today I:

1. Used Wheat pasta
2. Used 2 slices of low cal/low fat cheese
3. Cooked less than 1/4 of the box.
4. Ate half and put the other half in the fridge for tomorrow
6.Healthier cheese, healthier butter (though I'm pretty certain I used way too much butter b/c I didn't measure.)

So, although its one of those days, I'm still on track mentally I think. I want to exercise when I get home tonight if I don't feel like I've been hit by a truck. That remains to be seen. OH, and for dinner last night? My sister made the BEST salad!! She broiled some chick, then tossed it in with some green apples, craisins, pecans (this was bad, but not terrible - 1/3 of a cup is 130 calories. totally was worth it.), and a light balsalmic vinegarette for our dressing. Oh my god I wanted to marry it. It was about 300-350 cals overall, and then I went to the gym an hour later and burned 300-350 cals exercising. So woo woo! :)

Just keep swimming,
Micha

Today's Dish

Well, as non-exciting as my little life is, here I am posting again. Had a good day yesterday. I had a breakfast of Special K and applesauce again. I was not hungry at ALL for lunch yesterday, so I basically made myself eat. I had a bowl of pineapples, wheat crackers with cheese, and a thing of Yoplait Light yogurt (which by the way, if you have not tried this, DO. They have like 30 different flavors and they're only 100 calories for the whole container. Delish.). When I got home last night it looked like rain, but I decided to not let that deter me. I took the dog for a nice power-walk. This time she seemed to enjoy herself a little more than before - a little less panting. haha Me? Felt great! In fact, when I got home I actually wanted to walk more, but then a monsoon hit so that was out. I cooked a great dinner. Steamed cauliflower with light cheese (no butter or salt even needed!), a cup of peas and corn with basil, and a grilled turkey burger on whole wheat toast with grilled red peppers. It was SOOOOO delish.

Not gonna lie, I was pretty proud of myself. I know I cooked WAY too much cauliflower, but who cares? Its only 25 calories a serving, and it had absolutely nothing on it but the one slice of cheese. If I'm going to overeat on something it may as well be a veggie. And I was totally feeling the effects of not having a large enough lunch, so those veggies tasted soooooo good. :)

I came in the office this morning and drank my 8 ounces of water and my Zija vitamins (more about Zija in a later post). I had a bowl of Special K for breakfast, and a lovely cup of coffee, made in my lovely Keurig, and drank in my lovely purple coffee mug. 

For lunch, I went out with Ethan again. I'm trying to have him introduce me to at least one new restaurant a week here in Lexington. I feel like I always go to the same places if I go out. When people come to visit me here, I feel like I should know my city better. I'm kind of a boring hermit and tend not to do much, so I'm making an attempt at fixing that. Today he took me to Charlie Brown's. I give it an A+ for atmosphere. Totally great hidden place down off Euclid. Its really, super dark inside and is lit only by candles and a huge burning fire place. The walls are lined from floor to ceiling with really old books that look like
they're out of an old Sherlock Holmes film. There are big overstuffed chairs and couches that you can sit on instead of tables and chairs (though we chose a table), and it has big, dark wood floors. Loved it. Downside: their menu is standard bar food - aka, everything tends to be fried, dipped, or battered. But I did well! I order the Lucy Lite Chicken sandwich, which was just a plain piece of grilled chicken and a piece of lettuce on a bun. I didn't eat all of the bun but it was good. Instead of fries, I ordered a side salad and had them put my dressing on the side so I dipped the lettuce and ended up not even eating half of what they gave me for dressing. Dipping really works people! And of course: I drank water. So yay for for eating healthy! (as I stared at Ethan's french fries, creamy chicken bisque soup, and HUGE steak philly sandwich. mmmm).

Its raining so I can't take the dog for a walk tonight. Well, I could but we would both be pretty foul when it was over. I'll have to see what I can get myself into tonight for exercise. I just discovered yesterday that one of my bestest friends from my college days, Linds, has a blog of her own!! I don't know how I missed this fact. Anyway, her blog is very inspiring and she is hardcore about the exercise! She even uses an extra job on the weekends to help pay for a personal trainer. What?!?! I am uber motivated now to look into that myself. More to come.

Lastly, shout out to another old friend of mine, the fabulous Betsy. She and I met like fifty years ago when we both got accepted into an opera workshop at Capital University Conservatory and were paired up as roomies. We went on to do community theater together, and she is just in general a very cool person. I've reconnected with her recently and read her awesome blog as well. She has commented on here to tell me that SHE has lost 49 pounds on her journey. Holy cow!!! I can't wait until I can say that. Yay Betsy!

Positive for today: Two coworkers came up to me and told me I looked good today and they could tell I've lost weight. I'm going to accept these comments and try to absorb them. Because frankly, though down 15 lbs I believe I look exactly the same. It takes more than 15 lbs for this girl to look skinnier. But nonetheless - thanks ladies. :)

Charlie Brown is more than a cartoon character,
Micha

The Weekend Update

Well, this turned out to be a really good weekend and I didn't even see it coming! :)

Friday night was crash night. I'm always so exhausted it isn't even funny. So I grabbed my snuggie and some Glee on DVD and cuddled with the dog. My life is just so exciting. Though I did finally get around to using my iTunes gift card that I got for Christmas (I know, right). I spent $25 in like five minutes once I finally sat down and did it. Caught up on my Glee music, and got a bunch of songs that I've been wanting for a long time, including a ton of Bruno Mars. LOVE LOVE LOVE him.

Saturday I slept until I woke up, which was of course noon, and then decided I didn't want to waste my entire day of possible. I decided to throw my new music on the docking station and dance around and clean my apartment. I figured it would burn more calories, dancing is fun, and it made the cleaning seem a little more desirable. The end result? My apartment looks great, and I felt great. Totally broke a sweat dancing. :) Food-wise it was a good day,too. I had yogurt and a piece of skim-milk string cheese for breakfast/lunch. I slept so late breakfast didn't really happen ( bad Micha!) For dinner, I had a bowl of lima beans with two bunless burgers. Voila:

It was super yummy! I am the biggest lima bean fan ever, so I can't resist them. I even made them in my teeny tiny pot in my new purple Paula Deen cookware set:

I had a snack last night,too and then a cup of hot tea before bed. Thats usually my favorite part of the day! My Zija green tea. mmmm.

Today I got up and drove to Cincy with Leslie to go visit Matt. His grandma passed away this week, so he has been in town and will still be in town for a few days before he heads back to NYC. So Les and I drove up to meet him at Max & Erma's for lunch. I did pretty good - had a cup of tortilla soup, a DELISH salad that had green apples and a light balsalmic vinegarette, and drank water. Matt ordered the infamous homemade chocolate chip cookies, and yes I had one. It was toooootally worth it. :)

Once I got home I felt like sitting around in my apartment was pretty pointless. I started to just ignore that feeling, but then I gave myself a mini-pep talk. I've been saying how I need to incorporate exercise, in ANY form, more into my daily routine. So I put my big girl panties on (and by that I mean a sports bra and my Nike's), grabbed the dog, and went on a 30 minute walk. Felt GREAT! I power-walked, so I was really working up a good sweat. We walked all around my apartment complex, then I even took her down to the dog park, which I might add is truly hidden. It was borderline creepy walking down the path to get there. There was a creek there. And by creek, I mean it rained too much one day and there was no drain. Then some trees grew. Then they put up some toys and said "Hey ya'll, its a dog park!". Epic fail. The dog enjoyed the walk WAY more than the park. When we got home she ran to her water dish, then collapsed. Totally out of shape. ha!

For dinner tonight I had a turkey burger on wheat toast, and.....Lima Beans!! ha.

I adore turkey burgers. I season it really good, then I don't really need any condiments. Just some lettuce, and piece of skim milk cheese, and its totally delicious! I made two, so I have one leftover for tomorrow. Speaking of my wheat bread, I have found the BEST wheat bread. I used Spark People (http://www.sparkpeople.com/) all the time for food advice. They had an article on how to buy the correct bread, and voila: Nature's Own Wheat Bread. Its sugar free, only 50 cals a slice, hardly any carbs at all! Its my new love affair. :)

Anyway, thats all for now. Sorry so long. It was a great weekend. Oh, and by the way - had my hair cut/colored last weekend and attempted to take a picture of it:

 I prefer me with darker hair. Doesn't accent my chins as much. ;)

Going to watch some Lord of the Rings now.

Peace, love, and wheat bread,

Micha

Web + Log = Blog

Wow! I can't believe I have "followers". Thanks guys! :)

Yesterday went well overall. I had applesauce for breakfast. I knoooooow I need to eat more for breakfast, but its SO hard for me. Some days I do really good, but most days I fail at eating enough. I am just not hungry in the mornings! I went out to lunch with Ethan. I would like to state that he begged me to go to 1. Bdubs 2. Chipotle and 3. Qdoba and I refused all three. I told him if he wanted me to have lunch with him there was one rule: it HAS to be somewhere I can eat decently healthy. So we ended up at Panera. Before you gasp and tell me how going to bread heaven is probably the worst idea on earth....I ate good! I had a small side salad with little to no dressing, a bowl of black bean vegetarian soup, I drank two cups of water, and I ate maybe two bites of my complimentary baguette. I even stayed strong when he ordered a cup of coffee and some ridiculously delicious looking pecan dessert goodie. Go me! ha.

Dinner was fantastic - it was almost 70 degrees here yesterday so Leslie and I decided we just had to grill out. Granted, by the time I actually was able to leave work the sun was pretty much gone and it was more like 60 degrees, but still. We made foil daddies - allow me to explain.

The Foil Daddy:

My dad, when we were little, would always be the "chef" when we went camping. He is a gooooood cook. One time he came up with this idea to take a piece of aluminum foil, put every vegetable known to man inside of it, and lay it on a fire/grill for 2 hours. He self-named them a foil-daddy, and as a family we've eaten them ever since. Mine usually consists of peas, corn, green beans, cabbage, carrots, and whatever other stray vegetable there is lying around (Note: celery is NOT good in this). I season with fresh squeezed tomato juice (b/c I'm spoiled and my mom cans tomato juice. But Campbell's tomato juice will do.), salt/pepper, and worcestershire sauce. Throw in a lean hamburger patty or a piece of chicken, then stick it on the grill for 2-3 hours and let it all sloooooowly cook. It. Is. So. GOOD.

In other news, I've noticed that a lot of you gals following me on here are going through weight loss journey's of your own - Yay!!! I hope we can all encourage each other, especially on down days. Feel free to send me recipes and I'll post some on here from time to time. I had an AHmazing Weight Watchers chili the other day that was SOOOO good. I'll post the recipe on here soon.

Special shout out to Linds today - you're my twin!! She started her own thintervention the same day I did, and she has lost 15 pounds as well, and I can attest first-hand how hard that is. Go Linds, Go!! Miss you and love ya!

Lastly: Did you know that blogs are called "blogs" because the word originates from the two words "web log", and when you say it fast together it sounds like "blog"? I did not know this until yesterday. Win.

Much Love,
Micha

Here I go....

My "stats" thus far:
* Pounds lost: 15
* I have had NO fast-food since December
* I drink only water - no diet pop, no sweet tea, no juices, no sugary drinks. Ever.
* I switched to wheat pasta (and love it)


If you're reading this, then you most likely are already aware of my 2011 weight-loss journey that I like to refer to as my Thintervention. I started on January 3rd of this year, and thus far my last official weigh-in had me down 15 pounds. By "official" weigh-in, I mean I actually counted it. Sometimes I give in and weigh in mid-week, but will have only lost about a pound and that gets discouraging pretty fast. Its much better if I can hold off and only officially weigh-in about every 2 weeks - the numbers are lower and that makes a girl feel good. This is going to be a long entry because I really want to dive into how this process came about and exactly what this process is - and is not.

I decided to start this blog for two reasons: One, my facebook page has become largely dominated by me posting about my progress and uploading pictures of my meals. I figure if I'm going to put myself out there in web world, I may as well go full throttle and start a blog. Two, a HUGE part of this process being successful depends on my accountability. Before Christmas I sat my entire family down and had a thintervention with them. I've spent the past I-don't-know-how-many-years packing this weight on, and my big Southern family with big Southern cooking does NOT help. So I not only instructed them to not let me eat badly, but I also instructed them to hold me accountable. Call me and ask me what I ate that day, text me about exercising, facebook me, email me, come hunt me down if you feel so inclined. Just hold me accountable in any way possible.So this blog is an extension of that - I'm going to be honest, even when I don't want to. I'll keep posted what I ate, if I exercised, what my mini-goals are and whether I achieve them or not.

The next thing I want to make clear is this: I AM NOT ON A DIET and THIS IS NOT A NEW YEAR'S RESOLUTION. If I hear ONE more person tell me that diets don't work, they're only temporary, you'll gain it all back, etc, I will cut a bitch. For real. I am not following any trends, I am not joining weight watchers, I am not eating lettuce and sprouts and veggies 24/7. What I AM doing is making healthier choices and integrating those choices into my life both gradually and permanently. If I want pizza, I eat pizza. If I want chocolate cake, I eat chocolate cake. I don't believe in depriving myself or starving myself. But I do believe in eating in moderation and steering WAY clear of the portion sizes that I used to have. I believe in eating the amount of calories that is healthy for my height and weight, eating the varieties of foods and nutritions that my body needs, and taking good care of myself. The automatic results, without me even really trying all that hard, is that I'm losing weight. My body is realizing what it needs, and so am I.

 I don't have to turn to food for emotional comfort (my biggest weakness....I'm happy - let's eat! I'm sad - let's eat! I'm angry - let's eat! I got a promotion - let's eat! I got fired - let's eat!) When I feel those urges I really try to sit down with myself and find a better alternative than food. Taking a walk, cleaning my apartment, watching a movie, going to my sister's, playing the Wii, calling a friend or family member- whatEVER it takes.

Finally, exercise. Though I fully feel that exercise is an important part of this journey, and I have made considerable efforts to weave it into my life, it is definitely the weakest area of this process thus far. I dislike gym stuff - treadmills, elypticals, etc. I need creative ways. I have discovered that Zumba and Wii Boxing are both entertaining, and burn a ton of calories. I just need to do more of them. So hopefully as I continue to drop pounds and gain more energy, I'll focus even more on becoming more fit.

So thats it in a nutshell. I don't even know if anyone will read this, but its theraputic for me and it helps, so I'm not losing anything (other than the 10 minutes I've spent typing all this).

Micha