This time next year....

26th November 2016

Live, laugh, love because this all ends!

At this time of year (maybe a little earlier) parents around the country have been handed a letter from their children for Father Christmas telling him what they'd like for Christmas!  How about today you write a letter saying what you'd like to have changed by this time next year?

You could hand it to your leader, hold onto it yourself, it's just a good thing to do, get your goals clear in your mind, do you want to weigh less, do you want to learn to cook healthier meals, do you want to get more active, do you want to change your job, move house, I don't know - do you know what you really want?   Make sure you sign and date the letter and put it somewhere safe so you can celebrate when you open and read it and realise you've done what you set out to do! 

Of course you will have to plan how you will achieve those goals, you can't just write them down and offer them to the universe!

I had a chat with my member Bonnie yesterday about exactly this and one of the things she'd like to improve is her cooking skills so we're going to have a cook along on Monday, we're both going to cook exactly the same dish in our separate kitchens and compare notes.  Our first recipe is Chicken Jalfrezi from the new Weight Watchers one pot cook book, page 50, can't wait to see how it goes, you never know I might film me making it, but then again I might not - we shall see ;)

This time next year, what do you want, think about it?  How do you feel now, write that down too, if you're not happy with where or how you are, write down why, get it straight in your head, let's get all this decided before December, before we start enjoying Christmas so it's there in our minds ready for January.  I will be enjoying my Christmas but not until much closer to the 25th, until then I have a few more pounds I'd quite like to shift.  People are commenting and noticing which makes me realise they'd noticed I'd gained too and as a Weight Watcher leader, that's not a great example now is it!

Ooo my different thing list, yesterday I added to it;

1. Babybel
2. Bacon lardons
3. Beef
4. Bread
5. Carrot
6. Cheese triangle
7. Courgette
8. Cress
9. Egg
10. Green beans
11. Green peppers
12. Heck chicken sausages
13. Leek
14. Lemon
15. Lemon & Dill mayo
16. Mushrooms
17. Mustard
18. Pork (sticky toffee - so included syrup)
19. Potato
20. Red pepper
21. Salad leaves including rocket and watercress
22. Salmon
23. Satsuma
24. Skimmed Milk
25. Spinach
26. Tomatoes
27. White sauce
28. Wine! 

Need to go get some fruit and veg today as my fridge supplies are running low and I've been paid now.

I'm thinking faggots, mash and cabbage for dinner, nom nom, breakfast first though, that'll be sausage and egg sarnie to use up the sausage and well eggs are my thing, I might add lettuce as I think I'm out of mushrooms and tomatoes!  It needs some form of veg with it, maybe I'll have a couple of satsumas too, that'll healthy it up a little more.

I'm starting my day with an attitude of gratitude, I have heating I can turn on when it's cold on waking, so many don't, I have a radio in my office to enjoy music, I do love a bit of music, I danced and sang for a few hours in my kitchen yesterday, I was grateful my mom doesn't mind my noise, because when I sing - it is a noise :) I have to say the new Little Mix album isn't bad at all, I normally wouldn't be a fan but that Amazon Prime meant I could listen to it for free. 

I'm waffling, it's early, I'm off!  Here's to a Saturday staying focused, thinking before consuming, "do we want it more than a weight loss?" there's a question to keep close by.  Now go write that note, start it, "This time next year......"

Boom! I lost :)

25th November 2016

Never underestimate the power of good morning texts, apologies and random compliments.

YAY, I lost 1.5lb, so now I've lost 10lb in 8 weeks and it's true, in two weeks I felt it, four weeks I definitely started to see it and last week I heard it so many times from people telling me they could see the difference, I'm chuffed, I've managed to stay on track for 8 weeks, not 100% at all but 10lb worth of weight loss and that's more than I expected over the 12 weeks if I'm honest so anything from now is a bonus, if I managed a stone by Christmas I'd be so pleased because I would be able to enjoy my break without worrying too much about gaining a few pounds.

Here is the link to the food I ate and yeah there are a few bites missed off that I consumed! https://www.facebook.com/media/set/?set=a.10154488223600862.1073741941.595730861&type=1&l=0be2df15de

I'm well aware my diet wasn't the most varied over the last week but I'm feeling better now and ready to get back to it, I remember a few years ago I did a challenge with myself where I decided I wouldn't eat the same meal twice for a month, I managed it, it wasn't easy.

But my challenge this week is to see how many different ingredients I can include in my diet because variety is what I need to keep me engaged and eating a varied diet ensures we're getting all the nutrients and minerals we need from a health point of view.

Did you know the recommended daily allowance of calcium needed is 700mg for adults, it was pointed out to me yesterday that the photos I take never show milk or that I don't eat yogurts.  Nope I don't eat yogurt and I only have milk in my tea, occasionally I'll have a glass of skimmed milk or a cup of hot milk because I like it.  I did however go for 8 years without cow's milk because I was vegan for those years and I was concerned about my bone density etc so I had a test a couple of years ago and all was good thankfully.

The thing is you can get calcium from non-dairy sources, it's all about making sure you do, that goes for all vitamins and nutrients, you need a good balanced, varied diet and usually you'll be getting everything you need. 

Some foods, such as spinach, contain a high amount of calcium but is bound to a substance called 'oxalate' which hinders calcium absorption.  This is why including other low-oxalate vegetables such as rocket, cabbage and kale are key to a calcium-rich diet.  I love green veggies thankfully, I'm fancying cabbage after writing this now, I had rocket with my salad last night.  Interestingly, calcium in cow's milk is not as easily absorbed, meaning that vegetables such as kale are much better sources of calcium than animal milks or 'dairy'.

Salt and caffeine have been shown to inhibit calcium uptake too, so if you can cut down your intake of those, all the better, I'm glad to say I'm not drinking as much tea as I used to, I prefer water these days, salt is a work in progress, I don't add it to my food when I'm cooking but I do like it on my chips!  Eating plenty of fruit and vegetables will increase calcium absorption apparently, while adequate protein intake (roughly 1g of protein per kg of your healthy body weight) will also help.  Nutrition is a fascinating subject and still a very young science which is one of the reasons, theories keep changing and there are so many different opinions.

Did you know drinking hard water can provide 200mg of calcium daily, although soft water contains almost none!   Other sources of none dairy calcium included tofu, oranges, figs, some beans including baked beans, nuts and seeds. 

It is worth thinking and looking at your meals over the course of a week or so to see if you are getting the variety you need, not just for the calcium but other nutritients and vitamins, this time of year we need Vitamin D, good food sources are;

• oily fish – such as salmon, sardines, herring and mackerel
• red meat
• liver
• egg yolks
• fortified foods such as most fat spreads and some breakfast cereals

I reckon I eat enough eggs!  You can always take a multivitamin if you're concerned, but yeah I'm setting myself a little challenge this week, my goal is to include as many ingredients as I possibly can, if I include yesterday as it's my first day of my week, I had;

1.    Egg
2.    Skimmed Milk
3.    Cress
4.    Bread
5.    Pork (sticky toffee - so included syrup)
6.    Potato
7.    Green beans
8.    mushrooms
9.    Salmon
10. Lemon
11. Satsuma
12. Lemon & Dill mayo
13. Salad leaves including rocket and watercress
14. Babybel

           Wine :)

Not a bad start, wonder if I can do 100 over the week?  You fancy joining me on my challenge?

A calendar month today will be Christmas day, I'm going to have a cracking good week this week, it's not Christmas yet!  I want a weight loss next week and I'm going to do everything I can to help me get it, I managed my 30 minute walk yesterday too which I'm chuffed to say I made time for. 

Here's to a fantastic Friday!

Week 9, who'd have believed it!

24th November 2016

Never look back, it distracts you from the now.

Sat here thinking what shall I write...

It's that time of the week where I get weighed, it's Day one of week 9 of my 12 week challenge!   9 weeks ago today I wrote;

It takes It takes 4 weeks for you to notice a change It takes 8 weeks for your friends to notice It takes 12 weeks for the rest of the world to notice It takes one day to decide that you are enough Give it 12 weeks, don't quit!

I also wrote " Start today and by the 24th November your friends will start to say, ooo have you lost some weight?  By them you'll be feeling even better, you'll probably have lost 5% of your body weight, which brings all sorts of benefits with it."

I don't think when I wrote that I believed I'd be the one having lost 5% and having people notice, but they have been noticing and I have lost that 5%.

This is the bit I need reminding of;

It takes one day to decide that you are enough

Never forget that, as you are right not, you're enough.  What you're about to do is decide that you are worth taking care of, worth taking the time to eat well, to think about what you're consuming and the effect it's having on your body.  Worth taking that 30 minutes out of your day to go for a walk and get some exercise (even I need to realise this bit! Starting today!)

So the last two weeks, I haven't been so good, I've not walked at all this week, partly because of the weather, partly... oh who am I kidding, it just got knocked off my priority list!   It needs to get back on, I'm not going to promise to walk today, 5 meetings and busy makes it not quite so easy, but I'm going to try and I will definitely walk tomorrow. 

I'm not sure what the scales will say this morning, I've not been 100%, my tracking has slipped and I'm having to constantly remind myself "it's not Christmas yet!", It's the 24th November not December!   

I ate really well yesterday, we had a delicious dinner of chicken breast stuffed with St Agur cheese wrapped in ham, it was lush, so here's to continuing those good meals, thinking before eating, doing what I can to keep my momentum going and hit my 12 week goal. 

When I started the goal was just to get to the end of the 12 weeks still on track and focused, now it's still the same I guess, I've lost more than I expected if I'm honest, considering my track record over the last year.  I've just remembered I get weighed by my boss a week on Saturday so that's just given me that extra umph to have a super good week now.  If I could lose this morning and next Thursday - that would be awesome.   Then we'd be officially in December, I can start to think about Christmas!

Yeah here's to a cracking good day, I'm thinking sticky toffee pork with mash and veg, that's dinner of course not breakfast!  For brekkie, I might make me an egg sandwich, I need to do a veg shop, got no mushrooms, ooo but the new Co-op opens across the road today, I'm going to be able to walk across and fetch things like that when I need - I'm so pleased, it'll help add steps to my daily quota too.

Started my gratitude book yesterday, already I've noticed it made me more aware of the good things that happened during the day, like that moment when I asked my bestie what she wanted me to cook for our dinner and she replied, "I don't mind, you always cook good food", then when she ate it, she told me how delicious it was.  I love to cook and it's even better when it's appreciated.

Anyway, I'm waffling, moms just woke up, so I'll get going and get my day started. 

Here's to Tracking Thursday - you in BeYOUtiful?

Choose to be grateful...

23rd November 2016

Kindness makes you the most beautiful person in the world no matter what you look like.

What are you thankful for?

It's Thanksgiving in America tomorrow, a national holiday to give thanks for the blessing of the harvest and of the preceding year.  These days they gather today for a day of feasting, football and family both celebrations resulted in them all coming together around the table.

I was fortunate enough to spend one Thanksgiving in New York with my friends and watch the Macy's day parade, it was the best, I love the film Miracle on 34th Street and this fulfilled a wish on my to do list, for that I was thankful and blessed. 

 I love the idea of coming together, giving thanks for everything you have, acknowledging the things/people your blessed to have in your life is something we should do regularly. 

Stopping at the end of the day and writing down 3 things you're grateful is a regularly practised idea that can have an impact on your health.

People who are grateful tend to be happier, healthier and more fulfilled. Being grateful can help you cope with stress and can even have a beneficial effect on heart rate.  I've decided I'm going to take up the Gratitude challenge from now till Christmas (at least).  It's easy to do and yet it's benefits have been scientifically proven, in tests, people who tried it each night for just one week were happier and less depressed one, three and six months later.  I'm game for that, I struggle at this time of year with finding my "RA RA", so any help is gratefully received (ooo there's my first on the list).

Just one week, how easy would it be for you to test that theory and experiment with the idea.  How does it work?  Well science is showing that gratitude is important for how good we feel, it increases how much positive emotion we feel and decreases the negative.  We naturally focus on what goes wrong in our daily lives, you know how it goes, we play it over and over in our minds!   But when was the last time you 'dwelled' on the good things that had happened.  You know those things that bring that quick smile to your face or made you feel good, we tend to let them pass. 

If you're actively writing a gratitude list, then you're actively looking for the good throughout the day, that's got to be a good thing, even on a bad day, if you look, you'll find some good things.

One of mine yesterday was in my evening meeting, we were talking about what food we love to eat and one members daughter said 'pasta', I asked how she liked to eat that and completely innocently, she replied 'with a fork'.  Made everyone in that room smile, now if I wasn't focusing on keeping a gratitude count, I'd have soon forgotten that comment and I don't ever want to forget wonderful moments like that.

So here goes, every night before I go to bed, I'm going to think back over my day and remember three good things that happened, things that went well, that I enjoyed or I'm grateful for, however small.  It's a given I'm grateful for my loved ones, although I make sure they know how much regularly!

Once I've thought of those three things, I'm going to note them down, might start me a nice little gratitude note pad and keep it by the side of my armchair, you can actually get apps for this but I want good old-fashioned pen and paper so I can flick through it when I'm having a grumpy day and realise I'm blessed.

When I've written them down, I'm going to think about why, why I actually feel good about it.  I'll look back over what I've written each week and notice how it makes me feel, maybe I'll notice themes or patterns. 

If after a month I feel it's made a difference to me and lifted my winter mood, I'll continue to do it.

Do you fancy doing it with me?  We can share the things we're grateful for on Facebook.  Remember it's not a competition, it's not about the big things, who's got the most to be grateful for, it's about acknowledging life is good.  Mine yesterday were;

1) Members daughter really made me smile when we were talking about what food we love to eat and one members daughter said 'pasta', I asked how she liked to eat that and completely innocently, she replied 'with a fork'. 

2) When my ipads at meeting wouldn't sync and agree with each other, the lady on the helpline sorted me out without giving me loads of extra work to do.

3) Came home to beef curry that I'd put on at lunchtime and forgotten about until I walked in the door, it was delicious.  The benefits of a bad memory.

See keep it simple, don't overthink it, look for those moments, it'll make your day better. 

I'm going to clear out my shed today, then I can be grateful that I made the time to do it when I'm writing tonight.

Have a great day BeYOUtiful, focus on the healthy, happy and of course those things that make you grateful to be YOU!