Legging Lust and Rain (Erin)

Have you ever been addicted to something? As in, if you can't get around to doing it, you're a little thrown off?

It turns out, this bike riding thing is addictive. I don't know if it's that feeling of power as you push your legs to pedal harder then feel the bike respond by gliding down the trail. . .or the fresh air blowing over your face. . .or even the ability to cover so many miles in such a short time span. Maybe it's all of the above. As hard as it is when you're really pushing yourself on the bike, it's so rewarding!

Quick goal update -- Not only did I make my goal of three bike rides last week, but also I had the same goal for this week. Guess what? It has rained every dang day.

I'm with those 7-year-old kids who are sitting at the window watching the rain fall, looking dejected. I want to be out there!

Since we've been missing our bike rides, Will has decided it's time to introduce me to P90x. Ok, listen, I do not like plyometrics. Kindergarteners jump around for fun, not grown women with self-respect. Mmmkay?! But I've been overruled. Update on that later.

The week has been challenging, but I'm moving forward. I made chicken with mushrooms in white wine sauce, another recipe from Skinny Taste.

It was pretty good!

Will and I made a cauliflower pizza crust. We had so much fun putting the crust together, toasting it up, loading our respective halves with our favorite toppings. We were talking about how much fun it is to make pizza together because each person can put their own spin on it. 

Then we tasted the pizza, which I hesitate to even call pizza. In the name of all that is good and holy, who ever said this is an adequate replacement for pizza crust?!! It was AWFUL! I'm talking, we had to go to Wendy's to get chicken nuggets and sprite to calm our stomachs down after three bites awful! 

I guess you win some and you lose some. It was worth trying, but we wasted a lot of great toppings on that pizza. 

On a vain note, I guess all women envy qualities they don't have. I have always envied women with nice legs. For some reason, I just haven't had cute legs...ever. I have strong, sturdy legs that can push through tough workouts and keep pounding, but I've never had those slim, cute, enviable legs. Will says riding a bike takes care of that, which I would like to believe because I would someday like to wear this:

Everyone has that outfit. You know the one. The outfit you would feel like a million bucks for getting into. I would absolutely love to be able to rock a pair of leggings with high boots. Every pear-shaped girl would, I guess. :) I saw this outfit on Pinterest and have been fighting legging lust since.

Back on subject, this week I hope to get back on the bike trail. We'll see if that's possible with the weather. Got to keep pushing forward! My first goal is to be able to ride 30 miles at a time. Currently I'm sticking between 14-16 miles per session. I'd also like to try the road bike again in the next month or two. If you remember, I had a nasty accident on Will's spare road bike a little while back which caused me to buy a hybrid instead of a road bike. I think I've improved enough to give it a second chance.

Hope you're enjoying this day! Stay positive!

Smooth Blew My Mind, and I'm Going Bananas Over Here (Erin)

I had to blog twice in one day for this.

Are you guilty of throwing bananas away because you can't manage to eat them before they go bad? I am. Big time. I finally realized I could freeze ripe bananas and use them in recipes. I tried it for the first time today.

Let me begin by saying, Ally got me hooked on powdered peanut butter. Powdered PB has a quarter of the calories of regular peanut butter and 85% less fat. When I'm using PB in a recipe, this always tastes amazing.

The company site offers recipe ideas. I decided to see if there was a smoothie recipe to incorporate some of my super ripe banana stash. There was! You can view it here.

It's simple - throw these ingredients into a blender and enjoy!

1 cup: Skim milk
1 small sliced: Frozen banana
2 Tbsp: PB2
2 tsp: Splenda
2 or 3: Ice cubes

I was impressed. I used the chocolate flavored powdered PB. Highly recommend. I felt like I was having dessert. There's quite a bit of protein (13g) and potassium (450mg)  in the smoothie.

Next I'm going to try making ice cream with frozen bananas. Yep, ice cream. Crazy, right? Bananas are cheap and loaded with Potassium. I think I'm on to something. :)

The Cycle (Erin)

The other day, I was doing some research for work. I ran across this quote, and for some reason it really knocked me on my nether regions.

"Overcoming an addiction sometimes requires a cycle of failure and renewed effort."

Wow. Maybe it's where I am in life. Maybe it's the summary of all that I've been thinking. I don't know. It just hit me. When you struggle with weight, you struggle for life. It's not a war you win in one battle. You battle as long as you live. And you have cycles of ups and downs. It's not about whether or not you have a bad or hard phase, it's about how you deal with it when it comes. Because it will absolutely come.

I come back to this Japanese proverb when things get really hard in life. If you fall seven times, stand up eight. It's not about falling, it's about rallying.

You ever feel like there should be an action movie about someone trying to live a healthy lifestyle? I'm telling you, some days it feels like you're fighting an epic battle with bombs exploding around you, metaphorically speaking. But somehow there's grace enough to keep going when you dig deep and really look for perspective. And when you're forgiving. We can't be perfect, but we can get better as we go.

Quick story before I get into recipes. I went for a bike ride Monday. It was just ok. Some days your body is just not all that peppy, which was the case on this particular ride. I accept those days and do the best I can. Well, I think Nature knew it was Monday. I went on a 15-mile ride, and during that ride not only did I see a copperhead in the middle of the path, but also I got stung by a bee. Seriously. Thanks, Nature. Thanks for the love. :) I hope Nature is a little nicer when I hit the trail today.

This week I've had the chance to cook with Will several times. He is so supportive. He wanted to cook last night so we went and got all the fixings for gumbo. He was careful to buy turkey sausage and use oil sparingly. Love that man.

I was able to make the banana/blueberry oatmeal I talked about:

It was GREAT! I also made the jalapeno popper stuffed chicken:

For some reason the chicken was a little bland. I decided to cut it, season it, and reheat it in the toaster oven so I could enjoy the leftover a little more. It was good after the adjustment. 

More later. Stay encouraged!

Persistence (Erin)

So I’m still living in a constant state of horror that I have gained weight. And I’m still trying to get back on track.

Why is it that once a person tries to get back on track temptations are close behind? Today alone my company decided to coordinate with Pizza Hut so all employees get a deal on pizza and breadsticks. If it wasn’t hard enough throwing that deal in the trash, my coworkers decided to pass around chocolate cupcakes this afternoon.

It was really hard to say no to the cupcakes. We’re talking ganache and M&M covered goodies here. 

A thought occurred to me as I watched someone peel away that cupcake wrapper. Those are a cheap drug. In the moment, it’s so hard to pass up. And when you’re eating a really good cupcake, it’s so delicious. But what about the moment after?

The moment after always lasts hours (for me, at least). The guilt. The regret. I always realize that after that 2 minutes of pleasure has ended, I’m stuck with all the fat and none of the satisfaction. It’s twisted.

So I’m glad I passed on the dessert party. While they chowed down on chocolate, I ate an especially sweet apple. It was the perfect answer to the cupcake – sweet but guilt-free. After all, I can always work chocolate in if I really want to. I don’t have to ruin my day’s progress by splurging on chocolate when I don’t have the spare calories.

Last weekend Will and I went to see my family. It was a lot of fun. Ally even had a minute to come chat. Can I just say how AMAZING Ally looks? I wish she’d post an update. That girl looks like a different person. She really motivated me to keep trying. We were talking a little about how I’ve been struggling with weight gain, trying to figure out how to get my mind right so I can get back in the swing of things. She said, “Just don’t give up. You’ve come too far.” It’s a blessing to have someone who shares your struggles sit and talk for a while.

So since I got back home, I’ve been thinking about how I’m going to try harder this week. Poor Will, I actually made him listen to the whole plan.  He went with me to buy groceries last night so I could get things ready for the week.

Of course, I didn’t have time to cook when I got home so I had to eat out today. If you are a Popeye’s fan, they have naked strips. They're spicy and grilled, so what's there to complain about? :) I got three naked strips, coming in at 170 calories (26g protein). They are full of flavor. I highly recommend them!

The rest of the week I plan on cooking at home. A while back I made cheesy jalapeno stuffed chicken (a recipe I found on Skinny Taste). I’m going to pair the chicken with a veggie side I spotted on the site.

chicken: http://www.skinnytaste.com/2012/04/cheesy-jalapeno-popper-baked-stuffed.html

side: http://www.skinnytaste.com/2010/07/black-bean-avocado-cucumber-and-tomato.html

I’m also making banana/blueberry oatmeal, another Skinny Taste recipe. I thought it’d be great with a boiled egg and coffee for breakfast.

oatmeal: http://www.skinnytaste.com/2012/01/baked-oatmeal-with-blueberries-and.html

Will and I decided to try making cauliflower pizza crust. Have you seen this? People actually use cauliflower, an egg, cheese (in moderation), and herbs to make pizza crust. It’s got a fraction of the calories and carbs of regular pizza crust. Worth a try, right?

cauliflower pizza crust: http://detoxinista.com/2012/01/the-secret-to-perfect-cauliflower-pizza-crust/

This week, I started keeping my super special food journal. I’m including when I eat, what I eat, how much I eat, and who I’m with when I eat. Let’s see if I can spot any bad trends and improve how I deal with things.

My goals for the week are:

--go on 3 bike rides

--go to yoga once

--keep a detailed food journal

Just for laughs:

Knowing and Doing (Erin)

Well, I am home and showered from a bike ride, which is becoming commonplace for me. That in mind, you'd think this would be a victory blog. Think again.

I have been loving the bike rides. But I haven't gotten my nutrition/calorie count down yet. I'm still trying.

I was thinking today how emotions are potentially such dangerous things. In past failed attempts at getting healthy (read: losing weight), I always started to diet based on emotion. Guilt. Disgust. Anger. That never worked. Why? Well, I think because emotions roll over us like waves. After a minute, we're on to the next feeling. So you really can't thrive off of a changeable motivator like an emotion, can you?

Today I was feeling those emotions again so strongly. Especially guilt. And disgust. It was then that I realized those emotions are useless to me. I can feel those emotions and still make bad decisions. They don't really stop me from doing anything. In fact, negative emotions (when I give in to them) usually lead me to mess up by overindulging in comfort food or being lazy and watching a movie to distract myself. Those emotions have never done me any favors.

What matters is not that I find some emotion to motivate me for five minutes, but that I rebuild good habits. I have to dig in again and rebuild my belief in this process as well as my will power. It's not about how I feel, it's about how I live every day. How I take care of my stress, fuel my body, move my body -- even how I value myself. (If you care about yourself, you're going to live on a different level. Am I right?)

So I'm going to keep trying.

Recently someone suggested I keep a different kind of food journal. The journal would include the time I ate, what I ate, how much I ate, and who I was with when I ate. The point being, we have behavioral patterns we follow in certain situations (stress at work, afternoon drowsiness, etc.) or with certain people. It would be good to look at my eating patterns as they relate to my social life and my daily routines.

Maybe that's something we could all try. Sometimes it helps just to know certain situations are harder than others so we can either avoid them or prepare ourselves to face them.

Short blog this time. As always, I hope to be back soon. My super cute cyclist boyfriend is taking me to see his family this weekend. We're taking a short road trip, which is always fun for us. His plan is for us to sneak away and ride our bikes down the trails he grew up on.

So...I may be a little preoccupied, but I will be hashing out my thoughts here as I continue to try to get back on track. I hope people are praying for me. This is really hard. Sometimes you look at yourself in the mirror and think, "I know what to do. So why am I not doing it?" It's time to do what's necessary.

Your friend,
Erin