Never Perfection...Always Progress

This weekend was better than the last in the way of eating and exercise and I'm damn proud of that.  Last weekend I had 3 restaurant meals out.  This weekend I had 1 lunch out, eating 5 out of 6 meals on Sat and Sun at home.  Last weekend I did one walk on Sat and none on Sun.  This weekend I did 2 walks on Sat and 1 on Sun.  I took a few food pics to show the delicious meals I had.  Last weekend the meal plan was in my head, not solid and written down on paper as it should be.  This weekend I wrote it, edited it, re-wrote it and hung it on my fridge.  I even took into account the fact that Dwayne will be home this week on Thursday and Friday, and scheduled breakfast and lunches for him as well as me.

Saturday's lunch was the most delicious wrap I've ever made.  I mixed up some solid white albacore tuna (1 can) with some mayo, onions and dill pickles.  I put it on a Joseph's flatbread (10 net carbs) with fresh spinach, tomato slices, cucumber slices and sliced orange bell pepper.  Oh my goodness was it delicious.  It had just the right amount of crunch with the peppers, cucumbers and pickles.  I found something at the store I'd never bought before...Pepperidge Farms Pretzel Thins.  I had a handful of those with my wrap instead of the Doritos I served to Dwayne.

About 3pm or so I finally made it to the park to walk.  Dwayne downloaded the Runtastic App to my phone that Biz uses and it's pretty cool.  It measures your time, distance, calories burned, etc.  I've been doing 4 laps around the track (3 laps is 1 mile) and said I would bump it to 5 laps on Monday, but I decided since I was by myself with no dogs and no Dwayne that I'd go ahead and do 5 laps.  It took me 35 mins, was 1.75 miles and said I burned 499 calories.  When I got back home I had a snack plate of turkey slices, a cheese stick, baby carrots and baby tomatoes.  The dogs helped me eat 1/3 of this plate.  They're always willing to help Momma shave some calories of my daily intake.  :)

I decided to make jambalaya for dinner.  The only traditional item I leave out of it is the green bell pepper.  Dwayne will tolerate SOME tomato based dishes once in a while, but anything green is out of the question.  I used andouille sausage and some cajun spice and it had just the right amount of heat.  I also cut up and sauteed 2 boneless chicken breasts and shrimp.  I cook the shrimp separately and then add it to the whole pot when it's totally finished cooking.

You'll just have to forgive my crappy pics...I have zero photography skills.  Just trust me when I tell you this was AMAZING.

After dinner I decided to take Boomer to the park and walk with me.  Boy was that difficult for the first couple of laps.  He finally got the hang of "heel" about 2.5 laps in, and we ended up doing 5 laps altogether.  The app said it took 38 mins and I burned 533 calories, so just a little longer and more difficult than the earlier walk that day.  It was another 1.75 mi for a total of 3.5 miles for the day.  Go me!  Who am I??  I don't even recognize myself!

When I got back home I checked out my meal plan for the week and saw that I had lasagna soup scheduled for Sunday's lunch....time to make the soup!  Now I made this last week for the first time after getting the recipe from Biz and I followed it almost to the "T" last time.  This week I decided to make it my own.  I wanted a chunkier soup.  Last time I cooked the pasta separately and stored it that way in the fridge, only mixing the soup and pasta into an individual bowl when I was ready to heat some up.  This time, I decided to buy a bag of smaller pasta at the store (not the rotini I used last week), and mix it in with the soup.  I measured out 6 oz. of ditalini.  I used petite diced tomatoes instead of the fire roasted tomatoes (smaller pieces) and I used chicken broth instead of chicken stock (cheaper).  I also used about 5 TBSP of tomato paste instead of the 2 TBSP it called for, because I wanted a richer, deeper flavor this time.  Oh, and I used about 3x the amount of oregano it called for.  I only had 2 of the hot Italian sausage links left in the pack from last time, that I had in the freezer.  I knew I needed more meat, so I used 2 of the Andouille sausages I had leftover from the jambalaya.  I sauteed these 2 meats together and it added just enough heat to my pot.

I had a small bowl when it was finished and it turned out just as good as I had hoped.  I believe I'll be making it like this from now on.  I was supposed to have it for lunch today but those plans got trashed.  We went out to buy new shoes...

And then Dwayne wanted to go see that new Jurassic movie.  Well that was 2.5 hours away from the house I wasn't planning on, so we had lunch out first before we headed to the movie.  The movie was decent.  We headed home afterwards and hung out a bit before grilling pork chops for dinner.  I also had him grill some veggies while I roasted some corn in the oven.  Everything turned out so tasty...grilled is my favorite way of cooking, but Dwayne is way better at it than me.  I really need to learn...Biz is my grilling hero, lol.  I need to ask her for some tips. :)

I was seriously thinking about taking a rest day from the walking...I figured 6 days in a row was enough reason for a break.  Then the guilt set in.  A break from what?  It's not like I did anything strenuous or grueling today.  No reason not to walk.  I love walking at the park, although the scenery is growing a bit boring.  But tonight I decided we'd walk around the neighborhood with my new app.  I wanted to know the distance, but was also curious to know if the GPS in the app would measure elevation and difficulty based on that.  There is a horrible part of the walk that I call the Hill from Hell and I absolutely hate it.  I can walk up it now without stopping but it is the slowest walk you have ever seen.  I am putting one foot in front of the other the whole time I'm trudging up, without stopping, but it's so slow I'm pretty sure a turtle could pass me and leave me in the dust.  It is so hard to breathe and I'm just huffing and puffing the whole way.  Dwayne just walks straight up it w/ no obvious effort or pain (I so hate that) and I fight and claw my way up, many feet behind him.   So we were doing it this evening and about 10-12 steps before I reached the crest of the hill, teetering on the brink of death, the app says out loud "GPS Has Lost Signal".  Without missing a beat I blurted right out loud "F*CK YOU!!!"  I didn't stop...I kept on going just in case it recorded ANY part of the walk, but man was I pissed.  I nearly wanted to cry.  We made it on home and the app said it was .94 of a mile, it took 22 mins and I burned 324 calories.  Well that calorie burn is just about the same as it as walking laps at the park, with no hills, so apparently it does NOT measure difficulty based on elevation.  Therefore I see no need to ever walk that hill again.  EVER. 

When we got inside I fixed a small bowl of cottage cheese with blueberries to take my 5th pill for the day.  I dislike having to take so many meds.  I'm hoping by focusing on eating better, fewer carbs and exercising regularly that some of the meds can be reduced or cut out after my next lab appointment.  At least that's my personal goal as well as the goal I set for Biz's Summer Challenge.  Hope everyone had as nice of a weekend as I did.  It really feels great when you make the right choices MOST of the time.  Never perfection....always progress.