Getting Back on Track

This morning I woke up in my own bed, home after a wonderful road trip, but quite certain I had put on a few pounds with our summer activities.  The first thing I did after a cup of coffee was take a half-hour walk.  Next, I cleaned out the fridge.  I had stopped shopping for perishables when I knew we would be gone for most of a week, but there were little packages of unidentifiable leftovers from the past few weeks.  You know the gook that gets sort of built into the drawers and shelves of the refrigerator?  I showed the produce drawer to Stan and he took it apart so I could clean it.  It was a bit touch and go getting it back together, but now that I know he can do that, I look forward to cleaning the rest of the trapped-in crumbs and bits.

Fridge - before

I spent some time thinking about what I would need to help me get back on track with my eating plan.  I know I do better if I have lots of good healthy food on hand to choose from, and lately I hadn't been getting shopping, or hadn't been prepared when I did get to the store.  On most of the 4 days/week that Stan cooks he says "I'm going to the store.  Do you need anything?"  And lately I've been saying "Hmm, no, I do need stuff but don't have a list ready".  Today I worked on my list and was ready to say "I'll go with you."

Here's what I wrote down for food I should have on hand for healthy eating:

Breakfasts:

We usually have eggs and sausage, sometimes bacon, on hand.

I need:

Cabbage or sauerkraut and apple

or Kale, spinach or other greens

Onion

Pepper

Zucchini

Avocado and salsa, occasionally

Occasional plain Greek yogurt and fruit

Lunch – big green salad  and bone broth

Greens

Tomatoes (have been using from pea patch and Aerogarden, but none ripe at present)

Snap peas and/or other salad veggies

Tuna

Celery

Berries

Fruit in season

Pecans or other nuts

Bone broth

Dinner

I cook 2 nights/week – plan two meals and have ingredients ready

Dark chocolate (our usual dessert)

Snacks

Pistachios

Fruit and nuts

Carrots, celery (with peanut butter or cream cheese)

Occasional veggies and dip

Nice to have some paleo muffins or bread in freezer

Beverages

Soda Stream sparking water

La Croix canned lemon water (Melanie found this - it's good)

Kombucha

Lemonade or other fruit juice or syrup (I add a little to our Soda Stream water - Mira's idea)

Occasional gazpacho or Knudsen’s Very Veggie

Tea

Very occasional white wine

 Today is Tuesday, so I only need one meal planned for this week (Thursday, my other day is Monday).  I chose a dinner my friend, Marcia, posted on Facebook:  Lemon Butter Chicken.  I figured out what I needed and added it to my shopping list.  I'm going to be very happy when Thursday rolls around and I don't have to wrack my brain at the last minute for something to cook and then go to the store to get it!  I have often said I wouldn't mind cooking if I had a recipe and the ingredients - it's thinking up what to cook that's the hard part.

Here's what the chicken is supposed to look like, and I'll add a green veggie or salad.   I'll let you know how it turns out.

We went to the store and I bought the items on my list.  Now I'm confident I have enough to make my healthy veggie stir-fries for breakfasts and some big green salads for lunches.  Also some good snacks - yum! - I love celery with cream cheese or nut butter, and I have both.  If I eat enough good stuff all day long, I have less trouble limiting myself at dinner and thereafter.   Here's what I bought:

Yes, there is a bottle of white wine there...  this is what comes of going to the store at 5 PM instead of 9 AM!  I decided it would be easier to cut back over a few days instead of stopping the wine cold turkey after indulging every day on our trip.  I had two small glasses tonight and now I'm sipping  Celestial Seasonings Sleepytime herbal tea - one of my favorites.

So, here's my refrigerator, cleaned out and stocked with some healthy food.  (Does everyone use prime space in the door for storing batteries?  Is it true they last longer when kept in the fridge?  Maybe I'll research that sometime...)  You can't really see much, but my healthy produce is there in the drawers.  If you see something questionable, please remember I share the fridge with someone whose eating style is different from mine  : )

I have read suggestions to wash and cut up vegetables for a whole week at a time, and store them all ready for throwing in a salad.  So far I haven't done that, as I'm retired now and can spend time cutting up my breakfast veggies and then do it again for my lunch salad, however, I may try it, and if I do I'll write a post about how it works out.

P.S.  The next day I had good options for my breakfast, lunch and snack.  I mixed my veggies with some steak left over from the last meal of our trip.  Here's what I had.  btw - not to brag, but as I type, Stan is cooking Coq au Riesling for dinner  : )

Breakfast

Lunch

Snack

P.P.S.  According to Ask How-To Geek I am wasting valuable refrigerator shelf space for our alkaline batteries.  It seems that maybe some types of rechargeable batteries might lose their charge more slowly in the fridge, but the alkaline ones we keep there are more likely to get damaged from the condensation than they are to benefit.  They lose their charge at a rate of 1% or less per month at room temp and should be kept in a cool, dry, non-refrigerated place.  This is great!  I can spread out my walnuts, pecans, almonds and sunflower seeds, and Stan can put in a few more Stellas.

P.P.P.S.  Here are Stan's Coq au Riesling and my Lemon Butter Chicken.  Both were delicious!

Coq au Riesling

Lemon Butter Chicken

Time Out for a Road Trip

Stan and I just finished the best road trip!  We started out to visit friends  (co-grandparents of our granddog, Wilbur) who live at Black Butte Ranch in central Oregon, and made a few other stops along the way.   (I realize many of my posts lately are "Time Out for ...".  I promise when we get home, I'll do some serious "Time In" to get back on track with my healthy habits!)

We drove as far as Kalama, Washington on the Columbia River the first day.  We stayed at the Kalama River Inn, which Stan remembered from many years ago.  He would leave with his kids after work on a Friday and get that far, before heading down to Eagle Crest the next day for winter break.  I think the Inn has seen better days - they are still talking about when Elvis stayed there in 1962 on his way to the Seattle World's Fair.  The town is spread out along 5 or 6 blocks that front I-5, with the railroad tracks just on the other side.  We were amazed that the train traffic was pretty much constant the entire time we were there.  Both the motel and the town are neat and tidy, and there are lots of antique stores to browse in.

At Black Butte we had a wonderful time with daughter Melanie, her husband Ben, and Ben's parents Sharon and Bill, and of course, Wilbur.  What a beautiful community out in the wilderness!

The highlights of our visit were a hike along the Metolius River and golf at Black Butte.  I had never heard of the Metolius before.  It's a tributary of the Deschutes in central Oregon and is 29 miles long.  Our hosts have also visited its source, Metolius Springs.  Wikipedia says "The flow from Metolius Springs is sufficient to create a full-flowing river, making the Metolius River one of the largest spring-fed rivers in the United States."  It was flowing quite fast - Wilbur had to be careful where he went in for a swim.  It was a beautiful walk!

In golf we played Best Ball, girls against the boys, and they beat us 43 to 46.  In Best Ball each person hits the ball, then the team chooses the best shot and everyone takes the next shot from there.  In that way the ones who are not great golfers (that would be Melanie and myself on our team) get to experience how it feels to play golf without the frustration of really bad shots or taking too long.  Sharon was the strong player on our team, and Bill for the boys, and we all had a great time.

Melanie is learning good form

Stan enjoys the beautiful course

We also had some great meals and good conversation.  Wish I had gotten a photo of the dinner Sharon cooked for us our first night - healthy and delicious!  I won't tell you everything I ate - some definitely qualifies as cheats - but two items are interesting and healthy.  Sharon bought this gluten-free bread from Franz bakeries and it made great toast. (I'm always looking for good GF bread.)  She also made gazpacho - a cold veggie soup - which I had heard of but never had before.  It's delicious!  She shared the recipe and I'll be making it at home.

In the interest of full disclosure, she also shared the recipe for nut-sugar topping, which was great on ice cream with sliced peaches, but could also be wonderful on yogurt and/or fruit.  I might see how little sugar I can use and still approximate the same flavor!

The recipe calls for 2/3 cup each whole unblanched almonds and sugar and 3 tablespoons melted butter.  Chop the almonds in a blender, combine with sugar and mix in butter until crumbled.  Spread out in shallow baking pan and bake at 375° for 10 minutes, stirring several times.  Crush any large lumps and cool.

My favorite place in Black Butte was the back porch - a lovely place to sit and watch the world golf by.  Here Sharon and Wilbur rest after a full day.

Stan and I spent a morning in Sisters, Oregon, a cute western town.  My favorite places were the quilt shop, of course, and a shop of metal sculpture and other art forms.  When Stan and I get our retirement home, I want a sink just like this one!  The proprietor said there are tiles to go with it, so the fish appear to swim over the counter and through the sink  : )

Sisters hosts the largest outdoor quilt show in the country - second week of July.  It looks like they hang beautiful quilts all over town.

 We headed home on an eastern route, north up highway 97, across the Columbia River and on to Union Gap, Washington - in the Yakima County wine country.  We passed through beautiful scenery - farms, vineyards, horses with foals and goats with babies - even a big Billy Goat Gruff.  I'm glad to say there's still plenty of unused land around here!  We tasted wine at Owen Roe winery - son Tyler's favorite!  Then we headed over the mountains and home.

Seventh Monthly Assessment - July 31st

Wow - July already!  This month I haven't made progress - too busy having fun!  I gained back another pound - to 130 - and I better get back on track because I bought my whole last Stitch Fix shipment and I don't want to grow out of my new clothes!!

My shape doesn't look any different from last month, so instead of the usual front and side views, I'm going to show you how I look in my latest Stitch Fix clothes, compared to how I looked in my "before" picture.  You can see that, thanks to feeling better and losing some weight, I am paying more attention to my appearance and looking better  : )

Some differences you can see:  slimmer, better posture, my new blonder hair color, stylish clothing.

Three changes that don't show in the photos are especially motivating -

1. Nothing hurts - no joint pain!  
2. I can see some muscle definition in my arms, legs and even shoulders!  This is mostly thanks to Stan's keeping me on track going to the gym twice a week, and also due to losing some flab so I can see the muscles. 
3. I am just barely starting to see some little lines on each side of my face as it has become thinner.  Not crows' feet!  Not wrinkles!  I mean the little lines that sometimes show up on attractive faces of both male and female gender.  Jamie Lee Curtis' photo is a good example of what I mean.  I have just always thought they look nice and wished I had some.  

Hmm, how about a pixie cut like this for me??  My stylist, Thuy, warns that it takes a lot of "product" for a pixie hairstyle, especially for hair as thin as mine.  Thuy recommends a "thinning hair solution" called Cerafill.  I bought a small sample of one of the products - there are about 5 different items.  Expensive, but would be nice if it really works.  Here's the small sample and it does really make my hair feel thicker.  It's a spray for after washing and before styling that supposedly plumps up each strand.  It felt like I had more volume the entire two days before my next wash.

Okay, what went well this month?

• Considering how I've been eating, I'm lucky to only have gained a pound.  Better watch it!
• I have my vitamins sorted out for the week and have been taking them
• Made bone broth (also used some of it to make really good beef with barley soup with some leftover roast beef and garden carrots)
• Got back to walking more as it has been a bit cooler lately
• Golf still improving - going every week is getting results for both of us

Where do I need improvement?

• Eating too much
• Have had ice cream and cheese with crackers and even wheat bread - things that are definitely only for cheats
• On and off with wine - not bad, but not great
• Only did physical therapy exercises one time this whole month

What to focus on in August?

• Back to basics - review my early posts and what I was eating
• Make some paleo muffins or other "carby" items so I'm not tempted to eat wheat crackers
• We're planning two camping trips - make sure we do as much hiking as eating!  Don't bring cheat-type food
• Walk every morning
• Do PT exercises at least 3 times per week

Here's an update on the Aerogarden herbs - messy but still producing nicely!  I have mint or basil in my salads and I dried some of the sage.  Stan cooked yummy pork with tarragon cream sauce  : )