Making it a Le-Fit Recipe

OK...I am resolved to do better. Thanks for the encouraging words and honesty thrown out there.

Next Tuesday I am having the Missionaries, Jaren & hubby, Kylia & hubby and some Gentrys and a Gause over for Supper. Jaren requested Chicken & Dumplings so I started today. It is not labor intensive but takes a while to make it more healthy without surrendering taste. Most people boil the chicken and leave the fat in (they say it tastes better...NOT!) and also use dumplings made of lard, flour and water. I skin the chicken before boiling it, and then leave the stock in the fridge overnight. I defat it completely before adding the dumplings. I do not make my dumplings from scratch, but buy the frozen ones. If you check the lables you will find one type that is made from just water and flour. They are much lighter and I actually like them better. By taking these small additional steps the fat and calorie content is drastically reduced. They freeze better and longer, too since it is the fat in foods that goes bad first. For those die-hard southerners that want the fat left in I serve a container that just has chicken fat in it that they can add to their bowl...usually when they see it they go "eeewwww" and pass on it:)

Kylia is bringing dessert...If there is any left over it will not be allowed to stay in my house.

Friday Weigh-In

So how have you done this week? Did you make really good healthy food choices (we're going to exclude Ice Cream Cake in that question for this week, right Aunt B)? Did you maintain or loss pounds or inches this week?

There are only three ways to lose weight!!!!

The only proven ways to lose weight:

1) Take in less calories than you burn up.
2)Burn up more calories than you take in.
3)A combination of #'s 1 & 2.

This week I have failed to do anything I know that works. I didn't do my 10,000 steps per day but continued to eat as many calories as when I do...actually more calories than I usually do. Jaren made a wicked ice cream cake and left a VERY large portion in my freezer. I could not sleep knowing that it was sitting in there all cold and alone so I inhaled it. I fell asleep and slept off the sugar low but when I woke up this morning felt sluggish and with a headache. The food felt so good going down but the hangover from the sugar is just not worth it. I wish I could remember that feeling BEFORE I eat something instead of AFTER...oh, well...never give up. Today is another day and I can start it over anytime I like.

Workout Wednesday

It's time to check with how you have been doing with your exercise goals. Have you followed your exercise plan this week? What do you have planned for the rest of the week?

And just for fun - What is your favorite thing to do for cardio?

Supplements

Do you take a multi-vitamin daily? Do you take other vitamins, minerals, or herbs? If so which ones and why?

If you have a lot of information about a particular supplement and why you take, we'd love to read a post about it!

Grass Drills

So I have found that Yard work is great exercise and I seem to burn lots of calories. I feel so spent afterward that I believe it is almost as good as a 3 mile run. So I have a good start to the weekend and hope to maintain first thing Monday morning with a run and some upper body weight lifting at the YMCA. Hope everyone else is doing well with their goals.

Friday Weigh-In

Looking at our poll, we have two votes for Monday, one vote for Wednesday, and six votes for Friday. So we'll go with Friday. If in the future, we find that a different day works better, we can always change things up. One of the nice things about a group like this is we can be as flexible as we want to be!

Since this is our first Friday, maybe we could take today as the day to determine our starting point. So today, take a second and step on the scale and set your starting point. Or if you don't want to use the scale as your measure of success, use your method of choice. In addition to using the scales, I am also going to measure my waist and hips and try to track inches lost in those areas since they are my worst problem spots.

I am so excited that so many of you want to work on this together. Like several of you mentioned, I want being healthy to be a lifestyle change for me.

How has exercising been going this week? Has everyone put in the time they had hoped to? What do you think about also having an exercise check in day to see how things are going and encourage each other? I was thinking of maybe having "Workout Wednesdays" for us to check in with what we've been doing and what we're planning. What do you think?

BBQ Chicken Fajitas

I decided to go ahead and share the first low-fat, low-calorie recipe that I’ve tried so far. I am looking forward to all the recipes that you all will share on here in the days and weeks to come! (Oh and there really is no need to have a picture with it, you all just know that I am a camera freak, right?)

This is a slightly modified version of a recipe I found at KraftFoods.com.

4 Whole Wheat Tortillas

8 oz boneless skinless chicken, cut into pieces, salted and peppered

2 cups frozen fajita veggies (onion, red pepper, green pepper) - or use fresh

1/3 cup barbeque sauce

1/4 cup cheese

Sauté chicken and veggies in a non-stick skillet over medium heat. When chicken is cooked through add BBQ sauce. Put 1/4 of the chicken mixture on a whole wheat tortilla. Sprinkle with a little cheese. And viola! A super quick very yummy healthy meal! Dallin loved them. Me too!

I paired it with some fresh mango and it was delish!

Nutrition Facts

4 Servings

Amount Per Serving

Calories
251.5

Total Fat
6.5 g

Sodium
649.0 mg

Potassium
250.1 mg

Total Carbohydrate
30.2 g

Dietary Fiber
5.0 g

Sugars
2.7 g

Protein
19.7 g

*To get the nutrition info, I used a recipe calculator at this website (which also happens to be one of the ones that Jaren mentioned, Thanks J). You just enter in the ingredients, put in the number of servings and it calculates the nutrition information per serving. Very handy!

Weekly Weigh Ins

Do you have a preference for when we do our weekly weigh-ins? (Remember, our weigh-ins don't require you to post your actual weight unless you want to, it is really just sharing your loss or gain for that week so that we can offer pats on the back for success or commiserate with you if it's been a rough week.)



At first I was thinking maybe on Mondays, but then I thought maybe Fridays would be better because I know for me, I tend to do my best healthy eating and exercise during the week. Weekends tend to be rough! Or do you think it would be better to do it mid-week?



Anyway, I created a poll so that we can decide what day we want to do it on. Please vote!

Goals and a Title

I thought maybe we should start out by each sharing some of our health goals so we know what each of us are looking for in this site and can hopefully find a way to support each other based on each of our goals. Some questions to ask yourself might be:

1. Are you wanting to lose weight, maintain weight, or is weight not something you are worried about right now?

2. If you will be starting a diet plan, which one will you be using? Or will you be creating your own and are just looking to make healthier food choices?

3. What are your exercise goals? Cardio? Strength training? Days per week? Time per session?

4. Are there any dietary restriction that you plan to make? Eat less meat? Lower or cut out sugar intake? Eat only low fat dishes? Avoid processed foods?

And lastly, we need a good title for our blog. Please make some suggestions and then we can do a poll and vote on which one we like best. Thanks!

Digital Tracking

I am a technology freak. It is one of those things that has rubbed off on me from my husband. So I love being able to track success online and being able to see graphical representation of progress made. So if you are interested in keeping a food journal, monitoring weight/inches lost, tracking exercise details then I found a great website just for you (and me)! It is called FitDay.com. You simply register and begin tracking. It is nice because the food analysis breaks down the about of fat, protein, carbs (sugars and fiber) that you eat, so you can see where you need to make improvements. Have fun!