No snow in sight!! Yesterday turned out to be a mix of rain, flurries and freezing cold air. When I got up this morning I was expecting to see a blanket of white – nope. Just grass. Some forecast!!
I’m taking today off of formal exercise, but I do plan on going on a walk or two! The husband and I are planning a walking trip to the grocery store (under the condition that he carries the gallon of milk and tub of yogurt and I get the light vegetables!). We’ll take the “long way” there (20 minutes) and the “short way” home (10) when we have our bags full.
Early Morning
I had a cup of hot chamomile tea when I got up. I also made some blog updates: I updated the Kath page announcing my R.D. plans and have a new Husband page under construction. It seems we need a place to store all these great bread recipes!
Breakfast
I thought about making an oatmeal pancake or having cold cereal for a change (ok, that VERY briefly crossed my mind) but honestly there is just nothing like a big bowl of oatmeal on a cold winter morning. Made with 1/4 cup skim milk, banana, cinnamon, vanilla, brown sugar, walnuts, and PB. (Portions were a little less than usual due to less activity planned for today)
Cup of hot coffee (the splenda makes that foamy stuff when I pour the hot coffee on top!)
Breakfast kcal ~ 375
Off to write a paper!
sirenjess says
How many days off do you take? Usually when I take a day off I still eat the same portions. I just found this blog and I just wanted to say congrats on your success. I also lost a good amount of weight and changed my lifestyle. I went from 128 to 103 (size 6-0). It's amazing how eating better and exercising changes you. Before I use to have chronic heartburn and other tummy problems and when I changed what I was putting in my body all the bad that happened before went away. By the way the oatmeal looks yummy.
VeggieGirl says
enjoy the mild weather conditions – it's only 6°F here, with lake effect snowstorm warnings!! eek!!
I'm looking forward to the new additions to your blog; especially the new Husband page!! how fun!! :0)
Meg says
haha! I adore the "splenda foam". Alas splenda sweetner is my only vice. I figure I don't smoke…I don't drink…I can have my splenda!!
YUM
And I agree with VeggieGirl; it will be neat to have a page for "the Husband" as his participation seems to have grown over the past months of me following your blog!
Keep up the good work!
NATI says
haha the comment above me is so true! I am in love with splenda. I bought the huge box at costco (very worth it btw) and i even carry it in my purse! But I have a question, while cooking up some dinner last night I realized Im going to need to invest in a good scale. I need to get the whole portion thing down! What kind of scale do you use?
arimcg says
I like the changes you made! It'll be nice for the bread recipes to be in one place.
B_healthy says
I asked about the choc cake again the other day.. in the one post i got confused but then I just looked under the "dessert" section and scrolled down to see that first recipe for it… I am a HUGE chocolate cake fan and i love pumpkin… so I think it will be a great dessert for 110 cal!
I am curious how you calculate your exercise calories… I usually do about 45-60 min of cardio 6 days a week- which according to the ET or the treamill burns 650-700 cal just from my cardio workout (I lift 3x a week too) plus all the calories I burn running around teaching 3 yr olds all day…
The reason I go on about this is because you seem to do about the same exercise load as me each week but burn about 400-500 cal per cardio session. We weigh about the same (119-121)… So do you use something special to calculate your calories burned or do you go by the machines ?
hk says
b-healthy:
just to answer your question, Kath uses a Polar heart rate monitor to calculate calories burned during exercise. THey're great-highly recommend one!
Nicole says
Hi Kath!! I love the new pictures! Anyway, I bought some Annie's Mac and Cheese and JUST realized I bought the regular, organic white cheddar shells and cheese instead of the whole wheat shells and cheese =/ (just "grabbed the wrong box"). I don't know how to feel about eating the mac and cheese now. Is it ok to eat (portion control, of course!!!) even though it's not whole wheat? That's why I bought it (whole wheat boxed mac and cheese … hmm a healhty college kids dream), but now I'm wondering if it's any "better" than eating regular mac and cheese…despite being organic.
sirenjess says
B_healthy I highly recommend getting a heart rate monitor. I have the f4 polar heart rate monitor the only problem I have with it is that it does not have the own code. Meaning that if I work out next to someone who has one on my monitor will read their heart rate. But they really help with knowing where you are working and how much harder you want to work.
elizabeth says
I have a question about oat bran.
If I go to www.calorieking.com and look up oat bran, it says one cup has 231 kcals (dry). However, when I tally up calories using 4/g of protein and carbohydrates and 9 for fat… I end up getting a number that is WAY off. I even tried subtracting fiber! How many kcals are in oat bran?? I buy the raw kind out of bins at whole foods.
=/
B_healthy says
Thanks for the recommendations! I will check out getting one of those!
Karen Downing says
I like the new photos. Glad to see the husband getting his own page too!
Sarah LivingtoFeelGo says
Congrats on your plans to be a R.D. I am going to school too for nutrition.
You and your husband make a cute couple!! Congrats on the loss to both of you.
Kath says
Sirenjess,
I don't take a specific number of days off – just when I think my body could use one. Congrats on your weight loss – it makes such a difference inside and out! Thanks for reading!!
Veg,
6 below!?!? Yikes! It's absolutely freezing here. My toes were numb on our walk.
I love Splenda too but I wish I liked the foods without it because I'm not crazy about putting something artificial in my body everyday. I mostly just use it in tea/coffee though to try to keep my levels down somewhat.
Nati,
Check the FAQs – I have a link to my scale in there. I recommend any by Salter.
B_Healthy,
The cake is great! And pumpkin is a superfood so it's a GREAT dessert to have 🙂
HK, is right, I wear a heart rate monitor to track my calories burned (see FAQs). I would subtract 25-30% from the cardio machines – they are not very accurate at all, even when you enter in height/weight.
Nicole,
Eating refined grains is perfectly fine every now and then. There's nothing bad about them, they just aren't as good as whole grains. Add some veggies like broccoli and peppers to your pasta and get the fiber from them instead! Enjoy the mac and cheese – I wish I were eating some right now!
Elizabeth,
The oatbran numbers in CK are a little weird. I know from the box mine came in that it's 140 kcal per 1/3 a cup, so I just put in an amount that matches that. Always go by the box if in doubt, and if you don't have a box, go by the amount I just quoted because it came from one!
Thanks Karen and Sarah!
Kath
kristin says
Nicole – I almost bought the wrong box of Annie's just like you! I had the shells and cheddar in my basket until I went to pay for it and THEN I realized it was the wrong one. I deff see how you could mistake them.
Broccoli or cauliflower is a yummy addition to mac and cheese, I do it all the time. I think you'll be fine eating the regular like Kath said, just double check next time 🙂
nicole says
yea I'm not very familiar with the Annie's products, and we only have one very small organic store that even carries the mac and cheese…I think the regular may even be the only thing they carry so I assumed it was what everyone was raving about…until I looked online at ALL the products to double check =/ kind of a bummer, but I know now! Thanks for all the tips!!! I'll definitely use them!
Jen says
I was just wondering if anyone has tried using soymilk in their oatmeal instead of regular? I've never tried it, but I can't really have much milk because of the lactose.
MaryK says
I've made my oatmeal with 1/2 Silk Vanilla and 1/2 water…it makes it creamy and the vanilla flavor is great!
Kath says
Jen,
I'll be making my oats with vanilla soy milk this week because we got it instead of regular milk. I've found it take them longer to cook (probably because soy milk has a different proportion of water to solevent) but the vanillay flavor is really good!!
Kath