Tips, a Chart and a Shout-Out

Hello team! It's time for another round of LGH excellence! Thank you so much for stopping by!

What's on the docket this evening? Today we're going to talk about my random tips and tricks I've discovered on my journey thus far. I'm also going to show you my calorie chart, and we'll have a shout out to my dad! What an exciting day!

I'm not sure what this is about but it looks like 3D scrabble.
And I like that.

Chapter One: Tips!

So let's start with that first thing, yes? I have discovered several different things that really really help me with this process and they are as follows:

1. NO EXCUSES. Yes, we've talked about this a lot. No, I'm not ashamed of repeating it. It means that 4 times per week, no matter what, T and I go to the Y. And it's fantastic.

Were you expecting a cheesy picture of folk doing a village people dance?
This blog has taken a turn for the Classy... jk, I still steal images from google :)

2. Volumetrics!!! This means that I still eat just a ridiculous amount of food. However, I'm learning the art of  figuring out something's calorie density! I had a HUGE bowl of spinach, kale, matchstick carrots and alfalfa sprouts with my dinner tonight. As I mentioned previously, I eschew salad dressing in favor of lemon juice and ground pepper. I also had steamed baby carrots and Brussels sprouts. I had ONE SERVING of spicy couscous and one ounce of cheese with my salad.

 But you know what? Whereas before I might have done one thing or the other--- just eaten the vegetables and denied myself any couscous, or more often just eaten a whole box of couscous by myself (seriously not even close to the worst binge episode I've ever had). The point is, I felt happy, satisfied, and not at all like I was denying myself anything. I allot myself ~ 400 calories for dinner, as it is my largest meal of the day (right now, someday I hope to be grown up enough for it to be breakfast, like it should be). And it's surprising how MUCH food I can have for that amount.

I used to eat bowls of noodles this big. FOR BREAKFAST. Just kidding, that... came out as confusing.

3. This is very much a friend with volumetrics: Embrace Strong Flavors! T and I are thinking about putting it  in rainbowy letters in our kitchen (to those of you who have never seen or experienced our kitchen, it is a BRIGHT array of colors).  So, when I first started making myself salad, we so happened to have some leftover mozzarella from a raclette meal. I like cheese in my salad, so I measured out an ounce and tore it up. But I didn't find myself being very satisfied with it-- it was pretty bland compared to kale and fresh tomatoes. So, what did I do? We upgraded to habanero jack. It's MUCH more effective. 

Um... this picture is what I got when I googled "Effective Cheese."
It could have been much worse.

The same thing was true the other day when we made quesadillas-- I had my tiny one-- but I  used SEVERAL jalapenos-- guess how many calories those are? Since we are separated by the vast interconnected tubes of the interwebz, I can't hear you shouting out "jalapenos are 5 calories per 1/4 cup!" Well you are so right, friends and family! You need to eat like 30 slices of jalapenos to get up to even 5 calories. And let me tell you, I LOVE spicy things, but I do not need 30 slices.

Chapter Two: Can Has Caloric Deficit?

 Those 3 things have helped me do THIS so far--- BEHOLD my caloric deficit chart for the week:

Those dark green bars represent moving more, and the light green bars represent eating less!!!
The white space represents FAAAATTTTT being burned away, bwahahahah!

I am so very cool. I want you all to notice that I average less than 1500 calories a day, like a boss.

Chapter Three: My Dad is Hardcore

We should perhaps take just one moment to think about why I am so very cool-- which is that my parents and friends and family are so very ridiculously cool. Specifically, my dad is also working on a healthiness project-- his involves much more training and running. Whereas I should not be allowed to run for fear of ruining everyone's eyes. 

Yes, I know I need to work on my self-kindness... but damn if it isn't hilarious.

Anyway, here is an image my daddy sent me earlier this afternoon:

Dad is very like me (or rather, I am very like dad) in that pictures demonstrating his point are important :)

I want to give you a quick rundown of what we're seeing here, folks:

• 81.5 Minutes.
• 6 Miles.
• 729 Calories.

My dad is hardcore, like whoa. :) Also he (and my mom (and my whole family)) is super-duper supportive and completely awesome. That's inspiration right there, team!  We've both been around the block in the weight-loss world. If there's one thing I can depend on in this process, it's that my dad understands what I'm going through and he's there for me. I love my dad. <3

My blog just got all sweet and sappy.
That sap better be low-cal.

So props to my dad.

Props to me.

And props to you for supporting us :) 

Thanks for reading, everybody! Happy Thursday!