New Year Resolution Update

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Amazingly enough I am still doing good on my New Year Resolution. I have been pretty good this year so far. I eat lots of veggie and fruits, lean meat, and still doing my morning jog. Although I will admit with our cloudy weather I have not been as good. When it's cold and wet outside, it is just a little too hard to get myself out of bed at 5am to go on the track. You know the feeling right? I hope I'm not the only lazy one who wants to snuggle down into my warm blankets in the morning.

So, here's the updates. Since Jan 1st I have lost an additional 10lbs. My goal was to get down to a size 8 by Valentine and I'm almost there, but not quite yet. My size 10 are much more comfortable around my waist, but to be a single digit sounds so nice. So since I started my diet in Oct I have lost roughly 40+ pounds. I follow a low carb, low fat, low calorie, low taste...ok, the taste isn't too bad. However the peanut butter that my kids eat smell so good that sometime I just want to kiss it off of them.

I'll post some new pix of me as soon as I get a chance to take some and download them so you can see the progress.

So here's a recipe below for you to try out. This is typical of what I eat for lunch and dinner with an apple for desert.

Taco Salad
1. Prepare the meat topping

• Dice up 1 onion, 2 garlic cloves, 1c fresh cilantro, 1 green chile
• Heat up 1/4 cup of chicken broth. Place onion, garlic, cilantro, and chile in the broth and simmer until it is soft.
• Place 1.5 lb of ground beef into the mix. I use the leanest I can find which is 97/3% so I don't precook the beef and drain the fat.
• Add 2 tsp oregano, 1 tsp cumin, 1 tsp paprika, 2 dried bay leaves, 1/2 tsp sea salt, 1/4 tsp black pepper.
• Set aside the meat once it is done cooking.

2. Prepare the "rice"
I found that following a low carb diet, it made me crave carbs less. However I still love rice and the best substitute I could find for it was cabbage.

• 1/4 head of cabbage. Dice very finely.
• Dice 1/2 onion and simmer in chicken broth. Once the onion is soft, place the cabbage in it. You can season it with oregano, paprika, cumin, etc...or use about 2 tsp of taco seasonings.

3. Assemble the salad

• Chop up some lettuce, I prefer Romain. Chop up 1 tomato. Chop up 2 Tbs of purple onion
• Place lettuce, tomato, purple onion, "rice", and meat and enjoy!
• If I am going to spoil myself that day I will add some whole beans, avocado, and maybe a little bit of chedder cheese on top of it.

I hope this recipe inspires you to find more low fat, low carb alternative. I am not into the Atkins diet where you eat no carbs. This isn't Atkins because I eat lots of vegetables and fruit in my diet. Basically I avoid the whites, such as flour, sugar, rice, and other process food. I cook everything from stratch and avoid buying food that has ingredients that I cannot pronounce. It takes a little to get use to, but this works. If you want more recipes and ideas, feel free to comment and I will update with more ideas.

New Years Resolution

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So, can you guess what my New Years Resolution is? Think about it long and hard. You didn't guess to lose weight did you? Yep, me as well as the other millions of people out there decided that I want to lose weight for New Years. Well lose more weight at least. So after my birthday when I couldn't fit into a size 18 pants, I decided I had to do something about this so call "pregnancy weight". I mean, Violet is 18 months now. How much longer could I use the pregnancy as an excuse for my craving of chocolate, salty nuts, and Starbucks? So I went on a mission to lose the "pregnancy weight". I cut out everything but lean proteins, vegetables, and some fruits. I woke up at 5am every morning if not earlier, and hit the track running. Well I'm happy to say, I lost 25 pounds and went back down to a size 10 pants. I finally was able to donate my maternity clothes to Hope. So my resolution for this year is to lose another 25 pounds before my brother's wedding in May. Do you think I can make it? I sure hope so. I'll keep you updated with new images in a few months. I no longer have a need to hide behind the camera anymore.So what are my New Years Resolution?
1. Lose 25 pounds by May 30 for my brother's wedding
2. Keep my house and life organize for more than 1 day
3. Figure out what really makes me happy
4. Learn and forgive past mistakes, and move on to newer and better things
5. Spend quality time with my girls and husband

So are you curious to what the Top Ten Resolutions are nationwide? Here they are. How many of these are yours as well?
1. Spend more time with family and friend
2. Making time for exercise.
3. Lose weight
4. Quit smoking
5. Enjoy life more
6. Quit Drinking
7. Get out of Debt
8. Learn Something New
9. Help others
10. Get organized.