Thursday, April 27, 2017

Keeping it simple

Today is day 2 and I've felt a little better from my head cold today, but I still have that shooting pain into my upper teeth when I pound my feet to hard (such as running after the kids, or marching around in Chloe's music class).  I didn't need excedrine until about 2:00 so I figure that must be a good sign, hopefully this head cold won't last the whole month. 

Anyway, this morning Lily got up super early, so we used the extra time to make some flax seed cinnamon muffins. 
These muffins have 15.2g fat and 2.3g net carbs.  They certainly are not sweet, and they are meant to be eaten as a nice snack or as a part of a breakfast meal.  The meal plan in the book pairs these with the Rocket Fuel Late on one day and the Golden Smoothie on another.  I'm not sure how everyone else in the family will like them.  Chloe only got through a few bites and her muffin had honey all over it!  So I imagine these lasting me at least 6 days.

I did make it to the gym today, mostly because Chloe has been cooped up and needing to go play.   I walked on the treadmill for 55 minutes at about a 3.5mph pace and I was dying!  It never ceases to amaze me how much my physical performance plummets when I get even just a little sick. 

So I have a friend who is also doing Keto, and she is the one who finally pushed me over the edge and convinced me that I needed to do it with her.  In talking with her over the past week, it struck me how different we are in our preferred approaches and cooking styles.  What I like to do and what she likes to do is completely different.  She is more the type who can grab a few keto friendly ingredients and create something simple, like a salad.  She has been eating mostly the same thing every day because that is what she wants to do right now.  That is what she likes doing.  That is her method of simple because that is what her regular cooking looks like.  She is not a meal planner, and so she doesn't meal plan on keto either.  She has learned a few basic recipes and makes those daily.  Simple, and easy.  But that would drive me absolutely insane!  That is not the way I usually cook, and not the way I usually live.  I am a big meal planner.  I plan meals for the week and so I plan what I will eat for breakfast, lunch, dinner, and what snacks I want available, then I make a grocery list and do the shopping.  Usually my meal plans include days of the week but really I could even just use numbers because I never stick to specific days of the week.  I look at my meal plan and pick which meals I want to make on that particular day depending on how I feel, how much time I have, and if there is a food that needs to be eaten.  For my friend, she never uses recipe books, and creates things from Pinterest.  For me, if you took my cook books away I would be at a total loss as to what to do.  I need my cook books, I love my cook books.  I love trying new recipes and remaking ones I love.  That's just how I am.  And so that is how I'm keeping it simple.  My friend looks at me and thinks I'm crazy and making it too hard and I'm like: "What you are doing is hard!" 

I think that keeping it simple means different things for different people.  I'm keeping it simple by keeping my behavior the same.  If I try to change how I make food and what I'm eating, then that would be really hard.  In essence, I'm simply changing the ingredients I cook with.  Keep in mind that I like baking, I like cooking (most days) and I like having a plan.  Take those away, and that is a recipe for disaster. 

In that light.... My Mother's Day present arrived in the mail today!!!!
Yay!!!!!!  The twister jar for my blendtec!!!!  I've wanted this little guy for about two years now.  I of course couldn't wait for Mother's Day to use it, and besides I had a recipe I wanted to use it for today.  So I busted it out and sent it on it's maiden voyage pretty much as soon as it arrived at my doorstep.  There is a recipe for dairy free cream cheese in the Keto book by Leanne Vogel.  (That's my favorite by far of the three I got).  It's basically soaked cashews, apple cider vinegar, lemon juice, and water all blended up. 


It worked so well!  I'm in love with my new blendtec jar already, it made me so happy.  I was squealing with delight as I was using tee hee.  Just thinking about it again is making me giddy!  I'm such a nerd sometimes. 
So now I have my "cream cheese" draining and it will be ready to turn into pure deliciousness tomorrow.  I'm making some pumpkin fat bombs to have in the fridge as snacks. 
I just tied my cheese cloth to a wooden spoon and put it on a bowl.  I thought it was ingenious since the instructions say "hang over a bowl overnight". 

Tonight I am making Beef Stroganoff which I am particularly excited about.  I haven't had it since I went dairy free because it usually has so much cream in it.  This one is made with coconut milk and zucchini noodles and has gelatin in it to thicken it up.  And so I'm off to create that.  It has to simmer for like 45 minutes so I better get it started now.  And the longest time I've had to let something simmer on the stove for dinner is about 2 hours, so this is nothing new. 


1 comment:

  1. I'm so glad you are back to blogging. I really enjoy your blog. I appreciate your honestly, sharing the good and bad, of weight loss and maintenance. I struggle with maintaining. It's so hard! I did WW a few years back and our leader said that weight loss is like running a 5k. All you friends are there cheering you on and maintenance is like running a marathon, by yourself, in the dark, for the rest of your life, haha. Harsh, but true, at least for me!

    I, too, wish that I could just eat intuitively. But, I think my system or mind, or whatever, is too messed up. Intuitive eating ends up being just as much work for me as counting calories or points. I'm constantly asking myself, what do I really want? Is that enough? Too much? Am I truly hungry? Sheesh! Too much work. And of course, left to my own devices, I choose carb heavy junk food and always think I need more, more, more! :(

    I'm very excited about hearing how your experience with Keto goes. It's something I've been contemplating for awhile. I love that you are willing to try these experiments and then share, that's awesome!

    I, too, am a big Amazon shopper. I have a toddler, so shopping at stores is so tough, I'd rather just order it. When I decided to stay home with our daughter, I joined Swagbucks. I heard about it from the Krazy Koupon Lady. It's not a job, a scam, get rich scheme, or anything like that. It's free. You earn points and cash them out for gift cards. I don't make a ton, but enough to treat myself to some fun items on Amazon. They have many more gift card choices than Amazon, of course, but I always choose Amazon because, well, I love it, it's just easy for me. I usually get books, workout tapes, workout shoes, etc, and don't feel so guilty about spending since I earned it myself. Anyway, your Amazon comment made me think of that. Here is a link, if you ever are interested.
    http://www.swagbucks.com/p/register?rb=20324396

    I meant to comment awhile back, but I really appreciated you sharing about your fertility and miscarriage story. I, too, have had miscarriages and fertility struggles and I thought it was so brave of you and meant a lot and that you should know that.

    I also think you are an awesome Mom! You are way too hard on yourself, because you are doing great! Keep up the good work and God Bless! :)

    ~Tracy

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