Some cool (healthy) summer treats

Some bitchin' treats that won't ruin your killer bod...read on
TCBY nonfat sugar free frozen yogurt, 80 calories per half cup.
Today I experienced bliss..at only 80 calories per 125 mL the Flavour of Peanut Brittle was experienced...and was loved.
TCBY also has non-fat flavours, for those of you that don't like the taste of fake sugars..though I don't feel as though you can taste it in these treats. Just be careful, the frozen yogurt itself is healthy but the toppings can add empty calories quickly, so steer clear and enjoy the yogurt on its own.
Skinny Cow Caramel Vanilla Bars. Another fairly low cal treat (and for a good size portion at that) at 100 calories a pop, these are a satifying treat that provides good portion control. Just don't eat the whole box
Vitamuffins chocolate muffin. These are delightful frozen treats and are 100 calories each. You can find them in the frozen food section of your grocery store. there are a lot of different flavours if for some reason you aren't a huge chocolate fan...but who isn't?!? (also a small bonus, they pack in a ton of other vitamins and nutrients..dig in)

A List of Healthy Alternatives for meals out (canada style)

Joeys Restaurant:
This restaurant if a classic spot to go for young Vancouverites, Here are some dishes to steer clear Of and some to dig into:

1)Evil Jungle Noodle Salad (920 cals, 58g fat, 67g carbs)
Don’t be fooled by the word “salad” this dish id a fat BOMB, at 920 calories, 58g of fat and 67 grams of fiber, this is anything but a healthy choice.

Don’t worry though if you are in the mood for noodles and lettuce, there is an alternative!!!
Still not GREAT but the Chinatown Lettuce wraps are a much better choice. These have crispy noodles, peanuts and veggies tossed in a delish sauce and served with little lettuce leaves that you use to wrap up the mix.
Lettuce Wraps (660 calories, 42g of fat,77g carbs)
And to make this dish even better (I asked the nutritionist at Joeys) ask for it with half the sauce at noodles and twice the veggies and your meal will rack in at only 490 calories.

2)Cashew Chicken Stirfry (1060 cals, 52g of fat and 106g of carbohydrates)
If you thought stirfry was a Healthy choice, then you thought wrong, this dish racks in half a days worth of carbohydrates and ¾ of a days worth of calories. Though you could pack up half for later chances are, you will not be able to stop at half.
Instead, if you are craving chicken try the Chicken Ceasar, not only is it deliscious, it isn’t too bad for a restaurant ceasar.
Chicken Ceasar: (600 cals, 43f of fat and 11g of carbs)
Another good choice is the Half Rotissery chicken
Rotissery chicken: (355 cals,19g of fat,13g of carbs)

MILESTONES RESTAURANT

Portabello Mushroom Chicken 8oz.(cals,1270 fat, 71g of fat)
Chicken is Healthy right? And Mushrooms? Combine the two and Milestones has managed to spit out a fat filled calorie dense meal that will be sure to expand your waistline.
Chicken is Plentiful on the menu, so don’t fret there are many other healthy deals.
Try the...
spicy thai chicken drummets (660 cals, 44g of fat and 12g of carbs)
Or the Slow Roasted Quarter Chicken (430 cals, 20g of fat, 3g of carbs)

Some of the Meals come with the Roasted Cornbread Muffin, Don’t feel too guilty eating it, it only racks in 150 calries, 4grams of fat and 26 grams of carbs.

Starbucks
So you know where to find all the nutritional information on their drinks (if you don’t, right where you find your cream and sugar there should be pamphlets) but finding the nutritional information on the food is a little more difficult.
Here’s a littlee bit of help for next time you visit the coffee chain.

Starbucks Blueberry Scone (500 cals, 29g of fat and 56g of carbs)
All of the scones rack in about this many calories, except the pumpkin scone, which is a decent alternative at 360 calories, 18g of fat and 49g of carbs.
The Starbucks Blueberry Bran Muffin Looks Healthy but trust me, that muffin is cake in disguise, at 500 calories, 19f of fat and 75g of carbs, this muffin is not a healthy choice.
The Low Fat Blueberry muffin is a much better choice ( 280 calories, 1.5g of fat and 62g of carbs)
Just as a safeguard, stay away from all of the bars (oat fudge, oat, blueberry etc…) they all have over 400 calories.

Stay Tuned, the list will continue

A little Kick in the Butt

Working 40 hour weeks and sleeping a lot less takes a toll on one's motivation. I can personally say this has been a hard month for me, transitioning from living alone at school and organizing my own schedule to coming back home, working and trying to plan around my family's schedule. I must say that it has become tempting to just eat whatever I want to try to get quick energy and a little bit of a sugar high. Things that have kept me motivated (at least most of the time)
1)Rewrite down your goals:
Yeah at 11:11 every day, a.m (and pm if I'm still awake) i wish for certain things, but honestly writing down my biggest goals has, and will help me a lot more than hoping my clock will give me flat abs...
2)Eat a slightly bigger breaky:
Often If I eat a big breakfast (between 350 and 400 calories) I am satisfied until about 1pm or later. Of course I try to eat lunch by one no matter what, but this nice big breakfast really holds me over. It also stops me from snacking in between or overdoing it at lunch.
3)Take a Vanity Shot:
Last week I was feeling great one day and decided to do a few "vanity shots". I got into my bathing suit and took a few pictures. Looking at them has helped me see that I want to stay this way, and helps stop me from binging. I also found it helped to print one of the pictures off and have it in my food journal, as well as an old shot of me (from grad) where I look extremely overweight and unhappy.

Quote of the Day

If you don't grab the reins and take responsibility for your actions, all the advice in the world won't help you succeed

Exercise not likely to rev up your metabolism

This is brand new research. It was belived before that excersise and muscle mass helped burn up those extra calories even when you weren't performing excersise. Well guess what? The lastest research has proved that wrong.
My reaction, "Thank goodness, I never liked doing weights..here is one more reason for me to not start doing them"
Extra muscle mass has no significant effect on weight loss and metabolism.
“Bottom line is that we once thought that exercise would burn calories, especially fat calories, for a long period after a bout of exercise,” says exercise physiologist Gerald Endress, fitness director for the Duke University Diet and Fitness Center who was not involved in the research. “This does not seem to be the case.”
Of course cardio still helps burn fat, as well as weights, Just the afterburn isn't as sweet as I always thought...
For more info (from originial article): http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/30826120/wid/11915773//

Be Frugal

Be Fit, Be Fabulous and Of course, be frugal. Not cheap, no fabulous ladies are never cheap, but they are frugal. Splurge on things you really want, I'm still saving up for that Burburry Purse..sigh*. But, there are many ways we can save money and save a TON.

I've started printing off Nutrition and Fitness articles from online websites and clollecting them in duotangs (3 hole punched). When I go to the gym I like to read a magazine while I'm sweating away solo. So, To save myself about 5$ a magazine I just print articles right off the internet. Often magazines such as women's health will actually post their articles online anyways, so Why not save money and print off your own? Another benefit, no ads, and you pick and choose what you want. Enjoy!

If Hunger is Not the Problem Then food is NOT the solution.

This is something I have realised over the past few months. and even more so over the past few weeks, food only solves one problem, hunger. Try to use it to solve another problem and it usually ends up making things worse. Yeah Ice cream, cookies and chocolate will taste good for a bit, give me a high, but after, i feel even worse. I not only am STILL depressed about whatever else is bothering me but now I am also left in a situation where I feel out of control and gross. So far here is a list of things I've found to distract me...

Write down how I'm feeling in my journal, and try to see what is causing me to want to eat when not hungry

Do a craft, I have started painting again, also beading, and collaging pages in my journal

Call a friend, or write a message (facebook OBVIOUSLY) to someone I havent talked to in a while.

Go for a walk, run, or just sit on my patio and soak up the sun...

....Last week I even vaccumed, washed all the floors by hand, dusted, washed the cars and windows in my house to distract myself, and it worked :)

So I'm officially on Day THREE of the sugar cleanse. My friday night binge last week was so disgusting and I need to never do that again. Ive gona back to my old healthy habits and have come up with some super tasty new recipes that are helping me lots. Thank goodness for getting back on track. I kept the wrappers from fridays binge as a reminder of how gross I can be sometimes. I look at them and cringe. I also put up some new posters and pictures in my room to motivate me to remain svelte.
One thing that has helped a lot is seeing old friends and hearing positive feedback from them, that helps me a lot. When people notice then I know all the hard work has paid off, and it is allllll worth it. :)

Stop. Drop. and Roll...and yell a bit

Yesterday was an interesting day on the westcoast. It started off as a normal day, I sat on hold for 45 minutes waiting to talk to someone about summer school. I went to the gym, I cleaned up the house and I came home excited for a nice big veggie stir fry for lunch. Unfortunately my oven had a different idea in mind. I was wearing my coat and I guess i got too close to the gas flames and it caught on fire, I proceeded to yell a bit...ok A LOT and ran around my house before remembereing what i was taught in grade 2. I stopped, I dropped, and I rolled around. Thankfully my jacket was the only thing that got distroyed. I can imagine the burn from a gas fire wouldnt turn into a tan the next day the same way my tanning salon burn has. The rest of my day was good, I made dinner again, Spicy chicken, tomatoe and veggie paninis on fresh dough i cooked up first. They smelt great...I had a chicken salad, it was also great.
To be honest watching my familly eat last night wasn't as bad as the day before. They found a new way to annoy me.
Two years ago my parents started rowing, just in the spring, for a short season every year. They have started their season again and the topic over dinner always is, or comes back to rowing. I thought coming home I would be able to escape the wrath of the sport. Last night I had to endure a logn discussion involving my mom, who was stroking a 4x, splashing my dad, who was in 2 seat. Apparently she couldn't figure out why she was doing it. I told her to raise her eights if it is too low or to square up later. Frankly I felt like saying, "If you quit rowing, this wouldn't be a problem." i didn't say it though...I just thought very strongly about it, and pictured my life without it. Bliss.

Feeling in a happy mood over the past couple of days has motivated me to cook supper for my familly. Unfortunately "Healthy Eating" in my familly means eating more pasta than most people consume in a week, along with a side salad, to conpensate of course. Well I can say proudly that I have not touched the pasta. I made sure not to actually swallow the pasta, to test its firmness i put a piece in my mouth, mashed it around and spat it back out. Gross, I know. Then after rinsing my mouth out, I finished putting their dinner togther and put it out on the table for them. I served myself a small helping of chicken and tossed it into my giant salad. Then for the worst part, watching them eat. Now they all have very good manners, they dont talk with their mouths open, or chew too loudly, yet still when i see them shove giant helping of pasta into their mouths something inside me makes me want to leap across the table and knock all of their food on the floor. Whew, I'll be fine though, I figure if I avoid direct eye contact with the Carbohydrates i will be fine. I will be fine...