Get Real Food Challenge Update #2

There was supposed to be a vlog here yesterday, but my new computer was having none of that and I got too frustrated to fix it yesterday.  Or today.  So you get a blog.  Deal.

Food

Food wise was fairly good last week minus the times we went out to eat, but I stuck with paleo.  Umm.... except for me making a mistake with my pizza on Friday night and forgetting that I had to check 'no cheese' option when I ordered online.  So I ate a piece with it and then picked it off the rest.

Gym

Last week I felt off for most of the week and had trouble upping my weight on a lot of things.  However, during our special Monday workout, I actually managed a 2RM Turkish Get Up with 20lbs and majorly upped my box jumps.  Wahhoooo!  This week I've been PRing all over the place but I'll update that tomorrow.

Life

Sleep has been actually on a roll this week and despite feeling off and the stressors I've had, I've been well rested.  Some of those days were melatonin induced, but I'm okay with it.  Unfortunately this week started off with me trying to push down the stress eating cravings, but so far so good.

GOING FORWARD

Food 

My goal this week has been to take out my paleo treats and decrease my 'paleo approved sugars' to take down the stress eating cravings.  I didn't bake anything on Sunday, and instead prepped lots of veggies and protein to make it through.  Unfortunately, I also made maple cinnamon almond butter and someone needs to pry it out of my hands.  It's so good.

I'm also trying to up my water intake.  I've been slacking recently.  So the brita and I are now BFFs.

Gym

Trying to give it all no matter how I feel this week.  Pushing through and getting it done.  That's it that's all.

Life

My life goal is the same as the gym.  Approach things with positivity and every time my head gets into a vicious cycle of self doubt, counteract it with what is going right in my life at this very moment.

And a little something extra.... pictures and American Eagle LIE.

For those of you who saw that picture of me in my size 10 shorts and figured I was a 6-8.  Not so much.  AE is never consistent with their sizes depending on the cut.  Case in point:  I have 12s, 10s, 14s and they're all different.   I went in this weekend to try jeans on, and because EVERYTHING is flipping low rise, no 8s or 10s that I grabbed fit me.  Bah!

So you may have heard...

That I posted a vlog!

Go check it out.  I rambled more than I do here but there's a big success I wanted to share that comes at the end!

And if you want to know what I meant by bloating, this was the last time I posted a picture of it.  Right is normal, left is post gluten:

Gluten Free Carrot Muffins

 Actually, these puppies aren't just gluten free, they're paleo too.  But I figured the less I tote around my paleoness the better.  So let's just call these little muffins of love.  Okay never mind.  That's even worse.

I went to bed last night with every intention of going to the gym but this morning it was NOT going to happen.  Apparently I need to stop drinking afternoon caffeine.  I've been up 2 nights in a row until at least midnight trying to get my brain to stop thinking.  It just won't.  So I'm tired today and rambling.  And currently drinking tea.

Whenever I stay home on Tuesday/Thursday mornings though, I can never just rest.  I literally pulled myself out of bed at 9 and made myself some breakfast and got to work.  Lots of tidying, vacuuming, etc was going on.  And some baking.

After the holidays we ended up with a huge bag of carrots.   I love carrots, but honestly, they aren't my go to veg for meals.  However, what I like more than carrots lately is anything to do with the idea of carrot cake.  Prior to starting the paleo thing, I made carrot cake baked oatmeal and it was SO GOOD.  Thinking that there's got to be a way to make it Kelly-friendly I started searching the web last night and found a few recipes.  I finally snagged this one and got to work this morning.

The batter was a little thicker than I was expecting, but kept my fingers crossed and 25 minutes later was trying not to eat all 12.  These are delicious, full of good stuff, tastes just as good as your average junk filled muffin, but, dare I say it, are good for you?

Carrot Muffins

1 1/2 cups blanched almond flour
1/4 teaspoon sea salt
1/2 teaspoon baking soda
1/2 tablespoon cinnamon, plus more for sprinkling on top
3 eggs
2 tablespoons coconut oil, melted
1 ripe banana, mashed
2 tablespoons maple syrup or honey (optional)
1 1/2 cups carrots, grated
1/2 cup pecans, chopped


1.  Pre-heat oven to 325 and line a muffin tin or spray with coconut oil.

2.  Combine almond flour, seat salt, baking soda, and cinnamon in a medium bowl.

3.  Stir together coconut oil, banana and maple syrup, and eggs.

4.  Fold in pecans and carrots into the wet mixture.

5.  Add wet to dry

6.  Bake for 20-25 minutes or until a toothpick comes out clean.

7.  Try not to stuff your face and eat the whole batch

**My modifications:   I love cinnamon so you bet I upped that to a whole tbsp.  I also added some coconut shreds to the mix.  I think next time I would experiment with the spices in this one.  A little bit of nutmeg would have put these guys over the top!

Pure Laziness

Maybe not pure laziness, but pretty damn lazy.  That's how I feel.

My dad and Gregers... it wasn't too long after this picture that my dad declared he was drunk and going to bed.

I actually booked myself off for the holidays for a whole week and a half and it's hard to believe so much of it is already over!  I spent the first weekend prepping for my parents to arrive and then when they did there was a lot of yummy cooking happening that I didn't take pictures of (whoops).  We had Greg's now infamous ribbies, steak, banana bread french toast, ham, brussel sprouts, and lots of bacon.  It was glorious. 

Even if you aren't paleo or hate paleo, you really need to make this banana bread. 

But not.  I'm not sure if it was the sheer amount I ate, or the chocolate chips in my banana bread that did me in, or maybe the alcohol, but I've spent the last few days with an angry stomach.  I was really hoping that I would avoid the Franklin/Hyland stomach issues but it appears I haven't.  Which is really sad.  Dairy and gluten make my stomach really angry and other things seem to upset it on a whim.  It's really frustrating. 

Local cider for the win!

Then there was the fact that Greg and I went out for our belated anniversary dinner at Fabbrica and I couldn't resist a piece of bread... or the tiramisu.  You can bet I felt like ass yesterday after not having gluten for close to 4 months. 

I also spent most of yesterday in my pajamas not moving off the couch.  I wasn't going to workout but I realized that there was  probably going to be a 4 day gap between workouts because of circumstances so I should probably get off my butt.  I finally made it off the couch for the 5pm workout.  It was sweaty and disgusting but so worth it.

It was also chilly since Toronto finally decided to have some snow.

Alright... it's almost 11 and I'm going to try to aim for the noon class today... guess I should probably put some workout clothes on or something.

Happy Holidays!  Nothing like flying a helicopter inside!

1 Month Check-In

I am SO HAPPY.  I can't believe it.  I really can't.  Weighing myself etc never ends well.  It usually ends up with me in a corner crying and declaring I need wine, STAT.

So you can imagine that I may not have gone into today all that excited.  I thought I had seen changes... but that usually didn't really mean much.

BUT today, today there were changes.

Tired Kelly is tired.

I lost 2lbs which I was happy with.  It put me in the 160s for the first time in over a year. 

I was given a goal of 2-3% body fat loss and I nailed it.  I ended up losing 2.8%.   The biggest change for me was in my stomach which is my problem area and the place I have always hated.  My stomach caliper measurement went down by 25%.  That is just huge!

My goal is to get through the next 2 weeks without eating and drinking my face off and then kill January!

I can see an end point.... only 5-6% body fat to go to get into my first goal.

Tuesday is my blogging day...

I always get the urge to blog on Tuesdays.  I think it's because I get my workout done early and then don't have to be at work until noon.  Then I realize I haven't blogged in a week so I probably should get on that.

This week has been good.  I'm finally starting to notice the effects of paleo/primal in terms of cravings.   I had to go to a Christmas party over the weekend, and for once I didn't want to stuff my face with cheese and desserts.  But believe me that cheese did look kinda tasty.   I also went back for seconds of the salad.  Who goes back for more salad?  Gosh.  I did however have some wine, which has been my one weakness through this entire thing.  Okay and the dark chocolate peanut butter in my cupboard.  My plan is to get through this month, and then completely cut out the wine for a month just for kicks. 

Other stuff that happened this week:  I did my first attempt at a Crossfit Lady, Fran, and came up not too bad considering.   Though I couldn't Rx the weight and I still need pull-up bands but that's okay!  I'm getting there.

I'm not sure if I see more muscle there or if I'm just better at flexing.

 Thursday is my first checkpoint with Crossfit and I'm nervous.  Did giving 95% result in a decent amount of change?  It's so hard to see it on yourself which is why I take a million pictures of myself.  Pshhht.  Okay, I'm just vain.

Alright, I better get myself together... time to drink some tea and get ready for my workday.  4 more days til vacation!!
 

Learning to like...

1.  Black coffee.   Seriously?  Who knew black coffee could actually taste good?  I'm that person in your Starbucks who can never walk in there and just order coffee.  It's usually some form of crazy ass drink with 3-4 changes to it.  I'm sorry.  And I'm sorry to anyone who asks me if I want anything from Starbucks if they're going.  Anyways, the point of this ramble is that black coffee was never something I thought I could do.   On this whole Paleo challenge thing, one of the suggestions was to drink your coffee black, and ya know what?  It's actually pretty good!  Last night I even got a decaf americano.  Progress!

(Post-Crossfit hair)

2.  Me.  I took a picture of myself on the way to Peterborough on Saturday and I can tell you everything I hate about it:  I'm pale.  I'm tired.  I look chubby, etc.  But you know what?  My hair looks killer.  I love my makeup.  And I love that my eyes have gotten greener.  And I really look pretty good.  It's so hard to stop negative self-talk, but the only way to combat it is with positives.

3.  Spaghetti Squash/Substitute Carbs.  Let's talk about this.  Zucchini is not really a lasagna noodle, and no matter what anyone tells you, spaghetti squash does not replace fresh homemade pasta.  But sometimes it kind of tastes good.  And sometimes it's actually not so bad in a dish.  Promise!  Funny story about this one.

 As I was transferring pictures to use in this entry, I came across my screen cap for the recipe.  Last night I spent a half hour freaking that paleomg.com was down I couldn't see the ingredient list (can you tell I'm a baker by nature?  I can't deal without exact measurements),  and the damn ingredients were on my phone the entire time!

3b.  Side note:  changing up my cooking habits made me finally pull out my fancy Le Crueset cookware that I usually hate getting down because it's so heavy.

4.  Okay, we already know I love these two, but Greg wants me to post about our cats.  So here are our cats spooning.  Cutest thing ever.  How can you not like cats?  Also, we locked Pip in a closet for 24hrs this weekend.  Whoops.