Trouble with the Curvy

It is baking season and yesterday I passed along a couple of cake recipes that are "healthy." Let's be honest. Cake ain't healthy no matter how you look at it. It's as healthy as it is a breakfast food (you know, with egg in it and all). So what's a girl to do? Turn to substitution? Precisely. The last time I had success at this, I was able to bake some great things and cut a whole bunch of calories and guilt inducers out of my baking. My favorite substitution I found back then was apple sauce in place of cooking oil. I loved this trick because it actually makes cakes and breads more moist. It improved every recipe I try it with except for brownies. I was never able to find a good brownie recipe that didn't taste like it was a "healthy brownie." So I went out looking for more of these little tricks I can try in my baking because deer hunting season is coming right up and it happens to coincide with my baking season. There is something magica

Tonight's blog is going to be short and sweet. Short because I have some more plans to wrap up for Ben's birthday celebration tonight and sweet because I've found some great healthy birthday cake recipes! The chocolate fudge pudding cake might have to be tried before my next birthday.... Chocolate Decadance Chocolate Fudge Pudding Cake....  <3 Katie 193lbs Day 140 Feeling Sweet!!

I began Weight Watchers. So far, it's been a slow start. I'll admit I was hoping that it was going to be something that will help me easily keep track of what I'm putting in my body every day. While I still see it as a huge benefit, this isn't as easy as I thought. It takes a lot of thought to make sure you enter everything you eat into a system of some sort. By the time dinner arrives I barely remember breakfast which means I have to track it as I do it. What's that you hear? Is it... Whining?? No. My point is that even though I know better, I still believed there was a magical tool I just hadn't tried yet. Though it is more work I think it is the key I've been missing. Nothing about this is easy because if it were, I wouldn't have ever been Tubby McChubster. Easy is where the cheese puffs go. I've had a hard time with motivation lately. It takes so much more effort to get out of bed before the sunshine peeks though to beckon me outside for a wa

This morning I rose before the sun and while I was too wimpy to go out walking in the dark, I cranked my music and did a Boot Camp workout this morning. I LOVE this routine and I am sore as hell. I love it because most of the exercises are doable at my strength level (weakling). I also love it because the space needed to complete these exercises is very minimal. I worked up a hell of a sweat and am feeling all of the new muscles I worked. This can be found at: http://exercise.about.com/library/blbootcampcircuit.htm Bootcamp Circuit This bootcamp circuit workout works your entire body with cardio, lower body, upper body and core exercises. You won't need any equipment, which makes this the perfect workout for small spaces, travel exercise or for anyone who wants a challenging workout using their own body weight. Precautions See your doctor if you have any injuries, illnesses or other medical conditions. Equipment Needed None How To Perform the exercises in each circ

I can't wait for daylight savings time. I find it incredibly difficult to motivate my butt out of bed when the sun is still in bed. I go to sleep with the best intentions and the sunless sky makes me rethink my plan. It is dangerous territory. The answer to this is to drive to the gym while the sun starts to rise. Instead of walking I should be on my way to a better workout. Putting it in black and white really somehow makes me more compelled to follow it through. Accountability. Thank you TWTC <3 This, of course, is not the only thing I need to do to jump start my plateaued progress. I need to get a handle on my diet. While I feel like I've made some good choices over the past few months, I still have a lot of work to do. I don't really do anything right now that gives me concrete data on what I do. I'm horrible at keeping a food diary and I don't keep track of caloric intake. The last time I was really successful with weight loss was when I did keep track of

Wow... now that I read that title it sounds a little naughty.... But I'm keeping it because it is what tonight's entry is all about! Day's has nominated Camp Sunshine for a Grant competition funded by Jewelers for Children. On October 30th, if Camp Sunshine is one of ten organizations with the most votes on JCF's Facebook page, they'll win a $10,000 grant that will be used to send 5 families to camp. I created the video here with real families that have gone to camp and pictures from the camp. Check it out for details of the contest and lots of super cute kids! This organization is amazing, please take a minute to help them out. Please exercise your finger tonight by casting your vote for Camp Sunshine! <3 Katie Day 129 196lbs Feeling hopeful

128 days after setting out to lose weight, I feel like I've hit a wall. I sat down to write tonight and felt like I didn't have a lot of inspiration. I walked this morning. I ate healthy stuff through the day. Today wasn't a struggle but it wasn't invigorating either. So I did what a bajillion other American's do when they look for inspiration: I Googled it.  I came across a blog that I think I am going to LOVE. Fit Bottomed Girls  is described as a healthy network of female bloggers that sound like they have the same goal I do... only they do it better. There are a bunch of workout ideas, inspiration, and recipes. It seemed like a treasure trove of everything I was looking for.  I will certainly be trying this Homemade Salsa  and who know what other good things I'm going to find there. One thing is clear though. A girl needs resources and a plan to be successful. I started this journey with an initial goal in mind to just work out every weekday consisten

They say that if you wrap something in Bacon it is ALWAYS better. Tonight I'll try that with truth seeing how it is already pretty hard to swallow. The truth is that I was a big ol' slacker last week. I kept to my workout routine while on my business trip but I didn't on the days I was home or yesterday when I worked from home. It sounds an awful lot like an excuse by work is kicking my ass right now. We are short staffed and it is the worst time of year to only have a skeleton crew in our department. I've been doing this since the end of August and it is starting to catch up with me. The result? I don't workout, I don't write my blog, and I slow the progress I've worked so hard to continue. I was just exhausted and not writing was the sacrifice I made to recuperate. This morning I am back in business though. I started the day off watching the sun rise on my walk. When I returned from my walk to a news story about how about an hour of exercise a day is p

I know. I write a "fitness" blog and title a post "Bacon Wrapped Salmon." How is that even remotely helpful? It isn't. How is that relevant? I am a sucker for bacon and I am trying to lose weight. In this battle between bacon and chub-rolls who is going to win out? Seriously? Like you have to ask. Of course it is the bacon.  Without bacon I wouldn't even have these chub-rolls to blog about so really, I owe bacon a great deal of thanks.... Please pardon my extremely flawed philosophy above. I'm a little drunk on love and I can't help it. I had an amazing day. I write to you tonight from the beautiful city of Austin, Texas. I'm here on business and yesterday was a very long travel day that ended with me meeting the pillow of the Omni hotel and nothing else. Today, however, was the opposite. Today was a long day that left me itching for more.  This is my very first trip to Texas and my very first trip to the southwest. For a foodie and music

So I'm just going to come out with it. I have actually considered what would happen if the Apocalypse were to occur. Regardless if it is because of an Alien invasion, Zombies, or the Gates of Hell opening, I'm going to be in rough shape if I keep being a chubster. What can I say? I have an active imagination... but I think it would be just my luck to deny its existence and it would come the very next day and I'd be eaten or probed or possessed by a demon.  It's also not really a bad idea to make sure you can be self sufficient in any kind of disaster that is much more likely to occur than the apocalyptic motherload. Even the CDC has issued a document on how to survive the Zombie Apocalypse so I'm not really that weird... (you know you love The Walking Dead too.) With any luck you won't have to use your kickboxing skills to ward off a mugger but there are some really great reasons to lose weight that I didn't realize. Here's my top 10 practical rea

I began my journey when the days were long and the nights were warm. When the sun rises early it helps beckon me out of bed. This morning I didn't get out of bed in time to do a walk so I did it tonight and the sun had already set. It really kind of killed the workout for me. I need to make a better effort to make it to my workout in the morning. The colder nights mean that running the oven won't suffocate us. Baking has begun and comfort food season is upon us. I made my first batch of pumpkin chocolate chip cookies and the most unhealthful thing in them are the chocolate chips. They don't taste healthy and Ben couldn't believe they were sugar free: Ingredients: 2 sticks of Margarine 1 cup splenda 1 cup splenda brown sugar 1/2 cup Eggmate 1 tsp vanilla 1 cup of pumpkin 2 cups flour 2 tsp baking soda 1/2 tsp salt 1 tsp cinnamon 1 tsp all spice 1 cup chocolate chips Instructions: 1. Preheat oven to 350 2. Cream together the margarine and splendas 3.

My all time favorite thing about vacation has always been the food. I love going out and trying new cuisine from places I visit. I like the experience of taking a couple hours to make an event out of a meal. I like trying something from every course and I plot out what I can't wait to eat and look forward to it during the rest of my vacation. I do, of course, realize that these are not ambitions that jive with losing weight. Luckily I don't go on vacations a lot but my recent trip to Atlanta proved to be a good test on my progress. Before I tell you how it went, let me say that I started the trip out at 196 and I ended it at 196 so my title is pretty misleading. Don't worry about that. Know that if you follow my advice, you can lose weight, or maintain your weight depending on how much you are willing to sacrifice. So let me start out by saying that sacrificing is not really my idea of vacation and so I just maintained my weight and didn't make an effort to keep los