This Week's Menu - A day late

I've learned over the past few weeks that my body seems to handle small amounts of white cheeses & greek yogurt very well. I'm thankful for this as it's an additional source of gluten free lean proteins in my diet. 

Breakfasts this week:

My nutritionist of awesomeness Cheryl Harris' Millet Cereal, soft-boiled eggs, rice and/or hemp protein shakes. The chocolate shakes, I simply mix the protein with almond milk & a few ice cubes. For the berry shake, I like to make Ashley's Morning Smoothie and just add a few tablespoons of this protein powder. It's delicious!

Snacks: 

Walnuts, Pecans, Almonds, Babybell Cheese and/or cheesesticks, greek yogurt, apples, bananas, carrots & hummus, rice and/or hemp protein shakes

Lunches: Dinner leftovers or gluten free sandwiches + apple slices

Dinners: I've got the ingredients for all these dinners this week, so we can pick and choose which dinner we want! Somehow we're eating a lot of turkey this week! lol

• Turkey Burgers on homemade GF buns with green beans, and carrot sticks
• Grilled Halibut? (I think that's the fish I bought?? lol) with broccoli & steamed brown rice or millet
• Mock Chicken Parmesan with Angel Food chicken and spaghetti sauce. Served with green beans or salad and brown rice pasta
• Turkey hotdogs (since I made gf hotdog buns this week!) served with baked beans & homemade coleslaw
• Breakfast for Dinner: scrambled eggs, fruit salad, gluten free toast, turkey bacon 
• Friday Homemade Gluten Free Pizza night! 
• Easy Tuna Melts using my husband's tuna salad of awesomeness. Served with an easy spinach & mandarin orange salad. 

Sunday night preparations for the week:

1. Made 2 batches of dough of my honey oat bread. With the first batch I made an actual loaf of bread. After it cooled, I sliced it, wrapped it in plastic wrap, placed it in a ziplock bag and then froze the entire loaf. With the second batch, I made 4 hamburger buns using english muffin rings (or you could use emptied & washed tuna cans) and I made 4 hotdog buns using heavy duty foil shaped into oblong rings (like this great example). 
2. Placed my frozen fish & frozen turkey burgers in the refrigerator to defrost so they would be ready for cooking any night this week. 
3. Sliced 4-5 apples and placed them in bags so we could just grab them in the mornings as we headed out the door. 
4. Prepared the millet cereal & the boiled eggs in my rice cooker and then placed everything in sealed serving containers so I could just grab these items for breakfast as I headed out the door this week. 

What's on your menu this week? What have you done to make meals easier to prepare for your family this week? 

Gym Hamster: Week 6 - Learning to Breathe

I love this little contemplative hamster! Life has been challenging this week. I've made it to the gym... but stress hit an all time high on Tuesday. I had to deal with a family crisis. In the past I'm not sure I would have been bold enough to share about this publicly... but we all need to share our struggles. While details can still be private... it's important to know we aren't the only ones who deal with very hard and very personal family challenges. Alcoholism is a silent disease that is all too often ignored or avoided. It's time to stop avoiding the issues and face the problems that alcohol can cause.

Alcoholism has deep roots in my family. It's the reason I hate the smell of beer or liquor on anyone's breath. It's the reason I get nervous around anybody who's drinking. Alcoholism can tear families apart. It causes unnecessary worry, stress, and health problems. Even (maybe especially) when you're not the one drinking. It's like a cancer that just will not go away... It's especially hard when it effects the people closest to you. It's hard not to blame. It's hard not to be angry. It's hard not to want to shake sense into somebody... even though you know that's not really possible. It's hard to realize sometimes people are absolutely responsible for their own actions and they have to learn how to deal with the consequences. It's hard to realize that sometimes people do not want to change. And as much as you want to help them and as much as you wish things were different... you have to deal with life as it is and always hope for the best.

The crisis hit Tuesday night. We were supposed to head over to a GF support group meeting, but it was disrupted. I spent a good part of that evening on the phone with family members until I knew things were okay for the moment. Often incidences like this can move me into a panic attack. While I'm in the midst of the situation I can be calm, controlled, and directive... but once the wind has blown and settled... the panic can set in. The anger, the frustrations, the sadness, it all can just come to a head...and all those emotions balled up into one can result in some serious emotional eating. That's my alcohol... the food.

But with the help of my husband... I took a different approach that night. I did eat a few chips (it was 9 -I counted! lol) for some crunch action. Then I stopped and thought about what I could do to immediately help myself deal with the situation. My husband made me a cup of hot tea sweetened with honey... and I pulled out the laptop and went online to a wonderful site called "Step Chat" which is an amazing site that provides free, online "AA" and "Al-Anon" meetings. These meetings are held in online chatrooms, but they are run by volunteers in a very, very professional manner and it was exactly what I needed. By God's amazing timing there was a meeting just a few minutes after I logged onto the site. I felt such an immense sense of relief after sharing my story with the support group that I just felt the frustrations and stress simply release away. If you know me well you know I'm a very private person... it's hard for me to share such deeply personal things... but I wanted to share this with you because it was so healing for me. I will continue to attend these online meetings several times a week if I can.

I was proud of myself for not immediately turning to food. I was proud of myself for being willing to deal with the situation right then and there and not ignore it. I was proud of being able to be strong enough to cry and know it was okay. I know that's a huge step for me... and I'm thankful for friends who have been brutally honest with me about getting help with my emotional struggles.

So I've done a lot of breathing this week. A lot of listening to my body. In a way I'm thankful for the crisis that happened this week. Sometimes we don't know how strong we can truly be until we are put to the test and have the patience, strength, and faith to get through it. Breathe.

It's been a great week at the gym. While I don't officially have a weigh in until Saturday I know I'm down at least a pound this week! A WHOLE pound! I was really stalling there for a few weeks so to see that kind of progress is incredibly encouraging and invigorating.

I've also turned to exercise this week not only to get healthy, but to get serious stress relief. Punching it with every step on the treadmill, every turn of the recumbent bike, every knee lift with the ark trainer I dealt with some serious issues on those machines. And I'm thankful. And I still deeply love my family despite the struggles.

I'm breathing.  I'm blessed and I AM STRONG.

Favorite Gluten Free Pancakes for Shrove Tuesday

It's Shrove Tuesday... I actually forgot... but here's a quick roundup of my very favorite pancake recipes. Pick one to try tonight to share with your family just for "Pancake Day! Enjoy!

• My Dad's Best (Gluten Free) Pancakes - REVISED for a thickener batter without gums
• Whole Grain Yeasted Pancakes - a thick & delicious pancake with a wonderful flavor and texture! Great for using up leftover sourdough starter from Amy's Gluten Free Sourdough Bread!
• Master Baking Mix Pancakes - Super Easy & Quick using my Gluten Free Master Baking Mix -- Homemade "Bisquick." 
• Elana's Almond Flour Pancakes - Yummy low glycemic option!
• Gluten Free Girl's Whole Grain Pancakes
• Celiac Teen's Fluffy Gluten Free Pancakes
• Art of Gluten Free Baking's Pancakes
• Lexie's Kitchen Saturday Pancakes
• Gluten Free Homemaker's GF Pancakes
• Gluten Free Goddess' Pumpkin Pancakes

Now go make some Gluten Free Pancakes! Enjoy!! 

This Week's Menu - More One Pot Meals & Cooking Ahead

I've been trying to plan more meals lately so that I can be a more prepared "Gym Hamster!" Here's what I''m cooking in our kitchen this week! I'd love to know what you're making too! 

You can also find more wonderful gluten free menus with The Gluten Free Menu Swap... hosted this week by Celiac Family. 

Breakfasts this week: Made ahead in the rice cooker -- cooked rolled oats with stevia, raisins, slivered almonds, ground flaxseeds, applesauce, and cinnamon. Made a big batch in the rice cooker last night and divided into 4 containers for breakfasts. Boiled eggs for my healthy protein. 

Lunches: Either leftovers or sandwiches with sliced apples.

Monday: Made Ahead One Pot Meal -- Chicken baked with "Spanish" Rice -- made this with 5 ingredients: defrosted one bag of precooked brown rice I made last week... mixed it with frozen peas and leftover salsa. Poured half of it into a greased casserole dish. Placed 3 frozen chicken breasts on the rice mixture, and then placed the remaining rice & peas over the top. baked at 350 for about an hour. I prepared this last night to serve today. 

Tuesday: Errands & GF Coffee break night, so we'll have sandwiches on the sourdough bread I made yesterday, along with apple slices and carrot sticks. We're adults.. really, we are... lol

Wednesday: Made Ahead One Pot Meal -- Ground Turkey & Quinoa with veggies casserole. Made this last night: Basically cooked 1 cup of dry red quinoa in the rice cooker. Once cooked, I placed it in the bottom of a greased casserole dish. Browned ground turkey and cooked it with onions, garlic, green pepper, and a frozen bag mix of different types of green beans & wax beans and carrots. Then added some drained & rinsed large lima beans. Poured this mixture on top of the cooked quinoa in the casserole dish. Made a quick "sauce" to pour over everything with unsalted chicken broth, thickened with arrowroot starch. Poured it over everything and covered the casserole dish. For dinner on Wednesday night all I have to do is pop the casserole in the oven at 350 degrees for about 30 minutes. Dinner Ready!

Thursday: Leftovers or Breakfast for Dinner -- Hubs' favorite GF Pancakes, Turkey Bacon, and Scrambled Eggs

Friday: Pizza night! We love to make simple pizzas on Food For Life Brown Rice Tortillas. I like to top mine with homemade pizza sauce, onions, green peppers, turkey pepporoni, mushrooms, pineapple, and daiya cheese!

What's on your menu this week?

Gym Hamster - Week 5 Update

It totally cracks me up looking for hamster pictures for this series! If you have a hamster and want to share a picture of your pet, please send them to me!

So this is my 5th week hitting the gym... I'm slowly increasing my activity from 30 minutes to 45-60 minutes of cardio 3-4x a week. I am trying to work in my strength training routine at least twice a week. I'm beginning to challenge myself a little bit more each time I go to the gym with cardio. I jogged for the first time on the treadmill yesterday. It was only in one minute increments, but i did it. It's slow... but I know we'll get there.

My frustrations this week lie not in the gym routine... but in my eating. It is SO easy to revert to mindless eating. I've realized it's literally going to take months to make a "permanent" change in my eating habits. A few moments of weakness can can really hurt the scales at the end of the week. My "trigger" foods are chips and chocolate, and just eating too much of them... usually mindlessly.

For instance on Tuesday night I got home after the gym, I was starving and over the weekend on a trip I bought a bag of gluten free pretzels. (A purchase don't make often, because I know the consequences!) While standing in the kitchen chatting with hubs, having our daily catch up, I munched 2-3 servings of pretzels without even thinking about it. Then after that I munched on some lunch meat that I was preparing for a salad. Then I munched on a few gluten free cookies (agreeing to review gluten free foods for companies is an evil thing to do!) When I added up my calories after dinner, my mouth hit the floor. I had done so well during the day... it wasn't until I was famished after the gym that I just munched, munched, munched mindlessly and added an additional 900+ calories to my day's total. That's over half of my daily calorie allotment. Which of course completely blew up my total calories for the day. I was so utterly frustrated with myself. I couldn't believe I had let my evening snacking/mindless eating get so out of control in ONE afternoon.

I'm going to work hard this month to reach my calorie & protein goals. I really want to get under the 200 lb. mark by April. I'd love to knock the socks off of my Nurse Practicer for my May appointment. That would be an awesome reward at the end of the month.

I think what makes this journey different than every other weight loss journey I've had in the past is that I'm NOT going to give up. I'm paying too much at the gym to give up! lol Seriously though, I know this is going to be hard... it is hard. I know it may take a year or more to reach my goal... but I WILL get there.

It may be a long struggle to conquer my bad eating habits, but I'm determined to make it a lifestyle. And I lived an unhealthy lifestyle for most of my adult years... so it won't change overnight... it won't change in a week... it won't change magically in a month... there will be a lot of steps backward on the journey forward. But I'll get there.

Don't give up. Eat more carrots. Be a Gym Hamster.