Shelley: Day 11, Off a day, and I'm still a genius!!!

I'll explain why I'm a genius in Today's Tip.  But seriously, I had such a crazy great idea today!!  I'm a day off because I realized in my last post I said days 7&8 when I should have said days 8&9.  I blame my lack of memory on my children!!! ALL THEIR FAULT;).

Caitie, I'm so angry too!!! How dare Katie go on a walk without me!!!!!  :),  I'm never going to give up on getting Katie to be my next door neighbor.  Even if I have to get in lots of car accidents so there will be more people for Dan to adjust!

I got to the gym today but it became an unofficial Primary Meeting (I'm the secretary and I had to miss the last meeting).  It was good to get caught up but it really ate into my workout time so I only managed to burn around 777 cals.

Anyway, I can tell a certain monthly event is coming ever closer because I am retaining water like crazy.  When this happens, to keep myself from insanity, I don't weight myself.  It's not worth the stress.  I start to obsess that even though I'm working out hard and eating well I'm not losing and I swear it's a self-fulfilling prophesy.  So, I just ignore my need to weigh myself and obsess.  

I had a pretty good day (any day without a meltdown from one or all of my kids constitutes good), and here is the breakdown:

Budget 1,428 Food 1,219 Exercise -777 Net 442 Under 986

Breakfast: 170 Oatmeal, Maple & Brown Sugar Steel Cut 1 Serving 170 Lunch: 300 Sandwich, Egg McMuffin 1 Each 300 Dinner: 570 Peach Mango Salsa 8 Tablespoons 100 Veggie Lovers Salad 1 Cup 8 Black Bean & Corn Salad 1 Serving 80 Pizza, Family, Original, Pepperoni, Slc 2/3 Each 213 Tortilla, Corn 1 Each 50 Turkey, Breast, Ground, 99% Fat Free, Extra Lean, Nat 4 Ounces 120 Snacks: 178 Blissful Truffle Candy Bar, Dark Chocolate 3/4 Serving 98 Sea salt And Almond milk chocolate minis 2 Pieces 80 Exercise: 777 Elliptical Moderate 1 Hour 5 Min 737 Weight Lifting Vigorous 5 Min 40

BMR CALC:  (1760+777)-1,219= 1,318 Calorie Deficit Today (I'm going to have a snack tonight, probably mango salsa and Skinny Pop (I know it sounds weird, but it's oddly satisfying and takes me a while to consume.), so I'll subtract another 200ish cals for that.  A decent day.  I just have to remember it's the long game not the short that matters.  I know I don't look like I'm losing weight, but when a certain event is over, I'll pee off all this water and look better than ever!!!  Sorry for the TMI.  

TODAY'S TIP:  I'm a genius!!

Today I wanted something filling, so I went super low cal by making a ground turkey and onion soup with corn/bean salsa added.  I'm a volume person, so sometimes I just have to get creative.  It sounds odd, but SO GOOD!  Then I top it with salsa, I happen to have Peach Mango Salsa and it was the bomb!!!  I also threw some lettuce in there because I like leaves in my soup, what can I say, and I didn't have any spinach which would have made way more sense.  

The genius moment came when I realized I wanted chips and salsa.  But I hate packaged chips for two reasons, 1.  Calorie heavy, 2. I lack the self control to stop myself, I just do.  So instead of breaking out the tortilla chips I grabbed one of my white corn fajita sized tortillas and threw it in the toaster.  I had no idea what exactly it would do, but it did what I hoped!!! It got crispy!! I used my finger to put the lightest coat of water over some of it and sprinkled it with salt (I can give up calories, but NEVER will I EVER give up my beloved salt!!!!!  NEVER!!!!).  I broke it into pieces and ta-da, super low fat, low cal, completely contained chips!!!!  It was fabulous!!! I used my food scale to measure out some salsa and felt smug the entire time I ate it that I had defeated that big old bag of tortilla chips coated in oil!!!  Take that crappy habits!!!

Until tomorrow. . .