Daniel Plan, part deux-days 8-12

Yowzers! How did all this time go by without me checking in? Today was my easy week, too! I have no excuse! Anyhow I’m still sitting at 181.2 so that’s disappointing…

Anyhow, I’m tired still. I tried walking a mile last night and taking a bath with lavender scented Epsom salts…but still woke up at 3am and tossed and turned the rest of the night.

Foodwise, we did really good. The 10-day detox was done yesterday. We enjoyed spaghetti for dinner. I think we’ll still be watching how much dairy and gluten we put in our bodies to help keep us on track.

I don’t remember what exactly I had for breakfast (smoothies every day) or lunch (usually leftovers) but I did manage to write down what dinner was each night:

Monday: turkey burgers, broccoli/cauliflower mix

Tuesday: Baked chicken with either green beans (Kenny) or brown rice with broccoli/carrots

Wednesday: veggie stew

Thursday: Whole-wheat spaghetti with sauce made from tomato paste, olive oil, garlic and spices, 5-grain rolls, corn and (for me) broccoli slaw with vinaigrette dressing

Tonight the big football game between county rivals (one school I work for and the other school my kids attend). I have about 30 minutes after I get home to walk the dogs, change, throw down some food and then get back in the car to head to the kids’ school to help load equipment before buses leave. I’ll get a lot of exercise from loading and unloading instruments so I’m not going to do any formal exercises.

This week, the Daniel Plan Essential we are focusing on in: Fitness. So we’ve studied: Faith, Food, and now, Fitness. This is one this that tends to mess me up. I can handle the food pretty well. The fitness part gets me every time. I did come home from the study and after the sunset (it’s 95 and MUGGY here in Georgia right now) Meg and I walked to the front of the subdivision, which is one mile. I’ve tried to either stand at my desk or walk around more during the day, since I’m so sedentary at work.

I’m actually trying to set up a time for me and two friends to meet at the gym and work out tomorrow and maybe in the future. And I’ve made plans to do Zumba on Tuesday with friends (at a gym) and Thursday with DVDs after the Bible study.

Go me! (Especially if I go through with it!)

My silent rebellion

This year I took a new position within the school system. I’m now the secretary for the principal at the rival school of the school my kids’ attend. And, woo-wee, there’s some serious school pride going on over here. Not so much with the kids, mind you, but with the staff and the parents. I have been asked several times why I didn’t bring my kids with me…and by people who know that one of the girls is not only a senior, but one of the drum majors! Yeah, sure, I'm gonna make her miss out on all that!! Don’t get me wrong, this is a perfectly nice school. I’m proud to work here. I love the staff. But just like any high school, it’s not perfect. My kids know their school. When Jo graduates, we’ll have had a Stokes child enrolled for a solid decade. That’s a lot of history right there.

Anyhow, the first football game of the season is this Friday and everyone here is on super Patriot Pride alert. I mean, it didn’t take me long to know how they felt about my kids’ school. But this week? Wowsers! It’s almost to the level of “methinks they doth protest too much.” Maybe that has to do with the fact that Rockdale beat Heritage at last year’s football game? <giggle>  But, my goodness, really? It’s a football game.

Yes, yes, I know, I live in the South where Football is King. But, still, seriously, folks!! Get it together. It’s kind of sad that they have to have 20+ police on site…because of the alumni, parents, and adult fans!! Really? REALLY???  <sigh>

Anyhow, as things heighten to a fever pitch around here, I’ve decided to do the only thing I can do…wear Rockdale colors all week. I even have a Bulldog necklace to wear, thanks to Meg’s boyfriend’s mother!  I meant to take a picture every day and post it…but it was ridiculously muggy yesterday afternoon after work and after going to the Park to hang out with my bestie, Kim, and my sweet girl, Gloria, and then pumping gas…I was a slimy, sweaty mess and all I wanted to do was to get out of that dress (well, really, the Spanx, girl’s gotta be honest, here).

I will be so glad when this week is over, though. Of course, basketball season is right around the corner and I hear the Rockdale/Heritage basketball game is something to behold as well.

Joy…

Daniel Plan, part deux-days 6 & 7

These weekends are gonna kill me. I don’t know why it’s harder to stay on track at home than it is when I’m at work. I have a refrigerator full of good things to eat…but I didn’t feel like dealing with it. Maybe that’s it. On work days I make a smoothie and take it with me to drink on the ride. I also make lunch and that’s my only choice. At home I have all sorts of options but in order to eat them, I have to do something. Guess that makes me a lazy thingamajig.

Saturday I dropped to 181.8, which meant 3 lbs gone, so that started my day off well. I had so much to do to get ready for this weekend. I had the VBS follow-up movie and the Band Potluck on Saturday afternoon and evening and SKC/nursery meeting on Sunday to prep for. And what did I do Saturday morning? I lolled around in bed! Which made the rest of the weekend go pretty irritatingly. Nothing fell apart because previous planning held, which meant that I didn’t look all whackado. But still. It annoys me that I didn’t work on the things that I’d planned to work on.

The VBS follow-up movie was disappointing. Only three kids showed up and since we watched it in the fellowship hall, since I thought there would be more participating, the movie was too dark for that big room and the sound quality was really yucky. But I appreciated the parents of the kids that showed up for taking time on their Saturday to bring their kids and I had a couple volunteers who showed up and that meant a lot to me.

The Band Potluck was pretty good, I guess. I volunteered to help with the merchandise and ended up not eating…but that’s okay. I’m not sure what I could have ate. My favorite part of the night is when the kids take the field. This year they did something different. They encouraged the parents to come down to the field and take their kids’ places. We learned the responses to some of the different commands. Kenny took Jo’s place and she showed him how to stand and do flute stuff. I stood with Meg by her podium and learned a couple directing motions. (Wow! That is HARD!!!) The guard parents were my favorite because they some of them had to contort their bodies in to ways I don’t think they’d planned to EVER get into! But I think it gave the parents a new appreciation of a little of what their kids go through AND it gave a lot of amusement to the kids, the instructors and to the parents who didn’t choose participate.

Sunday I got to be in a Sunday school class. My soul is so happy. Jo joined me. We are doing Beth Moore’s study on 1 & 2 Thessalonians. SKC was pretty fun. 9 kids came. We looked into the battle of Jericho and what lessons we could learn from it. The nursery meeting was a bit of a bust because Brad had to skip in order to look in on his parents and Joyce had plans to eat out for lunch. Since we were just going to go over a sample nursery handbook and talk about changes and additions for our church, I just gave Joyce a copy and Kim a copy to give to Brad and we’ll chat about it some other time.

We went out to eat but it was a buffet, which when I’m eating regularly I don’t eat enough to make it worthwhile, but on the Daniel Plan was kind of silly. We paid $11 for me to have some salad, a hard-boiled egg, and apple and baked chicken.  

I don’t think I ate dinner Sunday night. I took a Sunday nap and just couldn’t get it together!

I’m still really, really tired. I’m just not getting sound sleep. I guess I need to work on scrubbing my bathtub so I can take a soak at the end of the day and see if that helps.

Food:

Saturday: peanut butter/banana smoothie, raw cashews and apple for lunch, no dinner

Sunday: no breakfast, baked chicken, apple, salad, hard-boiled egg for lunch, leftover walnut/basil pesto chicken and green beans.

Weight:

Starting weight: 184.8

Day 2 weight: 184.4

Day 3 weight: 184.2

Day 4 weight: 184.0

Day 5 weight: 183.8

Day 6 weight: 181.8

Day 7 weight: 181.2

Daniel Plan, part deux-day 3

Headaches abound! I feel like I am one big headache and stuffy headed person. I’m taking my Zyrtec and nosespray as usual so I’m assuming that this is either the toxins coming out or that I’ve caught a cold. Kenny feels crummy, too, which also could just be the toxins or that we’ve caught the same cold since we spent all weekend together in the car. I’m still a day behind on blogging so this is about yesterday/day 3. Maybe I’ll catch up at some point and blog at night about my day…and maybe I won’t. Depends on how saucy I get to feeling.

The Daniel Plan group is great. Emails flying and encouragement coming left, right, and center. Awesome, awesome, awesome!

Yesterday was one of those Cinderella days for me. I was feeling low because I’m still not an integral part of the team at work and although I have a nice little office with my name over the door, I still feel like I’m unnecessary. Since the girls had band practice until 6, I had to deal with the dogs. I felt mega-guilty about leaving them in the pen while I swept and mopped because they’d been crated up all day with no human companionship (coming off of a whole 3 months with someone there almost all day/every day). But the floors needed some attention and I HAVE to get this house on a routine…for my own sanity. I did my & Kenny’s laundry and changed my sheets on Monday (and some dish towels), Jo’s laundry on Tuesday, and yesterday finished up the delicates while I swept and mopped the family room, kitchen/dining/entry way, and my bedroom. I need to scrub down my bathroom today (yuck). Besides just needing to do it for sanitary reasons, I want to start taking Epsom salt baths at night to calm and draw out more toxins. Plus I’m having a hard time getting my quiet time in. I’m the children’s leader, leading a Bible study and a mom…I gotta have my Bible time!!!

Last night I also went by Kroger’s because everyone at Daniel Plan raved about their organic/gluten-free section. I was actually a bit confused. I do appreciate that they have everything grouped together but I still could not find cheap tahini!! I broke down and bought some though. I’m such a schmuck. J

After I got the house stuff done that I needed to get done, I realized that I didn’t have time to work on Sandra’s flyer anymore. Luckily she won’t need it until next Tuesday. I needed to get dinner ready. One of my favorite recipes from the Daniel Plan book is Dr. Hymans Walnut/BasilPesto Chicken. Unfortunately, I got popped by some grapeseed oil and burnt the snot out of two of my toes and in between them. Hurt like anything! Dingaling didn’t think about the fact that I had aloe with lidocaine in my cabinet. I just put cold water on it and griped about it until I got home and Kenny was saying I needed to put something on it.

Today’s meals: banana/peanut butter smoothie with protein scoop for breakfast, lunch-hummus/carrots and an apple, snack: raw cashews, dinner: walnut/basil pesto chicken with broccoli/cauliflower. Water: 114 oz


Exercise: none. My toes hurt too badly to stuff into tennis shoes. But I figured since I'd sweated up a storm with the sweeping/mopping, I hadn't been totally sedentary!!

Starting weight: 184.8

Day 2 weight: 184.4

Day 3 weight: 184.2

Daniel Plan, part deux-Day 2

Day 2 was hard, I’m not gonna lie. I woke up with a headache and not feeling like I slept enough. But I had a plan for the day: Work, dishes/laundry, salsa chicken, work on Sandra’s flyer and print out Band minutes, band meeting, home.

So the day pretty much went like that except I didn’t feel like unloading the dishes, so that didn’t get done. And the printer decided it was going to be offline no matter what I did, so I had to leave earlier than I’d planned to go by the church to print out the Band minutes, which meant I had to finish Sandra’s flyer later. I also didn’t get to eat dinner since I ran out of time. The Band meeting was kind of irritating because all the stuff we went over, I’d already heard in the planning meeting and the budget meeting. So when we started over for the people who didn’t realize that the meeting started at 6:30 instead of 7, well, I was on edge.

I got home and took the dogs on a walk out to the front of the subdivision (1 mile…go me), I really need to remember to put their harnesses on since they have no idea how to walk well on a leash and I don’t have the time to teach them.

I did sit down and finish Sandra’s flyer and looked over my lesson for tonight before I went to sleep.

I didn’t eat dinner because by the time I got settled after the meeting, it was almost 9. I wasn’t hungry and I didn’t want to eat that late…so I didn’t.

Oh, and I looked it up and Ezekial bread does have wheat and gluten, now it’s organic gluten and sprouted wheat so if you’re gonna screw up with your gluten, that’s the way to go. But I still beat myself up a little for not eating right the VERY FIRST DAY!!! And the second time I did this!!! Ack!

Today’s meals: Strawberry/banana smoothie with almond milk and chia seeds for breakfast, organic raw cashews and spinach/kale chips (checked…gluten free) for snack at work, quinoa salad for lunch, hummus and carrots for snack at home, and 96 oz of water. I made “Salsa chicken” (chicken breasts baked with homemade taco season and salsa) for dinner but didn’t eat it.

Starting weight: 184.8

Day 2 weight: 184.4

 

Disappointing, but with the thyroid issue and just having ate right and walked one mile for one day, guess I might be expecting too much? I have to say that emails to my hubby, friends and Daniel Plan peeps have turned my frown upside down!

Here we go again!

Daniel Plan, part deux!

Yep, I'm a glutton for punishment. Today is day 1 of the plan for me and Kenny. The first Bible study session was last Thursday. However, since we left Friday after work to make the drive to D.C. we figured the better choice would be to start today (Monday). I took the day off so it wasn't too horrible. Tomorrow I'll have to deal with work, too. Ugh. I think I may have boo-booed, though, because I didn't even think about it and had some Ezekial bread. I think it's okay on the 30 days but not the 10 day detox. I'll have to check that out. :(

Days 1-10 are the detox: no dairy, no gluten, no sugar, no processed foods, no caffeine

How I ate:
Breakfast: Smoothie made with banana, blueberries, almond milk, protein powder, and chia seed.
Mid-morning snack: Hummus with carrots
Lunch: Turkey sandwich, Dijon mustard
Dinner: Baked chicken breast, brown Jasmine rice, green beans
Water: 80 oz.

Exercise: I shopped and did a lot of laundry and housework (I even weeded a bit!!) during the day. Jo and I took the dogs on a 1-mile walk!!

Gonna do a banana & strawberry smoothie tomorrow, a quinoa salad for lunch, probably some more hummus and carrots for a snack. Dinner....if I get up in time, I think I'll put some beef stew in the crockpot. I have a band booster meeting tomorrow night so I gotta do something easy or fast.

Day 1 down, 39 to go!