Tag Archives: lean eating

Vegan Week in Progress!

02 Sunday Feb 2014

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WOW!  Never thought I’d be writing those words in a post title that’s for sure!  Recently in our Lean Eating Program we were presented a challenge to try eating only plant-based foods for an entire day.  Just another experiment to try it and see how we feel!

The Lean Eating program does not promote a vegan lifestyle; rather this is something to try and play around with.  We might feel worlds better or might not feel any different – it’s just data to make note of, that’s all!  I knew I’d need more than just a day to experiment – one day of change isn’t going to make a huge difference for me. So, I challenged myself to try this for an entire week!

I have a couple of vegan cookbooks and admittedly I needed to blow the dust off.  I’m getting more confident with my cooking abilities, especially when it comes to preparing meals for the week ahead (which I usually do on Sundays) and adding more lean protein and vegetables to my meals.  Notice I said “ADD.”  The Lean Eating program is NOT a diet.  We don’t take anything away – rather, we ADD.  Things like lean protein. Veggies.  Eat slowly, pay attention to your food and stop when you’re 80% full.  Now, that’s going to show up differently day to day and even meal to meal.  That’s OK.

What does plant-based eating mean?  It means lots of fruits and veggies.  No animal products – meat, fowl, seafood, dairy, cheese are not part of it.  Protein comes from sources like quinoa or tempeh.  And so much more!

One of my favorite vegan cookbooks is The Mediterranean Vegan Kitchen, by Donna Klein.  I absolutely adore foods from the Mediterranean region already.  The recipes in this cookbook are vegan by design.  Meaning, they’ve always been that way.  There are no artificial meats or cheeses incorporated into the recipes.  Nothing wrong with them, however I just don’t like their textures and tastes personally from what I’ve tried.

Donna Klein explains how in many parts of the Mediterranean things like meat, seafood and butter are scarce and expensive.  Rare delicacies.  So, simply use what bounty there already is!  Actually, she explains it far better than the way I just wrote it.  But you get the idea.

The beauty of vegan cooking is that you can use many of the entrees as side dishes too.

Here are a couple of my favorites – first, Wild Mushrooms in Garlic Sauce.  This is great as an appetizer, side dish or small first course for 4-6 people:

  • 1 pound medium fresh wild or cremini mushrooms, washed and stemmed
  • 3 T extra virgin olive oil
  • 4 cloves garlic; 3 finely chopped, 1 whole
  • Juice of 1/2 lemon (about 1 1/2 T)
  • 1 T finely chopped fresh flat-leaf parsley
  • Salt and freshly ground black pepper to taste

Dry the mushrooms with paper towels.  In a large nonstick skillet, heat the olive oil over medium heat until hot but not sizzling.  Add the whole garlic clove and cook, stirring for one minute.  Add the mushrooms and cook, tossing and stirring constantly until lightly browned and barely soft, 4-5 minutes.  Do not allow mushrooms to release their own juices.

Remove from the heat and add the remaining garlic, lemon juice, parsley, salt and pepper; toss well to combine.  Transfer to a serving platter or individual plates and serve warm or at room temperature.

See how simple these ingredients are?  And it’s a simply delicious recipe!  So quick and easy!

And here’s one more…Persian Cucumber and Tomato Salad (serves 4):

  • 1 1/2 lbs ripe tomatoes, cored, seeded and chopped
  • 1 large cucumber, peeled, seeded and chopped
  • 1 large red onion, chopped
  • 1/2 C fresh mint leaves, finely chopped
  • 1/2 C fresh flat-leaf parsley, finely chopped
  • 1 bunch scallions, white and green parts, thinly sliced
  • 2 large cloves garlic, finely chopped
  • 3 T extra virgin olive oil
  • 2 T fresh lemon juice
  • 1 1/2 T fresh lime juice
  • Salt and freshly-ground black pepper to taste

Place all ingredients in a large bowl and toss well to combine.  Let stand for 15 minutes at room temperature to allow flavors to blend.  Toss again.

Serve at room temperature, or cover and chill at least 1 hour and serve chilled.

This recipe is also great with some black olive and chickpeas, stuffed in pita bread for a fantastic sandwich.

Anyway, I’m having a blast with this experiment…I think Paleo/Primal is up next for us in a few days, so I’ll see if re-introducing meats makes me feel any different.

When I first tried plant-based eating I was worried I’d miss eggs.  Eggs have become a staple for me, mostly as a light dinner when I get home from the gym. I scramble them in a little olive oil and toss in some diced red bell pepper, minced garlic and some fresh spinach.  Now I sauté up the veggies and serve with a small side of red or brown quinoa.

I also enjoy a little quinoa during the day with some chopped veggies I bring with me to work for lunch in a Tupperware.  I used to have some low-fat cottage cheese or plain nonfat Greek yogurt, but now it’s quinoa and/or a little hummus.  I’ve also tried rice but I find it gives me almost a type of sugar blast and crash, so I tend to avoid it.

What else is in my fridge these days?

  • Tomatoes
  • Onions
  • Potatoes
  • Fresh Spinach
  • Scallions (green onions)
  • Red Bell Pepper
  • Flat leaf parsley
  • Cilantro
  • Mushrooms
  • Hummus
  • Carrots
  • …and in the pantry I’ve stocked up on olives.

So far, so good! I feel great and full of energy!  Buon appetito!

Minus 20

26 Sunday Jan 2014

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…as in POUNDS LOST, not temperature – well, at least not in this part of the world thankfully!

Yep, I’m officially 20 pounds lighter this week.  That’s about 9.1kg.  Since last July I’ve been completely overhauling myself.  Changing nutrition (and, really, changing my relationship with food) and getting regular exercise.  Weight training.  Cardio.  Core/plank work.  Lunges and squats.  I’m pushing myself more and more with each workout.  I was a little scared to at first because I didn’t want to injure myself.  But I’m learning the balance between training slightly out of your comfort zone and pushing too hard risking injury.  And I’m learning I’m stronger than I ever thought I was!  I CAN DO THIS!

And I swear this will be the last ‘program’ I ever do.  I’m learning lifelong habits I can live with!  We even had a mini ‘test’ of sorts a few weeks ago where they did not indicate any workouts to do for an entire week.  Sure, it’s easy to follow along when you have your workout online each day, but what about when no one’s directing you?  That was a great week actually…I didn’t freak out and stayed on path with regular workouts on my own!  Hooray!

And I got a good shocker/reminder of what 20 pounds is.  I use 15 pound dumbbells for some of my arm presses and flys, but hadn’t picked up a 20 pound dumbbell.  So, one night in the weight room I did.  And I was shocked.  I held the weight in my hand and noticed how heavy it felt…how much it pulled down that side of my body.  That was weight I was carrying around 24/7 on my BODY!  Oh my God!

I’m on a roll and there’s no stopping me!

Nike’s got it Right: Just Do It

03 Sunday Nov 2013

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JDIEvery day in this Lean Eating for Women program I started back in late July, we get some reading material.  Nothing overwhelmingly long…just maybe 10-15 minutes to read through.  And the material is archived so we can always go back and re-read something if needed.  The timing on these works out great for my daily routine:  given my time zone I usually get “tomorrow’s” reading in the evening here.  So I can take a sneak peek at it…and then I re-read it again in more depth after I get home from work and the gym that next evening.  And so on.  I’m blocked from lots of external sites by design at work (it’s a secure IT environment) and taking the time to read small print on my phone during a lunch break doesn’t really work for me.  And I’ve yet to pull the trigger on some sort of tablet.  Hmmmm.

OH, by the way, it’s one of my absolute favorite days of the year.  The Sunday after the end of Daylight Savings Time.  YES.  One extra, gloriously blissful hour.  Yeah, I know when we ‘spring forward’ we have the benefit of longer evening daylight hours in the summer, but the price to pay is a steep one.  Setting our clocks ahead an hour makes me feel tired, cranky and like I’m constantly running late for a good week or so until I adjust.  So now…the bliss of extra time.  Time – one of our most precious commodities of all.

Now, back to these daily readings from PN!  One of them (thankfully) shattered some weird mind perception I’ve had about people who are experts in fitness and nutrition.  Those of Olympic athlete caliber…or someone like one of my trainers at the gym who is probably 10 years my senior and puts people half his age to shame at how fit he is.  His spinning class is jam-packed with a waiting list for a reason.  I can always tell when he’s teaching, because the gym parking lot is extra packed those nights!

For some reason I had it in my head that fitness gurus are ALWAYS without fail super jazzed about what they’re doing and their workouts.  Endorphins perhaps?  Just extra happy, positive people by nature?  Motivated by achieving their fitness goals and inspiring others to do the same?

Well, maybe some or most days, but some days, well, notsomuch as it turns out!!

How illuminating this was for me, this new realization!  OK, I think I get it – there are days I’m not really going to feel like working out for all sorts of reasons.  It’s easy to come up with lots of excuses.  I just figured that as I stayed with this program and did the workouts that I would feel happier because I’m getting regular exercise, seeing improvements in my strength and muscle tone and I’m now down nearly 15 lbs since late July!  YES!  That in itself should be motivating, right?  I even had a shocker a couple of weeks ago when I actually was looking forward to working out during the workday!  Meaning, during the workday I knew later that evening I’d be at the gym…and was excited about it!  WOW! And what the hell?

But now I know I’m not going to always feel that way.  Not even when I get in more peak condition, whatever that might look like.

The point of this lesson in PN is to just do it anyway if you don’t feel like it.  Action before motivation, everyone!!  Get a routine scheduled and get what you need to surround yourself with for success!  For example, before I go to bed at night on weeknights I make sure my gym clothes, shoes, iPod and my workout printout are all ready for me to grab on the dining room table on the way out the door when leaving for work.  I make sure I have my lunch and snacks in the front of the fridge and ready to throw into my lunch bag that morning as well.  Mornings are not my strong suit.  I need my clothes, shoes and jewelry all picked out and laid out the night before so I can just get dressed, put on some makeup and get going to work as quickly and mindlessly as possible.  I don’t have time to linger and my mind is just too fuzzy at that hour to make any sense.

And when I get to the gym after work, I have my list of exercises printed out and ready to take with me!  I make sure to watch the short video clips the night before to mentally ‘practice’ them.  Maybe that in itself provides some motivation for me to keep practicing the exercises.  Every time I do them I get a little better and a little stronger.  And improved muscle tone – yes!

So action first…then motivation.  Great stuff for those days I just won’t feel like working out.  Love it!

Turning a Mini Corner of Sorts

20 Sunday Oct 2013

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The last couple of weeks something has really clicked inside me…and the first time it happened it kind of freaked me out.

I was at work, having a really good day, and then smiled to myself and thought: “Wow!  After this I get to go work out!”  What the hell??  Did I REALLY just think that??  What’s going on here?

This was a teeny-weeny sign bubbling up in me that my new exercise habits are starting to gel.  I’m in the gym 5-6 nights a week (and trying to get active outside one night a week but it’s getting a little too cold and dark for that now, despite having virtually zero rain in a couple of weeks – how rare is THAT?).  And when I can’t work out after work, I miss it.  I’m getting more and more comfortable with the workouts provided in this Lean Eating for Women program I’m now about 3 months into – it’s a year-long program actually, and I can’t wait to learn what’s next as we’re only 1/4 of the way done!

Just in these last few months I’ve noticed changes.  I’m making exercise and planning  meals ahead of time a habit.  That still requires a lot of practice, but just like learning a dance step…it gets a little easier every time.  Don’t get me wrong – the workouts are challenging and continue to build upon themselves gradually.  A great combo of weight resistance training, core work and cardio.  When I’m done I FEEL GREAT.  Well, I’ll admit the first couple of weeks were brutal, but not in a really bad way.  I hadn’t done any regular weight training in years (hockey does NOT increase your upper body strength, at least not at the intermediate/novice level I played at for 9 years).

After the first few workouts in the gym I woke up so sore I couldn’t hardly get out of bed the next day (whoops, there ARE core muscles deep in my belly, ha ha).  But I stayed with the program and I didn’t give up.  I knew every time I went back to the gym I would practice the workouts yet again and gradually I’d get more comfortable with them.  Only to have them change right at that time…by design, I’m sure!  Never want those muscles to get too comfy…the constant change and gradual increasing of resistance (without compromising form) is the key.  Gotta love variety.  And I never feel like I’ve overworked a certain part of my body with any of these workouts.

Does exercise actually DECREASE appetite?  In my case, the answer is a shocking YES!  WOW. I’m down about 12 lbs and 11 inches (a combo of neck, shoulder girth, bust, hips measurements etc. all totaled up).  And I DO notice my clothes starting to fit and hang a little better, and I even had to adjust my bra straps because they were getting too loose and slipping off of my shoulders during the day!  Some button front shirts I’ve had for a few years had become too tight and gape-y in the bustline (ugh, so tacky)…and now are starting to fit like they used to!  I have a ton of clothes to sort through to get ready for a big purge and run to Goodwill, and I’m trying to restrain from buying a lot of new clothes right now because they may (I hope) become too big again in the near future.  Now, I have purchased a few new items to give my wardrobe a little boost (I love my cashmere sweaters but after 6-7 years some are starting to look a little worn).  Soooo, I’m sticking with knits wherever possible, as they will forgive through changing sizes (I hope).  A short-sleeved shell for work, a motorcycle-style zip front black jacket and some knit black pants.  OH and a pair of dark denim jeans with a little stretch that fit like a dream and are super flattering.

Know what else I’ve noticed, er…not noticed?  Far fewer (if any) PMS cravings! And less tenderness and bloat, if that makes any sense to my female readers in here.  In fact, when (ahem) Aunt Flo arrived this month (right on schedule and I count my blessings for that at age 46), I was a bit surprised!  I didn’t have any of the normal food cravings, breast tenderness, puffy/irritated feeling that gave me all the signals my period was right around the corner.  Rather, the only ‘symptoms’ I had were midcycle – a flu-like feeling – which thankfully didn’t trigger food cravings.  Is this all the benefit of regular exercise and/or working on improving nutrition?  If so, I’m starting to ‘get it’!

My posture is better and I’m feeling radiant inside.  I continue to gain more confidence in the weight room, navigating through the macho grunts and the regulars.  I can deal with the crowds Monday nights…and on Friday nights it can be pretty much a library it’s so empty!

An 80-something man is one of the regulars, and he walked by me one night while I was doing push ups and joked ‘ya gotta SMILE when you do those.’  HA HA HA.

Random Tuesday Ramblings

08 Tuesday Oct 2013

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Surprise!  It’s fivenineteen here rambling away on a Tuesday night, not Sunday afternoon!  One of my followers (who is a dear friend, check’s in the mail) teased me a little that it’s been awhile since I last posted!  Yikes, she’s right!

I had probably one of the most blissful weekends I’ve had in probably a year.  Just basking in the glow of a glorious sunny weekend in October (yes, even in Seattle), which is as rare as white tigers.

What a wonderful surprise last Friday to hear from J…typically we each just chill out separately on Friday nights as we’re pretty pooped from the workweek.  I go to the gym, come home, shower and cook a light dinner.  Wow, what a far cry from my hard partying college years…am I turning into ‘that person’ we all swore as 21-year-olds we’d NEVER be?  Yep, I guess so.  So for a very cool change of pace, he offered to come over and cook us dinner after I got home from the gym!  WOW!  Color me happy!

And what did he bring?  Boneless, skinless chicken breasts he’d been marinating all day, a sweet potato to make fries with, and some frozen peppers for a side dish!  I couldn’t believe it. I hadn’t ever even dropped a hint as to what I’d like to try eating, and he nailed it!  This is EXACTLY an example of a meal we would be encouraged to try in the Lean Eating for Women program I’m nearly 90 days into.  No meal plans, no calorie counting, no forbidden foods…rather, food can be plotted on a spectrum from Better to Worse.  And we’re encouraged to add things to our food, not take away.  As in adding more veggies and trying other alternate sources of carbs, for example.  Voila…here it was!  We peeled the sweet potato, sliced it up into French fry-shaped pieces, sprinkled some spices on top and baked until crispy!  And grilled the chicken and sautéed the pepper medley!  YUM!

On Saturday we headed over to an Oktoberfest party.  The consulting agency I was with prior to the one I’m currently with has a food palooza of sorts every year, and all of the staff cook incredible meals from scratch and serve up to their current and alum consultants!  One of the big advantages of working with a boutique agency for sure!  Normally it’s a summertime seafood theme, but this year they changed it up and did Oktoberfest. They had tons of brauts, streudel, salads, sauerkraut, handmade pretzels, mustards made from scratch, desserts and of course lots of beer for tasting in custom-made steins we got to take home as party favors!  Even some quinoa-stuffed mushrooms for a veggie/vegan option and a kale salad – I need these recipes!

Then we went home, changed our clothes and tackled more of my Garage.  Which is now the most organized room in my house thanks to J’s help.  Yes, the popcorn ceiling scraping continues in the master bedroom/vanity next week…after a major delay which is fodder for another post.  Most of my garage is below ground level and there are some problems with drainage….whenever it rains water seeps through small cracks in the concrete.  Lots of fun being at the bottom of a super steep hill.  J mixed up some concrete (we used a spoon I sacrificed and some plastic keg cups as you have to do it in small batches) and patched up a few of the cracks, after first drilling out the loose concrete where the leaks are coming from.  We’ve got more to do, but it’s a great start and has provided HUGE peace of mind for me…I’m worried about the water seepage and the damage it might be causing elsewhere.  We’ll check and see how it’s working and continue with the rest of the wall later.  This concrete mix is so powerful you can even use it under water!

Tough football weekend here…U of W Huskies lost a hard fight against Stanford, and the Seahawks’ 4-0 winning streak got snapped in Indianapolis last Sunday.  UGH.  The boys were playing the refs as well as their opponents much of each of these games, I swear!  The chitter chatter in the gym locker room tonight was still going strong!

And hockey season is underway…yes! Go Canucks!  A FULL length season this year with no Lockout!  I’m still enjoying my own personal hockey sabbatical, which could definitely become permanent but that’s OK – 9 years was a great run.

And I have other fitness goals now which have my full focus…and they’re working!

Equinox Weekend

22 Sunday Sep 2013

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Funny how I started poking around online for “Equinox pictures” and all of my search results pulled up the car!  Hadn’t even heard of it before!

Ahhhh, the Equinox.  One of those turning points in our calendar where summer slips away for good.  I do love fall and the changing rhythm of our seasons but I also get a little whiney when summer goes poof.

Know those great days where you feel like you’ve had a whole weekend in one day?  When you don’t really have any specific plans and the day just spontaneously unfolds into its own deliciousness?  That was yesterday – Saturday.  And today just feels like a fabulous bonus day.  A day for laundry.  Blogging.  Seahawks football. A workout and some grocery shopping and food prep for the week.  Yep, that’s about enough for one day.

Yesterday was filled with late summer sunshine and that crispy feeling in the air where you can just feel Fall is right around the corner.  J and I spent the day over in his neck of the woods.  We were planning to go to a concert which was a fundraiser to save one of the old theaters in town, but we both were craving time outdoors – we weren’t in the mood to sit indoors, as fun as it would have been and for a good cause.

So, we grabbed a late lunch at the Buzz Inn restaurant at Harvey Field in Snohomish.  Damn, what a glorious day it was!  Nothing like relaxing outdoors (in mid September) in the warm sunshine and just watching small planes take off and land.  Not a care or a thought in the world.  And there’s a skydiving center right there at the airport so every so often the sky would suddenly fill up with skydivers landing in the field.

tandem_smallNow, skydiving is probably not going on my Bucket List anytime soon, but it sure looks fun…and watching the skydivers float by, glide in and land was relaxing.  That probably sounds a little odd but it was.

Then we drove to the Stocker Farms farmers market to poke around.  So much amazing, bountiful fruits and veggies…and local honey!  I couldn’t resist and picked up a small jar.  Oh, and a cucumber too.

Hmmmm, I’m trying to get more adventurous with veggies and incorporating them more regularly into my meals.  There was so much beautiful squash, plums, apples and on and on at the farmers market – I just didn’t know where to begin.  I knew I needed a cucumber to chop up for my salads to bring to work, but beyond that my mind was blank.  Oh well, it’s a start! Eating more veggies is one of the things we’re practicing in the Lean Eating for Women program I’m about 7 weeks into.  On the subject of eating local, one of our program coaches quipped, “buying tomatoes flown in from Peru makes about as much sense as flying there to crap them out.”  Too funny…and point taken.  When I’m at the grocery store I’m going to pay more attention to where the food comes from!  And maybe start shopping at a farmers market for fruits and veggies!

I look outside today and it’s like someone turned off a light switch.  It’s grey, cloudy and starting to rain.  It’s days like this where I can close my eyes, smile and remember the warm, sunny days and wonderful summer memories.

So, How’s that Lean Eating Program Going?

12 Thursday Sep 2013

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A few people have asked me how things are going with the Lean Eating for Women program I started back in late July.  WOW!  I did this through the entire month of August and now all of a sudden it’s mid September!  YES!  I’m still doing this…I’m not giving up!  This is a year-long journey, and I am so happy to have tons of support all around me.  People like J, my family and my friends.  And a few co-workers who I trust to share what I’m doing.

Ironically, my work environment, the place I spend the most of my hours, is not conducive to this life changing journey of mine.  Work is an all-out Food Palooza every day.  I’ve probably blogged about this before.  Someone is always bringing in donuts or pastries and passing them around to everyone.  The DBAs in the cube farm near me love to bring in ice cream for themselves every week and since I sit near them they always offer me some too.  We’re always chatting about what we’re doing for lunch – who’s going out to lunch and where – or who volunteers to go pick up takeout Chinese.  People sometimes get offended when I politely decline the donuts they’re passing out.  That’s OK – that’s their stuff to deal with, not mine.

We even had an ice cream social at work this week as a nice thank you for all that we’ve been doing these past couple of months.  200 people descended on the large meeting room near our cafeteria and it was a make your own sundae set up with our Directors and VPs scooping up ice cream for us.  Fun!  I did have one scoop of chocolate ice cream and ate it slowly.  Interestingly enough, it didn’t taste that great.  Kind of metallic and yucky!

Now wait a second, why the heck am I blogging on a Thursday afternoon, you might be wondering?  Well, I woke up not feeling that great this morning with a slightly sore throat.  So I knew I didn’t have a lot of meetings today and just stayed at home and slept.  I am feeling a lot better now.  I probably slept with my mouth open and it got all dry and irritated!  Too funny.  What a relief!  I simply don’t have time to get sick!

Lean Eating is a habit-based coaching program.  Who wants to get overwhelmed having to learn everything they need to do all at once when starting something new, right?  That’s a guaranteed formula for failure.  Rather, this program has you start out small, just doing one or two things every day, repeating them.  And you track your progress on a private site to show whether or not you did your habits that particular day.  As time goes by, exercise programs are introduced, and now we’re just starting to practice some food-based habits.  Every habit builds upon the other one.  Get off track for a bit?  No problem…tomorrow is a clean slate!

We also are provided some reading material online every day and a short assignment to reflect on how you can apply the lesson content into your own life.  And, you track your progress online to show you’ve completed that day’s lesson.  If you get behind, it’s easy to catch up and see which ones you still need to do!  This was perfect for me, as I was in Kansas City in late July for Silpada National Conference right when the Lean Eating program kicked off so I missed the first few days of the program.  In retrospect that wasn’t a big deal at all, but I remember at the time I was a little worried as I had no idea what to expect!

The Precision Nutrition coaching team is very grounded.  Each of us in the program is assigned a coach, and there are online forums and private Facebook groups to hook up with to share ideas and ask questions.  My coach sends her group a short video message every week and we can book appointments with her to chat over the phone or Skype.  I would bet there isn’t one scenario they haven’t been through with the thousands of clients they’ve worked with!  So, no excuses!  Practice your habits, do your workouts and complete your assignments!  And it’s all with a sense of humor too – I don’t feel like I’m in a military boot camp at all!  And did I mention how easy it is?  Meaning, I just read what I’m supposed to do that day, do it and note online I completed it.  They include short videos showing how to do the exercises and I just print out the exercise list for that day and take it with me to the gym!

Getting exercise is becoming a habit with me again. I remember now how great I feel after a workout and how it helps me unwind mentally.  I’m at the gym 5 nights a week, I do something active outdoors once a week and have one day off.  I looked at my stats and I’ve been 93% compliant with getting my workouts done over the past two weeks!  YES!  High Five!  I feel great and have noticed some subtle changes in my muscle tone.  I’m down 7.5 lbs (3.4 kg) and can see the double chin slowly going away. Some of the exercises that were super hard at first are now getting slightly easier.  This has been a huge wakeup call for me.  I turned 46 in May and have never had a naturally thin, fit build.  After losing 35 lbs 10 years ago I gained about 60 lbs back!  This is not healthy!  So that’s why I’m doing this.  Regular exercise is essential for me to be the best me…YES!

I am a ‘peeker.’  I want to peek ahead and see what the program content will be toward the end.  I want to know exactly how we’ll shift into maintenance mode once the program wraps up next year. I want to know how to manage things like life that will conflict with the time I’ve budgeted to exercise every day. Hell, when I cook I like to open the oven door and peek at what’s cooking and inhale the aroma!  Peek peek peek!

Well, the Lean Eating website must have been designed with peekers like me in mind.  There is new content posted each day….and we can only peek ahead two days!  Ha ha!!  If you try to peek ahead further you’ll get redirected back to today’s info.  Well done, PN!