What I Ate Wednesday - A Good Summer Day

Happy Thursday! I’ve been working to get back on track this week and it’s been going so well! I’ve stayed within my nutritional range all week so far and it hasn’t felt “hard”. It just took some extra focus and intentionality to make it happen!

I decided to take pictures of everything I ate again yesterday. This has been helping me stay accountable and also is nice for my future self to look back on when I need food ideas.

Breakfast: avocado toast, fried egg and peaches (the peaches actually went to my daughter)

After breakfast, we went to our local library for story time. It was a fun morning!

For lunch we had leftovers. I had steak bites and grilled green beans, which filled me up for quite a while!

I tried a new sparkling water this week because my usual was out of stock. I enjoyed it!

In the afternoon, I made myself an iced coffee and drank it as I plugged away at a little work.

For dinner, we had chicken sausages with a side of fresh cooked corn on the cob.

After dinner we went to a local campground. The kids went swimming with my husband, and I went for a walk.

After we got home, we all had Outshine popsicles. They were nice and refreshing and only 25 calories. (In case you notice, yes I painted my nails that afternoon, too.)

Before bed, I had a bunch of calories left and was also hungry so I made myself a couple slices of rye toast with peanut butter.

Also yes, it is summertime and I still have my Christmas lights up on the windows because I love how cozy it makes our home in the evenings. We call it our “evening ambiance”.

It was a good summer day! My total calories consumed for the day ended up around 1,420 calories.

Fresh Hair on a Busy Day

Yesterday was more busy than I would have liked it to be, but we were busy with all good things. We started our day off by dropping my oldest daughter off at a local church to record a podcast with some other kids and leaders. They talked about the VBS that just concluded at the church. God is using Piper is some pretty fun and amazing ways! I love watching her faith grow!

While Piper was at the church, I took Laney to a playground for a bit to play together. Right before it was time to pick Piper up, we grabbed Wendy’s. 

Eating fast food is something I’m trying not to do as much, but it should be the last fast food we eat all week. The food had to be fast during lunch yesterday because of the tight turnaround in our schedule. Piper had to eat on the way to our haircut appointments.

I got a fresh haircut, along with my daughters, and it felt so good to get a refresh! Laney got her hair cut for the first time and I swear she not only started looking like a big girl, but started acting like one, too. She did so well waiting for us all to be finished with our hair.

After our haircuts, I had to finish some house chores and then head off to work for the evening. My husband took over with the kids at home. He made dinner and hauled Piper to the basketball open gym, and took Laney to soccer practice. He’s such a great dad!

I worked until about 8:30 and got home around 9pm. Tuesday was a busy day but, I still stayed within my nutritional ranges and drank close to a gallon of water. I didn’t get a walk in, but I will make sure to do that today! 

Operation: get back on track is still in full swing!

What I Ate Monday: Getting Back on Track

Yesterday, I was on it! I set a goal to get back on track and I completed day one with much success!

Here’s what made it feel super successful to me:

• Drank a gallon of water
• Ate within my set nutritional range
• Went for a walk outside

It was successful for many other reasons, too. I had some good quiet time with God, spent a lot of good quality time with my family, and felt content and accomplished at the end of the day.

Here’s a little peak into everything I ate during my first day back on track.

Breakfast ended up being leftover grilled potatoes and green beans with a fried egg.

For lunch, my girls and I met up with my husband at Subway. We also shared some Timbits which aren’t pictured. I had 3.

In the afternoon, Piper’s friends asked her to go to their house and since Laney was feeling left out (since she was too little to go) I asked her what she wanted to do with me and she said, “bake cookies!”, and so we did! I had 2.

While we were at the farm stand earlier that day, we got some cherries and so I found myself snacking on a few before dinner.

Dinner was amazing! We had stuffed peppers and rice. I started out with just a half pepper but went back for the other half because I was still hungry.

My evening snack was a handful of “Spicy Queso Popcorners” with a side of cottage cheese for protein.

Overall, I ended up eating around 1,630 calories for the day. This felt like a win because I had a couple of treats and felt like I had balanced it all pretty well to make day one quite satisfying!

Starting Again

Hello, and happy Monday! Today I am working on getting back on track with eating within my nutrition range and drinking closer to a gallon of water each day. That hasn’t happened in well over a month, to be honest. So, I’m going to start back up!

My body has been feeling tired. I can feel I am carrying too much inflammation around, and a lot of that has to do with the way we have been eating. 

We also haven’t been as active as usual just because of our busy schedule. At night, we feel like resting will help but the lack of movement is part of the problem! 

So, we started committing to going on walks together each night again! It was a hot walk last night, but we did feel so much better after getting some movement in. Our girls enjoyed a bike ride while we were out, too!

It’s around 10am now and I have already eaten a balanced breakfast and drank 32 oz. of water. Today is the first day in over a month where the entire day is open. So, I have been catching up on laundry and connecting with my girls as we take the morning nice and slow at home.

This afternoon, the girls and I are going to meet with my husband for lunch and pick up some groceries for the week. Here’s the meal plan, which should help us to stay on track:

Monday: Stuffed Peppers

Tuesday: Egg Roll Bowls

Wednesday: Chicken Sausage + Veggies + Rice

Thursday: Burger Salads

Friday: Whole Wheat Spaghetti w/ Meat Sauce + Salads

After picking up some staples from the grocery store, I’m looking forward to going to the farm stand to pick out our vegetables for the week! We love to grab their fresh tomatoes (just until ours start to ripen), peppers and corn while they are in season!

My Body is Tired

It’s been a minute since I checked in. We have been busy! Some of our family was in town visiting and we did all of the fun staycation type things while they were in town.

This week, my girls are going to VBS in the mornings and we have been taking one of Piper’s friends with us. While they are at VBS, I am spending that time catching up on work!

We’ve been doing a lot of connecting with family and reconnecting with friends these past couple of weeks. It’s been great for my soul, but also tiring for my body. We have been on the go almost non-stop lately.

I am looking forward to not staying up as late in the coming weeks so my body can feel more refreshed. The way my body has been feeling also has something to do with the way I’ve been eating lately. My body is sluggish and not keeping up well with all of the things we are doing and want to do.

This afternoon has been my first chunk of unscheduled free time in weeks and I am so blessed by it! As this little bit of free time comes to an end (since I will be re-engaging with work this evening) I wanted to pop in with this little update. I hope to share more updates soon!

4th of July Weekend

I hope you had a wonderful 4th of July weekend! We sure did!

We went to a couple of picnics and watched fireworks, of course. Just the classic kind of celebrating over here. I love this season with small children. We know it doesn’t last long and so we’re cherishing every holiday and so much of this summer with them.

We also know that my husband and I are growing up right along with them, and so we carved out a day for just the two of us to get out and enjoy one another this weekend, too. We went out for bagels and s’mores lattes. It was a nice treat! Then we went to the lake to walk around and sit together.

The 4th of July picnics were fun and great, too! I made pinwheels as a dish to share and it went over well.

I’d love to say that now that the holiday is over, I am looking forward to getting back on track with eating well but I know there is a lot of “eating out” coming my way these next couple of weeks. 

My sister’s kids will be in town and so we will all be over at my moms house a whole lot, eating out as we go on adventures and just going with the flow most days. These next two weeks will be like a staycation of sorts when they are in town. It’s always a lot of fun and we’re looking forward to it but I also know the extra challenge it is going to be for my healthy eating goals.

I don’t want this to turn into an excuse to have a free-for-all with my eating so I am going to keep balance in mind best I can.

What I Ate Monday - Zoo Trip Edition

Monday morning started out the same way most of our summer mornings have started, with us letting the chickens out to free range in the back yard. 

It’s so peaceful and joyful to watch the chickens and kids run around the back yard together in the morning. These are the days!

Since the weather was warm and cloudy, I thought it would be a great day to walk around the Zoo. I drank a protein shake for breakfast and packed our lunches before heading out.

When we got to the Zoo, I renewed our membership and was thankful for the ability to do that and also for being in the season of life when we hold a Zoo membership for us and our young kids to enjoy.

First we rode the train, and then we walked around to look at all the animals. Our kids loved to see the chickens, even though we have some at home. They also loved seeing ducks, which is so funny because they were the wild ducks in the creek below the train bridge.

For lunch, I packed salami and cheese sandwiches, grapes and some vegetables for the girls.

We walked around the zoo some more after lunch, and the girls rode on the carousel before playing “fox and chicken” at the zoo playground. 

They have the best most comfy chairs at the zoo playground and so I took a moment to sink into one of those while they played and ran around.

We had a great day at the Zoo! Once we got home we had an afternoon snack and relaxed a bit in the air conditioning. 

When my husband got home, he grilled chicken sausage, potatoes, peppers with mushroom and onions on the Blackstone which tasted amazing for dinner!

After dinner, I plugged into work for a couple of hours from home. I was a little tired from our long day, but I was also super grateful to be able to work from home for a bit on top of all the things we did that day. It felt like the best of both worlds, and I know to cherish those moments.

After working for a few hours, I was hungry. I checked my nutrition tracker and I still had 540 calories before I hit my goal and so I made myself some “loaded nachos”. 

It wasn’t a healthy choice but it fit within my calorie range for the day and satisfied a craving. This is a real look into what I ate on Monday, when I was just going with the flow.