Oh Well For That!

New Diet Plan has already fizzled out. On Day 4 we had dinner at Los Cabos. Human failure at it's finest....

New Diet Plan

Both Aaron and I have noticed that as we get older, our weight fluctuates easier. We both are really bad about dining out. We LOVE Mexican food and eat at our fav Los Cabos Restaurant at least once a week or even twice a week. It is convenient, fast, and cheap. We are constant bad influences on each other; rarely does either one of us turn down a dinner date to Los Cabos.

So we started a new diet called The Four Day Diet by Dr. Ian Smith. Don’t let the title fool you or the book cover which says ‘thinner by Friday’. It isn’t exactly 4 days of eating healthy and bam you are done. It is 7 consecutive segments of 4 day dieting, where each 4 days you can incorporate a new food into your diet. We are currently on day 3 of the first segment. The foods we are currently eating are fruits, veggies, beans, and yogurt, no meat allowed on these first 4 days. These four days we are ‘detoxing’. The book instructs us to take 10 grams of psyllium husk, which is a potent fiber, the word potent had me nervous but so far the side effects have been quite minimal, actually frustrated that we aren’t experiencing the side effects, would like to know it is working.

Aaron is doing an amazing job of sticking exactly to the diet. I, on the other hand, have snuck in a few M&Ms, 2 chocolate kisses, and one tootsie roll. Sparse amounts but yet still cheating on the diet. Aaron and I did split a bag of Smart Balance light butter popcorn last night, another no-no. But really I don’t get bent out of shape or get hard on myself for those few slips here and there because overall we are eating FAR better than we have in awhile so that is a big improvement. Plus let’s be realistic, are we never going to eat that stuff again, highly unlikely so a little in moderation is being realistic.

So you ask how are we getting a fulfilling dinner with no meat? Last night we had asparagus in olive oil, brown rice, and black beans and it was very tasty and filling. I mixed my black beans into my rice and it was really good that way. You may look at the daily meal plan and think you will be starving considering what is allotted for one day, but the food is much more filling than the crap food we are use to eating. I’m much fuller between meals than I was before and we have yet to be starving. Aaron and I have both learned that we like arugula and baby spinach! Foods we’ve never considered before.

This morning we got excited because we found out Jimmy John’s is having $1 sandwiches tomorrow from 11-3. LOVE Jimmy Johns! I figured a BLT won’t hurt me too much until I looked up the nutritional page on Jimmy John’s website. YIKES! 630 cal, tons of sodium, high in carbs. So Aaron and I have decided we will have a veggie unwich (no bread/meat, basically veggies wrapped in lettuce). Who knows, I might actually like it! If anything, only out $1 to find out. Hopefully we continue the good work, we will still have our Los Cabos here and there but overall we are working towards a change and that feels good.

The joys of yard work... or not so much joyful. I'm not much of one who likes yard work, not that I've ever done it but figured I wouldn't like it. Aaron was a little more motivated than I was, which I was doing everything I can to act excited about it because I didn't want him to loose his drive. I want the yard work to be done but there is so much to do that it is somewhat overwhelming. There was one big thing that had to go first, this huge low lying ugly bush. Here is a picture of it:

It is gone now but we still have some work to be done to this spot before we can lay grass seed. This bush took us over 2 hours to cut out, I know it doesn't look like a monster but it was! I decided to plant some flowers, never really planted flowers before but figured I could handle it. They will be dead in a few weeks anyways, I'm really good at killing plants without trying to. But here they are full of life, hopefully I'm wrong and I will find that I have been gifted by my mother's green thumb. Both of my parents are great at yard work/planting, but somehow I didn't get that trait.

So the best part of the entire yard work weekend was the beautiful weather! Upper 60's/lower 70's, I couldn't help but just love everything that is green right now. Spring is definitely in the air!