I'm In The 170's!! Woohoo!!

 Weighed in this morning at 179.8!! I couldn't be happier!! I have surpassed my lowest weight that I reached in 2015! I am now the lowest weight I have ever been as an adult! This is such an amazing milestone for me! My BMI is now 31.1 and I am at the lower end of the scale in the obese range. Once I hit a BMI of 30 I will then be considered overweight and no longer obese. When I hit that point, it will be the first time in my adult life I was not classified as obese. That milestone will be another amazing moment along my journey! 

By using an BMI calculator I should fall below an obese BMI once I hit around 174 pounds! That is just over 5 pounds to go to reach that goal! That just makes me thrilled!! Once I get to 145 pounds I will be at a normal weight and no longer overweight at all! My ultimate goal is to reach 142.2 which will bring me to a total weight loss of 130 pounds! As I drop more weight, if I am more comfortable being a little higher then that, I may choose to not go all the way to 142.2. I just can't imagine myself too skinny. LOL! But we shall see how I look and feel when the time comes! 

180.4 This Morning Woohoo!

Weighed in this morning at 180.4! Super excited about that. I am so close to the 170's!! I fully intend to not mess up this time around like I did 7 years ago. I will get to the 170's and it will be very soon! 

Exactly 7 Years Later & Here I Am Again!

I lost a lot of weight 7 years ago and weighed 182 pounds around April 20th of 2015. Here I am this year hitting 182 on April 11th! Kind of a weird coinsidence I would say! But I am soooo happy to be back here once again. I never made it past 180.3 which has been my lowest weight as an adult. I hit that weight in mid May of 2015. Then my weight started to go back up slowly over the last 7 years. 

Here are some picutres from April 2015. This was me all dressed up for a wedding. 

I am more determined then ever to lose more this time and keep it off. For the first time in my life I actually feel confident that I can get to my goal weight of 144 pounds which would be a healthy BMI for me. I am almost out of the obese range with my BMI. Just a little more weight to go. I am feeling good that the rest of my journey will go well! I just have to remember how fabulous I feel and not allow the weight to get away from me again!

Back To My Lowest Weight

Weighed in this morning and was back down to 181.4! Definately good news. Now to work on getting into the 170's! 

Had Fun This Weekend!

Happy Monday! I had a great time at my scrapbook retreat. Although I didn't end up doing any scrapbooking because I misplaced the drive all my scapbooking projects are on. So instead I built Legos. LOL! 

I weighed in this morning and was up to 182.6. Only a 1.4 pound gain over the 4 day weekend! I would call that a win! I hope to drop back down pretty quickly. Hopefully today I will get in a successful 22 hour fast in and we will then see how my weight does tomorrow. 

Scrapbook Retreat This Weekend!

After Easter I have finally fallen below my lowest weight of 182. I weighed in at 181.4 yesterday morning. I am so close to the 170's!! Yay!

I am hosting a scrapbook retreat this weekend and will try my best to stay on track but also allow myself to have a good time. I actually brought a couple of lunches with me, which is something I never do. LOL! So this is certainly a sign of my commitment. I did bring a few treats as well to keep me from the carb heavy snacks I provide my participants. I brought a couple of cups of popcorn, almonds, macadamia nuts and a few of my favorite See's candy as a special treat. I will consume all of this in moderation of course and hope to keep my carbs down below 30 grams each day. 

Low Carb Lasagna Casserole

I came up with this delicious version of Lasagna for us on Easter. I loved it! Yes, my kids missed the pasta BUT they did like it. So everyone did enjoy it. 

Low Carb Lasagna Casserole

Ingredients ~ 

2 Pounds 85% Lean Ground Beef

1 24oz Jar Of Marinara Sauce*

10 Oz (2.5 cups) Cheddar Cheese

10 Oz (2.5 cups) Whole Milk Mozzarella 

3/4  Cup Parmesean Cheese

1 16oz Bag Frozen Cauliflower

*Choose a marinara sauce that is 7 grams of carbs or less per serving. I chose a sauce that was 7 grams per 1/2 cups serving. 

Directions ~

Preheat oven to 350 degrees. Brown beef in a skillet. While beef cooks, cook cauliflower as directed until the cauliflower is just fork tender. 

Once beef is brown add your marinara sauce, bring to a boil and let simmer 5 minutes. 

Marinara I used.

In a 9x13 pan add the beef marinara mixture. Stir in 8 ounces of cheddar cheese and 8 oz of mozzarella into the marinara sauce. 

Then add 1/2 cup parmesean cheese making sure everything is mixed well. Once the cauliflower is cooked, drain well and pat dry with a paper towel, otherwise your lasagna will be watery. Add the cauliflower to the casserole dish and stir well. 

Top the casserole with the remaining cheese. 

Cover with aluminum foil and bake at 350 degrees for 20 minutes or until casserole is bubbling. Once done, remove the aluminum foil and bake another 5 minutes. 

Makes 11 - 1 cup servings

  

Headed In The Right Direction

 Woke up to 4" of very wet snow this monring. Not super thrilled with that! 

But I was glad to see I dropped down to 182.6! So I'm headed in the right direction. I did manage to fast last night and didn't eat until 11am this morning. I am sure that helped me get a jump start on getting back on track. My ketones have been good. I was in low GKI ketosis yesterday but back up to moderate today! 

I'm happy with my progress and hope to see the 170's soon! 

Easter Went Well

 We had a very nice quiet family Easter at home yesterday. After losing 90 pounds I decided to allow myself 150 carbs yesterday. The smaller I get the more I want to try to learn to allow myself to enjoy the holidays, with guidelines to help me not over do it. I also am considering allowing myself a 150 carb day everytime I lose another 10 pounds. I'm small enough now that I think it would be a nice break for me and allow me to enjoy some foods that I have completely stayed away from over the last 7 months. We have this great Thai restaurant in town that I would love to visit sometime this summer. But my favorite dish there is their fried rice! So that would be a great time for me to be able to eat a delicious meal there. It would be nice to think that I could enjoy eating there once or twice a year. 

I did well yesterday and ended the day at 132 carbs. I was proud of myself for not purposely over induldging just because I had 18 carbs left. I also made it a point not to eat after 7pm so I could fast for 16 hours from last night until this morning. Mondays are typically my longer fast day, so my hope is I will be able to fast tonight through tomorrow for at least 22 hours and then I can see how that effects my ketones and my weight tomorrow. 

I weighed in at 184.4 this morning. I was expecting to be up, so I'm not surpised by this at all. I expected a spike from yesterday. Today I will get back on track and work to getting into the 170's! Hopefully sooner then later. Fingers crossed! 

Happy Easter!

Hit My 90 Pound Milestone Today!!

 I am so excited to share that I hit my 90 pound milestone today! I am officially 90.2 pounds lighter since I started this journey a year and 5 months ago! Wow!! So amazing and such a fantatsic feeling! 100 pounds here I come! Woohoo! 

Dropped Back Down! Phew!

 I was very pleased to see I dropped down yesterday morning to 182.4!! Just .2 pounds away from my 90 pound milestone! I couldn't have asked for better. Monday is my designated fast day. If I am not hungry at dinner I continue to fast until 11am  the next morning. Apparently that kicked my body back to where it should be. 

I choose Mondays because we do a lot of running around with the kids for Tae Kwon Do after work and we usually just stop and have a quick bite to eat. So if I'm not hungry, I just get a drink and hang out while my family eats. So far it has proven to be a good day to do a longer fast. It gives me at least one day a week where I am doing about a 22 hour fast opposed to my 16 hour daily fast I usually do. I find it really does help with the weight loss. I like to do a longer fast at least once a week, but sometimes can do twice a week if I am not hungry at dinner. I generally will not do more then 2 days of longer fasting a week. 

The big thing with Keto is it makes fasting much easier. The big rule is eat when you are hungry. It's important to eat if you are hungry and not skip a meal if you are. So I make sure I am not hungry if I am going to do it. Sometimes it's hard to know if you are just mentally hungry or physically hungry and that is something I consider when making the decision to fast. If you just take a moment and evaulate how you feel, you can usually figure it out. But if you are not sure, eat! 

I am super happy with how things are going right now! I went to the movies last night and was planning to have popcorn but decided the carbs were not worth it! I am going out at the end of April with a friend to the movies and I will have it then. I am just too close to the 170's to want to mess up my progress! 

I did weigh myself this morning and I was still at 182.4 which is great considering I ate out at all 3 meals yesterday! 

Had A Bit Of A Jump Up!

 I had a bit of a jump up this morning to 184.6. I am hoping this is very temporary and will drop back down quickly. Not sure what caused it. I did weigh in about an hour earlier then usual. So who knows. But I wanted to at least document it here in case I begin to see a pattern again. Fingers crossed I will not!

I'm Getting There!

 Dropped another .6 pounds this morning and am now down to 183.2! Only 1 pound to go to hit my 90 pound mark. Sorry if I sound like a broken record, but at least it is a good broken record. LOL! 

I took my son to a Tae Kwon Do Learning Tournament yesterday. My daughter was supposed to go too but she was sick. We were there for about 3.5 hours.

They had all kinds of snacks and food to munch on but I brought my lunch with me. Not really something I do a whole lot when I go out for the day. So I was proud of myself. Had my Bentgo box filled with lots of Keto friendly foods so I wouldn't have to worry about having a good lunch handy! 

 My son, my daughter and myself are all black belts. I have taken a break from it for the last few months but hope to restart on May 1st! I am pretty sure I'm going to have to order a brand new uniform as mine will be far too big! Here is a picture of my son at the end of the tournament. 

End Of Week Results After Making Changes

 It has now been a week since I implemented the changes to my diet and have avoided certain foods including nuts, yogurt & popcorn. I was down again this morning to 183.8!! I weighed in at just above 191 last Saturday. So I am down over 7 pounds for the week. I do realize some of this was water loss, but my weight has consistantly been going down an average of .4 to .6 pounds per day after I dropped the first few pounds. This is consistant with what I was losing before! And actually a little bit higher as my average loss per week was usally 2.5 pounds. I have added regular exercise to my plan to battle getting my HDL back up and I am hoping that this is contributing to my extra weight loss as well. 

Either way, if I can get back to losing an average of 10 pounds a month I will be siked! I am just 1.6 pounds away from my 90 pound milestone and 11.6 pounds from my 100 pound milestone so I am super motivated. Not to mention I feel fantastic! 

Easter is coming up next weekend. This is a busy week for me at work. My plan is to stick to what I am doing until next weekend and then give myself a couple of days to enjoy Easter weekend! I will probably allow myself around 50 carbs per day. No yogurt or nuts though! 

My Bentgo boxes have really been great and an easy option for me at work. Everything is premeasured and I make it a point to keep the total calories of the box to equal between 500 - 700 calories and that is all I eat while at work. 

All in all it's been a great week! I'm really glad I figured out how to kick my out of that plateau. Now to keep moving in the right direction and stay focused! 

The Scale Keeps Dropping!

 Down another .6 this morning! Woohoo! I'm loving these results so far! 

Chicken Enchilada Casserole Keto Style!

 I have been having a major craving for enchilada's so I came up with this enchilada casserole that the whole family loved! I'm sorry that their isn't pictures of the casserole after it baked. Being a mom I get very focused on getting dinner on the table and I forget to take enough pictures for the blog. LOL!

Chicken Enchilada Casserole Keto Style ~ 

Ingredients ~ 

2.5 Pounds Of Cooked Chicken Thigh Meat

1 8oz Container of Cream Cheese

12 Oz Cheddar Cheese

10 Ounce Can Enchilada Sauce

4.5 Ounce Can Green Chilis

1 Pound Bag Frozen Cauliflower

Sour Cream (optional)

Salsa (optional)

Instructions ~ 

Preheat your oven to 375 degrees. Before getting your casserole ingredients ready, cook your frozen cauliflower as directed on the package. If you haven't cooked your chicken thighs, you will want to cook them now and wait to cook your cauliflower once the chicken is done. The caulaflower can be cooking while you are shredding your chicken. I cook my chicken in the slow cook all day in the crock pot. I just add a little salt and pepper. You can also add taco seasoning if you wish. I find this is the easiest way to cook the chicken so I don't have to cook it when I get home. It also comes off the bone super easy when slow cooked. 

Once cooked shred your chicken and place it in a casserole dish. Cut your cream cheese into cubes so it will melt better. Add your cream cheese into the hot chicken. Mix well. Then add 8 ounces of your cheddar cheese to the chicken mixture. Once stirred in well, add your green chilis and enchilada sauce to the mix. Last add the cooked cauliflower. Mix the ingredients of the casserole well. Take the remaining 4 ounces of cheese and sprinkle on top of the casserole. Bake in a 375 degree oven for 15 minutes. Serve and garnish with sour cream & salsa. 

Makes 11- 1 cup Servings

The Positive Results Continue!

 I was down again this morning! Down another .4 pounds from yesterday at 184.8. So I continue to head in the right direction. I couldn't be happier about making the change I did. I'm just glad I figured out what the problem was! I am looking forward to what the rest of this week will bring! 

Down Again!

 I was so excited that I dropped more this morning! Down to 185.2! Woohoo! I am so excited to see my weight loss moving like it had before my plateau! I am just 3 pounds from hitting my 90 pound milestone! 

The lowest weight I have been as an adult was 180.3. I hit that weight on May 1, 2015. That was the last time I got under 200 pounds! I was so close to the 170's but I never made it. This time I am determined to get there! 

Broke Through My Plateau!!

 I was able to fast last night with no problem. It definately paid off! I was down to 185.8 this morning!! My lowest weight over the last month was 187.6. So I smoked my lowest weight this morning and that was just after 3 days of eliminating certain foods from my diet! 

I'm so excited and happy that these changes worked! Hopefully the weight will continue to fall off again like it was. As long as I'm trying to lose, I will stay away from the foods I eliminated and only have them as once and awhile treats! It is quite fascinating to me that these foods could halt my weight loss the way they did. They pretty much put me at a stand still! 

I have managed to lose less then 4 pounds over the last 2 months! I weighed 191.6 on 2/12/22. Went for almost a month and finally dropped to 187.6 on 3/10/22. That was 4 pounds in a month. And I think the only reason I dropped was because I was sick and didn't eat much. My weight has done nothing but go up and down for almost two months. So I knew something had to change. 

I can understand if I don't lose as quickly as before as I am getting smaller. It is just the constant yo yoing that was driving me crazy.  So hopefully my weight will start stabalizing and continue to go in the right direction. If I do begin to drop the weight like I was before, an average of 10 pounds a month, I would be stoked and this girl would definately not complain! Stay tuned!

 

Liking What I See & How I Feel

 It's only been a few days but I'm already feeling a difference in my hunger and cravings. I did splurge on Friday and had some extra carbs with the items I was giving up so I could enjoy them in case I have to give them up for awhile! So when I weighed in on Saturday I was at around 191. Sunday I was at 188.9 and this morning I was at 188.4. So at least I am headed in the right direction. Hopefully that trend will continue! 

I feel good about these changes and the fact I am less hungry and am not having as much cravings is surely a good sign! I hope to possibly fast tonight as long as I am not hungry. Then we will see how that goes with the changes I made. Usually I have a decent drop when I do that. So we shall see!

I'm totally determined. So game on!

 

Bentgo Boxes Are Great For Keto!

 I recently decided to buy a few Bentgo lunch boxes as I had some reward points I had to use up with Kohls and Amazon. I thought it may work well with Keto as I tend to have several different foods throughout the day rather then just one dish. Keeps up the variety! I like that it makes everything easy to proportion. 

The two adult boxes I bought were great but held a lot of food. So I decided those boxes would work great for salads and foods with more volume. After receiving the two adult boxes I looked around and decided the kids boxes would work better, as they are smaller and holds just the right amount of food for me. The best part was, I could pick out cute patterns with the kids boxes. LOL. Why not make it fun, right?

I also bought the lunch bag that can carry up to two boxes at a time making it easy to take the Bentgo boxes to work. I started with 2 boxes last week and got the 2 kid boxes yesterday. I got them all packed up and ready to go for the week this afternoon. I also ordered 2 more kids boxes as I really like the size. This time with zoo amimals. :) So hopefully I will get those by Wednesday. That way I will have 6. One for almost everyday of the week! 

I would highly recommend containers, like Bentgo boxes, that allow you to create proportioned servings ahead of time for your weekly lunches. You know exactly how much you are eating. It will be yet another great tool you can use on your weight loss journey! 

To find Bentgo boxes simply go to Amazon and search Bentgo Box and a whole list will pop up for you!

Getting Back On Track & Making Discoveries

 Yesterday was my first day of eliminating certain foods from my diet and, for the most part, the day went well. But I also realized that I have changed how I've been eating over the last couple of months. More then I really took the time to realize. I always had a bad habit of eating as soon as I got home from work before Keto. I always had the urge to snack. That pretty much went away for awhile, while on Keto, but I started doing that again within the last month or two. Yesterday, when I got home, I had that urge and it really made me stop and think. I realized I had been doing that again for awhile and it definately makes me think that it has a direct connection to the type of foods I have added to my diet in the past couple of months. 

I've also been more apt lately to reach for nuts at work and nibble on things here and there which I was really good about not doing for most of my time on Keto! I also found that I have thoughts of the foods I'm giving up and wanting to snack on them. To me, it's clear the foods I am eliminating are having a negative impact on me losing any more weight and causing me to have unwanted cravings. I think I can go back to eating them again once I reach my goal, but if I want to continue to lose, I need keep those foods at a minimum and make them once and awhile treats and not everyday occurances. That's what I do with chocolate, so I can certianly do that with nuts, popcorn and dairy (outside of cheese). 

Let's hope that these changes help kick me out of this plateau. Fingers crossed they will! 

Tips For Getting Through A Keto Plateau

 My plateau continues! I decided to do a little research yesterday to get some ideas of what I can do to get myself out of this plateau. I can't seem to get below 188! And I won't lie, it's getting more then a little frustrating at this point. 

I found this great article on things that could be causing the plateau and what to do about it. 

Keto Plateau: Tips to Break A Weight Loss Stall

There was really one thing that stood out from this article that applies to my situation. I need to eliminate a few foods from my diet. The one thing I have gotten into eating more is yogurt and nuts. Which are specifially mentioned as foods that might need to be eliminated from the diet. My yogurt increase started about the beginning of March and I have been eating a lot more nuts lately. I also feel I need to eliminate a couple of other foods that I have eatin more of lately to insure I can get some results. 

Starting tomorrow my plan is to eliminate nuts, any dairy aside from cheese and heavy cream, popcorn and sugar free jello. These are the items that I have added back into my diet recently and have eatin on a regular basis. Funny thing is, the yogurt coinsides to when I started this plateau. 

I am also going to be more deligent about my 16 hour fasting. Making sure I don't eat after 7pm at night and not before 11am in the morning. I've been a little more laxed about keeping that consistant lately. 

I will do this new plan for two weeks straight before I give any judgement on whether it is working or not to insure I am giving my body time to adjust and get back on track. I think this will be a very interesting experiment. Because if these foods are causing this plateau, that would just be amazing to me that something like this can halt weight loss! Super fasinating in my book! 

So stay tuned as I try to kick myself out of this pleatau!