Tag Archives: healthy living

Falling Off the Wagon: What to Do After a Diet Fail

I don’t remember which weight loss blog I read this on, but I’ll never forget the quote: “When you get a flat tire, you change it and keep driving; you don’t pop the other three tires”. Fabulous, right?

We all have times when we fall off the health wagon. Why did I eat that? Why did I eat ALL of that? Why did I stay up so late? Lifting sofa cushions to find the remote counts as exercise, right?

There are weeks when my butt is firmly seated in the health wagon and I’m buckled up and facing front. There are also weeks when I’m more like a little kid who’s hanging over the side trying to hit the wheel with a stick. I’m still in the wagon, but I’m being stupid. I reach a little too far and suddenly I’m eating dirt. (Low in calories, but not recommended. It tastes awful, even covered in chocolate… I mean broccoli.)

What do you do when you fall off the health wagon? You get back on. Make better choices starting now, but don’t beat yourself up about the ones you already made. If beating yourself up counted as exercise, I’d say “Knock yourself out!” But it’s not, and that was a great pun, wouldn’t you agree?

In ten years it won’t matter that you fell, it’ll matter that you didn’t stay down in the dirt. Is falling off the wagon frustrating? You bet. Painful? Sometimes. Embarrassing? Sure. But you still have three good tires. Each day is a new day and each morning you wake up on the wagon. And next time that little kid won’t lean out quite so far to hit the wheel with a stick. Perfection is not realistic, so we’re not aiming for perfect here, we’re aiming for not-stupid.

“My flesh and my heart may fail, but God is the strength of my heart and my portion forever.” Psalm 73:26

How have you handled a fall from the health wagon? What helps you get back on or stay on?

Posted by Katie Robles. Categories: Putting It All Together. Tags: aim for not stupid, diet fail, falling off the wagon, healthy living, humor, low calorie dirt, Weight loss. Leave a comment

Jul. ’14

Cook It At Home

My mom sent me a link to this cool video on the benefits of cooking the food you eat at home (as opposed to letting a corporation cook it for you). I hope you check it out HERE; it’s short and good.

Mom, you should have shown me this video when I was three and THEN cooked me homemade meals for twenty years straight; I might have grumbled less about all the vegetables. You got it backwards, but that’s okay: I’m truly appreciating it now! 😉

For the Turkey Curry recipe shown in this picture, click here.

Posted by Katie Robles. Categories: Putting It All Together. Tags: healthy living, homemade meals, maintaining a healthy weight, nutrition, turkey curry. 1 Comment

Jul. ’14

Inside Out Victory

High cholesterol runs in my family. It also runs high in me. I first got my levels checked eight years ago; the good (HDL) and the bad (LDL) cholesterol were both way high. I wish doctors would let the good and bad cholesterol cancel each other out, but they’re sticklers for things like scientific research, so every year we’ve had the “It’s too high, we should consider drugs” conversation.

I avoided drugs for the first five years by having children, because you can’t take cholesterol lowering medication while pregnant or breastfeeding. While I did NOT have children for the sole purpose of keeping my cholesterol high, I had four babies in less than six years, so I think I maxed out on that excuse. When my youngest was weaned, I had to make a decision.

I didn’t like the idea of drugs; I wanted to have a go at lowering my cholesterol with diet and exercise. Two years ago I started losing weight and my bad cholesterol went down about 20 points that first year. Still way too high. “But doctor,” I said, “It went down! Give me another year.” I just got my levels checked a few weeks ago and it went down 20 points again. I am now within ten points of “normal”! One more year of this healthy lifestyle stuff and I will be able to sit in my doctor’s office with an smug little smile that says, “I dare you to find anything wrong with me!”

But here’s the coolest part. (Sort of.)

My weight hasn’t changed at all this year. I weigh now what I weighed a year ago. (GASP! I know, I know, I’m not exactly happy about it either, but don’t give up on me until you finish the paragraph.) While this weight plateau is a bummer, the encouraging part is that I’ve been changing for the better on the inside this past year: I have visible muscles in my arms and legs, my clothes fit better than they did last year, and my blood vessels have less lipoproteins in them. The point is that I’m making progress. If your scale numbers haven’t changed, be encouraged that every healthy thing you do for your body (sleep, exercise, good food, and lots of water) ARE making a difference, whether you see the results yet or not.

I’m already looking forward to next year’s physical: victory is mine!

“It was not by their sword that they won the land,
nor did their arm bring them victory;
it was your right hand, your arm,
and the light of your face, for you loved them.” Psalm 44:3

Posted by Katie Robles. Categories: Putting It All Together. Tags: cholesterol, cholesterol lowering medication, healthy living, maintaining a healthy weight, Weight loss. 2 Comments

Jun. ’14

Happy Junesgiving!

Happy Junesgiving, everyone!

The sun is shining, the kids are sweating…must be time to bake a turkey! Last week I baked the turkey I bought on sale last fall and experimented with Zucchini Mushroom Stuffing. The result? Delicious! Celery and onion sauteed in butter makes ANYTHING you add to it taste good.

I used a classic Betty Crocker cookbook recipe for stuffing; I simply replaced the cubed white bread with quartered mushrooms and zucchini. I also used fresh thyme and sage instead of dried. You get a good amount of liquid from this stuffing, but the turkey seemed more moist than usual, so maybe there’s a connection there.

I encourage you to keep experimenting with your vegetables! Eggplant slices instead of noodles in lasagna, wraps wrapped in big green chard or lettuce leaves instead of a tortilla. Even little changes can make a big difference in the long run.

“You are free to eat from any tree in the garden” Genesis 2:16b

Posted by Katie Robles. Categories: SOUP: Water and Vegetables. Tags: healthy living, maintaining a healthy weight, SOUP: Water and Vegetables, turkey, Vegetable, Weight loss. Leave a comment

Jun. ’14

Why I Love Swimming At The YMCA

There are many excellent forms of exercise to choose from, but swimming laps is my favorite by far. Let me tell you why swimming at my local YMCA is so great.

1. No sweat! I like to hike, walk, bike, and so forth, but I don’t like to sweat. Ever. I avoid it whenever I can. When I swim, I feel cool and fresh the whole time. I’m going to invent a bike bubble that allows you to pedal down the street surrounded by cold water up to your waist.

2. Feel young and slender! I go to the Y mid-morning when the building is frequented by young moms and retirees. 95% of the young moms are on the elliptical machines or in the aerobics classes, which means that most days I can boast of having the sexiest body in the swimming pool!

3. Hope for the future! There are some days when the best body in the pool award goes to a swimmer in his or her seventies or eighties. While this is humbling, it proves to me that swimming is something I can keep doing for the rest of my life.

4. Full body workout! I love that I swim and then I’m done. Swimming laps works my arms, legs, heart, and lungs.

5. Safer snorkeling! On a planet that’s 70% water, swimming is a life saving skill and it doesn’t hurt to be good at it. After I’d been swimming for six months, my husband and I had the opportunity to snorkel in the ocean off the coast of Mexico. We were fighting waves and currents as we swam and I was so proud of being able to handle myself well in that water.

I realize that not everyone likes to swim. A good friend of mine came swimming with me once, but she didn’t like it. She likes to sweat. She likes to work each part of her body separately and feel the burn. She’s crazy.

If you don’t like your current exercise, try something new and find something you enjoy. Roller skating, biking, hiking, cross country skiing, zumba, kick boxing, square dancing…find a way to move your body and love it!

“What is mankind that you are mindful of them, human beings that you care for them?

You made them rulers over the works of your hands; the animals of the wild, the birds in the sky, and the fish in the sea, all that swim the paths of the seas.

Lord, our Lord, how majestic is your name in all the earth!” (excerpts from Psalm 8)

Posted by Katie Robles. Categories: SEX: Sleep and Exercise. Tags: exercise ideas, God, healthy living, humor, maintaining a healthy weight, Physical exercise, YMCA. 2 Comments

May. ’14

Weight Loss On Pinterest

If you’re looking for some extra motivation or creative ideas for weight loss, take a look at Pinterest. There are inspiring quotes, information on the benefits of vegetables, recipes for smoothies, cartoons about dieting, and work out ideas (depending on the time of day, I tend to skip those…just reading about all those planks and lunges makes me tired).

I’ve made a Pinterest board for Sex, Soup, and Two Fisted Eating where I’m gathering some of my favorite pins. Feel free to check it out HERE.

My favorite pin of the day is “I don’t need a personal trainer so much as I need someone to follow me around and slap unhealthy foods out of my hand.” Hee hee, gotta love it!

“The spirit is willing, but the flesh is weak.” Matthew 26:41

Posted by Katie Robles. Categories: Putting It All Together. Tags: Diet, healthy living, maintaining a healthy weight, Pinterest, Weight loss. 1 Comment

May. ’14

Cartoon: Perspective

Posted by Katie Robles. Categories: Cartoons. Tags: Diet, healthy living, humor, maintaining a healthy weight, Weight loss. 1 Comment

Apr. ’14

3 More 100 Calories Snacks

Geese keep flying north past my house, so in honor of Mother Goose…yadda yadda yadda, let’s get to the food!

1. The Creamy: 1/3 cup of cottage cheese, a teaspoon of jam, and some berries. To make cottage cheese, a chemical called rennin is added to milk and the proteins either clump together (curds) or stay liquid (whey). Since we’re eating our curds and whey, I call it the Little Miss Muffet.

2. The Crunchy: 1 Tablespoon of hummus and a plate full of vegetables. Disclaimer: to keep the calories to 100, there should only be 10 carrots on the plate, but it sure is prettier this way! I call it the Jack Sprat. “Jack Sprat could eat no fat, his wife could eat no lean…”

3. The Vegetative: A peck of (non) pickled peppers. Or about a dozen small sweet peppers if you’re counting. I call it the Peter Piper. Pick yourself a peck and happy munching!

Posted by Katie Robles. Categories: Interesting Tidbits, SOUP: Water and Vegetables. Tags: Calorie, curds and whey, Diet, Eating, food, Fruit and Vegetable, healthy living, humor, maintaining a healthy weight, Weight loss. 3 Comments

Apr. ’14

March Abness Results

I did it! 3100 crunches in 31 days! And the results are in: I lost 1 inch from my waist!

If you find it, let me know. Har har har. But isn’t that cool? For those of you who’ve been wondering (myself included) if that little bit of exercise you’re doing is making a difference: IT IS.

You know those Ab machine infomercials that show flabby tummies turning into six packs in 90 days, just 3 minutes a day? I’m beginning to suspect that ANY ab exercises for 3 minutes a day for three months will make a huge difference. It takes me about 3 minutes to do 100 crunches; that includes a few little breathers to let my ab muscles un-clench and the pain to subside.

Three minutes! That’s all it takes. I do them best while I watch TV. So, if you’re watching CSI, you do crunches until they find the body. Walking Dead? Crunch until a body finds them. Big Bang Theory? Crunch while Sheldon explains something, anything, to Penny. American Idol fan and want a real challenge? Crunch from when they say “Up next we announce the results of last week’s voting” and keep going until they actually tell you the results. I bet you could beat my 3100 in one show.