Beth's Getting Married Log

[bethcollins]

Thanks, Gatork!

Day SIX and back to the grind.

Breakfast (7:45): 2 hard boiled eggs with mayo, side of baby carrots, and a decaf iced americano with coconut milk. Not enough food, should have done three eggs and skipped a second veggie.

Lunch (12:30): Chocolate chili with red onions and half an avocado over a baby spinach. Again with lacking on the food amounts.

Snack: (3:00) Had too many macadamia nuts

Dinner (7:45): Middle Eastern hot plate - ground lamb, zucchini, Ras al Hanout seasoning, served over cauliflower rice pilaf and drizzled with Moroccan dipping sauce. (Yes, I'm a big fan of The Clothes Make the Girl.) 1/4 of a medium cantaloupe.

Did a better job today sticking with my three meals and no extra eating if not hungry.

I did not do a great job of sleeping Sunday night. I have a hard time following my week night rules on Sunday, and was up until past 10 and didn't shut the electronics down until bed time. I was tired and groggy during the day, but stayed away from the caffeine.

Other thoughts from today:

• The hot plate idea is genius. Yes, I did a lot of prep work this weekend, but I had a delicious dinner on the table with about ten minutes of effort tonight.
  
• I am super tired today. Not giving in to caffeine was tough, but happy to report I'm on finished day three.
  
• My skin is looking better and my stomach seems flatter. I don't care if it's just my imagine, I'll take it.
  
• Our scale has been broken for months, which I didn't care too much about. But I do want some measurable points from this W30, so I finally bought one tonight and weighed myself (I don't believe it's cheating as I'm not trying to see if I lost anything since day 1.) 133.4. Better late than never?
  
• Moroccan dipping sauce is pretty amazing.
  

[avocado]

that hot plate sounds so good! and i love The Clothes Make the Girl - pretty sure i could sustain myself entirely on her recipes.

[bethcollins]

@Avocado - I pretty much am sustaining us on her recipes! Actually looking forward to meal planning for next week this food is so good.

Day SEVEN and a very, very long night. Let's just say I had my first wedding-related stress meltdown and the dog had some problems in middle of the night. So I'm going on little sleep, puffy eyes, and lusting after caffeine but not giving in.

Breakfast (7:30): 3 hard boiled eggs with mayo and hot sauce, over spinach; side of pan roasted sweet potatoes drizzled with Moroccan dipping sauce, and a decaf coffee with coconut milk. Might actually have been too much food - I was really full. But I got hungry right around noon, so I guess it was the right amount?

Lunch (12:00): Thai hot plate (green beans, red peppers, chicken, sunshine sauced served over roasted spaghetti squash). Delicious and with the veggies it felt like I was getting to eat a ton of food.

Snack (4:00): Decaf americano with a little coconut milk; jerky.

Exercise (6:00): Finally got in a quick 20 minutes of push-ups, one leg squats, and sit ups. I was tired, but I need the stress relief of working out so I'm fitting it back into my schedule.

Dinner (7:45): Middle Eastern hot plate, again. Hot plates are the gifts that keep on giving.

Stuck mostly to just my meals. Helped that I was exhausted and too lazy to go scaveging during the day.

• I am super tired today. Not giving in to caffeine was tough, but happy to report I'm four days free!
  
• The quick WOD made me feel great, and having another hot plate to throw together in under 10 minutes was awesome.
  
• The fiance and I skipped a work event. If you knew us, you'd know this is a huge step for us in knowing when we need to say no and take some family time. It was sooo needed.
  

[bethcollins]

Day EIGHT, can't believe we're already done with the first week. Besides poor sleep (this has happened on all three of my W30s the second week) I'm feeling really great.

Breakfast (6:30): 3 hard boiled eggs with mayo and hot sauce, used baby carrots as a spoon to get in a veggie.

Snack (10:00): Realized I never ate the sweet potatoes with my breakfast, so ate those with a decaf cofee with coconut milk.

Lunch (12:00): Last of the Moroccan hot plate (cauliflower pilaf, ground lamb, zucchini, Ras al Hanout) and dipping sauce. I could drink the dipping sauce plain, I think. It will definitely be in frequent rotation.

Pre-WO Snack: One hard boiled egg with dollop of mayo and hot sauce.

Exercise (6:00): Three mile walk/hike with the puppy and a friend on some local trails. He's walking so much better now these trips are actually some decent exercise for the humans, too. We jogged with him for maybe 3/4 of a mile total.

Dinner (7:30): Chicken salad with peppers, tomato, cucumber, and creamy avocado dressing.

• Getting closer and closer to really just having three main meals. Today would have been fine had I not forgotten to eat half my breakfast in the morning.
  
• Looking forward to getting some good sleep in, soon I hope.
  
• I think I could do 50 Whole30s, maybe even a Whole365, and I would still want a glass of wine.
  
• My skin is looking a little sad, but I think it's lack of sleep combined with lack of water as I keep forgetting to bring my water bottle to work.
  
• I signed up for the daily emails and they are totally worth it.
  
• 
  

[Laura B]

Hi Beth! I love that you have bullet points in your logs for random thoughts. Mine just come out in a crazy pile of thoughts.

[gatork]

I definitely feel the same about the glass of wine :\

[megmac]

I had my first real craving last night (on day 26?! WTF???) and it was for...you guessed it...RED WINE!

[bethcollins]

Day NINE! Does anyone else feel this is the longest week ever? Not really related to the Whole 30, just in general, it feels never ending.

Breakfast (7:30): 3 hard boiled eggs with hot sauce, sweet potatoes, carrots dipped in avocado dressing. Decaf coffee with coconut milk.

Lunch: (12:30): Chocolate chili topped with 1/2 of an avocado, salad (okay, just lettuce) topped with avocado dressing.

PreWO (5:30): Jerky stick and baby carrots, few bits of guacamole.

Exercise (6:15): 13 minutes of jump rope, box jumps, and kettlebell swings.

Dinner: Mexican chicken (from ISWF) with guacamole, peppers, and jicama.

• Working out really feels good. I've always been a morning work-outter, but lately the evenings have been making more sense so I'm just going with it. It's getting done and I can feel the difference in my work-puppy-wedding stress levels.
  
• I'm also back on my Project 365 (taking a picture a day for a year). Lately I had been not making time. Funny how the Whole 30 makes you examine all areas of your life. I realized that the ten minutes I take for photography makes me happy and gives me a breather from the insanity going on right now and it's well worth it, if not necessary.
  
• I've not been doing great on sleep (not turning electronics off, not getting in bed by 9:45, etc), so I'm going to refocus tonight.
  

[Bucket]

I am on Day 5 and my body has not been feeling up for working out or strong during my workouts. I too am a morning workout person, but this week evenings have been making more sense. Hopefully I will get back into the swing of something consistent soon.

How is the chocolate chili? I am thinking of making that for next week.

[bethcollins]

I am on Day 5 and my body has not been feeling up for working out or strong during my workouts. I too am a morning workout person, but this week evenings have been making more sense. Hopefully I will get back into the swing of something consistent soon.

How is the chocolate chili? I am thinking of making that for next week.

I am on day 10 and working out nearly every day - not going hard every day, but I have the energy to do something at least! Hang in there and it will come!

The chocolate chili is pretty good. It's not my favorite chili, but it's super easy to make and I always make a double batch which turns out to be 12+ single meals.

[bethcollins]

Day TEN! I can't believe we're one third of the way done! It really does feel like it's flying by much more quickly than the first two I've done. Maybe that means I'm making overall progress and it's not such a shock to the system?

Breakfast (7:30): Two hardboiled eggs, hot sauce, scoop of guacamole. Pan roasted sweet potatoes. Decaf coffee with coconut milk. I brought three eggs, but was really full after two, so I stopped.

Lunch (12:00): Chocolate chili with a scoop of guacamole. Whoops... I ran out of veggies. I made it the whole week almost though with two servings of veggies with each meal.

Snack (4:30): Jerky stick.

Dinner (7:45): We went for Indian and I had a raw veggie plate with oil/vinegar/salt/pepper and a lamb dish.

• The weird side of my neck acne that had been popping up the last month or so is nearly gone.
  
• I am sleeping awesome now. For some reason changing my exercise to the evening and not getting up at 5am is really helping my routine. Whatever works!
  
• I'm not addicted to nuts. I just realized this today. The last two W30s I've eaten a lot of nuts and Lara bars. I think I've had one of each this time? It wasn't intentional, I'm just learning how to streamline meal planning, shopping, and cooking better and don't need to rely on them as much.
  
• I tried to eat clean at dinner, but I think something snuck in. I had a terrible stomach ache after and woke up almost feeling hung over - dry eyes and throat, headache, super thirsty. I'm guessing I (unintentially) off-roaded. Boo. I will do better asking more questions on our date tonight and will chalk it up to lesson learned.
  

[bethcollins]

I took the weekend and Monday off from logging everything I ate. Here's a few things I learned from non-logging:

• When I don't log I'm not driven to eat off plan, but I don't focus on three, filling meals 4 to 5 hours apart, which leads to:
  
• Mindless snacking and eating for reasons other than hunger (bored, stressed, etc), which leads to:
  
• More effort in making good food decisions and sticking to my plan (which I assume will eventually lead me away from good food choices).
  

{I should mention here that I off-roaded this weekend so I am no longer Whole 30ing. I'm totally okay with it, I made the decision before going to the event. I felt that I was missing out on the excitement of pre-wedding events and this is a once-in-a-lifetime time of my life. I had two glasses of wine and a few squares of dark chocolate. And then I got right back on W30 eating.}

Since I did end my Whole 30, I don't think I get to count this as Day Fourteen out of fairness to people who are still on the wagon. I'm going to swtich things up and start a countdown! 39 days til the big day. I hesistate to do this because it feels like I'm saying only 39 more days of eating clean and that's not what I mean at all. But I started this log to make sure I keep good clean eating and living a priority as things get crazier and crazier, so it makes sense to me. On to today's food:

• Breakfast (7:00): Chocolate chili, raw spinach, half avocado, decaf coffee with coconut milk.
  
• Lunch (11:00): Shrimp in stir fry sauce (the only thing I've ever made from The Clothes Make the Girl that I didn't care for), half an avocado, baby carrots.
  
• Snack (4:00): Baby carrots and a few slices Applegate Farms roast turkey
  
• Exercise (6:00): 3 mile jog/walk/hike around Discovery Park with friend and dog.
  
• Dinner (7:30): Ground lamb, cauliflower, zucchini, Sri Lankan Curry Sauce
  

[bethcollins]

38 days to go! And another day full of yummy clean food, but man was I snacky. Need to get that under control.

• Breakfast (6:45): Chocolate chili, half an avocado, decaf coffee with coconut milk (I'm almost two weeks caffeine free!)
  
• Lunch (11:15): Ground lamb, cauliflower, zucchini, Sri Lankan Curry sauce, half avocado
  
• Snack (2:30): LARA Bar (this was more that I needed to get out of the office, I should have just walked around the building)
  
• Snack (5:45): Jerky
  
• Dinner (6:45): Pork chop, salad with Italian dressing from Well Fed, sweet potatoes
  
• Snack (8:00): Small handful cashews and a few strawberries
  

I had my make-up and hair trial run for the wedding on Sunday afternoon, so I thought I'd throw on my dress and see the whole thing put together. The good clean eating is on to something, I'm definitely going to need a few alterations to take the dress in a bit.</p>

[Derval]

How exciting, I hope we're going to see pics of our paleo bride?

[Renee Kosowan]

This is going to be exciting to go through this with you as you prep for such a big awesome day!!

[bethcollins]

Yes, I'm happy share pictures after the wedding! (That would be in 37 days!)

So glad the week is almost over. In the past 13 months, I've taken a total of three vacation days and it's really. starting. to. wear. on. me.

Breakfast (7:30): Raw spinach with egg salad (three hard boiled eggs, mayo, hot sauce) and a decaf iced americano with coconut milk

Lunch (11:45): Work lunch at an Asian fusion restaurant. Lemongrass beef with extra veggies instead of rice. I'm sure there was some sub-par oil used and maybe a dash of sugar included. Baby carrots when I got back to my desk.

Snack (3:00): Decaf Americano

Snack (5:00): Jerky

Exercise (6:00): It's 90 degrees out (which is crazy hot in Seattle since no one was air conditioning), so I did 10 minutes of squats and push-ups and called it a day.

Dinner (7:00): Steak fajitas in butter lettuce wraps with peppers and onions, topped with avocado and hot sauce

Dessert (8:00): Two glasses of wine and a square of dark chocolate

• The next time I decide to celebrate the heat with wine, I hope I remember what it feels like to wake up at 2am and still be hot from the crazy heat, but also feel gross wine hang over. And then I'll drink water instead, I hope. (I am clearly making progress - I never used to feel like crap after two glasses of wine and now I'm thinking I might just be a one glass kind of girl. Not sure I'm happy or sad about this.)
  
• Eight hours of sleep fixes most problems. You'd think I wouldn't need to relearn this, oh, every week.
  

[bethcollins]

So, I fell off the logging wagon again. But this time I didn't fall off the good food wagon, so yay for me. Yesterday though I started to nibble on a few of my gray area foods (tortialla chips at a work lunch, glass of wine on a date with the fiance); instead of going where that path usually leads, I decided to carve out a few minutes to get back to my log. We're less than one month to go at this point and I absolutely need the solid sleep and energy that comes with eating clean right now. I don't get why planning a wedding is so exhausting, but I believe it now. Not to mention doing it at the same time as I'm wrapping up a year long client assignment. I'm traveling down to LA this weekend for my bridal shower on Saturday and my sister's baby shower on Sunday, so it's the perfect time to get back on here with some accountability.

Breakfast (7:15) - One can tuna mixed with homemade mayo and half of a red bell pepper - dropped the other half in the compost at work . Decaf coffee with coconut milk.

[bethcollins]

So I said I was going to start logging again, then the weekend went by in a complete blur and I barely had time to check email on my phone let alone get online. I guess that's the sign of a good weekend. What was not so good was that I veered way further than I had planned/wanted during my shower and my sister's baby shower. I'm not going to go through a run down because there's no real point, but suffice it to say I did not stop and ask myself what was worth it and what was not. I'm disappointed (and annoyed at the awesome acne I have today), but time to jump back on track. Even though I haven't remained completely compliant, having this log has really helped me keep the off roading to a day or two, which I'm going to consider progress!

Yesterday's food was an odd mix of what I found already cooked in the freezer and what I picked up at the store/restaurant:

Breakfast - Baked chicken thighs mixed with homemade mayo and a little hot sauce. Decaf coffee with coconut milk.

Snack - Decaf coffee with half and half (starving, no food on me, starbucks was out of bananas, so I tried to pick my best option)

Lunch - Baked chicken thighs topped with lots of guacamole and salsa. Small bowl of berries.

Snack - Jerky and a pickle.

Dinner - Salad of lettuce and tomatoes with a blackened salmon filet. I ordered the salad to-go and as such assumed dressing would be on the side. It wasn't and it was some sort of vinagrette.

[bethcollins]

I can't believe there are only 25 days to go! I'm definitely feeling the effects of not having been around this weekend to do my usual cook-up for the week. We have virtually on food in the fridge and I've gone through all the frozen cooked meat. I'm also sleeping terribly, which is all the more incentive to keep eating well. Yesterday's eats:

Breakfast - chocolate chili with guacamole and a regular (sbux was out of decaf when I went in) coffee with coconut milk.

Lunch - work lunch at a Mexican restauarant, carne asada and swapped the rice and beans for a side salad (which came drenched in ranch and had corn). I had a few corn chips with salsa.

Dinner - chocolate chili with guacamole

Snack - handful of cashews and two picklese

[bethcollins]

I'm going to make this short and sweet because yesterday wasn't pretty AT ALL. The stress of a wedding plus wrapping up a job got to me and instead of working it out or taking a nap, I went crazy on the appetizers at a post work function.

Breakfast - Chicken with guac and salsa, decaf with half and half (forgot my coconut milk)

Lunch - Thai shrimp soup

Dinner - two glasses of red wine and fancy bowling ally appetizers (fries, chicken skewers, an onion ring, ranch dip, etc)

Moving on to today. Going to get in a good solid week of W30 again. I think I've realized that any time I go off roading for a special occasion (last weekend's showers), I need to do a week of W30 eating to get my cravings back under control. I can't just jump back into normal life and expect to make good decisions. I need that foundation of how great I feel 4 or 5 days in.

[bethcollins]

Yesterday was an improvement, so I'll take it. Twenty two days to go and things are getting crazy. But not my food, for the most part.

Breakfast: I really, really wanted a starbucks breakfast sandwich, but instead I got my decaf and added coconut milk then went to the grocery store and picked up fresh guac, strawberries, and a pack of Applegate Farms turkey.

Lunch: Ground lamb with onions (the very last of my freezer stash of cooked meat) and a red bell pepper.

Snack: Jerky and a few too many cashews.

Dinner: Out for Mexican - had some chips and guac. Ordered beef mole and it came with a salad and sweet potatoes instead of rice and beans! Will definitely be going back to this place.

[Renee Kosowan]

Hi Beth,

I hate to break it to you but chips are not whole30 compliant.

[bethcollins]

Hi Renee - Thanks for the comment. If you read the beginning of my log, I am not doing a Whole 30, but using the log to manage my off roading during the stressful/exciting lead up to my wedding.