Day 27

The key to sustaining this lifestyle change is to adapt common and poor practices in my old life to the new.  One of these practices with some room for improvement is grocery shopping.  The activity of shopping itself is the easy part, the challenge is in the preparation.  In the past it was always a last minute list followed by a quick trip to the grocery store.   I am re-thinking my approach to this important part of the process.

Some key principles I would like to put in place in regards to acquiring food:

• We will always have fresh produce on hand | vegetables and fruit.
• We will purchase our produce in bulk | this saves money and forces us to create meals that include the healthier options | fruit usually offers a very easy and quick snack as well.
• We will utilize coupons and deals when available | this means clipping coupons as soon as we get them, or on the morning we design the weekly menu.
• We will continue to add healthy variety to our menu | as time passes we will most definitely come across some healthy cooking options/recipes that we really enjoy.
• We will continue to design the weekly menu to best prepare ourselves and diminish any guess work.
• I will continue to bring my own food from home | this saves money and combats any temptations to eat out or snack on some unplanned food.
• We will make the best effort to not throw out any food.

I am convinced that even though healthy food may cost more at the register when compared to less healthy options, healthy food is the better investment, yielding higher returns.  By eating healthy food, your body remains satisfied longer.  You feel better about your self.  Your body better utilizes the contents of the food, Etc.

Some of the healthier food options and decisions that I have been incorporating into my new lifestyle are as follows (I have included a comparison to how I may have approached them as the old me):

The New Me	The Old Me
Try to eat veggies with no less than 3 meals a day.	Ate veggies contained in soups, almost never ate fresh.
Maximize my protein intake as I am in the weight loss process.	Never focused on protein intake.
Take Omega-3 rich fish oil supplements every morning.	Omega what?
Mix milled flax seed into any number of different types of meals.	Flax who?
Splitting bulk food into serving sizes and placing them into Ziploc baggies, this happens the day the food is purchased.  So far, this has included: almonds, carrots, romaine leafs, yogurt (Tupperware), oatmeal power packs (serving of oatmeal, 2 tbsps. of milled flax, and 1 tbsp. of raw wheat bran.)  This makes the logging of the item easier in My Fitness Pal as well, no guess work.	Why split your food up when the chip bag has an opening your hand can fit into.
I have placed 3 quick access containers with transparent lids on the kitchen counter containing, raw wheat bran, milled flax seed, and whey protein powder mix.  My bottle of fish oil supplement also sits on the counter.  By having these contents in the open, I am continuously reminded that they serve an important role in my diet.	The pantry was my place to go, cheez-its, cold cereal, boxed dinners, etc.  No one food was of any importance.  The only thing that mattered was if it satisfied my immediate needs.
Eating as much fresh produce as possible.	An apple or two a week, maybe.
Eating more fish.	If it was convenient.
Limiting my red meat intake to less than 2 meals a week.	Red meat all the way! Give me bacon, ham, hamburgers!
Eating 3-4 sit down family dinners a week.	The dining room table was always covered with weekend project stuff, or mail to be sorted.  The sit down dinner happened maybe once or twice a month.
Drink 0.5 oz. of water for every pound of my body weight daily.	Maybe a glass or two of water everyday.  Drink milk, diet soda, the occasional full sugar 300 cal soda, chocolate milk, grape juice, orange juice, etc.
Chew gum in the interim, to satiate old habits until they are gone.	Didn't make a difference

The 30 Day Challenge | Week 4 Recap

Yep, it has been a good 4 weeks and the Doc wanted to remind me.

FOOD | 2 grocery stores, 1 Day

The wife and I got a Costco membership today.  We were a little overwhelmed when we set foot in the store, but immediately started seeing ways this was going to benefit our lives.  We also went shopping at Cub, we had over $50 dollars worth of coupons.

Here are my results for the day:

Food Log Entries:

Woke at 7:00, morning routine went well, Was going to get up at 6:00 but I got a call at 11:00 last night and didn't get back to sleep until 12:30.

7:30 - Egg Beaters, tomatoes, and toast for breakfast.

10:00 - Almonds and a cheese stick, heading off to the grocery store.

1:45 - Apple, 1/4 cup cottage cheese, almond milk, and all bran cereal.

3:30 - Experimenting with Whey protein powder and almond milk.

6:30 - Great dinner, fresh steamed broccoli with balsamic vinegar lemon juice and olive oil, small baked potato with Greek yogurt, a spinach salad with fresh red onions and tomatoes, and 4 oz of top sirloin tip steak on the grill.

I have really come to like hearty salads with some form of hot meat.

EXERCISE

No exercise recorded today.