Am I looking Any Thinner Then ...... ?

"Am I looking any thinner then? "  Suky seems to be asking in this cute photo taken yesterday.

She's been going to doggy 'Tubby Club' for the last six weeks, although I keep slipping up and calling if Fat Club!!

  With three fortnightly visits under her belt she has now dropped down from 12.1kg to 11.3 kg, not a bad rate at all and the veterinary nurse who runs the class at the vets surgery is really pleased with her.  She's been photographed for her 'before' pictures and she gets measured each time we go, this week she has gone down a total of three centimetres, two from her chest and one from her neck.

The best thing is she is most definitely more sprightly, which is lovely to see.

She'll never be a skinny Pug but we're hoping she will get down to around 8 kg and will feel a whole lot healthier .

Her mum was not a dainty Pug and has the same large shoulders as Suky, but she was definitely a bit smaller and lighter than Suky is at the moment.  This photo is of Suky, me and her mum ... Lady Midnight Star (Suky's full name is Suky Midnight Star after her mum).  Her dad is called Ken, Kenmilleven Graphite, unfortunately I can't find the picture I had of him, but he was a lovely black Pug.

She will never be as tiny as she once was ...

... but I'd like to get her back to this, which was taken two years ago.

But for the moment we are tackling this slowly and surely, and hopefully over the course of the next six months should be able to get her weight down to where we want it to be and more importantly give her back a whole new zest for life.

Now to deal with me and my weight .... I think I need to get back to doing Weight-loss Monday !!

Sue xx

I Don't Believe in Calories ...

I don't believe in calories .... 

..... a strong statement that no doubt caught a lot of folks attention, but what I am really saying is that I don't watch calories, never have, never will.  I've lost weight on a few diets, sometimes dramatically sometimes slowly and surely ... but I have never counted a calorie in my life.

And I don't ever intend to, although all through June I want to lose a stone in weight, fourteen pounds that I want to see the back of once and for all.

I started slowly losing weight a few weeks ago using the label on this blog of 'Weight-loss Monday' which I intend to pick up the reigns of once more this month.  Monitoring my weight week by week I went down from 13st 2lbs to 12st 10lbs, which was good as a couple of weeks before this official start I was actually 13st 8lbs.  However, I've really taken my eye of the ball this past couple of weeks and Jason really didn't help making this tray of Caramel Shortbread while he was here last week ....and leaving the whole tray behind when he went home to start on his healthy eating and fitness plan.  Talk about sabotage!!

The thing is in my opinion, and what I have really found is that you can eat anything, yes anything if you eat real food and only eat when you are hungry, and it's wise to check that you are actually hungry and not just thirsty, the body can confuse the two so easily.

And when you do eat, remember that your stomach is the size of your fist and only eat that amount of nutrient dense foods.  That much food eaten slowly and purposefully with a drink is as much as you need to fuel your body.

This is exactly what I intend to do for the next four weeks, and what I'm going to do is cut out the sugary foods, so no more caramel shortbread (the chickens have just eaten the last of it for me), I will have no processed foods and eat simply and only when I'm hungry, and lets see what weight I end up at the end of the month by doing just this.  

And as for calories ... nope, I still don't believe in them, counting them that is!!

Sue xx

Both Winning

I mentioned on my Blog post the other day that Simon, my eldest son was taking a truck to the Carlisle Truck Show on Sunday along with some of his work buddies.

Well guess what ......

... he came FIRST, and one of his mates came second!!

All that primping and cleaning and making sure the trucks were at their very best was worth it.

Well done Simon.

Another winner on Weight-loss Monday was me ..... I know I'm a day late again!!  

Going down, but nowhere near enough to see me at 12st by my birthday, oh well I'm doing my best. But one more pound gone this week, so I'm happy.

Sue xx

A Cake and a Half

We worked really hard this weekend, in amongst doggy walks, ordering materials for the front splay work and house cleaning we moved around 50 wheelbarrow loads of chippings, weeded and replenished the front flower beds, chopped wood, tidied the driveway ready for this weeks deliveries, unearthed and cleaned out the little Broody House so we are ready for the new chicks arrival and planted lots of seeds in the polytunnel.

So I thought we deserved a treat.

I had bought a punnet of strawberries, they were Spanish but they looked good and I was tempted.  It's not long now until good old British strawberries hit the shops and the raised beds, but spying these in the shop made me succumb  :-)

After seeing Lovely Hubby drooling over a black forest gateau in Debenhams cafe, when we called in for a coffee to thaw out our hands, after a long freezing cold doggy walk along the prom in Llandudno first thing in the morning, I decided to oomph up the strawberries and cream a little bit.

So with it being Easter and chocolate just having to be brought into the occasion somehow, I whipped up a quick chocolate sponge cake and layered everything up and up and up.  It's looks luscious doesn't it .... but I can hear you saying greedy sods, such a whopping cake for two people.

But looks can be deceiving, spin the plate round and my secret is revealed.

It's not a cake and a half .... it's half a cake !!

Weight-loss Monday

Yes, I know it's Tuesday but after this super busy weekend my body is telling me it's Friday so to get here on Tuesday for weight-loss Monday is pretty good ;-)

Somehow after helping eat some of the cake I am blessed to be able to reveal this weeks weight loss.

  Just lb ... but hey ho, to lose a whole pound since last week after scoffing chocolate cake, strawberries and cream is a minor miracle.  I'm happy.

Sue xx

Successes and Failures

My new favourite gorgeously tasting snack of choice at the moment is one of Deliciously Ella's Raw Brownies.  I admit to being sceptical the first time I made these but my worries were obliterated the first time I bit into one.

The recipe is on her blog HERE and of course is also in the book.

You can also watching Ella making them HERE.

I tried adding some different dates to the Medjool dates, just as a trial to see if you really do need to splash out on the Medjool variety which are usually the most expensive.  This pack of chopped dates made into block form works out as the cheapest way to buy dates and I got this one from T*sco.  

 In my honest opinion if you don't mind adding more of your liquid sweetening agent these work almost as well, but for richness of flavour I think I will move back to all Medjool dates in future.  As I only eat one of these brownies at a time .... and if I can hide them a bit from Lovely Hubby who thinks nothing of polishing off three at once .... one batch of the brownies actually last me well over a week, so the additional cost is really neither here or there.

The brownies are just the job when the urge for a chocolatey rich treat is too much to resist, and are a good filler with a cup of coffee if you get a rumbly tum between meals.

Another success, tried for the first time this week, was a salmon fillet, topped with Garlic and Herb Philadelphia ...

... flipped over wrapped in puff pastry (so the seam is underneath as it cooks), brushed with beaten egg and cooked for thirty minutes.

This is what comes of using up things found at the bottom of the freezer.  I found a large tub full of salmon fillets the other day, obviously bought when they were on offer and individually wrapped and boxed as is my way.  The frozen puff pastry was lurking under the bags of veg in the chest freezer (as were three more packs of shortcrust pastry ... all ready rolled too ... obviously another of my bargain buys).

The only thing is ... I forgot to take a photo of the finished dish ... we ate the flaky pillows of deliciousness with a leafy green salad.  Something I'll definitely be making again.

I did however take a photo of this weeks 'failure'.

There should be nothing wrong with it, these were also found in the freezer ... a bargain pack of raviolis stuffed with cheese and herbs and served with a jar of homemade sauce, topped with Parmesan style grated cheese. It just tasted wrong ... so shortly after this photo was taken the whole lot was tipped in the bin.  Now normally the chickens would have had these as tasty snack but as they had long since been tucked up in their henhouse for the night and I didn't fancy this failure hanging around the kitchen or the fridge until the following morning .... into the bin they went.

To end on a success and to keep up with my accountability on Weight-loss Monday, here is a photo of the scales this morning.

Yay ....  I'm in the twelves at last.

Sue xx

Seeds Up, Pounds Down

My special offer free seeds arrived this weekend, how quick was that then!!  

I only signed up for the magazine subscription that meant I got £36 worth of free seeds for spending £36 on the subscription midway through last week.  It's nice that a gardening magazine realises that getting promised seeds to a gardener with itchy green fingers quickly is positively vital.

And yes, I did check that I got my £36 worth  ;-)

I am now going to spend a happy hour sorting through ALL my seeds and I have a lot.  I have my own, my inherited seeds from Dad and now all these lovely new ones.  It's going to be a very happy hour indeed.

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In other news ... it's Weight-loss Monday, I refuse to call it anything other than that, I must go down.  It will happen every week until I get to my first target of 12st.  I apologise for those of you who don't really care what I weigh but I am determined to hold myself totally accountable.

Just 2lbs down this week .....

... but it does mean that this is the last time that you or I will see the number 13 appearing on these scales.

(If it subsequently all goes to pot I will now have to purchase some new scales to make that statement the truth!!)

Sue xx

The Wheelbarrow and the Challenge

Barrow load by barrow load I am moving all my planting paraphernalia over to the polytunnel.  It's taking me a while because as I'm doing it I am making sure that I brush or wash things.  I really don't want to introduce too many spiders and bugs to the polytunnel, enough will find their own way in without me helping them by taking in pots full of eggs or bugs.

Once each area of the 'chicken shed' is emptied of plant pots, trays and such like it is brushed down and wiped .... I might as well have a bit of a Spring clean whilst I go, it slows me down but if a job's worth doing it's worth doing well.

I keep finding areas of abandoned growing aids, dumped after we moved in and left to their own devices for over a year.  So these too are being brushed off, cleaned up and barrowed over.  I'll show you some pictures of the inside of the polytunnel once I've neatened up what's been taken there and planned where things will live.

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Meanwhile, after that little teaser yesterday I will let you in on mine and my sons Challenge to each other this March.

It is 35 days until my birthday in April,  so a Challenge has been issued and accepted by both of us.  I want to get to 12st which is 168lbs  by my birthday.  If I get to this and then manage to get to what I want to be my more ideal weight of 11st 7lbs by Summer AND then keep this off until Christmas day, Jason will owe us one long weekend of house-sitting.

I am currently 13st 2lbs ....eek!!

At the moment Jason weighs in at 17st 2lbs or 241 lbs, but as he's almost six foot tall this isn't as bad as you would think, but his healthy weight and the weight he looks really good and feels comfortable at is around 14st, which is 196lbs.

His Challenge is more monetary.  

Whatever he manages to lose by my birthday (35 days away) I will give him £1 per lb lost.  He will then continue on his weight loss journey until he gets to a weight he feels happy at but not get paid  for the additional pounds lost.  If he manages to keep off his initial 35 day weight loss until Christmas day, I will give him an extra £9 per lb lost, so he will actually get £10 per lb loss if he manages to keep it off.

Confused, yep so am I, but now it's down in print it's easier to remember and now we just have to stick to it.

We are both dieting/getting healthy in the way that suits us best.   I feel better with three regular meals a day, lowish carb and mainly vegetable based, with occasional workouts to my various Dvd's usually 'Slim in Six' and Davina McCall's, if I don't have a physically active day.  Of course I will also dragging the dogs out for long walks along the promenade in Llandudno on a regular basis, but I don't think they'll object to that  ;-)

  Jason is going back to his smallish  but regular high protein, low carb meals, usually between four and six a day and is also getting back into his gym habit of various workouts and lifting weights.  That he has also just qualified as a football referee and has his first  match on Sunday will no doubt help too.

So as of yesterday we are off and running ..... something I'm not that good at and Jason should avoid after his foot injury in October of last year.

Sue xx