Seasons of Joy: A Wibbly Wobbly Version

 

This was due to go out on Saturday, except we had some sort of virus attack our computer which stopped us accessing the internet at all.  So a few days late, here is an update on this wibbly wobbly weight of mine.

No, not really!  My friends are gorgeous for a reason.  They exercise self-control, something I really don’t have in spades….

As I am developing my self-control muscle, I am also making tiny changes behind the scenes.  Tiny, because frankly I am fed up with big, sweeping changes which last for a day or a week…..however long, but certainly not for the rest of my life.  These tiny changes are sustainable and are helping me maintain a very steady weight loss of half a pound a week.  A few months ago, I found this laughable.  Half a pound?  Why that is nothing!  Except it is not nothing.  It is half a pound.  And two of those make one whole pound.

Do you see?  The biggest change here is in my attitude.  I am perfectly happy with the small changes causing a small weight loss.  Because suddenly it is not about the weight loss anymore.  And I am left wondering if it was ever about the weight loss for God.  I view food very differently to how I did a few months ago, and tiny changes are having far-reaching consequences.

I thought I would share the changes I have made which have lasted, have been easy to implement and are helping my family and me move towards a healthier future.  Oh, and whose side effect  is losing half a pound a week.

• Creating an easy, healthy lunch which requires no thought, little effort and can be served every day

For lunch we now eat (every single day) a baked potato, lower fat grated cheese, and a huge salad made from ten different salad ingredients.

This meal is such a blessing to us because it just happens.  We don’t need to think about it.  The potatoes get put on by one of us at 11, who ever is free makes the salad which ensures that each of us have had our five (actually ten) a day in just that one salad, and we all love it.  It is healthy, slow to digest and a great blood sugar leveler.  This is the one meal I pile my plate full.  I know if I fill up on lunch I am not hungry at snack time.

The salad contains the following:

1. Celery
2. Tomatoes
3. Cucumber
4. Green pepper
5. Red pepper
6. Yellow pepper
7. Beetroot
8. Apples
9. Carrots
10. Mushrooms

I chop them all up and add a heaped table-spoon of low-fat salad cream and a heaped tablespoon of low-fat mayonnaise and mix up together.  I serve it with a small baked potato with a heaped table-spoon of low-fat grated cheddar cheese.

• Making a huge fruit salad each evening

Gary and I eat this as our evening snack with a Benecol yogurt drink poured over the top (to help with cholesterol).

The sheer size of this (a large cereal bowl) means that we are full and don’t get the nibbles at all during the evening.  Result!  We are finding that if we make an extra big fruit salad, there is enough to give the children a small bowl each the next morning for their snack, replacing toast and peanut butter at ten.  The salad at lunch and the fruit salad in the morning give the children and us twenty different fruit and vegetables each day, ensuring the mineral, vitamin and fibre content of our diets are where they should be 🙂

Obviously the fruit will change according to what is in season, but at the moment we are enjoying a selection of the following in our fruit salad:

1. Watermelon
2. Honey dew melon
3. Raspberries
4. Blueberries
5. Blackberries
6. Kiwi
7. Passion fruit
8. Mango
9. Pineapple
10. Plums
11.  and Banana if we have any going spare

I chop them up and mix.  Gary and I have a large bowl in the evening and I keep the rest in a lidded bowl in the fridge and the children have a small bowl each at ten for snack.

• Reducing the bread intake of our whole family

We used to get through over one loaf a day, now we are down to one loaf a week, if that.  Before I would eat toast and coffee with the rest of the family at 10; now I eat breakfast much earlier and have a boiled egg and crisp-bread, whilst at ten the children now have fresh fruit salad.  Tasty, filling and healthy with few of the calories of the aforementioned toast.  T still has toast and peanut butter  as well because he needs the calories, but the girls all have the fruit salad.

• Smaller servings at dinner time

At dinner time I have shifted away from meat and made my servings much smaller.  This change has been pretty un-noticeable and I am no more hungry than usual.  I am beginning to reduce the amount the rest of the family have and hopefully this will soon be seen in our food bill as well.

Another, surprise, advantage to all of this is that our weekly shopping is much easier and more streamlined.  We have bought a 12 month pass from Asda which means we can have as many deliveries in a month for a small monthly payment.  We make use of this by having two smaller deliveries a week instead of the usual one.  This ensures the fruit and veg we eat are as fresh as possible and also helps us with the storage issues we would inevitably have with that much fresh produce in our very tiny kitchen!

We still have a long way to go in our quest for healthy attitudes towards food (especially me) but I can see things gently falling in to place, one sustainable thing at a time 🙂  I have other ideas which I will share as and when I implement them.  How is everyone else doing?  What changes are you making for a healthier future?  Do share, I love to hear all your creative ideas!