Thanksgiving

I, Pucciola, would like to know what my readers are thankful for this Thanksgiving. Many bad things happen in the span of a year. I've seen bad things happen to good people, good things happen to bad people, I've seen things fall apart and people get hurt. But in the end, there is always something to be thankful for. This is the time of year that I like to take a minute to stop and think about what is most important in my life.

I am thankful for:

- My family
- My friends
- My boyfriend
- My pets
- My health (what's left of it :P)
- My job
- Being able to go to a university and get an education
- To have a place to live
- Waking up every day
- many many other things

I am thankful every day that I am given, though I may go days of even weeks without thinking about how thankful I am or how fortunate I am to have certain things in my life.

What are you thankful for?

XOXO

Caffeine withdrawals

SO sorry it has been so long since I have last blogged. I'm behind on the Recipe of the Week as well! Since Thanksgiving is coming and that is the last major divider between normal school and finals, all my professors decided that everything was going to be due on the same day. Today, for instance, I had a paper and an exam. So most of my time has gone towards finishing those.

But I wanted to update and share with everyone my fight with Caffeine Withdrawals! DUN DUN DUN! Since I decided to eat healthier (that's not going well at the moment, btw, and that will be a different blog), I decided to give up soda. Visit my blog about water and brita filters and such to catch up. Anyway, I gave up pop and I did GREAT for an entire week. I didn't have any soda what-so-ever and in fact I didn't drink ANYTHING except water and a bit of milk in the morning. I noticed I was feeling kinda awful every day but I didn't put 2 and 2 together until last Thursday. I felt nauseous, light headed, sleepy, had the worst headache ever, and just felt all around crummy. I didn't feel like I was getting sick or the flu, so I just dealt with it. I was sitting in my class one day and it just sorta dawned on me. A friend of mine was addicted to coffee for awhile and she tried to quit drinking it cold turkey and she went through the same things that I was. So I talked to her about it and she confirmed that she thought I was going through the caffeine withdrawals and that I should get some tea or something other than pop to give myself a little boost. Needless to say I went right home and bought a soda! oh my willpower is so small! And I have been drinking almost a soda a day since... I think part of me is afraid to feel sick again without it and the other part of me just plain craves it. I need to do something about it though. I want to get some of that Oolong tea that aides in weightloss. I'll let you guys know how my progress is but let me tell you, this getting healthy thing is NOT easy. Especially with a full day of school, work, cooking, cleaning, pets, boyfriend, homework, etc etc.

Stay Tuned for my progress :) And have a very Happy Thanksgiving

Minestrone Soup Recipe

Here is the recipe for Minestrone Soup. As usual I will add the original recipe that I got online and then after I will post how I changed it a tad.

Ingredients

• 1 pound ground beef
• 1 small onion, chopped
• 1 can (19 ounces) ready-to-serve minestrone soup
• 1 can (15 ounces) pinto beans, rinsed and drained
• 1 can (14-1/2 ounces) stewed tomatoes
• 1 can (11 ounces) whole kernel corn, drained
• 1 can (4 ounces) chopped green chilies
• 1 teaspoon salt
• 1/2 teaspoon garlic powder
• 1/2 teaspoon onion powder

Directions

• In a large skillet, cook beef and onion over medium heat until meat is no longer pink; drain. Transfer to a 3-qt. slow cooker. Stir in the remaining ingredients. Cover and cook on low for 4-6 hours or until heated through. Yield: 8 servings. 
  
  Editor's Note: The cost per serving does not include optional ingredients such as garnishes. When there is a choice of two ingredients, the cost is figured with the first one listed.
• Nutrition Facts: 1 serving (1 cup) equals 221 calories, 6 g fat (3 g saturated fat), 29 mg cholesterol, 901 mg sodium, 24 g carbohydrates, 5 g fiber, 15 g protein

Now when I made this recipe, I added an extra can of Mixed Vegetables: Corn, Carrots and Green Beans. I also cooked this on my stove top, bringing it to a boil until heated through and the flavors really mesh together, instead of the slow cooker. I don't have time to use a slow cooker because I am gone from the house a good amount daily. At the end of cooking, I added a half of a can of Beef Broth because there didn't seem to be enough "soup" to it and also I added a pinch of beef bullion. In the end it was great and my only regret is that I didn't have a nice, crunchy baguette to go alone with it! 

Let me know if anyone tries this!

XOXO

Day 3...

... has been the best so far. A mixup with my boyfriend and I caused me to oversleep this morning and I missed my exercise time :'( But I ate extremely well today. Probably didn't eat enough food though. For breakfast I had a hardboiled egg with mustard, whole grain toast with about a tablespoon of peanut butter and a half a glass of skim milk. I have never been a big breakfast person and when I do eat breakfast, it's rare if I eat anything related to breakfast at all. I'll eat leftover dinner for breakfast, sandwiches, soup, anything but breakfast. But now I find that I really enjoy eating my breakfast and I think it's because I know how important breakfast is for you and I know that I am eating some really great foods for my body. For lunch I ate a salad with kidney beans, garbonzo beans, and 2 pieces of tore up turkey lunch meat. So far I enjoy the salads as well but I know that soon I will get seriously sick of them so I need to look into something better for lunch. For dinner I made homemade minestrone soup with loads of vegetables. My boyfriend loved it too, maybe I'll post the recipe. And later in the evening when I felt the urge to munch, I ate 3 dill pickles. 1 1/4 pickles only have 5 calories. They have 280mg sodium though and I'm not sure if that's ok or not.

So in a nutshell: ate well but didn't exercise. And I'm pretty sure you need to have both for good results...  I have no class on Friday so looks like I have NO EXCUSE not to exercise :)

Stay Tuned

Brita Filter

I recently got a Brita Filter from Bed Bath and Beyond for I believe $31. It's PINK (of course!) and I love it! Having the filter around with fresh cold water has actually prompted me to drink more water. And it tastes great. I have this thing, where I can seriously taste the difference between certain bottled water brands and the only 2 I would drink were Dasani and Aquafina. Ice Mountain or other brands tasted metallic to me but the Brita filter has no such taste to its water.

Since I am no longer using plastic water bottles which I seemed to be going through like crazy (thus polluting the planet because plastic does not decompose) I also bought a new reusable water bottle to take with me to class. I bought it at Foods For Living which is similar to a Trader Joes, and I believe it is by the brand Green Bottle. It is stainless steel and completely BPA free. You can put it in the refrigerator to keep it cold but can't freeze it. If you are still using plastic water bottles, NEVER freeze it. BPA is a chemical in water bottles that makes the plastic more pliable. By freezing or heating the water bottle, some of the BPA molecules are released into the water and you drink it. Same with plastic wrap and plastic food storage containers. Take food out of the plastic before you put it in the microwave. Glass storage containers seem to be the way to go, though they are a bit heavy and cost around $9 a container.

I will be doing a blog on PBA very soon so stay tuned
XOXO

Day 2...

... was a medium success. Medium.

Before I start I just want to say that I don't plan on updating every day on what I am doing, but I figure since the beginning is the hardest part (to me anyway) of losing weight, that in the beginning I will post my trial and errors so everyone doesn't have to make the same mistakes as me :) just think of me as your own personal guinea pig :)

So last night I couldn't sleep for anything. I tried to go to bed at midnight and I tossed and turned until 1:30am when I finally got out of bed and watched youtube videos until 2:30am when I finally was falling asleep. I was finally able to fall asleep then but when I have to wake up at 7am I was exhausted. I felt sick to my stomach and had to sit on the edge of my bed for awhile trying not to vomit. I decided that there was no way I could go to my classes that early and so I drove my boyfriend to work and came home and slept a few hrs. I feel like I caught up on my sleep but when I headed out to class later in the day I felt drained and tired. I'm not sure if it's because of last night or maybe I slept a bit too much? For breakfast I ate a hardboiled egg with mustard and a cup of skim milk. I planned on eating some toast with peanut butter like I mentioned before but this was super early in the morning and I just went back to bed. When I woke and got ready for school I had a lunch of a small salad with kidney beans, garbonzo beans, 2 slices of thin turkey breast lunch meat that I tore and put into the salad, and a bit of salad dressing. Now let me tell you, it was a hard thing to not eat the entire bottle of dressing. I made a mistake of buying a delicious salad dressing (Kraft Tangy Tomato and Bacon) but I really tried not to use much of it. As Americans we consume a TON of calories in condiments that we don't even think about. A little ketchup here and there, some mayo. Mustard has 0 calories, which is why I chose to spruce my egg up a bit with it. And I'm talking normal plain ol' yellow mustard, not dijon, not spicy brown, because all of those have other things, like sugar, added to them. What I noticed I have been doing well is not drinking pop or juice. Yesterday I had a diet Snapple that I got while on my candy binge, and I did notice after that it was flavored with aspartame. isn't there anything left out there that is flavored with real sugar? And today I had the skim milk and then water. I will be posting about my brita filter next. I didn't work out today, I have the same excuse as yesterday, that it was dark when I got home. I have been racking my brains trying to figure out what to do about it since I have an obvious dilemma so I decided that on Monday/Wednesday/Friday I will work out in the morning before school, that way it wont be dark, and Tuesday and Thursday might just have to be the days that I take a break from exercise. I planned on only working out 5 days a week anyway. This weekend I also plan on taking my measurements so I can see if I am actually losing some weight. I just ordered 2 pairs of jeans in a size 16 so left pray that they fit :) I remember when I was a 9... before this PCOS thing started. Makes me sick just thinking about it. But then I think back a year to when I didn't own a single pair of jeans that fit and I wore the same pair of sweat pants every single day because I refused to get a side 20 pair of jeans. Now I'm back in a size 18 and the jeans I have are lose, so lets hope the 16s will give me a nice boost of confidence :)

Hope everyone is keeping well!
Stay tuned!

Sale!

Trade Secret (a store that is in most malls that sells hair, skin and nail products and also have a salon) is having a sale on MATTE O.P.I nail polish: Buy one get one FREE. This is a VERY good deal considering one O.P.I nail polish is $8.50. I was going to take advantage of this sale but the 2 Trade Secrets that I went to both were sold out of almost every color but white. Any other time I would NOT suggest buying the O.P.I matte colors, even though it is a huge trend right now, because ESSIE is a brand that actually makes a matte top coat. It turns any nail polish into matte.

Don't know what matte is? Take a look:
See how the color has no shine to it, it is just dull, or matte? Awesome, huh?