Ticking over

Last week was meant to be a quiet week which would lead to a kick start to this year's lard drop, I was prepared, shopping done, batch cooking, lunches prepped etc. Then I ended up eating out 4 times and I have an inability to choose well when I eat out. Anyway, the scales still showed a 1.5lb drop on Monday night so I'll take that.

This weeks follows in much the same vein. Out tonight, Friday and Saturday. Alcohol will be limited due to the boy's (extremely dull) flirtation with Dry January so damage could be minimal but you can never be too sure with me.

edit: It's already going badly, I'm working from home today awaiting an electrician (the light is still suffering the after effects of being a water feature) and my friend just turned up with coffee and croissants.... no lunch today then!

A lot of my class are following this new EE SP plan which I've not really considered, but they are seeing really good results. It seems very restrictive to me - no potatoes, pasta, rice and the freedom of SW is what makes it work for me. I may try the odd day here and there, but cauliflower rice and mashed parsnip don't exactly excite me. It may, however, have to come into full effect the week before we go away if I don't get to where I want to be by then.

So in an attempt to keep myself on the straight and narrow, here are some of my on plan meals....

 Mini omelettes/quiches, tuna salad, steak egg and chips, mini omelettes and toast with butter (butter I love you)

Homemade 'pot' noodles, slow cooked lamb curry, leek and bacon pasta with salad, steak pie with mash and veg

And a picture I took on Saturday because it looks pretty....

Brighton

Happy New Year!

So here we are, another year and all of that "New Year, New Me" propaganda is everywhere.

I had my first weigh of the year after a 2 week break at Christmas and was extremely surprised with a 3lb loss. Pretty amazing, all things considered.

The class had about 15 new members, which is not at all surprising given the time of the year, but I can't help wondering how many people feel the need to change themselves at the start of January and then give up after a few weeks or months.

I've always found weight loss hard, because quite simply, I don't care enough. I have always been happy with who I am and how I look but I had started to get to a stage where my weight was ever increasing and I was in danger of being out of control. I've lost over 2 stone now and I'm happy with the results, but I'd still like to drop more over the next few weeks before we head to Australia at the start of February. I imagine 3 weeks in Oz can do a fair bit of damage so I'd like a buffer before we go!

Matt is partaking in "Dry January" so that's definitely helping so far this year as no alcohol has passed my lips. After a couple of weeks of eating and drinking rubbish, it's really nice to be back to healthy foods again. I missed my own cooking.

Christmas and New Year were lovely but it's always pretty full on. I was looking forward to coming back to work for a break.....

However, Monday was a disaster:

1) My car wouldn't start
2) I discovered I didn't have "Home Start" on my AA policy
3) I had to pay £100 for the aforementioned Home Start
4) I then had to wait 3 hours for the nice man to come and fix my car to tell me I needed a new battery.
5) My bank card got cancelled by my bank whilst I was attempting to pay for the new battery
6) The upstairs neighbours decided to turn our kitchen light into a water feature causing the entire flat to trip and the temporary loss of electrics to the kitchen and bathroom.

It's enough to drive anyone to drink.... Thankfully the scales were kind to me otherwise I may well have drowned my sorrows in spectacular fashion!

Anyway, since then things have improved so let's hope that's all my bad luck out of the way for a while... I've a plan for food and drink this week so I am hoping for good things this week.

And finally, a few photos of the festive period.

Gong Bar @ Shangri-la @ The Shard

Amazing Meal @ Tim Raue in Berlin

Checkpoint Charlie

 German Markets

 Serve your own beer and awesome burgers @ The Pub

We fly out to Oz on the 6th Feb, so I've 4 weeks or so to make a difference. Watch this space...