The Final Countdown!!!!

♪♫♪♪Ta-da-da-da♫ta-da-da-da-da♫ta-da-da-da♫da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-d-a♪♪♫♪ the final countdown♫♪♫♪♪-- you get the picture...lol :)

Today is NOVEMBER 10, 2009!!! We're in the home stretch baby!! Exactly 30 days away from my one year anniversary on this journey!!! 5 WEEKS left to go and let me tell you, I'm really pushing it! I'm going to make every day count!! I'm going to say this everyday so that I do it, EVERYDAY!!! :)

5Weeks to Go - Day 2 - DONE!!!

Today again was awesome!!

I woke up at 5am to get a cardio session in. 45 mins of running on the treadmill.

Breakfast was a 3-egg white omlet with onions and a little more than a litre of water

Morning snack was a protein shake (vanilla whey protein, water)

Lunch - steamed spinach with 2 turkey sausages, water

Afternoon snack - a few Brazil nuts, water

Dinner - WILL BE ....grilled salmon, asparagus, small baked sweet potato, water

Evening snack - WILL BE.... sliced cucumbers, water or maybe a green tea!

As I sit here typing, I am so full of energy. I know there's a kickboxing class at 745 this evening - my husband is home tonight so I may just go - haven't decided yet! :)

I'm feeling good overall - a little bit of a scratchy throat today, but I'm trying not to focus on it and hopefully I could sweat it out!

That's it for now - until next time...

Joania (2KMINE!!!)

Let's Check Out My Food...

Hi guys,

I have been really trying these past few days to take pictures of my meals - I find that it truly does help me to say on track and let me tell you, I can use all the help I can get. So here we go...

Dinner: this is baked chicken breast (with onions, garlic, mushrooms and red peppers) with mixed veggies (broccoli, spinach, red pepper, mushrooms, onions, skim milk, seasonned with pepper, curry, garlic & onion powder) with a very small amount of whole wheat spaghettini. It was delicious. I don't usually have pasta but I splurged. It really wasn't a lot (maybe 1/4 cup); more veggies than pasta!

Close-up... The following was for lunch one day. A simple garden salad (spring mix & cherry tomatoes) with left over roasted chicken breast shredded on top. About 1 Tbsp of home-made dressing (EVOO, pepper, vinegar). It was great, quick, tasty and more importantly - filling! :)

Close-up... (you can see...very, very light on the dressing).

Dinner: My husband cooked this one. He was the grillmaster on the BBQ...Salmon skewers with grilled zucchini. There was also corn on the cob which he prepared on the grill but I didn't have any.

The following was another quick lunch. Sliced cucumbers with canned sardines (in water). I literally sliced up about 1/2 of an English cucumber, opened the can of sardines and poured it in the same bowl, added pepper, mixed it all up and ate it!!! No dressing required as the water from the sardines did the job. It was yummy - I've always liked sardines.

Close up...

Dinner: Roasted chicken leg with steamed broccoli and sweet potato mash! I baked a whole chicken (seasonned with pepper, garlic & onion powder, cayenne pepper). I baked the sweet potato in the oven, once it was done, scooped out the potato from skin and mashed it up in a bowl. It was quite moist. That's it!! This was a very filling meal and I had a lot of chicken left over to use in salads and for another dinner. Below is a close-up. So that's it so far. I have also been drinking between 3-4 litres of water each day. Hoping I can continue taking these pics. Just knowing that I have to take a picture helps me to plan what exactly I will be eating! Anyway, that's it for now, just a "food pic" post.

Until next time...

Joania (2KMINE!!!)

I'm BACK and I WAS BAD!!!

Hi everyone,


Another successful business trip done and over with (until the next one). I'm so glad to be home, very tired and thankfully the weather here is just beautiful (25 degrees celcius)!! I plan to sit in my back yard and veg today!! May go for a walk later this evening!

I tried so very hard to stay on track...didn't miss a workout...it's not too difficult when the hotels afford you top of the line fitness facilities, so that part was no problem....HOWEVER, those hotels and nearby RESTAURANTS also afford you top of the line FOODS!!! That's the problem!!!! My first two days, I did very well, stayed on track for MOST of the time, but I STRAYED a bit.

I don't know what it was, but this time I just found it so difficult to stay totally true to the diet....as I mentionned, I killed the workouts, but the diet got me!! As I said at the very beginning of this blog, I WILL BE HONEST and not only with successes but "slip-ups" as well. I do not consider this a failure and I've already put it behind me and after I finish this post, I will take it out of my mind altogether. So here comes the honesty - with pictures!!

Anyway, my flight was at 2:00pm that day. I woke up, did my exercises, had breakfast (3 scrambled egg whites with green peppers & onions), dropped my son off to daycare with and extra long hug and kiss, and went off to work. Left work for airport. I had a chicken wrap for lunch (which I grabbed at a restaurant at the airport)....wasn't good with my snacks. By the time I got checked into hotel, I was starving!! Here's a pic of my dinner on night 1.

This is steamed veggies (spinach, green and yellow beans, red peppers, olive oil, garlic) served with a fish called, "cobia". Never heard of this fish before but it was delicious - white, meaty and quite flavourful. I also had a glass of H2O with this meal. It was great ..restaurant was Canyon Creek! Sorry picture quality not so great...I didn't use flash - pretty good for my phone's camera, though.

The next morning we (my colleagues and I) had breakfast at the hotel restaurant and then checked out as we were off to a different city for more meetings. The breakfast was buffet style and offered lots of healthy options. I had just worked out and was very hungry!

A hard-boiled egg and a slice of cheese -which I wrapped up and put in my purse to eat as my morning snack a few hours later.

Breakfast: Scrambled eggs, two small turkey sausages, small bowl of fruit (did not eat grapes - extra sour) and a glass of water. Then went off to my conference meeting.

Lunch was provided so choice was limited however, I believe I made the best of it by having the following:

This is a garden salad, sprinkled with feta cheese (just a little, as you can see) with 1/2 of a whole wheat tortilla wrap (thinly sliced oven-roasted turkey breast, lettuce, tomatoes, cheese) and about a litre of water.

After conference, we drove to our next destination and checked into our hotel, got settled and went out for dinner. We found this great restaurant where I had a steak with a salad and some baked sweet potato fries (sorry didn't get a pic) but it was goooooood!! Sometimes, I feel a little funny taking pix of my food depending on where I am and how packed the place is. Anyway, this is where the problems started. I shared some fried calamari with my colleagues...they were delicious!! I also had DESSERT!!!! There were three of us and we shared two desserts!! I know I should have been stronger but just reading the options on the menu made me want it so bad!! I just couldn't resist - well, I probably could resist but I didn't!! AND OMG, was it ever yummy!!! They were delicious - I did manage to get a pic of that (the restaurant had emptied at that time)....

This is one of them - no words can do this justice so I'll just let you look at it. All I need to say is CHOCOLATE!!

Here's the other dessert......

Cheesecake with Chocolate

As I mentionned earlier, these beauties were "shared".....I'm certain I had the most of my colleagues.....here's a pic, showing that we did share them - please take note of the THREE forks!

SIN-sharing!!

EVIL!!(but tasty)...

The next morning I woke up, feeling guilty but not as guilty as I thought I would and I don't know if that's good or bad but I decided to forget about it and get my workout done....and I did. Met with my colleagues and we went off to the Market Fresh for breakfast. I had an eggwhite and vegetable omlet with water. I was back on track!! :)

It was quite good (green pepp, mushrooms, onions)

Anyway, I am now back on track with my eating but I know that my "slip-ups" may have affected my weigh-in. I've just weighed in this morning as I wasn't able to on Wednesday. My next post will show the results of my sins! Stay tuned..

Until next time...

Joania (2KMINE!!!)