The Howell Blessings

Spring is coming up fast! I, for one, am ready for it. The house has been closed up since late autumn; Christmas brought extra things to store and I am ready for Spring Cleaning. During this time of the year I always get excited to start purging clutter, organizing rooms and “stuff”, cleaning the house and detoxifying my body. My body needs to be cleared out from all the holiday yummies I allowed myself to have and that are now sitting heavy on my belly. Detox is a hot word these days. It was once known mostly for rehabilitation from drug and alcohol use, but more currently there are detox programs for weight loss and other various health and mental ailments. Detoxification is being used for our insides, outsides, and can be used to cleanse our mental state of mind too. Detoxification is defined as the process of removing toxic substances or qualities. Our liver and kidneys are great partners in cleansing our body of unwanted toxins and foreign substances that could potentially...

Week three of my detox diet ended on a high note.  I lost a total of just over 6 pounds and lost an average of 1 1/2 inches from my waist (3 points) and hips.  My honey was anxious to take the "after" pictures and compare them to the "before" pictures.  I wasn't so keen on the idea as I wasn't expecting to see an improvement. But, as you can see below, after just 3 weeks, there is noticeable improvement. Not as lumpy and bumpy as before. And is it my imagination or does the woman on the left look older than the woman on the right? I still have a way to go to look the way I want to look, but for just 3 weeks, I can't complain at all with the results.  I ended the 3rd week the day before my honey and my anniversary, and, unfortunately, took advantage of eating what I wanted (to a point) at a nice restaurant the next evening. Needless to say, I messed up on slowly introducing back in the food(s) without any other "toxic" foods.  So...

Week two proved to be a challenge on this detox diet. I started the week off gaining weight. The first day was about a half a pound and the second day I gained another half pound.   I was so discouraged. I was following the diet and couldn’t figure out what, if anything, I was doing wrong. I am still unsure but I think I may have figured out in part what was going on. First, and I think most importantly, I wasn’t getting all my water in. At best I was getting in 40 oz a day.   Secondly, I wasn’t getting good nights sleep.   Lack of sleep can actually cause you to not only hang onto weight, but to gain it as well. Week two had me eating lunch instead of drinking a smoothie. I found myself just eating leftovers from the previous nights supper, as I didn’t want to prep and cook lunch and turn around and prep and cook dinner as well.   I did several times anyway. I don’t think that contributed to the weight gain, but certainly dampened my excitement on top of ...

I finished week one!   Sorry didn't mean to leave any of you in the dark. I thought reporting daily was going to be just a bit... bland, so I decided not to update every day. I finished week one at an even 131 pounds. That is down 4 lbs 4 oz of my starting weight. Not too shabby. It's better than the typical 2 lb weight loss per week, but not as strong as the hopeful 7 lbs this plan suggested could be possible to lose in the first week. I have been faithful to the menu plan every day except yesterday, Saturday the 1st of March.  I had my morning shake and then  held a cooking class in the morning.  After class ended, I got busy cleaning up and chatting and skipped lunch.  I know, I know, I shouldn't have skipped. I warned you that lunch would be my biggest obstacle and it has proved to be true. I did snack on carrots and roasted red pepper hummus, (a recipe in the book)  later that afternoon and finished strong with a Kale and White Bean soup last nig...

Mon Feb 24 Water: 64 oz Weight: 132.6 - loss of 1.3 lbs  Total so far 2.8  Breakfast: Protein Smoothie Lunch: Protein Smoothie Dinner: Left-over Bean and Nut patty with lime vinaigrette dressing and cucumbers, Mixed greens salad No snack Exercise: 4x4 Bursting -15 minutes Notes: No cramping last night!  I'm hoping it is just all in the water control. I slept well last night too. Today I awoke ready to start exercising. I used an exercise DVD I own from JJ Virgin where you intermingle 1 minute of aerobic exercise between pushing, pulling and core muscle work outs. I followed that up with about 10 minutes of yoga. I believe I waited to long to eat supper tonight and was very hungry. After I ate, I found myself wanting to snack, but realized that I wasn't hungry for food in my tummy, but food in my mouth. Tomorrow I will have this lentil loaf to just heat up as soon as it's time to eat supper, so hopefully that helps with the craving to e...

Days 1 & 2 of my detox journey. Here I go. As scary as this is, this is the ugly truth. I'm about to share with you what I try to hide from everyone.  In four years I've gained seven pounds, and almost all of it has gone straight to my stomach. I am 53 years old, wear a comfortable size 6 and sometimes 4. I am post menopausal (thanks to chemo) and, according to a popular weight loss program, I am at a perfectly good weight. Really?  Does this look perfectly good to you? I can camouflage my pudge most of the time, but let me tell you, this is NOT attractive.  Nor is this easy to show you.  Normally I go to great lengths to avoid letting people, especially my husband, see my body flaws. Tonight I asked him to not only look at my flaws, but to make sure they show well in these pictures. ( He's a very good amateur photographer) . He, of course, didn't hesitate when I asked him to photograph me in such an unpleasant light, bless him. Usuall...

Hi! I'm glad to see that folks have been stopping by in my absence  My apologizes as it's been awhile since I posted last.  It's been longer still since I really felt like posting anything.  Let me try to explain. A LOT has been going on in the past year and a half that has been life changing.  Some good, some... not so good, and some quite frankly, that have left me with more questions than answers.  I've even wondered if I had anything to share on this blog that anyone would even care about, or if I should even take the time to blog. (Just getting real here).  The good news is (for me) that I've been contemplating things and getting back to the basics in a lot of areas. From asking "what is it really all about?" to decluttering just about everything. I am trying to simplify my life, my surroundings, and the way I eat. Some of the decisions that I have started to ask myself are simple and easy to answer, and some on the other hand will take comm...