I Won My Dietbet and Trader Joe Cookie Butter Alternative!

Woooo I am happy to say that as of today I officially won my Dietbet. All those moments of stress and scale obsession payed off. As sad as that sounds I am excited that I won. I mean who wants to lose money? Not me!!  I am happy that I succeeded. For one, that means I lost 10 pounds this month which is a great thing and I am very proud of myself for that. For two, it means that I can put my scale up for a while and just focus on my changes elsewhere like my measurements, eating habits, how many reps of exercises I can do , and am not always just thinking “scale number, scale number, scale number.”  Like I said I don’t think I will do another one for a while but we will see. The concept intrigued a lot of my friends and if doing it with them will motivate then I may consider it but it was a bit mentally draining for me. With winning this Dietbet it also meant that for the first time in a long time I was under 200 pounds. That is crazy to me! 

Woohoo my body 20 pounds lighter! I am so happy to be able to look in the mirror and see the difference finally. It is so much more motivating when you can see the changes you are making!!

 

Also being that the end of the month is coming that also means my Tone It Up Frisky Fall Challenge is coming to a close as well as my Betty Rocker Rocktober Challenge. I honestly loved both. While integrating both challenges together I saw a huge change in my body both in endurance and strength. I loved the gradual difficulty increase of the Betty Rocker workouts and loved seeing my body get stronger and better at each of the workouts. It also gave me a lot of new body strength exercises that I can do anywhere. I loved that the Tone It Up workouts gave me a set schedule of what to do each week and allowed me to never get bored. There was a nice mix of cardio, strength training, stretching, etc… Videos each week included new ones you hadn’t seen before which made things exciting and it gave me a lot of great cardio options like interval training and stair workouts! I can’t wait for either of these ladies to do another challenge and most definatley will sign up for them in the future.

 

New Discovery That I Wish Had Gone Unfound….

So since my wondrous discovery of the Trader Joe Cookie Butter which I wrote about (here) I have found myself longing for it. That rich, creamy, sweet gingerbread taste is missing from my life now and I do not know how to go on without it. I do not live anywhere close to Trader Joes and buying  Cookie Butter online is obnoxious. It is extremely overpriced and I just could not shell out $15-20 a jar for the stuff. In a desperation to find an alternative I googled recipes on how to make my own and found that was no easy task either. Buying the cookies to make it would cost almost as much as just buying it online so I decided to look at another route and see if I could find a brand that made something similar. Well I sure did and I feel complete again. Now I do not know that this discovery is a good thing because that means that I can get this stuff anytime I want and seeing as how it is my version of crack this could lead to bad bad things. I discovered that a brand called Biscoff Spread which is made by a company named Lotus is almost an exact dupe of Cookie Butter. Like Cookie Butter is comes in crunchy and creamy and is made with a similar biscuit. It is from Europe but you can buy it in many places in the US. I found mine in good ol’ Walmart in the peanut butter sections. It is fairly priced between $3.50- $3.75 at my Walmart which is about the same price point as Cookie Butter. The jar is a bit smaller in the crunchy style which is too bad since that is my favorite. I honestly didn't notice a difference between TJ’s and Biscoff. They both have a delicious gingerbread flavor which around the same amount of nutritional value. 

Talking To Myself and Avoiding Temptations...Love With Food Box Review Cont'd...

Hey hey there everyone! It is another beautiful fall day in upstate NY and I am feeling energized. It is finally getting cold up here so that part I do not love. We got blessed with  a couple extra weeks of strangely warm weather…for NY anyway! However, now I think that it is officially starting to head towards winter. Womp womp!!!

I had to do some serious refocusing this morning because my diet and exercise regimen went off the tracks this weekend. Seriously, it derailed in a river and sank!  I am still trying to get a hold on how to be social without ruining my willpower. I went out with some friends on Friday night to watch another friends show. He plays guitar and is awesome. I did really well with avoiding food temptations but I couldn’t say no to a couple a couple beers. I didn’t drink in excess or anything but I should have said no and didn’t. Saturday I did pretty well but yesterday was HORRIBLE. I was like a junk food Pac-man. I couldn’t stop! Half the problem was that I was at my mother’s which tends to make any diet go downhill but I could have made healthier choices everywhere! I ate donuts from the cider mill-FAIL, Wendy’s for lunch-FAIL (granted I didn’t get my usual frosty and pile of nuggets. I went with the Grilled Chicken Sandwich and a side salad but it still isn’t good), dinner was spaghetti at my mom’s (we ate early and were doing a bunch of work so by the time we got home Zach and I were starving), dinner #2 Pizza Hut Thin N’Crispy Pepperoni Pizza with breadsticks-FAIL, and lastly dessert was this Hershey’s Cream Pie-FAIL FAIL FAIL FAIL…. Yesterday just makes me hang my head in shame.

So this morning I woke up and said “Listen Staci, you are better than this. You want this and you will do better. Learn to say no and make these next two weeks amazing.” With my challenges coming to an end in the next 2 weeks I really can’t lose my focus. I not only want to be healthier and see my change but I want to win haha! It is time to put my Avoiding Temptation pants on and really get serious about this. I know it is going to be a tough one since Halloween is coming up and it is one of my favorite holiday’s but I am going to have to suck it up and do it. No turning back now!!!

Goals This Week:

·        Do not give in to temptations! Yes those pumpkin rolls and pastas look and smell delicious but they are what got you here in the first place.

·        Make time to workout and stick to my Challenge schedules.

·        Drink more water! This is always a goal because I am terrible at it.

·        Wake up and refocus on what you need to do. Do a little yoga and stretch and put your mind in the right place

I really need to make sure I read those goals every day! I also want to make a dream board! I have all the stuff to do it. I just need to find the time to sit down and make it happen!

Love With Food Review Con’t:

Did you guys check out my love with food box review? If you didn’t (click here) to check it out. It is a pretty awesome little box that I already realllly like. There were a bunch of things in the box that I had not tried yet when I wrote the post and I have now had a change to try more of the products with the exception of the apple vinegar pearls. Here are my thoughts on the rest of the things I got:

11)      Kind Fruit and Nut Mini Bar- Delicious!! I loved it just as much as all the others I tried. It was crunchy, chewy, sweet, and so delicious. I loved the big chunks of real fruit and whole nuts. You can just see how good it will be for you. I originally thought the size was small but it was actually perfect. I think these will be great for right before a workout or a little snack to tide you over till lunch in the morning.

22)      Pizzelle Crisps- I did not love these AT ALL! From previous run ins with similar products I knew that these would probably not be my favorite. I love pizzelles when they are homemade or the plain ones but I have yet to find a chocolate one that I like. These had the same problem as the Nature Box ones did for me and that is that they taste burnt. It is like eating burnt cardboard and I ate about 3 before tossing the bag right in the garbage.

33)      Happy Squeeze Apple, Blueberry, and Purple Carrot Pounch- LOVED!! Both my boyfriend and I really liked this product. We are already trying to figure out where we can buy more of them. We ate it on the way to run some errands Friday morning as a little snack until it was lunchtime. It was so good! The texture is like applesauce but a little more liquid like. The flavor was also great with hints of apples and blueberry but with a bit of a tart after taste which we liked. It wasn’t overly sweet!

44)      Glee Gum- Was also really good. I gave it to Zach since he is a candy monster. I did try one piece though and it was good. Fruity and sweet but the flavor didn’t last very long.

I will eventually try the apple cider pearls but I want to figure out a good recipe to put them in!! If you want to check out Love With Food or sign up for a subscription click here

Well here is to a wonderful week full of progress! 

Heaven In A Jar... Trader Joe's Cookie Butter Review...Food and Fitness Journal October 11, 2013

Hey there!! I can barely even type right now I am so excited. Have you ever tried a food that made you speechless? A food that made you scream "where have you been all my life?" That is about where I am right now. I am so excited about this new discovery. I am already upset that I didn't pick up more than one jar but it is probably for the best. My diet would not like me eating a jar of Trader Joe's Speculoos Cookie Butter everyday! I have been hearing about this stuff all over the place...blogs, Instagram, YouTube...everywhere! I don't live near a Trader Joe's so I had yet to be able to buy any but I knew I needed to get my hands on some. I am a huge gingerbread lover so when I heard it tastes like a gingerbread cookie I was super excited. I looked up Trader Joe's and the closest one to me was in Rochester which is 2 hours away...bummer! The upside is that it is only ten minutes from my best friends house! So clearly when I went to visit yesterday I had to pick some up. I knew after reading about other peoples search for the notorious Cookie Butter, that it would possibly be out of stock. The spot where the creamy should have been was completely empty but luckily they had plenty of the crunchy in stock as well at the cocoa one! I grabbed a jar of each for $3.69 a piece. A bargain in comparison to the $5-8 a jar range that I saw them for on Amazon. Well I made it to the car before I opened the jar and dug in! Heaven in a jar is the only way I can describe this. It does taste a lot like gingersnaps and I loved the crunchy little cookie pieces. Even my friend gave it a huge thumbs up. I liked the cocoa one too but I think the chocolate over powers the gingerbread taste. It tastes like hot fudge with a hint of gingerbread. I tried it on toast and it was good but not as good as the plain Cookie Butter!

Clearly I dug in there quite a bit! Don't you love the fork marks.


After we went to Trader Joe's we decided to go be active and enjoy the beautiful day. Since she is fairly new to the area and wasn't quite sure where a good place was to walk we kind of just winged it. Fortunatley we ended up driving over a bridge the crossed the Erie Canal and noticed there were walking paths below. We took her dog Leo and started down the path. It must go quite a way because we walked almost 3 miles down with no end. We then turned around and headed back but the walk was beautiful. The weather was a dream and the changing trees looked lovely against the water. It was also nice to see so many people out and about enjoying the day and getting some exercise. We saw bikers, walkers, runners, and many other dogs!

After our wonderful walk we headed back to her house to get cleaned up and go to dinner. I was famished so I munched on some Sweet Blueberry Almonds which were really yummy. I talked about them in a post the other day. We went to a place called Champps for dinner which was a sports bar type of restaurant. It was really nice and open. I also liked that the kitchen was open so you could see everything that was being made. We munched on some chips and queso for an appetizer and I enjoyed a couple Michelob Ultras. For my meal I ordered the Mahi Mahi with a spinach and penne cold salad. It was AMAZING! The girl said "nice choice," when she set my plate down and she wasn't kidding. I ate every bit of it. The fish was perfectly cooked and flavorful and didn't have a strong fishy taste. It was topped with a brushetta like mixture. The salad was also good. It had spinach, penne, tomatoes, capers, and roasted red peppers with a kind of lemony sauce. 

It was an amazing day from beginning to end. The weather was awesome and I spent it with my best friend. Not to mention I got to snuggle the cutest puppy ever!!!

Chipotle Rocks My Socks...Food and Fitness Journal October 10,2013

I will keep this post short and sweet since it is past midnight and I am one tuckered out little lady. Seriously, I am practically holding my eyes open at this point. My workout tonight wore me right out. I will sleep like a rock for sure. Let's get too it shall we!!

Meals Of The Day:

•   Breakfast- I woke up quite a bit before Zach and knew he would want a big meal when he got up so I ate a Nutri Grain Crunchy Granola Bar to tide me over while he continued to snooze away. I accompanied this with some Pomegranate Berry Green Tea from Lipton.
• Lunch/Brunch- We had some delicious pancakes. I used the Log Cabin All Natural Pancake Mix. It was my first time using this kind and it wasn't too bad. I think next time I will add a little vanilla and cinnamon to the mix because they were kind of bland but they weren't terrible. I topped them with light butter and some light syrup. 
  
  
  
  
• Dinner- Didn't happen until after my workout and probably later than it should have but I didn't have time to eat until that time. A meeting with a client went longer than I thought it would and by the time that was done I had to hurry home to change and meet my friend at the gym. I didn't want to eat right before a workout because that is just a terrible idea so instead I munched down a Fiber One Oats and Chocolate Bar to give me a little preworkout boost. Anyway, epic ramble there....for dinner I stopped and got a salad at Chipotle. I had only been there once before and I don't remember being that impressed but this time around it was awesome. I have been hearing a lot of talk lately about Chipotle being non GMO and having a lot of fresh ingredients so I figured it would be a good choice. I went with a taco salad and topped it with black beans, chicken, avocado, mild salsa, peppers, and onions. I left off the cheese and said no to the dressing. It was still extremely flavorful and yummy!!
  
• No snacks today!!

Workout:

I had another wonderful gym workout with my best friend! We did the Abx Trainer for 20 minutes as a warm up. We then did the #FriskyFall challenge circuit. Boy was that a tough one. We then cooled down by doing a 20 minute hill climb walking circuit on the treadmill. 

Overall, today was wonderful. 

Food and Fitness Journal: October 1, 2013

Well today is the official beginning of October! If you could see me right now I am doing a little happy dance. October/ November are probably my favorite months out of the entire year! There is just something about fall that makes me fall in love with Upstate New York all over again. I love the scenery, fresh apples, and the local cider mill that's only miles from my house. I also am a big lover of Halloween. Now I know I will not make it into any itty bitty Halloween costumes this year but I hope to definetley see some changes by the time I do go shopping for a costume.

Since today is officially the beginning of October that means that all three of my fitness challenges that I talked about here have started! I bought a big desk calendar from Target to help me keep on track with my workouts each week. It seemed like a lot to do 3 challenges at once but they fit together rather nicely. The Frisky Fall challenge has a set cardio/strength training each day but the Rocktober challenge only has one workout 3 times a week so it isn't overly tasking. The Dietbet doesn't have any set workouts you just need to lose 4% body weight in a month so the other 2 challenges will lend a HUGE helping hand as far as that goes.

Highlights of the day:

• I did not feel sore this morning as I thought I would. I think the hot bath before bed played a huge helping hand in that. I also ate within the first hour of being awake. Though I have read a zillion studies on how to eat a good breakfast and how important it is, I never do it! Until recently that is. I am getting more and more used to it. Breakfast consisted of a DELICIOUS Thomas Pumpkin Spice English Muffin. I know these are not organic and are probably processed out the wassoo but they are just too darn delicious. Plus the calorie count/sugar isn't bad in comparison to a lot of the pumpkin breads, muffins, and bagels I have been seeing around. 
• I completed 30 minutes of cardio at the gym which was on my schedule for the Frisky Fall challenge! I used the stair stepper/elliptical type contraption at Planet Fitness and really put my all into it today! I upped the level by 2 and was a sweaty mess by the end. I can thank Ke$ha radio for that ha! I always pace myself with the music so I try to find a IHeartRadio channel that is fast paced. 

• When I came home I did some prepping for dinner. I made a yummy cucumber salad since I had some cucumbers to use up before they go bad. I used this recipe right here but made some substitutions. Instead of sugar I used Stevia and added some diced tomatoes! I also whipped up some Guacamole for snacking since I also had an avocado that was on it's last leg. My recipe is fairly simple 1 or 2 avocados depending on the size, 2 cloves of garlic finely minced, lime juice (I just kind of squeeze it in there so I don't know how much), 1/2 tomato diced, fresh chopped cilantro, diced jalapeno (if you don't like it spicy you can omit this but I like it caliente), pepper, a pinch of salt, and a dollop of greek yogurt!! Came out UHHHMAZING but I only had a spoonful. 
  
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• After getting a few kitchen things done I then completed my first workout for the Rocktober challenge. It was a tough one that is for sure and I was sweating when I was finished. Betty (founder of The Betty Rocker and couch of the challenge) posted a workout today that we must do three times in the first week. It is a circuit style workout where you do 7 exercises for one minute a piece. When you are done all 7 exercises you repeat the whole circuit 2 more times. So you do 3 rounds of 7 exercises total. Since I used an interval timer I put 10 second rests in between each exercise but it was still tough. You can check out the challenge or sign up here ! I won't post the whole workout because I am sure that that is not allowed but it was a good mix. A couple squat variations, some tricep exercises, and core work! 
  
• For dinner we had the Cucumber Salad that I made earlier and Lemon Pepper Seasoned Chicken Breast Cutlets. Zach had some rice but I opted out of that. 

Overall I think this was a pretty successful day and I can't wait to see how tomorrow goes. I am feeling better and stronger already!! 

Hello World!!

So where to begin with this post? Well I guess I will start with a little bit about myself. I am a makeup artist with an intense love for makeup and beauty. I actually have another blog which you can view here! It is a beauty blog with a bunch of reviews and things like that. I am starting this blog as a way to track a huge journey I am beginning in my life! For most of my entire life I have been overweight. I have fluctuated between "cute and chubby," and "omg I can't even walk up stairs." Over the course of my teenage years and early adulthood I have tried my fair share of diets, gimmicks, and exercise plans only to give up after a couple months and go back to my chocolate and ice cream addiction. The closest I have to come to actually seeing progress was last year around this time. I dove head first into a great fitness routine and did a great job of changing my eating habits. For once I actually started to see changes both in my body and in my attitude. I felt great!! I had more energy and actually wanted to workout. However, I lost my job in February and all my drive got deflated. I went back to my unhealthy lifestyle and gained everything back and then some.

For months this went on but at the beginning of this month I said enough is enough. I started working my way back to a healthier me!! I love writing and journaling and sharing my successes and set back so I thought I would make a blog. A blog for others to join me on this journey but also a place for me to document my progress!

So let's talk about goals...Mine are as follows:
1)Cut out more processed foods from my diet
2)To do a hundred miles by Halloween (either by running, walking, biking, or on the elliptical)
3)Drop ten more pounds

I figure setting small goals for myself is a great way to start!! My starting weight was 214 GASP!!! My current weight is 208.8 and my goal weight by the end of October is 198!

I know this post was not the most exciting to read but I hope it helped you get to know me!!