I love starting a new week in my wellness/food journal!  I’m part of all sorts of planner Facebook groups and I was inspired to draw lines this week!

I had a good food plan today. 

And breakfast went exactly as planned. (Can we say YUM to all those berries from our garden?)

My table was even clean (another struggle here…keeping the table free of clutter).

I love this table so much. In the spirit of Kon Marie, it brings me tons of joy every time I look at it!!

I also got my grapes into a jar today. I think the reason this works so well is because the food becomes sort of vacuum sealed into the jar. When the room temperature air cools down, it shrinks inside the jar which seals the lid. I don’t know the scientific reason why this happens, but when I open the lid to eat some grapes, it kinda has that pop sound. And it does it every time!  It’s like the sound of “fresh” every time you open the jar. I like it!

After breakfast…well…that was it for food today. I went to my classroom and got engrossed in my work. I felt hungry a few times but I’ve learned to ignore it and I was so absorbed in all that I was accomplishing, food was definitely secondary and mostly not even on my mind. 

I know this is not a good thing to do. It’s something I’m working on. I seem to be working on a lot of personal growth right now. 

When I drove home at 10:30pm, I decided to just call this a fasting day and wait till morning to eat. 

Another day, another chance to have bright shiny lines. That’s what I love about this program. It’s real life and you just don’t ever give up and always try again. I don’t beat myself up over my short comings. Tomorrow is a new day. 

Can we just admire this rainbow planner layout though?  It’s giving me all the feels right now as this is a fun hobby that I’m just completely obsessed with!!

In case you like to see planner stuff, I have a whole different blog about it at http://www.myerincondren.com. Enjoy!

I knew I would have a hard time blogging once I went back to work. Oh the joy of being a teacher and having summers off!  But I’m back now, and blogging this a day late. After a few days of fuzzy lines, I decided to go back to my tried and true breakfast. 

Lunch was grab and go. I waited too long And I was too hungry to make something. It’s a bad habit that I am still working on changing. At least now, I’m not grabbing junk food (which was totally my pattern before).

I did get inspired for my supper from this post in the BLE Rockstars FB group. 

I got busy immediately to duplicate it!

Garlic from our garden. 

Zucchini from our garden and onions and red peppers from my mason jar storage in the fridge. I did the onions on July 15th and they were still good!!

Sauté’ all the food in a bit of oil. 

Growing up vegetarian, I was introduced to a lot of “meat” substitutes. I’ve been using this taco filling in different ways since it’s a soy base and the BLE plan does say “vegeburger”.  I’m not sure if this is an ok food but maybe someone who is more experienced can let me know by looking at the ingredient list. 

I don’t use a lot of meat substitutes anymore so this does feel a bit like a treat. 

My oh so delicious meal!!  Green beans and tomatoes also from the garden!!

I want to mention again how much I love storing my fresh food in Mason jars in my fridge. I bought this package of sweet peppers at Costco and immediately put them in this 2-quart Ball jar. 

Not only does it keep longer, the food is so pretty this way!!!

My Cavachon, Scarlett, watched me the whole time!!

Another amazing week in the books!!

I keep forgetting to post this!  My measurements have been doing great things!

This sticker is from Planner Chick Designs. She’s one of my favorite sticker shops and a great friend of mine. She’s also on this journey as well and doing well!!

Today was a very relaxing day!  It’s Sabbath so I went to church today. Somehow I totally forgot to eat breakfast even though I knew exactly what I was going to eat!

When church was over I had to grab my friend who got me going with BLE in the first place. It was selfie time and time to document some progress.

Between the two of us, we’ve lost 36 lbs and still counting!  We both feel fantastic and I will forever be grateful to her for talking to me about her new food plan, even though I thought she was nuts and it took me a month to finally wrap my head and heart around the idea and get on board. 

For potluck today, I eyeballed my food, ate in my categories, except that there were no fat options by the time I went through line.  Since I had failed to eat breakfast, I decided to eat some rice for lunch, otherwise there would have been very little food on my plate. 

(Those strawberries were ours, frozen, from last year’s garden!)
For supper, I had a grab and eat fast meal because I was feeling lazy and I wanted to eat that peach that was planned for breakfast. The peach with the yogurt was heavenly and the crunch of nuts was perfect. 

The only problem was that when I was done I was still super hungry because I had grossly undereaten today, so I grabbed a pickle and called it good enough. 

I’m not sure how I want to handle a skipped meal. I think I’ll leave my plan in pencil and not go over it with pen like I normally do. Today was a little off, but tomorrow is always a new day!

That’s a wrap!!

I’m getting a lot of questions about my food journal!  I actually did a whole blog post about it on my other blog and you can check it out here. 

I love filling it in each day and tracking my core exercise, water, and Fitbit goals (which are semi on hold right now since I’m still on weight loss focus).  

I don’t remember if I talked about where I buy my stickers from. I try to post planner pictures on another IG that I have just for my planners (yep, an IG for planning is a thing!). You can follow me at myec_kristy. 

Let me know if you have any questions about the planner!  I love helping and sharing how things have worked for me. This is my 3rd year using the planner as a health/wellness journal, though in the past it has been very hit and miss. 

My most recent full week!

Another day of happy food, happy eating, happy feeling!  So much of this has become automatic now, and the habits are being cemented into this new lifestyle.  I had some thoughts this morning and shared them in the BLE unofficial support group on Facebook.

It really is a LIFESTYLE.  It’s not a passing whim, or a “diet” that you do till you reach your goals.  It’s just how you live, how you eat, how you relate to food.

I don’t think I’ve actually ever really laid out what the “bright lines” are in Bright Line Eating.  Here they are:

#1 No Sugar…of any kind…at all…ever!

#2 No Flour…it hits your body just like sugar does and creates an addiction to food that is very difficult to control.

#3 Three meals a day.  Period.  No eating between meals.  No snacks.  No bites, licks, or tastes while cooking.

#4  Quantities. Eat your foods in specific and measured quantities. 

These are the FOUR bright lines and there is a whole multitude of people following this way of life all around the world.  The Facebook group affords amazing support.  You can join it here.

Then there is Instagram.  If you search for anything along the lines of bright line, BLE, etc., you will find people that are posting about their meals and you can get tons of ideas!  I’ve opened a new IG account just for bright line eating (@bright.line.kristy).  Feel free to follow my journey there too!

I really enjoy posting on this blog, so I will continue to post the most details here.  Let’s talk about today!  I’ve been doing this for 53 whole days now!  That is a lot of days in a row and I have stuck to the plan almost 100%!!  I am proud of my progress and I can’t wait to see where it will take me.  Here was the start of my week.  I always look forward to doing all the little prep work for my week in my planner!!

Breakfast is my favorite meal.  It always looks so pretty to eat and it always tastes delicious.  There is something to be said about no snacking and not eating between meals because when breakfast comes in the morning, you’re HUNGRY!!  And eating food while hungry ALWAYS makes it taste better!!

Lunch today was on the run!  I was in my car, driving home from taking a dog to the vet (in a far away town), and I hadn’t packed a lunch.  I stopped at Safeway and bought foods from my categories.  For protein I had hummus, vegetables were carrots and cherry tomatoes, fat was the cheese stick, and my fruit was cherries.  I did not measure but just did my best to guesstimate how much I needed to eat.

One interesting thing that happened was that when I was leaving Safeway, I saw this row of trees that I used to park under and eat junk food in the shade.  I can’t tell you how many times, when I lived near this Safeway, I bought snacks foods and then parked in the shade and ate them in my car.  Sometimes I did this with my children in the car, and sometimes I did it alone.  It was really strange to see that space, remember my old habits, and know that I will not repeat that ever again!  Success and victory are around every corner!

After getting home, I took a stroll through my garden (that will be the next blog post) and picked an onion, some peppers, tomatoes, and kale.  My guys called and asked if there was supper planned, so I got to work making food that we could all enjoy.  I decided we’d have fajitas!

These are the Soy Curls.  They are so quick and easy to make and can be seasoned any way you’d like.  I used my McKay’s children style seasoning again, onion powder, garlic powder, and a garlic/herb powder that I got from Costco.

I sautéed a garden onion and bell pepper so we could build fajitas with all the veggies and the Soy Curls.

This bouquet of kale was waiting for me to use in the green salad.  I learned to store leafy greens in a vase of water.  They stay fresh and can be stored in the fridge, or we just leave them on the counter.  This was picked a couple days ago and it looks perfect still in the water!

The guys used a flour tortilla to make their fajitas, but I just ate everything on my plate.  Delicious!!

This week I will be doing my measurements again.  I can’t wait to see if there are any changes.  I’m sure there must be because my clothes are starting to feel loose!

I did my core exercises this morning, so it was great to already have those check marks in place.  Everything is getting so much easier to do and I’m more than half way to my goal of 50 push ups by my birthday!!

And that’s a wrap!!

I have a plan today!  It already needs to be adjusted thought because I forgot we are going to the air show and I’ll have to pack a lunch.  It should be a fairly easy adjustment. 

Today was a milestone!  This is the last pack of original Quaker Oatmeal. 

These have been floating around our home for a LONG time because nobody would eat them…

But now they are a staple on my menu plan and I will need to buy some more!

Breakfast this morning not only tasted good but it looked good too. I’m trying to get better at making my food look as delicious as it tastes. 

Lunch ended up being late and we had to hike back to the car to eat it. They didn’t allow any food into the Air Force base today and we got busy watching the air show. 

We ate so fast I didn’t snap a picture. I had too much protein at lunch but other than that, everything stayed on track. 

For supper, I was starving again and could barely wait to eat. I fixed up some quick fried cauliflower rice and rounded out the meal with produce from our garden. I didn’t measure anything truly because I was too lazy and starving and I didn’t want to wait.  Those are bad reasons, but the truth. 

I took the peas out of the shells and ate them raw. So sweet and good!!

I also had some mixed nuts that I ate while I was making the rest of the meal.  I know this is not a good habit to get into.  

Looking forward to a new week and seeing where the BLE journey will take me!  

Another successful week with Bright Line Eating. Things weren’t perfect but progress was made and that is always my goal!

That’s a wrap!!

…and we begin…with no plan again. My meals really suffer and look very elementary when I’m throwing them together at the last minute. 

Breakfast – this was good and visually looked good as well. Breakfast is the easiest meal though. 

Lunch – basic food. Lazy day. 

Supper – this did not look very good and while it tasted OK, I hate to have to even show a picture because this food does not look like something I would want to serve other people. I can do better than this if I plan ahead. 

Oh! I forgot the garden grown tomatoes. Had these been on my plate, it would have looked like a more inviting meal. 

And that’s a wrap!

Today marks 50 days of Bright Line Eating, 50 days of new habits, 50 days of my new way of living and eating. I also have 111 days till my 50th bday.

It was a great weight loss week with the scale going down by 2.4 lbs. I think that is my largest weekly loss since the first week of Bright Line Eating. 

At this rate, I should be really close to goal weight by my birthday and that will be the very best present I have ever given myself. 

I took some progress photos today but I don’t really think anyone wants to see a 49 year old half naked body. Maybe when I’m on the other side of this journey, I’ll have enough courage to post them!!

Today had two shiny bright meals and one not so much. I also had no real pre plans—AGAIN!!

Breakfast was really yummy and I want to do it again soon!

Lunch was a quick throw together type lunch and I expect many of my lunches to be this way during the school year. 

I was starving when I ate it and did not want to wait for something to cook!

Supper did not get a picture. I was away from home and there wasn’t much food for me to choose from that wasn’t NMF. I had fruit for a 3rd time tonight!  And some rice crackers plus what is listed in my food journal. I don’t feel real guilty. I did my best and I’ll be back on track again tomorrow. 

Day 50 is a wrap!