Resourcefulness: The budgeter's friend

WinterWarrior

As you know, I’m loudly and boringly calorie counting at the moment 😅 and weighing things is so eye opening! I try to fit my evening meal into what calories I have left, so sometimes the portions look tiny…and just goes to show that I was merrily dishing up 4x what I should really have been eating before. Last night I had one wrap when before I might have had 3 😮 

foxgloves

@WinterWarrior - I think wraps are a good case in point, calorie-wise. Compared to a nice chunk of hand-made sourdough bread, you'd think some wraps would have the approximate same calories as a circle of cardboard, but not so! I am someone who has lost a significant amount of weight in the past (6 stones between Jan 2011 & November 2013) but has gradually regained A LOT! We are about to take ourselves in hand weight-wise, but I can't face all the calorie counting again. I can lose on the Traffic Light Diet (Judith Wills) so will be combining that with TRE to see how that goes. If I don't get on with the TRE bit, I shall just do Traffic Lights. I have some goal garments ready to try on as I progress, as does Mr F, who is really pig-sick of not being able to fit into some of his lovely collection of shirts. I think my naughty gallbladder might well have to come out at some point, & am not entirely sure I have permanently managed to dodge the threatened hysterectomy, so I would also like my weight to be better controlled in anticipation of either of those scenarios rearing their heads!
Keep up the good work!
F x

foxgloves

Well, I think I will pop today's post on, then go & find some lunch....doubtless Soot & Ash will think they need lunch too, honestly those boys have hollow legs!
Having learned that tomorrow's forecast looks rainy, I decided to defer my mid-month budget check-in for another day so as to make the most of another good gardening session. Am a bit achy now, so I think I gave it more welly with the fork & shears than I thought I had! Anyway, today's small money saving wins:
*Made bread - on its 2nd proving.
*All the laundry had dried overnight on the heated airer, even the bedlinen & big towels - shows what a difference even a few hours of pegging out in the fresh air makes. Not much ironing....which suits me fine.
*Free fitness clearing first half of the herb bed, which will have a minimum spend (& I MEAN minimum!) makeover this year. Despite the drought followed by several big overnight frosts, the bed was being colonised with self-sown lemon balm, golden feverfew & oregano, all of which are nice plants in their own right, but thugs if they get out of control. Also lots of couch grass, so mostly weeding & cutting back this morning. Feel I've had a good bending & stretching session.
*Mr F reminded me that I haven't yet supplied him with a list of garden jobs.....that's because I haven't finished it, so I will do that today, rather than pass up that opportunity!
*Checked heated propagator & discovered that the first chilli seedlings are up. We're off the blocks!
*3 surveys done.
*Pantry jars topped up with Saturday's purchases from the eco-refill shop. So much cheaper to buy spices this way.
*Write meal plans - will defo be doing this later. Think grocery shopping day will have to be Thursday this week, so need to have it ready earlier than usual.
*Valentine's Day - we do celebrate it, but we stopped doing big bunches of flowers, expensive meals out, etc, back when we were debt-busting. We haven't bought cards. Like last year, we bought a single boxed big shortbread heart filled with jam & buttercream from our little indie bakery & we will share that for dessert tonight. Mr F is working today so we've planned to visit a local-ish gorge for a walk at the weekend, & to treat ourselves to a )budgeted for!) Indian take-away. Mr F is treating this as the last meal of the condemned man, prior to the resumption of weight loss plans next week! 
But......how about this for a coincidence? While I was forking over the herb bed around the winter savoury, which I'd just cut back, I dug up quite a large flat heart-shaped slate pebble.....on St. Valentine's Day!! What are the chances of that? No idea from whence it came, as no natural slate source in our garden - I may even have brought it back as a long-ago beachcombing find from a Cornish beach, I don't know. Anyway, I've written Mr F's name on it & today's date in silver pen, which I know he will like & probably use as a paperweight or keep in his treasure box. 
I can see another survey has popped up, so I shall get onto that, then go & make some lunch.
Take care all,
F x

Sun_Addict

What a lovely find with the pebble. Must be some sort of sign 🙂 The wrap is very pretty. 

WinterWarrior

Ah, I love a heart shaped rock 😁 What a nice find. 

Suffolk_lass

Very interested in the meat portions. My housecraft teacher back in the day (early 1970s) taught us four ounces of meat was plenty. These days I go by the British Heart Foundation guidance that a pack of playing cards is about right. My big weightloss was a bit later than you, around 2016 when I did the 8-week blood sugar diet and lost nearly two stone and then another 1-1.5 over the next few months.

I am nearly a stone more than that at the moment but with Shrove Tuesday next week, we plan to use up some naughty stuff and then be good through lent until Easter to try and kickstart things again. By removing potatoes, pasta, rice, biscuits and most bread as well as anything like chocolate and ice cream, the weight does drop off. If we only eradicate the last two it drops much more slowly. There are two challenges in that period - my birthday and a lunch I am organising, but as the book says, "A lapse is not a collapse. If you break your plan for a few hours or days, it’s not the end of the world!"

Good luck, I shall follow you with great interest and join you, after Tuesday

Humdinger1

At the risk of highjacking diaries and becoming a one-topic bore, may I agree re the low-carb diet? I've reversed diabetes and lost 2.5 stone since June.  I had already lost weight (a further 1.5 stone nearly) but low carb speeded everything up no end.  I think i used to manage my emotions by eating, to suppress anxiety; i think the next few pounds I lose will mean I've lost all the pounds i put on while married to first husband. We eat hardly any meat and red meat probably twice a year; my old student cookbooks (aka one million interesting things to do with lentils) are earning their keep.  At least we are all aware of our habits, no: eating, financial and other and how they are linked.   Love Humdinger xx 

Makingabobor2

Humdinger1 said:

At the risk of highjacking diaries and becoming a one-topic bore, may I agree re the low-carb diet? I've reversed diabetes and lost 2.5 stone since June.  I had already lost weight (a further 1.5 stone nearly) but low carb speeded everything up no end.  I think i used to manage my emotions by eating, to suppress anxiety; i think the next few pounds I lose will mean I've lost all the pounds i put on while married to first husband. We eat hardly any meat and red meat probably twice a year; my old student cookbooks (aka one million interesting things to do with lentils) are earning their keep.  At least we are all aware of our habits, no: eating, financial and other and how they are linked.   Love Humdinger xx 

@Humdinger1, that's a massive achievement. Someone I know has just been told she is pre-diabetic, already has high BP & Cholesterol and is over weight. She is doing diddly squat to help, apart from stopping eating biscuits....or so she said, and then admitted she is still eating ginger ones!  She has even refused the GPs advice.
Good luck with your lentils....lol.  

Suffolk_lass

Makingabobor2 said:

Humdinger1 said:

At the risk of highjacking diaries and becoming a one-topic bore, may I agree re the low-carb diet? I've reversed diabetes and lost 2.5 stone since June.  I had already lost weight (a further 1.5 stone nearly) but low carb speeded everything up no end.  I think i used to manage my emotions by eating, to suppress anxiety; i think the next few pounds I lose will mean I've lost all the pounds i put on while married to first husband. We eat hardly any meat and red meat probably twice a year; my old student cookbooks (aka one million interesting things to do with lentils) are earning their keep.  At least we are all aware of our habits, no: eating, financial and other and how they are linked.   Love Humdinger xx 

@Humdinger1, that's a massive achievement. Someone I know has just been told she is pre-diabetic, already has high BP & Cholesterol and is over weight. She is doing diddly squat to help, apart from stopping eating biscuits....or so she said, and then admitted she is still eating ginger ones!  She has even refused the GPs advice.
Good luck with your lentils....lol.  

It's a proper risk with diabetes and if you continually cheat, it is your future self you are damaging. Many congratulations on controlling your diabetes with diet @Humdinger1 - that is certainly the best solution for you. I found my taste for sweet things has permanently changed, and while I still make the occasional crumble, it is always with sharp, unsweetened fruit as the topping is sweet enough!

lucielle

@Humdinger1 I thought lentils would be carb?  Interested as trying to get into keto.

Thanks L