It starts now.

Over the last month, I've reread most of my blog postings (I'm hilarious, btw), especially for 2012. That's when I was most successful at weight loss and exercised most consistently. I was reading to try to figure out what I did right, and of course, when it started not working for me. I've debated the pros and cons of Weight Watchers, Paleo, counting calories, workouts, etc. 

It's been a while in the making, but tomorrow it begins -- Whole 30. For real. There will be one day off -- our anniversary is in a couple of weeks -- but otherwise, I'm in this until February 25th (31 days, to make up for the day off). 

There's a bit of prep involved, even when I know what I'm doing, so I've spent the week trying to figure out menus, plan what's most important for me to do this successfully, and just get my head in the right place. 

This weekend has been pretty busy...

I don't care what anyone says. Meal planning is not easy. I feel like I spent 20 hours just thinking through what to cook, what to buy, what order to put them in during the week, how to make enough to ensure leftovers, and on and on. 

Saturday was planning and shopping, Sunday was prep.

[*Sidebar: Last post mentioned the planner we're waiting for. We're still waiting, but it's on its way now. The page above is from the pdf they provided because of the delays...so part of my mental work has been figuring out how to use it for this, work, and all the other stuff that makes up my days. I'll do another post on how that's working out once I get the real thing.]

I don't know why I don't always make my own mayo - it tastes better and it's so easy. 

Breakfast muffins - another thing I don't know why I don't always keep on hand. Bug and I snag a couple of these for breakfast - egg, spinach, and sausage.

I'm not saying that bacon was the reason for the choice of Paleo over WW...but it was definitely a factor.

With the homemade mayo and grilled chicken, chicken salad has to be in the fridge. This will be lunch for a couple of days, unless others in the house find it. Apples, celery, grapes, walnuts, chicken, and mayo = heaven.

All the fruits and veggies are in the fridge. I need to get them all washed and prepped so I grab those for snacks. I know I eat way more fruit than the official Whole 30 recommends, but it keeps me on track. I'm breaking one rule that I hope doesn't haunt me -- I'm not getting rid of all the non-Paleo stuff in the house. I'm trying to make it difficult to get to, but Bug will starve if some doesn't stay here. 

My plan is to post every few days with pictures of the food, to keep me on track. Boot camp is on -- Monday/Wednesday/Friday -- and I'm trying to get my foot well enough to be able to run on other days. We'll see how that goes. 

Here's the dinner menu for this week:
Monday: Shrimp stir fry and leftover grilled chicken 
Tuesday: Grilled pork chops with butternut squash and kale saute
Wednesday: Crockpot chicken and tomato soup
Thursday: Asian meatballs with zoodles
Friday: Fish tacos with cauliflower rice
Saturday: not sure, but will know by the time I get there. 

Breakfasts will be smoothies, egg scrambles, or egg muffins. Lunches will be leftovers, most of the time. I like leftovers. 

So, that's it. I'm back to using the blog for accountability. I want to look back at what I did successfully in 2012 and use the determination I had then to remind myself that I can do this. More to come...