Almost through...week one, anyway.

Well, it's been one week of eating clean and things are going pretty well. This weekend wasn't the best, but I'll get to that in a minute. Highlight of my week (foodwise) was eating a yummy Italian beef sandwich that was amazing! It's my mom's recipe that I've always loved and when I realized it was clean, I was pumped! Italian beef is one of my all-time faves! And I love crock pot meals because 1. I throw it together in the morning and don't have to worry about it until I'm ready to eat and 2. there are usually leftovers! Can't get much better than that. I've enjoyed everything I've eaten so far and it's so nice to realize that eating clean can actually be tasty! One of my new favorite snacks, especially for these hot summer days, is frozen red grapes. Just wash them, throw them in the freezer and voila...delicious little snack! I've been eating what I would consider typical diet foods but luckily I like it all. I feel like I've been eating the same things over and over again. I'm anxious to discover a variety of clean foods and it's pretty exciting when I make that discovery. But honestly, it doesn't seem like I've had much time lately to do that. You would think that now that I'm off of work for the summer I'd have all the time in the world. Common misconception. In fact, it seems that life seems to get even more busy! But I shouldn't complain. I wouldn't trade my life for the world. I have been awfully busy though. Case in point: this weekend. Don't get me wrong...I had a wonderful time and glad that I was able to do everything I did. But being away from home and with family and friends can make eating clean difficult. Especially while I'm still new at it. I wouldn't say the weekend was a total bust. In fact, looking back at it, I don't think I did as bad as I was thinking. So here's what happened...I got up as usual at the butt crack on Friday and went to class. I ate half of a banana on my way...I feel like I need the energy to get through the workout but don't really want my pre-workout snack to make a reappeareance in the middle of class. Afterwards I got a smoothie which was my breakfast. Then, we left for St. Louis en route for Pappy's Smokehouse. I'm not lying when I say there was virtually no clean choices on their menu. Sure they had veggies for a side, but they were fried or covered in sugar. Not good. Had I been more prepared I probably could have come up with something better than what I got, but I wasn't. So I ended up with a beef brisket sandwich, green beans, and sweet potato fries. I didn't eat the bun but some BBQ sauce accidentally got squirted on my meat. =) The green beans were maybe okay, not sure how they were prepared, but the sweet potato fries...not. Remember the "covered in sugar" I spoke of earlier. That would be the sweet potato fries. Maybe "covered" is a little excessive, but there is no way those babies were clean. So we left Pappy's and I felt like crap. I had worked so hard all week to eat clean and I felt like it all went down the drain with that one meal. But it's just hard. I could've brought my own meal and eaten on my own but I want to eat with my family. I had taken some snacks but we left for the zoo and I didn't bring them with me. It was hotter than a two dollar pistol and I was lured in by some frozen lemonade. I read the label and it wasn't as bad as I thought it would be, but it wasn't totally clean. At that point I was delirious from the heat and didn't care. One yay for me moment was when I had been drinking cool/lukewarm water all day and my sister got some ice cold soda. I literally started to put the straw to my mouth but then I realized what I was about to do and stopped. So yay for me! Supper with other family and friends wasn't too bad either. I ordered a veggie burger with all kinds of crazy stuff in it...bulgar wheat, brown rice, mushrooms, etc. I was a little leery but I actually liked it! I got a side of cottage cheese with pineapple and felt pretty good until they brought out little bowls of ice cream for my cousin's birthday. I didn't really need it and I knew no one would care if I didn't. So what did I do? Ate it. Nice. This might be the time to also mention the chocolate yogurt with coconut I accidentally ate from Coldstone. But hey, if you know me, you know this is a huge step for me. I have never gone to Coldstone and ordered something that isn't ice cream with at least three mix-ins. Again, not clean but better than my usual and I only ate about half of it. So at the end of Friday, I felt like poo. Today wasn't too bad. Eggs, yogurt and a banana for breakfast, grilled chicken with a salad and salsa for lunch, and cheesy chicken roll-ups for supper. As far as the food, it's pretty much all been clean today. What I haven't done too well with is eating every 2-3 hours. So I'm not sure what to feel about this weekend. I've really struggled with whether or not I'm going to be able to keep this up past the one month. Crap, I've not even gone a whole week and I've already screwed up! But I refuse to let it stop me. But there are going to be more times like this weekend in my life where I'm not going to have many clean options or temptation is going to be outrageous. Hopefully I'll learn how to deal with all that better as time goes on. I'm already nervous about my birthday. It's 10 days away and I should be able to eat a piece of cake on my birthday, right? Or am I just using that as an excuse to eat something so unclean it's probably a sin? *sigh* I just wanted to eat clean for 28 days. I've already blown it but again, I'm not going to consider it done. I'm still in this. I've just hit a speed bump. I'm starting a Jillian Michaels exercise program with my sister and her friend on Monday. It's a 30-day thing. I'm sure it'll be killer but I'm looking forward to it. Right now though, I'm looking forward to bed tonight. It's been a long weekend and after walking around the zoo all day Friday then walking all over downtown St. Louis today for the Race for the Cure (which was awesome, by the way), I am exhausted. And there's nothing like your own bed. So until next time...