Thank You, Subway, for my Healthy Breakfast Break!

A few weeks ago I was excited to learn that I'd won a gift card to Subway in the BlogtoLose Breakfast Blogger Break Giveaway.  This morning, rainy and grey in the Boston suburbs, I set off to try my first Eat Fresh Breakfast sandwich and I'm happy to report:  it was great!  Heck, it brightened my day! :)

I decided to get the Egg White Muffin Melt which is a whole wheat english muffin, american cheese (or your choice of another cheese), black forest ham, and egg whites (hence the name! lol).  My server at the Waltham Main Street Subway location was so friendly and helpful... which I find rare in customer service these days, sadly.  She pointed out the different options for breakfast, told me what many customers ordered in the morning, and even showed me Subway's frequent visitor Points program (this isn't offered in all Subway locations she explained).  I also was happily surprised that - because Subway now serves breakfast - they also have fat free and low fat milk and juice in their cases to purchase. 

My Egg White Muffin Melt was only 160 calories and contained only 4 grams of fat!  Being that I count fat grams and calories daily (thanks, Vtrim!) , this is an excellent advantage over the McD's Egg McMuffin as they have 300 calories and 12 grams of fat! I think I'm a morning sandwich convert, folks! :)

You guys know I am a Biggest Loser fan and they often feature trips for the contestants to Subway but I hadn't ventured into a Subway in years. Now  I've found out on the Subway Facebook page that they're also holding a Commit to Fit sweepstakes with giveaways of $26,000 total ($1K for each marathon mile that Jared runs) and additional gift cards. How cool is that?!  Check out the rules by following the link above! 

Thanks so much to Roni for the great giveaways and challenges on her BlogToLose site.  If you haven't checked out the blog, please do... it is always worth a visit and will encourage you in your weightloss and fitness journey!

Here's to our health! : )

Jan / Healthy Loser Gal

All the news that's pit to frint...

I have a couple of updates to let you all know about… first of all, the Healthy Loser Gal blog has received a few neat awards recently! I’m always grinning ear-to-ear when I see someone has thought enough of the blog to bestow a blog award. Thank you!! I’m like a little kid when it comes to winning things or being give presents, I nearly burst with glee!

Thanks to my Canadian friend at Finding My Weigh who awarded me with not one, but two blog awards.  She’s a great writer and looking to lose weight before going back to work after her maternity leave! (Boy, do I remember THAT feeling!)


For the "One Lovely Blog Award" you need to:
* Thank & link to the person that gave you the award.
* Pass this award on to 15 fantastic bloggers you’ve recently discovered.
* Contact said Blogs and let them know they’ve won

For the "Beautiful Blogger" award you need to:

* Thank & link to the person that gave you the award.

* Pass this award on to 15 fantastic bloggers you’ve recently discovered.
* Contact said Blogs and let them know they’ve won.
* State 7 things about yourself.

I am taking the easy way out on the stating seven things about myself and linking back to TEN THINGS about me from a previous post! :)


I'm also the happy recipient of the "Creative Writer" Blogger Award, thanks to Michelle at A Healthier Me.

The rules of the "Creative Writer" Blogger Award are:

1. Thank the person who gave this to you.
2. Copy the logo and place it on your blog.
3. Link to the person who nominated you.
4. Tell up to six outrageous lies about yourself, and at least one outrageous truth.
5. Nominate seven "Creative Writers" who might have fun coming up with outrageous lies.
6. Post links to the seven blogs you nominate.
7. Leave a comment on each of the blogs letting them know you nominated them.

Six Outrageous Lies & One Outrageous Truth about Me:

1. I had breast implants when I was a freshman in college.

2. President Jimmy Carter and my father went deep sea fishing together.

3. While visiting Finland, I met the then-President of Russia, Mikhail Gorbachev.

4. I once swam the width of an Adirondack mountain lake.

5. My teeth were knocked out in a field hockey accident & I have worn dentures since.

6. I raised chinchillas to earn extra money to help support my son & myself.

7. I am a sharp shooter at the local pistol range & own three small caliber hand guns.

Seven nominated bloggers for the "Creative Writing" Blogger Award:

1. Shannon at Superwoman Spirit : http://www.superwomanspiritblog.com/
2. Fiona at Becoming the Best Me: http://fiona-becomingthebestme.blogspot.com/
3. My pal, Kyra, at A Foodie Gets Fit:  http://kyratx-afoodiegetsfit.blogspot.com/
4. Lil Miss D at 105 in 365:  http://105in365.blogspot.com/
5. Kat at Kat's Adventures in Dietland: http://katdoesdiets.blogspot.com/
6. Patty at A Work in Progress: http://awip.blogspot.com/
7. Bubbly & Fun Diz at Death By Calories: http://mybattlewithbulge.blogspot.com/

A Happy 101 Award... fun! :)

I love being referred to as a "happy person".  That, alone, can make me happy! *grin*  It is true.  So when my blogging friend, Ellen, of Weighting Around passed along the Happy 101 Award to me... well... it made me happy!  Ellen is a fun person and honest and real... her blog is a lot like mine in that we're not terribly strict in what we write about - it is whatever the spirit moves us to blog on.  She has some great recipes, too, so please do check out her Weighting Around blog! Thanks, Ellen, for the Happy 101 Award! :)

Here are the instructions:

1.Copy the image and display it on your blog.
2.List 10 things that make you happy.
3.Try to do at least one of them today.
4.Pass on the award to 10 bloggers who brighten your day

Ten Things That Make Me Happy:
This will be hard 'cause I know myself and know that there are soooo many things that make me happy.  I'm likely to wake up in the middle of the night and think to  myself "oh! I should edit that blog post... this makes me REALLY happy..." lol  But... as of right now... the ten things that immediately pop into my head that make me happy are:

1.  My son.  He is my one and only. He's nearly 24 now and at the point in his life where he's exploring all the options of life.  I love that he is a happy person, too, and will often kind of hop with glee when we're discussing something that excites him.  He'd kill me for saying that, of course, but ... I'm grinning ear to ear thinking of how he makes me happy.
2. Knowing that God "has my back" makes me happy and makes me feel peaceful.  I've gone through some pretty rough patches in my life... I've been a single Mom for 20 years now... I've faced some major illness... two which could have killed me... I've lost my job when I had no other income... and through it all, I knew I would be fine.  I know in my heart that nothing is going to 'best me' as God is my strength and only asks me to trust Him.  And I do. :)

3. Books!  I love to learn new things and am like a sponge when I read books.  I seep up all the info from people who are experts, travel logs, history lessons, optimists, collectors, great cooks, poets, illustrators, wonderful health mentors... I am happiest when I am in the sun, in the summer, a book in my lap, my mind free to lose itself in the book I'm reading.  Heaven! :)
4. Laughter.  Who can't love a person with a good laugh?!  It always makes me happy to hear someone really truly laugh... old or young... a really heartfelt laugh makes me happy! 

5. Losing weight.  I'm pretty focused on my health and weight right now... it makes me happy that I have finally found the fortitude to lose weight and that I am actually healthy.  Getting healthier every single day... THAT makes me happy.  Really happy.
6. Friends makes me happy.  And if you're reading this blog, you are considered one of those friends who make me happy.  You're the people I am on this incredible journey with - we're honest and open with one another - some of us have met in real life, many of us have not, but you are really good friends to me and seeing your words, reading your blogs and tweets and posts on Weight Watchers, all those tiny bits of outpouring of who you are - that makes me happy! Thanks for sharing you!
7. Random acts of kindess.  You know when you see someone reach down and stop someone to call them back and give them the leather glove they dropped that the person didn't know they'd dropped and then you watch and they smile at each other?  Those little acts sometimes make me happy to the point of getting teary eyed.  I try to be of help to others where and when I can, I have - as a result - experienced SUCH kindness from strangers... kindness makes me happy.

8. Letters in the mail from friends and writing to them in turn.  It may be a lost art but I still have a few friends whom I have been life-long friends with, and we write real letters.  I save every one.  I open my mailbox with great anticipation and when one is there, instantly I am happy.
9. Traditions.  I love love love traditions.  I like breaking the wishbone at Thanksgiving and buying a new broom at New Year's.  I like looking for the 1st robin in the Spring and get excited for opening day at Fenway.  Wearing red at Valentine's and orange around Halloween... all these things... they make me happy!

10. Baseball.  I just sat here for 10  minutes and tried to decide whether to list "travel to Ireland" or "baseball" as my last item of this list.  I do really love Ireland and love to travel... I love exploring 'cause I am curious by nature and love to learn about new lands... but BASEBALL.  Darnitall... I really do love baseball.  It makes me happy to see a home run, it makes me happy to read the stats and follow the teams, to know the historical references, to remember collecting baseball cards and trading them with friends (I was a tomboy!), to go to games with my Dad and now with my son.  Baseball makes me happy.  It always has.  I would definitely be waking up in the middle of the night if I didn't add it to this list! *grin*

So there you go, my friends... really a lot more than you'd ever want to know about my happiness triggers.  I could go on and on... I truly could and I realize that I am blessed in so many ways because I have to edit down my list and not scratch my head trying to think of ten things!  (That makes me happy, too!)

Now I get to pass along this award to blogging friends and I'm going to try to break up the list with new bloggers and friends who have an active blog following!  Enjoy the award, gals! : )

A Foodie Gets Fit ~ my friend Kyra, a displaced New Englander in Texas @KyraTx
A Year in the Life, One Picture At A Time - Izabella's new blog
Cunning Mom Christine's weight loss journey
Fighting the Fat: Another War Story -  Diz is the best - just love her & her great blog! :)
I Lost Another Me  Charity's #WeightWatcher journey - she's doing great!
The Big Girl Blog such an inspiring, fun blog... you've probably gotten 1,000 awards; here is another ; )
The Healthie Foodie Ashley's great recipes & blog
Fit this, girl! My pal Mary who always has something new & interesting posted on her blog!
Lady In Weighting - love Alice~ great blogging friend who can hold a plank for nearly 3 mins when I can barely get into the position w/out falling!

"I want to thank the Academy..."

I feel a bit like Sally Field today... remember when she accepted the Academy Award for Norma Rae (or was it for Places in the Heart?) and her acceptance speech of "You like me... you really like me." ?

Well, I am little-girl-giddy-excited that a healthy Twitter friend (Downsized76) has passed along the "Honest Scrap Award" my way! Thank you, Tina! :)

Rules:
1. “The Honest Scrap” award must be shared!
2. The recipient has to tell 10 true things about themselves.
3. The recipient has to pass along this prestigious award to 10 more bloggers.
4. Those 10 bloggers all have to be notified they have been given this award.
5. Those 10 bloggers should link back to the blog that awarded them.

Ohhh the truths I could tell but I'll be good and let the ten things I reveal be about fitness and weight loss and my journey so that I can, hopefully, give others the courage to be truthful in their journey, too.

Heck - if I can't be truthful at this point I am sunk... I've posted my weight on the blog and that was a HUGE wall to have tumble down around me. I often wonder if people who aren't overweight have ANY idea how incredibly scary it is to admit one's weight when it is in the "obese" range of the BMI? How about when you have to admit that you can't register your weight on a regular scale? I never got there but I was well on the way... and that alone kept me from getting there. Sooooo... here we go friends.

1. I collect antique kitchen yellowware bowls and vintage kitchen "stuff"... like tiger maple rolling pins and 1800 pie crimpers, antique wrought iron apple peelers.  I used to have a giant kitchen in an 1855 colonial home and I went semi-crazy at New England antique auctions collecting all this stuff.  And it was all kitchen and food related... hmmmmmm.....   I no longer have that enormous kitchen, however, and rarely use those items which is GOOD 'cause that means I'm not making fancy fattening pies and cakes and cookies weekly. ; )

2. In high school (30 years ago...ack!) I ran track.  Me!  I ran track.  The 440 relay was one of my better events.  I was long legged and lean and fast.  I want to get back to being able to run someday in the next year and I hope I'll enjoy it again!                                                                                                                   
3. Once upon a time I was a life guard.  I had to swim a mile across an Adirondack lake to receive the final test badge and I did it without a problem.  That was after college... and I was really incredibly fit then, too!  I still am a fairly good swimmer but I've let my fears of my adult-onset asthma sometimes get the best of me so I don't push myself to complete laps in a pool like I probably should for fitness.                              
4. I have had near-death experiences and have (obviously! lol) lived to tell the story.  Five years ago I had to have thoracic cardiac surgery as the doctors believed I had lymphoma.  It turns out I had and have (although fairly dormant now) a lymph-disease called Sarcoidosis.  Three summers ago I went into the ER with the worst ear ache imaginable and with what I believed was an asthma attack.  My son drove me despite my protestations that I didn't need to go to the hospital.  Within four hours they'd revealed that the cough and weakness wasn't asthma this time but a blood clot that had traveled to my lung.  A second one had broken a blood vessel in my ear.  I missed death by the breath of my guardian angel's voice whispering in my son's ear to get me to the hospital.  When tested, my right leg was filled with blood clots and I now have an implanted filter that prevents other clots from traveling beyond the artery at hip level.  I was in the hospital for two weeks and have been fine since, thanks be to God! :)

5. People who know me now think of me as a city-girl but I am not at all.  I grew up in very rural upstate New York - right on the border of Vermont and love the country.  My parents were not farmers but nearly everyone else in the town I lived in was.  I can milk a cow, toss a bail of hay, bait a hook, help muck out a horse barn if necessary.  And living in the city has made me cherish a black sky with endless stars that can only be seen in the country.                                                                                                   
6. I have tried Jenny Craig and NutriSystem in the last 20 years and failed miserably on both! And I spent a lot of money at the same time! Weight Watchers is the program for me!  I joined earnestly four years ago... lost about 20 lbs and then had the whole blood clot fiasco!  And then I began to have relationship issues with my fiance... and then that seemed like a good excuse to really gain A LOT of weight. But now, as I look back, I wasn't really ready to lose the weight and get on with my life.  Now I eat veggies and fruit and try new things, experiment with recipes and am really into this being a lifestyle change. And - as a result - I am seeing the weight slip away and I am loving life!

7. I couldn't open my treadmill when I bought it and had 1st unpacked it.  I know this sounds crazy, but it is true!  I had never been on a treadmill  - I had never seen one "open up" from a "slide away" position and I was truly dumbfounded.  I finally had to wait for my son to get home from college on a break for HIM to open the damn thing up! LOL  And then I didn't use it.  If I walked 5 minutes on it at a time I thought I was really 'working' my exercise.  My WW friends were so encouraging during this time- they used to say "5 minutes is great! You're not sitting in front of the tv."  No, but the treadmill was in front of the t.v. and I used to pause and watch more than I walked.  But that was then... and this is now... and I've given that treadmill away to someone who knew how to set it up - wanted it - and I walk outside or at the YMCA!         
8. Embarrassed to go, I joined two separate gyms and never spent one day in either.  No, I didn't join them simultaneously - but within a year of one another.  Both were convenient and close to my house.  I didn't know HOW to approach someone - or couldn't because of my shame over my weight - and ASK how to use the equipment.  I had no idea what any of the equipment did, how to turn on the machines, how to sign up for circuit training.  And I let the fear of asking and the embarrassment of my weight hold me back.  I was the only one judging myself.  The trainers weren't.  They actually LIKE to help newbies and see you progress.                                                                                                                                                    

9. I sing and I dance and I'm a pretty good mimic and a stage actress and I plan to do all of that again! My asthma has changed my ability to sing so that is a bummer but that doesn't mean I can't perform on stage again in comedies or dramas.  I was very active in community theatre not all that long ago (my son was 8 or 9 so maybe it WAS awhile ago - he's 23 now! lol) and I will be doing that again!                                       

10. And finally, dear friends... I have every intention of having upper arms like Michele Obama and Sheryl Crow by next year at this time. And I will not have an extra 'flap' of stomach that - when left to its own devices - would like nothing better than to hang over my panties... You all know what I'm talking about. *grin*

Thanks for the award and for reading my 10 silly facts!  Now I'm off to bestow the Honest Scrap to bloggers whom I've enjoyed reading!  ; )