Day 8: Containers! Containers!

It's Day 8 of the challenge and it is going well. I have slept harder then I have in my entire life (that I can remember) and have begun to feel a little lighter. It is certainly a challenge NOT making my coffee each morning. It is my first thought upon waking!

The hardest part has definitely been making sure I am eating a healthy snack/meal every 2/3 hours. With a crazy busy schedule this sometimes entails inhaling hard-boiled egg whites and blueberries! (I recommend not mixing the two!)

There have been some ups and downs but it is getting easier to make sure I have all of my needed food prepared and ready to go before a busy day out and about.

This evening (Sunday) I began preparing food for the week. One of the things that I didn't do last week was to make sure any fruit that needed to be cut up (strawberries, etc.) was ready. This was a mistake because, as we all know, fruit doesn't stand the test of time, or even a week. I really hate throwing food away so this week I made sure to have all that type of fruit cut and into containers for easy access.
I also switched from brown rice to quinoa, for something different. I roasted carrots, sweet potatoes, chicken and asparagus, hard boiled eggs, cut up peppers and celery for snacks. chopped fresh garlic and scallions (to add to fish/chicken and kale cooked during the week), and made a turkey and bean soup.

My refrigerator is also stocked with mixed greens, hummus, egg whites, bananas and oranges. All of this preparation will PAY off and I will be able to attack this clean eating challenge! Each morning I will grab containers (yes...more containers) and make balanced meals from the food I already prepared. For dinner, when I am home, I will most likely make a fish and vegetable. All you need to do is put in the work Sunday to get ready for at least the first 4 days of the week. I definitely had to force myself to do it because MAN I am tired! It is totally worth the effort though.

As for how I did after my "prepared" food from last week ran out... let's just say I ate A LOT of egg whites! I think I had about 8 per day Thursday, Friday and Saturday! Remember this is all trial and error. I also did make a grocery trip Friday because I had a friend over and couldn't serve her egg whites! I made steamed kale and chicken sauteed with onions and peppers. She loved it and felt great that it was SO good for us.

I will admit that I had a glass of wine Saturday with that same friend but after eating my best all week, I made peace with that decision. It is all about living life. We can't be perfect all of the time and no one ever asked us to be. We can only move forward, one day and one moment at a time.

Let's raise our WATER GLASSES to another great week to come! We are so lucky to have this life. Let's make great choices!