My journey thru cervical cancer

So as the title explains I will be blogging about this new journey we are going through. I will be posting a week at a time with a little from each day starting in a post or 2.

First I will be giving you all the backstory that leads me to the seat I currently fill. The second post with be filled with the misdiagnosis, correct diagnosis and my first week living with this invader I have named junior.

I know not many will read this nor care and thats ok. Someone may read this and it might help them and that is a great thing, however I have decided to do this for me simply as a way to process and deal with everything that I am going through.

Veggie Straws Vs Great Value Regular wavy chips

Ok so hubby and I had a recent conversation about an article he saw that says veggie straws are just as bad if not worse than regualr chips. He doesn't remember where he saw the article but didn't see any reference to any actual amounts. He looked at me and said "looks like something you can look into for a blog post or a vlog." So lets take a look and see what we can find that might be the same and what might be different between the two. For this comparison we will be looking at Veggie Straws with sea salt with sweet potato added (we got ours from Samsclub) and a bag of Great value original potato chips (the red bag).

So there is the front of the bag. Sorry for the crumpled great value chips the kids had already started eating them prior to me deciding to write this. Ok so here is a picture of the backs so we can see the nutritional information and then we will start comparing them.

Ok so now that you can see everything for yourself so you can see where my information is coming from.

Ok so based on that chart you get more veggie straws per serving, less calories, less total fat, less saturated fat, and less protein than a standard chip. However you are getting more sodium and 1 more gram of carbs than standard chips.

So I 'm not sure which would be worse healthwise. Maybe if you are trying to watch your sodium intake then the Great Value would be a better choice. For me I prefer the veggie straws. While it says they have more sodium they don't taste as salty to me or as greasy.

So one last test lets lay one of each chip on a napkin and see how much grease transfers from chip/straw to napkin after 5 minutes.

Ok so after 5 minutes we can see there is slightly more grease on the right from the standard chip but not much of a difference. Sorry my daughter decided she was going to help and that Poppy needed to help out too.

So after seeing the nutritional info I would still choose to eat veggie straws over regular chips. Which do you prefer? Does this info change your thoughts on which you would choose?

Grocery Store Comparison. Adli vs Food lion

Is it better to drive the 20 minutes across town in the traffic and deal with a bunch of people? Let's see if it is by comparing Adli vs Food Lion's prices on store brand items that compare in size.

                                          vs        

So as I family of six I have to look at where I can get the most for my buck. So here is what I did today. I went to the new Aldi store that opened here and bought some things I needed. Well since they don't carry everything I need I also had to make a stop at Food Lion on the way home. So I priced the same sized items and did store brand vs store brand on everything except the bugels and little sausages since those you can't get store brand anywhere else.

Here is a picture of everything I got today at Aldi. My total today after the $5 coupon from their grand opening with taxes came to $31.15

So lets see how they compare.... Prices below are for single items with exception to the ground turkey. I have to buy 2 of those at Aldi to equal the weight of 1 at Foon Lion so price for it at Aldi is for 2. Also the totals below are without taxes

So by looking at that we can see that by getting these items at Aldi over Food Lion the amount difference was $12.25 in savings. I think that makes it totally worth the drive accross town and dealing with the people for that kind of savings and this was just some things we needed.

2016 coming to an end time to plan for 2017

Well as 2016 is coming to and end it is time to start planning forward to the year to come and all of the new things tha it will bring. This year has been yet another yo-yoing year with the weight loss so it is time to work on changing that.

So a little back story about me. See I have pcos which has several side effects and one of those is making it harder for me to lose weight. I started trying to lose weight in 2012 which was 2 years after our youngest was born and I knew that we were done having kids. Well after 4 kids,  the miscarriages and the etopic pregnancy I had gained just over 100 pounds. When I got married I weighed 145 and after the kids I was at 245. I decided to start losing weight in 2012  and for a while I was doing great. I was doing really great with it.  I did great until I decided to give up smoking when I was down to 175 well after I quit the weight started coming back. Let the yo-yoing begin.

It is hard to lose weight when you get on that scale each Monday and it shows a gain even after working your tail off all week. It is really hard to stay positive and want to keep going. I started to give up and I tried off and on until Feburary 2015 to lose the weight until I got sick. After a brief hospital stay and surgery I came home to recover and I lost it. I lost the desire to work out to keep trying when all it did was lead to failure time and time again. It was easier to just not try.

Well not trying will never get me anywhere. While I have the most supportive husband one can ask for who tells me all the time that he loves me and that he didn't marry me based on my size and that no matter what size I am, how red or acne filled (yes more side effects) my face gets that he will always love me.

While he may be ok and love me as I am I am not ok with it. I don't like how I look and while I am willing to accept that I may never lose a bunch of weight I want to be healthy. I know that pcos can lead to some nasty health issues as life goes on and honestly I don't want my family to have to deal with those. So all of that being said I want to start working on losing some weight or at least making the insides of me healthier if the outsides never change.

So starting in 2017 I want to start working on making me healthier and plan to start easy. I am thinking of starting and ending my day with 25 squats and using potty breaks to do 25 squats each time too. Then because of my weight nothing to crazy just doing simple walking. Time to break ok the walking dvds and just start. Also I am thinking of trying to start following a diet plan that cuts out sugar. Not sure what it is called but that is ok. It is only the 8th so I have over half a month to work on finding recipes and meal plans.

Time to work on getting healthier in 2017. Good luck to everyone who is trying to start the new year to change how they are living and working on making themselves better.

Cheesey ham and hashbrown casserole

This is a quick and easy recipe. I love to make this after having a big ham or just some leftover ham from a previous meal. It is quick and easy and oh so yummy.

Ok so here is everything you need except I forgot to take a picture of the ham, tomatos and seasonings. lol

So here is the easy part you just put the hash browns (still frozen) in the bottom of a casserole dish

Then just open and dump everything else into a bowl and mix it up. Doesn't look good here but it will look better and tastes so good. I do add eggs also. I put 6 eggs but u could do more or less if you choose. I also add a little salt, peper, and garlic powder but again with the seasonings you can do it to your tastes.

Now just dump it all ontop of the potatoes and bake in the oven at 350 degrees for around 30 minutes or until it  is set and warm.

 
Now just dish it up and eat as is or add some salsa and/or sour cream.

Crunchwraps

So we used to eat out more before we had 4 kids and we used to love going to Taco bell and getting crunchwraps. Well now it is to expensive so I just make a version at home. So here we go....

So we need cooked ground meat, taco seasoning (prepackaged or homemade), refried beans, shredded cheese, cheese sauce  (optional), large burrito size torillas, corn tostadas, beans and corn miture and then toppings of choice.

Step 1. smear some refried beans on the middle of the tortilla and a little cheese sauce..

Step 2.  Put on the bean/corn and meat mixture and sprinkle with shredded cheese. 

Step 3. Place on a tosta shell

Step 4. Fold the buritos shell

Step 5. Place on griddle brown the folded side then flip and brown other side.

Step 6. Serve and eat

Not the normal Banana muffins or Bread

So we have all looked and seen basically the same recipes for banana nut muffins or bread. There is usually very little change to the recipe and well I decided I didn't like that idea so I decided to change it up a bit. So I made one and have made regular sized muffins, mini muffins, jumbo muffins, shaped muffins and loafs of bread. The only thing that varied from one to the next was baking times the batter is always the same.

 

So this is how I made mine....I started with all of the wet stuff in the mixer. ( I goofed and added the sugar at this point too)

Mix all of that 

Then add all the dry ingredients at once.

Just mix it all up and then your ready to go.

Put into your prepared pans. I did these jumbo pans....

and these shaped  but they are the size of a standard muffin...

and we did some mini muffins too...

Then just let them bake...

And then out to cool

oh and I made a few loaves also. 

One set of the batter will not produce all of these. This was the recipe multiplied. lol The regular recipe should give you roughly 12 muffins of standard size, 6 large or jumbo muffins or 1 loaf.

So on to the recipe. This has several optional items also....

3 large bananas
1/4 cup pumpkin or 2 eggs
1/3 cup butter (I have done melted and non melted and both worked)
3/4 cup sugar
1 tsp baking powder
1 tsp baking soda
1 1/2 cups all purpose flour
1 tsp pumpkin pie spice or check the *** below

So here r the optional things

If you want to add salt 1/2 tsp (I do not add it and they are fine.)
1/2 cup chopped nuts
2 Tbsp flax seeds
3/4 cup quick oats plus a little for the top
chocolate. I put batter in half way ad some chocolate then more batter to give a chocolate layer in the middle.

***
If you don't have pumpkin pie spice you can mix cinnamon, allspice, nutmeg, cloves for the same taste. I add the pie spice and then some extra cinnamon and all spice

Also you can replace some of the flour with wheat flour with no issue.

Bake at 350 degrees until golden brown. I won't give you times since depending which your making and how your oven bakes times can be different.