Day 6=Success

The last FULL day of vegan week (I still had a half day left to go) was a success.  I stayed vegan AND stayed under my daily calorie count goal.  My bagel obsession continued as did the hummus, but I threw in a little pasta, and another Cliff bar.  I was definitely looking forward to Monday night when I could consume non-vegan foods again. 

So Close, 'til things got a little (Goat) Cheesey

Sorry for the delay in blogging.  Work was a little busy.  Anyway, Saturday of vegan week was not quite successful.  I consumed a little goat cheese.  I had made plans ages ago to go out to lunch with my mother and my godmother.  The place we were going has DELICIOUS wraps.  I love them, but of course they are not vegan.  So I ordered a salad instead, which was also delicious, but it had goat cheese on it.  And I did not eat all of it, but I confess I had a few bites.  Otherwise, I had a successful day consisting of things like Cliff bars, rice, pita chips, and of course hummus.  By the way, I'm still enjoying hummus, but I have cut back SLIGHTLY. 

A Little Willpower

For the most part, I have been successful in my vegan week attempt, but that has largely been because I planned and shopped accordingly.  Well, day 5, my fiancé had an errand to run after work and there is a restaurant he likes near where the errand was.  He asked if I wanted to go out to dinner.  Normally, such a thing would thrill me, but instead I peeked at the menu and the only vegan thing on it wasn't anything I liked.  So instead we ran the errand, then  he ordered a pizza and I had my rice.  I was so close to being done with vegan week, I couldn't quit now.  Willpower.  I also found out Sun Chips were vegan (not all flavors, but one kind I like is) and enjoyed some of those.  I peeked at a few other restaurants in the area, and really there aren't a lot of options for vegans, which makes me wonder, do they not eat out a lot?  Do restaurants make special stuff that they just don't post on their on-line menus?  I really don't know.   I don't know if there are any vegan restaurants in the area.  I know they exist, but not sure if they are close by. 
On an unrelated note, most sweets that I enjoy are not vegan, but I broke down and had Oreos this week.  (They are vegan!).  I'm not usually a big Oreo fan and truth be told, I rarely have them in the house.  However, I do like Oreo balls (you mash up Oreos, mix them with cream cheese, roll them into balls, then dip them in chocolate--they are delish).  I made Oreo balls for a friend's birthday a few weeks ago and had one unopened roll of Oreos left so I gave in to my sweet tooth and had two.   

Help, I think I need a hummus intervention!

Ever since I began vegan week, I have been eating hummus like it's going out of style:  I have it at lunch, for snack, sometimes even at dinner (with pita chips each time).  I mean it's gotta be better for me than the junk I usually eat, but I think I am out of control, I need an intervention.  I am also hooked on bagels.  I have had one for breakfast every day since vegan week began and I confess I even had one for dinner on days 4 and 5.  Day 4 was because I was being lazy and day 5 was because I was short on time.  I got home from work after 5:30 and had to leave for ballet by 6:30 so with limited time a bagel was an easy solution.  I miss my cream cheese, but I'm doing all right.  I'm not doing so well with coming up with exciting vegan dinners.  So far vegan dinners have been:  rice, pasta, bagels, and vegan pizza. Not terribly original or exciting, but I'm a picky eater.  Lunches continue to be salads, which is normal, but as I said in a previous blog, I've had to watch the dressing choices.  Oh, well,  only a couple of days left to go.  In the mean time, if you run into me any time soon, lock up your hummus and bagels.   

Vegan Week Continues: Day 3

So not gonna lie, I was a little worried about day 3 because I didn't have to work.  Would all the snacks in the kitchen be too tempting during my free time?  Turns out not so much because I got rid of a lot of the junk in the house a couple of weeks ago.  Sure there is still some candy lying around leftover from Christmas presents I received, but I wasn't craving any.  Also, it turns out one of the hot chocolates someone gave me is vegan so I could still enjoy a hot chocolate after shoveling, I just had to mix it with water instead of milk.  Sorry, but I am not doing fake milk.  As you probably know, one of the main reasons I could never go vegan for real is because of the dairy factor (okay, and to some extent the seafood too, but mostly the dairy).  Anyway, late in the afternoon after a little shoveling, I decided to try the vegan-friendly hot chocolate.  It was good, but it would have been better with milk instead of water.  Oh, well.  Dinner required some careful planning.  Apparently, not all pasta sauce is vegan so a couple of days ago, I found some that was and bought that since the one I had contains cheese.  Also, I MIGHT have unintentionally had a non-vegan drink.  I had a glass of wine on Tuesday night in celebration of not having to work the next day.  Well, I really didn't think wine had any animal products.  I've been to a winery before and they didn't show anything that came from animals, but on the other hand, they don't have to list the ingredients like foods and non-alcoholic drinks so I did some research (too little too late) and I cannot be certain one way or the other.  All I could gather was that it was possible it was not vegan, but not definite.  Foods/drinks I was uncertain about I looked up ahead of time, but really wine?  I guess I just didn't think it would have any animal in it, that'll teach me not to look things up!  So if I did indeed cheat, I swear it wasn't on purpose, it was just stupidity.     

The Fake Vegan Day 2

So Monday night was easy enough since I didn't start eating vegan until dinner.  Tuesday was an all day affair.  I had a close call, but I succeeded.  Breakfast is easy because there are vegan bagels and though I love cream cheese, I can easily swap it out for vegan friendly apple butter or peanut butter and a glass of juice.  Lunch isn't bad either because I usually have a salad.  I just sadly had to give up my honey mustard dressing and croutons.  And I've been eating pita chips and hummus lately so that wasn't a problem.  And I had some grapes too.  Later in the day though someone came by with delicious looking frosted brownies.  I REALLY wanted one, BUT (be proud people!) I found some will power and said no thank you.  Maybe there's hope for me yet.  Snack time=banana, more pita chips, and hummus.  Dinner=the leftover veggie pizza and yes, sadly, a few more pita chips and hummus (I think I've replaced my sugar addiction with pita chips and hummus).  And I've been drinking water instead of my usual milk at dinner.  Overall, not a bad day, but I ate way too many pita chips--put me over my daily calorie count.  I can't believe I just bored you with a post about everything I ate.  You may never want to read my blog posts again.  Maybe for the rest of the week, I'll try to sum things up instead or throw in some wedding talk or a funny story.  Speaking of weddings, I have my first dress fitting in a few weeks so maybe that'll inspire me to keep eating healthy.  I'm home from work today on a snow day (Wednesday as this won't post 'til tomorrow) so I'm hoping to do some honeymoon research and peek on-line for shoes for the big day.  That's about it for wedding news right now.  We're at the 6 month mark now though.  Woohoo!       

Fake Vegan Night 1

Vegan Night 1:  Okay, I'll warn you the next few blog posts might be boring since they're all about food.  I began attempting to eat vegan on Monday night.  It wasn't bad.  Did you know they make vegan pizza?!?!  I didn't know that until I went to the grocery store on Monday after work.  It's actually quite good.  And though I miss my milk, water was fine.  Dessert=banana, yum.  One night down, six to go. 

The Fake Vegan Strikes Again

So the day after I ate the non-vegan veggie burger, I began eating vegan foods again.  I did it for 2 1/2 days.  Not quite the 1/2 week I wanted, but gosh darn it I tried, that veggie burger really messed me up.  Let's just say thank goodness for fruit, pita chips, and hummus.  Apparently, Fritos and most bagels are vegan too so I enjoyed those immensely.  Of course those aren't necessarily healthy, but it kept me vegan.  I decided on Saturday that since my dinner plans for one night the following week fell through, I am going to go vegan Monday night--next Monday afternoon.  Despite not having Super Bowl plans for the first time since...since I don't know when, maybe since I was a teenager, my fiancé and I decided to eat junk while watching the game.  Yeah, we're crazy, I know, but such is life.  So wish me luck with vegan week take two. 

@ Natalie, I think if I would give up the sweets, I'd be able to lose weight, but I have such a darn sweet tooth, but feel free to e-mail for FB tips.  :)