My Glass is Half Full. Is Yours?

I just want to start off by saying peanut butter multigrain Cheerios are my new favorite thing. It's like Peanut Butter Crunch for adults! (minus the roof of your mouth being cut up and the weird coating that comes along with it)

I made my pineapple angle food cake last night. I'll admit it wasn't as good as I had remembered, but it was still yummy! I think the difference may have been the brand of cake mix I used. I don't remember what I had used before (Betty Crocker or something?), but I bought Target's brand this time. It comes out much more dense then a normal angel food cake which is why the serving looks a little small, but it is totally satisfying!

Pineapple Angel Food Cake

1 serving with berries and light cool whip

That delicious looking plate you see above is approx 200 calories. (166 for the cake, 20ish for the cool whip and that leaves you 14 available for berries. I think 200 is a good guesstimate) It was a perfect sweet treat after a ho hum day.

I had mentioned a couple days ago that if you cut the cake into 20 pieces each serving is only 100 calories (I saw the suggestion reading a recipe for it online) but now that I've made it again I think 1/20 would be a bit small. You can kind of see the cake cut into the 12 slices in the first picture. If it's for a party and meant as just a taste then it would be perfect, but I know a piece that small would leave me wanting more! (but then again, that's how I got fat in the first place...)

I've come to terms with the fact that I gained most of the weight I had lost during the cabbage soup diet back. I mean, what did I expect? I barely eat for a week, then start loading up on carbs and cheese as soon as it's over. The weight won't magically stay off. But that's ok. I've still lost 2lbs since the week before, and I'm sure that's a more permanent weight loss then eating like a rabbit for a week. All that diet did for me this time was to cause me to go way over board with eating unhealthy food once the week was over. Most of that was my mindset though. Like I mentioned before, I did the same diet to kick off my weight loss journey in January with much success. It got me out of bad habits and off sugar and caffeine and I lost 12.5lbs that I kept off. This time, not so much. Meh, you win some you lose some.

It's beautiful out today. Lillie is on the deck basking in the sunshine, and my half weeded garden looks awesome. I can't wait to see it when it's done. Yesterday and today I'm focusing on the inside of my house. It had been a little neglected while I was playing in the yard. My fridge and oven have never been so clean! Cleaning my fridge and freezer also gave me the opportunity to clear out a bunch of food I don't want anymore. I tell ya, I have a lot of food in this house for 1 person. Working in a grocery store I'm always like "Oh, Fiber One brownies on sale?! Heck yea!" then I'll eat one of the 12 pack and they'll sit on my fridge. I have 5 kinds of mustard, 6 salad dressings and about 8 different sauces and marinades. That doesn't even count the standards like ketchup, relish, mayo, BBQ sauce... Why do I have so much STUFF?! I don't even like mustard that much!

I am so happy I'm enjoying taking care of my house. It was always such a chore to do anything in my darker days. Don't get me wrong, I wasn't a very happy camper scraping a mystery crust off the bottom of my fridge yesterday, but I did it, and it looks awesome now! It still amazes me sometimes how different life is when you're not depressed. I just thought that's how I was; lazy, sloppy, unmotivated, ungrateful, miserable... but that's not me. I wasted so much time living that way, not realizing how depressed I really was or even considering the possibility that there was another way to live! I assumed other people were happy because they were prettier, made more money, had someone who loved them, or had a better job. But in reality it's all in the way you perceive things. Seeing the glass half full instead of half empty.

I can look out the window now and smile, content with the fact that I weeded half my garden and it's going to look awesome when I finish. Seeing the beauty of life, and myself, imperfections and all. The old me would have looked out the window and felt guilty, anxious and like a failure because I only got half done. Then I would continue to look out the window day after day feeling horrible about myself for not doing it, beating myself up about it and calling myself names. Then I'd turn around and turn on the TV to distract myself from my own thoughts, or grab a bowl of ice cream to cheer myself up. Because a smile for 10 minutes is better then no smile at all, right?

I wasted way too much of my life living this way. It's weird starting over again at 26. This week I have done so many things I've never done before. I had never weeded a garden, never completely taken apart my fridge to clean, never cleaned my oven (it's even a self cleaning oven!) and I'm thinking to myself, "God, I've lived her for almost THREE years and I've never done any of this before? WTF have I been doing this whole time!?" It makes me sad to think about.

But now is a time for learning and growth. For expanding my horizons and taking responsibility for bettering my own life. And most importantly, enjoying it along the way! So, here's to being content with whatever progress you're able to make today working towards a brighter tomorrow. Here's to enjoying the morning birds' songs, smiling at the flowers and taking a moment to soak up the sun. Here's to LIFE!