In my experience, losing weight is might harder in your thirties than your twenties.  I gained quite a bit of weight at the end of college.  And then I continued to gain when I started working.  I eventually said enough is enough and easily lost close to 40 pounds.  I barely remember what I did to lose it.  I started doing some moderate exercise, started paying a little more attention to what I was eating.  That was about it. I don't remember it being difficult at all.  Before I knew it, I was back to a very healthy weight again.

This time around, several years later, not so much.  I started eating out less and less, and cooking in more and more.  I started running (jogging) several times a week.  I went to the gym.  I continued to gain.  I finally tried the South Beach Diet and it worked.  Here are the top four things I changed that helped me lose weight over the last year:

1. I replaced my usual cereal (bran flakes, shredded wheat, rice krispies) with quiche and turkey bacon.  I make the quiche with egg beaters so my cholesterol go out of control.  I use the South Beach Vegetable Quiche Cups to Go recipe. I bring 2 with me to work each morning and heat them up in the microwave.  My co-workers are always commenting how amazing they smell and wishing they had them.
2. I greatly reduced the number of carbs with dinner.  I stopped eating large plates of pasta, white rice, bread and started eating a lot more meat and vegetables.  As a result I've actually greatly expanded my horizons and come across some really great recipes as a result. 
3. I replaced my usual sandwich for lunch with leftovers from dinner the night before.  We make some great dinners and we always cook an extra serving of everything so I can have some for lunch the next day.  As with the quiche, I get comments several times a week how amazing my lunch looks and smells.  It's funny how people are so jealous of my "diet" food.
4. I found other ways to satisfy my chocolate/sweets cravings.  I always have  fudgsicles (of the no sugar added variety) in the freezer and occassionally make chocolate milkshakes in the blender with unsweetened cocoa and artifical sweetener (splenda).  This really helped me get over the hump of the terrible cravings at the beginning.

What has your weight gain/loss experience been in your thirties?  What are some things that worked for you?

With tonight's dinner we made a side of roasted vegetables.  Yellow squash, zucchini, onion, green pepper (we didn't have red on hand).  The squash and zucchini came from my garden (specifically those in the picture below).  We also threw the home-grown tomato into a salad.  My boyfriend said the veggie dish tasted even better than usual.  I said it was because I grew the veggies.  :)  Maybe?

We chopped up the veggies, put on a bit of extra virgin olive oil, mixed in some roasted garlic and herb seasoning and put in the oven at 425 degrees for about 20-25 minutes.  Super easy, super tasty side dish.  Looking forward to leftovers in my lunch  :)

I never had a passport until about two years ago.  I didn't have any particular trips in mind or planned, but thought it would be a good idea to have in case my boyfriend and I wanted to go out of the country.  We actually haven't gone on many trips in our nearly 4 years together so I was just being optimistic, I suppose. 

This past week we went on our second significant trip together (last summer we went to Cape Cod, MA).  A few months ago we were asked by a couple of friends if we wanted to go on a trip with them.  We said yes right away and got to planning.  We went around and around on ideas, which is bound to happen with 4 people involved and nearly infinite possibilities. 

We finally settled on heading to Canada.   We called it our  "Fantastic Canadian Voyage".  We first travelled to Niagara Falls and then to Toronto.  Niagara was the half-way point to Toronto so we stopped there for 2 days.  We saw the falls during the day, the falls lit up at night, ate at the rainforest cafe while sitting next to a large aquarium, hung out at Margaritaville, and walked for pretty much two days straight.  We also ate dinner one night at a brazilian steakhouse called Copa Cabana.  If you ever have the opportunity to eat at a brazilian steakhouse and you like meat, I highly recommend you go.  It's quite the experience.  Men come around with large slabs of various kinds of delicious meats and cut a piece off for you.  They keep coming until you tell them to stop and take requests.  They also came around with grilled pineapple with some sort of spice (cinnamon and/or brown sugar, I don't remember, but it was delicious) for "dessert".

We were in Toronto for the three days after that and bought a city pass.  The pass included 5 different tourist attractions and was a real deal compared to if you paid for each of the 5 attractions individually.  Day 1 we just walked around and toured on our own and went to Gretsky's for dinner.  The next day we went to a castle called casa loma, went to the Royal Ontario Museum, and then that night we went to the cn tower (amazing view!).  The third day we hit up the Toronto zoo where I took over 200 photographs of the various animals.  That evening went went to the ballpark and watched a Blue Jays vs. Rays game. 

All in all it was an amazing trip.  We were busy the entire time and pretty tired, but it was the good kind of tired.  We made a lot of great memories with our friends and we were all very sad to see the week end.  I plan to be back soon to post some more pictures so stay tuned...

I just wanted to provide an update that yes, I actually am getting edible goods from my garden.  Pretty tasty goods, too  :)  Tomatoes and cucumbers are doing well.  Yellow squash and zucchini, not so much.  At least not yet.

This past weekend my parents met my boyfriend's parents for the very first time.  We hosted a little barbeque and I was incredibly nervous.  Nervous about being hostess, and nervous about all the parents meeting.  Would they get along?  Would it be awkward?   

I am a perfectionist and was freaking out about everything.  There was pouring rain for a couple of days beforehand so I was upset that my flowers weren't looking their best.  I was worried about what we were going to serve.  When we were at the grocery store gathering supplies I wanted to get chicken, ground beef, and sausage so people would have a choice.  I wanted to do pulled pork and baby back ribs so that I'd be sure everyone would be able to have exactly what they wanted.  My boyfriend eventually convinced me that 2 options was plenty.  We settled for BBQ chicken and cheeseburgers.  I was worried our sides and appetizers weren't fancy enough.  I wanted to buy a million different types of drinks so that, again, everyone would have exactly what they wanted.  I was freaking out about the house not being clean enough.  Everything had to be perfect.  I am like this with most things.  I get very upset if I don't live up to perfection.  And since I'm not perfect, I get upset a lot! 

Now that it's all over, I can breathe again (until next time).  And I am happy to report that everything went better than I could have imagined.  Our parents clicked immediately.  Everyone was really happy with the appetizers, drinks, main meat choices, and side dishes.  The food was cooked to perfection.  The weather was perfect and the yard actually looked really good.  We sat outside for hours and hours and we didn't stop laughing until it was time for everyone to head home after an apple pie and vanilla ice cream dessert.

I am certain there will be many more such get-togethers in our future.  In fact, my parents have already invited everyone over to their lake house later this summer.

Do you have a good story to share of your parents meeting the parents of your significant other?