Protein Challenge and My Knee

I went to the ortho yesterday morning and within a minute of me getting to the office, they scooted me right in.  Did my blood pressure (a bit high 153/100 huh), asked a few questions and I was whisked into the x-ray room.  Four pictures later, I was up and back in the room I started in and she got on the computer and within seconds my x-rays were front and center on the monitor for the doctor to see when he got in.

The good news?  My knees are actually in great shape – he pointed out all the space between my knees (I of course was looking at all that muscle – ha!) and he said based on the x-rays, he can’t see what is wrong.  He laid me down and realized it hurt when he tried to straighten my leg all the way flat, and when he pressed on the inside of my knee where it hurts, he said it could be a tendon or meniscus tear – an MRI later this morning will rule that in or out.  I am just glad it doesn’t hurt to walk so I can still get my steps in!  The doctors office was right across the street from my office – my appointment was at 7:45 and I was at my desk at 8:10 – nice!  Although I have to tell you – with Tony having three knee replacements, when I first looked at my x-ray, my first thought was “I can’t wait to show Tony how good my knees look!” 

So I keep playing around with my granola recipe.  I usually use a combo of brown sugar and honey for the sugar component, but decided to see if I could use the same amount of sugar free pancake syrup in place of the honey.  I actually didn’t realize that half a cup of honey is 515 calories and 139 grams of carbs vs. 40 calories and 16 grams of carbs for the sugar free pancake syrup.  I used Aunt Jemima sugar free syrup – I like that as much as I do Smucker’s sugar free.

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I used two squares, or about 1/4 cup of granola for my Chobani breakfast parfait.  I haven’t figured out the stats yet for the granola, but I’ll update it later.

Before I knew it, it was time to hit up the treadmill.  Trisha Yearwood was on The Chew and they were talking about southern comfort foods, and she made a really good pulled pork in the crock pot that looked good – it’s vinegar based which is the way I like it!  The 2.5 miles went by in a blink!

You have to read my brother’s latest blog post about joining the gym and using the treadmill – it’s so funny!  Go ahead, go check it out and then come back and finish reading.  I’ll wait.

So since Hannah was picky about the shrimp in the shrimp lo mein dish I made the night before last, I didn’t want it to go to waste, so it was the base of my picky plate – I love plates like this – a little bit of this, a little bit of that.  It’s perfect to eat at work because you just take a bite of something, do a bit of work – it seems to take forever to eat too.

Since I was heading back to the gym, I had my new go-to workout snack – banana/honey almond butter/walnuts!  Sweet, salty – the perfect amount of carbs before I did strength and more cardio.  FYI, I never take insulin with this snack, and by the time I finish working out, my blood sugar is usually around 125 – nice!

So I have been doing about half of the strength workouts lately – basically all the upper body ones and skipping the lower body because of my knee.  So guess what?  I am getting pretty strong! Yesterday I had a PR and did 5 sets of ten reps each and used a 30 pound barbell!   I used the new layout on Instagram for the photo below – I need to figure out all the options I have with that app – I am all about the apps!

Then I finished off with another 2.5 on the treadmill – this time watching Chip and JoJo on HGTV – I wish someone would come gut my house and make it pretty like they do!

The kids meal planned nachos for themselves for dinner last night – I borrowed some of their taco meat and made a taco salad – ground sirloin, 1/4 of an avocado, red pepper, cucumber, corn, black beans with ranch and Tapatio hot sauce.  I literally could eat this every day and not get sick of it.  Lookie me getting all fancy with the cilantro with the fork!

I got an email yesterday from my friend Karli who is part of the beef.org/Beef It’s What’s For Dinner/Beef Checkoff organization and they are starting a 30 Day Protein Challenge.  Basically to make people more aware of how lean and healthy proteins can be a great part for a heart healthy diet.  You all know I love beef, so I was on board for sure.  You can join and check out more information here, and I’ll be talking about protein in blog posts to come.   I didn’t know anything about this protein challenge before yesterday morning, and all of my meals for the day were already planned.  Their goal of the challenge is to have people eat at least 30 grams of protein each meal.  Well guess what?  Each and every one of the meals above was right around 30 grams of protein!  The best part is that because my meals were so high in protein, I find myself fully satisfied after I eat, and I am not thinking about snacking in between at all.  In fact, my lunch only came in at 311 calories but had 30 grams of protein, and I had to force myself to eat my pre-workout snack three hours after I ate lunch.

Question of the Day:  Do you have any idea how many grams of protein you eat a day?  What’s your favorite source of protein?  Mine of course is lean beef, but beans are my second favorite.

And I got my steps in and then some!

Wish me luck on my MRI – make it a great day!