SlimmingWhirled and stuff

A Christian mother's notes on her battle with weight, MS, and life in general. With a generous helping of optimism and craft-work!

Wednesday, November 30, 2005

Mince pies low syns

Mince pies with a twist (recipe by a good friend of mine)

Pastry
2 shredded wheat
1 oz self rasing flour
1 small pot very low fat toffee flavour yoghurt
4 tablespoons sweetner
2 teaspoons ground ginger
3 teaspoons mixed spice
½ weetabix for rolling
frylight

Filling
Juice of one lemon
One large grated carrot
2 tablespoons sweetner
1 tablespoons mincemeat
2 teaspoons ground ginger
2 teaspoons mixed spice

Method
1. Crush the shredded wheat into tiny pieces and put in a bowl
2. Add the yoghurt and spray several times with frylight
3. Add the flour
4. Add the sweetner and spices
5. Stir well
6. Crush ½ a weetabix and use as you would flour to help ‘roll’ the pastry out without it sticking – best method is to roll it into a ball in your hand and squash as flat as possible (make sure you have some weetabix on your hand first) and then put onto the tray (ie bun type baking tray
7. Squeeze the juice from one lemon into a bowl
8. Add the grated carrot and mincemeat
9. Add spices and sweetner and mix well
10. Fill each ‘pastry’ case with the mix
11. Bake in oven for about 25minutes (or until cases harden) at gas mark 7

Makes approx 9 open top pies
Syn value for entire recipe is 15syns or 8 syns if shredded wheat are taken as healthy extras. (flour 4.5 syns, shredded wheat 3.5 each unless taken as healthy extras, mincemeat 2 syns, ½ weetabix 1.5 syns approx


or more tradional Style


Mince Pies (3.5 syns each)

Ingredients

Frylite for spraying
Pastry
227g/8oz plain flour (i use wholemeal)
pinch of salt
113g/4oz margering/butter
cold water , for mixing
For the Filling
16 level tablespoons mincemeat
1 level tablespoon icing sugar for dusting

Makes 32 tarts (i got 36 out of it)
Syns per tart 3.5 on either days
cooking time approximately 15 minutes.

1/ Preheat oven to 190 c/375 f/ gas mark 5.Lightly spray bun trays with frylite
2/ Make the pastry.Sift flour and salt into a mixing bowl.Add fat , cut into little pieces.Gentely rub it in with your fingertips.Add sufficent cold water to mix to a ball that leaves sides of bowls clean.Rest in refrigerator for 30 minutes.
3/Roll out thinly on a lightly floured surface.Cut our 32 rounds (36 in my case) with a 7.5-cm/3-inch fluted cuter.Use to line prepared bun trays.
4/Divide the mincemeat between pasrty cases.Roll out remaining pastry trimmings and make some stars with a knife or a small cutter.Use to decorate the tops of tarts.
5/Bake in a preheated oven for 15 minutes until pastry is crisp and lightly coloured.Cool on wire rack and lightly dust with icing sugar.

Weight in

Aha im back on track lost 2 lbs this week so loosing half a stone by christmas seems possible now. Total loss of 22.5 lbs now.

Class was a little different this week the men in the club were being photographed by The Gloucestershire Echoe.The photographer said My Husband had a cheeky smile ( which i have to agree with).
Was quite amusing to watch and definately put a smile on my husbands face as he had a little gain this week but he did weigh in jeans which he never does!!

Im now on a mission to cook low syn (slimming world terms) mince pies and im cooking some as we speak watch this space for results. A normal mince pie is 18 syns!!! i was shocked mean't to only have 15 syns a day or less to loose weight.
It now seems i really have to get my thinking cap on for delicious food for my Husband that will help him loose weight. Of course i will be eating it too.

Thursday, November 24, 2005

Tuesday's weigh in

Weigh in had been going well , but i fell completely off the plan and over indulged in bad food and i paid the price this week by putting on 3 lbs (over a 2 week period). So now my weight loss is 20 lbs and 1/2 lb.
I intend to loose atleast 1/2 stone but christmas and so does my husband. So i must get myself into gear and think up some new recipes to tantalise our taste buds.
Well watch this space and see what happens.

How things change

Last night I was looking forward to watching a new series of wildlife programmes by David Attenborough, I so used to enjoy them when was younger - I remember vividly Life on Earth starting. Within ten minutes I switched it off it was full-on evolution and 'this was 1 million years old' etc.

It concentrated so much on this that I felt it lost the primary reason for the programme and that was investigating the animals themselves (life cycles etc).Then I had to remind myself that when I watched these programmes before(many years ago) I wasn't a Christian.

I never really saw these type of programmes as harmful until last night as all they do is deny God throughout. Yet another reminder on how my thoughts on things have changed and how I thanked the Lord last night for allowing me to know him as I do now.
Not going too far off topic, my son loves Dinosaurs so my husband found two great books on them , one called 'Dinosaurs by Design' by Duane T Gish,Gloria Clannin and Earl Snellenberger and the other 'Dinosaurs of Eden' by Ken Ham. They are wonderful and my son thinks they are awesome.

We can still have wonderful books on animals without evolutionary propaganda ruining them.We just have to be careful and watchful what our children read and watch.

Tuesday, November 22, 2005

Saw my neurologist and packed son off for his trip.


On Monday i had a busy day. My son John was going away till wednesday on an activity trip with his school and i was doing all my last minute checking he had everything packed then i had to double check it again before i felt satisfied. My mum and dad were coming down as my hospital appointment was at 12.30 and John had to be in school at this time, so they were taking him and waving him off.
I was meeting my husband at 12.15 so we could both go together for appointment. As we were making our way to hopsital time was disappearing and i just knew we were going to be late, the quick walk my husband said would take 5 minutes turned into a 15 minute march!! Arrived at hospital red faced and 5 minutes late but they were ok about it thankfully.
We didn't have to wait long before we were called in and i explained the new symptoms that my body was experiencing due to my MS. After a quick examination of my lower legs and arms joints he said to me your symptoms are a little weird (that just sums me up lol).
I have stiffness of joints aswell as muscles spasming when they feel like it . So i have been perscribed CARBAMAZEPINE , a very low dosage to start and increasing it over a matter weeks. I am also going to start injecting myself once a week with a product call ANOVEX. I will have to get myself sorted out over my fear of injections.
So all in all i feel good i didn't need to go onto steriods(which i am truly thankful about) and its onwards and upwards.

On a different note tonight is my weigh in at slimming world , i am prepared for a large gain as i only have myself to blame for eating all the wrong things. I am now focused and going to be a 100% on plan until christmas.
I will post later whether i have had a gain or loss so watch this space.

Wednesday, November 16, 2005

Some days are good some are bad


Today is a bad day for me with my MS. I struggled getting out of bed because my arms and legs were stiff and painful, then I put the kettle on and couldnt even pick it up without pain!! Then I couldn't lift up the milk container, and my poor husband had to help me.
The simplest of tasks proved to be a problem - I could only just manange to clean my teeth because of the pain, then the icing on the cake was putting my socks and shoes on, I got there but it took me ages and so frustrating.

Sorry just needed a moan.

One postive thing is my diet is going well so far today , making a quorn chilli for my husband - not to sure what I will do for my son and I.

On a lighter note, here is a picture of my rat, Terrence.

Tuesday, November 15, 2005

My journey

This blog will hopefully be a look at my weight loss journey going to Slimming World. I have a lot to lose and so far have lost 23.5 lbs.