My thoughts on Giveaways

Here is my take on giveaways: I love them. I love to receive (useful and interesting) free things, and I love to give them away. I find a lot of really cool, useful and interesting things, and when I can I like to share them with people; with my family, friends and now my blog readers. I will give away books, herbal or natural products I make, other products, food, services and more. (hint hint: the more is coming up soon!)

One thing that I do ask of you is that if you win something here and you don't need or want it, please let me know so I can give it away to someone else. I don't want you to take something if you really don't want it, and I can give it away to someone else. :-)

Please tell your friends, family and online circles about my blog.

Drumroll Please!

My first Giveaway will be a pair of bus tickets from Boston, MA to Burlington VT leaving Friday 2-22-13 in the morning and coming back Monday 2-25-13 in the evening.

Church Street Marketplace. Click Pic for more info.

For your chance to win 1.) You must be subscribed to my Blog Newsletter and 2.) You must get someone else to subscribe to my Blog Newsletter. That's it! For each person you get to subscribe, your name will be added to the drawing again for a better chance at winning. You can shoot me an email or comment below to let me know which new subscribers you sent my way. So get the word out; tell your Facebook friends, Twitter followers and Email lists to SUBSCRIBE! Here's the link to the signup form: http://eepurl.com/q_hyz.

The contest will end Sunday 12-23-12 and the winner will be announced 12-24-12.

I will also be sending out my FIRST Newsletter this week, so look out for it!

My Healthful Self, Week 4

Week 4 Check-in:

During week 3, I lost 1 lbs. Total lost: 8.6 lbs.

I rode my bike for 1 hour. For breakfast I ate oatmeal with vanilla almond milk, pecans and maple syrup. For lunch I had 4 some steamed potstickers and some Shepard's .Pie. For dinner I ate a meatloaf sandwich with 2 pieces of whole wheat  bread and ketchup. For snacks I had 2 bananas and some granola. I drank 71 ounces of water

Accountability: I have been having difficulty with drinking the 96 ounces, and I have to pee constantly when I do. I think I will change my satisfactory number to be between 64-96.

My Healthful Self, Week 3

Week 3 Check-in:


During week 2, I lost 0.8 lbs. Total lost: 7.6 lbs.

I rode my bike for 1 hour. For breakfast I ate oatmeal with vanilla almond milk, pecans and maple syrup. I ate an early lunch of a baked chicken thigh and some leftover sweet potatoes from Thanksgiving (which means they had a lot of butter and sugar!). I had an early dinner of 2 slices of veggie pizza. For an evening snack, I had a small bowl of cereal and vanilla almond milk. I drank 64 ounces of water today.

Accountability: Even though this pounds-lost-for-the-previous-week number seems really small, I am sincerely happy not to have gained any weight during this long weekend. This past long weekend not only included Thanksgiving, but my Guy's birthday... which meant 4 out of the 7 days included celebratory eating! Today I didn't really want to eat the pizza, but I didn't bring any snacks like nuts or fruit, so when I got hungry in class, I decided to eat my lunch early. I then had to get something else for lunch.

My Healthful Self, Week 2

*I will do a check-in for the first 7 days of this journey, then I will check-in once a week for the rest of the year.

Week 2 Check-in:

During Week 1, I lost 6.8 lbs!

Today I rode my bike for 30 minutes. I ate oatmeal w/strawberries, walnuts and vanilla almond milk for breakfast. For lunch I ate yogurt with granola, a banana, some hot cocoa (vanilla almond milk, cacao powder and cinnamon) and a salad. For dinner I ate whole wheat spaghetti with spinach and mushrooms and marinara sauce. For snack I had almonds. I drank 96 ounces of water.

Accountability: I am incredibly proud of myself for loosing this  much weight in 1 week!

My healthful Self, Day 7

*I will do a check-in for the first 7 days of this journey, then I will check-in once a week for the rest of the year.

Day 7 Check-in:

Today I rode my bike for 30 minutes. For breakfast I ate a "thin" whole-wheat bagel with cream cheese. For lunch I ate cheese, multigrain and flaxseed crackers, and yogurt. For dinner I ate spinach, mushrooms and shrimp with rice. For snacks I drank some Kefir and at a banana. I drank 96 ounces of water.

Accountability: I am trying to stay away from bread, although like pasta, I doubt I will ever give it up. The bagel I ate was about half the size of a regular bagel, so it least the portion size wasn't so bad. I would like eventually try to make my own "cream cheese" by separating the curds from the whey in yogurt.

My Healthful Self, Day 6

*I will do a check-in for the first 7 days of this journey, then I will check-in once a week for the rest of the year.

Day 6 Check-in:

Today I rode my bike for 30 minutes. For breakfast I ate oatmeal with Strawberries, walnuts and vanilla almond milk. For lunch I ate spinach, mushrooms and shrimp with rice. For dinner I ate a small bowl of whole wheat spaghetti with marinara sauce. For snacks I ate almonds and banana. I drank 96 ounces of water.

Accountability: I am trying to stay away from processed foods as much as possible. I will never give up pasta though... so organic whole wheat, and someday homemade will be as good as it gets!

My Healthful Self, Day 5

*I will do a check-in for the first 7 days of this journey, then I will check-in once a week for the rest of the year.

Day 5 Check-in:

Today I rode my stationary bike for 1 hour to make up for not riding yesterday. For breakfast I ate a banana and a bowl of org cereal with vanilla almond milk. For lunch I ate 2 hard boiled eggs and a banana. For dinner I ate org whole wheat spaghetti with marinara sauce. For snack I had cheese and crackers. I drank 96 ounces of water.

Accountability: I did not have a green vegetable today. Also, I ate too many cheese and crackers and I ate them right before bed.