12 Weeks & First Coffee

As of yesterday, I am 12 weeks post-op! Most important thing about that is... I can have coffee again!! Whooo hoooo!! This is a pic of me enjoying a dark cherry mocha frap yesterday at Starbucks with my friend Christine. It was good! :)

I definitely noticed it was sweeter than things I am used to now, so next time I might go for a plain coffee frap, or just ask for less syrup. I am so glad I didn't get whipped cream, I think it would have killed me lol.

In other news, my official weigh in at 12 weeks is:

247 pounds. Yay! I am happy with this. Total loss of 63 pounds at 12 weeks!! So happy that I keep going down. That's an overall average of 5.25 pounds per week. However, the speed really varies. Things picked up when I started my protein shakes and I went down 12 lbs in 2 weeks. I weighed in at 251 on the 1st so I guess it's been 4 pounds the last 2 weeks. I don't even care! Haha I'm just so happy that it keeps going down and I'm really in no rush. Also I really have not worked out other than about 1-2 days a week the past two weeks... life has just been SO busy! I am going to be getting back on the wagon this coming week for sure... and I'm having another yard sale tomorrow which is a lot of work so that will be good exercise too :)

I do kind of hope to get to 240 by our 3 month doctor's appointment which will be August 24th. If not, that's okay too, because hey I am happy! I truly have until Sept 10th to reach 240 in regards to my original goal. When I had surgery I thought, I would like to be 240 again (my typical low weight) by the time I go to my friend Stacey's wedding on September 10th. When I set that goal, I thought it was pretty unrealistic! I mean 70 lbs lost in 3 1/2 months? But look, I am only 7 pounds away and almost a month left to go :) That just feels awesome!!

My official 3 months is coming up on August 20th and I hope to be able to put together a slideshow of comparison photos (not the official ones, but the real-life photos) for 3 months - and plan to do the same at 6 months, 9 months, and a year :)

Life is good y'all!

For those of you who know April - She called me from Mexico yesterday to say she is doing well, surgery went great, and she is feeling good except for gas pains up in her shoulders - ouch. I will be able to see her on Monday when she gets home!

Starbucks Chicken & Hummus Snack Plate

I thought I already posted this but I guess I didn't! I tried a different snack plate at Starbucks - the Chicken on Flatbread with Hummus. This is a lower calorie, higher protein snack plate than the Protein Plate. I absolutely LOVE this snack plate. It's delicious.

The chicken strips in this snack plate are very flavorful and tender - absolutely delicious. The veggies included are cherry tomatoes, carrot sticks, and cucumber sticks - that's right those are cucumber! The hummus is really good too.

I am able to eat all the chicken and a couple veggie sticks as one meal, then as another meal I finish the veggie sticks and hummus and have maybe 1-2 bites of the flatbread dipped in the hummus too. I ignore the tomatoes because I don't like them.

This is a great on-the go option.

I've actually had this one 3 times this month because it's just so darn tasty. The only one I haven't tried yet is the fruit & nut one - which I'm sure is tasty too but it has way higher calories and fat so not sure if I WANT to have it... since these other two snack plates are both good optons and tasty anyway.

New At Starbucks: Artisian Snack Plates

Pulled through Starbucks the other day for my free ice water and saw these advertised. What a great thing! Healthy snacks on the go. Our society could use a lot more of these!! They are called Artisian Snack Plates and (at least here at my sbux) come in three varieties: Fruit, Nut & Cheese Plate, Protein Plate, and Chicken on Flatbread with Hummus Plate.

Any of these would be fine for me to eat, but since I'm still eating such small amounts I went for the Protein Plate. Wanted to give it a try so I would know if it was a good on-the-go option for me. I picked it up when it wasn't really meal time so I actually ended up eating it at home. :)

I thought this was a great option for a (relatively) healthy meal on the go. At 8 weeks post op, this still made two full meals for me. At the first sitting I had one of the 2 cheese slices, 1/2 the hard boiled egg, 1 apple slice and some grapes. At the 2nd meal I had the other piece of cheese, the rest of the egg, the rest of the apple and grapes, and about 1/4 of the bread with the peanut butter & honey spread on it. Threw the rest of the bread away. It is nice to know options like these are out there - along with ALWAYS FREE ICE WATER - great options for road trips, travel, on-the-go, etc since you can find Starbucks almost everywhere now.

Full Nutrition Info Available Here

They do make this look so much prettier on their website, don't they?

I plan to eventually try the other two snack plates also. This one was right in the middle as far as calories. The fruit, nut, cheese is higher (but would also pack more protein) and the chicken and hummus one is lower in cals (also with more protein!)... I'm excited to try them sometime.

If you are interested you can read about the content and nutrition of all three offerings here:

Fruit, Nut and Cheese Snack Plate

Chicken and Hummus Snack Plate

Protein Snack Plate 

Interestingly enough, the Protein Plate has less protein than the other two. Lesson learned.
Hope this has been helpful! I was so delighted to find out about these!