The "New" Plan

So, I'm on Day 4 of my "new" diet plan. I say "new" rather facetiously because it's not really new at all. I'm just doing what I should've been doing from Day 1 - 3 years ago... I started counting calories and attempting to exercise regularly every day. What a novel thought! It's interesting that everything I read points me in this direction. All the experts say that the best way to lose weight and keep it off - healthily, I might add - is to eat right and exercise regularly. Most of them don't recommend trying any of the fad diets at all. So, here I go. Trying what has worked for years.

I'm amazed at how calorie-illiterate I am. For example, I made a very yummy breakfast pizza yesterday - crescent roll crust, eggs, bacon, potatoes and cheese - 428 calories per piece! I wouldn't have guessed there were that many calories in it. But I'm learning - fast, I might add. I found a very helpful website:
http://www.livestrong.com/
This site is awesome! I started by answering a few questions about losing weight and then it gave me my daily caloric allowance to help me lose 2 pounds a week. I'm able to track everything I eat and my exercise. It also lets me input my own recipes and gives me the caloric content per serving - which is wonderful, because I'm all about cooking from scratch! I am then able to track my progress and see what I need to add to my diet - such as more protein, etc. and I can see where I need to cut back - such as sodium, carbs, etc.

Another thing I really like about the website, is that it calculates how many calories I can have when I don't get any exercise so that I can still lose weight. This means that when I don't exercise, I have to eat a lot less! Just another good reason to exercise.

I really want to be successful at this. I don't need to look model-thin, but I do want to be healthy. And I don't believe that being 70 pounds over-weight is healthy at all. So, here I go!