Whew, I made it to our January vacation. I got through the holidays with minimal damage. I was at first going to stick to the diet plan like a trooper. No variance, no deviation... follow the plan! My husband (my co-sleever) and I discussed the up coming holiday eating with trepidation. We decided to not restrict any food that anyone prepared as off-limits and would make the best effort to try to stick to the plan. I would definitely NOT cook foods off the plan.

Then I got the puppy eyes from the kids. "No cookies?", "No nut roll?", " no dinner?" So I caved in. I made a few cookies with the eldest daughter, and the nut roll. Christmas dinner was a ham, roasted vegetables, and I indulged in making some awesome but decadent potato volcanoes. I passed the beer without a hitch as it still does not agree with my new taste palate, but when my baby girl showed up with champagne, I could not resist a few glasses. New Year's Eve dinner was more champagne! the food then was mostly finger foods; lots of dips and stuffed mushrooms.

I was on the scale about every 2 days fretting a massive weight gain. However, over the past 3 weeks, I have been bouncing among 5 pounds. So I survived well, indulged myself on some tasty treats and am back on my plan.
I thought it would be painful to drop the holiday foods and get back to a more streamlined diet plan. surprisingly, it was a relief. I found a lot of the richer foods to be upsetting even in small amounts and I despise being nauseated. So it felt like I was escaping those delicacies that I thought were going to be so tempting.

I just had to bake. It did not seem right no not have my house smelling of baked goods the week of Christmas. I even baked my eldest daughter's favorite wine and cheese bread. The big difference this year was after getting my baking need out of the way, I gave mostly all of the baked goods to the children for their holiday entertainments. There was very little left for either me or the husband to nibble at.

This was the first alcohol we had since October. The champagne on Christmas and New Year's eve was great. I usually cannot tolerate the taste of Asti Spumanti but this year it was definitely different and good. My taste buds are still surprising me with the changes. Coffee unfortunately is still tasting weird. I used to drink over a pot a day but now I can't drink any. Carbonated beverages are still off the permissible list.

One thing I discovered was the difference between eating a meal and nibbling throughout an evening. When eating a meal, I barely tolerate 1/2 cup total volume, some vegetable heavy meals I can push that volume a bit more. I either eat or drink but cannot tolerate mixing the two. However, at the party with a lot of dips and stuffed mushrooms, i know my volume tolerance was a lot different. Nibbling a stuffed mushroom then chatting a bit, nibbling a baguette with crab dip and chatting, followed by some sips of wine, add a cookie.... I never really got a feeling of fullness. Never got nauseated from over eating. It is a situation that I will have to be on alert for in the future. It obviously is a pit fall for over eating. Definitely an eating pattern that has to be limited to extreme special occasions and avoided totally if possible.

All in all the holiday month was great. It is a slight bump in the road to better health and my goal weight. I am not going to beat myself up over indulging in tasty goodies, cookies, champagne, chocolate or anything thing else. It was the holidays and now it is over. My weight survived the hit, I escaped to normalcy. I think the biggest disappointment was to find out that I no longer like M&Ms or Hershey kisses. I thought they were going to be a tasty indulgence. I felt like a little kid buying them.... but they taste flat. Go figure...... lol.