Well, I'm back! It's almost 2008 and I'm ready to start again with my bento diet! I've been reading a couple books and have some new goals for the new year:
1. Eat as healthy as possible: cut out white flour, white sugar and processed foods as much as possible.
2. Eat fruits and/or veggies, whole grains, and a lean protien with every meal.
3. Eat about 6 small meals/day (with the last meal being smaller)
4. Drink 64 oz. water/day--starting early in the morning--and also drink herb tea (cut out any sweetner/milk in my tea)
5. Allow myself a "cheat treat" occasionally but only a little and then I'll get right back on the wagon.
6. Continue my bento box portions (or less at some meals).
7. Continue my exercise program.
8. Take a multi-vitamin daily.
The books I've read:
YOU on a Diet by Drs. Roisen and Oz (This book has some helpful info, but I really was turned off by the writing style. Tries too hard to be cute and funny. It was sooo overboard on the wise cracks that it was hard to sift through to the helpful info. What I got out of this book is that I need to loose at least 1 1/2 inches from my waist ASAP but more will be better. Alright, so I already totally wanted to do that, but this book helped me to see the urgency of it. Also, I learned that stress can cause weight gain in the waist.)
The Eat-Clean Diet by Tosca Reno (This is a very pretty, colorful book with shiny pages. I'm a sucker for shiny pages. LOL. But seriously, this book has given me some good ideas to try in the area of eating healthy foods and in eating complex carbs, like fresh fruit and veggies and whole grains, with a lean protien in every meal. I'm going to give this a try. It's supposed to keep the blood sugar level even and I can really tell that my blood sugar has been going up and down a lot lately. I'm excited to try this as this is really the way I've always enjoyed eating anyway.)
Other goals of mine include:
1. to plant some tomatoes this year and hopefully some basil, too.
2. to spend more time cooking.
3. to work on a few dishes that are very good (and that the family will eat) that I will be able to make easily by memory.
4. to make some things that are more time consuming (like there is a recipe for "yogurt cheese" in The Eat Clean Diet Cookbook by Tosca Reno that looks interesting). Once upon a time I actually made my own soy milk and my own alfalfa sprouts.
Dinner Bento: lemongrass chicken and grape tomatoes and mashed potatoes. I only ate a couple bites of the potatoes and all but four of the tomatoes. I got a little container of apricot/applesauce instead. 
