There is something that I really love, that I decided to sacrifice.  I’m a fried food lover.  My favorite food in the world is french fries, and yes, as bad as that sounds, I can’t help it.  They’re crispy, salty and delicious.  I also am a fried chicken lover too.  I just love the crispiness that fried food offers, but I decided that I am going to stop eating.  I’m experimenting with how fried foods affect the way I look overall, and I think its a start.  It’s a start to eating healthy and watching what I eat.  If anyone knows of any food recipes that are not fried and still crispy, let me know!

By the way, dance class was cancelled today, but at least tomorrow is ballroom.  Ballroom is definitely different from hip hop, and we were the youngest ones there, but it was still fun, not only because it’s dancing, but I get to dance with the person I absolutely love and adore.  I can’t wait!

The sun goes down way too early because we’re all in Winter, although here in Florida we don’t see the snow the rest of the North sees.  I’m not up for going out in the dark alone, and even with Glen for a run.  Call me scared of the dark, but I value safety over anything else.  I hope that this weekend we’ll get to go for that light jog I’ve been wanting to do.

I was reading an issue of Health magazine and saw this ad for those 100 calorie pack snacks.  While I think they’re great for portion control, I don’t consider them any different than the snacks in regular boxes.  Chips Ahoy cookies are still the same cookies even in a 100 calorie pack.  What do you think?  In no way I am against eating cookies from time to time, but it was just something I was thinking about as far as how companies market their products to make us think its healthy. Does that make any sense?

I realized a bunch of things yesterday about my blog.   I know that I’ve been a bad blogger and I want to change that this year.  I’ve been really bad with emails and commenting on my blog as well as other blogs, and this plans to change!  So I decided as a New Years ‘resolution’ I guess you can say, I will be better with this and be more interactive with those who read my blog and reach out to me, because I would like the same for me and my blog.

So another challenge in the new year is eating better, notably, clean.  I picked up the book, ‘The Eat Clean Diet’ by Tosca Reno a few months ago and I only got through the first few pages of it.  Let me tell you, this book is pretty interesting and I’ve definitely learned from it so far.  But being able to do it?  That’s another story!  Eating Clean for me will definitely take a while to get used to only because I don’t have the time to cook my own foods unless its the weekend.  Fortunately since I still live at home, my mom takes over the kitchen.  So its going to be a huge challenge for me.  The concept of eating clean is something that I want to do so this book is the perfect resource in getting started.  If anyone has any advice I’m open to it!  I’d also love to hear anyone who is already eating clean already too!

• Practice sports that require a ball… which is a lot of sports, but table tennis or tennis is a great one.  You have to focus your eye on a small ball and be able to hit it with the racquet.
• Play catch with a friend.  I’ve read suggestions that you should write letters or numbers on the ball and as you are catching the ball call out a letter or number on the ball.
• Adding more zinc to your diet is known to help improve hand eye coordination.  This includes foods like almonds, pumpkin seeds, whole grains and beans.
• Video games!  Even better… playing Nintendo Wii, especially Wii Fit. You’re concentrating on certain Wii Fit activities and you’re not sitting down.  A two in one bonus!

Yesterday I got a package in the mail from the wonderful people at POM.  I haven’t tried pomegranate juice so when I was contacted by Andrea at POM Wonderful I was glad to give it a try.  POM juice by POM Wonderful is great because it is the only brand to contain 100% pomegranate juice with no added sugars or preservatives.  Also it has lots of antioxidants which is known to improve immune function and lower cancer risk.  POM juice has also conducted medical studies in which they examined the effects of POM products on heart health, prostate health, diabetes and a host of other age-related conditions.  In each study after consuming POM it benefitted each health condition!  To me, that’s pretty amazing.  And truthfully, I wasn’t too sure how great it was going to taste, but it tastes great and with ice, its a pretty refreshing drink.  And the bottle is super cute too.

I learn something new everyday.