Attitude of Grattitude!

Happy Thanksgiving Weight Loss Buds! Let's go for another loooooong thread so we can have oodles of smiles to take us into Thanksgiving! Cut and paste the Questions and share your thoughts....... 1.  What are your Thanksgiving plans?  My hubby and I are having our 4 kids home.  Two of them live out of state.  With their spouses and our 3 grandbabies; we'll have 11.  It will be smaller than usual but just our immediate family so very very fun!  We're celebrating Christmas while we're together.  I just finished the wrapping!  Yahoooooooo! 2.  What are you thankful for in regard to your weight loss surgery?  I am thankful that I have had my health returned to me and that I don't have to take a zillion meds any more! 3.  What 3 things are most important to you; that you count as blessings?  1.  My family  2.  My church  3.  My friends 4.  What healthy thing are you planning for yourself for your Thanksgiving mini feast?  Share a recipe?  I always make a yummy sugar free jello and I bake a small sweet potatoe so I can sprinkle Brown Sugar/Splenda and some cinnamon on it!  Yummmmeeeee! Happy Thanksgiving!

1.  What are your Thanksgiving plans?   I have an EGD with Bravo (?) planned for the day before T-day, so am not sure how this will affect my plans for the holiday. Hubby and I will be home alone as his daughter is flying home for a week with her mother. 2.  What are you thankful for in regard to your weight loss surgery?  Since I haven't had surgery, I'll just say what I'm thankful for in relation to it... I'm grateful to my sister for encouraging me to overlook a "bad example" of WLS that was keeping me from looking into it. I'm grateful to have such a supportive PCP who is really the best doctor I've ever known! I'm also grateful for the new relationship I have with food since coming to OH... I said good bye to some of my old food and beverage friends, and have made so many new ones that I have no desire to ever return to my old and gluttonous ways. 3.  What 3 things are most important to you; that you count as blessings?   1.  My husband   2.  My job   3.  My health 4.  What healthy thing are you planning for yourself for your Thanksgiving mini feast?  Share a recipe?   CURRENTLY I'm planning on cooking up a Capon, stuffing it with fresh herbs and vegetables, and enjoying lots of yummy food but in serious moderation. (I'm pre-op). No stuffing, no mashed potatoes, but yams, yummy yams (can't stand them candied). I figure I'll have four days of nice leftovers from this before going back to my supervised diet.

1.  What are your Thanksgiving plans?  My surgery is the Monday afternoon before Thanksgiving, so my plans are to be home from the hospital and simply hang out at my sister's house and just enjoy visiting.  All my siblings (and their spouses and children) get together, which makes for a very, very large group (I am the oldest of ten kids).  So there will be lots of Thanksgiving chatter and game-playing and sports-watching.  For once my focus will be 100% on the people I love without a single thought towards the food.  I will be bring my own turkey broth (gives new meaning to BYOB!) and pumpkin juice.  Mmmm... 2.  What are you thankful for in regard to your weight loss surgery?  I am thankful that it is finally happening! 3.  What 3 things are most important to you; that you count as blessings?  1.  My family  2.  My church  3.  My education/career 4.  What healthy thing are you planning for yourself for your Thanksgiving mini feast?  Share a recipe?  Here's my pumpkin juice recipe for any of you who may be on fluids at that point: 1 pumpkin, halved and seeded 1 cinnamon stick 1" piece ginger, sliced 5-6 whole allspice 5-6 whole cloves Roast the pumpkin til soft.  Scoop out the flesh and strain it through several layers of cheesecloth, catching the "juice" in a bowl, until pumpkin is as dry as possible.  Simmer pumpkin juice with spices for 30 minutes on low.  Add sweetener to taste.  (I use stevia.)  Enjoy! If you can tolerate milk, you could blend this juice with equal parts milk, some of the cooked pumpkin, and a scoop of vanilla protein powder.  Since I will be only 3 days post-op, I don't want to try the milk and risk having a bad reaction.  I'd rather try new foods in the privacy of my own home--just in case.   Maybe I'll try it with soy milk...

I have a juicer... I forgot that one of my plans when I got it was to make pumpkin juice at this time of the year. I think I'll have to buy a pumpkin for Thanksgiving and juice it... yummy. :)  I can understand what you are talking about trying new things in the comfort of your own home. I am so worried about being an unreliable teacher, that I'm going to figure out what works for me and stick with it during the day while I teach, so I won't have sudden "episodes" that make me have to go home.  One thought I've had for post-op is to use lactaid when I'm immediately post-op and for the month or two following so that my stomach can recuperate before I start taking in milk products. I'm also going to make sure that any protein powders I get are made with Whey Isolate instead of concentrate, which I believe is the least "reactive" whey product. I love my Syntrax fuzzy navel!

1.  What are your Thanksgiving plans?  I am going on my ritual house jumping! stopping in at various friends and family members homes to visit - dinner will be at brothers house  with my 88 yr old mom   2.  What are you thankful for in regard to your weight loss surgery?  I am thankful that I am 170 lbs lighter and able  to be here and enjoy the family holidays  3.  What 3 things are most important to you; that you count as blessings?  1.  My family  2.  My Wonderful Dr's who take such good care of me   3.  My friends who love me and support me ! 
4.  What healthy thing are you planning for yourself for your Thanksgiving mini feast?  Share a recipe  I have no clue  But Joyce's  Sweet potatoe souns really good !!   Guess I will make the pumkin bliss  1 can pumpkin  1 box sf pudding - vanilla  1/2 c milk  1 container s.f.  cool whip

really good  as a pie if you make a crumb cracker crust  from  the S.f vanilla cookies