Back in skinny jeans

Nosh bites: Veg friendly protein snack ideas and things to do with left over roasted chicken

Looks like we're going to have a nice weekend! Over at Noshtopia, here are some healthy eats ideas for your journey to eating wellness. We've got a nice round up of snack ideas, recipes, and reviews to satisfy almost anyone's palate. Here's to healthy noshing:

• 5 vegetarian + some vegan friendly protein snack ideas

• A food review of Hot Chocolate Mochi Krunch Spicy Brown Rice Crackers in Dark Chocolate.

• 4 ideas for nosh bites you can make with left over roasted chicken.

• A light meal quickie: Under $5 and 15 minutes: Fusilli with Flax and Bolognese sauce

Letter To Your Body: What would you write?

BlogHer is doing this awesome campaign called, "A Letter To My Body." Of course, this subject is right up my alley, so I'm going to share my letter with all of you today. I encourage all of you to write a letter to your body. You don't have to blog it or put it online, good old pen & paper works.

This is a very powerful exercise to help you open up communication between you and your body. It will also help you look at your body more compassionately because writing hate mail to yourself just doesn't seem to make sense. It's very easy to speak ill of yourself (in your head. remember all that put-down chatter?) but when you start putting it down on paper as if your body was someone else, then things start to change. More of your compassion starts to come out. How can it not?

What's fabulous about this campaign is reading the letters from other women. Geez Louise, I'm telling you that we (as women) have more in common than you can imagine, and you are never alone in what you feel. There are times you may think, "Oh, I'm the only one who feels this way." Well, you're not. This is one reason I LOVE the Internet, it helps to show people how connected humans really are to one another.

So, get on your computer, or get your journal, or a piece of paper & pen, and start writing. You'll be glad you did! And without further adieu, here is my letter to my body:

The "Pull My Finger" Workout

Those of you Sister Skinny lovers saw this recently. Most of us would dread something like this happening especially in front of a TV audience yet at the end of the day, it really is funny, embarrassing yes, but in a good-fun way. I just had to share it for some Friday giggles.

Who is that photoshopped lady on the cover of Elle?

Okay, Vogue went crazy and photoshopped Drew Barrymore into a shiny mannequin creation. Now, Elle has gone and done their photo retouching magic on Kate Hudson to the point where she does not look like Kate Hudson. Who are they trying to make her look like? She's looking a bit Heidi Montag to me.

Again, Kate is one of my favorite natural beauties and they went all hog wild on the paintbrushes and erasers turning her into some un-recognizable glamazon erasing the features that make her adorable. Oh, and like nails on a chalk board, they go and plaster right next to her face, "Why You're Not Losing Weight?" How about, "Why You're Not Good Enough As You Are To Be a Cover Girl?"

Is it me, or do you all think that the fashion rags lately are really crossing the line too much now on the covers with all this photo manipulation?

"Your Two Cents": Your Personal Health Records Online - exciting or cause for concern?

It's inevitable that absolutely all of your health records will be available online for you, your doctor, and for potentially lots more people. There are a slew of companies now like Google, Microsoft, Aetna, and WellPoint who are working to provide ways to help you (the consumer) digitally manage your health records. They are touting it as a "consumer empowerment tool." Sounds all fancy and exciting, no?

But, and this is a trunk full of loads of unknown junk, the privacy protection surrounding your health records is not all cut and dry and simple. You may think that just because a record is "medical" or "health" related it is automatically protected with privacy policies. Oh no!

You may have heard of HIPPA, the federal Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act, which will provide privacy and security protection for your health records, but this protection is only covered for records covered by protected entities like health-care providers, health insurers, health-care clearing houses, such as billing services, and business associates, such as companies that administer health plans.

Tech companies like Google and Microsoft are not HIPPA covered because they are only providing the digital means to manage your records. They are a technology service not a health service. They can have in their privacy policies clauses that are similar to the HIPPA laws but they can change them at any moment because a company can change their policies whenever they want to.

There is an interesting report put out by The World Privacy Forum that illustrates in more detail how not all "Personal Health Records" companies (PHRs as they call it) are HIPPA protected. It is great food for thought. There are lots of things that I never would have thought of like linkage between your different doctors or health stays like rehab. If you are not careful or aware of the privileges you allow, your dentist can see all your rehab records, your GYN can see that you were treated with anti-depressants and see your psychiatrists records, and stuff like that.You may not want all your health professionals knowing EVERYTHING about you.

You as a consumer need to educate yourself about your health records online and what it means. The idea of having all your health records online sounds like it would make life easier, faster, and more organized. Because many people are not tech savvy, or privacy protection savvy, and the laws governing health records online are all in their infancy, there is also so much room for doubt, error, and confusion. So, time to weigh-in...

Your Two Cents: Does the idea of your health records online with greater accessibility possibilities make you excited or cause you concern because you are not sure really what is involved with privacy protection?

Submit Your Story: "How is your work life affecting your weight?"

This is a call for a new round of submissions to share your story with the readers at Back in Skinny Jeans. Careers, work lifestyles, and your level of happiness or unhappiness related to the work you're doing can have a profound affect on your weight and health. For the week of March 10th, I thought it would be great to see how people's work life is affecting their weight, and how BISJ readers can offer the same kind of wonderful support and helpful tips as they did during "What Others Are Doing to Get Fit Week" in January. Here are the details:

Submission Deadline:
March 7, 2008 midnight PST
Use the email address in the "Story Tips & Contact" page

Criteria:
I'm looking for anyone who wants to share their story about how their work life is affecting their weight, and would like helpful tips and insights to get healthier. If you have recently had some major success where you conquered or changed something about your work life that helped improve your health like quitting a stressful job, finally doing something related to your life purpose, or started an exercise or healthy eating campaign at work, then please share too.

You do not have to have a blog or website. I'm looking for some new voices. If you submitted a story for Get Fit week, let's give new people a chance. This is an opportunity for you lurkers to come out of the woodwork! This is about people inspiring and helping others through their own stories.

What to submit:

Quote on Beauty from a screen legend

Can you believe this woman is considered a Plus-Size Model?

This woman does not look Plus-Size to me at all. I saw these ads for Marina Rinaldi inside O magazine, and thought wow what beautiful outfits. I had never heard of Marina Rinaldi before so I Googled the name.

I honestly was shocked to discover that Marina Rinaldi is the Plus-Size division of Italian designer Max Mara. This woman in the ad is supposed to be Plus-Size? Marina Rinaldi's sizes run from a 10-22 US, and the clothes can be found at upscale department stores like Bloomingdale's, Saks and Bergdorf Goodman. There are also Marina Rinaldi stores around the world.

They consider a size 10-12 Plus Size! Are you kidding me ?!?

If you look at the Saks Designer Apparel sizing chart a size 2 is a 24" waist which is the average waist size of your typical Victoria's Secret model. A size 10 is a 28" waist and a size 12 is a 29.5" waist which is ONLY 4-5.5" bigger than someone who is the width of a mannequin. Fashionistas, you are telling me that someone with a waist under 30" is still considered Plus-Size? I am seriously perplexed and horrified by this notion.

Do you all think this is crazy or is it just me?

When Emma Thompson throws her weight around a movie studio caves

If you didn't love Emma Thompson before, you are REALLY going to love her now.

Recently, Emma had a dinner party and one of the invited guests was fellow Brit actress Hayley Atwell. The two are starring in the movie Brideshead Revisited.

Emma was serving up some lovely eats, and Hayley was picking at her food. Emma was taking some offense to this, but alas, Hayley told her that she couldn't eat much of it because Miramax, the film studio, told her that she needed to lose weight. This 25 year old young lady is gorgeous as she is. Look at her.

Now picture the reaction of a multiple Oscar winning actress who thinks that this is absolute bullshit. Sense and Sensability on a rampage. I so wish I could have been a fly on the wall.

An outraged Emma then tells the producers of Brideshead Revisited that she will pull out of the movie if they make Hayley lose weight. No more Lady Marchmain for you, you unrealistic snobbish studio heads. She probably read them a serious riot act while she was at it. Emma threw her Oscar heavy weight around and won. The studio caved and Hayley can now go back to healthy eating.

I so love Emma! Can we get more like her in Hollyweird.

[via The First Post via Shapely Prose]

Give your scale a personality

I decided to give my scale a personality makeover (more in my head than anything) and replace the previous "bearer of bad news" persona with this new light hearted goofy personality with these cool INAnimate stickers that let you add character via stickers to your inanimate objects like scales, PDAs, or water bottles.

It may sound ridiculous, but I found that when I added these silly stickers onto my scale, the thing didn't look so daunting or cold as it did before. I mean look at it. Doesn't it look cute? While, I was at it, I added a face to a water bottle. The water looks like it would be so much fun to drink now.

And how can I get all uptight when I have that goofiness staring back at me. It makes me giggle to look at that face. While I'm at it, might as well give the scale a name. People name their boats and cars so why not a scale which some of us spend more time with than with people. Not saying that is a healthy thing, I'm just saying.

The name that pops into my head is Lucille. I know that was the name of some famous musician guy's guitar, and perhaps since that was a symbol of his trade, the scale is a symbol of mine. Although, I'm trying to wean myself from the need to live by the scale. I've been doing fairly well with that since January.

Instead of weighing myself every other day or week, I now weigh myself like every 2-3 weeks. Been trying to do what Pasta Queen is attempting to do and weigh-in only once a month. It's a toughie when you are used to weighing yourself every day. I actually find it relieving that I don't have to report to my master any more. Now, somehow, reporting in with Lucille and her goofy grin feels so much lighter.