Could have been better

But the day also could have been much, much worse.

I succumbed to a bad case of the munchies again tonight after dinner (11 Points worth of cookies, Cheez-its and Sun Chips).

However, I also tracked everything I ate. And I got in 40 whole minutes of activity, in the form of a 30-minute walk, 8 minutes on the exercise bike, 1 minute marching in place and 1 minute of modified pushups.

And I did not snack when I got home from work, even though I made the dough for a batch of my Mom's butter cookies. I was going to bake them, too, until I read the dough has to chill for an hour. (It was already 2:30 when I finished mixing it. I didn't want to be up at 4 a.m., rolling and cutting out cookies.) I plan to get up at about 8 a.m. and finish them then, instead.

I'm making some to take to the Boyfriend's when I head down there tomorrow — and also to take to our office Christmas party at noon.

Not sure how I'm going to avoid overeating (and using up the rest of my FPs) at the party. It's a potluck. Maybe I should just plan to eat lunch before I head over there.

Here are my vows for tomorrow:

• Track everything I eat, even at the party.
• Get in some kind of activity.
• No late-night snacking.

There's something about baking

There's something therapeutic about creating something sweet from scratch. Home-baked treats don't just taste better than store-bought; they also transport me somewhere else — back to my childhood, when I helped Mom in the kitchen with all our holiday cookies.

So it's not surprising that today, when I was snowed in and unable to get out of town to visit the Boyfriend, I headed to the kitchen.

I baked up a storm — three batches in all. I'd have probably gone ahead with a fourth — my Mom's butter cookies — had we not been out of flour. So it's probably a good thing I didn't have flour. Three batches of cookies was more than enough.

All three recipes are from the Weight Watchers Web site. They can be found here.

First, I baked some Oatmeal Pecan Lace Cookies. But I used walnuts instead of pecans because I had a limited amount for groceries, and the walnuts were cheaper. The recipe uses no flour but still has 2 Points per serving. (I misread the instructions, and made 18 giant cookies ... but the recipe says 2 cookies make a serving, which means I should have made 36. Live and learn, I guess.)

Next, I took a break for lunch and shoveling (whoopee!). Then I whipped up the Chocolate Chocolate Chip Cookies. They didn't look anything like the ones in the photo at WW.com, but they still taste delicious! Better yet, they're just 1 Points apiece.

Finally, I made a batch of Spiced Peanut Butter Cookies, featuring pureed garbanzo beans. I think they're my favorite of the bunch. Yum! And just 2 Points per cookie ...

I managed to not eat too many while baking them and putting them away. I even froze half of the chocolate and PB ones for later. Still, I'm going to drop by my office with a plate full. And once I get paid, I'll probably still make a batch of Mom's butter cookies. It's just not Christmas without them.

No weigh-in Monday

Because of the storm that blew through Flagstaff, the substitute WW leader couldn't make it for the Monday meetings ... so no WW meeting for me.

I did weigh in at home. 184. 2 — about a pound more than last Monday on the home scale. I'm not surprised. I had more bad days than good again.

Today, I'm celebrating a huge NSV: I finished my 90,000-word manuscript this morning (at about 5 a.m., after a marathon writing session, fueled by an early night at work and a loss of the satellite TV). You can read all about that at my other blog.

How shall I celebrate? Well, being snowed in, I'm baking a few batches of WW-friendly cookies. I picked up brown sugar and nuts Sunday night, knowing I wasn't going to be driving anywhere Monday or Tuesday with a full-on blizzard coming to town.

I may try to take a trudge through the snow, too ... but I wouldn't count on that. I will, however, keep a handle on my cookie consumption. I want to see the scale move in the right direction next week.

24 Points worth of cupcakes ...

That's them, over at the right: The Carrot-Pumpkin Cupcakes from the latest issue of Weight Watchers magazine.

They're 3 Points apiece, so if you count the one on the cooling rack in back, that's 24 Points worth of cupcakes.

Thank goodness I didn't eat them all! I actually managed to restrain myself and eat just one, if you can believe it.

Actually, I was more than a little restrained: The recipe said it made 16 cupcakes, but I ended up with 17. I froze nine of them for later and made half a batch of frosting for the rest. I ate one the first night I made them (and gave one to the roommate's husband. I’d have let her have one, too, but she just started doing Atkins again, and they had way too many carbs in them for her.) I ate a second one Monday night when I got home from work.

Then, knowing my dentist was on WW too, I took four of the five that were left to him Tuesday morning, saving just one more to eat myself. My ploy to butter him up didn't work, though: I still need a root canal. Bummer.

Successful or not, that leads me to my tip for the day: If you must bake (and sometimes feel I must), don’t eat all of what you make yourself. Share it — with friends, family, co-workers … whoever you can get to try a “healthy” treat.

(My Boyfriend, unfortunately, need not apply. He doesn’t do healthy. I wish he did, because then I wouldn’t have to stare down a bag of Sour Cream and Onion Ruffles. Right now, I’m winning. I counted out a serving — 11 chips for 4 WW Points — and am studiously avoiding a second helping.)