Jenny,
Weight fluxuations are so dependent on things like your food intake, water intake, exercise habits, time of month, that I doubt your lesser gain is a result of metabolism. Muscle gain does positively impact metabolism, as does any form of regular exercise, but not to the number of a whole pound – maybe a few extra calories per day (unless you’re gaining TONS of muscle as a body builder type). So I’d attribute the flux to other factors.

Donna ,
I know I do get a lot of complimentary foods – foods that I definitely would not buy otherwise. If I didn’t get so many varieties of nut butter to sample, I’d probably be eating the huuuuge jars of Smucker’s Natural from Costco or the $1.97 jars from Trader Joe’s with only an occasional treat of a fancy nut butter. I don’t buy Amazing Grass and don’t plan to either. I don’t buy many packaged foods with my own dollar – I’d make my own granola, eat oatmeal for breakfast, and just skip things like chips and granola bars. We focus our spending on produce – heavily – and compliment with some organic dairy and meats. If we weren’t getting our bread and variety of samples for free, I would definitely increase our grocery budget some, but since we do, I keep it super low as motivation to use up what we have in the house along with fresh produce.

HappyWriter7,
I use Chunk Light tuna from Costco.

Stacy ,
I don’t remember! I think Homegoods??

Kath

Dinner looks fabulous. Hooray for Matt getting his new cell phone.

And I’m the same way with Kashis…they can’t enter my house without my trying them asap.

Love those star plates – dinner look amazing!!