It's all in the measuring baby...

If you are faced with a diabetes diagnosis in your family, either your self or someone that you will be caring for, you are going to have to master the skill of counting carbohydrates.  There is a myth that all that diabetics have to worry about is sugar (T2).  Gestational diabetes, type one, type two etc. it doesn't matter if you will be using insulin or not, you have to know how to count carbohydrates and there are some tools that make life much easier when faced with this task.  Here are a couple of gifts that I received for Christmas that are going to make my carb counting life easier!

Ode to Salter

Oh Salter, how I have longed to have you in my home.  You have weighing and measuring skills like none I have ever known.  I see you sitting there on the store shelf but my budget won't allow it unless you are brought by an elf.  Christmas came and now I get to have you near.  I just love the way you help me carb count for my little one so dear.  Salter, I am so glad to have you on my team, owning you is like a dream. 

Here are the features from Cookware.com     



Features:

• Nutri-weigh dietary computer scale
• Silver color
• When a healthy weight is the lifestyle of choice, more detailed monitoring is required
• Salter dietary scales are specifically designed for better portion control
• Track accumulated nutritional value of weighed food at the touch of a button
• Analyzes the nutritional content of your food by portion size
• It calculates the calories, protein, carbohydrates, total sugars, total fat, saturated fat, fiber, sodium, cholesterol, net carbohydrates and G.I. (glycemic index) of your food on a large LCD display
• Database stores nutritional value of 1440 foods and liquids, plus memorizes an additional 100 foods/recipes of your choice
• Allows daily food intake record to set dietary goals, then review progress at any time-two user memories
• Automatic predictive text feature for quick and easy on-screen food search
• Removable stainless steel cover
• Resistant to staining/carry over flavors and easy to clean
• Add and weigh feature enables weighing all ingredients in one bowl
• Includes our aquatronic liquid measurement feature
• Can also be used as a conventional scale

 If only I could train it to do the dishes =)

Check out these babies!  They fold up to fit nicely in a D-bag to go along with you to a friend or family's house.  I would even whip these babies out if we were eating at a buffet restaurant.  (we don't go out that often and buffets are not on the top of our list except for Sweet Tomatoes and having a teenage boy I feel like I get my monies worth in that place while still filling the family up on healthy fare) My mother-in-law got them for me.  I have seen them at Walmart and William Sonoma.  I'm not sure where my mother-in-law purchased these. 

My sister has a set of Weight Watcher measuring spoons, that I am hoping to get sometime soon.  We are celebrating Christmas with my sisters in a couple of weeks and if I don't get them then I will purchase them myself.  The large one measures 1 cup exactly, medium 1/2 cup and small one is 1/4 cup.  They will be so convenient when dishing out food especially for Bekah.  Right now I scoop the food in to a measuring cup and then in to her bowl or plate. 

 I'd love to hear about any other cool measuring tools that any of you have found to make carb counting easier or more fun =)