Good job! Keeping gain under 5 lbs while on a 2 week "eat-all-you-want" break is pretty darn good. After 2years doing this, I find that I am usually aware of what I'm eating(with occasional lapses) even when I am having a "cheat day".

While I sometimes exceed my daily loss/maintenance intake level, it has been a long time since I went totally overboard, like 2500-3000+ calories, which used to be a common occurrence for me. Of course, at 205 pounds, it took those kinds of intake from time to time to maintain that weight.

I hope that self-awareness is sustainable over the years as it will make it easier to maintain the weight over without always having to add up everything I eat.

I read about HOT in your neighborhood. Manure combustion and wildfires. Could be a matter of time everywhere, not getting better any time soon, as far as I can see. However, ice cream helps!

Weighing food is definitely more accurate. So many things, when measures in cups, depend greatly on how you pack it in the cup. What i was calling around 7.5 cups turned out to be equal to 2.5 cups when weighed.

On the other hand, I weighed out my ice cream last time I bought some. I have a bunch of small containers, sold as 1/2 cup containers. But, if I fill that container, it weighs significantly more than the grams listed as a serving on the carton.

This is not the fault of the container however, I get the same result if I use a measuring cup. i think the manufacturer doesn't want to say that a "serving" is really more like 1/3 of a cup so they list the grams as well, knowing most people will never question it.

@DotLewis Having trusted containers is helpful. I go away for 6-8 weeks every summer, leaving my husband his meals in the freezer. I have a heap of mini-icecream containers that i pack helpings of cooked rice into which hold 100 grams of rice, which is just right for him. The way I pack the containers makes the weights vary between 90 and 110 though, so I know what you mean about how things pack down.