Helpful tools

These are some websites and apps that I have tried and tested.  

My Fitness Pal

My Fitness Pal is both a website, but also has mobile apps available for both iPhone and Android platforms.  Use it to log your food intake, including caloric and nutritional information, as well as logging your exercise.  You can specify your goals and it will tell you how many calories you need to eat in order to reach those goals.  The database of foods is comprehensive, but it also allows you to easily enter your own recipes and will calculate the calorie content/nutritional value for you.

Weight Watchers Points+ Calc

This is a free app available through the Google Play store.  If you are planning to follow the Weight Watchers Points+ system, this is a nice app to use without having to pay for the Weight Watchers app.  You can calculate your daily target points, broken down into Points+ for weight loss, and Points+ for maintenance.  Then you can use it to calculate the points of foods that you eat.  I use the nutritional information from My Fitness Pal to make point calculation easy. 

A few things not noted in this app:
- Remember to recalculate your target points regularly as these change as you lose weight. 
- The Points+ system allows an additional 35 extra points each week to burn as you see fit. 
- Breastfeeding moms, add 14 points to your daily target (or 7 points if you are only breastfeeding part-time).