Progress Report

Well, I feel as if I did ok today. I did come home and immediately got onto the exercise bike and rode for about a half hour. So I at least got SOMETHING in exercise wise. I've so got to remember to ALWAYS exercise in the morning..first things. Later in the day just doesn't work for me; unless it's at the gym!

After my half hearted attempt at exercise, I brought the laundry in and then set about making dinner. Tonight was an attempt to make a knock off version of the Outback Steakhouse's Alice Springs Chicken. I think I did a pretty darn good job of it, if I do say so myself. The recipe is a keeper.

The rest of the evening, I've simply sat here and split my time between my scrapbooking and being online. I am very proud of myself. I've actually caught myself up...the year 2007 is DONE! So at least I'm working on the current year now! (well except for those things that I'm going WAY back for....but I'm talking about the current stuff)

*^@#O Cake

Cherry Angel Food Cake, originally uploaded by mfcstotler.

On Saturday at work we were all sitting around and talking between customers. My manager mentioned the cherry angel food cake. Well, it sounded delightful. So I of course had to pick up the stuff to make it when I went to the store that afternoon. I came home from the store and set about preparing the dip, and fruits and veggies for the week. I made some more watergate salad for my huband and I made this cake. We each had a piece for dinner. It was scrumptious! SOOOOO on Sunday when I packed our lunch to carry along on our hike, I cut two pieces of cake to add to the lunch. Well, I ate a sliver (ok, ok ok...it was not a sliver, it was a normal sized piece of cake, I can't lie!) We hiked for most of the day, we thoroughly enjoyed our lunch and the cake that I had packed. We got home and we discussed and agreed on the fact that we would have dinner in about 2 hours. I decided to have a 'sliver' of cake. COME ON NOW! I planned on having a sliver of cake! I promise you, that was really and truely the plan! Yeah, it was a honkin' big piece of cake. Well, I ate that and I was getting ready to leave the kitchen when I saw tha tI hadn't covered the cake tightly. So I walked back over. And that is when I noticed that there was really only enough cake for three pieces left. So I went ahead and cut it into the three pieces. I immediately plated up two of the pieces for dinner and covered them up. But what to do with that third piece? Yep, you know it! Ahhhhh it tasted sooooo good! Just as good as the other three pieces I'd already had earlier in the day! :-) And let me tell you....piece number four for the day; the one that I had at dinner......outstandingly delightful! But that is the end of the cake. Soooooo even though it's relatively healthy....I've got to be careful.....dangerous cake for me!

Thank you to Donna for her advice to log onto fitday (where I count my calories.....in conjunction and parellel to weight watchers). I was honestly thinking about letting it slide and just chalking up the day as a loss.....even with all the hiking from yesterday. BUT after reading her comment, I did just that. I found that even with all that cake (oh yeah, and the 1/2 cup of ice cream that I had AFTER dinner and all that cake...hey it was fat free ice cream at least) that I was still about 1000 calories below what I had expended. THANK YOU HIKING!

This morning....on the scales. I was back down to 183.2. (from 182.6). I determined...this week I'm going to bust through that barrier and get myself back below that weight watchers goal so I can maintain lifetime. (for those of you who brought up the doctors note thing....my doctor thinks between 160 and180 is a good weight for me....and has already filled out the papers for me...so my weight watchers goal is set at 180 instead of 164.....I'm just having a heck of a time getting it to 180 and keeping it below there! But as I've said in previous posts. If this really is the weight for me, and I really can't get it lower (when I'm not eating whole cakes obviously) then I'll be ok with it and if I have to stop goign to weight watchers meetings, I'll be fine!

I was a bad girl this morning. The alarm went off and I didn't get up to exercise. SO consequentially, now I'm sitting here at work and thinking about having to go home and do 'something'. But I will!

This path I walk

Where-feet-trod, originally uploaded by mfcstotler.

This morning Todd and I decided to go hiking. So we went up to the Catoctin Mountains and went hiking. Yes, the picture above is from where we hiked (as are the pictures below). We hiked for about 5 hours. There were some steep uphill segments as we climbed to summit. We enjoyed the views the top! I had packed a picnic lunch. A Turkey sandwich, carrots and dip, a clementine, some fat free chips, and a piece of Cherry Angel food cake. I also had some apples that we ate at a different overlook/vista. We ate it up at Hog Rock (no, I am not lying....it's a vista overlook..and it's called Hog Rock). It was a great day. The weather was perfect and the hiking was fantastic.

The bad part??? Uhhhhh well, thus far this evening I've been a bottomless pit! I've eaten way too much food. I"m not going to stress about it. I worked my tail end off, my body must need the food.

My weight this morning. 183.6. I just can't seem to get it down any further. What's up with this. I will say that I talked to Todd about it this morning. I let him know that very soon I would have to make a decision. At the end of this month, if my weight didn't drop I would have to either let ww go (as I'm not maintaining lifetime) or start paying weekly until I get back under. He didnt' even think about it...and said PAY. I hate to spend the money though! ARRGGHHHH Why does my body like this 180-183 zone???? I've been here for a year!

Tree-in-the-path

Tree-in-the-path, originally uploaded by mfcstotler.

Todd-at-the-vista

Todd-at-the-vista, originally uploaded by mfcstotler.

Small-Berry

Small-Berry, originally uploaded by mfcstotler.

OK, this really grabs me for some reason!

Blue-Mountain-Vista

Blue-Mountain-Vista, originally uploaded by mfcstotler.

Deer

Deer, originally uploaded by mfcstotler.

That's my desk!

That's my desk!, originally uploaded by mfcstotler.

Yep, that's my desk and the firemen checkin' it out! :-)

I set the alarm to go off early in the morning this morning. But when the it went off, I just coulnd't bear to get up. I haven't taken an off day from exercise in at least a week, so I decided to make this an 'off day'. I usually do try to give myself one day of 'rest'. So I snuggled back in and tried to go back to sleep. Uhhhh not happening. I did lay there for another hour and did eventually get out of bed to get ready for work at 7. I got sidetracked a bit this morning and forgot to weigh myself until after I had eaten breakfast so I have no clue where I'm at today. Little worried though. Last night I splurged on points and ate a pumpkin muffin. This morning at work we were talking about pumpkin stuff...so what did I do. I ran home and brought muffins back for everyone...and yes, I ate one here at work also! They are so yummy!

Today is a typical Saturday. Work, home, grocery store, home, fix and clean everything that can be fixed. And that will pretty much fill up my day. Nothing exciting happening at work today. Nothing like yesterday that is. Well, I'm brain dead and totally messed up someone's transaction.......not cool....and let this be a lesson and reminder to anyone out there that reads this. ALWAYS COUNT YOUR MONEY BEFORE YOU LEAVE THE WINDOW AT THE BANK! I'm appalled at how many people just drive away and don't check it. Come on now...the teller is a HUMAN. And humans do make errors! I was taught to recount my money before driving away. Most of my customers do not do that. And some apologize for doing it. NO NO NO...I appreciate it when customers do so! (I shorted someone...as soon as they drove away I glanced at the check and realized my error...recounted my drawer to verify...and called the customer...but still if she would have counted before pulling away it would have been a much easier fix)!

Fire, craziness and emotions

What a day! It started out good. I got up early, rode the bike and I was feeling pretty good. I had some pretty deep thoughts while I was on the bike. I was anxious to put them down on paper, er blog. I LUCKILY wrote on a scratch paper a couple of the basic ideas to take with me to work to write my post and then I made breakfast, pumpkin pancakes. My oh my were they good. This is a new recipe for me. We've had pumpkin pancakes out at restaurants but I had never found a recipe that I really liked. I think I found it! :-) I had extra pumpkin, so I made some pumpkin muffins also. :-) Cleaned up the kitchen and came to work. And that is where the day started to go crazy! First, I got there and my computer was torn apart, every 'free' (not being used by another teller) computer was torn apart. So I sat behind the teller line for an hour while I waited for him to be done. Hey, no skin off my back, if you want to pay me to sit and do nothing, be my guest! Well, it finally got fixed and I had just logged onto my computer, my money was in my drawer and I turned on the counter heater. (Hey, I'm cold all the time!). Within a minute or two we heard this loud popping noise coming from my desk. I looked there and oh my word smoke was pouring up through the bucket, and all cracks and crevices on the counter. I pulled out the drawers and removed my money....threw it in the main vault and we called the fire department. We were reasonably sure that it was nothing other than some short or something, but procedures had to be followed. So we evacuated the building and waited. Oh my word..the brought 4 fire companies to our little electrical 'short' fire. Too funny. They started rolling the hoses down the road, some guys ran in with axes and claw thingies. It was just a hoot! Luckily, I had my camera with me! :-) (as a side note, ironically enough, less than a half hour earlier, I had been wondering out loud what I could shoot for my daily picture for the envisage project..hmmmm) Lets see...that excitement died down (well, as much as possible..the drive through was TOTALLY shut down, and on a Friday. Although they came and worked on it all afternoon...it's up and working again..and I'm the one that's sitting at the fire trap desk!). Lets see, I got money from the vault and found a $50 mixed in with the $20's. :-) Just crazy!

OK...my weight this morning.... 183.2 I was hoping that it would just drop off and be water weight. But not my luck. Oh well......it will come off! :-)

I watched another episode of The Biggest Loser Australia (season 2) this morning while on the exercise bike. They were doing a hike where at certain stops up this huge mountain, the contestants put weight into their backpacks that represented the weight they lost each week. The contestants were then able to reflect and relive their thoughts and emotions from being a 'bigger' person and whatnot. It got me to thinking.

One of the contestants started talking about how the girl that started the show was not a happy person and in her unhappiness, she was actually sabotaging her weight loss efforts. It made me look deeply. I've come to the conclusion lately that I'm not the happy bubbly person that I used to be. I know that there are a lot of issues in my life right now, personal things that are dragging me down. I don't' like it, and I've actually tried to make a real effort in the last week to not let these issues totally encompass my life and my feelings. But that said, it does make me think......is that having an effect on my weight loss?

One of the other contestants then talked about all the years of being teased and made fun of for being overweight. I've laughed and proudly told people that 'I didn't experience any of that'. And I'll admit that when someone did say something I didn't care I am who I am. I've made the comment on many occasions that if someone doesn't like me because I'm fat, then that is their loss and I don't want to be friends with anyone like that anyway. BUT as boldly as I say that, I have come to the realization that my weight has embarrassed me for years. And while I didn't get too much teasing and taunting (remember, I wasn't overweight until my upper teen years and adulthood) I know that especially as an adult, I let my weight define who I am and what I do. I basically put myself in a bubble. I tried to stay as un-obtrusive as possible. Don't draw attention to myself, stay hidden. It was a total defense mechanism. Those comments do hurt, even though I only experienced a few....and I tried to avoid them.....by making myself invisible.

How do you fix this? I mean, yeah, I've lost a lot of weight. A phenomenal amount of weight, but those feelings do not disappear overnight. I realized within the last week that I am still doing it. Ironically enough, it was my camera that showed me this. I was out walking on the battlefield with my husband (I do believe it was last Saturday night). I had my camera with me and I saw some re-enactors. I snapped a picture, the one guy (a re-enactor) was doing something really cute, but when he saw me taking a picture he stopped. I snapped a few more pictures...and I actually liked the pictures. Later that night I was talking to a friend and mentioned it. My friend was like, "why didn't you ask him to do it again". I stammered out a reply. I think I said something like, "that would have required me to walk across the street!" or "I don't' like posed pictures" or something like that. Both of which are true. (and honestly even looking at this objectively I wouldn't have...because of the posing thing). But it got me to thinking, because I KNEW that I wouldn't have gone over there no matter what. I'd rather lose the shoot than go over. Why? Because I didn't want to draw attention to myself. I know he wouldn't have been angry...he was a re-enactor doing a living history on a battlefield for goodness sake! I knew that it was because I wanted to remain un-obtrusive and without a shadow of a doubt it was because of the weight issues in my life.


Heck, I still have problems even accepting the fact that I am no longer morbidly obese!

New meal

Rosemary Chicken with Mediterranean Brown Rice, originally uploaded by mfcstotler.

I try to do a new recipe or new meal at least once a week. Some weeks is just doesn't happen. Other weeks it does.

This picture if of my experimental meal for the week. For lunch today we had Rosemary Chicken with Mediterranean Brown Rice. It was actually quite tasty. When I was dishing it up, I was a bit nervous....but it was really good. Todd loved it!

I've done really well eating wise today. Point wise I actually have a few points left. According to fitday, I'm at 1335 calories for the day. I also did ride the bike for 45 this morning so I feel as if I'm on track for the day!

Bummer

Well , what can I say. I'm a little sore this morning. I'm sure that once I actually get myself up and moving that I"ll be fine though. I haven't exercised this morning yet. I decided to let myself work some kinks out first.

My weight. I was excited and anxious to step on the scales this morning. I mean, I worked like a dog yesterday. ON fitday.com I have it set up that my base metabolic burn is for a sedentary lifestyle. I figure, lets make it as hard as possible. But then I add in activity. I usually don't add in cooking and general stuff like that unless it's something I do for over 2 hours (like my day canning, etc) They say I burn about 1900 calories a day with a sedentary lifestyle. Well, I added in the digging......and the bike ride....and they say that I burned up near 3500 calories yesterday. I will say that I did eat 5 extra ww points yesterday. I also entered in my food intake into fitday, just for comparisons sake. I ate 1600 calories (actually a few over, but I can't remember the exact off the top of my head). SO my comparison was really good!

So I got on the scales........... 6/10ths of a pound up! Isn't that a hoot? I have no clue what my body is doing! Oh well, I'm just along for the ride. The only thing I can do is stay strong in my motivation and willpower!

I will say that I drank a good deal of water yesterday. I had drained my 64 ounce mug in the morning (well, all except for a little ice that was left). I had drained it a second time by dinner (including the ice that was now melted). I had a 16 oz glass of water while I made dinner and one while I ate dinner. I did drink a diet drink last night while I was on the computer. SO I would think that it SHOULDN'T be a water issue. But what else can it be????

Hard day of work

Sept. 17, 2008 (17 of 365), originally uploaded by mfcstotler.

Well, I could have used this old tractor today! That's for sure. (yes, the tractor actually does still work, but it's not mine!) I had a busy and very productive day. This morning I went over to the farm to deadhead flowers. We've been saving seeds on everything we can every year. Number one it is interesting to see how the colors change a little more each year. Each year it seems as if we get a new color that we didn't have the year before. Just intriguing! Secondly, in the case of the zinnias (which is what I cut and put in the drying racks this morning) the original seeds were given to us in a garden basket gift that someone gave us for our wedding. These are our wedding zinnias. I can't let that seed stock die off now can I? (sentimental I know). After the flower/seed expedition, we came back over here to the house and got to work. I decided to dig up the garden for next year. We moved this past spring and kept the garden at the old place as it had been re-tilled and fertilized before covering it with straw for the winter. The ground was ready and waiting. (Not to mention that we didn't have time to do our garden over here.) I decided that I was going to tackle the garden area today. Get the soil turned, so I can pull out the tiller and till that ground up. That way we will be able to spread fertilizer and our summers worth of compost and get that ground ready and fertile for spring planting! SO that is exactly what I did. I laid out our garden, (paths and walkways are measured exactly to fit the riding lawn mower through! ) and I got to digging. HOURS upon HOURS later, and I was done! WOO HOOOO. Next week I'll work on the tilling!

I do believe that my husband thinks I'm crazy though. After all that digging, I came inside and rode the exercise bike. You see, my upper body was exhausted, but my lower body, while active really wasn't worn out. Soooo I fixed that. I was beat after the exercise bike. FINALLY I showered and then I was off to the kitchen to make dinner. I had my main meal at lunchtime, burritos. They are supper yummy and extremely easy to make! Todd had worked outside all day also, and I wanted to treat him to something special for dinner. SO I baked some fish for him and made some homemade biscuits and that is what he had (plus peas and watermelon). Since I don't eat fish, my plate was full of veggies. All kinds; green beans, cooked carrots, sauerkraut and peas! Watermelon for dessert....oh yes, and I had the last of the strawberries! What a yummy meal!

My weight this morning was up to 183.0. I wasn't totally surprised. I had a good bit of pasta last night and I know that sometimes affects my daily weight. :-) Anxious to see tomorrow. I mean, I can't imagine that it will not be good after eating well today and all the activity!

Not starting out the greatest!

Woke up this morning and TOdd and I headed to town to go to the gym. I had a pretty good workout and I was relaxed as Todd drove us home. I went to get out of the driveway and realized taht I had left my keys at the gym. DUH! SO I had to run up to town AGAIN to pick them up. Oh well....at least the snafu didn't interrupt my workout! I did still have time to straighten up the house and sweep and mop the kitchen floor. (does that thing ever stay clean???)

I'm tickled pink. I was able to hold my weight loss that I showed yesterday. Today I was pretty much the same. Oh I'll be honest...I was 2/10ths of a pound down. (ok, maintained........but technically a loss...lol) SO that made me pretty darn happy! I guess that second bike ride really made the difference for me in keeping that loss on my side! :-)

Not much else to report. Eating is on target for the day. I"ve planned dinner and I should be fine, with 2 points to spare for a little snack while I watch TBL. Yeah, that is terrible that I'll eat a snack while watching THAT show! LOL

Monday evening chit chat

Got home from work today at 3PM. I didn't have anything to do so I hopped onto the exercise bike and rode for an hour. That added to my 55 minute ride this morning, and I think I've done pretty darn good. I did have a banana with a bit of peanut butter tonight...which pushes me over my points by 2 points, but I do believe I"ll be ok. :-)

Made dinner tonight. One of my favorite meals. I made Maple pecan chicken, green beans and sweet potato pudding. For our dessert/fruit I fried some apples. YUMMY! While we were eating dinner I had a grand thought. We are eating better foods by eating healthy. I used to be a lazy cook. Yeah, I've always liked to cook, but I was lazy. I did prepackaged stuff and took the easy route. I rarely do that anymore and you know what? I do not miss the prepackaged easy route!

trepidation

Yesterday evening, I was just hungry and I couldn't get a hold of myself. I had a banana with peanut butter. I actually had the points for that, so I was a-OK. But then I had a second one (about an hour or so later) and a cup of the cheesecake stuff that I made. Both were not exactly 'bad things' for me. But still, I did not have the points for them! I also had a Chinese style meal for lunch, and we all know that Chinese is super high in sodium. And if that wasn't enough, we had taco's for dinner. I did a taco salad and filled up on lots of lettuce, onions and tomatoes. I only used one taco shell (crumbled up on my salad) and about 1/4 cup of the meat (turkey). I did add a little fat free cheddar cheese, so it was pretty healthy. BUT, the sodium was high! Outrageously high for the day. So, this morning I was a bit nervous about weighing myself. I had contemplated not doing it...skipping it and going or it tomorrow. But then this morning I realized that if my weight was up, I'd know why and I would not be bothered by it at all. So I stepped onto the scales. Exactly 2 pounds gone!!!!!! Now, I did exercise, AND push mow for an hour, AND walked while shopping for a couple hours, not to mention the normal things like cooking, cleaning up and the load of laundry washed and hung on the line. 2 pounds WOO HOOO!

This puts me at exactly the weight I started with for my little 'first to lose 10 pounds challenge with my friend who's getting married in October. Whew...now I can actually start losing that 10!!!!

I've laid out my food eating plan for today. I know that because of my little splurge/binge/eat fest that I will have to be super diligent today. I know that two days of overeating (even if it is healthy options) will start to have a negative impact! So I'm set and ready for the day!

The good old sinus' are STILL acting up. Headache is back today. My cheek bones and teeth hurt...and the throat is still just feeling icky. Go away sinus issues!

Going full steam ahead

Sunday morning! WOo hooo! I woke up early and got a 45 minute ride in first thing! My weight was just about the same as yesterday... 184.8 (2/10ths higher). So that is a good thing. I've been getting some stuff done around the house....I've mowed our yard (riding mower) and I've already got one big load of clothes on the line...the second is in the wash right now. I've calculated my foods for the day. And other than make and eat lunch, I'm pretty much ready to head to town for the day. I"m going up to my parents house. I"ll be doing their mowing today. That equals to about 45 minutes of push mowing.....which in my book equates to exercise/activity! WOO HOOO! I talked to mom and she and I are going to go consider my options for a dress for a wedding that I'm going to in early October. I have a black sundress....and a white jacket that will work. I also bought the cutest black and white polka dot sandals that I can wear (if it's not too cold....). I also have a green dress...but I would like to get a shawl or something if I end up wearing t hat. Or am I going to add a splash of color to the black dress with a different colored jacket/shawl for the black dress. Decisions decisions decisions.

My sinus headache is pretty much gone......I can feel the pressure in my head, but it's not a pounding headache, thank goodness. My throat however....not good. And I've picked up a cough. NOOOOO I do not want to be sick!

Got bit/stung by something when I was outside mowing this morning.....my arm hurts like the dickens....but oh well. Nothing I can do! :-)

Well, today's foods are super high in sodium......I know it and I know that there is nothing I can do about it (well other than eat something different...but they are stuff that has been requested by my husband....so I"ll eat them. They are not all that bad for me. I'll be under my points...but for lunch we are having a Chinese style meal.....and for dinner tacos. I'll be doing the taco salad thing again....so I'll be fine point wise...but sodium..eii yiii yiiii. Hey, at least I know about it.

Just for curiosities sake, I'm dual journal ling. I"m still keeping my journal with my weight watchers points. However, I'm entering everything into fitday.com. I've parallelled some days in the past, but I"m trying to do it for a couple weeks. It seems to me that 24 weight watchers points is about 1400 calories for me. The nice thing about this dual journal ling, fitday gives such cool reports, charts and numbers for your figures! :-)

Busy Saturday

reenactors-collage, originally uploaded by mfcstotler.

Woke up today and weighed in at 184.6. I was pretty darn happy with that! I had set the alarm early enough to exercise. So I hopped onto the exercise bike and rode for 45 minutes before getting ready to go to work. I had been planning to go to the grocery store after work and all morning I toyed around with the idea of actually stopping at the gym on the way to the grocery store and getting in another work out. Well, that didnt happen.....Todd decided to go to the store with me...and with his ear infection...makign him a bit dizzy, probably not a good thing to go to the gym. BUT, after dinner tonight I asked him to go for a walk with me. We went over to the battlefield. There were reenactors encamped at the dunker church to commemorate the anniversary of the Battle of Antietam/Sharpsburg. (later this upcoming week). I snapped a few pictures. I came home and at first wanted to kick myself because I hadn't switched my camera to monochromatic/black and white. But then decided to actually play on photoshop. Above are the results!

Did the normal grocery shopping. I came home and took care of preparing everything that could possibly be prepared in order to make this healthy eating venture as easy as possible! :-) Let me tell you, that takes time. I had to dish up two cartons of ice cream into 1/2 cup containers, cut up a watermelon, clean and cap strawberries, make lemon mousse and watergate salad (for todd), clean the grapes and something else that is escaping my memory. I also made pesto crusted chicken and homemade onion rings tonight. I've made the onion rings, but the pesto crusted chicken was a new recipe. It is definitely a keeper! :-) YUMMY!

Pain...but success

sept. 12, 2008 (12 of 365), originally uploaded by mfcstotler.

Well, this picture about sums up my day thus far. That's why I snapped the shot......thought it would be funny. Now, after having taken those pills and still no relief....it's not so funny. Last night I went to bed with a slight headache. I didn't think anything of it. I rarely get headaches anymore (surprisingly, it's one of the things that kinda dissapeared as I lost weight), but when they do come, I can usually sleep them off. So I went to bed. I woke up this morning to find that I still have a headache. Oh yes, and add a sore throat to the mix. Nothing contagious....I now know why I have a headache...sinus pressure.....and the drainage causes the sore throat. LOVELY! It's a rainy dreary day........which is causing my arthritic knees to kick up a fuss. And if those three things are not enough...the monthly ick has made it's appearance. What wonderful day! (note the sarcasm).

Excuses? Nope! I gave myself a day of rest yesterday because my body just ached and I was suffering lingering exhaustion from my marathon day of apples. But this morning, I drug myself out of bed. I got on that exercise bike and I rode 45 minutes.

My weight, dropped again......185.8. I'll take it.

Last night I never got off my butt to make my menu or do my grocery list. The biggest thing I did was pull out some ground turkey from the freezer for the chili that I plan on making when I get off of work tonight. I did bring my stuff with me today. I've made up the menu for next week. I'm actually very statisfied with what we are having this coming up week. I really do think I'll be able to navigate this week of eating at home fairly well. Some weeks Todd makes requests for certain meals that while they are super tasty....are just soooo hard to navigate.....simply becasue portion control is something that I struggle with. But anyway, grocery list is made, I just have to check a few more things at home to finalize the list and I'll be good to go.

Sitting here at work......twiddling my thumbs, hoping for the day to progess onward in a fast manner. 4 hours and 45 minutes left. I'll pull out my journal here soon. I"ve kept a hard copy of this whole weight loss journal (it actually goes further back than the beginning of this blog). I'm in the process of rereading it. It' been interesting. I forgot about certain events and happenings that are actually pretty big. Things like, if I allow a waitress to rush me, I tend to slip back into old habits and order the first thing that catches my eye, which is not usually the healthy item. And I'm remembering feeling and emotions that I had when I reached certain goals and victories. I am actually somewhat dreading the time when I get to this last year....because what a shame, I've really sat on the fence for the past year and have gone NO-WHERE with this weight loss journey. Wel, wait, that's not true. I have continued to learn little aspects and idiosincracies about myself as I progress onward in this new lifestyle. SO it hasn't all been a loss.......I've learned to 'maintain' and I can sit back and relax a bit knowing that I wil be able to maintain my weight. (not that it's going to be easy...but I can do it....as I've proved this last year).

Ok all deep thoughts and reflections are just not going to happen anymore with this sinus aching head!

My weight jumped back up to 186.6 this morning. Not too worried, I ate really late last night (uhhh 10:30PM) and TOM is right around the corner. So, I'm sure if I continue to follow the plan that things in diet world....ooops healthy lifestyle world will right themselves!

I didn't exercise today. This morning I ached something fierce. TOnight I still ache, but I'm also dead tired. BUT, I have done stellar with my eating! :-)

I need to summon the energy to work on our menu and grocery list. Our fridge is bare! :-) There is plenty here to eat...but we are just pretty much out of fresh fruit (not to worry, I have a bit of applesauce..amongst other things) and perishables are running low. :-) But that's typical for the end of the week!