Waterproof cycling jacket/invisibility cloak

I shared this eBay listing with Amy yesterday, but thought you all might get a kick out of it too. Don't forget to read the Q&A!

Do the "skinny" Girl Rock!!!

I changed the words of the song...I'm so freakin excited.  I lost 1.5lbs last week!!!!!!!  I ran like a mad woman on Saturday with a friend (she nearly killed me) and although I've been skipping Aerobics to squish on my little baby girl *who is crawling BTW*; I've not missed a night of run/walking.  So that takes me down to 217.5.  Looking at goals, I technically have 7.5 to go to June 1st (unreasonable, I think) and 17.5 to Ireland (5 weeks from now, also unreasonable) but I'm not really that worried about it!!!  I'm just excited I keep losing. 

This is so different from EVERY other way I've ever lived my adult life.  I have always ALWAYS ALWAYS been obsessed with dieting and my weight.  I'm sure that is why I'm in the predicament I'm in now...However, this time is totally different.  I am really enjoying this new lifestyle.  I love eating well and not feeling stuffed and gross.  I LOVE LOVE LOVE my green monster.  I eat everything I really love to eat, just in moderation.  I have started to really think about portion control and noticing when I'm full.  I have also added exercise to my daily routine.  I can't say that this is my favorite part but I do it b/c I feel good afterwards and I KNOW this is what is making my weight loss possible. 

Today is a good day!!!

Up this week

I was 142.8 today, which was better than I was expecting. Every day I get on the scale and expect to be back to 146. I'm eating fairly well, but getting no exercise so even when I eat perfectly, I still feel like a lazy slug.

Connor seems to be heading back into bazoinka immune system land--he took over our bed a couple of nights, then didn't sleep more than a few hours for several nights, and then added in scratching himself a lot over the weekend, then moved on to middle-of-the-night baths and fighting off getting dressed the past two mornings. We're not going to "wait and see" this time--he's going back on prednisone tomorrow morning.

I didn't forget

Ugh. I don't wanna talk about it...

I didn't forget...

I was 140.5 today. But that was, honestly, several pounds better than I was expecting, even though it was a pound up from last week. Last week's weight was the lowest it had been in several days, so it went right back up, and this week's weight was after several days of gluttony and absolutely no exercise. Not to mention car time, which usually makes matters worse. I have to assume I'm somewhat dehydrated to get a reasonable number like that. But today marks the beginning of a return to normality for me; maybe I can at least avoid gaining any more.

Whoops..forgot to weigh myself

I never forget to weigh myself but the last few days I've been in a weird zoned out mood in the morning.  I will weigh in tomorrow with my results but the last time I weighed myself was Saturday and I was down .5 lbs from last week.  Hope I lost at least another .5 :)

Revelation

Exercise and food are going along fairly smoothly -- it's nice to have the farmers market back. I've had fresh strawberries, asparagus and lettuces, including a bunch growing in pots on my deck. The strawberries are *so* good, especially when I put them in fresh yogurt obtained at the farmers market.

I've picked up my exercise again and am trying to bike around the neighborhood at the minimum in anticipation of a busy biking summer that starts in about two weeks.

So ... onto my revelation ... I'm pretty sure this isn't the first time it's hit me but this time the facts hit the target.

I was watching a documentary about David Blaine -- the guy who likes to lock himself in boxes and not eat for two months. Fun, huh? Anyway, he did a 44-day turn of only drinking water and sitting in a clear box hanging from a crane in London.

He lost 52 pounds and his waist expanded by probably 7-8 inches. He couldn't believe it. His starvation trick turned him into a tub of goo not just a bag of bones.

I know it's easy for me to sit in front of a computer all day and not think about moving until my after-work workout. So I'm trying to inject a couple of walks into my day -- it's my proven way to shed pounds and I've neglected to get them back into my schedule. I'm trying harder.

For your viewing pleasure...

This is the color of the yarn (sort of) that I ordered to make my new sweater. I ordered it on an alpaca/merino base so it will be very soft and fuzzy. However, the alpaca has a tendancy to not want to suck up as much dye as the other wools - so it will be less intense than what is here. Isn't it pretty?? 8-)

Running in the Rain...

Last night after I put Livie to sleep (around 7:30) I decided I wanted to go for a run.  I headed out and realized that a storm was brewing.  I was pretty sure I could make it back before the rain....so out I went.  I headed out for my 2 mile run/walk.  I decided I was going to run to a timer b/c I'll cheat distance but I won't cheat a timer.  Where I'll stop running a little before the end of a distance goal...I will run straight until the timer goes off (at least I know my limitations, LOL).  So I set my timer for 10 minutes and took off at a pretty good pace.  I was thrilled at how easily I was able to do it.  After the buzzer went off I started to walk for a bit.  After about 30 seconds of walking the heavens opened up and God unleashed his furry in the form of a DOWNPOUR!  I still had about 3/4 of a mile to get home...I just started running and laughing!!!  I was drenched when I got home.  My hair was dripping and I looked like I had been in a wet t-shirt contest :)  It was pretty comical!  But I ran basically a total of 20 minutes without stopping!!!  THIS WAS A HUGE breakthrough and I have the rain to thank for it!!!

Just thought I'd share...:)

So now the clock is ticking!!

I have officially ordered the yarn for my next sweater - which means that I have to finish Sarah's sweater before that arrives. So - I better get busy on that! I don't think it should be a problem. I finished the body (front and back) up to the armhole split. I have started on the left front. That I should be able to finish tonight. Then the right front (only a few days for that). Then the back - maybe a week. The big challenge will be the sleeves and the button bands. I heard one person describing knitting sleeves to knitting kneesocks - which no one does because it takes too long. OTOH socks are done on toothpicks with thread and sleeves are done on knitting needles with yarn - so it can't be THAT bad! I will keep you posted.

In other news I had no ingredients to green monster on Saturday and didn't get to the store until Sunday (except for one abortive attempt where I got as far as the parking lot of the grocery store and realized I had no way to PAY so I went home). Anyway, after chuch yesterday I went to the grocery store and bought a BUNCH of ingredients and promptly came home and made one last night. I was REALLY missing it!! It tasted so good last night!!!

Today I ordered a new blender from Amazon. Mine has been acting suspiciously for a while now. Today it was sort of surging and smelling like burnt rubber. I don't want to be left without any way to whomp a green monster in the future (although, I could probably use the food processor... we already figured out that the immersion blender doesn't do it...).

On Saturday I went to the all time weirdest home show. It was for a company called Norwex. My good friend Patty has just signed up to become a consultant. Norwex is green cleaning products. Who would think it is a good idea to sell cleaning products through direct sales...? However, the woman said that these are used in the majority of homes in Europe and 1 in 7 homes in the Canada. It is just now starting to be sold in the US. I gotta say - you know I hate to clean - but I was very impressed. It was SO COOL! But - don't worry - you will all have a chance to see this stuff for yourself. I told Patty I would do a party for her in July (so I can earn the Mop System... hee hee). I am not kidding though. I was REALLY impressed!!! BTW - Norwex stands for Norwegian Experience - so Emily - you will need to arrange to be in town for it so you can tell us if it really is like living in Norway. Ha Ha!! Wear Cecilia's dress. LOL!

Tuesday? Really?

I don't know why I can't seem to remember to post on Tuesdays. I look at the blog on OTHER days! My weight was 139.5 this week -- just a half pound up from last week, remarkably. I realized I was eating just as much junk food without my Easter basket, by dipping into the general collection of candy. So instead I got my basket back and put a bunch of it into the family collection, which balanced things out a bit. Only I hadn't counted on Mother's Day -- spaghetti and meatballs and MORE chocolate!

I've been exercising still just the one or two days a week, but I've been so busy otherwise that I'm not just constantly eating, and my step count isn't too bad. I'm eating meatless lunches still -- I find that I'm completely hooked on hummus on toast and these organic soups we've been getting. I'm not sure that it really reduces the calorie count, but I'm liking the lighter taste of the meals. We're aiming to cook meat only once a week at most -- seafood and vegetarian the other days -- but so far we haven't settled into a routine, because of baseball nights, Easter, Mother's Day, an approaching birthday (chicken tenders for the kids' party, pizza with the family), and a night of pizza at home (which I'd been craving through Lent). And that's just in two weeks! Surely it has to calm down soon.

Slow and Steady wins the race...

I'm down .5 today (219)  To meet my June 1 goal I have to lose 9lbs in 3 weeks.  I don't think this is logical but I'll give it a go.  Food wise I've been "ok".  Nothing spectacular but I haven't been restricting myself either.  Today I made a bad lunch choice at Poulet.  I should have brought my lunch :)

My neighborhood ladies decided that we were going to start a walking club.  We walk on Mondays and Wednesdays.  Monday nights we go to the Ma Pa trail and we did 3.5 miles last night and it felt GREAT!  Wednesdays we will just walk 2 miles in the neighborhood.  I think I'm going to run either a half mile or mile in the neighborhood before I meet up with them...then walk the 2 miles.  I'm LOVING this time!  Aerobics is still on Tuesday nights but only until May 24th.  As far as this weekend goes...Friday night I went to the zoo on the first grade fieldtrip so I walked ALL DAY.  Saturday I ran/walked 2 miles.  Sunday I did nothing b/c it was mother's day :) 

I've just read an article that interviewed the authors of The Diet Survivor's Handbook: 60 Lessons in Eating, Acceptance and Self Care, Judith Matz and Ellen Frankel.  Fascinating stuff!!!  I think Mason and I are going to pick up the book tonight at Barnes and Noble.  I can totally get behind what they're talking about.  I definitely need to improve the relationship I have with food!  Has anyone read it?  I know it is in Amy's wish list...I'll let ya'll know what I think.

This is my crazy time of year...work wise with Open Enrollment so I'll probably be kind of out of the loop for a few weeks but I'll be back! :)

Holding steady

I was 142.2 again today, a testament to the fact that my normal diet keeps my weight steady. "Normal" this week included quite a bit of indulging, though--the G.S. Harry Potter overnight included a visit to Honeydukes; the Sheep and Wool festival of course included eating fair food (cotton candy--yum!); I had barbeque and ice cream (not together) for dinner on Sunday, and last night we went to Red Robin for dinner. So overall, not great eating. I guess I'm glad I didn't gain weight!

I did get some exercise, though. Kind of informally over the weekend--I took the girls to Patapsco State Park on Saturday and we went for a two mile walk, then I followed that up in the evening with a four mile walk with Davy. And this morning I got my act together to get out for a run in the morning. Ugh. I hate getting up before 5:30 in order to go torture myself! And when I say "run" I don't mean that literally--I probably didn't run more than 2/3 of the route. But I covered slightly more than three miles while the rest of my family was still asleep, so now I don't have to feel guilty all day.

One week later

So I haven't lost my five pounds of post-nasal drip yet. I did lose 1.8 of them. So that is a start. I should go back and read old blog entries for spring. I don't recall ever in my life having the post Easter weight gain that Emily talks about. I know I eat a lot ON Easter - and I know I have Easter candy for weeks following Easter - but it isn't like Halloween and Christmas, where I have the candy and eat it too, and spend the next three months avoiding going outside. Easter I have candy - and it often lingers for a long time - but I am not in hibernation mode, so I don't eat as much of it and I don't have as much time to eat it because there are other events going on.

My eating at Sheep and Wool festival was bad, but wasn't HORRIBLE. I had a Gyros on Saturday and a large limeade. Then Sunday I had a petite cheese burger and two large strawberry lemonades. I scraped together my last few dollars and borrowed two from Katie and bought some cinnamon almonds - which I ate all gone on the way home. So Sunday was worse than Saturday - but not awful considering it was festival food. OTOH, I spent about the equivalent of a week's worth of groceries on the food. Grrr. So Katie and I are back to Green Monstering with frozen spinach. Ick.

Exercise was OK last week. I took a couple of walks, did yoga (which, BTW, I was mentally deranged at - I had my migraine all last week that came and went in waves - and it was on an upswing during yoga - and I could not keep my balance for anything - and then twisted my arm weirdly doing a DWFD and it still hurts from that!). I took a nap after yoga so my headache was better by clogging - which was a lot of fun - as usual! We don't have clogging this week (conflict with the school or something) but Pam sent us the cue sheets and music for the dance we have been working on - so Katie and I will clog in our kitchen - or maybe the yoga room. Kitchen probably. We will have to do it at full speed since I can't download clog-amp on my Mac.

I have a new challenge for me. Katie and I are going to do a sweater knit along (we are going to do the same pattern, differnt yarns - BTW, Emily, if you want to do it too it would be a very good first sweater pattern for you - I will email the deets to you). So, my plan is to order the yarn - which will take about 6 weeks to get here (custom dyed). By that time I want to finish Sarah's sweater. I am about 6 rows from the armhole split - which means I am more than a third of the way through. I could do this in six weeks. So - the clock will start ticking as soon as I place my order... YAY!

Why did I bring jelly beans to work?

Terrible idea. But I might be close to being sick of them...they are the Sweet Tart jelly beans.

Shoot. I missed Tuesday.

I was actually on here and responding to comments and everything -- I just didn't get around to posting. Which is fitting, because even though I had all my normal Tuesday stuff going on, it did not feel like a Tuesday all day.

My weight was 139.0. I started to go up over 140 but I made Mary hide my basket, which worked a little bit -- there is still a lot of other candy around the house but I'm less inclined to be a total pig on the shared candy. Only a minor pig. So I'm not losing weight but I'm not gaining dramatically (yet). And when I got down under 139 -- my breaking point -- and my basket was out again, I shared freely. Only today I was up to the 139 again, so the basket has gone away. Since today I ate a couple of Cadbury eggs anyway, I'm not expecting a drop tomorrow. But I'm also not getting into my post-Easter free-for-all mode, at least not entirely, so when the candy dries up I might be able to keep the calorie counting going. We shall see.

I felt pretty icky last week most of the week, but after the first day it didn't seem like a dairy issue -- I think in the end that that was just coincidence. I think it was just the all-around bad eating. I do strongly suspect I'd feel better more of the time if I ate like I did during Lent more of the time. I'm finding I'm not as enamored of breakfast cereals as I was two months ago; if it didn't take 10 minutes longer I'd be back to daily oatmeal (but I'm still eating it a few days a week). But I LIKE the foods I eat most of the time! So I think I'll go on feeling icky sometimes and just trying to keep calories down, the way I always have.

I read an article on SparkPeople today that said the most effective exercise is the one you love to do. Several commenters said they simply haven't found an exercise they love. I'm kind of the same way -- I have a number of activities I like, like cycling, swimming, and tap dancing, but none that I wouldn't get tired of if I tried to do them five days a week. I like cycling about once a week if the weather is great, and I like it for commuting. I like tap dancing when it's part of a production but not really for its own sake. I like swimming about once a week. And NONE of these is practical for me on a weekly basis right now anyway, so it's not like I can rotate through them (and I'd still get bored of them because I'd know I NEED to do them). I accept that I'm not going to love any exercise that much -- of course I'd rather be reading a book or wasting time online or baking or doing something else at home -- but I do boring exercises WHILE I read a book because I need to do something for my physical well-being.

Holy Canolli!

And not in a good way. My weight was up FIVE and a half pounds since last week. AND - last week it should have been inflated because my period started that day. This just isn't right. OK - even if last week was an unnatural low - and today is an unnatural high I still want to know how I gained FIVE POUNDS in a week!?

It could be five pounds of post nasal drip - but I don't think it is. I have been dealing with allergies - but that is mostly an extreme headache (possibly a migraine and not allergies) and fatigue. I haven't been excessive with my exercise - but I have also been not that bad... Every other day if not daily. I had eaten virtually no Easter candy - until just this past weekend. OTOH, I ate almost no protein this weekend either. I have been Green Monstering every day, so I haven't been completely devoid of nutrients.

This past Friday I had another weird dizzy episode like I did back in February. This time I was at work in the middle of the day and started feeling dizzy. It is more vertigo than lightheadedness - but at the same time I don't really feel like I am going to fall down. It is more like I am stable, but the world is moving around me. Anyway - that lasted from about 1:15 to 5:30. I went home at about 2:30 because it came with an urgent need to sleep. I do know that my body will gain weight in reaction to pretty much any stress. It is very possible that THAT alone made me gain weight. I continued to feel bad off and on all weekend. I STILL feel like I can't get enough sleep and my head is being pressed in a too small headshaped steel mold. Yesterday Suzanne told me I looked unnaturally pale - even for my normal paleness. Anyway - so today I went back to my doctor for a follow-up anemeia, vitamin D blood test.

Sigh... The worst part is that when I have these weight spikes, they don't go away. I will never drop those extra five pounds.

*Sigh* Tuesdays

I think I'll have to adjust my weigh in day.  I have some mental block on Tuesdays for some reason.

We hiked about 4.5 miles Sunday in Patapsco before the drizzle started.  My arms are still sore today; I guess I must have been swinging them with extra vigor or something. We did two marked trails and then an unmarked that takes you to the base of Liberty Dam. It was a good outing overall; we finished up in about two hours. I was hoping to get out again tonight, but now I'm not sure that can happen because we have to stop by campus after work to pick up Peter's Blackberry that he left in a classroom last night. At that time of day we'll be lucky to get home by 6 pm.


I'm really sleepy today, and I even went to bed at a decent time last night. I managed to make us breakfast this morning, but lunch was just pushing it, so we have to eat out.  I wish I didn't work in the ghetto. It is really true what is written about food deserts in the city; even when you go into the market, your choices are pizza, chinese food or fried chicken. There isn't a grocery store nearby either.  At least if I go to Potbelly's I'll get in a decent walk.

Took a week off, gained a bunch of weight

After hitting my 140.4 goal, I decided to just not even think about my weight during the week after Easter, so I ate all the candy in sight (my theory is that you're going to eat it all eventually anyway, so why not get rid of it quickly?), didn't exercise at all (that one wasn't by choice, but necessity--I really need to figure out a way to fit in exercise when I don't have lunch breaks and Brian is gone for 12 hours a day), and basically acted like a gluttonous slug all week. As a result, my weight is up two pounds today from two weeks ago--142.2 this morning. Seriously, I was expecting worse so this was a nice surprise! As of today I'm back on the healthy diet bandwagon (although I think there are still some Peeps around here somewhere). I'm also back to a more normal work schedule. The last couple of months have been insane. I finally tracked all of the grants that went out--we finished 14 proposals in 6 weeks. A more normal rate is about two or three in a month. I've got two more in the next two weeks, but that's nothing--I should be able to finish those during actual work hours and not have to keep putting in time at home on weekends and during the evenings.

It's now less than six months until the Wild Goose Chase (metric century bike ride in October), which is plenty of time to train, except that I haven't done anything at all recently. I've been on my bike maybe twice this year. I miss commuting now that the weather is nice. Today would be a perfect day for bike commuting! In theory I don't really need to train--I did the 100 Miles of Nowhere a couple of years ago with no training, but my legs were toast by the end and I was averaging maybe 7 m.p.h. at the end of the ride (which I also did as a metric century because I had a 2:00 meeting that day!). I'd rather not do it that way again. Things should get easier in June when I won't have Girl Scout commitments every weekend, and the sun won't set so early (right now it's pretty much dark when Brian gets home from work), but between now and mid June I have no idea what I'm going to do to train.

I'll take it!

OK Ladies...I'll take it!!!  219.5!!  WOOT!  I'm getting there.  I have 9.5lbs to lose by June 1st!!!  This weekend was CRAZY so I wasn't sure how it was gonna work out on the demon scale but I'm pretty happy with my results. 

My exercise was unconventional this weekend.  Friday, I'm counting the maraton clean I did on my house before my Pampered Chef party.  Saturday, I'm counting the walking and walking and walking I did at QVC during Beauty Bash.  I also partook of some easter candy this weekend, but not too much and now all the good stuff is gone so I'm in the clear!

Sorry for the short post but I'm S-W-A-M-P-E-D today...Hope everyone has a GREAT Tuesday!