Week #2 – Full Day #3

Today I woke up really missing hubby. I just felt like curling up with him and getting a hug, but obviously no hubby, and the kitties were not having any of the cuddles. I felt like crying this morning, and really didn’t want to get out of bed.

Dusty was just as pesty today as yesterday, but he tried different tactics this time. Yeah, nice try Dust – those tactics only got you kicked off the bed and out of the room today! Instead of going for my head today, he went for my feet and our nice, not-so-cheap comforter that I wanted since we moved and finally got on sale just before winter (it’s still on the bed because it looks nice and I get chilly sometimes overnight with the AC on). He was digging incessantly at my feet, then tried biting my toe, and finally settled for attacking the comforter with his teeth and rear claws. I thought he was going to destroy it! And since I was in no mood to get out of bed this morning, he landed himself in the hallway behind a shut door.

When I finally did get up, the Wii fit was actually nice to me this morning – 0.9 pound difference from yesterday! After what I ate for dinner and how late I ate it last night, I really didn’t think there would be a good difference in my weight today. That was a nice surprise.

I had trouble finding my motivation again today. I have a lot I wanted to do this week, and really haven’t done any of it yet – I’ve been feeling blah, and that doesn’t make for a motivated me. I decided I needed to do something about it today though, so I wrote a list…..a fairly long list. I knew I wouldn’t accomplish everything on the list by the end of today, but at least I have a list now, and I thought that might be good motivation, since it feels great to me when I accomplish things and get to cross something off. I managed to cross off 4 things. Tomorrow’s another day, but I won’t have as much time to get things done due to going out and about with my parents.

I missed our patio furniture delivery today. I thought the stuff was going to come by Monday, and still wasn’t here as of yesterday. Today they decided to deliver it immediately after hopping in the shower, so now I signed their little slip and hopefully I’ll see it tomorrow. I’m going out with my parents tomorrow to purchase our canopied pergola. We will then be almost fully furnished for our patio – we just need the patio itself now! We bought almost all the stuff we wanted to put out there already, even though the patio hasn’t been started yet, because apparently the end of the season for the stuff is now already, and we were already starting to have trouble accumulating these items. The pergola is on clearance now at $180 off the regular price, so we’re getting while the getting is available. I’ll do a patio post another time though.

Tonight I watched the new “Fame” movie. When it first came out and I saw the previews, I wasn’t so sure I wanted to watch it at all. I just kept thinking it looked weird, and how could they screw up “Fame”. I was very wrong – I loved it! The music is awesome (my twirling and dancing ears were active throughout the entire movie!), and they kept the general concept of the original without simply just copying it. So, on that note – have any of you watched it? What do you think about it?

Thursday Five and Other Things

My five “happy’s” for this week:

Jubilant

Giddy

Excited

Thankful

Stoked

1. I hit my lowest weight yet in my most recent weight loss endeavor! It’s not my overall lowest weight ever, but it is for this attempt! This attempt seems to be working….slowly….but still keeping motivated and now down about 24 pounds!

2. Watching “America’s Got Talent” with my hubby – he never really was a fan of the show and didn’t watch it with me much before, but now that Howie Mandel is a judge, he seems to be enjoying it more with me. I like when he gets into shows with me. :)

3. The baton twirling group I used to perform with, and now volunteer my time helping out and teaching will have their first show of the summer season tomorrow – they are performing a few new brand new routines for the first time, and I’m excited to see how they do!

4. I enjoyed the awesome weather here this afternoon and sat on my porch for a while. When we looked for a house, a front porch was a must have for me, and today I was thankful to have it and be able to enjoy it.

5. Still “stoked” about some possible new writing opportunities that might actually make me a little extra pocket money – I’m still doing my research on them, and figuring them all out, but I’m hoping for some good things to come out of it all.

Now onto the other things:

Jillian Michaels new show, “Losing It with Jillian Michaels'” literally makes me lose it every time! There have only been two episodes so far, but both made me bawl like a baby! She’s one tough cookie, and even just watching it motivates me to get up and do something. Today I did 20 minutes of free step and 10 minutes of free run on the Wii Fit. That equals 1600 steps through the step aerobics and 1.something miles for the run. I later took a long walk with my hubby around our neighborhood. I even stretched! So hopefully my legs won’t be yelling at me tomorrow and I’ll be able to do more.

I also made a new dinner tonight, and I must credit my hubby for the idea, because it came out very yummy. I made a “Taco Turkey Burger” if you must give it a name (and I like the sound of it!). I took extra lean ground turkey and mixed taco seasoning into it, grilled the patties on the Foreman grill, placed them on a wheat hamburger bun and topped them with fat free shredded cheddar cheese and salsa. It was delicious!

Hope you all have a happy Friday tomorrow – I will be doing my “Favorite Kitty Pic Friday” link up again. One person participated last week, which still felt great and I loved seeing her kitties, but I’m hoping for some more this week! If you’re reading this and would like join in, check back tomorrow for it!

20! And other things…

I finally reached 20! Not 20 years old…hit that almost 9 years ago. 20 pounds! I finally made it to the 20 pound mark in my weight loss, yay! I struggled a lot to reach that over the past 2 weeks. Even when I was really good with what I ate, I just seemed to stay kind of stagnant, or even increase in weight, but I finally made it today! I certainly have a long, long way to go, even a lot more just to reach the shorter term goal I had, but 20 pounds shed seems like a good milestone to me. I was very happy with my Wii Fit today. :) I’m headed to my in-laws on Sunday until Tuesday for my brother-in-law’s college graduation, and low-cal eating is never much of an option at their place, so we’re trying to plan in advance and take food options with us, hoping to avoid any big setbacks. I really need to stay on track as much as and as often as possible, so here’s hoping for the best from this visit!

I also got my biopsy results yesterday from my dermatology appointment, and I’m very happy to say that everything came back normal! That’s a huge sigh of relief on my part. I do still have to go back in November for a re-check on all my current spots, but if everything still looks good then, I most likely will only have to go back once a year or every other year.

Happy news all around so far this week. Tomorrow is Favorite Kitty Pic Friday, so remember to check back for your weekly dose of cute/funny! I still need to pick a photo, thinking I’ll feature Dusty again since Jasper had the spotlight last week.

At Home Chinese “Take Out”

I recently discovered Hungry Girl, and I absolutely love her! My hubby and I love Chinese food (he loves it even more than me), so I have been trying to figure out Chinese-like recipes to make at home since we are dieting, with no great similarities to really satisfy the craving. Hungry Girl does a lot of healthier, lower calorie alternatives for favorite fast foods and restaurant meals. So I turned to her website for recipes for some of our favorite Chinese take out choices. I found some awesome recipes, and we tried them 2 nights ago. We picked 4 items off the "menu", which now in retrospect was too many. Each individual recipe seems fairly quick and easy enough, but combine all 4 together, and it took a couple hours to prepare! Thankfully, my hubby was a great help with chopping, prepping, rolling, and even made one of the recipes totally by himself! Anyone that knows us knows that he does not cook at all, so I was pleasantly surprised and grateful. Even with his help, however, we still didn't eat until about 10pm...
Our meal consisted of:
-"Wowowow! Wonton Soup"
-"Shrimpylicious Egg Rolls"
-"Crab Rangoonies"
-"So Low Mein w/Chicken"
(all named by and courtesy of Hungry Girl)
The amount of food was ridiculous! I couldn't even finish it all, and neither could he, but the meal was supposed to be 611 calories for one serving of each item. The serving sizes were as follows:
-2 wontons with 1 cup of "soup" (broth and veggies)
-2 egg rolls
-4 crab rangoons
-1/4 of the total amount of lo mein (I used my very large chicken fryer pan to make it, and the whole recipe filled the pan pretty well)
Imagine what the calorie count, fat content, and sodium would have been for the same amount of food from a real Chinese take out place!
The egg rolls were probably our least favorite part of the whole meal, especially because I'm not a huge fan of egg rolls to begin with, and Joe is so he had high expectations for them. Our favorite part: the crab rangoons! They were awesome!

               

I don’t know much about her copyrights and such, so if I’ve peaked your interest in her at all, just search for “Hungry Girl”, and you should have no problem finding her site.  She also has books published available for purchase at multiple locations.  I’m excited to try her version of corn dogs next – I even bought the appropriate hot dogs already!   :)

Big Sigh of Relief

I had my appointment with the dermatologist today - his name is Dr. Daniel Shurman and he is with Family Dermatology of Reading. After just one visit, I highly recommend him to anyone needing this particular specialist, and I thank my aunt very much for recommending him to me! He was very nice, and knowing I was extremely nervous about this appointment, tried to keep me at ease. The assistant, Nicole, was absolutely wonderful too. I told her how nervous I was about the visit, and that I can be a big baby when it comes to needles, and she was very caring and understanding. They were both very easy to talk to and really listened to everything I said - and sometimes I probably talk too much to doctors, which most of the time is just nervous chatter. But anyway, enough flattery to my doctor - on to my appointment...

I had to fill out the usual paperwork, they asked the usual questions, and he did a quick skin check all over. He said that it's perfectly normal for skin tags and freckly spots to change and/or grow over time, as long as they are not multi-colored or asymmetrical. He felt as though all my spots seemed to be fairly normal and of no concern at this time. The mole that started off all of this panic was removed (I will spare you the gory details - and no icky pics of any of it either), mainly because it was becoming larger and could eventually get snagged on or irritated from rubbing on my clothes. Overall, he said it looked to be a typical mole, worthy of no other cause for concern. It will be sent for testing anyway, as is office policy with any biopsy or removal, and I should know the results either way in about 2 weeks. I was in and out of the exam room in about 25-30 minutes, and only waited about 5 or 10 minutes after finishing the paperwork. I felt about 50 times better after the visit was over - it's amazing how anxiety can wreak havoc on you! Even my hubby said "welcome back" later on and how he could see the difference in me compared to how I was earlier today and yesterday.

So the worst part of the whole visit was the local anesthetic. The needle was nothing compared to the actual anesthetic itself - that stuff can really burn! Kind of makes me feel like it contradicts itself...supposed to be numbing, but causes a decent amount of discomfort to get there! Now the numbness has definitely worn off, and I feel pretty sore in that area. It started feeling mostly like a bruise, but it has gotten a little worse as the night went on, and cleaning with peroxide didn't feel too great, so I will be taking some pain medicine and hoping for a restful, comfortable night. Now I just wait for my test results and hope there's nothing abnormal about them. I'm not nearly as nervous about that, especially since he seemed to think it was pretty normal, but I'm sure some worried thoughts might creep in there every now and then until I know for sure. Keeping my fingers crossed and thinking positive!

I didn't get any crafting done today due to this appointment, lack of concentration, and no motivation, so I'm hoping to accomplish a lot tomorrow for the yard sale at my parents on Saturday. Also, I will be making a made-over Chinese takeout dinner tomorrow, courtesy of recipes from Hungry Girl. On the menu: wonton soup, crab rangoons, shrimp egg rolls, and chicken lo mein. 1 serving of each item comes to a total of 611 calories! It's a little more than my usual calorie count for dinner, so I will have to adjust my calorie intake accordingly earlier in the day, but could you just imagine what the calorie count would be at for all that food from a Chinese takeout place?!? Maybe I'll figure it out and post it with an update on how everything turned out.

PS - Happy Birthday to my dad! Didn't get to see him today, but possibly will tomorrow evening. Hope he likes his gifts!

Weight Loss and Family

I haven't heard it much lately, but people have already asked me when I plan on having children. My response used to be "When I have a house". Well, we now have a house, so now my response has been "When I lose some weight". I will not mention actual weights in this post, but I was always a healthy weight (actually perfect weight) through my childhood and high school days. After starting college, my freshman 15 turned into a good 30, and continued higher and higher from there. Part of my weight gain was the fact that I wasn't eating very healthy, which I never did during my younger years, but combined with a sudden decrease in activity, it was a very bad combination for my metabolism and body. Since graduating high school, I have gained a total of approximately 97 pounds in 10 years. Over the years I have tried a few times to lose weight, with some success here and there, but that not-so-good-for-me-but-oh-so-yummy food always called to me and roped me back in to gluttonous eating habits, making the pounds come back with extra friends. One year I was even tested for thyroid problems and diabetes, since they run in the family, and thankfully the tests came back negative. So, in looking to start a family, I did not foresee having a healthy pregnancy with the extra weight I carry around. All I could imagine was bed rest and all sorts of complications due to hypertension, gestational diabetes, etc.

So my husband and I have started "dieting" yet again. We began back in February, and our weight loss plan is based on counting calories. We have figured out how many calories we are allowed to eat in a day in order to lose a certain amount per week. I'm allowed 1121 calories/day, which is no problem most days, and some days very hard. We do "cheat" every now and then, but since starting I have lost 18 pounds (he is down 20!). I would probably have lost even more by now if we hadn't cheated as much as we have, but for the most part I am on my way. We have tried this method of dieting before, with success, but holidays with not-so-healthy foods always tempt us back into weight gain. Other than just wanting to lose weight, I never had a serious motivator. Until now. Wanting to start a family has been my main motivator this time, and keeping healthy as well as raising a healthy family will continue to be my motivation in the future. I had a goal to lose a total of 40 pounds by July, which seems like a lot, but was attainable at the time I set that goal. With some of the cheating we have done, I still have approximately 25 pounds to go by then, so it may no longer be attainable at this time, but I'm certainly going to try!

We went to go visit my grandmother yesterday for Mother's Day. I have not seen her for about a month. One of the first things she said to me was "You're getting skinny!". That made me feel so good, especially coming from her! Keep in mind, this is the same grandmother who went prom dress shopping with me in high school and decided to "announce" from the dressing room that I couldn't fit into a certain dress because I was "too chunky" (style of dress didn't fit my body shape). I was kind of embarrassed at the time, but she was only being honest, and I love that quality about her. I can always count on her to tell me the truth, whether I like it or not. I get enough of the typical grandmotherly love from my other one - you know, how you are perfect to them in every way, no matter what. So to hear that from her, to have her notice that I'm losing weight just by looking at me and not knowing that I did lose or how much, made me feel really good. It's hard to visibly see it myself, since I look in the mirror everyday and there's not a huge difference from day to day, but I have noticed some extra room in my clothes lately.

So I will continue to try my best to meet my goal by my deadline - it might not happen at this rate, but I will be very glad to lose whatever I can by then. I have a long way to go, so that is just my short term goal, but it's a start! Stay tuned for updates...maybe even some before and after photos later on when I have lost enough to show off some "after" photos!