Wednesday Check-In

I have already broken the news to Jen that in the weight loss department, I sucked big-time this week.

I am up four pounds this week.

Yes, you heard me right. FOUR FREAKING POUNDS. I am attributing some of this to Aunt Martha (just to be nice to myself), and Jen is attributing some of it to my strength training (just to be nice to me), but the truth is, I was on a major binge bender this week. Worse than usual, I'm afraid, because several days my bingeing went into the evenings, when it's usually limited to afternoons.

The good news is that I must, at least, be losing inches because my husband said to me this morning, "Wow, you must really be losing weight!" (and we all know HE wouldn't say that just to be nice to me).

My Habits for last week:

Every Day

Weigh--100%
Read morning prayer--98%
3 daily pages + Gratitude Journal--missed several days
Use my FLYLady Control Journal--solid
Follow my Momentum Work-Out plan--100%
Do Kelly's Missions--solid
Do Weekly Pamper Mission--I learned this week that if the Pamper Mission requires assistance, PAY SOMEONE because I can't rely on my husband to follow through (it was a massage this week)
Yoga--80%
No pop--100% (woo hoo!!)
No chocolate--fell off the wagon with this one
No frosting--one day slip-up
No Target--went once, which is better than SEVEN TIMES (I caved in to Snacks' begging)

This week I'll keep working toward 100% on what I've already put together, except I will take out no chocolate and no frosting and replace it with the following:

When I feel compelled to eat sugar, I will first drink a glass of water and write three pages (I will carry a notebook in my bag) about why I want to eat it, and how I will feel and what the effects will be afterward.

I will also limit Target to MONDAYS, which will give me more leverage with the other Target addict in our home.

I am also journaling my food, which I will continue.

Despite my gain this week, I am feeling really solid about my fitness--I had a kick-ass 5K run last weekend and knocked 6 minutes off my time from a February run. I feel strong and in control in that department. Now I just need to find the same sense of control I am feeling with my workouts and with my routines, with my FOOD. I think I can get there this week.

The Fashion Department

was hard at work this morning getting Daddy ready to go to the office...
Snacks specializes in "bows", while Sissy, of course, takes care of the shoes.

We Spent the Day Yesterday

in Wabasha. I decided at 7:00 a.m. that we needed something to do on a Sunday when it was forecasted to be cold and gray, so we loaded up the car and took a road trip down the river.

We walked along the Mississippi Riverfront looking for Bald Eagles. We didn't see any, but we had a nice walk in the sunshine.

We had lunch on the water at Slippery's where Grumpy Old Men was filmed, and then walked back to the National Eagle Center where Daddy and Snacks went to a program to learn about bald eagles. They got to watch an eagle named Columbia scarf down a dead rat (Snacks later declared that rats are crunchy, which was MUCH more information than I needed...)

while Sissy did a little browsing in the gift shop--the results of which can be seen below...

A little further down the road we visited the LARK Toy Factory for a ride on their hand-carved wooden carousel...

and icecream...


which Daddy had been waiting for ALL DAY LONG.

The End.

I Ran My Personal Best Today...

I decided only a couple of days ago to run the shorter version of the race I started training for earlier this spring. I had hoped to run the 10K race, but only a few days into my training, I realized my foot wasn't healed enough to compete.

Now that I'm finally on the mend (woo hoo!), I decided I would still take part in the event--just in a lesser capacity--and I'm really glad I did.

Even though it was cold and snowing (last year I ran the 10K in a tank!), I had a great race. I shaved almost SIX MINUTES off my 5K time just from February, and ran an 11:50 mile, which for me is HUGE! I finished with the runners, instead of at the front edge of the walkers.

Just before the finish line I had to say a little prayer that I wouldn't either puke or have a heart attack (thankfully, I didn't do either), and DAMN if that didn't feel AWESOME.

Sissy's Sense of Style

seems to get stranger and stranger over time...

but you'll notice her outfits almost always include a shopping bag.

A Couple of Weeks Ago,

around 20 months, Sissy finally said her first word: "Yeah," (sometimes pronounced "yeee-ahhh" in the voice of a feeble little old woman, which is especially cute).

She has occasionally said, "Ow," "Oh, oh," and, "Woah!" For one day she said, "More," but then that passed and she reverted to the sign.

Nothing but "Yeah" has been consistent until yesterday when she started saying, "No," as in, "Sissy, it will be time to get in the shower in five minutes,":

"Noooooooooo! Nooooooooooooo! Noooooooooo!"

I think that one might just stick.

I Feel it's My Wifely Duty

to record these things since my husband has declared that some day he is going to write a book for husbands titled, What NOT To Do:

Last night I discovered that my dish sponge was missing. Gone. Nowhere. We searched high and low. We used to have a dog that ate sponges, but the current dog? Not a chance; he's too short to reach it anyway.

Since I go to Target every day, you would think that I'd have a plethora of extra sponges in my stockpile but, it turns out, not a one.

So it's 8:30 p.m. and I'm trying to get the kitchen cleaned up for the night, still haven't eaten dinner, still need to shower after my run. I can't clean the kitchen without a sponge, so I ask my husband--who is fully clothed including shoes, who has eaten, showered after his run, and is about to sit down at the computer or watch TV while I finish up the last hour of home care before I finally drag myself off to bed--if he will run quick to the corner store and grab me a new sponge.

His response:

"Do you really need a new sponge tonight? Can't you just go and get one first thing in the morning?"

Hmmm...Jackass, let me see... You could make the round trip by yourself RIGHT NOW in just under four minutes (no exaggeration there, Jen), so I can eat my dinner and won't have to go out in public all sweaty with my bangs in a clip, streaming mascara, in work-out shorts with suede CLOGS on, OR I can drag TWO KIDS to the store with me in the morning and then have twice as much clean-up work to do with TWO KIDS hanging off me and whining while I am doing it.

Yeaaaah...I don't think so.

His response to that?:

"You don't have to be such a bitch just because YOU'RE EMBARRASSED that you lost the sponge."

I had to end the conversation there and run to the store myself because, OBVIOUSLY my husband has gone completely insane.

What They Were Up To...

While I was typing up my weekly check-in, the children were very busy.

I told Snacks I would not get his money containers down for him while I was working. Being the clever and innovative child that he is, he decided to take matters into his own hands:


Once I recovered from the freaking heart attack that I had upon discovering what they were up to, I got the containers down for him.

Snacks is learning how to count money. He has counted out more than five dollars and wants to go spend it. On anything (hence the tantrum he had moments ago upon learning that we aren't going to Target for at least a week).


While he has been counting, I've had to contain Sissy so she won't mess with his piles of money. I put her in her highchair and let her rifle through a make-up bag that has essentially become my Junk Drawer in the bathroom since I was planning to clean it out today anyway.

Somehow I managed to take this photograph of her and didn't notice her chubby little finger was jammed into a tube of lipstick...


until a little bit later... when it was too late.

Wednesday Check-in

Since we've both decided that counting Weight Watchers POINTS sucks for all eternity, Jen and I check in every Wednesday to help hold each other accountable for reversing the effects of what Jen has come to call The Expansion Project.

I've decided to start posting my check-ins so I have a record for myself of what has worked and what hasn't. I came across an old journal page of mine several weeks ago that made it clear to me that I do not have good recollection in this respect. I thought I was Doing So Well at this time last year and was beating myself up for Falling Off the Wagon at one particular point, but in reading this particular entry, I came to the amazing realization that I had been struggling at that time too. Only that time I had been able to right myself. I wish I had documented that so I knew how I did it back then.

This week I am down 1 pound.

As I look back over the past month or so I realize that I have pretty much just been maintaining--losing and gaining the same pound. Good in the sense that I haven't continued to gain back the weight I lost in '06-'07, but not the direction I want to be headed either.

I have spent the last several weeks rebuilding the solid foundation of habits that I had when I was successful in losing my initial 60, so even though I've just been maintaining, I feel so good about getting myself back to a stable position.

FLYLady has been key to my success, as has finding, through FLYLady, a fitness program that I LOVE and can see myself sticking to long-term. My house looks great, the kids and I are dressed, fed, and ready to go by 7:00 a.m., because I have been getting up at 5:20 a.m. to get a shower and breakfast BY MYSELF, which has been HUGE for me. We are also getting in our regular long walks with the dog.

I still have a long way to go, but I'm feeling really strong in the changes I've made in the past few weeks.

The current working list of habits that I'm strengthening is this:

Every Day

Weigh
Read morning prayer
3 daily pages + Gratitude Journal
Use my FLYLady Control Journal
Follow my Momentum Work-Out plan
Do Kelly's Missions
Do Weekly Pamper Mission
Yoga
No pop
No chocolate

This week I am going to add the habit of No Frosting, because I've been bingeing on frosted stuff every day this past week, and I feel like that's something I'm ready to give up this week. It doesn't feel scary to me, even though we have a birthday party to attend on Saturday.

What does feel a little scary to me is saying I will not go to Target for one week*--but I'm going to commit to it. We've been going almost every day which is bad for a whole lot of reasons.

Congrats to Jen on her loss this week!


*Snacks is lying on the floor right now having a fit about this already.

Miraculously, we had no plans on the calendar for today, so I took advantage and got some things done around the house while the kids had a Dance Show in the living room.

The song of choice for today was, unfortunately, Puff the Magic Dragon, which always makes me cry.


The good news about this particular version of Puff is that the artist, Paul Lippert, wrote another verse at the end in which Puff is rediscovered by Jackie Paper's daughter and they all live happily ever after.


The bad news is that that makes me cry too.

___________________________________________________

On the subject of dragons, I encountered this when I returned home one day earlier this month:

Minna, Snacks and Sissy had great adventures while I was gone.

Quote from Snacks this morning:

"I can't believe I have a sister like her...I love her."

Snacks 5, Sissy 20 months

One thing I have learned about myself--and us--over ten years of home-ownership is that in the spring, we have only enough enthusiasm and motivation for outdoor spring clean-up to last ONE day. Anything that doesn't get done on that ONE day, probably will not get done the entire season.

So today was that day. It was sunny and almost 70 this afternoon. We took full advantage of the inspiration that we have come to know as fleeting and did our whole yard--front, back and sides.

Damn, that felt good.

Tonight I deleted Marlee's Rant. I deleted it because I was no longer blogging for me, but for my readers. I had become more worried about pleasing my readers, than about doing any actual writing, which is what I initially created the blog for.

I was spending too much time obsessing about my layout, how it looked to everyone else, how I always had to keep it fresh (but couldn't), how hard it was to come up with ideas for my readers, and how much time it was all taking away from my family and other things I love to do.

I did a trial run this past week of no posting and no blog networking. I felt downright giddy and free. I took that as a sign.

I am very grateful for all my faithful readers, but I've decided it's time to go back to blogging just for me, which is why I do not have a comment section on this blog...at least for now.

And who knows where I'll go from here...