Last post for a week! (probably)

So I thought I'd post one last time before I jet, got a lot to get done still but I'm giving myself a mini-lunch break. :)

I hit the ground running this morning at about 7, didn't bother with my usual morning shower because I knew I'd jsut be going to work out and want to shower again when I got home. By 8am (after breakfast (Cereal and Milk) and a bottle of water) I was standing in front of the DMV waiting for it to open so I could get my plates switched. Got that done, came back home and cleaned my entire kitchen including the stove, inside of the fridge and microwave, and then picked up any trash/extra stuff laying around. Just have the bedroom and living room to tackle and vacuum and I'm done with the house. I'm waiting until D (the BF) gets one so that I can get him to help me bring the stuff up out of my car. I'd do it myself but going up and down the stairs so much gets me very winded, I'd rather NOT have an asthma attack kthxbai. Good for me yes, in moderation, I'm not in that good of shape yet. But I have brought up 2 things out of my car so far today, from both times of going out and coming home, gotta go up the stairs anyway might as well carry something right?

Anyway, so about 10:45ish am I ran to the gym, did a 45 minute walk at 2.5 speed alternating between 3 and 4% incline. My legs were jello after. Did a little stretching, hopped back in my car, swung by subway (rather than go do grocery shopping on a hungry tummy) and came home to eat. I got a foot long oven roasted chicken with lettuce, tomato, onion and black olives, and one thin swipe of light mayo (about a tbs I'd guess) and a bag of baked lays potato chips. I've noticed when I get a foot long it's too much but not enough with just half. I decided to try the baked chips today to see if that helped and it did. I get the foot long cuz they're 5 bucks right now vs. the 4.02 for a 6 inch. I save the second half for later, whether it be lunch the next day, dinner tonight, whatever don't matter, still good :)

So next on my to do list today is to finish up the house, bring up my stuff out of the car, go to get some groceries for D so he has something to eat while I'm gone most of the time this coming week and do the laundry >.> HATE LAUNDRY but it needs to get done :)

I have some pretty heavy duty stuff planned this week, my mom is flying in tomorrow morning around lunch time. Me, her, the girls, my friend Ken, his wife Robin and their daughter "'Stina" are all going to go to grab a quick bite to eat and then to the.....ZOOOOOOOO!!!!! XD 2 to 3 hours of walking fun woo! After that I dunno, maybe we'll hit up some shopping or something, some other sort of sight with them. I think it'll be a blast! :) I'm SO taking my camera, so be prepared for pictures! lol.

Anyway, I leave now to go get some stuff accomplished. I may post again, especially if I have pictures, we'll see. I know that my mom has to go back to the hotel to sleep sometime (unfortunately my one bedroom apartment is not NEAR big enough to house all 5 of us by far and so my mom opted for a hotel room). So maybe when I come home if I"m not dead tired, I'll post stuff.

Until then!

Amber

A mini-weigh in

Today marked the end of the challenge on WW, so I had to weigh myself to get the final tally. According to the Wii Fit I'm at 275.1, my own scale that I've had forever (and wanted to see how far off it was) said 274.6. But I'll be good and take the higher of the two numbers. :) I am .1 away from the 10pound mark. woot!

I've been really worried about when my mom comes, what we're going to do, eating out, her meeting the BF (yikes!). You see, my mom, because of all the trials and stuff we went through as a family with my dad, is kind of hard to read and get along with. Don't get me wrong, she's the nicest person ever, and would drop everything to help anyone. But she's got this...gruff bubble exterior you have to get passed, and she's a huge into religion and so sometimes jokes and stuff don't really fly with her. Basically she seems to be like a "witch" but only until she lets her wall come down a little. I'm not too worried about say...my boyfriend not liking her because, frankly I don't think he'd care one way or the other. I'm not worried about my mom not liking him because she knows I'm happy and so she will be happy if I'm happy. I just want everyone to get along! The whole mother in law thing horror stories I've heard, don't want to be a part of that! lol. What's nice is when I first mentioned my mom was coming I didn't get the usual "Where is she going to stay" response I was expecting. My BF surprises me all the time, I guess I've just had a lot of duds in my years of dating lol. He just asked when, and for how long, and when her flight was getting in, if I could have Ken (our friend) take me to the airport since she was coming in so god awful early...But never once did he balk about it, or complain about it, sound annoyed or anything. Was nice. :)

I have so much to do tomorrow OYE! I have to get my plates for my car done, work out (Friday through Sun are my Y days), get some semblence of groceries in the house for BF to have something to eat while I'm off galavanting with my family, finish moving the stuff up from my car, finish my homework assignment that's due on Monday, possibly clean out the BF's truck if I get ambitious, and clean up my house. Wow, I have a lot to do! lol. Maybe I better start tonight while the BF has his daughter...

So anyway, I'll probably "disappear" after tomorrow. Fret not, I will not have fallen off the bandwagon, I'll just be incredibly busy :)

Amber

Morning time it is!

Ok, much better. :) I forced myself to stay up until 8pm last night, so I wouldn't be going to bed too early and getting up way too early and I slept from 8 until I crawled out of bed at 6:30 this morning. I probably could've slept longer if I didn't have to come to work that's just how tired I was.

But I'm much more awake this morning, by far, than I was yesterday. Yesterday's utter lack of sleep messed up my points day though, that's for sure. I was too tired to get up and eat breakfast, too tired to mess to much with lunch (ended up with 2 pb&j's) and too tired to eat much for dinner either (subway sandwich!). Going into dinner I'd used 12 points for the day, and I had a 6 point sub. Bringing my total to like around 18, out of 32. So I was 14 points short yesterday...not cool. But one odd day isn't going to kill me. Shockingly enough when I woke up this morning I wasn't really hungry either, so I opted for a granola bar and 1/2 cup of milk (something I could quickly eat since I was running a little behind), and off I went.

So I'm getting excited. I just work today and tomorrow and then I'm off for a week and my mom is going to be here Saturday morning. I have SO much stuff that needs to be done. I need to finish bringing up the stuff out of my car, and get it washed and vacuumed out (winter is not kind to the inside of my car, especially this year when we got dumped on twice, lots of dirt and rocks and stuff that was at the bottom of the snow got stuck to my shoes and into my car it came). I also have to pick up my house a bit, it's relatively clean, but by Friday I'll have a few dishes to do and stuff, and I need to vacuum and dust again. I'd also like to get a coffee table before she gets here. We don't have one right now and it'd be nice to have one. I"ve been wanted to get one but just haven't. I also have to go on Friday and switch my plates (FINALLY). They had to send off for my title or something (I still have a loan on it) and they called to say that it came in. That's good considering my Texas plates were set to expire at the end of this month. :)

Here's to hoping I can stay OP when my mom's here! lol

Amber

One of those days...

Short post today folks. I'm having a good day food wise, water wise, but I plan on going home, eating half a subway sub and going to bed. Last night I think I finally fell asleep about 3:15am and the boyfriend was still awake when I got up for work this morning at 6:30am. Why? I dunno. I was sorta tired when I laid down, my boyfriend said he wasn't tired so he was playing the playstation that's in our bedroom. Doesn't bother me to have music or game stuff playing in the background when I'm trying to go to sleep. I actually find it relaxing. You know how most people complain video game music is too redundant? Well it's good sleeping music lol.

We were just kind of laying there joking and then all went quiet and...nothing. Couldn't sleep. I tossed, I turned, he even gently "woke me" at one point because he said it sounded like I was having a nightmare, don't remember. Needless to say no real sleep came to me. So...no real creative juices flowing today folks (as if there are most times lol), I'm going home to get a much needed long sleep.

Amber

The little things...

Have you ever noticed the little things in life are what gives you the most pleasure? I have several "little things" that really give me pleasure in life...

Joking with patients as they come into the office. I really enjoy bringing a smile to someone's face.
Being supportive of the ones I love most, including my BF, unconditionally.
Enjoying a nice hot cup of hot chocolate on a cold winter's day.
Playing with a puppy or kitty.

The little things. They're also a huge motivator for me when it comes to weight loss:
Making my mini-goals (even if it takes a little longer than planned)
Seeing the number get bigger of what I've lost.
Knowing that regardless of the change in weight, I'm making overall better choices in food.
Wanting to wow the people in my family when I go home to visit
Being able to throw away clothes that don't fit anymore (and I mean they're too big on me).

It's the little things we take for granted every day in our lives that I really strive to try to enjoy. My dad's death at 51 taught me so much. It taught me that any day could be your last, and that you need to enjoy your time while you can. Once I got past the initial heart ache and anger of him leaving, I've really started to realize priorities in my life.

I have come a long way in the past 3 years, I used to get so mad at the stupidiest things, upset with myself over things I couldn't control. Get angry with my dad over things HE couldn't control about his medical conditions. Angry about past things that bothered me that obviously couldn't be changed and were making me miss out on the PRESENT things that could be changed. I've learned to really enjoy today because tomorrow may not come.

So I'm viewing this journey of mine as a little "big" thing. It's a little step in the right direction. A step that will allow me to more fully enjoy life. Not be winded walking up and down the stairs of my apartment, to be able to freely chase my children (whenever I have some) around, and who knows what else. Each pound I lose is a little thing. All those little things will eventually add up into a very big little thing I call the skinny me.

Are there going to be bumps in the road along the way? Undoubtedly. But for now, I am relishing the little acomplishment I've had of going a full month of thinking of only my health and not of what other people think of me. Of stocking my house with nothing but good for me food, and of the "not so good" food, resisting eating. Of enjoying the support I get from my BF and the support I give him every day with his own problems he's having.

I hope you too can relish in the "little things"

Amber

Weigh in Day today!

Today's the weekly weigh in day for me, and I'm down 1.7 to put me at 276.7 pounds. Without even realizing it, I've met my goal I'd set a full week early from weight watchers. I joined a small group of people looking to lose at least 50 pounds this year, and we do mini goals each month (weight loss or otherwise). I'd put my goal to be down 5 pounds (to 277) by Feb 13th, which, when I set it was an average of about a pound a week. Something to start me small, very attainable and easily able to boost my confidence. The fact that I reached it almost a week ahead of schedule excites me.

I had a pretty good weekend, I met some of my goals, and those that I didn't well, I just didn't and it doesn't really upset me. I had a lot of fun this weekend and made the choices I did and that's that, no use in getting upset about something in the past. I easily drank all my water, it's getting easier to squeeze it in, especially at night. I did try out one new recepie this week, girlfriend of mine sent me a wendy's chili knockoff, I made it over the weekend it was really good. But for goals met that's where it ends. Sorta. I didn't exercise as much as I would've liked to this weekend, but I DID manage to get my car cleaned out of all the trash and some of the stuff brought up before it turned cold again. I DID manage to sign up for the YMCA AND use it on Saturday, and I DID manage to get my laundry done, house cleaned up, kitchen spotless AND all my grocery shopping done in one weekend! So for not getting the homework done, or getting the cardio exercising in for 4 days (I did 3) I think I got a lot accomplished otherwise.

Besides that my weekend was filled with pushing to get my paladin to level 70 on WoW (she was 63 on Saturday) and I had a blast doing it! So I did a lot of work and some play time and I feel good about that. I still lost 1.7 this week, and that's good. Not too fast, not too slow, just a good pace.

On another note, I can no longer wear my pants. That's right, the jeans I love so much are just too big. I constantly have to pull them up, and even with a belt they don't feel right. So ... I'm putting them on a hook on my door to my bedroom to remind me of just how big I was and where I DON'T want to go back to. I still don't see any changes in myself, except those pants. My shirts pretty much fit the same, those pants were just too big to begin with so it didn't take long before I had to retire them. But I'm ok with that. I've lost over 8 pounds already, which is good. I'm shooting for the 10 pound mark this coming weigh in if I can. If it doesn't happen, it doesn't happen. I have to be very careful when my mom comes to visit because I don't want to gain it all back. But I'm sure she'll have me pretty busy walking around a lot while I'm here, so who knows, maybe I'll lose some while she's here. :)

Anyway, I hope today finds every one well! I'm off to go finish some work up here at work and (ugh) work on my homework assignment >.>

Amber

A successful day

Today was a successful day! It was beautiful outside, so I cleaned out my car (just have to bring up the non-trash) in anticipation of needing it cleaned out for when my mom comes to visit. I also went to the Y and walked on the treadmill for 30 minutes. I walked for 10 minutes at a 2.0 pace and then the last 10 minutes at a 3.0 pace (which I will say was kicking may ass at the end of it) and then the other 10 minutes were a warmup/cooldown. I also did some exercises on my Wii, fixed dinner, did the dishes and am now relaxing. Dinner tonight consisted of lean cut center loin cut porkchops (no bones) with augratin potatoes and peas. It was quite yummy. Only time I can cook porkchops is when the BF isn't home, he's not a huge fan of them, he'll eat them but why cook something he'd rather not have aye?

Oh, and I got my hair cut! :) I also found the book to my camera, hopefully I can figure out how to take timed pictures.

Beyond that, it's just another beautiful day. Hope it finds you well :)

Amber