It's finished!

Believe it or not, Kyra was very excited. I got several spontaneous hugs in thanks. At least one of my kids likes my quilts...

Freeze motha... er, Mother....

Ethan had some post xmas money to spend and he bought himself an FBI kit. It didn't include the glasses. Still, not bad for $7.00, and that hat will fit him forever....

Greetings from the Windy City

No, I'm not traveling, it's just that Portland has been experiencing some rather rough winds lately. Our power went out on Saturday just as we were sitting down to dinner and movie. The power outage was limited to our neighborhood with just about 2,000 folks effected. When I went to the gym the next morning (and saw many branches littering the road as well as some power lines leaning further into the road than I was comfortable with), we had another one. That time it was many more people effected. I came home and was not able to open my garage door. The power was off for an additional hour. Knock on wood, that was the excitement for the week. Amusing kids with no power can be more difficult.

Last week, we watched Spiderman 2 with Ethan. He enjoyed it, making it the 3rd big people's movie that he's sat through without being distracting. He commented last night while brushing his teeth how Spiderman is still a kid and how unlikely it should be that he overpowered an adult such as Doc Ock. Dangerously, I told him that age and power are not always equal (well, we have had to argue with him that age and height have no logic either, but that's another story).

As for me, no comment on how I'm doing weight-wise, if only not to jinx myself. Obviously, I'm still reading Jane Austen-esque novels...

Curses! Foiled again!

OK so bragging: bad idea. I went downhill from that point on. 2 bakery shop binges later, and I gained a half pound this week. Sigh. Crap!

It's not like I was so restrictive all week and the binges were the result of that deprivation. No, it was probably a combination of depression and premature celebration. I felt down all week, and then Wed. I had a webinar about resumes, the result of which I felt worse about myself. So along with the food binges, I also had movie binges (Pride and Prejudice times two: both the Keira Knightly version as well as the Colin Firth marathon version).

But at least it was just 1/2 lb, and that could be just a dehydration thing because I did not have enough water the last couple of days. At any rate, new week and new opportunity to stick with program. You know how you can't be "kind of pregnant"? Well, program is a bit more forgiving occasionally, and you can lose from time to time while not being all "letter of law" about things, which of course makes it harder to actually do program right. I keep snacking on good things and I am hungry. I have a feeling it's not real hunger, but you'd be hard pressed to convince my stomach...

Mid-week check

Wow! 3 more days of the week to go and I've still only used 11 of my 35 bonus points. Yay me! Yesterday I suddenly started getting some bad thoughts, seemingly out of nowhere, but I squelched them. Must've helped to have had a dream the night before of me with incredibly baggy pants. Can't get any bag in my pants if I stay the same weight or gain, now can I??

I bought a candy bar yesterday and just now ate it. Now I just need to get past the mysterious call from my doctor's office: the nurse called to follow up, and she left the message Monday. They were out of the office yesterday and now we're playing phone tag. It's got me a bit buggy. I'm assuming it's to do with my mammogram and having to have one mid-year in addition to the regular one, but still... Did I get the results of my pap?? Was there something else I should worry about????? So many trigger situations to get over...

Something I wish I had video-taped was the other night when Ethan spontaneously started dancing to the music from iTunes. It was the love song from Enchanted, and all of the sudden he starts twirling and kicking up his legs and doing arms and arching his back. O-M-G it was SO hilarious!!! Add to that the fact that he's so macho all the time and more typically is doing kung fu moves. I about died (in a subtle, not to get him self-conscious kind of way). Future "America's Got Talent" contestant or what?

Dodged yet another bullet

I really must stop taking my luck for granted. Finally went to a WW meeting on Saturday and discovered my snow binges and lack of exercising only gained me 2 ounces. Phew! Well, it wasn't entirely luck: I did make some healthy choices here and there in between the baking (and subsequent eating) sprees. So yay, me! Now here I am almost halfway through my WW week and I've used 11 of my 35 extra points. No bakery trips yet. I worked out today, and as usual didn't have anything to eat before going, but thanks to my not over-indulging last night, that meant my "tank" was on empty, and I barely made it through my workout. I fantasized about food (read: sweets) all the way home, and then had a glass of ice water before having my new favorite breakfast: sliced banana with high fiber yogurt and a couple of tablespoons of granola on top. More yay me. Now I'm going to try to stay too busy to think about food.

I worked out my usual chart of potential weight loss and I can lose between 20 to 50 lbs by the end of the year, depending on how I stick to it. It sure would be nice to be slimmer this summer for my 30th (?!!?? Holy crap, where did the time go?!) High School reunion. Needless to say, I'm only going if I weigh at least 25 lbs less than I do now....

The Worst Day Ever!

When I picked Ethan up from school yesterday, he complained that he had the worst day in his whole life! Gee, sorry to hear about that, buddy! And what, you might ask, was so bad?? Well, people were mean to him, they blamed things on him, and he got hit in the face during dodge ball. His friend Tyler gloated about it (gee, that sounds so familiar...oh yeah: Ethan does that all the time, too!) When asked what would help make the bad day turn better, of course TV was the answer. Well, that I could do. Scooby Doo, where are you?!

Finally!

On Sunday, in the afternoon, just a half day before school began again for the rest of the Winter session, it began to snow. My first thought was "Crap! Not again!!!" My second thought was to confer with the oracles of weather. They were not freaking out, which was odd for them (perhaps they, too, were sick of being snow bound with increasingly cranky kids...) And in a lovely reversal, we went to bed with a blanket of snow all over the houses, trees and driveways and awoke to just an average, dismal rainy Oregon morning. Phew!

So one of my resolutions this year is to finish my projects started last year. What a change it would be to complete a quilt during the same fiscal year it was first conceived! Well, that hasn't happened yet, but I have hopes... Yesterday I sandwiched Kyra's new twin/full quilt and got a couple of blocks stitched. Man, that thing is bulky! Today I spent a bunch of time looking at alternative ways of getting this done. I think I've already decided that I want to do only small pieces unless I can borrow a thing called a "HandiQuilter", a system by which you put your sewing machine in a device and move the machine instead of the quilt, which is rolled neatly on these rollers instead of being bunched and pushed through the tiny opening of my machine. Or maybe next time I'll just send it to be quilted.... This is my least favorite part. I like doing the borders and the free motion quilting. I suppose if I were smart I'd do free motion all over it, but there would still be bunching. I will have to revise my notion of doing a queen sized quilt for my room. That or try out the "quilt as you go" concept.

As for my other "weightier" resolution, so far it is hit or miss. I spent a lot of time in my sewing room yesterday instead of snacking, on one hand, and doing stuff like ironing and laying out my quilt and pining it, so that was labor-intensive. On the other hand, I made break and bake cookies and ate some. Sigh. Today I intend to do more quilting (I just did the other 3 squares in the middle row; just 5 more rows of 6 across left to do.... Ack!) but I'm also toying with the idea of baking. I was thinking of making snickerdoodles with chocolate chips, or rather chocolate chip cookies with cinnamon, whichever. Would they be chipper doodles? Or snicker chips? Hmmm.... And how not to eat them all before everyone comes home. 

I was having an interesting conversation with one of my sisters the other day. She is thinking of joining WW. She want to lose like 20 lbs, but that would be well below the weight chart. If she goes by what WW says someone her height should weigh, she would only need to lose 13 lbs. Do I encourage her or not? She was saying that she is still working on her bulimia and is now mostly doing it just "recreationally". I don't get that, although I suppose eating just for the sake of doing something probably is the same thing except without the vomiting afterwards. It occurred to me that the hardest thing for her would be to eat all the points for each day. I can see  her trimming off a few just to speed up the process, but WW is all about not doing things in a speedy and unhealthy manner. Anyway, she was bemoaning the fact that she is not as thin as our other two sisters and she is tired of being the "chubby one". I'm sorry: that's my role, not hers! 

But her envy of my other two sisters is the unhealthy thing. I suppose I would be lying if I said I didn't envy it, too, in a way. I hate taking pictures with my sisters because I do look so big in comparison, and it's hard not to compare when you are side by side. I don't want to look emaciated by any means. Would I be happy if I were normal sized? What is normal?

I'm at a loss at how to help my sister when I can't help myself. I can't make her snap out of her habits and behaviors anymore than I can get myself to do it. Sigh...