I did 30 minutes on Lippy. 425.9 calories burned. I went a total of 1.515 miles. Wanted to go more, foot was tingly/not quite numb. Tomorrow morning I need to get my tukas outta bed and hit it again. I need my exercise energy back, and I’m working on getting it back.

I downloaded a really cool Excel program/chart from Benjamin at Finally Slim (links over > there) and he also has a post under todays (10 days of Moving Averages) that explains more about the behind the scenes of the chart. It made me think and seeing the chart is really cool Thanks Benjamin

I’m off to bed…time change is throwing me off a bit…kids are taking it better than I am. I just want to sleep at 7:00 p.m.

Trick or treating was fun I pushed the stroller with Abbie and Megan switching off who got to ride to rest their legs. We had fun. They are both a little squeamish of creepy costumes, but they did wonderful I had chocolate. Lord help me, I had chocolate. Last night before bed…Little miss monthly decided to show. I’m NOT a happy girl this morning on my scale. Good news is, I know I haven’t done anything to cause the gain. Well…somewhat. Chocolate. Yes, I did have a few more than I had planned on. Then Clint made this AMAZING dinner for us last night. It was gnocchi…which are like potato/dumpling/kinda noodles…and he added diced tomatoes, spinach and some garlic alfredo sauce and mixed it. Talk about DELICIOUS. It was 8 pts. for 1 cup. This stuff was not only yummy, but VERY heavy. Literally. Like before I knew it it felt like I had eaten a bowling ball and it had just finally worked its way down and smacked bottom. whoa. So there are the 3 reasons that my scale was most definitely up this morning.

Ways I’m going to defeat that number today??? 1. I’m heading out to clean the barn. That is ALWAYS alot of calories burned/activity points earned. Alot of shoveling, lifting, climbing over the gates…very good workout 2. I shall have my feet practically glued to Lippy when I’m not doing my Pilates DVD or my WATP DVD. Today is going to be known as ‘Kick some ass Sunday’…officially.

I may give myself another day or two before I post an offcial weigh-in. I’m real good at getting discouraged when I see a gain, so why blow it when I can just wait another day or two, right?

I just spent over an hour flipping through approx. 127 diet sites. You know those sites that have like 200 sites listed on one page…well I found one and started at the top. Wanna hear something sad? I am not kidding, out of the 127 sites that I went through (mine is listed and included in this number as well) only 3 (yes, including my site) THREE of them were still an up-to-date site. 4 of them were people that had reached goal in like 2003 with no recent updates…kinda makes me wonder if they have stuck with it or if the weight had crept back on, therefore no update?? But the other 121 sites were seriously abandoned, removed, or showed 3 weigh ins with the last weigh-in showing a gain and then no more updates.

I know how discouraging a gain can be…I’m determined that I and my site will not end up as these places did…so I am on my way to clean the barn and get my exercise in so that my mind gets out of ‘a little worried’ mode and I tackle the gain head-on I know Miss Monthly is the culprit, but it’s still scary as hell to a number that wasn’t supposed to be.

Can I just say that for the past many months I have seriously been hooked on PostSecret. Every Sunday there is a new set of postcards sent in. I live for Sunday mornings to see the newest cards. There are alot that have adult pictures/themes so be careful who you read them around

Tonight is the girls Trick or treating I will post pictures later after my mom e-mails them to me as my digital camera has decided that it’s life is no longer worth living.

I plan on no candy.
I plan on no candy.
I plan on no candy.
I plan on no candy.

Yes. That’s the ‘plan’…I can do it. I’m not big on candy anyways, truthfully. The chocolate, now that’s a different story. But I can do it. Chocolate is not worth ruining the number on the scale that was so beautiful to me yesterday.

I’m going to put my pedometer on when we go and see how much walking I do. Trick or treating is for 2 hours. Even at ‘light’ activity, that earns me 7 activity points, and as of right now, it’s 1:30 p.m and I’ve only eaten 8 points. Add in 30 minutes on Lippy and I do believe it’s going to be a good day…

Water is getting easier to get down again…after I started the new medicine, water just didn’t want to flow downward at all. It was like my body was refusing to swallow. Strange. Better now though.

I added a couple of new reads on the right…I have found so many awesome journals (I despise the word ‘blog’…don’t ask me why) lately, and these two new ones are guys One is Fred from One Phat Man…he’s the one that wrote the book ‘From Chunk to Hunk’ and he is back to journaling to get off 15 lbs. that he had regained…so it’s great to see him back. The other, ‘Finally Slim’ is a ‘metro-sexual’ man, as he describes himself and he’s alot of fun to read I have a few others that I’m keeping an eye on before I add them…so you may see a few more new ones soon.

When I find new reads it snowballs. I read their site, and all of their links to other journals, and links from those journals and so on. Before I know it, 5 hours have passed, the dog has passed out from needing to go outside so badly and the girls have become weak from lack of nutrition. Therefore, I limit my time.

I know my official weigh-in isn’t until Monday…BUT…

I woke up this morning to a 3 lb. loss SO FAR this week…that puts me at

50.5 LBS. GONE!!!!

Do you know I started out needing to lose at LEAST 137 lbs. and now I can say I ‘only’ need to lose 87 more??? Do you have any idea how GOOD that feels???? I’m on freakin cloud 9 this morning!!!! I won’t update my charts or stats until Monday’s weigh in, but I couldn’t contain myself this morning.

Things are going really well again this week. I’m journaling everything, in my new Palm Pilot, of course! I don’t know if I mentioned that here or not, but I got a new palm off of ebay last week sometime for $28.00 shipping and all…I was so excited…anyways (sorry if this is all a repeat, I can’t remember if I posted about his or not) I downloaded Dotti’s restaurants into it, so I always have an updated restaurant list with me which is a Godsend. Also on Dotti’s she has a program you can download into your palm that is a points calculator. When I downloaded it, I really thought it would just be a points calculator. No. This program (which shows your points ‘range’ still from the 123 success program which I loved the most) has a journal to journal your food and points everyday. It has a points calculator. It has an activity points calculator. It stores your weight. It figures your BMI. It keeps track of your water, veggies, fruit, milk, and even has a little box you check when you take your vitamins. I never in my life imagined I would ever get a Palm…just didn’t seem feasable to me, but getting it so cheap and being able to store all my journals and points alone is so worth it to me. I love it

The only thing I really need work on this week is more exercise…so I’m on that tonight

I made a snack last night (which I had only ONE of because I wanted to keep my points low), and I tried it out on the girls and Clint and they really liked it In fact, Abbie ate the rest of what Megan didn’t eat. When I figured the points out it comes out to7 pts. for the entire snack. Here’s what I did.

Mini S’mores
1 bag 100 cal. honey maid graham snacks (Nabisco 100 cal snack packs)
1 mini marshmallow per graham snack
1 mini kiss (a larger version of a chocolate chip) per graham snack

I set my oven broiler on low. I placed the bag of graham snacks in a single layer, spread out on a cookie sheet. I took each mini marshmallow and gently smooshed them between my thumb and first finger so they were kind of ‘flat’ and would sit on the graham snack easily, then I set on mini kiss on top of the marshmallow. I put them under the broiler for just like 2 minutes. I saw a couple of the kisses fall over, so I knew they were getting ‘melted’…took them out of the oven and used a butter knife and pressed the kiss into the marshmallow gently so they would mesh together and let it cool for a couple of minutes. The kiss never really melted, but the marshmallow got very soft, so they weren’t messy at all…but the entire tray (there were 18 of them) was only 7 pts. total. So even if you ate 9 of them it’s only 3.5 points for a snack, and 9 of them is a lot. They are kinda sweet…I had one, but I can see after a couple it would probably be enogh. Definitely would curb a sweet tooth If you decide to make them, let me know what you think, would you??? I wanted to take a picture of them to show you, but my camera decided it didn’t want to turn on last night.

TWO. FOUR. NINE. POINT. FIVE.

Yes, I squeaked in, but I’m IN the 240’s!!! 249.5

That is a loss of 4.5 lbs. this week!!! I just need 2.5 lb. loss next week to hit 50 LBS GONE

Jennifer, I’m going to send you an e-mail a little later on, I have to get ready for work, but I wanted you to know I did get your comment…I will write as soon as I can today!! Wake up with a POSITIVE attitude today You CAN do this!!!

Friday night there was a talent show at Abbie’s elementary school. It was so cute. Then Saturday around noon, Jana (from A Lot Less Jana) and her family came up for the weekend from Pittsburgh, PA. It was so much fun They crashed here last night and left this morning after breakfast. It was great to see them

Today I’m doing N-O-T-H-I-N-G !!! Feels wonderful. I worked on my website a little bit, just a few little things I wanted to tweak a bit, and then I got up my new link for my challenge page. Jenn from Against the Odds had started the challenge, I had posted a while back about it, and just now finally got it up…so I will update that each week also along with my regular weigh-in chart. My goal is 20 lbs. by Christmas…very do-able

I did my very first 20 minute Winsor Pilates workout today. Ok. two words. HOLY. CRAP. Even watching the video itself WHILE I’m doing it, these people seriously make this look so easy. Like our bodies just automatically move, stretch and balance that way. I can honestly say, they have to be some strong-ass people…it really felt awesome after I did the workout, I felt loosened up everywhere, really feels good, and what a good workout! It’s basically, slow, controlled movements using your ‘center’ (your stomach muscles) to keep flowy movements…I am going to give this a serious try and stick with it a few times per week and see how I improve. I was able to do a few things decently, but most of it was a bit uncomfortable. It will just take some time to get my body used to the movements and get to be a bit more flexible, which I’m not.

Tomorrow’s weigh in I’m very excited about, as I saw a beautiful number this morning I am going to go and hit Lippy for one last shot at a teeny bit more of a loss…we shall have the big reveal in the morning!!!

Driving down my road after work today, I could see a lovely ‘You’ve got Mail’ box hanging on my mailbox!!! LOVE that It is my new Palm Pilot I won on Ebay for a measly $28.00 shipping included…deal or what?? I have never owned one and am completely drooling over it. Then I OPEN the mailbox. Junk, Junk, Junk, Junk, then I see it…a make-you-happy-cuz-it’s-not-junk yellow envelope. It’s got the cutest things written all over it…

I’m at 48 oz.! where are you?
Oh man! I only have 2 points left for the day
Yah! I stayed on track for a whole week!
MMM pudge brownies with FF cool whip!
How many points do you have?

It’s a surprise envelope from Karen. You won’t even believe this. She sent me a 3 DVD set of Winsor Pilates. I have been DYING to order one of those DVD’s…I’ve always been so curious about it…and she sent them to me!!!! I’m SOO dang excited Thank you AGAIN Karen!!!!

AND my new Weight Watchers magazine even came today!!! I had a mailbox full of joy

I weighed in at 250 this morning That is 4 lbs. so far this week…I want to get at LEAST one more by Monday…I want those 240’s SOOO bad. I used 22 pts. for today. Still having a hard time getting water down. I’m thirsty, but can’t down the water like I was. Ever since I started this medication, I almost feel gaggy when I try and drink it down…so I have to sip it to get it in and it’s literally cut my water intake in half…so I’m still working on that…

Today has been wonderful from the get-go. Medicine is working it’s wonders so far. The nasty sick feeling I was having has passed and I’m doing great. I feel better, I’m sleeping better, waking up easier, all that good stuff

Scale was nice to me this morning I’m down 3 lbs. already since Monday. That puts me 1 lb. below where I was before the whiskey free-for-all at the wedding If I can just do 2 more lbs. by Monday I’ll see 249 That is exactly 10 lbs above my lowest that I hit after I had Megan. After that it’s all virgin fat territory people.

I had 22.5 points yesterday and only about 60 oz. of water…so today I’m trying for around the same amount of points, 100 oz. of water, and hit Lippy for 1/2 hour later on. Need some intentional exercise

Oh, and I still need to get pictures up from the Wedding…I will work on that soon as I can…(thanks for the reminder Karen)…and Mel, thank you so much for your comment!! I will be e-mailing you soon!!!!

I started my new medication today. I did feel a little different a few hours after I took it, but not all in good ways. I paid more attention to my toilet today than I did my kids. Kidding. But seriously, I had to run to the bathroom SEVERAL times today (wont’ give you the nasty details that I’m sure you can figure out for yourselves, but…activity points??? Nah…), had a very dry mouth (so it was easy to get my water in), and another good thing, I had NO appetite (so my points were low). Food didn’t even LOOK good. And, pinch me please, but even ICE CREAM didn’t sound or look good. LOVIN’ the new meds (not that I feel them working really, but all of the above kept my day good).

The Biggest Loser is on tonight, but I’m having to record it on the DVR as I can’t sit and watch any TV show while the girls are still up. They are heading to bed, and then at 9:00 I will be able to replay it. I caught the first 10 minutes maybe, but I’m anxious to see it. Lost and Biggest Loser are shows that I just can’t WAIT till the next week comes on