Happy Birthday to...Us!

My family threw me a great party last night, and I would like to take this opportunity to thank everyone that was involved in the planning and preparations for it. It was awesome! There were frogs everywhere...and not an over-the-hill embarrassing gag gift to be found...they were actually nice to me, believe it or not.

I would also like to take the opportunity here to wish a very happy birthday to my "twin cousin" Bonnie. She's even OLDER than I am, having been born at least a few hours before me! When we were kids, we were always the same height and weight, and both had blond hair and blue eyes. We even had a few people convinced that we were twins. We celebrated every birthday together, but then she moved to Iowa...and then on to places like Chicago...California...the remote island of Adak in AK...and finally to Washington state, which has made it a bit difficult to get together for birthdays. She had hoped to come for a visit and celebrate with me this year, but is now planning to visit this September. I can't wait! Here's a picture of her, as you can see...we don't look a lot like twins anymore. Happy Birthday, Bonnie!!!

On my and Bonnie's 11th birthday, (which was also a Monday), I believe we had celebrated the day before, and then I spent the night at her house. My mother was pregnant with baby number 10, and we kids were all "farmed out" to the cousins, because the doctor had scheduled Mom to be induced that day. I was pretty excited that I was going to get a new little brother or sister for my birthday. Yes, I really was...even though I already had 5 sisters and 3 brothers! We waited anxiously for the phone to ring all day, with the news of my newest sibling. At last, it came, somewhere around 4 pm, if I remember correctly. I'd gotten a brand new baby sister for a birthday present. Her name was Kathleen Jo, and she looked as different as night and day from Bonnie and me, with tons of black hair and almost black eyes. She was a beautiful baby...and 39 years later, she's still beautiful. Happy Birthday, Kathy!!! See you tonight!

Happy 1/2 Birthday, Hayden!

I meant to post this yesterday, but I forgot. Our youngest (so far) grandchild turned 6 months old yesterday. We haven't had the opportunity to actually meet him in person yet, but we will very soon. He and his mother will be coming to town from Oregon in about 2 1/2 weeks. We can't wait to finally get to know him a little bit. He sure looks like a happy little guy. Last we heard, he was not yet crawling, (except backwards I think his dad said), but was sitting up really well.

We won't get to spend a lot of time with him this time, but then his Dad is going to bring him back for a longer visit in September. His grandpa is especially excited to meet the little guy who's going to carry on the family name. They're so much fun to play with at this age. I suspect he'll be a little scared of us at first, having never met us, but hopefully we'll all be getting along famously by the end of the visit.

Week 12 Weigh In ~ 25 lbs Off!! WooHoo!

I can't believe I haven't posted in an entire week! I guess I haven't done anything exciting enough to post about lately. However, I am pretty excited about losing another 2.6 lbs, for a total of 25.4 lbs to be exact, which leaves just another .6 lbs to go before I get to my target weight, and earn my bronze key chain. I did get a "25 lb weight" charm to go on it tonight. Of course, being my ADD self, I managed to lose that too before I got out of the building ...but I went back there and it had been found. I'll try to hang on to it 'til I get the key chain.

I'm going to try to be really "good" the next 4 days, maybe try to go for a walk at least once a day, and write down everything I eat. The challenges will come with the weekend because first of all, we are going camping with a group from our church, and then on Sunday afternoon, a "surprise" party is planned to celebrate my big 5-0! Don't worry guys, I'll act surprised when I walk in and you all yell "SURPRISE!". No - no one let the cat out of the bag...remember, I was the one that suggested the time and place for the party in the first place, because of everything else going on...and I knew my family wouldn't let me get away without a party. And I really do love that about all of them.

My plan is to weigh in next Monday, which is my actual birthday, (and If I play my cards right), I should still have a total of at least 26 lbs off by then and will have reached my first short term goal, which was to reach my target weight by my birthday. After weigh-in, we'll probably find someplace to go for a free birthday meal. We generally go to the supper club here in town for our birthday dinners...but unfortunately, they're closed on Mondays and if your birthday is on a Monday...well, you're just out of luck that year!

Hopefully, I'll keep busy enough with organizing and packing things for camping this week, that I won't have time to think about eating much.

Week 11 Weigh-in ~ Just keep losing...Just keep losing...

Well, believe it or not, I was actually down 2.8 lbs tonight! I was pretty happy with that, especially after the week I had. As I said in the last post, I had a hot dog on Wed., we had ladies night out at church on Friday, so I had some cake there, since we had a birthday girl there. Saturday night, Ruth and her fiance, Dan took us out for Father's day and I had ice cream. We did our usual Chinese buffet yesterday, and to top it all off I had a pork steak and even a mini cheesecake at our Father's Day pot luck dinner at Mom and Dad's yesterday! Just think what I might have lost if I hadn't "indulged".
That's okay. I have decided that if I'm going to stick it out and lose this weight, and then keep it off, I have to be able to enjoy myself once in awhile. If I feel like I'm depriving myself all the time, I won't be able to keep it up. As long as the numbers on the scale keep going down...I will keep "indulging" now and then.
I've had a couple of non-scale victories this week too! I sat in one of the church nursery's rocking chairs the other day, and noticed that my thighs were no longer touching both chair rails, like they used to! Maybe that's not that exciting to most people, but it was to me. Then on Wednesday, I tried on a pair of size 18 jeans that I had saved from the last time I wore that size...quite a few years ago. I got them zipped...and buttoned. Woohoo! They were a little tight around the waist, but I wore them anyway. Friday night, my friend Sarah brought me another couple of pairs of jeans...one of them was a size 16! I can get them on too, but they're not exactly comfortable yet. I started out in a tight size 22, and right now I'm wearing a very loose size 20. I really need a size 19 right now. Those new jeans are going to be my inspiration for the next week or two.
I have stated that I would like to be down to my "target weight", (10 % off) by my birthday which is two weeks away. I am within 4 lbs of that goal right now. I can do it. I know I can.

V.B.S. 2008 Whew...What A Wet Week!

I have been helping with VBS, (Vacation Bible School) at our church all week. They did a water park theme this year, "Splish Splash Bible Bash ~ Where Kids Ride the Wave of God's Love", with the bible stories being all somehow related to water. I worked with 2 and 3 year olds this year...yes, I'm a glutton for punishment. No, actually, I really like 2 and 3 year olds. They're just soooooo cute at that age, ya gotta love 'em. I always figured God made them that way on purpose...if only for their own survival. We had anywhere from 2 to 6 of them every day this week from 9am 'till noon. There were a few tears when the moms left at first, and one day we had a little girl who cried and cried and then cried some more for her big sister. Eventually, we put her in with her sister who was 6 or 7. She got along great with that class and came over to me the next morning with a big smile and a wave...but she made it clear she was staying with Sis.

All in all, they had a lot of fun and hopefully learned a little something too. It's kinda hard to tell at that age. The only problem was, that they rotated from station to station like the bigger kids, with 30 minutes to spend at each station. Half an hour is great for kids who are a little older, but these little guys have an attention span of more like 5 minutes at a time. I was thankful that we didn't have more kids in our little group to watch, because at that age, it's difficult for two adults to get them safely from one activity to the next, without getting trampled by the older kids. I was also thankful that the weather held out (for the most part) all week, other than one rainy day. So we generally got to go out and play on the playground at least once a day, and played with water balloons, spray bottles and bubbles outside too. For the last station of the day, we took them into the nursery and let them have a little free play time while we popped in a VeggieTales movie for them to watch.

Today we invited moms and dads for a picnic. I decided to splurge and ate a hot dog with a bag of chips and some watermelon. Since that made up 13 of my 28 daily allowed points, I skipped the lemonade and the brownies.

13 Random Things You Might Not Know About Me

1. I met my husband on an online dating service.


2. I was once a "carnie" (and coincidentally, so was my husband).


3. I am the 5th of 10 children.


4. My first child was born in '79...and my last one in '97.


5. I had open-heart surgery at the age of 43.


6. I have a "twin cousin", (my cousin and I were born the same day in the same hospital).


7. When I was a little girl, I had a pet chicken named "Henrietta".


8. If you have ever told me when your birthday was...chances are I still remember.


9. I took care of my grandson for 5 months while my daughter served in Iraq.


10. I have been mistaken for my youngest daughter's grandma...but have also been thought to be my grandson's mother.


11. I'm a "Veggietale-ian". I am trying to collect every VeggieTales DVD ever made.


12. I have never given birth on or before my due date... child #3 was 29 days late!


13. I HATE sports. Yes, ALL sports. No, I'm not looking forward to 8 . 8 . 08.

Week 10 Weigh In ~ 80 Sticks of Butter - Gone!

That sounds a little more impressive than 20 lbs, doesn't it? Yup, I finally did it. I lost the first 15 lbs in about 6 weeks, but it has taken me almost a month to get that last five off. Not that I'm done, mind you...I've still got a loooooooonnnnnnnnnngggggg way to go, but it's a great start.

Someone reminded me of the old "sticks of butter" thing. I remember about 24 years ago, when I was first on my way to lifetime status, we used to compare our weight loss to a lot of different things, for instance:

1. 5 lbs = a small bag of sugar or flour


2. 10 lbs=a sack of potatoes


3. 15 lbs =a rather large cat


4. 20 lbs = a standard bag of dog food

The first time I did this, my son Joel was not even a year old yet. He weighed somewhere around 20 lbs by the time I'd lost that much. That made it very easy to comprehend exactly how much weight I'd lost. Obviously, I carried him around all the time. Eventually, I ended up losing almost as much as my 4 year old weighed at the time: 35 lbs. I wish I only had that much to lose now, but wishing isn't going to get me anywhere, is it?

There was one lady who had lost 90 lbs on WW, and said that after she lost her next 10 lbs, she was going to go to the grocery store and have someone lay ten 10 lb bags of potatoes on her, just to see what it felt like. I don't know if I want to go that far, but someone else pointed out that if you fill a 5 gallon jug with water and try to carry it...it's not easy. Wow! you never think of losing (or gaining) five lbs as being that big of a deal, but if you think of it in terms of water, you wouldn't want to carry those jugs too far, would you? I've been carrying around waaayy to much weight for waaayyy to long. Time to start melting off the next 20 sticks of butter...

I Walked TWO MILES Today!

Well, not all at once, but I did. I decided to take the dog for a walk this morning, just around the neighborhood. He's gotten kinda fat over the winter months too, so I figured we could keep each other company. Besides, tomorrow is pet day at Molly's school, and I thought I'd try to teach him a few manners before then. Our little development is kind of in the shape of a capital E. There are 3 roads coming into it that meet another road, if that makes any sense. If I completely trace the "E", from my house and back to it, it is exactly 1 mile. Jake and I did that this morning, and decided to do it again tonight.

Believe it or not, I can feel it in my shins already. I have been walking on the treadmill a mile at a time, 2 or 3 time a week lately, but that's about it. My doctor told me I should work up to walking 3 miles at a time. Maybe. I don't mind walking outside, but I don't like the other dogs that come out to defend their territory, (which to them is the entire street in front of their houses). I've figured out though, that if we walk on the opposite side of the street, they think they scared us away, and leave us alone. That's okay, they can be the alpha dog...we'll let them.

The good thing about walking outside this time of year, is that almost every yard around here has got some kind of lilacs or other flowering shrubs. Beautiful to look at and even more pleasant to inhale the sweet fragrance of. Tonight's walk had the extra added aroma of freshly mown grass. It was almost worth the effort of the walk right there. I'm bound and determined to have at least my first 20 pounds off by next Monday's weigh-in. Maybe I'll even venture out of the neighborhood one of these days. Who knows? What?? It could happen.

Week 9 weigh-in ~ Getting there...

Slow and steady wins the race. That's what they keep telling me. I weighed in tonight and had a .6 loss again. This gets me within one pound of having my first 20 pounds off! Next week has got to be the week. That will still be an average of 2 pounds a week, I can live with that.
Weight Watchers has incentives for your weight loss. When you get to your "target weight" (losing 10% of your weight), you get a bronze key chain. After losing 25 lbs, you get a silver star to go on that key chain. The other two charms in the picture are the clapping hands for staying on the program for 16 weeks, and the gold key that you get when you achieve lifetime status.

There was a woman at the meeting tonight that got both the key chain and the star, having lost at least 25 lbs to get to her target weight. I had set a goal for myself to get 30 lbs off by my birthday at the end of this month, and I would still like to do that, but I would be happy to get my key chain and my silver star by that time, even if I don't have the full 30 off by then. I can do it. I know I can. I just need to stay "OP", which in weight watcher speak means ON PROGRAM. I should also get the clapping hands some time in July.