I had a bad feeling

 We had another busy weekend!  When will things slow down?  Will they ever slow down?   It was a good week overall though!

Zoey

We had another fun week with our puppy.   We have had her for three weeks now and she is settling in.  She is a bit of a ham and comes running up to the camera, so I have to be sneaky with pictures!    When we got her, she was right at 32 pounds (at home weight).  She went to the vet a week after we got her and she was 34 pounds.   SHe went back to the vet this past week and she is now almost 42 pounds.  My girl is growing like a weed!

She is learning lots of new things.  Important things actually.  We continue to potty train her.  She is pretty good with that.  She just needs to figure out how to tell us she has to go potty.  She goes into the kitchen and stares at the door, but that is not a feasible method since we can't see her if she is in the kitchen.  So currenty we are jumping up and running to look to see if she is staring at the door.  We have jingle bells on the door which we rattle each time she goes out.  SHe has rattled it two times on her own and we have immediately taken her outside but she just plays out there on those trips.  SHe will get it....I hope!   She is also learning to not jump up on us.  As a puppy (albeit a big puppy) it's not too bad, but she is growing and will be well over a hundred pounds.  We can't have that much dog jumping up on us.  We have been working on how to walk on a leash without pulling our arms out of the sockets.  Newfoundlands are noted for being awesome at pulling....so it is her nature, and we are trying to break her of that.  We have been talking about getting her into drafting......pulling a cart.  But that won't come until she is at least 18 months old and her body is done growing and her bones and muscles are ready for it!  She is doing well! 

She enjoyed the 4-5 inches of snow that we got on Wednesday.  She was running and leaping in the air.  I honestly think that may have been one of her best days thus far in her life. 

Exercise and food

I have been doing great with my exercise and food.  I have been super consistent with my tracking.  I track each and every bite that I eat.  I have managed to keep my points within my target range for al but one day.  The day that I wasn't in my range was calculated and planned.  I also have my weekly points so that is what I used to cover my overage.  So I did great with eating.

Exercise I also did fantastic with.  I have remained consistent with my efforts and have exercised each day that was planned.  I did take some time off over the weekend to allow my body to heal.  I plan on doing that again this weekend.  My legs feel heavy and cumbersome, so I know it's time for a bit of a break!  I will still be walking the dog and doing other stuff...just not squats and jumping jacks and whateer else the youtube workout videos throw at me!  

Weigh in

I was nervous about this weigh in.  SO nervous.  I have not been weighing myself daily like I used to. It's not that I don't want to.  It's simply that I have been using the hall bathroom and my scales are in the master bath.    So it was with fear and trepidation that I stepped onto the scales this morning.  Sadly, my fears were founded. (Don't ask me how I knew that it was not going to be a good week on the scales...I just had this gut feeling.)  I gained a pound.  

I am bummed.  No gain is ever welcome.  A maintain is hard enough to bear, but a gain?

I am telling myself that it's ok.  I know that I lived a healthy and fit life this past week and that the scales WIL catch up.  My main goal is to be fit and healthy and i did that.  The numbers on the scaes are a bonus whenever that happens.  The main thing is to stay consistent!  I'm not letting that number on the scale derail me from the good that I am doing!  So full steam ahead!

Have my cake and eat it too

 I am still at it!  My absence did NOT mean that I have fallen off the bandwagon.  It did not mean that I have given up and started to shovel food into my mouth at some insane rate of speed!  Nope, my absence is simply that I have been busy!  I have continued to work my healthy living plan and I'm doing well!

Healthy Habits

I continue to work on the healthy habits. I feel like I am nailing them.  I have some slips to report, but overall, I feel as if I'm doing great!

 I am continuing to track all of my food.   I do great with this!  I am able to keep myself within my food budget most days.  I usually have one day on the weekend that is a bit higher, but I'm actually really cool with that!  I have always adhered to a 'cheat day' mentality.   Even though I hate the word cheat....I have a day where I kinda do what I want.  I don't worry about the calories or points.  I feel as if this is important for the longevity of this lifestyle.  I know for me saying that I will never again eat pizza or that I will never have cake again is utterly preposterous.  That is not sustainable.  I also know from experience that I can abstain and lost weight.  But when I lose the weight I will dive back into those unhealthy options and unhealthy habits face first.  So I am working to learn to have my cake and eat it too!  So I did have cake over the weekend.  I did have a day where my points were kinda high.  And that's ok!

I am continuing to work on getting at least 64 ounces of water each day.  I am pretty consistent with this now.   I don't have to give it 'too' much thought.  So it really is becoming a habit!  I am still flavoring my water.  I use a trace mineral vitamin packet in the morning.   I have been doing that since before Covid .   At first I was more sporadic but once covid hit, I became quite consistent with that.    I also use flavor packs for my water throughout the day.  Each packet flavors one bottle or 16 ounces of water.  I use one flavor packet to flavor a 32 ounce container of water.  SO not too bad.  I am working toward eliminiating that flavor packet and only have my morning vitamin packet.   In time.  Right now I"m just happy to be getting my 64 ounces of water even if it is flavored.   

There was one day where I did not get my water.  I got up to about 32 ounces of water and prepared my next 32 ounces of water. I was going to take it with me when I went to visit my mom.  I was about 30 minutes down the road when I realized that I had left it on the kitchen counter.  Ooops.  I didn't get home until about 8:00 or 8:30 and I was NOT going to chug 32 ounces of water before bed. (We go to bed early as the morning alarm goes off at 5AM and I"m usually up before that).  I dind't want to have to get up numerous times to go to the bathroom.  THat's annoying for me....and Jason who has his sleep interuppted when I get up out of bed.  It wakes up the bird...who needs sleep so he is not a jerk!   AND it stirs up the puppy who sleeps in a crate in our bedroom.   And when the puppy gets stirred it means a trip outside.....it's winter and cold!  So I readily gave up my perfect streak of water consumption.   The good thing?  I was right back at it the next day and I"ve not looked back and didn't let that one day mess me up!

Exercise has also been going really well!  I have been exercising consistently!  I have even added in some strength training!  GO me!   My steps have suffered a bit.  The first to weeks of the year I was doing GREAT with getting my goal of 8K steps a day.     A lot of that was procurred during my exercise time. (I do youtube videos......).   I was doing great!  BUT, I knew that I needed to work on some resistence training.  So i backed off on my cardio videos and added in some strength training videos.   The problem?  Strength training doesn't give me the steps.  I didn't hae the time to add the strength training in on top of the cardio.  So I opted to back off on that goal and be more well rounded in my workouts!  

So the healthy habits are going really well!

Puppy life

The puppy is doing well.  She is so cute!  It's cold outside though!  It's miserable to take her out sometimes.  We didn't think through the fact that we don't have a fenced in yard!  So we have to be out with her!   She has bad separation anxiety anyway!  So even when we try to put her on the lead and go inside and watch from the warmth, she just comes to the door and cries.  Yeah, breaks our hearts also!  So outside we go in the cold. (and rain on a few occasions). 

Axe Boy

Jason is still not back to work.  His foot is slowly healing and at his last appointment the doctor was surprised that there seems to be more function than he originally thought Jason was going to get.  This leads him to believe that the tendon was possibly NOT cut the whole way through OR that it was cut but somehow the ends have fused together on their own.  (The MRI was inconclusive.....it looked as if it was severed but it was not a 100% certainty.)  So the doctor wanted Jason off for 6 more weeks.  (he still is in PT to get more function to be able to actually do his job).  He goes back to the doctor on Feb 13.   His being home is nice.  I like having him in the house while I"m working and spending my breaks with him.  It is also perfect timing to get a puppy since he has time to work with the puppy.  It's not perfect timing financially as we just bought a house.   At least Jason can drive now himself.  The first two months or so were rough as he couldn't drive and I was waiting on him hand and foot as he was supposed to be off the foot 100%.

Weigh in

I have been weighing myself on Fridays.   Surprisingly, I have been staying away from the scale most other days. FOr me this is weird because I have always been a daily weigh person.  And some days it drives me crazy because I am in a state of panic about what my weight is doing.  (I don't torture myself; I just go and weigh myself that day for a check). This past Friday I weighed myself and I was down more!  I have lost 7 pounds since the beginning of this year!     I have the momentum and I am determined!

The days are just flying by!  I blink and it's the next day.    I am still trying to do it all and juggle everything.  Some days I feel as if I'm failing miserably and some days, I feel like I've got this thing called life licked.  I'm trying to not let life get to me.  I'm trying to not get overwhelmed.  I'm just trying to take one day at a time!!!

An Extreme Way to get steps!

Here we are and we are already closing out the second week of the new year!   Let me tell you, it has been a super eventful first two weeks of the year!   I've been killing it with my weight loss efforts.  We added to our family.   It's been....well it's been nuts!

Exercise

I have been absolutely killing it with my activity levels this year!  At the end of December I started to get things ready and lined up.   There wer some changes with furniture coming and I was losing my dedicated spot in the living room to do my exercises and really spread out.  So, I got a tv and made a nice spot for myself in our nearly empty family room.  (Nope, not much furniture in there yet).  We also got some bowflex adjustable hand weights.  I used my money from work (they give a certain amount of money each year that we can spend toward something fitness related....weights...bikes...fitness watches....gym memberships, etc).  So I knew that come the new year that there would be NO EXCUSE!    I also joined a step challenge on Youtube.  My personal goal is 8K steps each day.  That doesn't seem like a lot...but for someone that was struggling to get past 3k steps and whenever I managed to get to 5K I thought it was a big deal.  Thus, you can see that 8000 steps is ahuge thingfor me!   I started on the first of the year and I have been absolutely slaying the exercise/activity!  There is only 1 day that I have missed my 8K steps!  But when I average it out, I am KILLING it!   I have also chosen to do some type of formal exercise every day!  And the only days that I have NOT done something in terms of formal exercise are days where my steps are already through the roof.   BY formal exercise I mean a workout video....zumba, walking video....something like that.     My steps have increased and while my legs hurt the first few days, they are slowly getting better!   I was so determined to get my steps that I went to the extreme!   

New Family Member

About a week ago, Jason came flying into the office. He had found a Newfoundland puppy!   Now let me backtrack a bit.  I have ALWAYS known that Jason wanted and planned to get another newfoundland.  His first newfoundland had passed away before I met Jason and on one of our first dates (I think it was date number two) we actually had a conversation about my feelings toward big, slobbery, hairy dogs.   (I wonder if he would have halted and had no further dates if I had said that it would be an issue.  HMmmmmm )   So I have always known that it was just a matter of time before this would come to pass.  While we lived in our apartment he talked about it and actually switched to other dog breeds. (our apartment had a 40 pound weight limit for animals).   We finally got our own house...with land and I knew he would ramp up the talks!  Recently he had started talking about a rottweiler.    I knew it was coming soon.  I have even laughed and said "I expect you to come home from work one day with a puppy int he car...something that you run into in your travels to peoples houses".    So when he came flying into my office I wasn't surprised!  We went to see the puppy that night and the next night we welcomed a 33 pound newfoundland puppy into our house!

Meet Zoey. She was born September 19, 2022 and currently weighs 35 pounds. (She will weight over 100 pounds when she is full grown).

So there has been lots of dog walking in the yard. (the yard is not fenced).   OK, maybe getting a puppy is a bit of an extreme way to get more steps!  

Eating and Weigh In

My eating has been doing really well.  I have been tracking EVERYTHING and I've been managing to stay within my points budget most days.  I have had a few bobbles.  But I have always said that I am not striving for perfection, I am aiming for sustainability! What I have done the last few weeks have been perfectly sustainable!

So how have I done on the scale?   Well I have dropped just about 5 pounds in 13 days!  I had a moment of disappointment when I stepped onto the scale and saw a loss of just shy of 2 pounds for this week.  I wanted more!  But 2 pounds (1.8) is quite respectable and is a very healthy rate to lose weight!  So I will take it!

Life is still extremely crazy.   I'm trying to shuffle so much. I'm stressed about so many things.  But I am determined this year to take care of myself first and foremost!   Thus far I'm winning!

Happy 17th Blogiversary

 Oh my word!  Has it really been 17 years?  It surely has!  I started this blog in January of 2006 and I have maintained it  ever since then, even if sometimes sporadically.  

This blog has been so much to me.  It was the outlet for me when I was first figuring out this weight loss thing. I was a large girl when I first started this blog!

 This blog was my salvation!  It was my random thoughts as I learned how to eat healthy.  It was my outlet as I figured out what plans and techniques to use to lose weight.  I celebrated my successes and temporary failures as I lost a LOT of weight.   I actually even lost down to my goal weight with weight watchers!

This blog walked with me hand in hand when I went through my divorce.  It followed me when I was falling in love with Zumba.  It was there when I  was running consistently.

This blog has also been there as I've regained more weight than I want to admit...but pictures don't lie!

This blog has been there through the good times and the bad times for sure!   I know most of the people that started out blogging when I did have left the scene, but I'm sticking around.   

I sometimes get so mad when I try to find something and can only find videos.  Maybe I'm old fashioned but I like to read my information sometimes!  So I wil continue to write.   PLUS, writing for me is cathartic.  It allows me to process things in my head.  It allows me to work through problems.  Plus, I have this weight to lose!!! It allows me to see things more clearly!  So here I am....ready to keep writing!  Lets make it to 20!!!! (and beyond!)

Happy New Year