Wednesday, June 16, 2010
WORDS OF WISDOM
Wednesday, May 12, 2010
WALKING IN THE RAIN
Sunday, February 28, 2010
BUM BONES
After Sacrament Meeting we go into Sunday School--there are two rooms where the lesson is taught--the Relief Society room, which has padded chairs--and the Priesthood room, which does not. I go into the Priesthood room. I don't know what the group in the Relief Society room is like but the the Priesthood room group is very knowledgable, we have great discussions and I learn a lot. The teachers--we have four of them, rotate so we get them in both rooms.
I am going to have to switch rooms. My bum bones, which are now without any padding, take a beating on the hard chairs. After class I feel like I've been drug behind a car, in the sitting position. In fact, as I sit here, on the padded office chair, my bum bones are hurting. Okay, the chair is old and the padding is not very cushy but still.... Maybe my computer time will be curtailed and you won't hear from me so often.
Thursday, February 18, 2010
FAT KNEES, TOO by Lynne
I do not have a wobbly bottom but the fat knees? I'm afraid so.
I went to the temple today and while I was walking to the chapel I heard a noise. A rhythmic noise. An embarrassing noise. So then I walked bow-legged and it quit. I'm so embarrassed. So embarrassed that since no one heard my fat knees sploching together I told the whole world about it here, just in case I could increase my embarrassment by ten fold.
I'm sorry, Pam. I shall not scoff at you anymore in case that fairy-of-all-things-bad might be listening and whack me with her evil magic wand. Again.
PS The illustrator for OUR GRANNY, Julie Vivas, is my favorite watercolor illustrator. I have this book but I won't read it to the grandkids because the last time I did one of them identified me as one of the grannies I didn't want to be.
Monday, February 15, 2010
CHECKING IN--by Lynne
"Because you gain it again," you're saying, aren't you?
You're not the first to tell me. I've heard that one jillion times.
I had a Weight Watcher leader once say she used to make a bargain with the Lord. "I'll do such-and-such if I wake up skinny." She never woke up skinny until the final day after months and months of dieting. She stayed skinny because she wanted to work for Weight Watchers.
Where is this leading? No where. I'm just sayin' I want to be in new numbers every two weeks. Five pounds loss a week isn't unreasonable. What? What is that you're saying?
"You'd have to exercise--A LOT--to have a five pound loss every week."
Who asked you?
Saturday, February 6, 2010
Fat Knees
I've known for awhile that my knees were fat. But the other night for some reason, I just kept thinking about fat knees. You know the old song, "High Hopes" sung by Frank Sinatra? Well, that tune came to me while I was thinking "fat knees, I've got fa-a-at knees" and if I were clever I would be able to come up with a whole new set of lyrics to that song. But I'm not, so I just keep singing that one line over and over.
I never dreamed I would some day have fat knees. (Heck, having grown up with the nickname "Bones" I never dreamed I would some day have fat anything.) I remember not too many years ago, seeing older women who had fat knees and thinking, "Boy am I glad I don't have fat knees!" That'll teach me. Now I have fat knees and I bet younger women look at me and think "Boy am I glad I don't have fat knees!" This is my warning -- don't think it. Maybe thinking it, judging those other dear ladies' knees, is what brought the curse of the fat knees upon me.
Or maybe it was because I ate too much.
Wednesday, February 3, 2010
HOW I'M CAMPAIGNING FOR A LESS STUFFED CLOSET
Today I bought a pair of sixe 16 pants ($12.00--70% off but it was as Kohls and they mark their stuff high to begin with so you think you are getting a bargain). Okay, they pants are stretchy. And they don't exactly fit yet. But, I can fasten and zip them, and even buckle the belt, but if I tried to sit down, there might be a problem.
I'm adding them to the small white cardigan I bought some time ago. So, three items of clothing in smaller sizes. If I continue to loose they will be my new wardrobe. Three lone hangers, instead of the millions I have now. I'm campaigning for an empty closet with smaller stuff in a two inch space instead of the 12 items in "grande" size that I have in every two inch space now.
Wish me luck. And more bargains.
I tried on a herringbone jacket--black--that I haven't been able to wear in a while. It too almost fit. But, now I need a new red necklace to go with it. Problems with getting thinner. Three items--four with the herringbone--and no jewelry to wear with it.
Does this sound particularly shallow? I thought so. When it's late at night my river doesn't run deep.
PS I finally lost this week. I'm down fourteen-point-something pounds. My hope for you that if you are not thinner--not everyone wants to loose weight--that you are happier. Giddy with happiness, even.
Friday, January 29, 2010
CABBAGE SOUP (Lynne)
So, because I ate whatever I wanted, I decided to eat cabbage soup for dinner. Jo--also a co-author of this blog, who may someday post--when she stops being up to her ears in house selling and house buying--send me the recipe. I four times'd it.
CABBAGE SOUP--This made a LOT because I'm planning on eating it non-stop until I loose weight. Okay, not non-stop, but you get the idea. I added tomato sauce and mushrooms, just because.
3 diced carrots
1 large--or two medium--onions, diced
a whole head of garlic, chopped
1/2 pound mushrooms, halved
12 cups fat-free broth (beef, chicken or vegetable--I used vegetable and chicken)
1/2 cup diced zucchini
1 whole green cabbage, chopped
2 cans green beans
1 (6 oz.) can tomato paste
2 (8 oz.) tomato sauce
2 tsps dried basil
1 tsp dried oregano
1 tsp salt
Spray a large saucepan with nonstick cooking spray. Heat. Sauté the carrot, onion, garlic and mushrooms over low heat until softened, about 5 minutes. Add broth, tomato paste, tomato sauce, basil, oregano, and salt; bring to a boil. Reduce heat; simmer. Stir in zucchini, cabbage and beans. Cook until cabbage and zucchini are still quite a bit crunchy. Eat every day for a week. Honestly. It makes a LOT.
Saturday, January 23, 2010
THE WEEK IN REVIEW--EVEN THOUGH THE REVIEW IS B-A-D. By Lynne
"Failure is only the opportunity to begin again more intelligently."-- Henry Ford
Wednesday, January 20, 2010
LESS THAN A MEASLY POUND
Thursday, January 14, 2010
PAM'S SECOND WEEK: One Baby Step at a Time
On Monday, my WW weigh in showed that I had lost 4.6 pounds during my first week. I'm grateful for the progress, but impatient also. Fortunately, and very gratefully, I realize that it will not take me as long to lose all this extra weight as it took me to gain it. I have to make this effort one baby step at a time, and will learn patience along the way.
Monday, January 11, 2010
I'M PANICKY--posted by Lynne
I don't dare eat because I'm afraid I'll eat the wrong stuff. And I have, too.
I can't think of anything to eat.
I'm afraid I'll go over my points.
I can't think of anything to cook.
I'm paralyzed about this business.
I'd go eat worms but I don't know how many points they are. And they'd be frozen, anyway. Help!
I'm so panicky I'm messing around with the blog colors. And now I can't remember what it used to be, which I think was better. Maybe Pam and JoAnne should take over. They can find one of those nifty wallpapers instead.
LYNNE'S WEEK TWO--CARRYING ON, HOPEFULLY I'LL HAVE LESS TO CARRY AT THE END OF THIS WEEK
Weight lost this week--.8, that's right, less than a pound
Monday
Exercise: Walked to and from Activity Days...let's see, that's three houses away. I don't think that counts.
Points: I'm too tired to figure this out.
Food Eaten:
1 cup frozen blueberries--my fingers are blue--I should have used a spoon
1 toad in the hole--1 slice bread, one egg, cooking spray--so satisfying
2 slices bread, 1 Tbs. peanut butter, 2 tsp. butter, 2 Tbs. honey
1/2 cup carrots
lasagna
salad
ranch dressing
French bread
Tuesday
Exercise: Not yet
Food Eaten:
1 cup blueberries
toad in the hole
10 salted nuts
1/2 piece pumpkin bread
1 "veggies added" turkey burger
3/4 cup mashed potatoes
1/2 cup brown gravy
broiled zucchini
biscotti
1 slice salami--so bad and so darn good and one bite cheese--I was making a sandwich for Elizabeth and just couldn't help myself.
1/2 of a caramel that had been sitting on the counter for weeks. It was all sugary and incredibly delicious. Probably worth a point of two. I didn't even look it up. And it was late, too, probably about 10:00 o'clock.
I drank probably at least 4 ounces of dill pickle juice throughout the day. Weird, I know but it's really good. And really full of salt so it's really bad.
Wednesday
Exercise: walked one block
Points:
Food Eaten:
1/2 cup blueberries
2 turkey burgers on two pieces bread with ketchup and mustard
pickle
2 nuts
1 1/2 pieces sweet bread
1 manicotti
raw broccoli
ranch dressing, I Tbs
Italian dressing, 1 Tbs.
coleslaw
3 Jr Mints
didn't keep track of what I ate the rest of the week. That is probably why I had such a non-losing week.
Thursday
Exercise:
Points:
Food Eaten:
Friday
Exercise:
Points:
Food Eaten:
Saturday
Exercise:
Points:
Food Eaten:
Sunday
Exercise:
Points:
Food Eaten:
Saturday, January 9, 2010
Weight Watchers' "Points"
One of the really nice things about this now-not-so-new plan is that there are no forbidden foods. You can eat anything you want. You just have to count its points and stay within your points limit for the day. Your personal points limit is determined by using an easy formula based on current weight, age, activity level. Your allowed number of points per day slowly drops as your body shrinks. Seems fair.
I remember my first encounter with Weight Watchers as a participant. The weigh in was no problem. It's private and no one yells out, "Wow!" when they see the number on the scale. They just quietly write down the secret number in your own private record that you take with you. The weigh-in girl always has kind and encouraging words whether you've been "good" or "bad" or lost or gained. Easy for the weigh-ee think of those revealing moments as a judgment of "good or "bad", but that dear weigh-or is totally non-judgmental. After all, she was once in my position, too. I could be wrong but I think all Weight Watcher employees are Life Members, having had their own weight-loss struggles, failures, and ultimate success. So the weigh in is as painless as possible.
What surprised me was the meeting, the little pep rally I attended each week. All they talked about was FOOD. Gad-zooks! I'm trying not to think about food, and all they could do was talk about it -- what to eat, tricks to not eat. How to survive Halloween, Thanksgiving, Christmas and all the best foods to eat at those occasions. "Great" recipes. This was not my idea of how to lose weight. I don't know what I expected, but all this talk about food was making me hungry.
Enter the points plan. Several years later, at a different place, I again found myself at Weight Watchers. Much had changed. Most noticeably, they had a new formula for weight loss. It was the Points plan I described above. Yes, we still talked about food in the meetings, but this time around the discussions seemed more helpful. After a few weeks of counting points, an amazing thing happened to me. I quit thinking about food. I was thinking about points. Food lost the increased importance it seemed in the past to take on when I was trying to lose weight. Nothing was forbidden, so nothing was craved. If I wanted it, I ate it. But counted the points and did without something else. I no longer thought of food with its intrinsic taste and hunger satisfying qualities, I thought of it as a number of points. And it worked. That go-around, I lost 30 pounds. That was my success. My failure was not staying with it until I reached my goal weight.
This time I will. Thank goodness for points. I had 5 for breakfast and savored every one.
Friday, January 8, 2010
PAM'S WEEK ONE - She's Making Me Do It
Today is Friday morning, the beginning of Day 5 of Week 1 of Weight Watchers. Well, Week 1 of several different stints with Weight Watchers over a greater number of years. How did I get here?! I was a skinny kid whose parents took her to the doctor because she appeared malnourished. Ok, underweight, "malnourished" is an exaggeration. I remember once as a young mom I was again underweight and had trouble gaining. Wellllll, whatever I did then seems to have paid off big time, pardon the pun. If this were AA, I would start by saying "My name is Pam, and I'm an overeater." I could say, "My name is Pam, and my thryoid is dead," but that would be a lie. My throid is alive and well, and way overworked.
Many years ago -- when I was thin, which is irrelevant, but I like saying it -- we had a neighbor whose name was Candy (yes it was), and she had been overweight all of her life. She finally found the determination to "diet" and lost so many pounds that she was a ghost of herself and I didn't recognize her. We weren't close friends, but one day she told me that she was having trouble stopping her diet at her "recommended" weight because she still saw herself as "fat" when she looked in the mirror. I bring this up because, despite what I see in the mirror, I still think of myself as the skinny kid who always had to eat, eat, eat to keep from blowing away. Those days are lonnnnnnnnnnnnnnng gone, but the mind is a powerful thing.
Like Lynne, I anxiously await Monday's weigh in. I know I'm making progress because I find tying my shoes just a little less painful -- the bending over part, not the tying part. I've been "good" with my food choices, stayed within my points with the help of the weekly points allowance, and am getting better about drinking water. Doing this with a friend will make it more palatable (food reference here?) and not so much a punishment for being "bad" for so long. Weight Watchers emphasizes the need for support, in their meetings of course, and hopefully with those around us. Lynne and I will encourage and support each other. I know we can do this.
Thursday, January 7, 2010
LYNNE'S WEEK ONE--so she will keep herself accountable.
Tuesday
Exercise: Zilch
Points: 30--over my target points. Hey, it's my first day!
Food Eaten:
2 carrots
grapefruit juice, fresh squeezed, yum
sandwich made with 2 slices whole wheat bread, 1 Tbs peanut butter, 1 Tbs. peach freezer jam from my neighbor Cindy--I had dashed home, with only ten minutes before I had to be at my Personal History mini class and the bread was frozen so I toasted it, threw it together and took it in a paper towel to class
spaghetti noodles
spaghetti sauce
salad
ranch dressing
one small slice french bread
2 Triscuit crackers with clam dip. The devil made me do it.
biscotti
Wednesday
Exercise: Same as Monday
Points: 17 1/2
Food Eaten:
1 egg
1 toast
2 Tbs. Ketchup--yes, Mother dear, it was Hienz
1 bite pumpkin bread
Vegetarian chili--Nalley's
1/2 cup acorn squash
1/2 cup yams w/brown sugar--so bad and so good
salad
2 Tbs. ranch dressing w/2 Tbs. apple cider vinegar--so puckery
12 grape tomatoes
Thursday
Exercise: Same as Tuesday and Wednesday--there seems to be a pattern developing
Points: 22 1/2 except for the chocolate orange, so maybe it's 24 points, who knows?
Food Eaten:
Toad in a hole--I won't let my kids call "Acini de Pepe salad" "Frog eye salad" but I'll eat a toad in a hole--1 egg, 1 piece toast, vegetable spray. This was so delicious. I wanted two but ate blueberries instead.
1/2 cup blueberries
1 cup veggie chili--I seem to be in a rut
12 grape tomatoes
2 Tbs. ketchup
1 "hamburger" patty--a friend had asked another friend and me to dinner because we are members of the Healthy Living mini class. She got the cookbook Deceptively Delicious: Simple Secrets to Get Your Kids Eating Good Food by Jessica Seinfeld and her meal was from the cookbook. Her "hamburger patty was ground turkey, mushrooms, zucchini--I think--, whole wheat bread crumbs, Worchestersauce and salt and pepper. It was one of the most delicious burgers I've ever eaten. She got 13 patties from one pound of turkey so you can see the calories were way diminished.
1 whole wheat hamburger bun, which she had made from two slices of whole wheat bread! Clever. That tip was from the cookbook.
2 Tbs. ketchup
1 Tbs. mustard
lettuce
tomato
1 1/2 cup French style green beans. Yes, I ate that much.
1 1/2 banana-zucchini-oatmeal cookie--very delicious.
Skinny Cow frozen dessert that my friend--the other poster on this blog--Pam gave me when I stopped by to chat after dinner. Pam is always willing to let me crash at her house.
2 slices chocolate orange leftover from Christmas--it was in the drawer, calling my name. I answered.
FRIDAY
Exercise: HeLLo (knocking on my wooden head). None. Although I did move my feet up and down the entire time I read my scriptures this morning--one half hour. I don't think it counts.
Points: 27 1/2 maybe--this is an estimate
Food Eaten:
1 orange, juiced
1 grapefruit, juiced, both juices mixed together, which was nasty.
2 homemade taco's with salsa, no cheese
8 baby carrots
1 Tbs. ranch dressing
4 Funyums. I asked Hillary what they were and she said, "Don't try them, they are the best junk food ever." Of course I tried them and they are crunchy and oniony and delicious. I should have known. The more processed a food is the better I like it. Bad Funyums. DO NOT TRY THEM. I'm warning you, which really means I'm warning myself ,since I'm the only one who will read this.
ALL of Hillary's leftover KFC coleslaw. Bad, bad and good, good. I squeezed the dressing out with my spoon but you know lots made it into my mouth.
1 bite berry sherbet
salad
The rest of the can of chili, one cup
biscotti
SATURDAY
Exercise: 20 minutes, walking--not that I wanted to but I needed to get out of the house and so it was forced exercise. I came home after only 20 minutes because I was in danger of freezing to death. So much for forced exercise.
Points: 19
Food Eaten:
1 1/2 grapefruit, juiced
almost a full 12 ounce bag of baby carrots
1 Tbs. peanut butter eaten right out of the jar
1 cup spaghetti noodles--I really dumped half of it in the garbage
1 cup spaghetti sauce--half of it got dumped with the spaghetti
1 small dried up piece of French bread--yes, I was desperate
1 cup cooked broccoli--there was more, I couldn't force it down
2 Tbs. ranch dressing, full of fat, full of flavor--it's worth the 4 or 5 points--at least today it's worth it, maybe not as my "points available" goes down. And I have a half quart of dressing to eat. There's probably 10,000 points in the container.
I'm going to have a "Skinny Cow" frozen dessert in a few minutes. Pam gave them to me, bless her little heart!
Later...Nope, didn't eat the Skinny Cow. I will for sure tomorrow. Ate two bites of pumpkin bread and a Tbs. of mashed potatoes w/butter when I warmed up some food for my daughter. But...I didn't eat a bite of lasagna, and I really wanted to.
2 small slices apple
SUNDAY
Exercise: I'm not saying.
Points: as close as I can estimate 35!
Food Eaten:
Nuts--a mistake. I came home from church hungry and I didn't have time to eat any breakfast. I was going to go to bed and sleep because I only had about 5 1/2 hours of sleep last night. I figure I ate ten points of nuts! And it wasn't very many, either. Oh well.
Pumpkin bread, another desperate act. I'm talking to Pam as I type this and she's saying she had blueberries this afternoon. I wanted to slap my my forehead. Why didn't I do that? (Then I went to bed and when I got up Phil had put the casserole in the oven and it was hot and tasty. Way too tasty.)
Stove Top Stuffing casserole. I had to take a casserole to the food coalition on Friday so I made a smaller version for us. I knew it would be loaded with points but figured it'd be okay because I'd have made good choices all day. Rats. I ate nuts and pumpkin bread. Oh well.
Coleslaw, leftover from BEFORE Christmas, I think. It's been in our Redneck fridge--the garage. I should have had just carrots but.... Old as it was, it was still tasty.
Skinny Cow frozen dessert--only two points and delicious
But, then, I ate the last of the chocolate orange!
I'm now eating carrots and giving some to Kramer.
I also swallowed about ten fiber pills and have had three glasses of water--16 oz. glasses. So far the water is plumping the fiber and staying put so I may not have lost much tomorrow. Oh well. I seem to say "Oh well" a lot.
So that's my week's confession. No exercise. Either not enough food or too much. We'll see what Marion--our Weight Watcher leader--has to say tomorrow.