Week 7

Another early weigh in this week, but I was down another 2 lbs, which brings my total to 8.8 lbs lost in 7 weeks! Hopefully within the next couple of weeks I’ll have lost 10%, which is just another 2.4 lbs.

I slept in today, so I didn’t have breakfast (which is a first time in a LONG while). I went straight to lunch: a homemade fruit cup (grapes, cherries and apples), along with a grilled cheese sandwich made with Arnold Sandwich Thins. I find them to be quite amazing. It’s about half the amount of bread than regular bread slices, which means half the amount of points!

Just figured it out that to have a BMI that takes me out of the “obese” category, I need to be 163 lbs. At *hopefully* losing a pound a week, I’ll be that 163 by this time in 2010. Here’s to 2010 getting me there!

I hope everyone has a happy and safe new year’s eve! Be smart, don’t drink and get behind the wheel of a car. Yes, it may cost you more money to get a cab, but it’ll cost you EVEN more if you get into an accident.

Lend An Ear?

Last night I had the strangest dream and I didn’t remember it until I received an e-mail this morning from work. Weird, right?

Dream/nightmare:

Apparently Jeff and I had a 20 gallon-ish fish tank in the house, on the ground. There wasn’t much water in it and there was only one fish. This fish was part catfish, shark and a plecostomus (algae eater). Emma (our cat) decided to jump in the tank with this fish (by the way, she actually HATES water!) and check it out.

Well, this fish thing decided to take Emma’s ear COMPLETELY off. I saw the top of her skull, which is kind of what happened when Jeff and I had our accident.

The fish then escaped from the tank and made it’s away around the house. I was yelling at Jeff to get it and kill it, but he didn’t want anything to do with it either.

So at this point, I’m walking around the house with a bloody cat in my arms, whom does not want to be held. She wanted to chase after the fish and play with it. It was like her ear missing or the blood didn’t bother her at all.

—-

Where are the dream experts? What in the world does that even mean? Or am I just crazy?

It was not a good week

Last week, I weighed in on my normal day (Thursday). I had already set myself up to figure that I was going to have a gain. Which was a horrible thing to do to myself, but if I tell myself I’ve gained and then don’t gain, it’s a double whammy.

Not so much a double whammy this time. Just a whammy. I had a crazy Saturday night which I went over my points and then the rest of the week didn’t seem to add up. I was already being told by people (friends and family), “It’s the holidays, you’re bound to gain.”

But why?!

Why should getting together with my friends and family mean that I have to do nothing but eat?

It doesn’t have to be like that. And thankfully, I’ve been pretty open about doing Weight Watchers. My family knows, my co-workers know, my friends know. I HAVE to stay on point and I HAVE to get my activity points in. I need more than just walking. I want to be able to do another 5K sometime soon, but RUN the whole thing. This time last year I was preparing for a 5K, while this year, my main focus is taking some of the weight off so that I CAN prepare for another 5K. And soon! I want to be able to keep up with my best friend while she is running the 5K. I want to be able to run a 10K within the next year or so. But first things first. This weight needs to start disappearing, which it is!

Last Thursday, 11/17, when I weighed in, I was up .6 lbs. Okay, I know .6, not a big deal to most people. But when I could have TAKEN that weight off it is a big deal.

And let me just tell you, I spent all night last night baking and then cutting up fruit to make Jeff and I fruit cups. As sad as it may seem, making those fruit cups made me so happy because now I have a “go to” snack ready for me in the fridge! Plus fruit is something Jeff will eat. Yippee!!

So, since Thursday is Christmas Eve, I will be weighing in tomorrow, Tuesday, evening. Fingers crossed that this goes well so that I can have something else to be proud of this Christmas!

Christmas Photo Contest!

This is a Sponsored Post written by me on behalf of Competico. All opinions are 100% mine.

There isn’t a better way for a photographer to bring in the new year than entering to win up to $50,000!!

Competico’s Winter Holiday Photo Contest 2009 has started and you have until January 12th, 2010 at 9PM to enter. You can submit your favorite picture of your family around the tree, your dog in a Santa hat, your niece opening up presents, or your dad hanging up lights on a tree and falling off a ladder while doing so (I really wish I would have been there to see my dad do that, so I could have snagged a picture!)

Once you submit your photos, other photographers vote and at the end the judges combine their vote with the previous votes to find the top photo. The entrance fee is $100 per photo, but if you submit your photo now, you get to submit TWO for the price of one, but you only have until December 17th, 2009 at 9PM!!

So go! Find your favorite picture, even if it’s not your wonderful father falling, and get your picture included.

The winners will be announced on January 15th, 2010. The top 3 winners get awesome cash prizes ranging from $1,500 to $50,000. Think of all of the post New Year gifts you’ll be able to buy everyone.

Saturday..what did I do to you?!

Saturday night was the IZEA holiday party. And Sunday was my day to spend in bed recovering from Saturday night.

I had the BEST night that I’ve had in a while just hanging out with some co-workers/friends and enjoying myself. Thankfully, I had Jeff there and he was able to drive. I went a <bit> over points, on alcohol alone, but that’s ok. I don’t drink much and when Sunday rolled around, I was downing water and watching my points.

I remember Saturday, don’t worry. I just had one heck of a night. I remember drinking water from a Darth Vader glass at Annie’s and *I was NOT* whispering in Ross’ house. Why was I doing those things? That I don’t know. But I do remember it.

**Pictures to come**

Upload pictures wirelessly? Yes please!

This is a Sponsored Post written by me on behalf of Eye-Fi. All opinions are 100% mine.

You will never know how many times I’ve been searching the house, high and low, and Jeff askes, “What are you looking for?”

A USB cable, a memory card reader, SOMETHING! I just need to find one so I can get the pictures off of my camera. It’s not that we just have one in the house. Oh no, there are numerous cables from cameras and scanners and card readers. All over. And they just seem to get up and move themselves.

If it’s not misplacing a cable, I take a crap ton of pictures and then just let them sit on the computer or even the camera for months before I do anything with them (yep, I’m super bad at that!) Not that it’s difficult to go in and upload some pictures, but I just can’t seem to take ten minutes to do that. What is wrong with me?!

When it comes to having gadgets like the Eye-Fi card in my camera it seems to make it a bit easier. All you need is a SDHC capable camera, a Eye-Fi card, and a wireless router. This would be PERFECT for my parents. They take pictures, but NEVER do anything with them.

Turn on the camera and watch the pictures magically appear on your computer! You can also set up the Eye-Fi card to upload your pictures and videos to websites like Flickr and YouTube. I wish there were other sites that you could upload videos to, but as of now, there aren’t many choices. If you’re pretty savvy on taking care of your pictures and videos and uploading them for your friends and family to see, this may not be for you. But I’m 99% sure that we all know someone that just doesn’t put their pictures up for others to enjoy.

And don’t worry, when it comes to flickr, you can set the picture/video upload to private, if that makes you happy.

Check out the video to see exactly how easy it is to use.

Food Challenge

I am always finding it difficult on taking lunches to work. “Everyone is going out.” Sorry, I’ll take a walk with you to get some lunch, but that’s about it. I need to save money and also take weight off. What better way to help that than taking my lunch to work and controlling what I eat.

After months of looking for a container that holds milk and cereal separate, I FINALLY came across one in the store tonight. Why is it that breakfast foods seem comforting when it comes to lunch? I could pretty much eat cereal, oatmeal and bagels for lunch and be happy with it.

Now that I believe I’m done talking about my lunch for tomorrow (yeah, so I like to plan ahead.), I’m going to get back to work up some Weight Watchers Activity Points. I can claim 4 so far tonight and I’m hoping for 6-8 tonight, which means another hour on the gazelle and I’ll be set! Then off to make dinner. Tacos anyone?

Bills, Bills, Bills = Weight?

After over a year of working 3 days a week (approx. 21 hours) and picking up the random shift at Disney every month or so, I have been stressed. Yep, stressed. It’s not my favorite word, but I will have to get over it. Actually, I am over my stress!

I have a new job! A couple of months ago I started working 3 days away in another office and down to 2 days a week at the job that I already had. And I could not be happier!

The main reason I was stressed…no money. Well, SOME, but no enough to pay by part of the bills. It’s never a good feeling (as I’m sure we’ve all been in that spot at one point in our life). I’m not saying that I’m rolling in money now, but actually working 5 days a week helps a LOT. Bills are getting paid on time and our “To Pay Off” section on the white board is going down. Not fast, but it’s a slow, steady pace.

The less I stress about money, I realize I don’t have much to stress about. Part of me feels like that’s why I was gaining weight.. eat the stress away. So having more money is maybe helping me lose weight, in a weird sort of way.