My Honest Opinion: Weight Watchers Works For Me!

If you have read any of my posts this week, you have probably noticed a theme.

If you have read any of my shared items this week, you may have noticed the same reoccuring theme.

(Seriously, click on the one entitled, "I am my own infomercial.  It's INCREDIBLE!)

Along with the entire rest of the world, I jumped on the New Year's Resolution/Weight loss band wagon.

It's annoying isn't it?

I know, I know.

And I promise to tone it down soon. 

If March 1st is soon enough for you.

And IF I have actually lost my weight by March 1st.

But today, since the entire world is working on dieting kick, I thought I would share with you the diet that has worked for me.

The summer between my junior and senior year of college, I went on birth control.

Just to give you a feel of my starting point, check out the chub here:

Ewwww, and that hair....

Already being a nice 162 lbs., I didn't want to pack on any additional weight, so I decided to try weight watchers.


My mom was a member and thereby, I became an Honorary Member.

I proceeded to read all the books, borrow her points calculator, and tote the handy meal calculator to every restaurant I went to.

But that summer I lost about 10 lbs.

So I toted her smallest book with food calculations back to college with me.

Where I continued to follow the plan along with hitting the gym for a 30 minute workout on the stair climber.

And by Christmas, I was a good 15 lbs. lighter than when I left.

By spring time I was down to 125 lbs.

That's almost 40 lbs! 

And I was on the pill!

And here's the kicker, people.  I didn't follow WW every single day of my life. 

I followed it from Monday through Friday and every weekend would be free.

It worked for me then.

It has worked for me now.

Now, admittedly, over time I did gain 12 lbs.

But, honestly, 125 was probably not the healthiest weight for me, anyway.

My goal weight is 130.

Where it probably should be.

Point being, with the help of Weight Watchers, I managed to maintain a healthy weight for 6 years just prior to getting preggers with Little Man.

And with the help of Weight Watchers and the same kind of freebie weekend schedule, I have managed to lose over 50 lbs in the past year.

I have tried other diets in the past.

Like Atkins.

But I think I have made mention of the fact that I am a little bit of a carb fanatic....

And I failed that HARD CORE.

And the pre-packaged meals diets just don't cut it for me.

I need freedom.

Otherwise, I start chewing my arm off in rebellion.

That's not to say other diets can't work for you.

Just that the freedom and lifestyle that Weight Watchers offers is the easiest for me to follow.

And it makes sense to me now!

And that, people, is my honest opinion!

Sorry for beating a dead horse, here....

I CAN'T HANDLE TODAY!!!

Because I feel like my pile continues to grow and grow and grow.

Because my Christmas tree is still up.

And so is my dancing Santa

Credit

Because I gained 5 lbs. over the holidays.

And then deleted the pic of my scale to prove it.

Because the pile on my desk at work continues to grow.

Because the pile on my desk at home is even higher.

Because my house is a mess.

And my pants are too long.

Because the bills are high.

And it's tax time.

I just wanted to say "ACK!!!!"

Hopefully, you get it.

If not, here's a hint.

Credit

It's a Cathy kind of a day.


Stay tuned...

I plan to work on a My Honest Opinion post as soon as I come up with something to be honestly opinionated about!

Helpful-How To: Sticking to a Resolution

Did you miss me bossing you around in my weekly HHT posts? 

Telling you how to live your life, tie your shoes, and zip your fly?

I know I have missed being the authority on all things near and far.

And this week, I am back to annoying thrilling you with my amazing wit and charm, while making your life complete with my Helpful How To.

And because, despite the fact that January 1st is just another day on the calendar, it is still another day to decide I want to be better than I already am (yes, people, it is possible!  Shocking, I know....) and to begin working toward that goal.

But the real elbow of the situation probably won't happen in January.

It will probably happen around February 14, when you get that giant box of chocolates and tear into it like a T-Rex in faced with a shiny car full of fresh tourist-meat in Jurassic Park.

Unless, like me, you got sick 1 day into your "New Year, New You Diet".

Then your "elbow of the situation" will happen on day 2.

That being said, where do the resolutions go when you hit the rough spots?

Do they go out the door like last night's trash, or do you pick them back up, brush them back off and embrace them as soon as the opportunity arises?

Either way, here are a few helpful hints for how to remain faithful to your New Year's Resolution:

1.  Be truthful to yourself.

Unless you have one of these

You aren't going to go from this

To this

(Note, this is a GOAL look for me.  This is not a CURRENT look for me.  Oh, and that's me in the orange....)

Without a lot of this.

Whether your resolution has to do with losing weight (me) or saving money (Techy) or making money (Techy) or travelling (me AND Techy) or having a baby (me) or doing home improvements (me) or learning something new (always TECHY!), you have to be honest about where you are starting from and where you want to go and rationalize a REALISTIC way of getting there.

2.  Realize it takes alot of work and even more CONSISTENCY to reach your goal.

As in, you have to be dedicated to your goal daily.  Techy once told me that if I were as dedicated to saving money as I am to losing weight, we would be millionaires.

Know what?  He's probably right!

The point is, you have to approach each day with the bigger goal in mind.

Yes, bumpy days will come. 

And you work around them.

And pick up where you left off after you get over that hump.

3.  Remember, you don't want to achieve your resolution through means you can't live with.

The idea of a resolution is to get you to a better place, right?

So why not stay there?

In that case, the best way to get there is by doing things that you can continue to do.

No, I am not saying that all Biggest Loser contestants need to continue working out 8 hrs. a day for the rest of their lives....

But I am saying the best way to reach your goals is to change the way you LIVE. 

And then live that way.

But it has to be comfortable enough for you to enjoy living that way....

Is anyone even reading this anymore???

4.  Finally, follow-up with yourself.

Every year, my boss performs an annual review to see if I have gotten any closer to the goals we set last year.

Every year he talks about wanting to do these reviews more frequently to keep both of us more consistently working together toward the goals.

And that's what I am suggesting to you.

Do a "Quarterly Check-In". 

If your goal was weight loss, in March, check your scale and see if it's any lower than it was today. 

If it was Home Improvement related, make a honey-do list and get him going pick out a date to have your big project of the year done (mine is March 1!!!!). 

And if it was baby-making, when March 1st comes around, go buy this book (am I the only one who ever saw "The Other Sister" and laughed until they cried over this?!) and one of these and get to gettin!

And at the other end of this year, I hope we can all cross at least a couple things off of our list.

Just because I didn't say it....

After having learned some lessons the hard way about making confrontational comments on this here blog o' mine, I have opted to keep most of my posts as far to the middle as possible.

But in being as non-confrontational as possible, I have managed to leave out one of the most important components of my life - my faith. 

Because it's easier to not talk about.

But that doesn't make it any less present.

I think I may have mentioned a time or two about how private I am about silly things.  Things that don't mean much to most people.

And my faith happens to be one of them.

Odd, huh?

It's just that I don't want to step on any toes or tear anyone down.

But I can't not talk about it anymore. 

Part of me thinks I am going to come off as a hypocrite.

Because I like to complain.

And I talk about things like hanky panky.

And periods.

And just stuff.

But I hope you don't think that. 

I hope you understand that this is just another way for me to really be me with you.

I am going to start out with something really simple.

And I am going to try to focus it to one day a week.  That way if I get too preach, and you decide you are sick of it, you can skip it.

I am going to call it the Sunday Sermon Series.

And in a nutshell, I plan to be posting them on Sundays as a general recap of what I got from church that morning. 

Feel free to comment with your thoughts on this as I am still formulating ideas for how I want to do this and your input as readers is very valuable to me.

Beauty for Ashes

If you scoot around blogland at all, you probably have heard about Edie, who lost her home In a fire just days before Christmas.

I was not a follower of her blog before.

In reality, I had never heard of her.

But I started reading her posts over the last few days....

And this post took me to my knees.

And I was reminded of something.

In our darkest days, we have a God of promise and restoration.

It hasn't been so long that our family had our share of dark days.

It hasn't been so long that I went to God looking for explanations and only received these words.

 1 The Spirit of the Sovereign LORD is on me,
   because the LORD has anointed me
   to proclaim good news to the poor.
He has sent me to bind up the brokenhearted,
   to proclaim freedom for the captives
   and release from darkness for the prisoners,[a]
2 to proclaim the year of the LORD’s favor
   and the day of vengeance of our God,
to comfort all who mourn,
 3 and provide for those who grieve in Zion—
to bestow on them a crown of beauty
   instead of ashes,
the oil of joy
   instead of mourning,
and a garment of praise
   instead of a spirit of despair.
They will be called oaks of righteousness,
   a planting of the LORD
   for the display of his splendor.
 4 They will rebuild the ancient ruins
   and restore the places long devastated;
they will renew the ruined cities
   that have been devastated for generations.

Promises.

Beauty for ashes.

I have lived it.

And I pray that Edie experiences it too.

Beauty for ashes.

And I send this out today, along with all the other bloggers in the world, in honor of her special day.

Check out their posts too! But have a box of Kleenex handy!
Happy birthday, Edie!

The Other {big} Christmas Gift

When it comes to Techy giving Christmas gifts, or any kind of gift, really, technology is always involved.

And this year was nothing different.

Unless you consider the fact that he finally found a gift wherein our passions collided.

Enter the Babylock Ellegante 2

Or for easy reference: The Godfather of All Sewing Machines.

As in, all other sewing machines are mere puppets to this machine.


As in, this machine kills all other machines.

Of course, in my house I may be calling it, "the love of my life".

You get my drift.

So now for the juicy details: 

See that screen?  Um yes.  Touch screen.

See the arm?  Fully detachable/expandable sewing/quilting arm.

See the embroidery hoop?  Um yes.  It comes with 4 of them.  In multiples shapes and sizes.

I can do everything from download fonts/images/designs to quilting.

This thing is rated to quilt through extremely high loft batting.

And I can't wait to get started with this thing.

That's right. 

This beauty has been in my possession for almost a week and a half, and I haven't had an opportunity to try it out yet.

And it's killing me.

But I went out this weekend and got plenty o' fabric and stabilizer and thread so that I am equipped to begin trying it out as soon as possible.

Or as soon as Techy is feeling well enough to manage a 1 year while I go spend days hours with my new toy.

Because everyone knows that a 1 year old boy would love nothing more than playing with my new toy in the face of all his new toys.

Can someone please explain this phenomena?  Why does my child want nothing to do with his abundance of new toys when any type of technology is present?  Remote Control?  Check.  Cell phone?  Check.  iPad?  OBVIOUSLY!

Anyway, all things considered, I think Techy is going to have a very difficult time topping this year's Christmas gift.

For many years to come.

Finally...A Post-Panic Project

Welcome to 2011!  Happy New Year!

In honor of the fact that I should be cleaning, but instead am sitting on my duff playing on the computer and watching Little Man play with everything BUT his new toys - including but not limited to packaging of any kind, soda cans, clothing, cords - yes, cords!!!, remote controls - ALL OF THEM, diapers, wipes, tubes of chapstick, ink pens, etc, etc, etc....  Basically anything but what I WANT him to play with...I wanted to show off my first post-holiday project with one of my awesome Christmas gifts.

Did I mention that I got 2 awesome Christmas gifts?

Well, not just 2.

I got alot of amazing gifts.

But I got 2 CRAFTY gifts.

You may remember one of them....

That's right people!!!

Santa, a.k.a. ME, bought me a Silhouette.

Credit

And the other Santa, a.k.a. Techy, bought me an embroidery machine.

And not just any embroidery machine....

Techy got me the KING of all embroidery machines!

Credit

A Babylock Ellegante 2.

Magical machine of all machines.

But I really need to save the details of that magical machine for another post.

This post is about a quick project I whipped up using the Silhouette this morning while Little Man was throwing some of his Christmas gifts at my head.

And I am so happy about it!

Let's jump on in, k?

And it had something to do with this lovely, faded atrocity.

For some reason, having a faded duck adorn the front of my house just wasn't up my alley. 

In reality, I have been BEGGING Techy to do something about this for 2 years now.

Today, I took matters into my own hands.

Or maybe I should say, I let my Silhouette take matters into its own hands....

A little wall vinyl later....

And then a coat of paint....

And then, just a quick flip of the wrist....

*

Did you hear that?!

My house just thanked me!

And 2 years of complaining are behind me!

To think, it only cost me $199.00 plus $1.98 for spray paint.

Oh well, at least I had fun using it!!!

And there you have it.

My first craft of 2011.

I love it!

*Um, yes.  That is a picture of me.  In my bathrobe.  And this is me saying, be thankful I was wearing a bathrobe!