just being me

i was checking out some new blogs today and came across this one by stephanie (please check it out because her before/after pic is amazing!)... my rule of thumb is, if i find a new blog that's interesting, motivating, inspirational, funny and/or daily-read worthy - i'll leave a comment... so i left my usual, "hi there, love your blog, blah blah blah" and this is what she writes back...

"I have been reading your blog forever and have found some great inspiration from you so you had a hand in some of my weight loss and you didn't even notice it. Sorry I never commented before but I just never knew enough about this blogging thing until I started doing it myself! Your writing cracks me up and your "just being me" attitude is perfect and just what i enjoy!! Thanks again and you look fab yourself!"

wow.

i had a lurker, who found me inspirational, and i didn't even know it (thank you, stephanie)... now most of you would be like "how cool is that?!?!" but honestly - i feel that i've been everything BUT inspirational these days... since that 5K came and went, my jogging has been minimal - like 3x/week when i was doing 6x/week back in june... my diet has been okay but my weight has been more up than down, so no gold stars in that department... weekend exercise has been null and void and that needs to change... i know my postings have been less than interesting as of late so i feel this comment was just the kick-in-the-ass i needed - what that means, i don't know but i'll figure it out soon... :o)

i went to the store last night and decided on making samiches this week for lunch - i found this awesome 1 pt. bread (2 slices) and with roasted turkey breast, low fat provolone, and lettuce - i had a great lunch for 4 points... i also had a peach which was very tasty and i'll be having some cantaloupe for my afternoon snack... dinner will be my usual night-before weigh-in meal: a light, multigrain english muffin, laughing cow cheese, egg, and salsa verde... mmm mmm... we'll see what happens in the morning...

happy tuesday...

i'll have just ONE more chip

weekend:
i went to my sister's this weekend (western maryland and in the middle of nowhere) to hang-out and see my dad... we helped out w/a friend's yard sale on saturday, grabbed some lunch in town, and she took me by the log house they are having built on 25-acres... its pretty nice even though its just the walls and roof right now, they hope to have it completed by next spring... for dinner we had grilled chicken, veggies, and silver queen corn - yummy - my first ears of the season... sunday, we did the church thing and then took my dad for pizza - he's still pretty wobbly so getting him in/out of the wheelchair is pretty challenging... he's also in a different room, on a different wing (not the nice one anymore) so my sister and i tried to spruce things up a bit by hanging pictures... the drive home was fine until i hit traffic (for no reason) and that added another hour onto my trip - i was pretty beat by the time i got home...

food:
it hasn't been stellar, unfortunately - i had mexican for lunch on saturday and i just can't say no to tortilla chips and fresh salsa... the pizza probably didn't help yesterday either but i only had 3 slices and i ordered a garden salad on the side... i'm back OP today though and i feel in control again - we'll see how things even out on wednesday...

exercise:
today was my first day back on the treadmill since i hurt my back and i managed to squeeze out 35 minutes, not bad... i felt like crap since i didn't do anything over the weekend but my back was still hurting and i tried to rest as much as possible... i think its okay now but we'll see how i do tomorrow with weights...

miscellaneous:
not much else exciting has been going on - i do need to go grocery shopping tonight (no fruit/veggies in the house) and do some laundry... i know, exciting right? :o)

happy monday...

friday couldn't have come any sooner

sorry for the lack of posts - between work and my back, i just haven't had the time or the energy... and all i can say is I'M SO FRICKING GLAD IT'S FRIDAY... my plate was still pretty full as of an hour ago but am happy to say, everything's either been finished or in the final stages of review so that means - no more work for me... plus, the boss is out so i'm going to read my rachael ray magazine and call it a day... :o)

my back is probably 20% better - eric came over last night and between me not feeling well and him having some issues w/his new boss, we were a delightful pair during his bday dinner at carraba's (insert sarcasm)... a glass of wine helped, as well as some really tasty food - i chose a ceasar salad, chicken bryan which had goat cheese and sundried tomatoes, and grilled zucchini on the side... i also had 3 small pieces of bread because their olive/oil dip is amazing so point-wise, i think i did okay... i could've done better but i have almost all my flex points and that's what they're for... :o)

as for this weekend, i would love to stay home and rest but i must head to my sister's - i will take an extra pillow for the drive and hopefully, i'll be in okay shape when i get there... its been a while since i've seen her and my dad so we're going to hang-out and take him to lunch tomorrow... eric's heading to PA again so the boys are hanging out at my place this time which is funny because all they do is run from my bedroom to the living room and back again (no downstairs like at eric's place)... :o)

i will have to skip this week's top 5, i've just been way too bus to find anything new... i'll be back to it next week though... :o)

have a great weekend, everyone!

weigh-in

considering the last time i set foot on the treadmill was friday - having the scale show me a 1.2 pound loss this morning was greatly appreciated... i was just too busy with work and staying late and - well, you know the drill... i did go today but could only run for 25 minutes - it seems i have now pulled some muscles in my back (me thinks this is from weeding as well) and it hurts like a mofo... it was okay before i went and now i just made it worse - nice going, jodi... i see a lot of tv-watching in my future tonight along w/the heating pad... :o(

as mentioned above - work has been kicking my royal ass this week... i have come to learn that even though i always give 110%, i get stressed-out easily when i have multiple jobs on my plate... i'll be the first to say that i'm an excellent multi-tasker but sometimes, even i can get overloaded and overwhelmed... and when that happens, i put work first instead of me and i really, REALLY need to work on that... if i'm not happy/healthy, then my work will suffer - end of story...

did anyone watch that new show saving grace? i had taped it monday and watched it last night - it was pretty good so i may watch some more episodes before making my final decision... i do like holly hunter... :o)

happy hump day...

at least i can still see

my weekend was good but it could've been better... i was weeding in one of eric's flowerbeds on saturday and while bending down, i got poked in the eye with something... it hurt like a motherf*cker and after rubbing it and putting eye drops in it all day (and sitting thru 'ratatouille') - eric came to the rescue and made me an eye-patch... i know, sexy, right? i think he just wanted to play the 'doctor/patient' game... anyway, it helped but i still found myself trying to open my eye so half the time, i had my hand over the patch too... since i couldn't read or watch tv, he read me stephen king's short story 1408 and now i REALLY can't wait to see the movie - its really scary... my eye is back to normal today but man, that was NO fun at all... :o(



not much else is going on, work has been shit today, AND i didn't go to the gym (see #2)...

i hate mondays...

slow down

happy friday, everyone... and congrats to my team, the skinnie minnies, on losing a whopping 15.6 pounds this week! awesome job, ladies! keep up the great work (i promise to be in the losers column next week!)... i'm challenging them to lose 16 pounds in week #2 so let's see if we can can do it! :o)

happy hour was okay last night - i had one glass of wine (that sucked AND cost me $9) and by the time i got home, i was tired, and had a headache... my boss was showing off her new iPhone that she got for her birthday - she's so into the newest gadgets and gizmos... i have to admit - it looked pretty amazing but i doubt i'll ever get one - i hardly use the phone i have... i also spoke w/another coworker, whom i see at the gym pretty much every day, and found out her husband needs a heart transplant... he's 6th on the list for O-type and 1st on the list for B-type - i'm hoping he gets lucky soon... and speaking of organs - are YOU an organ donor? i am and it says so on my driver's license... :o)

i'm going to do something different with the weekly top 5 - sometimes, i'm all over the place so i think i may start grouping things together instead... so, i've found a few new blogs this week and i thought i would share them with you - enjoy! :o)

—finding flabuless
—cranky fitness
—becky & heather's 30 day challenge
—trials and tribulations
—elastic waist

i hope you all have a great weekend - do something fun, get your exercise, drink your water, and relax... monday will be here before you know it...

happy friday...

my daughter's turned into a blueberry

i swear, if the sky gets any darker - i will have to turn-on my office light... i'm not a fan of overhead lights and since i can remember, i've had lamps in my office - it seems to make it much more homier and inviting... plus, who wants a nasty glare on your computer screen... speaking of office stuff - my boss scheduled a happy hour after work today... i have no idea who's coming or where we're going but my goal is to have 2 drinks and that's it... i don't have the money and i certainly don't feel like wasting the points on liquid - i'd rather use them on sushi tomorrow night!... :o)

FYI ~ last night well (both seeing eric AND the tacos)... ;o)

i'm SO looking forward to this weekend - i feel like i've been running around like crazy so it will be nice to hang-out and do a lot of nothing... okay, BESIDES going for sushi - we may go see a movie... it seems everyone is raving about 'ratatouille' so perhaps we'll try that one (or something else like 'pirates' or '1408')... my coworker gave me the harry potter book and my goal is to reread it before seeing the movie - all 800+ pages - crap, i forgot that it's a long one... :o(

sorry, not much else is going on... i'm happy that my workload has calmed down a bit so now i can catch-up on all your blogs and see what you've been up too... :o)

happy thursday...

weigh-in

weigh in:
scale was up .4 pounds this morning, could be for a lot of reasons (weekend, new weight routine, etc.) so i'm moving on... i WILL have a loss next week if it kills me... :o)

skinnie minnies:
don't forget today is weigh-in day for the team challenge - congrats to those that have had a loss this week, you are doing great! keep up the good work! :o)

running:
i kicked ass today and ran 4.21 miles in less than 45 minutes - talk about a workout! i was even doing 6.0 at one point and i've never lasted for more than a minute at that speed - maybe i AM making progress... :o)

other stuff:
i picked more blueberries last night with my mom and was very happy to see mr. kitty, mr. puppy, and mr. horsey at the farm we go too... i think there's one more good week of berries so i'm hoping to get a least another picking (i really should pick tons and freeze them, we'll see)... eric said our tomatoes and peppers are doing well in the garden - haven't seen them in 2 weeks so i'll check them out this weekend... speaking of eric, i haven't seen him a long time either (we were both away this weekend) and being the sweetheart that he is - a dozen roses magically appeared at work today... he's known to do that, for no reason, and i'm still not used to it - even after 2.5 years... i'm so looking forward to seeing him later - he's coming over and i'm making tacos for dinner... yummy! :o)

happy hump day...

what would you do with $30k?

i'm tired, in a bad mood and yet, find myself watching "victoria beckham: coming to america"... its pretty funny actually so maybe i'll leave it on as background noise... i am slammed at work and there's no end in sight which means, going in early and staying late this week... being busy DOES make the day go by faster so i shouldn't complain but its draining and by the end of the day, my eyes feel like they're permanently crossed... i'm going to need another vacation after all this...

the girls weekend went well - my friend really enjoyed herself although you could tell that being the center of attention 24/7 wasn't her thing... we started w/some spa treatments on saturday morning - i had a wonderful masseuse named ken (gayer than gay) who was incredible and so much fun to be around... he walked in and was like, "when i saw your hair, i just KNEW we'd get along" (he had the same haircut!)...



after that, us girls walked around princeton, grabbed some lunch, and spent the rest of the afternoon hanging out in the room talking... i felt like the oddball though, since i'm not engaged or married, and was quite overwhelmed at times so i pretty much listened to everyone else's stories... saturday night, we took her to dinner to this over-priced (and not very good) italian restaurant but tried to make the best of it...



and to end the evening, we dressed her up in a toilet paper wedding gown and made her walk down the hallways... :o)



sunday, we grabbed breakfast at the pancake house (a well-know est. across from the univ.), got ready for the shower, and headed back home... my friend, who never used to be very girly - made an appt. to get her hairdone before the shower (which led to a weekend of teasing mind you) AND she was ½ hour late! it all worked out in the end though - the favors looked really nice on the table, as well as the centerpieces that the maid of honor made...



the food was good, the games worked out well, and all was said and done by 5:00... good thing because i had a 4-hour drive ahead of me, as well as a lot of traffic - gotta love 95 in the summertime... i was happy to be home, as well as max - i think he sat on my lap for 15 minutes purring and kneading my belly...

speaking of bellies - i give myself a 6 for this weekend eating/drinking wise... i managed to get a 25-minute run in before i left on friday and then we went for a walk early saturday morning but the food was more of a challenge... since my friend put her townhouse on the market - she doesn't cook anymore or keep anything in the refrigerator besides coffee and water so we ate out a lot... i'm hoping to stay the same on wednesday so i'll keep my fingers crossed - i'd hate to have a gain on the first week of my team challenge... how funny would that be!

i apologize now if i don't post/comment often - as soon as work calms down, things will get back to normal again... i really do miss reading your blogs...

happy monday...

p.s. $30k is the price-tag just for my friend's reception ($170/head)... are you kidding me?!?!

when will my bug bites go away

i'm so glad today is my friday and i'm also looking forward to spending the weekend w/my girlfriend and the other girls from the bridal party... and yea, getting a massage and relaxing by the pool doesn't sound too shabby either... anyway, did i tell you that i never got her wedding invitation? she sent them a month ago and mine was nowhere to be found - until yesterday... she sent me a note saying it came back in the mail, finally, so i'm curious to see what went wrong... as for the shower - i have to finish the favors tonight which requires putting the jordan almonds in the organza bags and then attaching them to the card i designed (see below)... on the back, i put the candy history which is what you see in yellow... not bad for a homemade favor, huh... :o)



you will see that i added another section on my blog (top right) for the team challenge i'm doing... my team name is the skinnie minnies and each week, they will report their weigh-ins and then i'll post the team's results... there's also a sparkpeople page, if you're interested, and it can be found here... if you didn't participate this time and would like to try it, perhaps we can do another one in the fall... :o)

and i finally loaded all my pictures from our camping trip, you can view them here... :o)

since i'll probably be super busy tomorrow morning, i'm going to post my top 5 today - enjoy!

—how to stop negative self-talk
—what is the best weight loss diet?
—check out these surprising expiration dates (borrowed from cranky fitness)
—the august fitness magazine is full of special features & articles
—try some of these tasty, frozen treats for under 200 calories

well, that's all i have for today... i hope you have a great rest of the week and i'll catch-up w/you guys on monday...

happy thursday...

weigh-in

for some reason, max likes to chew on my flipflops so i thought i would share... :o)

well, today's weigh-in was better than expected - only a 1.6 gain so i call my vacation a success... considering i drank everyday, didn't do any jogging, enjoyed s'mores by the campfire twice, and over indulged a bit this past weekend - i'm ready to move on and reach my next goal... i would like to lose 5 pounds by my friend's wedding on august 11... :o)

speaking of goals - i'm sharing a weightloss challenge with kim... she received an overwhelming response to her challenge (27+) so i offered to help out and lead one of the teams... each week, kim and i will share everyone's progress on our blogs and at the end of 12 weeks, whichever team loses the most weight (percentage-wise) will win... i told her we are ALL winners anyway so lets use that term lightly, okay? as soon as i get my team's info, i will post everything on here - let's have some fun with this... :o)

product review: before we left on vacation, i picked up some sugar-free margarita mix and let me tell you - it was awesome... even eric commented on how good it was so if you like that sort of thing, check out their website... they also have flavors like: blue raspberry martini, mojito, pina colada, and wild strawberry margarita - just to name a few... you can find out what stores in your area sell them too so check it out... :o)

happy hump day...

p.s. i found a beautiful, short, black slip/robe last night at macy's - it has tiny pink flowers on it but not too many that makes it busy, if you know what i mean... my friend is petite and italian so i think it will look stunning on her - white just seemed too stark...

who's your mac daddy?

i love watching infomercials in the morning, while eating my breakfast, because by then - i'm sick of the today show and just need some background noise (gotta love the food network at 7:30am)... i came across this beauty today and actually laughed outloud - please watch the video because it's quite hilarious - can this thing really work? you tell me... so today's question is: have any of you ever purchased a fitness/weightloss item from tv? if so, what did you buy and why? and if you haven't, what product have you secretly wanted to try? i'm just curious... personally, i have tried billy banks' tae bo as well as windsor pilates but that's it... ;o)

i started a new weight routine today (since it had been over 2 months) and i may need to tweek a few things but all in all, i'm happy with what i came up with... i found some exercises on a few different websites so if you're looking for something different - check them out here and here...

i'm also finally settled at work - they took away my old PC this afternoon so i'm officially a mac-only girl (gulp)... its actually not as bad as i thought - there are a ton of things i can play with on here and who doesn't love these widgets? i could customize my desktop all day (but i won't)... :o)

this coming weekend is my friend's bachelorette/bridal shower in NJ - i hope everything works out because its been hard trying to get everything coordinated and planned while out-of-state... i started on the favors last night and need to finish gluing the sunflowers tonight - i also need to find a shower gift... i hate doing the traditional 'registry' thing so i'm hoping to find a really nice slip/robe set because what woman doesn't want something just for her? we'll see what i can find, wish me luck... :o)

happy tuesday...

reality bites

nothing like getting back from vacation and finding a new Mac sitting on your desk - these machines are so foreign to me and yes, i'm a designer but have never had the pleasure of working on one... so far, so good - things are working out nicely but it did take some time to get firefox installed and all my bookmarks loaded... i'm totally digging the cordless keyboard and mouse too - talk about having freedome to move around... i could lay on the floor and work if i wanted (but i won't)... :o)

so camping was great and as expected, the best day was on friday, the day we had to pack-up and leave... we asked every day if there was an open space for friday night but got nowhere, so we stayed on the beach til around 7:00, hit the showers, fueled-up, and headed home... my legs are covered w/mosquito bites - there weren't any flies on the beach like last year but the campsite was swarming w/these nasty, green head flies that had a ferocious bite... we only got rain one night and were able to hit the beach almost every day so that made me happy... we did a lot of walking and biking and ate relatively well - think i made veggie kabobs every night w/dinner too (and will post pictures soon)... there was drinking but not too much and just a lot of relaxing, reading, talking, and just enjoying the ocean... a pod of porpoises swam by the beach, several times a day, sometimes getting very close to the shore, and on the last day, we saw a stingray jump out of the water so that was pretty cool... we didn't make the ghost crab tour but did our own thing one night with a flashlight (after drinking some rum & cokes, mind you) and that was awesome... i'm always sad when we have to pack-up and leave but know we have many a summers to go back there and do the same thing... it was just nice to get away from phones, computers, and the tv... :o)

according to eric's scale on saturday morning, it showed a 2.5 pound gain which is cool considering i didn't jog once and had alcohol every day... but i won't be surprised if its higher on wednesday because we had mexican for dinner on saturday, after seeing 'live free or die hard', and then i grabbed a frozen, spinach and goat cheese pizza last night when i was doing my weekly shopping (still on vacation mode, what can i say)... i WILL be back on the treadmill today and had a great salad for lunch so we'll see what happens - no use worrying about it...

i'll try and catch-up w/everyone's blogs as soon as i can... :o)

happy monday...