2014, officially.

On the Today show this morning, they said that today, the first Monday of 2014 is the most depressing day of the year. I was super bummed about this day coming - the first Monday without a mid-week holiday interruption in, what? 3 weeks? That sounds right.

But, this morning wasn't depressing. Right now, I am not unhappy about starting this new year. Usually, I start off the year  with the resolution to drop pounds. This is it! This is the year that I will be 30 lbs lighter! Well, not this year, folks. I am 12 pounds lighter this January than I was on January 1, 2013. While that is significantly less than my goal was, I'm not unhappy about it. So this year, that is NOT my resolution. In fact, I resolve not to go on a diet in 2014 at all. I'm not giving myself free reign here, just the freedom not to follow a meal plan, not to adhere to set list of foods, or certain calorie restrictions. I will exercise and eat mindfully. But that's it, folks. No diet 2014!

My main resolution for 2014 has to do with Knitting. I love knitting. I usually knit at least 1-2 hours every night, and it is almost always the reason I stay up later than I should. I've been seriously knitting for 3 years, since my pregnancy, but 2014 is the year that I become an accomplished knitter. I resolve to follow patterns, to learn new things with every pattern that I undertake. I resolve to finish that I start. I resolve to swatch. I resolve buy yarn only with a project in mind, and not to buy yarn simply because I like how squooshy it is. I will post all my projects on Ravelry. I resolve not to pick up some needles and yarn, and cast on with nothing in mind. I have too many cowls/scarves that are boring. I resolve to make a piece of adult size clothing that fits. I resolve to make at least one blanket. I resolve to participate in my local yarn shop's community, to make more connections with others who love this craft as much as I do. I resolve to knit from my extensive yarn stash! Knitting 2014!

Also, 2014 means a new season of the Bachelor. I resolve... to watch it as usual. Juan Pablo may very well be a disaster, but I am going to enjoy every minute of it! Who's watching?

Weight-loss milestone #1

15 lbs down, 36 days in.

As of this morning, I weighed the exact amount I weighed on the day I found out I was pregnant. I specifically weighed myself a few moments after seeing the double lines wanting to keep track of how much I gained for the next 9 months. In the end, I gained just around 25 lbs.

So, stepping on the scale this morning, only two days after the indulgence of our mini superbowl party, I was pretty proud of myself and continue to be. I did try my fancy designer jeans on, but those do not fit yet. (Like, not even close. My ass and thighs being the main culprits) Though the number is there, I suppose the weight is still distributed differently. I'm OK with that, I did grow a human, after all. I'm sure those jeans will fit again in another 10 lbs and a lot of butt and thigh toning. The exercise portion of the new year's resolution has yet to kick in since the whole family has just been continuously sick since the first of the year.

In other news, things are better all around. The work-paycheck situation is unchanged, but we've made several adjustments to our expenses and used some of our forbearance time on student loans to ease the lack of available cash a bit. B got some good news at work regarding a small raise and a small bonus, so those two things should help us through the upcoming weeks.

Plus, this week, the Bachelor is on TWO NIGHTS IN A ROW! This season is quickly becoming one of my favorites.

What I don't want to post about

It's been tough coming up with things to write about recently, because there are many things that I don't want to write about. I don't want to devote an entire post to them, because, well, it sucks, but I also want to write about something on this blog of mine.

• I don't want to write about how I'm changing what I eat. I went back and re-read the posts that I had tagged "weight loss" to see how much of my blog I have devoted to something that I've always struggled with. It's not an inordinate amount, thankfully. I didn't want to make a topic out of being back on the South Beach Diet plan, thinking that I'd tried (and obviously failed) it so many times in the past year. The last time I did it, I lasted 4 weeks. I didn't realize that I had gotten so far last time, that I had given up past where I am now. I'm starting my 3rd week now and suddenly got very deflated. I feel different this time - it feels like I'm having fewer cravings, making a better effort to cook every night and keeping my menu diverse enough to keep me from wanting to stray. Something big is different this time, though. B is on it with me, and has been very committed to it. We've both moved from the very restrictive Phase 1 (no sugars/carbs/fats/caffeine/alcohol whatsoever) to Phase 2 (gradually reintroducing complex carbs, whole grains, caffeine and alcohol). Yes, he's been more liberal with his reintroduction than I have, but it doesn't bother me in the least. My temptations don't come at home, since we are both committed to changing out food intake (or as B puts it "taking control of our waistlines", LOLZ), but at work, where my Filipino coworkers make a rice cooker full of evil jasmine rice every day for lunch. I'm not tempted so much as feeling sad about not being able to have any. I'm not hungry. My meals are nutritious and tasty. And, I've lost and am continuing to lose weight. 3 weeks in and I'm already down 11 lbs, to B's 15 lbs. Some of my old work pants are even starting to fit, though I have yet to wear any because they are a bit snug. In a couple of weeks, my wardrobe options will increase dramatically, and I love that thought!

• I don't want to write about how sick we've been since January 1st. Mia had pink-eye and strep. B had pink-eye, strep and an ear infection. I was also sick, but Minute Clinic assured me everything I had was viral. Also, as the least affected by whatever was going through our house, I was the caretaker for the two others. B turns into a bigger baby than Mia does, needing "directions" on how to care for himself. "Should I take my Tylenol now? What can I do to make my throat feel better?" I have to admit that I lost patience with him on more than one occasion.

• I don't want to write about my frustrations with my job. Not wanting to work for this Company (or really, at all anymore) but not wanting to move. My plan is still to take the Nevada bar this summer and hope that I can find something else. It seems like any job that is out there that I might qualify for would require us to move again. I don't want to do that to B, who really enjoys and does well at his job, and I really don't want to do that to my parents, who essentially bought this house knowing we would be their tenants. So, I come to work every morning, and wait for my paycheck (7 days late at this point).

That's it. Those are the things that have been on my mind, that I don't like to think about. So, until something happens that I want to write about, there you go. 

Embarassing thing #749264

In my everlasting attempts at trimming down my baby pooch, I've been searching for a way to work out without defending myself from constant dog and toddler assaults. My previous inclination was to join a gym, but many a thing happened immediately after I decided to do it, with the #1 strike against a gym membership was having to put Mia in daycare. I didn't want to commit to the two year membership, and I didn't want to have to spend MORE time away from my child than work was already making me.

I don't have many friends that have children. I do, however, have quite a few far away facebook friends who do have children though, and although it might be considered borderline cyber stalking, I try to keep watch on their profiles for Mommy-related tips. I noticed one of my facebook Mom-friends was frequently posting about Stroller Strides, which intrigued me, so I did a web-search. No stroller strides in Las Vegas, but please give us your email address if you'd like us to e-mail you if someone opens a franchise.

Well, several weeks ago, I got an email that Stroller Strides was starting a Las Vegas location, and click here if you'd like to view a schedule of classes. As almost everything else in this city, Stroller Strides Las Vegas seemed to be geared toward the Stay at Home Mom whose husbands make enough money for them to afford the pretty high monthly membership fee. But, after exchanging a few emails with the very nice and enthusiastic owner, she decided that people had expressed enough interest in a Saturday morning class, and if I was only going to be attending one class per week, there was an option for a 10 class pass for a not ungodly amount per class. Excellent. I signed up and this past Saturday was my first class.

As soon as Mia and I showed up, we did our introductions and I promptly gave my "I haven't worked out in 15 months" disclaimer, and everyone assured me that I'd be just fine. I lined up next to the other Moms in their BOB strollers with my thankfully appropriate enough City Mini (I have a serious case of stroller inferiority complex, despite LOVING my City Mini and recommending it to everyone who doesn't want to spend more than $250 on a stroller) and got to my jogging in place.

The Stroller Strides exercises are pretty basic, where we did a circuit through a local park. We do brisk stroller walking on the paths and stop every 500 feet or so to do some strength training. The music was perfectly synched where it played pop music during the walking, and kids music during the strength exercises. During the stops, the Moms interact with the babies in their strollers. For example, we did something they call "Peekaboo Squats", where you basically play peekaboo with your baby as you squat in front of them. There was some other things, like doing "If you're happy and you know it" while doing a chair squat against the wall. It was good, and it was mostly just really fun to be with other Moms acting ridiculous in front of their children, and having the babies love it.

Until the 45 minute mark of the 60 minute class, when I realized that the half a nectarine and the one bottle of water was insufficient for an outdoor Las Vegas workout. During the follow-the-leader drill, I had to pull over and actually sit on the ground. It was so sudden. I was totally fine one minute, and the next my head was spinning, and I grabbed Mia's pack of Teddy Grahams from her hand and shoved a fistful in my mouth, grabbed one of the instructors water bottles (she had very kindly offered and sprinkled some on the back of my neck) and chugged it down. Five minutes later, everything except my ego was fine, and I was able to join in for the last 10 minutes of abs and stretching.

Everyone was very nice and assured me that I was neither the first nor the last that this would happen to, saying that if you've never worked out outside in Las Vegas, this is bound to happen to you, and next time, make sure you at least have a bowl of cereal with that nectarine! Being highly skilled in the self-deprecating humor department, was able to recover relatively well. I also [loudly] informed the instructor that I would be out of town next Saturday, so not to think that I was wimping out. I'd be back the week after that to punch the first class on my 10 class pass.

Bad Sleep Habits

I mentioned last time that we were in the middle of sleep regression. Amalah says that this is only supposed to happen during the baby's 4th month, but Mia turned 5 months on Monday, and we're still in the thick of it. A couple of weeks ago, on a particularly difficult night when neither me nor B could afford to be awake for two hours in the middle of the night, we plopped her down between the two of us, and she fell right asleep. And so, we did it again, and again, and again, and basically every time she wakes up in the middle of the night... we pick her right out of her crib/bassinet, and put her in our bed.

I know, I know, there's all sorts of stuff about how you shouldn't put a baby in bed with you because you might roll over in the middle of the night and crush it... but really? I've slept with my dogs in bed about a million times and I've never even come close. So let's move on from that.

I'm afraid that our "laziness" (I dare you to call it that when you're the one who desperately wants to sleep in the middle of the night because you have to get up and go to work in the morning) is going to end up biting us in the ass. Tonight, for example, Mia woke up at 1am, which is significantly earlier than she usually does, so I tried (this being friday night and all) to get her to fall asleep in her own bed. After an hour or so of me continuously patting her chest and replacing the pacifier, she finally did fall asleep. But... not me!

So here I am, at 4 am, realizing that perhaps I am the one who now needs to have a baby in my bed to fall back asleep in the middle of the night... who would have thought?

On an unrelated note, I have gotten much better about waking up in the mornings and actually getting some exercise in before work. I'm doing it at least 3 times a week (which is about 2 times more than I ever did before!), either with a DVD, some streaming Netflix, or going to our crappy apartment complex gym. On the other hand... I have absolutely failed on the diet front. I am eating all sorts of un-complex carbs (does that make them simple carbs?), and even made a second batch of those double chocolate chip cookies replacing the chocolate chips with peanut butter chips. So one win, plus one fail.

Unfortunately, the Las Vegas weather is already taking a turn for the cooler, so my goal of fitting back into my pre-pregnancy jeans before I actually need to start wearing them again is likely not to be hit. I may have to stop at the Gap tomorrow and pick up some tweeners.

SBD Week 3

I've been a bit of an absent blogger this past week, but we are in SLEEP REGRESSION CITY. Mia has taken to napping for only 20 minutes at a time, and waking up at 4am without going back down until almost 6am. I cannot physicall function on that little sleep, so I go back to sleep when she does and then I can't wake up. I need to grow up and realize that it's part of being an adult and a parent, but instead, I act like a college student who can sleep until 20 minutes before class. So yeah, it wasn't a great week. My LOST obsession has not yet subsided, and I am in the 6th and final season. I am trying to fit in as many episodes as I can so that this can STOP.

So, back to Weight Loss blogging. I'm starting week 4 of South Beaching, and I've been midly successful. I'm down to an 8 pound loss. That's a good number, but I haven't lost any weight for the past week. This is where it starts to get dangerous for me. If I don't get that positive reinforcement of seeing the numbers go down, I start to lose my resolve. On Saturday, B came home saying that he wanted a chocolate chip cookie. I said I would bake him some. He said, he wanted it to be double chocolate (chocolate batter plus chocolate chips). I said, No problem. He said, I want it to be big, like the ones from Panera. I said, Sure, why not? Yeah. Bad idea. Instead of cheating by having one regular sized cookie, I had one GIANT double chocolate cookie, the size of my hand. That lead to having pizza for dinner.

I woke up this morning and told myself that every day, you have a clean slate. Just because I messed up this weekend (and last weekend, when Juliet Cap and I shared two pitchers of Sangria (with a third person). I resolve, not to beat myself up over any slip ups, but I do have to stop sleeping until right before I have to leave, so that I can actually fit in a work out!

SBD Week 1

Week 1

Lbs Lost: 6

Regular Pants: Still don't fit

I could not be happier with those numbers! After one week, I am going strong. The South Beach Diet, even though it was most popular in 2003 when it came out, still works like a charm. The Diet itself works in phases. Phase 1 lasts 2-4 weeks, and is super super restrictive. You eat basically lean meats, reduced fat dairy, and non-starchy vegetables. Plus, no alcohol for phase 1. NONE. Although the first few weeks are unsustainable for longer than a month, the total elimination of sugar from your system really kick starts your metabolism. 6 pounds in one week is a lot of weight. I am hoping for 12 by the end of the 3 weeks that I plan on doing phase 1 (except booze. I'm bringing that back after 2 weeks). 

I have struggled though. The first few days are not a big deal. I eat some kind of veggie scramble for breakfast, pack a salad for lunch, and a piece of string cheese and almonds for my snack. For dinner, I make a meat and vegetable, and have some sugar free jello for dessert. It works. The weekends though, those are a different story. I'm at home, B is at home, and all I want to do is take a few of the chips he's snacking on, or eat those hash browns that came with my omelet at breakfast this morning! But, for the past 7 days, I've resisted. It feels good.

Just to end on a fun note, here's a Mia pick!

Mia, having her first Glorious Carb experience!

Prelude to a Diet

Mia turns 4 months old on Sunday, the 25th. Now that I've stopped breastfeeding (more on that in an upcoming post), it's appropriate (and necessary) for me to start paying attention to the number on the scale. 9 months, plus 4 months is a long enough vacation from paying attention to what I eat. So, right now, I'm +12 lbs from the weight I was the day I got pregnant. That weight was nothing to be proud of, a result of post-wedding slacking off. An acceptable weight, for my body's standards is the weight I was at my wedding, which I am at +21 lbs. That weight will let me fit (and look nice) in all of the clothes that I present own, including my favorite $160+ jeans of which I have numerous paris, bought pre-wedding and pre-2 law school tuition's worth of student loans. So, I need to get back down to an acceptable weight before the Las Vegas weather cools off, and I would want to wear said jeans. Plus, my cold-weather work wardrobe, which is extensive, coming from Chicago.

For now, I am making due with a minimal wardrobe that fits. I bought 2 pairs of capri pants from the Ann Taylor outlet store in a size 14 to get me through the summer. I also have a few dresses that are loose enough around the belly. But soon enough, I'll have to put away the summer dresses and bring out the wool slacks and long sleeved shirts. So, for practical reasons (and about a million others, like feeling good and being healthy) I can't stay in this post pregnant pudgy phase.

I've always had a bit more weight on my body than others. I was a size 10 in High school, and gradually crept up to a 12 somewhere between then and getting married. I'm OK with that. I'm happy with the way I look at a comfortable 12. You know what I mean by comfortable: clothes button and zip with ease. A comfortable 12 is about 31 lbs away from where I am right now. So let's round it up to a 35 lb goal. I'm not looking for a bikini body - with these stretchmarks, bikinis are not in my future. Just looking nice, being able to wear a bathings uit without constantly feeling the need to cover up. That's the goal: comfort, relative confidence.

I've been working up to this for a while. Dieting, that is. I've never been able to lose weight by just "watching what I eat", or "eating in moderation". I am apparently incapable of doing that, unless I impose strict guidelines on what I can and cannot eat. Limiting quantities is not great for me. The summer between my Junior and Senior year of college, I did the South Beach Diet one week after my 21st birthday. I lost a kind of unbelievable amount of weight, getting to under 10lbs of my freshman year of high school weight. It was amazing, and I looked great. But the factors that made it possible back then (getting seriously dumped at the end of Junior year, having free total access to a full-service gym, a cafeteria with endless salad combinations every day, a SBD buddy, and you know, being 21). From September until December, I was actually a size 8. Then, I started dating a guy, a BIG guy, and it became impossible to keep up with low-carb restrictions when he was ordering pizza for dinner every night. But those days are long gone. Now, I can accept and be happy with my goal. Comfortable 12. The diet itself is really very restrictive, but I followed it religiously back then, so I feel like I have the control to do it again.

I had some success a few years later during law school with Weight Watchers. I didn't follow their traditional points system, since it is based on calculating calories and limiting the amount of food. I didn't do well with that, I like strict guidelines. They had another option called the Core Plan, which I did follow and did well on. I got down to the goal I have for myself now, but I had a less to lose to get there. I haven't 100% decided on which one of those two I will follow, but I'm leaning towards South Beach.

I had initially given myself a start date of October 1st. But, somehow from the time I decided to diet and now, I've managed to gain weight. Two weeks ago, I was only at +10 pre-pregnancy. So, yeah, I think I subconciously started gorging myself, knowing that I will soon have to stop eating my favorite combination of vanilla ice cream and crushed up Reese's cups. Something that started during pregnancy, and somehow I haven't given up yet...

So, that is my diet tale. I start Monday. I will update periodically on my progress, although I promise not to get obnoxious and make lists of what I've eaten every day.