Blogging my weight loss journey - month 8

Because of our schedule tomorrow, I am not going to be able to weigh and measure in the morning, so I am doing it one day early this month.

Can you say PLATEAU?! Arg!! I am exactly the same as last month. I don’t want to discourage myself, but at the same time, my final goal, which seemed so reasonable at the beginning of the year, is now looking less and less reachable. That’s ten pounds a month for four straight months, and that seems fairly unlikely given my track record of the last four months.

My weight is the same and my inches are the same. Nothing has changed. Actually, that is not exactly true. Three days ago I changed my exercise videos. I am hoping that a change to my workouts will jump start me past this plateau. I am using the FIRM workouts, which have been my favorites for nearly twenty years. There is a lot of paraphernalia involved, so when I started again this year I wanted something really easy and simple, so I went with Turbo Jam. Now, that I have been exercising regularly for over six months I can deal with all the extra stuff (weights, boxes, sticks, 2x4s, etc. -- it sounds funky, but you’ve got to see them!) Even with eight months of exercise under my belt, the last three days of FIRM exercises have given me sore muscles, so I know I am working harder and that is a good thing!

Also, my friend Cory and I started walking at night and that lasted about a week before all our schedules got in the way, but I am hoping after this holiday weekend we can get back into that habit, and that may help as well.

Hopefully the next month’s blog post will be much more exciting!

Excited!

The Letters to the Editor only allow you 200 words, so I thought I would post about this! I am not one to wear my politics on my sleeve, but often that is what a blog is for, right?!

I feel very strongly about my right and responsibility to vote! Yet I have had little to be excited about in the political process for a long time. For many years I feel that our choice for president has been a vote for the lesser of two evils. I was feeling that way about this election as well. . . until today!

I am so excited that Senator McCain has chosen Alaska's Governor Sarah Palin to be his running mate!

For the first time in this and many elections I am excited and wanting to talk to people about what is happening. I called my mother, who lives in Alaska, this morning and we had a great talk about Sarah Palin. I have not lived in Alaska since before Palin was elected, so I am not familiar with her as a politician. My mother said that she is sad that Palin could be the VP only because that would mean that Alaska would lose her as it's governor. She really likes Governor Palin and all that she has done for the state of Alaska and it's citizens. Governor Palin has an 88% approval rating in her state!

Now, I am not so naive as to believe that there were not some powerful politically strategic reasons that McCain chose her -- the fact that she is female may draw voters who are still upset that Hillary didn't win, the fact that she is pro-drilling fits with his energy plan, to name two -- but the fact that he chose her makes me happy in two ways. One, McCain had the gumption to put a woman on the ticket and not play it safe with more of the usual. Two, she is really a great person. When I heard that she was the choice, I was excited just because she was from Alaska, and how cool is that! Then I heard her speak! She is genuine and sincere and that is missing from so many of our politicians today and it has made most of us very cynical about what we hear coming out of their mouths. So far, from what I have seen and heard, all that she says about herself can be backed up with reality. I like that! Her acceptance speech blew me away and I am excited to see where she can go from here!

For the first time in a long time, I can't wait for November 4th!!!

-Lora

Read an article about Sarah Palin HERE.

Butterflies!

Two weeks ago we were given a Butterfly Treehouse by a friend of ours. She had ordered it for her grandson, but it arrived too early and the larvae would die before he got there. So, we took it home and the girls were excited to watch the lifecycle of the butterflies.

The larvae had their own food stuff in a small cup and they would feed off that for several days before they went on to become butterflies. The girls took a close look at them and decided to name them (although I am not sure how they thought they were able to tell them apart). They called them Climber, Eater, Hanger, Small and Cat Deeley (caterpillar - cat - Cat Deeley, from So You Think You Can Dance). Anyway, we watched them grow, pretty much doubling their size each day.

After a few days the caterpillars crawled to the top of the cup and attached themselves and formed their chrysalises. The chrysalises were attached to a paper disc in the top of the lid of the cup and so we opened the cup and took out the paper disc and attached it to the mesh side of the Butterfly Treehouse.

And then we waited. And waited. And waited. For the girls seven to ten days is an eternity. One morning the girls woke up and were so excited that four of the butterflies had come out of their chrysalises. We put some flowers and a slice of orange on a plate with some sugar water sprinkled on top and we put it in the bottom of the enclosure. There was one more that hadn't come out yet and I was hoping to take a few pictures as it emerged, but in the five minutes it took to run to the post office and back, the last one came out of it's chrysalis.

We fed them for a few days and then today we released them. We figured they were anxious to go, as there were several of them that would flutter madly around the enclosure, but when we opened the enclosure we actually had to pretty much chase them out. They stopped long enough to perch on the girls fingers for a moment, but then they were gone. It was fun! Rebecca is already asking when we will be doing it again!

To see all the day by day photos of these butterflies CLICK HERE. .

Back to School

This morning the girls went back to school. Amanda was nervous and excited! She was up nearly the whole night with a nervous stomach. Rebecca was pretty even keeled. It’s just another day for her.

Kevin went in late to work and we all took Rebecca to Sun Empire (which was extensively more chaos than usual!) and got her to her third grade class with Mrs. Sutherland. When she walked into the classroom there were several kids who called out, “Rebecca! Over here! Your desk is over here!” I was glad to hear that, as ever since Kindergarten, Rebecca has been in classes where she had only one other student from the class year before. This year there are quite a few kids in her class from last year, from church, and, ironically, from Kindergarten. Wonderful! When I have told anyone about who Rebecca’s teacher is this year they have all told me what a great teacher she is! I am glad to hear that as well!

Next we took Amanda over to Liberty Intermediate. Much less chaos there. That campus has pretty well got it together. (It’s the parents that cause issues.) Amanda’s class is in the new building that was completed just before the end of last year. Her teacher is the 6th grade GATE teacher, Mr. Kismet. Most of the kids from last year are in her class again, so no worries about friends there!

They are going to do well! Both of them did very well on their STAR tests last year and they have done a lot of reading during the summer. We are very proud of our girls and how much they love school! Now Katrina and I get some time together!

Road Trip 2

I'm still trying to figure out why Lora would think that I had the camera in the first place. She took it into the resturant, one would think she would take it out. While we were there, I even asked her why she brought it in. (I know, it sounds funny. It sounded just as funny when I was asking it. She doesn't go ANYWHERE without it.) But somehow, since I was the one who left it behind, I was the one who had to go get it.(?)

I figured I could make a ride out of it on the new bike. The fact that the new ST gets better than 40mpg made it an easy decision. I'm not one to ditch church, but I really didn't want to be riding accross the Valley floor on a near 100° summer afternoon, so I headed out in the morning.

I got to the resturant right at the noon rush and met a harried manager who would have been happy to have one (or six) less things to deal with at that moment. I told him who I was and he quickly told the hostess, "I'll be right back. I gotta go get this guy out of the doghouse." (What did Lora tell them on the phone last night?) A moment later, the manager was back, he tossed me the camera over the counter (literally), and I'm out the door.

As I'm getting on the bike, a quick look at the GPS reminds me that I'm only 6-8 miles from the top of Hecker Pass. This is the pass between Gilroy & Watsonville, and while it's short, it's twisty and one of the prettiest roads in the State. Since I was right there, I ran up to the top, just in front of a local Mustang car club. I snapped a few pics and headed back down.

On the way back, I stopped in Casa de Fruita for a moment. While I was sitting there, two more bikes, a Yamaha FJR and a Harley Fat Boy, each with two riders, pulled up and stopped next to me. The guys & I talked bikes for a while, and I overheard one of their wives saying how funny it was to be out on a trip with two Kevins. I looked at her and asked if her husband's name was Kevin. She said "Yes" and added that both of their husbands were named Kevin. I raised my hand and said, "Well, so am I!" She then asked if my middle name was Wayne. When I said it was, she yelled at her husband (the FJR rider) "Hey! This guy's your twin!" It was his middle name too. When she asked the other Kevin (the Harley rider) what his middle name was, he declined to answer.

Over Pachaco Pass, past the San Luis Reservoir and B. F. Sisk Dam and through the Valley's inversion layer. Up in Gilroy, the temperatures were in the 70's. Headed into the Valley, the temps were climbing into the 90's. The wind was very strong blowing into the Valley; between the downhill grade and the tailwind, my fuel consumption gauge was showing 60-70 MPG! Very nice. I stopped at the San Luis Drain visitor's center on top of the dam to look at their exhibits about the dam construction. (Interesting to me, probably not so much for the girls.) The water was very low behind the dam, so low, in fact, that the dam power plant intakes were exposed. They're usually under 50 feet of water. Interesting to see. After a short visit, and a few pics. I was on my way again.

By the time I got to the Valley floor, it was afternoon and well above 90°. Just where I didn't want to be and the reason why I left early in the morning. No matter. It was fun to get out on a second road trip in two days. I may have to start leaving things behind on all of our family road trips.

Total trip: 260 miles.
Average fuel: 46.3mpg.
Camera: returned (with a few extra pics).
Lora: Relieved and Happy.

Mission accomplished.

Road Trip!

We decided to spend yesterday, the last day of summer vacation, on a road trip to the coast! It was a spur of the moment decision the night before, so we just played it by ear. It has been so hot here in the Valley that we decided to escape for the day!

We left a lot later than we wanted to, but that seems to be par for the course. With snacks, sand shovels and cache pages in hand we started our way towards the beach.

We drove up through Mendota and Firebaugh and then caught the 152 west. We drove through Pacheco Pass and stopped in Casa de Fruita near lunch time. There were a few caches there, so we got them first and then the girls got to pick out a fruit to go with their lunch. Amanda picked half a watermelon, Rebecca picked half a cantelope and Katrina picked a basket of strawberries. Yum! We also got some dried fruits and nuts as well. I picked up some dried figs and dates and have plans for a future what-would-Jesus-eat lesson. The girls also watched the train go by, played on a train engine and explored other fun things they have there.

While we were in the fruit stand we saw an accident happen out in the intersection. A semi was swinging wide to make the turn back onto the freeway and the trailer completely ran over a mid-size pick up truck! I don’t know if the guy in the pick-up truck didn’t realize the semi was swinging wide and tried to get passed him on the right, but the semi just drove along the side of his truck and knocked him clean off into the dirt on the side fo the road. The semi didn’t even notice and kept on going, getting on the freeway before we could even think to get a license plate number. The driver of the pick-up truck couldn’t even get out his driver side door and had to climb out the passenger side. He got on his phone as he walked around the truck. Kevin went out to go let him know that we had seen the accident, but before we could, he took off. We called the CHP to let them know we had seen it, but without an identifiable victim it is hard for them to follow up.

Anyway, after lunch we got back on the road, heading through Gilroy and Hecker Pass (that drive is so beautiful!) and then down through Watsonville to the coast. We stopped at one beach, near Aptos, and walked down under an old train tressle. That was fun! (Again, this is why we love geocaching! We would not know to have stopped at this spot if not for a cache nearby.) We decided to go to another beach a little farther down the coast, and we really liked it. It was Manresa State Beach, and there is a campground there and everything. (We want to come back another time and camp there!)

The beach was nice, although the sun was firmly behind the clouds (thanks to the hot weather in the Valley), so it was cool and windy. Amanda and Rebecca had a great time playing in the waves! They made a friend and they all collected sand crabs and put them in a bucket that we had brought. Katrina spent all her time digging in the sand up higher on the beach. She was not keen on the waves getting too close to her. The clouds were really low and there was so much mist it felt like it was sprinkling on us.

When chill and hunger had got the better of us, we left the beach and took the long route back, walking up through the campground area. By the time we got cleaned up and back on the road home it was nearly 7:30pm. We drove through Watsonville, but not being familiar with the town, we didn’t know a good place to stop for dinner. We kept going, back over Hecker Pass, and stopped in Gilroy. We went to the Black Bear Diner, which we had been to once before on a trip up to Oregon. There was a wait, so forty minutes and three very hungry, whiny girls later, we finally were seated and ordered dinner.

It was about 10:00pm when we finished dinner. Katrina was already resting her head on my shoulder and everyone seemed to be listing slightly. I got up to pay and then we scooted the girls out to the van. They were all sound asleep before we got to the city limits.

We called Kevin’s mom to see how she was doing (her long-time boss and friend, Jeff Dockstader, passed away on Friday. She called us this morning to let us know. He had a heartattack on the way home from work and his car slammed into a house. Jeff was one of the witnesses at our wedding, so we knew him well too. What a sad thing to have happen.). Then we called Lora’s mom to see how she was doing (he’s heading to Homer this for a week of glassmaking!).

We arrived home at about 12:20 in the morning. We had found nine caches, carried home a lot of sand and had taken a ton of photos to document the whole thing!

We got the girls into bed and started unloading the car. We had done it a little at a time separately, so it was a few minutes before Kevin asked where the camera was. We both said: “I THOUGHT YOU HAD IT!!!” Yikes! We got online and looked up the Black Bear Diner and got the number for the restaurant in Gilroy. Thankfully an employee was still there! I described where we were sitting and what the camera looked like and they confirmed that they had found it! Whew! She asked if we would be back tonight to pick it up. I told her we were all the way back in Fresno and so we would be there the next day. They said they would keep it in the safe for us.

So, this morning, at about 8:30am, Kevin hopped on the motorcycle and headed for Gilroy. He has been gone for over seven hours. . . can you say Road Trip? : )

See all of our Road Trip pics HERE.

Blogging my weight loss journey - Month 7

Since I have been talking so much about my size 16 jeans, I thought I had better take this month's photo with them on! (Thanks Amanda for taking my picture!)

The word of the month was definitely TURNAROUND! I feel really good about how things went this month! I exercised a LOT more this month! (Again -- LOVE Turbo Jam! I am especially enjoying my Turbo Jam LIVE! workouts!) I can really tell that all my exercising is improving my metabolism! I also got my portion sizes back down to where they need to be. AND, I started writing down the foods that I am eating again. I HATE doing that, but I really needed to make sure that I writing down what I was eating so that I would be accountable for my food choices.

I honestly did not think that I would have lost that much weight this month, although I hoped to reach my goal of passing 178 lbs, which is the halfway mark, but I know that I have lost inches. With all the exercise and strength training this month I know that I am building up muscle, which weighs more than fat, so even though I am losing inches, my muscle mass is balancing out the fat loss.

I am sloping down in my hips where I used to bump out. When I lie down on my back, my stomach doesn't fold over onto my legs. This is all very exciting!

For the first time I am seeing photos of myself and I am not thinking, "look how fat I still am." Especially when I see photos of me from around Christmas time. I can really see the difference then! It is easier to tell when you have that type of comparison!

So, to recap my goals:

*140 lbs by the time I turn 40
*to get below 200 lbs COMPLETED!
*to get back below last years 32 lbs. lost COMPLETED!
*fit into size 16 jeans COMPLETED!
*pass 178, the halfway mark COMPLETED!
*my stomach no longer touches any other part of my body

I have added three more goals:

*waist measurement less than 32.5"
*body fat less than 30%
*change my eating behavior for good!

(Back in 2004 I had my body mass measured, and it was a depressing 47.6% fat. That is nearly half my body mass in fat, AND, at the time I only weighed 198 lbs. So, when I started this year, I had another 20 lbs. on top of that.)

I feel that I have set realistic goals and I am pleased with my progress.

So, for this month:

weight loss this month: 4 lbs.
inches lost this month: 12"

TOTAL weight loss: 41 lbs!
TOTAL inches lost: 57.25"

Awesome!!!