2.8 pounds of food donated this week.

I am soooo close to breaking into the 160's! Just .5 pounds and I'm there! However, I'd like to be down another couple pounds by next week.

Check out that Ticker! I'm so close to making a new one!!! And only 15 pounds away from my goal. It's amazing to be so close and still KNOW I'm going to get there. According to Weight Watchers, I'm only 6.4 lbs away from goal weight...so I figure a couple more months of paying them for meetings and then it's FREE!!! This is - by far - the best investment I've ever made into my health.

It's not just the weight loss...it's the tools I've learned to help me get here and then stay here. I use at least one or three of those tools DAILY. :D

Wedding plans are going well, we're only 9 days away from the big day...friends and family begin arriving next week on Wednesday and I'm going to enjoy every minute of their company! It's lonely here in Santa Barbara when you're just a "regular Jane" like me. I'm looking forward to seeing the people I love.

My friend, Tina, threw a Lingerie Bridal shower for me last Saturday. It was a lovely day, the salad bar style lunch she prepared was FANTASTIC and I was showered with nightgowns and pajamas. There were a few "sexy" things, but nothing to wear outside of the bedroom. I suppose that's what it's all about and I really loved everything I received. It was awkward receiving so many gifts, but as I was putting all the pretty things away that evening, I was pretty stoked to have so many nighties to enjoy wearing. I've even picked the one I'll wear to lounge around in on Wedding night/morning after. I'll share pictures when I get my hands on some. I did look at a few and there is one that I had to stop and stare...I looked so much like my mother. I will miss her terribly on the wedding day...but I know she'll be with me in my heart.

This coming week will be pretty easy on me as far as stress eating is concerned...I've got most of my stuff taken care of, now it's just little things here and there, and my girlfriends will help a lot when they get here next week. I've cut out alcohol and chocolate until the day of the wedding. Though I did have to taste the wine we'll be serving...it's drinkable, but not the wine I'd hoped to be serving. After the wedding, I'll reintroduce some wine in the evening, but I really do need to limit myself to one glass. Two is just too much anymore. :D I lose all resolve and then get the nibblies or have a third glass that I really don't need.

I do expect the party to begin Thursday, September 18, as my childhood friends will be here and we'll be reminscing and enjoying a little "margarita therapy" together. Just need to keep the drinks to ONE for me. Wedding day, I'll have a glass of wine, then a few glasses of water...repeat. :D

Any pointers on really good eye cream to battle under-eye puffiness?

Have a great week!

Up 1.2 AGAIN

Ok, so the dancing around in the 170's is getting old.

I'm doing way too much comfort eating...and I'm not doing much, but enough! I'm drinking too much wine to relax due to all the wedding planning stress...and I'm eating too much chocolate which is breaking out my face and that's just not ok with a wedding only 2 weeks away.

GOSH, two weeks! EEEEK! I'm excited, anxious, delighted, and a bit concerned...just that the day will be nice weather, that we'll have a wonderful day and start our MARRIAGE off right and without me behaving like some kind of bride-zilla.

I'm hoping to have a nice massage the night before and quite possibly the day of. :D Colette Cooper is a talented Masseuse here in Santa Barbara and I'm hoping to pay her for her services to help me relax and not have any muscle tightness or issues with my back due to stress (and corset lacing) that day. :D

So, I finally realized, with the help of one of the ladies who helps weigh us in when we arrive, that I am only 9 lbs away from the top of the goal range for my age/height. However, she had me at 5' 8" and I'm only 5' 7" or a little less...thanks to gravity. So really, my weight range is 128 to 160...so I think my goal of 155 is realistic.

I WILL reach my goal of 155 lbs by the beginning of November.

By my wedding day...only 2 weeks away...5 lbs is doable. Maybe 6, but that's REALLY pushing it. Though I've been FLOATING here at the low 170's for so long, I might be able to drop a quick 10...
I just need to be more strict with myself. I've been really lenient because I've come so far. I look at my pictures in the previous post, before and after, right next to each other...it's FRIGHTENING to see how bad I let myself get AGAIN...and I will NEVER do that to my poor body again. I fear, if I did, I would die. Seriously.

But I had a reset in the brain last night...I'm SO CLOSE, but not yet there. Yes I've come far...but I close last time and went back up. THAT ISN'T going to happen this time. NOPE. I'm ON IT!

Most of you know which program I'm on, but I'm going to break precedent and let you know which one I'm on because, if I inspire ANYONE, now's the time to join. Weight Watchers is promoting, for the next 6 weeks, "Lose for Good." For every pound of weight lost by Weight Watchers members between 9/7/08 and 10/18/08, they’ll donate the equivalent of a pound of food — up to one million dollars — to people around the world who need it.

I WILL lose 12 pounds during this campaign. Join me! Join Weight Watchers and do something good for yourself and for others at the same time.

I WILL walk daily. I WILL do 50 sit ups daily. I WILL take EVERY opportunity to MOVE my body and break a sweat. I WILL track everything I eat and I WILL be VIGILANT to the plan and I WILL reach my goal weight.

JOIN ME!
~Lizbeth

New Pictures, and old.

Today is weigh in day, that's my new weigh in dress. It's pretty lightweight.

I still need to lose about 20 lbs to get all the flab off, but I'm doing really well.

I am down another 1.6 tonight. yay! I'm moving and grooving again. Date Nights involving exercise are a good thing! We rented bicycles out by the beach, rode around for 1.5 hours (should have been 2 but Jef wanted to make a phone call)...and then enjoyed a wonderful dinner on State Street in Downtown Santa Barbara under the stars. Skipped dessert but enjoyed a lovely dinner.

So the scale says 172 lbs now. That's a total loss of 121.2 lbs. Just 22 lbs to go. I could do it in 11 weeks if I got really serious...but I am not sure I will...wedding coming, and the dress fits, so I think I'll just stay on track and take it as it comes.

Wedding plans going swimmingly and the exercise is back on track. Though I still get lazy sometimes. All in all, I'm just dealing with the daily struggle of not stagnating HERE at this weight. I want to reach GOAL!!!

Have a great week!

Back on Track

So it's been a while. Hi there!

Vacations, birthday, summer visitors are done and behind me...for now anyway. I'm refocused and back on track. Been struggling with the whole weight loss thing since my laptop died. (No it cannot be fixed afterall.) So tracking wasn't happening for a while and that made a huge difference.
In order to lose weight I GOTTA TRACK what I'm eating. (There's new scientific proof of this as well!)
I also have to MOVE my butt more.
So I'm tracking again and making a POINT to get out and walk at least 4 times a week, more if I can.
What can I say...I'm down 7.6 pounds in the last 2 weeks. :D Here's the kicker: This is FAT (Water retention) week and I'm down 4.4! This plan really works when you work it.

I realize I let myself slip into the habits that other people on the plan slip into and the complain it doesn't work. Well, it doesn't if you don't USE THE TOOLS. I'm proof of it. Truly.

So I'm trekkin on, and I do believe I'll be at my goal weight by my wedding day. Fitting is this Friday, so I'm going to get an undergarment that sucks it ALL in...to see if we can get by without the MAJOR alteration that we have in mind. It will work, but I would really like to keep the dress as it is if I can.

Plans are moving right along, we have nailed down our site, my gown, our officiant, our cake baker, our caterer, my shoes, and a few little things. We still have a lot to do, but we've got more appointments this weekend and a fun one on Friday - we meet with a custom jeweler to discuss creation of our wedding set!

On a food find note: I am not much of a soda drinker, but Jef and I have found one we like to indulge in from time to time. You gotta try Coke ZERO. Today. If you like Coca Cola Classic...but you don't want all that sugar, this comes much closer than Diet Coke ever has. Try it, and let me know what you think!

Only 28 more pounds to go to goal. I know I'll get there. WHOO HOO!
Have a GREAT week!
~Lizbeth

Up .2, but so what? I'm floating on a cloud.

So I am up .2 pounds, but that's ok...we had a lovely dinner out on Saturday and I had the left overs on Sunday for lunch...or was it breakfast?
Anyway, Sunday dinner came with a proposal! Yes, THAT kind of proposal. :D And I said YES!
So Jef and I will be married soon, we've not picked the day but will probably have that solidified this weekend after we look around at possible sites in Santa Barbara to have the ceremony/reception.
It's really easy planning a wedding with someone you really share values and deep love with. I'm enjoying the process.

However, I am feeling a little down...I would like to share this event with my family and special friends, but they are all so scattered...not only geographically...so I am concerned that some of the people who are important to me won't be there. The day really is about SHARING this wonderful love and the joining of our lives together with others that we feel love for...it's this whole LOVE fest and I worry that it will be lacking in some way for me. *sigh* Am I just being silly?
I'll just come out and say it: It would complete the day for me if my family were present. All of them, the good, the bad, the ugly, the survivors that we are in our own ways. We're a goofy bunch but there is love between us that I hope hasn't been lost over the years. I hope there is a glimmer and that when they receive my invitations, they will come to Santa Barbara for a fun weekend and share this very special day with me and see me join my life to this very special man who loves me so unconditionally. I cannot have my mother and father there in body, but they will be on my mind and so there in spirit...so I would like to have my siblings and their partners there too.
The Moore-Allbright wedding would be VERY special if they can all be there, but I'll take what I can get. If only my sister's come, I'll be content with that. I just had to express that I want them all to be there...

Hustle and bustle ahead, and still about 30 lbs to lose...I'd love to have it all off by the wedding day...but that may be just a tad unrealistic...however, 20lbs is doable and I'm shooting for that.

I'll be running around a lot but still need to focus on getting EXERCISE... :)

Root me on?

Down again: 7.4 pounds and back on track

What a GREAT week. Not the weight loss...although that's not too shabby, but the WEEK was so nice.

We spent the weekend in Lake Tahoe with a bunch of REALLY SMART people and did some hiking up in Heavenly Valley.

I let this post sit in my drafts too long and I'm lost about what to say cuz I have more to say about the current week.

This having no laptop stuff is for the birds...I'm calling the fixers NOW!!!

NYC, Junior's Cheesecake and I'm up 8.8 lbs. Also a Parenting Question.

Vacation was FUN FUN FUN. We traipsed all over Manhattan, across the Brooklyn Bridge, rode the subway to places far and wide, and took full advantage of the wonderful public transportation available in that area. Why can't California get their public transportation together like NY and the surrounding states have?

Thanks to a gentleman in our complex here at work, I learned about a lovely diner in Brooklyn called Junior's . We never found the one in Brooklyn...but 'lo and behold, our hotel was right around the corner from the Times Square location! Sooooo, over the course of vacation, I had 3 pieces of cheesecake. I know...overkill, shame, and sweet ecstasy!
I went completely off my plan, drank too much, ate too much and came home to enjoy food poisoning from the wee hours of June 9th til the later hours of the same day.

What did I learn? With my laptop dead in the water, (sending it back again for repair) and not having an electronic way to track my food while away from a pc...I am useless on this plan. I think I could set up an excel spreadsheet to do what I need to do, but the convenience of looking up the calories for the foods I'm ingesting is GONE and that makes it challenging for me. I'm all about ease of the plan. :D

So, I purchased another book last night, this one is basically an oversized pocket size booklet that has most of the information found on the website I use. I'm going manual with paper and pen until I set up an excel spreadsheet that I can use on my smartphone. I gotta get used to tracking even when I have no electronic aid. So I have my tracker, my book for foods, my book for dining out foods and a few others, and I'm taking them with me as we head off for Lake Tahoe tonight for "Fusion 2008" a masterminding session with some very bright people.

I will not let a little thing like the loss of computing power stop my progress...though it did slow it down, I learned why, and I'll make the necessary adjustment and move on. :D

For all you parents out there, I need some input/advice/thoughts on the matter:
I had made arrangements with my son to watch our doggy while we were in NYC. The few days before, he got a little flaky doing something we talked about and I warned him not to do...so I fired him...then he wouldn't return my call, so I made other arrangements for the doggy.
He was upset with me for doing that, but whatever...next time, return my darned phone calls.
So, while we were away, our doggy broke free from her caretaker at the local "Big Dog" Parade...apparently, she'd seen something to freak her out and off she went, wriggled free of her collar and ran like a bat out of hell. I called my son to ask him to help find our doggy, and he never responded to phone calls or text messages.
When I spoke with him after our return, to tell him to go ahead and use the job I fired him from as a reference, I won't slam him, nor will anyone else...then I asked him...and his reason for not calling or responding was because he figured, after I changed the plan on him last minute, he could only laugh and go back to sleep. What a great kid, huh? I reminded him to keep this whole thing in mind when he needed a favor from me...

So yesterday, he calls me to get something from me...help with living arrangements at the college he wants to attend in the fall. My question is: Why should I help this selfish person make his dreams come true when he does selfish things like that and for all he knows, our doggy could be dead. I realize, as a parent, there are things I need to do to help him, but I think, right now...he needs to learn to apologize for being a jerk, really figure it out...and until then, I am not going to help him. Why should I go into debt for his college? Why should I put a deposit on his housing? He's been working since June of last year here with me and not saved a dime. Yet I'm supposed to foot the entire deposit. He's not found another job either.

I think the most important help I can give him right now is to let him see/feel/experience a bit of humility. Crack the hard shell around him and learn that it's ok to admit mistakes and to take responsibility for one's choices and the consequences (good or bad) that go along with them.

Of course I want to help him get to college, but I absolutely refuse under the current circumstances. What are your thoughts Parents??