evan has been working on a wordpress blog for me for a couple of months. i may still tweak it some more, but i'm pretty happy with it right now.. i just made my first post, and i should be moving over there permanently. check it out here.

i bought a stopwatch at target last night for $9.99 and tried it out this morning. i THINK my route is very close to a 5k, but i go through some residential areas that i can't accurately measure on mapmyrun and i also can't drive them to check with my odometer. anyway, i clocked in at 35:56 and i am pretty happy with that. i might play with mapmyrun this weekend to look for a lightly longer route. i'd like to get run to 40 or 45 minutes and keep it there.

i never liked running. i still think it all goes back to mr. fields, my 7th grade gym teacher. we were doing physical fitness tests and the first time i ran the mile, i did terribly. mr. fields made me (and all the other failures) do it over again. a friend of mine who had passes easily the first time ran it again with me, and i improved my time by more than 2 minutes. i missed the passing time by about 10 seconds, but mr. fields wouldn't pass me. he made everyone who hadn't passed do the mile over and over again (not consecutively), and i quit trying after that. naturally, mr. fields was a very overweight, middle aged black guy who used to fall asleep at his desk on the days he was "teaching" health class. he couldn't have run one lap if his life depended on it. what a douche.

i'm really proud of myself for sticking with this, and i'm finally starting to enjoy my runs. i have an evolving playlist that helps keep me going; i don't know how anyone runs without music. i like trying to improve my time, and running makes me feel strong. i like doing it first thing in the morning. it leaves me feeling accomplished and ready to face the day.

lost this week: 2.4 pounds
total lost: 25.0 pounds
pounds to pre-pregnancy weight: 0.4 pounds

woohoo! obviously it was a good week for me - i got to raise my hand during celebrations and collect charms for 16 weeks (the "stay and succeed" award) and 25 pounds lost. i got a key chain quite a while ago when i reached my 10% loss. now i really feel like i'm in AA, collecting chips.



i'm trying really hard to have a good week so i can get past my pre-pregnancy weight and beyond.

i'm still jogging three mornings a week. i think i got under 12 minutes a mile this morning, but my system of adding up the track times of all the songs that played on my ipod probably isn't the most accurate. i think i'll try to buy some kind of stopwatch tomorrow so i can check out my times, and hopefully sign up for that 5k soon!

apparently my boss and a number of the executives with long commutes love audio books, and they have quite a collection that they share with each other. i've always wanted to try one, and my boss gave me the last song by nicholas sparks. i've never read anything by nicholas sparks, and i thought the movie the notebook was so so. it wouldn't have been my first choice, and i didn't end up loving the story, but i did really enjoy listening to a book in my car. the voices were a little funny to me at first, but i got used to them after a while. i think it took me less than two weeks. i returned it to my boss and she gave me sunday's at tiffany's by james patterson. i really need to finally get a library card and see what they have to offer!

it used to get pretty old listening the moms on america's next top model (and project runway, and any host of other reality shows) cry and cry and cry about how much they missed their kids and how much they were giving up to be on the show. now that i have an infant son, i finally understand. if i couldn't see him even once for weeks at a time, it would be heartbreaking. i can honestly say that when i get home from work each day, i am THRILLED to see him. i can't wait to scoop him up and kiss his cheeks, even if he does pull my hair and slobber on my face.

speaking of things i've come to understand since i had a child... i used to supervise seven employees and some of them came to work late more often than not. that drove me crazy. i was ALWAYS on time, and in fact, always early. when i talked to my boss, she wanted to give one employee a break because she had kids. i thought to myself, pfft! so? that's no excuse! these days, i am the one who is late to work more often than not. only 5 or 10 minutes, but i feel a little twinge of shame every single time. i can't say for sure that stephen is reason i'm late, but i know that i often stop getting ready for work to talk to him, play with him, kiss him, and hold him for just a few more seconds before i have to head out the door. although i sit right outside my boss's office, she's never said a word.

note to self: when you are restricting the amount of calories you eat per day, and you start your morning off with a chai and a big old piece of banana chocolate chip coffee cake from starbucks, you may very well find yourself eating a bowl of green beans for an afternoon snack as you try to tide your hunger over until dinner.

i think i've had a pretty good week as far as healthy habits are concerned. really hoping for a good weigh in tomorrow!

lost this week: GAINED 1 pound
total lost: 22.6 pounds
pounds to pre-pregnancy weight: 2.8

gah! my pattern lately is to have a good week followed by a bad week. i was really hopeful that my success at my previous way in would help me stay on plan during the week, but it didn't. as usual, i did well with exercise, but i didn't track any of my food and i ended up having a lot of little slips that really added up. i was disappointed, but not surprised.

i didn't let myself get into a funk. evan and i were busy from the moment we got home, getting ready for my mom's birthday. we spent the day at my parents house with the mulligans, eric & martha, brad & michelle, and zach. the weather was GORGEOUS and a lot of us ate and visited on the deck. i made seven layer dip and bought a vanilla bean cheesecake (my mom's favorite). krystle made potato salad and deviled eggs, and my dad grilled the hamburgers and hot dogs we brought. michelle brought a really good broccoli salad that i need to get the recipe for. i ate what i wanted and didn't worry about it. we played wacky sports on the snes. i really suck, but it was fun. hopefully we can squeeze in another get together before krystle and gavin move. it's coming up fast... i try not to think about it.

sunday steve came over to work on earsauce with evan. i took care of stephen and watched a LOT of tv. i ate well except for a piece of leftover cheesecake. i ate well yesterday. i think my goal is to have a good week every single week until stephen's birthday. i think breastfeeding is giving me an advantage and i want to utilize it while i can. i plan to stop breastfeeding completely at 12 months, which is less than 2 months away!

i also want to post more than once a week, so hopefully i'll be back before my next weigh in!

lost this week: 3.2 pounds
total lost: 23.6 pounds
pounds to pre-pregnancy weight: 1.8

i ate well and exercised 5 days last week, so i knew i was going to have a good weigh in. (hmm, there seems to be a pattern here... eating healthy and exercising = losing weight. who would've thought?!) even so, i was surprised and delighted to lose more than three pounds! although there is no chance of me fitting in most of my pre-pregnancy jeans and tops even after shedding the final two pounds, i'll still be happy to hit that milestone. next weekend could be a big celebration for me. i should be getting the stay and succeed award for making it through 16 weeks, and hopefully i'll get another 5 pound award and 25 pound award if i can lose 1.4 pounds. maybe that will help motivate me this week!

we headed to rock bottom brewery in arlington on saturday afternoon to have lunch with the mulligans, eric, martha, zach, and brad lee. the food was pretty tasty and the group was small enough that i was able to chat with just about everyone. at home, i was able to catch up on some dvr and we got nathan's for dessert. yum! sunday was a very productive day. we did a little cleaning, a lot of laundry, went to costco ($409 cash back rebate from amex, woot!), had dinner at quizno's and went grocery shopping. based on our accountants projections of what we'll owe in taxes this year, we decided to go ahead and pay off the hyundai. no more car payments for us! of course, that savings will be offset by the roughly $100 per month we're about to start spending on our life insurance policies. we were both approved recently for 30 year return of premium policies. this means that if we don't die during the policy term, we get all our premiums back. pretty cool. we completed our wills several weeks ago too, so i think we're pretty much set in case of catastrophe.

it looks as though i don't have any board meetings for the next two weeks. awesome! next weekend we'll be celebrating my mom's birthday and easter, so hopefully the weather will cooperate.

feeling good and hoping for a good week!

lost this week: GAINED 1 pound
total lost: 20.4 pounds
pounds to pre-pregnancy weight: 5

sigh. i sort of knew this was coming. after my weigh in last week, evan and i went to outback and ate like there was no tomorrow. it was DELICIOUS. that wouldn't be too big of a deal, but i sort of slipped all week. there was cake at work on two different days, i had a taco salad, i ordered chinese... i did work out hard monday through friday, including three jogs, but it just wasn't enough to counteract all that food. i was disappointed, of course, but not surprised. i made the choices, the food was good, time to move on to a new week!

saturday afternoon we headed over to my parents house with the dogs in tow to enjoy the gorgeous sunny weather. the dogs played in the yard, and we sat on the deck, visiting and playing cribbage. i also enjoyed a blueberry muffin, chicken enchiladas, spinach dip with fresh bread, and a homemade rice krispie treat. i need to stay on plan for the rest of the week.

we took a lot of family walks this weekend; evan takes both the dogs and i push stephen in his stroller. he sat facing forward in the stroller for the first time, instead of being strapped in his car seat facing me. we put some cheerios in the little tray which he was able to reach and he just sort of looked around the whole time. i think he liked it. he's 10 months old today and he's getting so big!

i used www.mapmyrun.com and it looks like the route i take is just over three miles. i'd really like to do a 5k this year. if the weather holds up, i plan to keep jogging three days a week. once i improve my time a bit, i think i'll start looking for a local 5k. i'm sort of hesitant to put that out there, but maybe i'll feel more accountable if it's in writing.

just ate a new morningstar farms frozen meal - lasagna with sausage style crumbles. it's very good, and fairly large and filling, especially for a frozen dinner. i've also been eating a lot of their spicy black bean burgers. i'm trying to branch out! we did our grocery shopping sunday, and plan to make mexican meatloaf and maybe vegetarian chili this week. another unofficial goal of mine is to try at least a couple of new recipes each month. we've had good luck so far with the weight watchers recipes we've tried.

also got a new crowntail male betta fish yesterday. he's not getting an a name until he survives a week!

lost this week: 2.4 pounds
total lost: 21.4 pounds
pounds to pre-pregnancy weight: 4

i ate well this week and worked out fairly hard, so i knew it was going to be a good weigh in. i also had several coworkers who didn't know i joined weight watchers make comments about my weight loss. it's always nice to know that other people are noticing your efforts. i've started reading a couple of weight loss blogs and they've been a big inspiration to me. i'm going to see if i can find a few more that i like. also mulling over the idea of starting my own blog... we'll see.

i'd like to lose about 25 more pounds after i hit my pre-pregnancy weight. evan and i are talking fairly seriously about trying to get pregnant again this fall, which would space stephen and his sibling about two years apart. i'm nervous that i won't be able to lose the weight before i get pregnant again. i'm nervous that when i do go pregnant, my eating and exercise habits will go back to shit and i'll gain a ton of weight again. i'm nervous that i won't find the motivation to lose it again.

kind of silly to be nervous about things that i have almost complete control over, isn't it?

breastfeeding has been quite an adventure for me. i know i've mentioned that i faced a lot of challenges when i first started, which i'm sure most first time moms do. stephen and i got the hang of it after a couple months, and at that point it just got annoying sometimes to always have a baby attached to one of my boobs. once i went back to work, i had to start pumping regularly, and that was annoying too. i would breastfeed stephen when i got home from work and on the weekends. then i was only feeding him to sleep at night (and on the weekends). now, i am exclusively pumping. i pump five times a day, and it's getting absolutely exhausting. i have to schedule my workday, my social activities, and even my sleep around it. i also mentioned that my supply dropped several weeks ago. i tried a few marathon weekend pumping sessions, and also took nine fenugreek capsules a day for a few weeks, but it didn't help. we've had to start supplementing stephen with formula now. i am seriously considering quitting.

i did try to breastfeed him one night recently, and he threw a FIT, screaming and arching his back. i don't know if he was just tired and cranky, or if he doesn't want the boob anymore because he has to work for his food that way. it was really upsetting for me. probably hard for any non-moms to understand, but it was like the ultimate rejection. i'm sort of sad, thinking that i might never feed him directly again. as much of a pain as it can be, it really is a bonding experience. i think i'll try again soon and see what happens. if he refuses again, it will probably make me lean even more towards quitting. i've made it nine and a half months so far - i think that's pretty good!

on the other hand, we'll have to spend money on formula and i'll probably be burning 500 less calories a day... dagger!

six years ago today, we brought chloe home from the athens clarke county pound in georgia. she had two strikes against her as a "georgia black dog" and an owner surrender, and was on the short list to be euthanized. she managed to woo evan by acting shy and sweet, but it didn't take her long to come out of her shell once we brought her home. she's been a handful at times but overall she's a great dog and it's very rewarding to know that we saved a life. happy "birthday", chloe!