Going to include activity level and nervous about calorie increase
 

I started at 1200-1350 and with my activity level this was just too low for me so I bumped it up to 1450-1500. This seems to still be little too low, my weight loss is stalling, I'm still pretty hungry in the pm, etc., etc. So I'm going to take the plunge and use the Fat Loss column on freedieting. I'm nervous because the cals seem so high, but everyone seems to have had great success using these numbers so I'm going to give it a shot. I shaved a few cals off here or there and I'm giving myself a high/low window based on how I felt my activity level has been that day so I used the 3xs a week and 5xs a week numbers. The cals aren't higher than my goal weight maitenance so that makes me feel better. But what do you think of these numbers?
M-1650-1750
T-1400-1440
W-1850-1950
Th-1650-1750
F-1500-1600
S-2000-2150
Sun-1650-1750
I hike 3-4 miles 2xs a week, walk/jog 3-5 miles 3xs a week and do balance ball exercises 30 mins 3xs a week. I take two rest days, but on one of them I usually walk a couple miles.
I just keep reading that it's better burn the fat than starve it and that if your cals are too low your metabolism slows down and your body starts to hold onto everything it can. I noticed that the week after I bumped my cals up to 1450-1500 I had two weeks of 2-3 lbs loss then I stalled. I'm just started to get confused I guess - help!

When I first started out, I was doing 1200 cals and I lost 1-2 pounds a week consistently, for a while. Then I totally stalled... for 3 monthes! I was too scared to raise my calories, but when I finally raised them to 1500-1600 the scale started moving again... and I think I could probably stand to raise them a little more.
It looks like you really are pretty active, I think you should definitely try upping the calories... give it a few weeks and see what happens. If that doesn't work out, play with the numbers some more. It's trial and error...

Monkey

All of that looks good to me, but whatever you do give it some time. With the great progress you've already made it's to be expected that things will slow down a lot. You've already gotten rid of the "low hanging fruit"