Hi Feathers!

Happy Monday! Well, to be honest, I was quite stressed out and grumpy this Monday morning (as my family could tell you), but I'm trying to turn it around and make the most of the day. It's beautiful weather around here!

Just some random thoughts/things that have been helping me lately:

Drinking hot tea and/or decaf coffee. Hardly any cals and pretty filling and satisfying.

Hungry Girl recipes. I had a few of her cookbooks already, but I picked up the latest one and it's great. I especially love any of her dessert ideas. One simple one I tried is stirring a little bit of peanut butter into a 60 calorie, sugar-free Jello chocolate pudding cup. Then top with a little fat free whipped cream. Yum! Tastes like a peanut butter cup and is a fun treat for me!

Cold Stone Creamery......yes, I said Cold Stone. I've been getting a small sinless cake batter or sinless sweet cream mixed with fresh raspberries while my kids get the good stuff. It's a fun family outing that I can participate in. Sometimes I get their frozen berry yogurt instead. We have another ice cream dairy near us with "guiltless" ice cream, so I go there sometimes also.

Grilled chicken at restaurants. I love dining out. So I go out and order grilled chicken. I'm getting out, enjoying the day, spending time with friends and family, but still eating healthfully. Thank you, grilled chicken! LOL.

Food journaling. About 2 months ago, I started really tracking everything I eat. It's been eye opening! I was keeping track before in my mind, but never writing it down. I like looking back on what I've been eating. I use the weekly food diary page from www.personal-nutrition-guide.com.

Running...I think it's actually changing my body inches-wise. It might not be my favorite form of exercise, but I think it's working, especially as I move toward the lower numbers.

New Spring Clothing! Woo Hoo! I'm amazed at what fits me in the stores lately. I'm getting seriously small. And I was a 2XL for many, many, years. This is so uplifting. It gets a bit expensive, but I think I deserve new clothes, and I've earned them!

Planning and preparing healthy dinners and freezing the leftovers. I like making extra soups, casseroles, etc and freezing them into individual portioned containers. Then I just pop them in the microwave for a quick, yummy and healthy meal. So much bettter than the pre-made frozen dinners.

Hope you guys are all doing well!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Lots of good vibes from fellow feathers. Way to go. ;)

I agree Danni, it's gonna be a good week :D

kellost-Thanks for the thoughts! I needed that reminder to inventory what's going right!

Another good OP day here, though the scale has slowed once again. I ate some good new foods. One I loved, the other I liked well enough to eat it, but wouldn't make it very often. Gotta try new things though. It keeps me on my toes! Okay well, those are my closing thoughts for the day. Here's to more OP days and the results we deserve!!

Good for you trying new things, Ms Perception! I've been trying to do that lately and it really can be a lot of fun.

Kellost, interesting thoughts--thank you for sharing :)

I had my weigh-in today and I'm excited because I lost another .6 lbs. After my 2.2 lbs. loss last week, I wasn't sure if I would lose anything this week! This is also a pre-exercise weigh-in, when last week was after a 2 mi. run. I know I would have hit 164 if I had weighed after a good run.

I'm a little scared because my 5K is this weekend and I hurt my heel running 4 mi. on Saturday. I'm icing it and resting it and hoping it will be back up to snuff, but it's kinda depressing that I can't run on my last week to train before my race! I also was looking forward to doing spin class again this week and I just know it would be a bad idea. I'm going to sub in swimming for elliptical this week and try to keep up my upper body strength training and my yoga/pilates class so I'm not too far off track.

Hello feather weights!!! I really enjoy reading this thread, but rarely ever add anything here! I wanted to pop in and say hi. I am feeling really good about being back on track after a holiday, a major flu and guests coming to town. I am back to running and getting into shape. I am still maintaining 121.

I got engaged last month and have been planning a quicky summer wedding for July. I am very excited, and it makes me want to meet my goal even more! I am hoping to be at least 115 by the big day, and would love to be down at 112. I am planning to wear a short sun dress, so i want my legs and arms to look toned and lean!

I hope everyone is is doing well!

Stella - I can't believe how hard you are working. Hope the heel feels better and :goodluck: on the 5k.

Today I am back down to 127.5. I also go to the dr. today and hope he has good stuff to say about the lab reports. It will be interesting to see if all this healthy eating has made a difference yet.

I have to eat downtown today - so I will pack some snacks so I won't get too hungry before lunch. Still hope to make it to the gym on Thursday.

We are in the 80's all week and I still have plants to get in the ground. That has been my exercise this pass week. Our ground is nothing but roots and rocks so at least my arms are getting a workout.

Smile - we care about you. :)

Hi everybody.....great, positive posts indeed.

I am back OP after a lost week, due to kids being home from school and Easter vacation, not that that should be a valid excuse, but there it is. It's a shame....wish I could have kept up that fabulous momentum I had going. It felt so great. Well, I want it back!

Kellost, your tiny spring clothes--swoon!

EmmaD--3 lbs gained overnight, vs lost in six weeks? Oh, have I wailed about that before! Unbelievable, isn't it? Right up there with bad food tasting good and vice versa. I swear, I can gain 5-6 pounds overnight if I put my mind to it.

I was bummed to see no change on the scale today after having a really wonderful OP day yesterday, but then I figured it's gotta come off eventually. Maybe I'll get paid back on the scale tomorrow. The point is that I'm doing very well with food and keeping right OP with my exercise. This is a great place to be! I've been saying no to temptations left and right and it gets easier every time. I'm not gonna lie...today I was almost day-dreaming about (or wishing I could) eat what/when I want with no negative effects. That's not my lot in life, so I'll be happy with eating healthily and staying fit the good ol' fashioned way!! It's worth it.

This week has been a binge week for me....last week I was doing great. I am hoping that the binge last night did not derail my progress.
I know that I eat when I am stressed out and yesterday was extremely stressful at work. So what did I do? Instead of trying to center myself, I went to my friend's house. She lives right by a doughnut shop. I ended up eating 6 doughbuts, a croissant, steak, bread...all the bad stuff.
Why are some weeks harder than others?

My scale moved down a little bit. Not at goal yet. (I was SO close to goal recently before I regained a little!)

Something I heard from the Ruby television show blog was that it's okay to progress slowly, as long as you do not quit. So, in other words, it's okay if the weight doesn't come off exactly as fast as you planned, just keep at it! Slow and steady wins the race!

kellost-Amen, sister! I'm the queen of slow and steady most of the time. ;)

I was not good last night so I am taking a day off of getting on the scale.

:( Hope today is better.

Danni, thanks for the encouragement. It's Wednesday and it's still really bothering me. I did do yoga last night, but I skipped my spin class today (just gonna hit the gym briefly for some upper body). I will be devestated if I can't do my 5K Saturday.

Ms Perception, you're sooooo close--just hang in there! You'll eventually see those results you deserve.

Kellost, you're doing awesome--I was so happy to see in the other post that you finished C25K! Grats again for that--it's such an achievement.

I'm down another pound today. I really hope it's not just because I haven't been working out as hard and my muscles are letting go of water weight!

I did it! I made my monthly weight goal of getting under 135!! This morning the scale showed the loss I was expecting yesterday: 134.4 YAY! To stay on track for the rest of the month, I'm just going to see how close I can get to my final (?) goal range of 125-129. At this rate I should be a maintainer by next month, but I realize the losses will change as I increase my calories in the next couple weeks to 1500. I'm just gonna ride this momentum for now and try not to screw it up!