I made it through Easter without one single piece of candy, jelly bean, peep, or Girl Scout Cookie - Woot Woot.

Of course, that stuff will still show up at the office when those who don't have the courage to toss it will bring it in and put it conspicuously next to the common printer that we all have to use. Perhaps I'll think about just how stale it is by now since it's been in the stores for a month already.

Excellent job with the Easter treats Bill.

I have never had much of a problem with Easter candy (as an adult) because there are no children in my home. DH and I had our single bunny each and our 2 glasses of shiraz on Saturday and that was it.

I did wrestle with servings of honey ham this weekend. It comes pre-sliced but still on the bone. I usually peel the pieces off with my hands and put them on the serving plate (doesn't that make you wanna run to my house for dinner? ). I kept putting pieces in my mouth as I peeled.

We had a lower cal version of scalloped potatoes with the ham yesterday and the leftovers of those didn't really tempt me. DH cleaned those up later in the evening.

I am up 2 lbs. but I think most of that is water retention from the sodium in the ham. And I am over the ham today. Still have a bunch so will take some to my dad and freeze the rest for pea soup next fall.

I feel relieved that all the birthdays, anniversaries, and holidays are over in my family until Thanksgiving. Now DH and I have no excuse to overindulge on the weekends.

It's getting close to summer and I'm determined to get to goal by the end of May and stay there until winter.

Great Monday all!

Dagmar

Golf both Saturday and Sunday gave me my weekend's exercise. No candy to be had, well, not Easter candy. We did share a Good & Plenty box at the movies Sunday afternoon (Water for Elephants--very good movie even if you have not read the book). I did buy some Reese's PB eggs for DS but he put them in the fridge and didn't even open the bag!

My in-laws are leaving this Saturday so it gives me the opportunity (a little) to cut down on some eating/entertaining. Tonight we're meeting them at their place for a retirement party for our favorite security guard there. Sad to see her go--she's the friendliest of the bunch. Most of them won't even give you the time of day.

I made a very interesting salad yesterday to go with dinner. Cantaloupe and honey dew melon, proscuitto, mint, lemon juice, black pepper and shaved Parmesan cheese. It was really good!

I am going to see that movie today (Water for Elephants), I read the book - hope it is as good as the book.

Easter bunny left a small bag of mini eggs - so not too devastating.

I did take advantage of our one nice day this year and had a bbq. Unfortunately, there were plenty of naughty leftovers I just couldn't let go to waste.

Sure is nice to have a Monday off - hooray for a short week!!

S

Happy Monday!
No Easter treats for me either.
That salad sounds delish Allison!

I also saw Water for Elephants this weekend. Loved the book and loved the movie!

Saturday was kinda sucky though. I had the whole day planned out and it got off track right away. My cat, Wilbur, threw up a few times on Friday but I didn't think too much of it because it isn't too uncommon for him. However, Friday night/Saturday morning he threw up a HAIR TIE with blood and then proceeded to keep throwing up blood. He of course felt terrible. Dh had taken my car in for service, so that left three of us (me, dd and dd home from college) with one car. Of course, my car needed more than expected, so dh needed to be picked up from car dealer, cat needed to go to vet, etc. All plans of the morning were out the window! Wilbur was dehydrated and got a shot for the vomiting. Dd went with me and got a big lecture from the vet, not to mention from us, so I don't see that happening again. He now seems mostly recovered, but his sister, Charlotte, is still hissing and running away from him (b**ch!).

I did manage to get exercise in and a few other things in, but the day's schedule was radically changed and tension filled. Not exactly what older dd wanted to come home to for the weekend.

Sunday was much better. Younger dd went to temple for religious school while the rest of us went to church for Easter (joys of interfaith marriages!). We met up later, took younger dd's new boyfriend with us to see Water for Elephants and had sushi (our normal sushi place was closed so we tried a new place and it was great!).

The scale teased me Sunday morning at 125.2 and jumped right back up to 127.2 this morning. I suspect the sushi even though I don't use soy sauce and we stick to just fish and veggies with our sushi (I did have miso soup and some edamame and I know they are salty).

Hoping the week's trend will continue to go back down on the scale.

It had been such a long time since I'd read the book but I think the movie was depicted perfectly.

I'm having a very disturbing day at work. First, I came in and our fire alarm was beeping. A call to the security company determined that it's a battery that has died and needs to be replaced. I've been waiting two hours for the tech to come and do that, meanwhile the beeping persists. Then, about an hour and a half ago, some heavy equipment moved in across the street and jackhammers have been hammering ever since. I can't quite determine what they're doing as there is a tree in just the wrong place, but it is involving said jackhammer, a backhoe and some other large vehicles moving about at a snail's pace and creating quite the ruckus. Methinks a headache will follow lunch.

Hi all,

I'm trying to rejoin the land of the living, the land of people who sleep 8 hours a night, the land of people who eat meals with other people (like their sorely neglected BFs) and not just while driving, the land of people who go to the gym! The sleeping thing in particular really excites me right now. My weight has been (surprisingly) stable, fairly healthy food consumed balanced by lack of exercise, stress, and occasional stress eating. I actually spent the last 4 days mostly off of work, trying to clean the house and get caught up in a little bit of normalcy. I could still really go for a spa massage, mani/pedi, facial though. I'm pretty pleased with how my play turned out but as I've said before, sort of peeved with my theatre group, and am ready to take a break. The last two weeks were just complete insanity between theatre and extra long hours at work.

Yesterday my energy just bottomed out for unknown reasons around 5-6 PM. At that point I recognized I was tired, and just trying to get stuff done for work the next day so I could go to bed earlier - pack lunch, gym bag etc. My BF made a not-so-nice comment about how I'm "always tired" (no, this was not in response to um, intimate relations, wink). I was so upset and hurt (did not help that when I'm tired, I'm more easily upset). I've really been trying to catch up on sleep, decided to cut back on some of my other commitments, and does he think I enjoy being so tired all the time? I've had my vitamin levels checked, thyroid checked, all that, am generally healthy, so I've only been able to conclude this is just how my body is. I suppose besides ticking me off it made me aware of my continued struggle with my energy levels. It's getting hot and humid here and I struggle even more in the Florida summer sun, so I really need to keep myself in top shape to prepare. I do know my levels are better when I eat properly and stay away from refined foods - so do it, Megan!

Allison, sorry about all the annoying noises. Did the tech ever come for the fire alarm? The salad sounds really delicious! The only things I made with my mint over the weekend were mojitos.

Michele, sorry about all the cat drama but glad it's over with and kitty is ok. The rest of your weekend sounds nice.

Dagmar, I also looove ham and find the sodium (is there something extra special about ham sodium) really affects me if I've got a ham and the leftovers around the house! I sort of missed not having one yesterday but didn't mind not having the salty side effects.

Bill, that candy is gross, and stale! How long has it been from manufacture to that printer? Maybe you don't need to print things for a few days?

Jessica, I'm sorry about your continued health issues and not being able to work out. Major bummer. I hope the new meds help and something is figured out soon.

Hi everyone else! I'm glad to be back!

Megan

We ended up having two different cooking light crustless quiches for the easter lunch yesterday. Of course they became less "light" when I subbed heavy cream for the skim milk + flour. Oh well! They still tasted good.

DH is now on the P90X diet and I'm on my own for making my own food. Hopefully we won't collide in the kitchen too much.

Please let us know how the separate cooking thing goes, in particular cleaning up afterwards. I am really getting peeved at DH who keeps saying he can't diet because I refuse to become a vegetarian. I keep suggesting separate meals/cooking but he's not budging.

Dagmar

I'm happy to report that the noise didn't cause a headache! I don't know what they're doing across the street (almost that entire block houses a waste management company) but they've torn down part of the block wall. I think they're going to make that the main entrance which means they'll do away with a dozen parking spots AND it means that the big garbage trucks will be entering and exiting there from now on. They're noisy in the first place but this will probably make more noise. Oh, well. Nothing much I can do about it, but it makes me rethink our desire to purchase the building we're in (we're planning on it as the current owner wants to sell).

We had a nice time at the retirement party last night. There was a huge turnout to the point where we didn't all fit in the lounge! We met some interesting people.

I've attempted separate cooking before. But separate meant me fixing one thing for me and something else for everyone else as I'm the only one who really does any cooking around here. It didn't work. Too much work for me! So now I try to fix all healthy for everyone and when I get bored with that I fix the things my son likes and I try to eat smaller portions. It doesn't always work out right and I know that that is one reason why I've gained back so much weight.

But I'm booking a Hawaiian cruise for next summer so I'd better get back to shape for snorkeling!

I want to come Allison!
The first time I ever snorkeled was in Maui (also the only time I've been to Hawaii). It was incredible. I've snorkeled many times since and nothing has come close.

Jessica-- enjoy your pasta! I haven't stuck to a Passover diet but both of my daughters have (mostly).

I'm waiting to hear about a PUPPY!! I'm hoping we get him but there are a lot of folks interested. If we do, we'll be getting him sooner than I planned so my life could get very interesting very quickly! Wish me luck!!!!

I have eaten so much Easter candy and junk food in the last few days that I've completely lost track. I've had cupcakes, easter candy, fried food at my grandmother's, hot dogs with the neighbors, sugary coffee beverages. I have had a terrible last few days - DSS has been just awful in school all month, so we had to come down pretty hard on him all weekend long. No video games, no television, no play time with daddy, no birthday party that he was invited to Saturday, no Easter party at my grandmother's Sunday. The weekend was awful - DSS was miserable all weekend, DH felt guilty, I felt guilty. I went to my grandparent's solo, and had to explain to my whole family why DSS wasn't at the only holiday event that we ever get to bring him to for that side of the family, which made my mom cry. Then yesterday there was a big fight between DH & XW over my involvement in DSS's life, which made all day yesterday terrible, too. Cue more junk food - chicken wings and ice cream for dinner along with no exercise. DSS did get greens at school yesterday, so I'm hoping all the the trauma was worth it. And, my mom eventually understood and stopped crying, and the rest of the family supported our decision and told me to stand my ground, and to tell DH that he was doing the right thing. We'll see if it actually heps long term. DSS is so smart, and he knows how to behave at school, he just doesn't want to do it. It makes us crazy.

Today will be a better day. It has to be.

Good week everyone!

Dagmar, so far it's been okay but a little cramped. Breakfast and lunch aren't a big deal since he's been doing his workouts in the morning and having a protein shake for breakfast before I even get downstairs. He also packs up his whole lunch and dinner for the day the night before. The only conflict so far was that he started cooking his day's worth of food before I was finished cooking my dinner, and while we have a big kitchen, it really doesn't work to have two people at the stove at the same time. I think for next week we might have him cook his whole week's worth of food in advance on Sunday. That way he doesn't spend so much time cooking during the week and I can have the run of the kitchen.

DH does most of the cleaning in our household because I have crappy wrists.

Hugs to you Shannon. That is terrible. I can only imagine the stress for all of you.

I think we got the puppy!!!
I'll try to link a picture here to the breeder's website but she may have taken down his photo. We are getting "Righty".

http://www.3acesranchdachshunds.com/puppies.html

Michele - Righty is gorgeous.