I'm really pleased to have make it through Thanksgiving in good shape. The guests and family all interacted admirably; food and drink consumed as expected; and I had only one plate of a moderate size. Seems to make sense to make Thanksgiving eating such that it could happen every day and not bloat us to the Michelin Man.

If you look up today, you should see the New Moon.

Bill I will try to remember to carry the ideas in your post through the holiday season. I have my first "eating event" of the Christmas season this coming Sunday. I'm hosting it so I know that the food will be relatively low cal. Even dessert - cut up fruit with low cal yogurt dressing.

My potential downfall will occur after the guests have gone home - post stress eating of large amounts of cookies and cake (the leftover coffee offerings for the guests). I will be very conscious of clean up and will quietly dispose of or hide most of what remains. I think neighbours will be dropping in for coffee throughout the season so I'd like to have some cookies handy to offer. But I don't want DH to go off in a frenzy of eating.

Balance will be a key word in my holiday celebrations.

Dagmar

Our eating fest has not yet finalized. ((sigh)) My sister, BIL and Dad do not leave until tomorrow afternoon, so there will be one more dinner together. At least I have to go to work today so I won't have to partake in their breakfast out. We all (10 of us anyway) went out to breakfast yesterday and the only saving grace from that was that we were able to skip lunch. Dinner was turkey leftovers (of which there are many). Frankly, I (and DH as well) cannot wait until tomorrow evening when we can throw out the leftover pies (only two were homemade and those are practically gone anyway) and some of the leftover food that is just too carb-y.

The dessert I made for Saturday night was a hit and I was able to give ALL the leftovers away and not bring any home!

We went to see Nebraska yesterday. I hope I'm not like that when I get old. I'm also glad my Dad didn't want to go see it. There was a lot of him in that movie.

Hi all!

Today is a sad anniversary for me - my father died of a sudden heart attack 23 years ago today. He was 42 years old. So I just want to get through today.

We got the tree and decorations up this weekend.

I ate like a maniac both Thanksgiving Day and the next day with the leftovers that were sent home with me. Miraculously I am only .5 pounds heavier today then I was Thanksgiving morning, and well below my red line.

The body is a funny thing - I can restrict like crazy and my weight stays up, but then 2 days of eating like crazy and I'm down.

I'm not complaining, though!!

Jen

Morning all,

"Mondays are hard" is my favorite quote from my favorite Joy the Baker podcast. After having four days off it was hard to get up and drag my rear into work, and say goodbye to BF who will be working away from home for most of this week. I fed the dog, started packing my lunch, making oatmeal etc, and looked around for her this morning. She had finished her breakfast and was already curled up back on the pillows in the bed.

My holiday was mixed. It was fine, really, though there were some awkward moments w BF's family involving viewing of old home videos and BF's dad, who had taken the videos about 12 years ago, zooming in on certain parts of his wife's anatomy repeatedly. I think I was already predisposed to doom and gloom bc of my changed plans. I really tried to keep busy and shake myself out of it, and not be overly sensitive, which worked sometimes, sometimes not. I am aware that I didn't have a "good" reason to be depressed and that many folks didn't have holidays as nice as mine, and tried to be thankful for that.

I am totally lacking food inspiration right now! Cold salad doesn't sound appealing so I'm hoping to find some veggies that look decent for roasting. Does anyone have any healthy, relatively easy suggestions for weeknight dinners and lunches? I have weekend holiday events coming up over the next two weekends, so I'm going to try to focus on having healthy things prepared for the weekday meals and as much movement as possible. I took the last two weeks off from yoga to take care of things at home, but I will go to class all month. My brain needs it.

I agree, Dagmar, balance is key - see my last few sentences!

My sister wants to try spatchcocking/butterflying a turkey over a dish of stuffing for Christmas. I'll warn her about having a big enough tray/small enough bird to fit the flattened bird on.

Saef, oh no, what a time for an oven to fail. I'm glad you and your mom had a back-up.

Jen, . Also, the body is a funny thing.

Hi Silver! And everyone else out there.

CherryPie99: We just passed the 12th anniversary of my dad's death. Seems like yesterday in some ways and eons ago when I think of all the things he has missed in the intervening years. Hugs!

Megan1982: I could use more easy, healthy dinners in my life right now, too. But here's a lunch thing that works for me, tempeh sausage crumbles: http://www.theppk.com/2008/10/tempeh-sausage-crumbles/
I make a double batch and then eat it all week on a potato, or rice, or (this week) stuffing.
Oh, and I like cabbage salads in the winter as a change of pace from the normal lettuce-based fare. I don't use a recipe, but something like this: http://tastespace.wordpress.com/2012...hini-dressing/
Another advantage of cabbage salad is that you can make a big batch and eat it for several days -- although in the above recipe, you would have to leave out the seeds and just add them when you serve it. Seeds would get soft from the dressing and refrigerator.

Hugs to you today Jen. My parents both have passed and when I stop to think about it, I can get quite sad. Glad your weight is cooperating though!

Megan-- how is puppy doing? Better, I hope!!

Allison-- I bet you'll be glad to get rid of your last guests. My daughters left Saturday and Sunday and my dh Saturday so my house is quiet once again.

Holidays are always stressful. Overall good but my girls just never get along so there is constant tension. I ate too much on T-Day but I didn't have any leftovers after that and I threw them all away yesterday once dc's had left. My weight was up 2.5 pounds from T-Day but it's almost back down now (still 5 over red line though).

I *may* skip my workout tonight. It's amazing that I'm planning all that I can do with my "extra" time! I have a chiro appointment after work and I was going to try to work out but I went to Trader Joe's yesterday and forgot to get my lunches (salads)-- I was quite distracted and it was busy. Ugh. I figure I can also fit some shopping in at Target.

Check back later.... parents and kids are here.

Hey there folks! We survived babies' first Thanksgiving, and only Thanksgivukkah. I'm kind of ashamed to admit that I bought Hanukkah candles but we haven't lit any of them yet. Oops.

In any case, we managed to get the girls to Thanksgiving at MIL's and to a baby naming at DH's aunt and uncle's house. They were pretty much overwhelmed, got their schedules messed up, and then were cranky and didn't sleep well, but today they seem back on schedule and relaxed again. Holidays with two babies is more stressful than fun! We did manage to get them to take a very brief nap at MIL's during Thanksgiving at least. I got annoyed at a lot of relatives -- DH's aunt was so excited to hold them and when C started fussing and I tried to take her back, she insisted on keeping her and trying to calm her down herself. Well, C was upset because she didn't want to be held by a stranger anymore, so she just got more and more fussy and by the time we managed to convince the aunt to give her back we couldn't get her calmed down at all until her next nap. Then at the baby naming DH and I took the girls out to the enclosed sunroom to burp and do diaper changes after feeding them since it was a tile floor and there was nobody in there, and MIL and FIL came in with us and just would not go away. I told them, "Why don't you go see the baby who we are here to celebrate today?" and even then DH had to basically kick them out. I don't know why it's so hard to understand that when one baby is spitting up all over the place and the other has a blowout out of her diaper that having extra people hovering around just gets in the way of us doing what we need to do to get them taken care of. The whole time we were at the baby naming I just felt like I had to shove people out of the way so I could get to the items I needed in time to avoid any puke/poop disasters.

Sigh. Hopefully next year holidays will be easier. At least by then the girls will be eating regular food, hopefully not still spitting up, and won't need to nap every couple hours. They'll also probably be more used to being around people. I think the crowd was just too much for them.

To not be a total complainer all the time, I will also say that A&C are now on a very nice and reliable 3 nap schedule, slept well last night though not the two nights before, and are successfully eating some solid foods! C eats both her oatmeal and peas pretty easily. A eats the peas just fine but spits out the oatmeal (not good because it's iron fortified and we stopped giving iron supplement). I got her to eat it by mixing some peas in yesterday though, so that was a success!

Megan, how is Emma doing?

to those who are remembering departed relatives. My mom is in NJ for a couple days this week to attend her aunt's funeral. She lived to be 101 years old! My grandmother was 96 when she passed a couple years ago. I guess that side of my family has some good genes for living a long life. DH's grandmother is not doing so well. Her health is on the decline and she had to be moved from regular assisted living into nursing care (she is 86).

Oh yeah, and I found the way to make me not eat dessert this holiday season . . . being on a dairy and soy elimination diet. I splurged and ate dairy at Thanksgiving and I don't know if that contributed to the girls being super fussy the rest of the weekend, but I'm back to no dairy and no soy now. No dairy means no chocolate, no ice cream, no cakes or cookies or anything with butter, etc. etc. etc. Sigh. About the only desserts I can eat are pie filling and marshmallows.

On the "cute babies" side of things here is a photo DH sent me this morning.

Jessica,
Did you have the naming just for one of them? Or both?

I'm kinda depressed because I'm lighting the candles by myself for the first time. I skipped Saturday night (forgot) but I did them last night.

Anyone doing any fun Cyber Monday shopping? So far I hit up Sephora...

Jessica, as I was reading the first part of your post, I was thinking that I hope that you are I are both here 2 years from now and I can just imagine how different your post will be about entering the Holidays with the girls!!!! I know a lot of people are gaga over babies, but when they are toddlers and can interact more and understand what is happening? That will be LOADS of joy and fun!!

One down side to being uber organized is that I have probably 95% of my shopping DONE and WRAPPED. But now I see all these deals and I just want to BUY BUY BUY more for people!!

My father-in-law is 95 and we spent Thanksgiving with him. I know nothing is promised to anyone, but with my father having passed so young, I feel lucky to have my hubby come from such long lived genes!!

I overheard someone refer to the first week of December as the "tain't" of the holidays. I am not going to explain why I laughed so hard that I almost threw up. Anyone who's familiar with the term will get some insight into my atypical sense of humor.

Cute girls, Jessica!

I've been alternating between working, writing Christmas cards and Cyber Monday shopping. Most, if not all, of the presents are purchased (mostly from Amazon) but none is wrapped. Christmas is going to be rather small this year. My in-laws and DH and I are not swapping presents. DH and I have just one thing for each other. DS will get the bulk (maybe 4 or 5 items from us and a couple more from the in-laws). DD and her fiance won't be in town but they'll get their presents a couple weeks early when they drop off the cats for cat sitting (they're going to Seattle for two weeks).

Thanksgiving was a comedy of errors at our house:
First night, my sister gets an insulin reaction and I have to call the paramedics
Second night, my BIL falls over a small chest in his room and bonks his head
Friday, I cut my finger while cutting bread for Saturday's bread pudding AND BIL gets his hand caught in a shopping cart while at Costco with DH (that required BIL, DH and some random guy in the parking lot to pry him loose with all three laughing)
Saturday neither DH's or my GPS wanted to take us on the same route to Orange County. I ended up just following him and hoping his GPS would get us there (it did).
While listening to the GPS, my 92 year old father demanded to know "where the lady is in the car." We explained that it was a computer simulated voice and that we were being tracked by GPS (a satellite in the sky). Needless to say, he doubted us and finally exclaimed that we were lying to him that there is no way there are satellites up there and again wanted to know "where the lady is based so that she can talk to us like she is." I debate showing him the ELI5 from Reddit explaining GPS.