Hi Everyone!

Nikkic, I am abit shorter than you. I am 5'6. I know for sure my
weight is up but I have made Jan 11/03 my day to 'Face the music" as it were. I figure by then I will lose my water gain and
only the pounds of fat will show. But really, how much real weight
could we gain in that bit of time? I figure maybe 2 pounds but I
may get a shocker when I step on the scale. As the saying
goes, Christmas comes but once a year......I am determined to
see this through. I will be 46 in March so its getting scary.
Anne.

Anne, I'll be 46 in June. My skin has suddenly become way too lose lately. I have bought all kinds of miracle creams, but so far, no miracles.
On the bright side, I have been using makeup lately. I haven't done that in years. I feel much prettier. Even shaped my eyebrows.

Evening everyone!

Welcome Mandapanda

Well one of my New Year's resolutions was to have a more positive attitude at work - HA! by 10:15 am I was cursing my boss' name! Oh well I'll just have to try again tomorrow.

Sounds like you are in for some lovely weather Aleka!

I was watching the Shopping channel up here on New Year's day, they were calling "New Year, New You" mmm how original They were selling all sorts of diet programs and exercise videos and equipment - I hade to switch it off before my credit card mysteriously appeared in my hand

The chicken Kiev was pretty good! I used the recipe from the new
SS book. I will definitely make this again as Chicken Kiev is one of DH's favorites and we have been buying them at the grocery store but they are breaded so this is a good alternative.
There is a recipe for coq au vin in the book that I would like to try too.

Nikki-was it hard to do your eyebrows? Mine need shaping but I am afraid to get them done professionaly as the beauticians all seem to have that overplucked/drawn on look -not for me thanks! Mine aren't bad but I think they could look better.

Anne-I hope the doctors can do something for your dad.

Ginamarie-I felt a bit sick the first week I was on SS because of the sugar withdrawl but I got through it and felt better afterwards. I cut out the caffeine slowly though as I find that I get severe headaches if I quit cold turkey.

Evening everyone,
I've had all kinds of problems with msn, but today is the worst. Can't even get there now, they won't let me sign on. I've gone to yahoo, but it's a real pain as I've lost all my addresses and have had to change a my email addresses everywhere.

Mauvaisroux, both of the channels down here are saying that new year, new you stuff. It's getting pretty old.
I used a little tool I found at Walmart to do my eye brows. It kind of shaves them. It says El Perfilador (eyebrow shaper) by Personna. Everything down here is in spanish anymore, like this product is in spanish first and english second. Sometimes, there's also french, it is confusing. It was very easy to do and didn't hurt a bit. I won't go to a beautician either. I did once and they looked pretty bad.

I love chicken kiev. I will have to make it soon. The last time, I rolled it in parmesan with some herbs. I'll have to look up the recipe in the new ss book.

Nikki- I know what you mean-all of the packaging on grocery items are in English and French here. I think the only way you can avoid learning at least some French is through sheer stubborness. I must say I do enjoy being able to speak more than one language and it has does come in handy at work

The chicken Kiev is pretty much how you describe it; chicken breasts, butter, chives all rolled up and pan fried.

Popping in to say HELLO! I hope to be able to post more tomorrow night. Today was just bad time management and so many little things to do on the site. I have to get back up in 5 hours for work, so I'm gonna dash. Hope you are all doing well!

Thanks for the welcoming and well wishes!!

Morning All:

Nikkic, I wear alot of cosmetics, I don't look like Tammy Fay
Bakker or anything, but I love to doll myself up. I always took
pains with my appearance even when I was alot heavier. When I
was a teenager I took a course at a modeling agency so I can
apply it without looking overly made up. I love Morgen Shicks
products on shopping channel. Do you know her?

Thats me in a nutshell, Love my jewelery, my cosmetics and my
rock music and my weekends (and of course my family!!!!)

We are in the middle of a big snowstorm here in Toronto. It
forcasted to be the biggest in four years.



Hope you all have a great day!!!!
Anne

We are gearing up for another snow storm. We're in one of the areas where we're supposed to get 12+". I am trying to look at this positively, that this will be great for our well situation come spring because of the drought conditions we had over the summer.

nikki, one thing that is very frustrating is computer problems. My Gazelle arrived yesterday, and I've done 2-10 min. workouts. I LOVE IT The only cosmetics I wear are lipstick and mascara, and only when I go out. I am way..way shorter than you, 5'2". I'm always getting teased, but my come back is always, Good things come in small pkgs. I saw the inversion table last night on HSN. Let me know how it is.

ANNE, sorry your Dad has to go through all that. I wish him good luck this week when he sees the Dr. I will be thinking of you. How much snow are you going to get?

mauvaisroux, hope you had better luck today with your boss than yesterday Having a horrible boss does not make for a very pleasant workplace. A New You is what they're calling it on our shopping channels too. I did buy one diet item, but then had to sit on my hands so I wouldn't reach for the phone again!!! I will look in Suzanne's books for that recipe.

Take care and have a great day. Aleka

Hi everyone,
Anne, Morgan S. is on HSN down here. I have some of her makeup. I have a lot of makeup, from a lot of different companies. My favorite is Smashbox. I don't like their eyeliner, but I love everything else. It looks light and natural. I put on a lot of products, but I try really hard to make it look like I have little on. I don't like that Tammy Faye look either. As I get older, my lashes have become so sparse and short. I may have to go to falsies. Now that would be a TF look. My oldest daughter took a course at a modeling school too. It did teach her how to apply makeup as well as carry herself nicely. They sure weren't much help getting her a job though.

Aleka, we have not had any moisture in over 50 days now. It is snowing everywhere but here I think. The ground is so dry. I am worried about next year. We live close to a big lake/river so we will not have to worry about water supply, but the people like you that have a well or the people downstream will. A few years ago, down in southern Iowa, people were really desperate for water. I felt so sorry for them. The water they had was horrible smelling, the river was like an open sewer.
I'm glad you like your gazelle. My daughter bought one and yesterday she told me she hates it. I don't think she likes to move much anyway. I'll probably buy it when mine wears out. I see Tony is on HSN today. Even though it's $10 cheaper, the s&h is pretty high.
I always thought 5'2" was the perfect height. I have always felt too tall. In Iowa anyway, men are all short. The average man seems to be around 5'7" or 5'8" or less. DH is around that and I'm taller than him. I always wanted to be able to look up, rather than down when I was in my guys arms. Have to stand on steps for that to happen. It would have been nice when we went dancing too. I can get stuff off of high shelves without a ladder. I don't know if that's a good trade off or not.

I've been good with my eating the past 2 days. I have to exercise today, but I don't feel like it. I'm getting a cold and my head is pounding. I'll do it anyway for awhile, it will get my blood moving and my limbic system will go in high gear. That should flush some of the germs out. Well, that's my theory anyway. First, I have to walk in there.

Have a good day, Nikki

Hi Everyone

Aleka, so far we have had 20 cm of snow but that's not the
worst of it. I was getting off the bus tonight on the way
home from work and I took a big flip. I was so scared my
thigh bone was going to break. There was tons of black
slush and my right leg went forward and my left leg went
backwards with me falling towards my outstreched left leg.

The bus driver was calling to me are you ok and I slowly got
to my feet. I was so dizzy I thought I was going to pass out.

I took a hot bath in epson salts when my pain pills kicked in.
My back, thigh and even my neck are killing me. I hope I can
get out of bed Saturday. I don't know if my size
helped me or hurt me!

With the way I'm hobbling around you would think I was
85 instead of 45!!

Anne.

Anne-that's awful! I hope you are going to be okay!

Poor Anne. Wish there was something I could do to make you feel better. Rest and let everyone else do for you for a few days, if you can. See a Dr if your not better soon. Tomorrow, your going to hurt even more. Put cold packs on your sore places for the first 24 to 48 hours, just for 20 -30 min at a time with breaks in between. The cold will reduce swelling and keep the bruising down. After that then use heat. Take it easy, Nikki

Oh, Anne, how horrible you falling like that. Like nikki advised, use cold compresses where you are hurting along with the heat, also if you can, take some aspirin, or Ibuprofen for your pain. Just take it easy for awhile, sit back and be waited on like a queen I hope you'll be feeling better really soon.

It started snowing here late yesterday afternoon. So far we have over a foot and it's still snowing like mad. I heard yesterday that it's not supposed to stop until around noon. DH was out plowing our street and driveway at midnight, plus shoveling our stairs and a spot so that our dog could go out and do her duties. Our only other neighbor was out plowing at 4:00am. We went to let the dog out, we couldn't get the door open, our stairs and landing had filled up with snow since DH shovelled it earlier. So he had to shovel them again, then I let her out before it filled in again. DH is out plowing again, trying to keep up with it all.

nikki, the tops of my thighs are stiff this morning. It's amazing what different muscles you use doing the gazelle. I'm sorry your D doesn't like her's. Does your DH use it? If he does, buy your D's so that you can have his & hers equipment Reading about short men in Iowa, it brought back something that happened to me many years ago when I was single. I was at a club with a bunch of friends when this man asked me to dance. When I stood up, I was amazed that I was taller than he was I was so surprised because it had never happened to me before. Ya, getting stuff off of high shelves is a good trade off. Hope you're feeling better, and didn't get that cold.

Take care and have a great Sat.
Aleka

Morning everyone,
Anne, hope your doing ok. Like Aleka said, use Ibuprofen or Aspirin rather than tylenol if you can, the reason is tylenol doesn't reduce inflammation or swelling. I guess it depends what is in your pain medication that your already taking. I know that you can take a tylenol based product and then 2 hours later you can take ibuprofen. Kind of staggering them through the day. I take 800 mg of ibuprofen 3 times a day and have for the last few years. It is hard on your liver, but only if you take it for a long time or with alcohol.

Aleka, wow, now that is snow. That is too much snow. Send some over here. We had a few drops of rain this morning and when DH came home from work, he said there was some strange stuff on his window, looked like water. It's getting kind of bad around here.

I got that cold. It's not too bad yet, sore throat and sniffles. I take a lot of antioxidants, I hope that will help me some. Yesterday after I exercised, I really did feel better. I'll have to go do that soon today. Something else strange. I just started to wear makeup again, you know. Well, the skin on my upper eye lids was getting sore and red and I thought I was getting a lot of wrinkles. But then, I noticed it was swollen. So I had to quit wearing makeup and started to put some antibiotic ointment on them. They feel better and the swelling has gone down (and some of the wrinkles). I thought this was funny, I wash my face twice a day and am really careful to remove all my eye makeup. I just got some new makeup, so I guess I'll throw out the old stuff just in case. What a waste, it is so expensive and I like it a lot. Has anyone else have this happen? I hope I can wear it again. I look a lot better with eye make up on than with antibacterial ointment.

Here Anne, I can't send you flowers and a big

Take care everyone, Nikki