Good morning everyone. We're back to rainy weather after having a day off. I have a major announcement. I managed to stay on plan for an entire day. I realize that should be the expectation, and it should not be a major announcement. But my track record of late has been......well there's a reason that I've gained back 30 of the pounds I initially lost. It felt great mentally to know that I can do this.

Fi -- Thanks for sending on suggestions about handling the Halloween candy. I think I have now traveled full circle in terms of now listing forbidden foods. I simply don't seem to have the will power to eat certain foods in moderation. So, I'm taking a chapter from your no-more-coookies book. Are you getting to bring Oscar home today? I know what you mean about litter mates being especially bonded and not happy when they are separated. I had two dogs like that and it's heart breaking to see them basically traumatized.

Bllondy -- Welcome and thanks for sharing your story with us. It is a challenge when living with someone who can easily control their weight. Is there anything that is a tremendous challenge for your husband? Maybe comparing your weight loss challenge to what he struggles to do will bring some understanding.

Donna -- I agree. Thank heavens for NHS......and wish we had enough sense to embrace it! Interesting what your therapist pointed out. As you delve further into the root causes, if you feel comfortable sharing, I imagine that it would help many if not all of us. Sorry I made you cry, but feel good about yourself in wanting to be a better mother than you had. So often the pattern just repeats itself. Hope your walk was a good one.

Terra -- Whew! Sounds like a busy day. What kind of foods are you learning to cook in your cooking class? Do you get to eat what you fix (or is it you have to eat what you fix?).

Ubee -- Yes, I got everything on the list done and some I'll make a list like that again! I've decided that I'm going to create a weight loss graph to put on the frig. I'll compete with myself. I'm a totally visual person, so I'm hoping that seeing the results of my actions (loss when I'm on plan, gain when I'm not) will spur me on. Wonder what is getting both of us back in the weight loss mind set? Change of weather? Anniversary dates? Who knows but going with the flow? And, yes, I know I have gone to the basement for candy before. This time my knees are hurting so badly from falling on them that the house would have to be on fire to get me up and down those steps.

Off to the gym, then home to shampoo the area rugs and do some cleaning. Tomorrow is end of the month so I'll do the bookkeeping and get things ready for Halloween and my 2-3 people who stop by. You have to work to get to my front door, so I don't get many kids. Hope everyone has a great day.

Ubee ~ Yes you saw right, My ticker has moved down more.

Betsy ~ We made mashed potatoes and Chicken and Noodles for the main dish and then we had green beans,carrots and dinner rolls for the sides, Today was the first time I've made Chicken and Noodles without it being Chicken Noodle Soup LOL. It was good though. Yeah we get to eat what we cook but we dont have too if its something we dont like, Like sometimes they have fish and I dont eat fish so I bring something from home when they have fish.

Good Morning!
Cold and blustery day today. This morning I saw a few flakes of snow. Where is Dean with our warm coffee? Dean I hope you are well.
Terra yippee on the scale moving down. Are you doing anything new?
Betsy hope you did better with the Halloween candy then I did. I felt so positive yesterday. Well, I did get 1/2 a day in. Today is the day I get a full day on plan in.

Yesterday I put on my smaller winter jacket I bought and wore last year. It is too small. I feel so disappointed in myself. I have got to stop the gain now. I'm off to order the book Fi recommended. I have to stop this insanity. I deserve to be healthy. I need to be healthy.

Have a peaceful day.

Said Goodbye To The 310's This Morning!!!

309- That's 37# Lost And Today Is Exactly 2.5 Months! That's Some Serious Motivation Right There!!!

And... I Finished The 30 Day Squat Challenge Last Night!!! So Proud Of Myself!!!!!!!!!! (i Can Barely Feel My Legs Today After 175 Of Them Last Night (too Me Forever To Do Them!!!!) But It Was So Worth It!!!)

Anticakechick: Awesome news! .. I like your name. Losing weight is the best.

Betsy: Your idea was a really good one.. I'm just having trouble thinking of something my husband struggles with. He's one of those people who is so good at so many things. Probably the only thing he's not good at is singing.. .. But we will keep searching for that area.

Ubee: Sorry to hear about yesterday. Stay encouraged though.. As soon as you mess up get right back on the wagon and keep going. You know you can lose the weight.. you've done it before. Be stubborn with yourself and keep up the hard work!! By the way, I love Wisconsin.. I lived in Ripon for a while and my grandmother used to live in Menomonie (She passed away recently..)

Anyway, have a great day today everyone!!

Wow, AntiCakeChick, you're doin' terrific!! Kudos to you for the 37-lb loss and for making that squat challenge! I do a few squats as a part of my Qigong exercises. I can't imagine doing 175. But then, I do 600 leg lifts a night, and I suppose that sounds unimaginable to some people. (Breaks between sets: that's the key.)

Ubee— You are much in my thoughts these days. Remember to be grateful for the small things that are going well, and smile as you put a new face toward the future. Sometimes I do a meditation where when I inhale, I think "in with the good future" and imagine the happy changes that are coming, and when I exhale, I think "out with the bad past" and imagine the negative past stuff blowing away. Try it!

Betsy— If moderation in matters of candy and other top three temptations is impossible, accept that fact and go for total abstinence. I know you can do it! You are a strong woman. The cravings will fade with time: I can guarantee you that.

Blondy— Thanks so much for tellin' us more about you! You must long for Brazil...I hope you get back there to visit from time to time. My husband's father was a child of Presbyterian missionaries—of Scottish descent, even related to John Knox!—in Laos and Thailand, and he went to prep school in India. All his life he could speak Thai and a smattering of Laotian, and he made regular trips back to see old friends. Our house has quite a few pieces of Thai & Indian art in it: I hope your house has reminders of Brazil.

Donna— I don't how to explain "being present in your body," to either you or Ubee, but you are right that it is part of Mindfulness. I can give an example: yesterday when I went to the grocery store to buy my special dark chocolate bar for tonight, and I parked, as usual, far from the store, I relished the walk to the store as an experience of being alive inside my skin, all the way out to my fingertips, all the way down to my toes. I contracted my abs to support my back. I felt the comfortable rhythm of my walking—the movements of my pelvis, the swinging of my arms. I enjoyed the way that walking is something that happens from head to toe, a beautiful dance that evolution has refined for us humans, the only apes whose bodies are designed to walk upright. I wasn't at all in my thoughts & feelings alone, with my body as this reluctant machine carrying my head around. My thoughts & feelings were there, of course, but they were thoughts & feelings in the moment—which were about my body, the parking lot, the afternoon sky, the fall colors in the trees, and a little bit about choosing my chocolate bar. I hope I don't sound obnoxious or self-righteous: this has not been an easy state for me to achieve. And by the way, it helps to wear comfortable clothing: no jackets that are too tight, or pants you can barely zip up!

You'll be glad to hear that Oscar came home late yesterday afternoon and is doing fine. Nénu was hilarious when we let him out of the crate: not only did she not run to greet him, she turned her back to him and quite literally stuck her nose in the air. Boy was she miffed! Even when I picked her up and put her down next to him, she jumped back up to where she'd been sitting, in the window sill, and turned her back again. At the time it seemed too weird to laugh, but later on, after the siblings had kissed & made up and were having a royal battle from one end of the house to the other, Bob and I laughed until our sides ached. Cats are so funny: that's part of why we love them so.

I made a new collage titled "speech bubbles". Don't worry about the issue with getting an ad: this one's on a different server that's ad-free. You'll have to click on the image to get a bigger version so you can read what's in the bubbles—which is worth doing, especially for the "women throughout the 20th century" part in the middle. Enjoy!

And Happy Hallowe'en to everyone! There's a reason why tonight at midnight is called "the witches' New Year": November 1st (or the closest full moon) is the beginning of the Celtic (pagan) year. Maybe some of you will find it a New Year's occasion for jump-starting new habits: I intend to start walking tomorrow, weather permitting.

I probably showed you this postcard last year, but it's worth repeating for the new folks: Happy Halloween!

Good morning. Man am I running late. I will be so happy to have the clock fall back this weekend. I wake up when the sun comes up, and with it being rainy, it's been 8 or later for several days. I feel like I'm losing the whole morning......and of course, I couldn't possibly be an adult and set the alarm. It's in the retirement handbook that you never again have to set an alarm except to get up for something you actually want to do.

Fi -- Loved the collage!!!!! I am always in awe of your coming up with your collages and have thought that having a scan done while you were creating would just show your entire brain firing off synapses. Loved the cat reunion, but glad they are back to playing together. Loved the explanation of being mindful. It dawned on me that basically instead of making out the list of everything I need to do and thinking about 10 other things, we should just focus on the event at hand. Interesting approach.

Bllondy -- Just ask him about something that he has struggled with. A lot of times people have things that are bugaboos for them, that seem to be great capabilities to us. Once he thinks of something (there has to be something!), have a discussion on how he feels, what are the challenges, etc. Then remind him that with eating it's every day. It's not like you can just stop eating because intaking food is a requirement literally to live. Maybe ask him for suggestions on how he has worked on overcoming anything that is a problem -- he may have some really great ideas. If nothing else, hopefully he will understand more what you are facing.

Anticakechick -- Woohoo! You are rockin' it. Now bottle some of it and send it to Ubee and me, please. The squats would be an effective weight loss technique for me as one squat would result in getting down and never getting back up. No worrying about getting into stuff I shouldn't eat since I'd be permanently in duck walk mode.

Ubee -- I got in half a day, too and then went nuts. I am thinking through what Donna said about getting to the root causes of the emotional issues and I think that will eventually help. In the meantime, I have put a graph on the refrigerator and am tracking weight daily. I want to see it go down, down, down. Try on your jacket every morning to give you inspiration for the day. We can do this!

Terra -- Your menu from cooking class sounds yummy -- and I laughed at fixing chicken and noodles instead of chicken noodle soup.

Dean -- Hope you're just busy and not having more clot issues.
Sam -- Where are you?
Donna and Andrea -- Hope all is well with both of you..

Off to the gym and then I really do have to get some cleaning done today as I invited people over for dinner on Sunday. We're supposed to have no rain tomorrow, so I want to get the geraniums potted for overwintering. Have a great day.

STOP!
October has flown by.
Please join us in the November, 2014 Chat Thread.