Let me prop one eye open here, just long enough to pour another mug of coffee ... this time change is brutal! Ugh, it wasn't so bad yesterday because I didn't have to get up at any special time, but today!

Our dinner party on Saturday night turned out perfectly (except that I gained three pounds ). People had seconds and thirds on everything and one guest, who eats in upscale New York City restaurants every week, said that it was the best meal she had in years. So I was happy that it turned out so well and everyone had fun.

Back to reality -- today DH and I are driving for five hours to trade in one 20-year old car for another one, then driving five hours home. This is what happens when you're married to a Crazy Car Guy who collects older cars. I probably won't be allowed to do any driving, but it's such a lot of driving for one day that I said I'd go along to keep DH company. I just hope that the new (old) car has a working heater!

Lily, we'd love to see prom pictures and I hope you're feeling better today.

Kara, is Tom home? I love your story about the love letter!

Lisa and Anne, thinking of you.

Baff, are the cravings any better?

How's everyone else today? My Red Line took a major hit with dinner this weekend, so it's going to be ultra-serious Back To Basics this week. Anyone want to join me?

BTW, I mentioned a thread for ideas about improving our forum last week but don't think I'll get that posted today since I'm going to be on the car trip with DH. Look for a thread tomorrow or Wednesday.

Off to hit the gym before we leave!

Hi everyone.

Meg, I hope you've got lots of good snacks prepared for the road trip. Your party sounds like it was a big success.

Lily, I too would love to see a pic of your DD and her fushia vest wearing BF.

Tara, that is just too sweet.

Hello to the rest of the gang.

Still at my red line this morning. Hoping to get below this coming week.

Today is my 22nd wedding anniversary. And I am 44 years old. So, I've been married 1/2 my life. BTW, I weigh less now then the day I got married. By at least 15 lbs or so. Pretty cool. I can't stop thinking that when, I G-d willing double my life again, get to 88,I will STILL be at my red line and "moving it to use it", like we spoke about last week. Now when I do get to that 88, I can't promise you after that that I will still be worried about red lines and splurge meals. It just may be time to be a little less, ummm, stringent. Ya think?

Hope you all have a great start to your weeks with a very good Monday. TTYL

Good morning-

Just popping in to say hello to everyone. I've got a crazy couple of days so won't have much to say (or time to say it!) until Thursday.

I did post an intro above so won't repeat it all here. It's so good to know this forum is here. I'm nervous enough about maintaining. It helps to know there are all of you with more experience to lean on when I'm not sure how to do it.

Thanks Meg for the welcome. And hello Kara - nice to see a face I know

Good luck on your crazy days, Cyndi! We'll look for you later on this week.

Happy anniversary, Robin! :congrats: And you made me think about how long I've been married -- more than half my life! Any celebration planned?

I'm back from the gym and let me tell you, it was the sorriest, tiredest looking crowd ever! I guess I'm not the only one hating this time change.

Ah, daylight savings time. Don't miss it. We don't do it at all here in Arizona, so I just go to bed and get up. Just like a normal day. It is very civilized.

DD was cooperative this morning so things are off to a good start so far. But I am soooo TIRED. I'm not sure how I'm going to keep working for two more months. One foot in front of the other, I suppose.

I'm now officially in survival mode with my eating. Whatever happens, happens. Not that I'm not trying, but realistically, I'll clean up the mess later. I'm gaining weight so quickly now. But the baby seems healthy--we had another major sonogram last week, and is moving around a lot and that is the most important thing.

Oh, yeah, I still really miss running. I'm taking that as a good sign that the mess will in fact get cleaned up.

Meg, 98 days to EDD. Single digits officially. Happy Anniversary Robin. Hi and welcome Cyndi.

Anne

Oops. I went and posted in last week's thread. *sigh* Still need more coffee.

It's just as well as the reason I came back was that I felt I just made the most depressing, negative post in the world. So don't read that post. Hee hee. 3 good things about my parents visit: 1. they really liked the songwriters concert we went to Saturday. 2. My mom caught her first redfish, that was our dinner last night. 3. I kept my workout schedule. I really do hope I didn't ruin their trip by being crabby.

3 good things about life today (my immediate, selfish life):
1. I have health insurance.
2. My boyfriend is (still) wonderful.
3. Last week I fit into 2 pairs of pants that had been too tight to wear for I don't know how long.

Robin, happy anniversary!

Cyndi, welcome!

Meg, glad your guests enjoyed your party so much. I am suffering from sleep deprivation too. It's not from the time change, but that didn't help. It was so dark this morning driving to work!

Jessica, how is your joint pain? I hope it continues to subside.

Lily, I hope your flu continues to mend.

Kara, how exciting that Tom is almost home!!!

I hope everyone has a great week.

Good morning everyone! I am slowly inching closer to my red line, but it's still 4lbs (= at least 1 month) off. I think I'm going to try to keep at it long enough to give me some more wiggle room, so my "goal" of the moment is to get down to 127/128. I think that will be more comfortable, as after this maintenance blip I'm afraid to even gain 1lb once I get back to 130.

Kara - that is so sweet about you and your husband!

Megan - sorry to hear you visit with your parents was stressful (I did read your other post before this one!). Congrats on fitting into the pants! My joint pain is not bad right now. Knees feel just fine. After doing taxes all day Saturday though, my right wrist is bugging me again. Hopefully it will clear up soon.

Anne - no daylight savings time! You're lucky. Apparently they didn't used to do it here in Indy, but a couple years ago they went back to it. It was tough this morning since it was so dark out, but the birds were still singing! I wish we could just get up with the sun and go to bed with the sun. Seems more natural.

Cyndi - welcome!

Robin - congrats on the anniversary!

Meg - Glad to hear the dinner party went well! What did you serve??

We spent all day Saturday doing our taxes. Okay, it's not 100% true. We went to the BMV to get my name changed on my car registration first, then from about 10:30am until 8:30pm we did taxes. It took so long because this was our first joint return, so that was confusing in itself, and then DH had sold some mutual funds, but they were funds his dad had bought in his name years ago, and he didn't have the records from them, so we had to do a lot of work to figure out the cost basis. Plus we're supposed to pay estimated taxes this year. We might just not pay them and then pay the underpayment penalty, but then again next year we'll have much larger deductions (since we will have lived in our house all year) and I've already adjusted my withholding to be higher. Taxes are so confusing! I'm glad we're done, and we don't owe them TOO much money.

Something I was wondering about a particular statistic quoted a lot . . . When they say that maintainers have an average of 60 minutes of exercise per day, does that mean that each maintainer reported a per day number, and they divided by the number of maintainers, or does it mean each maintainer reported their total weekly exercise, they divided by seven and took the average of that across maintainers? Because these have very different meanings. In the first case, it means that among maintainers, the average person reported that they have a 60-minute workout each day. The second interpretation means that they could be exercising three days a week for about two hours each time, going on a seven-hour hike once a week, or any number of other things.

Meg, good luck with your driving! Tom has to stay in California for a couple days to co-ordinate the movers packing up our things from our storage unit out there (we were stationed in northern California before he left for Korea). That should take up today, tomorrow, and part of Wednesday, and then he flies back here Thursday. IF he finishes early he MIGHT be able to come in early, but that depends on so many factors that I'm not counting on it. (But I'm hoping!)

Lily, I agree with everyone else that we can't wait to see the prom picture!

Happy anniversary, Robin! This year, Tom and I crossed a half-way line, too. We've known each other over half of our lives. It's fun to have those little moments!

Cyndi!

Anne, glad to hear you are having an easy time with your non-existant time change! We missed the fall change, being in Korea, and I was a little annoyed that we got stuck being here for *this* one!

Megan, I'm glad you had three great things about this weekend, and about your life. What a wonderful exercise to do when you feel down!

Jessica, I agree. Taxes are very confusing! Glad you got them done!

I weighed this morning at 0.5 pound above Friday's weigh-in, but I'm not concerned really for a couple reasons. #1 - I stayed on plan, to the letter, all weekend. #2 - I did a long run yesterday and I've heard that can cause some people to hold onto some muscle-repairing water. #3 - I ovulated yesterday and I usually gain 3-5 pounds then, so if I go by those numbers I could've actually LOST weight since Friday, in essence. It will be interesting to see what the numbers read on Friday.

I got to talk to Tom last night and he arrived in California safe and sound. Hopefully the movers are quick and he can find space on an earlier flight! I'll be walking around with crossed fingers and toes for the next couple days!

Kara

Hmm, it's still morning so good morning all. I just got back from a well baby check up and a trip to the grocery store. The four year old was an angel so that's something to be thankful for today. Tomorrow is my weigh in but the weekend wasn't great so we'll see.... I finished all the paper work for Girl Scout Cookies so that is a definite hurray. Never again... yeah right. Hopefully it will warm up soon and I can get outside more. That would help the boredom eating for sure. I got hopelessly behind last week so if you're feeling poorly I hope you're better, if you're battling cravings I hope you're better and if you're expecting I know it will (eventually) get better. Have a great day all!

Daylight Savings time is killing me! I went to bed tired (or so I thought) and couldn't fall asleep for over 3 hours! Then I woke up several times before the alarm went off. I'm sure tonight will be better.

DH and I will be starting our evening walks again tonight. Then I won't feel so guilty about wanting to run on Saturday (the past 2 Saturdays I've walked with him instead of running and I think it is not helping with my weight loss).

Happy anniversary Robin! This year will be my 20th anniversary and I'm just about a year older than you (turning 45 next week).

I saw the most adorable little girl at the grocery store yesterday. I'm not good at estimating ages but I'm guessing she was between 2 and 5 or so. I was buying broccoli and I heard her asking her mom, "Do we need broccoli??? For salad???" in this kind of voice like she was excited about broccoli. Then she asked if she could buy a dress! (It was at Meijer which is like a superstore for those who don't know.)

hey everyone,

I posted in the wrong thread too! I am out of time and need to get packed and ready to leave town but just wanted to say hi.

Have great week!

I first posted in the wrong week's thread too but I cut and pasted it here!

baff - good for you for staying away from the cigarettes this weekend, especially with those temptations. I think it's particularly hard when you're with the people and the circumstances that you've always linked to smoking. I think maintaining that as your first priority is fine and then hopefully the weight will slowly (or quickly) fall back into place.

Megan - ah, the parent guilt. I think we all suffer from that in one way or another. My parents are much older and we live in the same city but not as close as we used to. I am constantly feeling like I don't see them enough and to have the added stress of worrying whether or not they're having a good time on their vacation! Yeesh. A little stress eating balanced with some workouts is not too bad, considering! Read your new post...glad you're feeling better!

Robin - happy anniversary!!

Kara - enjoy the homecoming!!

I had my usual "not great" eating weekend and for no good reason really! Well maybe being snowbound and bored had something to do with it. I'm just not good when I'm at home all day and while sometimes I just feel snacky, I've been feeling what I think is real hunger more. Why not during the week?? I don't know. Back on track today!

I think the daylight savings time change is killing everyone. I was surprised that I managed to fall asleep but I also woke up a few times during the night. Oh well, it will be worth it soon....I hope!

And I tried the recipe for the WW chocolate cake that Pat posted last week, if anyone wants to know my thoughts on it, let me know.

Joy, glad the trips out went well! I always carry plenty of snacks and sing my way through the grocery store with my kids. I probably look crazy, but it keeps the kids happy.

Jessica, when I dropped my three year old off at her church group last week, I was headed to the store and I asked her what she wanted me to get. She thought for a moment and then said, "Broccoli!" All of the leaders laughed because they said they'd never heard a little girl ask for broccoli so excitedly before! But I have my kids "tricked" into thinking yogurt is a special treat, so they're on a different plane than your general American child...

Baffled, I almost did the same thing this morning. Maybe a mod should lock it up?

Elisa, is that a picture of you on the trapeze? How cool!

I can't believe how quickly this day is going. I really hate wishing that days would go fast, because we really should enjoy every moment of life, but I can't complain about this week flying by!

Kara