What we really want in a weight loss support group, boils down to one concept; we are looking for a sanctuary.

Sanctuary means different things to different people. Sanctuary is a place of peace, rest, safety, and rejuvenation. It keeps our spirit and our sanity intact.

Many of us who have a long journey down the weight loss path find ourselves in need of a break. Sometimes our bodies crave it, and sometimes the choice isn't ours, but circumstances forces it upon us. Other times, we need the clamoring throng to cheer us along our way as we breeze past milestones and overcome obstacles.

Sanctuary can be all that as well. It is what you need and when you need it. Sanctuary can be found in good friends who aren’t afraid of your truths and in an open, honest atmosphere.

Sanctuary isn’t judgmental, neither does it discriminate or ask to be censured. It is open to anyone with a desire to share, and especially those in need of and willing to offer support

Here you go Andria....BUT your statement isn't true. You wrote the welcome to this thread and look at all the posts!!!!!

Well, I feel behind again. I will catch up on replies but not tonight.

I was running WAY behind so I thought I would read and post while eating dinner. I NEVER eat at the computer but since it is already 9PM I was trying to get two things done at once. Well, I have rice all over my key board

That will teach me!!! I have to get this cleaned up before it dries!!! (remind you of anyone, huh, Gloria???)

Thank you, Lucky!

This day feels like a success food wise, and I'm excited about that! I've been keeping a pot of soup growing in the crock pot and eating that whenever I get hungry. I keep it loaded with lots of different vegetables and just add bits of this and that as I go, so it changes with every couple of servings. Yesterday I added cabbage and asparagus, today was mushroom, stewed tomatoes and banana squash. Always different, flavors always changing, but very healthy and low calorie. I love doing this, too bad my family won't play along. I would keep a pot of soup going every day if they would eat it with me. At least it is keeping me out of the remnants of their Easter candy.

I'm planning to work out at Curves in the morning, but the rest of my day is up in the air. They are trying to get a staff meeting together to work on some problems we are having with a person on my shift. Since I was the one who finally got fed up and filed a grievance form, I kind of have to be there. Blah. Well, weighing in and working out will be good, at least.

When is the next 2 lb. WI date? I've been so off an on here, I've lost track.

Andria

I'm glad I'm not the only one here Lucky that starts out with good intentions, only to wonder what the heck i was thinking.
I've been meaning to tell you that i have at least 20 tomatoes on my tomato plant and there all about the size of a golf ball. I guess all the singing to them is starting to pay off. Speaking of singing, a couple of weeks ago we had a good weather day so i had my windows and doors open. I was working on my floors and just singing up a storm. Then i hear a mans voice from a couple of houses down yelling, "SHUT UPPP. I stopped singing and the fantom mystery caller was never heard from again. Was he tell me to stop singing? We may never know.

Yesterday while on one of my excursions on my bike, i found that some people still have there Christmas lights up. Also, yesterday (Wednesday) was trash day and i found that you can tell a lot about a person by way of there trash. Now I'm not a dumpster diver, but as I'm zooming past the houses i noticed that people throw out a lot of interesting stuff. Lamps, rugs and even old beds. I don't know why i find this interesting, but these are the things i never noticed before while driving my car. The sounds of birds singing to me as the sun warms my face just seems to be sweeter now.

My dear sweet wonderful husband came home yesterday with a new fancy dancy seat for my bike. My old one was hooooo, making my butt sore. This new one has lots of padding in it. I just love it when he does stuff like that.

Must go now. What new adventures will i have today on old blue, the bike?
Gloria

Good Morning!

Did everyone post themselves out last night? That was quite the flurry of activity! I'm going to pull up the old thread and see if I can view Chelsea's picture today.

My little one is home sicky today and the oldest called to say she isn't feeling like a million bucks. Guess Doctor Mommy better get ready! I'm not feeling so great either, plus I'm craving chocolate like there is no end to it. Why did I even let myself have any?! I'm like an alcoholic with the stuff!

Andria

Me again

Ok, can't see the picture still. That happens. When Gloria posted pictures of her house, I couldn't see them for a couple of days, and then just one time. Not sure what is up with that.

Gloria, I love that your honey bought you a cushy seat for your bike! That was totally sweet of him. Keep the bike excursion stories coming! I can hardly wait until I feel confident enough to ride the bike Tony gave me. It is sitting out there beckoning.

The weather has been iffy here for walking. Cold, rainy days make my knee ache so bad that I end up keeping mostly off it for the next 24 hours if I do try walking. I can't afford a big, expensive treadmill, and I'm only soso fond of exercise bikes. Wal-Mart had an elliptical that wasn't very expensive and didn't look all plastic. I'm one of those "you get what you pay for" type girls, but I think I might risk this one. I really need something to do every day, and I like to do something different on my off days from Curves. Anyone have other suggestions? I do use a big a$$ ball (yoga ball, Swiss ball, exercise ball, whatever you call yours!) for stability exercises, but I want something for cardio!

Going to go concentrate on something for breaky. Hope you are all having wonderful mornings!

Andria

Andria, i have a treadmill that i got at Goodwill for a hundred dollars. If you have a thrift store nearby, try looking there for good cheep exercise equipment. A lot of people buy expensive equipment thinking there going to use them, then they never do and give them to Goodwill or Salvation Army.
Gloria

Gloria, you are not alone. I don't consider myself a nosey person but I think it is interesting to pay attention to how other people live. When I walk at night and people have their windows open and lights on inside I can't help but take a look. I would feel like a peeping tom - but hey - if they don't want people to look they need to pull the shades. More than anything, I like to see how they have their houses decorated. I can always tell right of the bat who have children at home. Let's just say that those homes are always creatively decorated. I love to browse garage sales. I don't get to do it often but when I do it is always fun. The best part is that if the kids come with me I can give them a handful of change from their piggy banks and they feel like they've got a million dollars. You can get a lot of toys for $2 at a yard sale!

Which reminds me of a funny story. We had a garage sale just before we moved. We had a box of old toys that the kids hadn't really paid much attention to. UNTIL.... a little boy comes up to Greg with about .15 and says, "how much do you want for that ball?" I think Greg sold it to him for a nickel. That kid's eyes lit up like a Christmas tree. And he goes skipping down the driveway bouncing his ball while he waits on his mom. All of a sudden Will notices what has gone on and screams, "HEY! What's that kid doing with my ball?" We were lucky that it didn't go much further than that. But it was clear we had done a pretty poor job of explaining exactly what a garage sale was. I guess he thought it was just a big party where strangers came to LOOK at our stuff. He wasn't quite four at the time.

And aren't those husbands something? For all the trouble they can be sometimes and then they go and do something like surprise us with new bicycle seats! I'd rather get something like that than flowers. I think it show they are paying attention to what we enjoy. But, I wouldn't send Greg packing for bringing home roses either.

Andria, I'm glad to hear you had a good food day but sorry to hear about that yucky work meeting. I finally had to break down and file a complaint on someone a long time ago. We had an Admin who was in charge of dispersing office supplies. But as it turned out she was an office supply ****. She made a schedule for each department and people from that department could only come and get supplies during that time frame. And, even then, she wouldn't give you more than one of anything at a time. I was in accounts payable at the time and went to get some tape for my adding machine. I asked for two rolls. She wouldn't give it to me - she wanted a written explanation of why I needed two. Okay, now it was going to far so I took a kiss my a$$ attitude. Took my ONE roll of adding machine tape and sure enough, saw that I was going to be running out soon so went to get roll number two. Guess what? It wasn't Finance's scheduled time and she wouldn't give to me. I told her to hand over the key and I would get it myself. Nope, she wouldn't budge. So, first of all, I waited until she went to lunch, went to her desk and got that stinkin key. Then, after work talked to the guy she reported to. Explained that I understood the need to control costs, yada, yada, but DAMN! I've got to have what I need to do my job! I knew this guy for a long time and had worked very closely with him so when he said, "we expect you to plan ahead so that you don't run out..." and he said this with a chuckle that was my breaking point. He had told her to keep people from raiding the supply closet but he didn't know how far she had taken it. He had no idea how annoyed we all were with her so I'm sure my reaction to his snide little comment surprised him. Boy, oh boy did he get an earful. She was fired (not over that - but the ton of other similar stuff that she used to do). I honestly don't know why some people get off on making other peoples work more difficult than it has to be. Blech, and this person had a snotty attitude to boot. When Greg and I were planning our wedding and I told her where we were having our reception and she had the nerve to say, "You know that place is really expensive you might want to make sure it is in your parents' budget." I just smiled and told her that I didn't think they would agree to it if they couldn't afford it but on the inside - I was imagining telling her that just becuase SHE didn't have the money for something like that didn't mean that THEY didn't. She was just a bitter, bitter lady. And then, after all of that, we decided to get married and have our reception at my parents' home so I am sure she was very satisfied to think that it was all just out of reach for us.

Gosh, that was so long ago and it still gets me worked up. Sorry, I didn't me to go off on a rant!

I sure hope you little ones aren't too sick. Take care of yourself too!

I gotta go see what all the fighting is about upstairs. Check in later!

Yes Andria, we sure did post a lot yesterday, didn't we!? I sure had a heck of a time trying to get that darn picture up! Don't worry about not being able to see it, it's no big deal.

That's awesome that your hubby came home with a prize for you Gloria! I hope I have a husband that thoughful someday.

I am sicky today and don't know if I'll be able to get my excersising in, I'm just so worn out. I got home from the doctor about an hour and a half ago, and he said I have a respiratory infection. Yuck! Now I've got to go all the way out to pick up my meds. Sigh
I'm going to my good friends play tonight. He's going to be in "A Chorus Line". He's a really good singer and dancer, and I'm looking forward to it. I hope I'm feeling better by tonight.

My uncle took us out to the Olive Garden last night. First of all, I'm a real picky eater, and never found anything at that restaurant I liked. Well, I thought maybe I could just order some vegetables or something. So...I ordered this chicken vegetable noodle type dish that sounded alright and had a mark by it on the menu indicating it was a healthy dish. Ewwww, it was not good at all! Not to me anyway. I ended up just having some salad and one breadstick. I'm really going to have a hard time finding healthy things that I like at restaurants. My taste usually revolves around cheese and bread and pasta. So I've got to try hard to like more healthy things for me. I've mainly started this weight loss thing this time because I'm worried about my health. The weight loss will be awesome, but I just want to feel better mainly.

Well, I guess I'd better head out to pick up my antibiotics.
Take care!
Chelsea

Hi people, no time to post and because of it I lost a post. Usually I write in another file for that very reason but I was rushing and sure enough, the application crashed and I lost it! Damn!
Well, like I said, very busy, disgusted that I can't go through a whole day without eating some junk! Last night I could have capped a good day with. . well, just sleep. Instead I come home and ate all this junk I'd bought at the bakery, something I never do but I just was indulging. So stupid. Will try to make consistently, with emphasis on the word consistently, better choices.
Chelsea, you say you're a picky eater but I think you mean you have strong likes and dislikes. This is probably a large part of your weight problem. It sounds like you have a very unbalanced diet and your body will naturally be demanding more food until it gets the vitamins and minerals it wants, regardless of the calories. I know you may hate it but I think if you start adding more fresh vegetables in your diet, your body may start easing off on its demands.
I am glad to hear you're getting out and exercising a bit. Hope your friend's play was fun and I do hope that infection doesn't get any worse! Good luck to you!
Others, I will have to try to talk later. 5dogs, that singing was funny. Maybe it wasn't about you, that guy shouting, maybe it was and he had to try to sleep at some odd hour or concentrate on some unpleasant work and was in a foul mood. Then again, just what do you sound like?

Gloria, you have inspired me again. I finally dragged the kids to Home Depot and got a few tomato and pepper plants. We picked up some sweet strawberry plants as well. We only got a few of each so we were able to get them all in the ground in about half an hour. It was all so little trouble that I am kicking myself for not doing it sooner, then I would have 20 golf ball sized tomatoes right now too!

Hey, and look at you without those 10 extra pounds! Great job! I wish I could live without the scale like you do - but I just haven't been able to end that relationship. It would probably be the worst break up I've ever suffered through!

Chelsea, I sure hope you are feeling better soon. I HATE to be sick. It puts me in the foulest mood.

I've got good news too. I am officially 1 lb less than my highest weight back in college. Granted, I'm not thin yet but if I ran into someone from those days they couldn't claim that I'd gotten any fatter since then! I've lost a total of 50 pounds now and I'm just flat out smitten with myself!

The bad news is that I didn't make it to the gym tonight. I'll count my gardening as at least some activity so that I don't feel like a slug.

I am headed for an early bedtime - I'm worn out today for no good reason. I'll check with you all tomorrow!

Tricia

Wow Tricia, I'm so proud of you!! I would die to be your weight! I think you are doing awesome!! Don't kick yourself for not going to the gym either. It's impossible to be absolutely perfect, absolutely all of the time! You've done so well, just be as smitten as you are and more!

And you are right Red about my needing to add more fresh veggies to my meals. I am working on that.

Well all, I'm very tired, it's quite late. I think I'll try to go back to bed.
Chelsea

Hello people. Well, I got through the day. Got 10 minutes before I hit the sack. I managed not to go out with the guys drinking after work, no thanks to me, though, just no one was going out tonight. I had promised myself I wouldn't go, but if someone had said, "let's go!" I would have gone. So, I'm home and I'm going to bed. Trying not to eat too much right now.

chelsea -- how are you feeling? I hope better. I didn't mean to be preachy or anything about veggies. You probably know everything you need to know. Don't mind me. I'm usually saying it to myself the same time I'm saying it to someone else. have you started a food journal. I have kept one whenever I lost weight and found it is ruthless, if I add up the calories and note the exercise, I can never moan and whine about not seeing results. It is always obvious why I am or am not seeing them. Give it a try.

jawsmom -- glad to hear you're feeling inspired. oh yes, fresh tomatoes, pepers and strawberries! Oh yum! Congrats on your weight. 50 lbs off! that is amazing! You should be very, very smitten with yourself! I'm with Chels, don't sweat not getting to the gym. Of course your gardening counts as exercise.

Oh gosh, guys, I'm so tired. qsilver, 5dogs, lucky, anyone I missed! I will be back tomorrow morning! Good night. It's Friday night already. We'll be busy tomorrow at work no doubt with the pope likely to pass. Sad with the Schiavo girl, isn't it? And to think that that was from an eating disorder that put her in a coma, bulimic I think she was. So very, very sad.

Ok, good night.

How was the play Chelsea? I just love getting all dressed up and going out for dinner and a play. Makes me feel all girley girley.

I have an opinion on your extreme dislikes of a lot of fruits and vegetables. Maybe its not the taste you dislike but the texture. I know that sounds crazy, but from my own experience, when i just have to have potato chips or die, what i really wanted was something crunchy and salty. A cucumber with a little salt, plus oil and vinegar for tang does the trick for me. Soda is the worst. I know on the west coast you call it pop, but here its soda. I don't know what they call it in Japan. Anyway, i was drinking truck loads of diet soda every week because thats what i thought my body was telling me it wanted. I now have a hard time digesting preservatives because of it. I now know that its not the taste of the soda i was craving but the feel of the bubbles in my mouth. That was when i started making my own flavored soda without the preservatives. I buy seltzer water and shove three peppermint tea bags down inside the bottle. I keep it in the refrigerator overnight and the next day i have a bottle of flavored soda. I do use Splenda that has preservatives, but i can control how much i use. I've even put a teaspoon of coco in a glass with my peppermint soda when i need a quick chocolate fix. Chocolate peppermint soda taste like mint chocolate chip ice cream without all the fat and calories. Maybe the next time you eat something that you don't like, concentrate on the texture of the food in your mouth. Is it the taste you cant stand, or is it the texture?

I will post more later but right now i must get old blue and ride before the heat of the day gets to where i wont be able to go outside.

Hugs to you all.
Gloria

Chelsea, I hate to beat a dead horse by I've got to put my 2 cents in on the vegetable suggestions. I have never been a big fruit and vegetable eater. But, anytime I was dieting I felt like it had to be a plain old raw veggie. Yuck. Like Gloria said, even if I didn't think the taste was too bad I didn't like the way it felt in my mouth. I finally figured out that preparing the vegetables was much more palatable. I make a vegetable lasagna that is AWESOME, and I will sautee spinach to put in with pasta that has a light lemon sauce, I love vegetables with a little Italian dressing and then grilled, and stir frying them and putting them over rice is great to. And, of course, somethings are just an aquired taste so don't give up.

Try a variety until you find a few that you like. If you want, I'll be happy to send you a couple of my favorite fruit and vegetable recipes for you to try. Just PM me if you do.


We are bored to death today. We had terrible thunderstorms last night so it is too muddy to get outside much. It isn't raining today but it is still dreary and I think that is making the kids feel a little lazy today. Plus, the storm woke them all up last night so I am sure they are tired to boot. I figure we all need to just lounge around every now and then so I'm letting them just hang out.

Gloria, you've bragged about what a cutie your son is. As it turns out, I have a little lady killer in the house too. Not long ago, Will came home with a note from two little girls who had written their phone numbers so that he could call them sometime. That was funny enough but yesterday a different little girl sent home a "love" note. She colored a dinosaur picture for him, drew hearts on it and wrote , "To Will Wef Love, Emily." Attached was a note she had decorated with hearts and wrote, "Hi, You or (are) God (good). I wodr (wonder) haw (how) you or (are) dowg (doing). You or (are) kot (cute). Love, Emily." I didn't mention the note to him but when I found the picture in his folder I commented on how nice it was of Emily to draw it for him. Without any prompting he said in a VERY affirmative tone, "MOM, EMILY IS NOT MY GIRLFRIED! WE DO NOT HAVE GIRLFRIENDS IN KINDERGARTEN!" I get tickled everytime I think of his face as he said it.

I am so excited. Greg's parents are coming down April 20 and have offered to keep the kids for the week while Greg and I get away together. We've decided to drive down to Gulf Shores for the week. I just can't wait. It has been soooo long since I got to just hang out with Greg for more than just a couple of hours. And, my goodness, the idea of sleeping in and lounging by the pool, well, it is just almost too much to take! I can't wait. Now, if I can just manage to shed a 5 or so more pounds between now and then.

The kids are finally bored enough to ask for a project. We're going to make jar tornadoes. Catch you all later.