[cece]

Hi all.

I hope that everyone had a nice holiday! Our's was great, if a bit hectic. We eneded the weekend by meeting up with my best friend from high school (she lives out of state and isn't often home) and her family as well as some other friends at the pizza place we used to go to in school. It was a lovely time. And now back to "normal" life. Actually, I love this week between Christmas and New Years. The holiday spirit is still in the air, but it's much more relaxed because there's no shopping, wrapping, planning to do. Now I just have to ease back into regular meals and I'll be fine.

Have a good one.

Carla

[Merrylegs]

Good Morning!

Carla, I'm so glad you had a great Christmas. Me too, but it's amazing how quickly it's all over after the weeks and weeks of build up. I'm glad it's done with. Your reunion with your school pal sounds lovely.

The Christmas feeding frenzy is officially over. I did better than in years past, but I hate that feeling of being too full, and of waking in the morning with a sugar hangover headache. Back to basics for me. We took a trip to Whole Foods yesterday to stock up on good organic produce for the week, so we're all set. I only have to work on Wednesday and Thursday this week, so I have plenty of time for making myself my biggest priority.

This morning is frosty and foggy. I've been to the beach with the dogs, but didn't do my hour-long circuit with them because I forgot my gloves and my hands were freezing. I'll make it up on the TM this afternoon and huff and puff my way through Oprah.

We're going to a pot luck dinner party for NY's eve. We're bringing veggies, so I know there will be at least something healthy on the menu.

Have a great day, and will check back soon.

Karen

[cece]

Hi all.

Karen - I'm glad you had a great Christmas too. It is a wonder that so much preparing takes place for what is such a short period of time. This year was especially frantic what with the parties and all. The peace and quiet now is lovely. As for the feeding frenzy - ah yes. I'm on such a sugar high right now that I'm not even thinking straight when I put food into my mouth. That said, I'm slowly working back towards sane eating. I'm actually cooking tonight (my nacho casserole is in the oven). I'm going to work my way back to Core, but will probably start out with points. I haven't decided. Right now I'm concentrating on eating actual meals, snacking heathily, and getting my water in.

We don't have any plans for New Year's Eve. We'll probably stay home, as usual. Perhaps we'll invite some friends for pizza. Who knows. We'll probably spend the weekend de-decorating. We like to keep the tree up until January 6th, but this year's tree is not soaking up much water, so it may not make it until then. Our cold snap broke and it's in the 30s today heading into the 40s. However, the temperature is supposed to drop next week, so I'll probably start working towards my 2005 workout goal on the stationary bike rather then walking. We'll see. And now to put dinner on the table.

Have a great evening.

Carla

[JudySP]

Good afternoon, Carla and Karen. I'm glad your Christmases (sp?) were nice. Ours was too, both Christmas Eve (quiet and lovely) and Christmas Day (lots of people, fun, late). We had a nice time out at the beach too although we ended up driving out the day that a snow storm started (it didn't start until we were there thankfully) and the east end got somewhere between 6 and 8 inches! It was very cold but very pretty. We had one great dinner (drove through the storm) and one OK one. We relaxed, watched some movies and I read a whole bunch. All in all, it was lovely.

Ah yes, the feeding frenzy. I wouldn't say this was my best holiday season - I gave up resisting towards the end of last week at school (it was worse than I remembered it last year in terms of what was brought in, given, etc.) and my "I don't care attitude" seemed to carry through the holidays. I started on the road back to better eating yesterday and am going to try my best during this difficult week. It's difficult, because from Sunday on we are eating out every single day through New Year's Eve. We had a late lunch with my fil (he's sort of on the way back from the beach) yesterday at Red Lobster. I did pretty well, with the exception of one of those yummy biscuits. I snacked a bit last night but it wasn't bad. Tonight my parents are taking us out for a belated birthday gift for Tony. Tomorrow, we are going to our friend's house (the friends of the lots of alcohol and laughs) and the tradition is that I bring a baked brie. With the exception of the alcohol and the baked brie the rest of the food should be ok ;-) Friday night we are going out to a very nice Italian restaurant for New Year's Eve - I guess I'll try to have fish and eat lightly for the rest of the day. My sneak peeks have been atrocious but have moved downward two days in a row - my goal is to try to get back on track as much as I can.

I guess the good news is that even though I didn't exercise much last week, I'm firmly back on that bandwagon this week and as of today, went over my goal for the year. I'm officially at 241 workouts as of today and plan on doing something both tomorrow and Friday. I'm also dusting off my drill sergeant's hat ladies, so get ready! One thing I find motivating is to record my workouts on a wall calendar I hang in my basement (where most of my workouts are). I highlight the days I work out and it helps to see most of the month highlighted - and it really points out the gaps - just a suggestion.

I'd better go - I have to wrap the gifts we are taking with us tomorrow and then jump in the shower.

Have a great Wednesday!
Judy

[cece]

Hi all.

Judy - Glad to hear that you had a good time at the beach. I'd love to see the beach after a snow storm. Sounds like you really got the chance to relax. Good for you. You certainly do have a lot of eating challenges this week. I'm sure you'll handle them well. As for meeting your exercise goal: Yay for you!! Although, I'm not a bit surprised. I'm going to do my best to keep up with you this coming year.

Not much happening here. I cooked dinner again last night, so I am indeed easing myself back into real meals. Tonight it will be swedish meatballs and probably mashed potatoes. I need to spend some time this weekend with my cookbooks and start mapping out menus for the next couple of weeks.

Talk to you all soon.

Carla

[JudySP]

Carla - way to go for cooking dinner and easing back into real meals. Good idea checking the cookbooks. I know it really helps me when we can have some good new recipes and not get into a rut.

I've done so-so the last couple of days. I've eaten reasonably at times but had a few slip ups (like after we got home last night - tiff with Tony on the way home - not a good reason to snack on anything ande everything around the house but there you go). At least I did a good workout this afternoon getting me to a grand total of 243 workouts for the year. We are having dinner tonight at a very nice Italian restaurant. I'm going to try to limit (or eliminate) the bread and see if there's a light fish dish on the menu. Then it's home to a fire and some champagne. We've already talked about dinner for tomorrow and Sunday - good core, homecooked meals and we'll be making a menu for the week so we can grocery shop on Sunday. I'm really looking forward to getting back to core and eating at home!

Here's to my best wishes to you for a Happy, Healthy and Much Lighter New Year!
All my best,
Judy

[cece]

Judy - Well doing so-so is better than blowing it utterly and completely. I hope you enjoy your dinner tonight. Bread at an Italian restaurant gets me every time. I think we'll light a fire tonight too, but if we're going to have champagne, I guess I better get it in the fridge to chill.

We're kind of grazing our way through dinner tonight. John made some homemade guacamole - yum. And I still have some appetizers from Trader Joe's in my freezer, leftover from our party, so we'll probably munch on those. So, not a big, exciting night planned in our house. I've added a 2005 worksheet to my exercise spreadsheet and have copied everything over, so I'm ready to start tracking those workouts. If it's as warm tomorrow as it was today (in the high 50s), then a walk will definitely be in order.

And now I'll close by wishing all of you all the best in 2005.

Carla

[Merrylegs]

Happy New Year, dear friends!

We spent a fairly quiet evening with friends; potluck dinner was great. Someone brought a big tray of baked goodies, and I grazed on them for hours. We were home in bed by 2 a.m., and feeling lazy today. I may work up enough gumption to use the TM later on.

Have a great weekend!

Karen