0.2 lb loss?!?! I'll take it!

So remember when I said anything less than 140.0 would be a good day? Well I weighed 139.8 this morning. Cutting it pretty close, but it's still a good day right? If I only lose 0.2 lbs per week, by my sister's wedding...well it's only 6 lbs in 6 months. So I better step it up right? ;)

Today's a good start already. I had just 2 pb and honey toasts (friday I feel like honey's ok, usually it's homemade sugar free jam, I guess if I were being strict I'd toss the honey for awhile). Snack was 2 cranberry muffins. (there will be a lot of muffins in the next couple days, my cranberry muffins are delicious and healthy, but they mold really quickly. So moist?). Lunch is gonna be a salad with my homemade dressing AND leftover pulled pork. I like having 2 lunch meals. The salad with no protein or nuts or anything isn't enough for a meal. So it's just like I'm taking apart a chef salad or something. Plus I don't need as much "dessert" things after. Just an orange or some berries or something (instead of both + more). I've also got yogurt and a hard boiled egg and more oranges and an apple. I'm hoping that the office slacks off a bit this afternoon and has beers (good english...) in the conference room (I just have a pop, I don't like beer anyway). It distracts my for the last 45 minutes of work, plus I usually don't eat my full afternoon snack (and don't miss it).

Speaking of miss it. Yesterday I, for some reason, was munchy like crazy!!! I ate all my food AND a day old donut (i know i know) by 1:30. Leaving me nothing for the afternoon. I managed fine, I left work early! haha! I did leave early to meet my sis and mom to dress shop (AGAIN). I got lost and really really frustrated.

NOTE: if you have a pay as you go phone - keep some G*# (#&$(! minutes on it!!! and if you have a cell phone period - keep the ***#*@ $*$&ing thing charged! Mom's phone was dead and sis's was out of minutes so I could only text her and she could text back. Well I'm driving back and forth up and down this huge street (across the whole city and back) looking for this place and when I say I'm lost, they're like "go south". South from where? I say where is it? Avenue? They say near the DQ. Well that doesn't help me figure out which way I have to go does it? Where's the DQ? I was furious with them. Especially because I'm texting while driving which is not good. and I don't even know if I'm going the right way. boo them!

ANYWAY, we went to my house for supper (souvlaki, salad, buns, veggies, yum yum.) Then to this place where the lady orders and sells (and sews) dresses out of her house. My sister found her dress! It's super pretty. PLUS, it probably would have cost $800 or $900 in a store, but the lady charged $450! The mark-ups are ridiculous! Granted they have to pay staff and for the buildings etc. But double? too much. I sort of felt like this lady was getting them off the black market or something though. She said she's going to call her guy and see if they can make the dress (in China) for her in Ivory instead of white (not really an option in the catologue but she thinks her guy will do it.). sort of sketchy. But she doesn't pay until she picks it up.

Her dress has sweetheart neckline (something she knew she wanted) and is fitted to the waist, then it poofs out a bit with random pick-ups (the things that make it look like whipped cream). Mom hated those things, but it got worked out because the seller/seamstress said that you can move them to lower on the dress and have fewer of them or whatever. Sis loved it because it had lace (on the bodice) and the sweetheart neckline. The dress before it was almost the winner, but you could see the seams which she hated (dress didn't have enough lining and nothing on the top, just smooth satin), but the neck was perfect and it was simple like she wanted. but when we (bridesmaid, me and mom) started picking it apart a bit, and she realized she didn't like the seams showing, it sort of broke her heart and her face was turning red and tears were welling up when she changed out of it. I felt so bad. I remember crying when I bought my dress. The dress I sort of really loved I got talked out of and it just hurt a bit. It was the first moments of realizing that "my big day" really wasn't all about me no matter what they say.

But I think she's really happy and likes her dress and didn't just settle.

Anyway, weekend today! woohoo! plans? Not much. house cleaning. INCLUDING shampoo the carpet. yay! Plus hubby's having his hockey team over after their game on saturday so I'm playing perfect wife and making appetizers and stuff. Other than that, not much. hope to get a workout in. watch some tv and movies maybe. scrapbook? More cooking and baking. Hubby's hunting for half the week next week and I'd like to send him with some goodies. (man I AM the perfect wife huh?) I think I should also start thinking Christmas shopping and at least plan what I'm getting everyone. how 'bout you?
;)

follow ups

Christmas oranges - I don't know what they really are, we just call them Christmas oranges or Chinese or Japanese oranges. I guess Chinese mandarine oranges. I think it's a prairie thing to call them that (as Jen totally knew what I was talking about!)





eggs - How to eat a hard boiled egg? I'm sort of funny about this. My office is so quiet that I don't like to make lots of noise, so I wrap it in a tissue and crack it on the floor (just the first hard whack). My desk would make too much noise. Then I just peel it and eat it in 2 bites. Sometimes I take the golf ball (aka yolk) out, sometimes not. I know it contains cholesterol, but I also heard that it's not the cholesterol you eat the contributes to high cholesterol, but the kind your body makes from bad fats and whatever.





salad dressing #1 - not so much like Olive Garden. It is pretty good still and I'm quite enjoying it, but not quite the same. recipe (don't mind the >, from an email):





>Olive Garden Italian Dressing >>


1/2 cup mayonnaise >


1/3 cup white vinegar >


1 teaspoon vegetable oil >


2 tablespoons corn syrup >


2 tablespoons parmesan cheese >


2 tablespoons romano cheese >


1/4 teaspoon garlic salt >


1/2 teaspoon italian seasoning >


1/2 teaspoon parsley flakes >


1 tablespoon lemon juice >>


Mix all ingredients in a blender (I used a salad dressing mixer thing, worked fine)until well mixed. If this is a little >to tart for your own personal tastes please add a little


extra sugar. >>





Olive Garden Salad Mix >>


1 bag American Blend Dole Salad >


4-5 slices Red Onion >


4-6 Black Olives >


2-4 Banana Peppers >


1/2 cup Croutons >


1 small Tomato Quartered >


Freshly grated Parmesan Cheese





I can't remember if there was anything else I was supposed to follow up with. remind me if you're missing it.





Today I think I'm cutting work a bit early again to go dress shopping (Again) with my sis and mom. But today is the day, she's gotta find it. We've got an app't booked at this place that sells dresses out of her house and custom orders ones if you want, or sews them etc. From her website she had lots of really really nice ones, for much cheaper than other stores. We're very hopeful about it. (even though it sounded sketchy saying she sells dresses from her house...)





i'm also making supper for them, souvlaki's (bought, not homemade, cleaning out the freezer), fake olive garden salad, homemade buns and mixed veggies. Nice and healthy and well rounded.





what else can I say...





Oh, class last night was good. I was teachers pet again. We were doing planks and she talked about how to make it harder, and came over to me and put a weight on my back. I loved it (I love planks, but my shoulders always tire before I even feel it in my abs, this helped!). THen she let me use her barbell instead of my dumbells for the rest of the exercises (KILLER for lying tricept extensions!) It was really good. I'm anticipating a loss (as in I'm going to start weighing in officially again) tomorrow. Anything less that 140.0 and I'm calling it a loss and happy.





I also came up with a new goal. I want to get in shape again (well duh) not just for the looks, but because I don't like being tired with things I don't think should tire me out. Also, I want my back to be nice. As in, I used to have those muscles on either side of my spine in my lower back. Hmm, I'll find a picture. Anyway, I want them back. (and this picture isn't great but I think it shows what I'm talking about at least:

I prefer more muscley and sweaty and less looking outside in my granny panties, but i'm at work so don't have time to google pictures of women's backs. Well I have time, but don't want to get caught.

Anyway, that's a new goal of mine. I remember when I was in high school and played competative volleyball, I was walking home and put my hand on my low back and felt the muscles moving with each step I took, it was pretty cool. I want that again. Currently, I have back fat...

asldkf

Anybody else completely sick of coming up with titles for their posts? I think I give up.

My other favorite food that I feel like I just discovered? Christmas oranges! I've been packing back 2 a day (well starting this week) and love it. I love that they take a little while to eat, are cheap, are healthy, easy to pack. etc etc. Oranges and eggs x2/day. (that looks like a math equation, I guess it is! yay math!)

So I did go to the gym yesterday. It wasn't all I was hoping for, but I guess I've got to ease myself into it. First I forgot to pack a sports bra, so it was regual bra under workout shirt, and strap kept falling down (bright teal). I wore my zip up the whole time too. So I started with a run on the treadmill. And since I also forgot my MP3 player, the 15 minutes dragged on. Oh well. I still managed to run fast and with a decent incline without being too exhausted so I'm glad my running fitness hasn't deteriorated completely.

The gym was crazy busy, and I hate that, because then I have to hover at weight machines or whatever and guys on them always take like 10 minute rests between 9 sets of like 5. I ended up doing some bicept curls, rows, chest flies, and leg presses. Nothing was really sore so I didn't push hard enough.

Then supper was pulled pork buns. They were only alright. I think you have to find a barbeque sauce you can eat spoonfuls of to like that one. I only like a hint of it. Hubby cut up veggies too. Such a sweetie.

Then the rest of the night was wasted downloading tunes and reading magazines. (I can't believe that I got a new Women's Health magazine and I haven't started reading my last months! that NEVER happens!)

Tonight I've got kickboxing. That and a dog walk I think are all I'm up for. I'm very tired lately.

Hard boiled eggs

Do you guys know about hard boiled eggs? I feel like I just discovered them. I ate 2 today, once for mornign snack, once for afternoon. They are GOOD! 80 calories, 6 g of protein. Keeps me full. CHEAP. EASY. What more do I have to say!
(small smell factor I suppose, but I eat them in 2 bites so it's gone quick).

Busy at work, but so productive and the day just flies by. I was the last one here yesterday and had to lock up. that NEVER happens. I love being busy. (but not stressed, deadlines are far away).

oh yeah, I'm gyming after work today! Wish me luck!

Fun times

So my weekend was great. Very quick and I do feel ripped off like I didn't get a weekend. But it was fun. Friday night was prep. Packing etc. Saturday way early I picked up the other girl and we took off. It was pitched black for 2.5 hours then all of a sudden light when we picked up my sister in Lloyd. Then drove the other 2.5 hours. We borrowed my parents GPS since none of us knew the city at all. Well my sister was navigating and she did say she sucked, but did she ever suck. We wasted lots of time and gas driving to West Ed. AND once there we got lost in the Mall over and over. Oh I should say, I ate pretty crappy. Grabbing greasy A&W breakfast, then eating lunch at Hooters (don't even ask), I had a crappy hotdog that I didn't finish, and fries that were hard as a rock so I only ate around 5. But I did have a big margarita. Wandered all over the mall, I ended up buying:
noodles from the Chinese grocery store
black satin pumps from Forever 21
Teal short sleeve sweater and black off the shoulder top from some other cheap place
Make up at Sephora


Sis and other bridesmaid (BM) bought a bit of stuff too. Sis didn't get much because she went in looking for something specific and then could never find it, (a grey camisole, shouldn't be hard, but it was). BM wanted a coat so that took tons of time trying on all sorts of different ones, every place had a big selection of them but we wanted to find an inexpensive one that was nice, so it was a lot of comparison shopping. The wedding stores in the mall were very busy and really expensive, plus sis didn't feel like trying stuff on by the time we got to them. (Mom's probably coming up this weekend or thursday to try shopping again).

We got lost on the way to pick up my friend again then went to Olive Garden (we were such the saskatchewan tourists! No Olive Garden in SK so that's where everyone always goes on AB trips, so lame). I still wasn't hungry, even though I hardly ate any lunch, (not meaning it was low cal or anything). Like severely not hungry. I ordered a chicken dish because the accompanying veggies sounded good. I ate a plate of salad, and half a breadstick. Then the veggies and 1 bit of chicken, boxed up the rest. It was weird how unhungry I was. I did have another drink, another margarita I think.

It took so long to eat and everything that it was already 10:00 when we got to my friend's. So we just sat and visited for a couple hours and then went to bed. The next day my friend made us waffles with strawberries and whipped cream and had fruit and muffins and juice etc. So good. (I love breakfast foods so much!) Anyway. after that was Ikea (again, no Ikea in Saskatchewan so have to do it in Ikea, that and stop at Superstore liquor store and stock up on Brewhouse. It's about half the cost of beer is Saskatoon [we don't have private liquor stores] even though it's made in Saskatchewan). So we spent 3 hours in Ikea or more. I didn't get that much. A couple containers and a toilet brush and some Christmas decorations. But with 4 people all looking for different things and nothing very specific it ended up taking a long time. Then we were hungry again by the time we got done so just grabbed some hotdogs and cinnamon buns (these hotdogs were $0.50 and were way way better than my $7 one.) Then we dropped off my friend and took off again! End of road trip! (stupid 5 hour drive one way!)

The driving was mostly lots of fun too though I guess. We were quite giggly.

Other random things I want to say:

- Both BM and I admitted to sis that we'd probably getting pregnant now if it wasn't for her wedding. She told us that we could be pregnant anyways. We'll see...
- My sister's idea for favours for her wedding was to not do individual boxes of candy for everyone, but rather have a candy buffet where you can fill up your own little bag from a huge assortment of candies. That idea made me so happy. Just the idea of it. It's like going to a candy store and getting whatever you want by the scoopful. It was originally goign to be in various glass bowls and cups and fishbowls and stuff (think Martha Stewart how unmatching things can match) but then when we were almost done Ikea and she picked out all these glass things that really added up, we saw the flower pots and changed it to that. Her theme is ivy and plants and flowers, so flower pots (cleaned, probably lined) full of candy, mixed with some real pots of houseplants with ivy between them all. Oh, and you scoop your candy with miniature trowels and stuff. Cute huh?
- My pregnant friend we stayed with is the type of pregnant woman you hate. She didn't look pregnant at all from the front. Couldn't tell at all. It looked EXACTLY like she shoved a basketball under her shirt. Only 7 weeks left.
- her hubby really really appreciated the tiny Rider jersey onsie we got. Pretty cool. Friend really appreciated the M&M's gift certificate I also got her, she hates cooking.
- I am very ready to lose weight again. The scale only shows me up 5 lbs from my previous low, but I think somehow it looks more like 10 lbs. I didn't used to have any muffin top when I weighed this much, and my tummy was flat and tight, just larger than I wanted. Now it's all lose and jiggly and I have to wear coats or sweaters on top of all the clothes I used to wear. Starting this week I'm back to the gym.
- I found 2 different recipes for the Olive Garden salad dressing, if either of them tastes right, I'll share.
- I weighed 140.2 this morning. That's less than I did friday before we left. Sometimes it is so weird what a weekend can do for you.

oh did I mention

Hey did I mention that i'm a super cool grown-up business lady now and have a work cell phone? Paid for by work? Not really sure why. Probably it's just cheap for them to add me on, and it was a free cell promotion. But it's way cool and I'm super excited about it. Unfortunately I don't know anything about the plan I'm on, I don't think they expect me to use it for only business since my boss said I could get rid of my personal cell now and save some money. But I don't want to rack up all these texting charges and stuff either. I should just be able to go into Telus and give them my phone number and they'll be able to let me know right?

Anyway, my new cell number is 306-71 - haha, just kidding!

I'm way excited, it's not as hip as my other new cell phone (which flipped 2 different ways and had a QWERTY keyboard for texting:

But it came with a car charger, micor SD card AND a full size SD card AND an SD card reader to plug into computers. Plus a headset and earphones. I'm way excited, it's the lg chocolate flip:(shitty picture) And yeah, I only got black:

Anyway, way excited, probably spend the rest of the day reading my user guide and downloading things to put on my new cell. (plus because it's a different provider than my personal phone, I don't have any helpful tech guy to transfer all my contacts so I'm doing that one at a time. Unless anybody out there knows a trick?)

Oh, also, anybody know anything about breaking a 3 year contract with a cell provider? I think I should just have to pay an early termination fee, I'm guessing $100? (totally worth it in my case as I JUST signed this contract like a month ago.)

yep

So today is a nice relaxed day at work. I have a bunch of mindless (yet urgent) work that's going to take up my whole day for another dude so it's podcasts and green tea and mouse clicking. nice way to end a short week.

Then it's off to Edmonton tomorrow! yay! I'm very excited, gonna check out the Ikea website soon. I can't think of anything, but there must be SOMETHING I need.

I found a great recipe for chocolate chip cookies last night which I baked up as a gift for our preggers hostess (can't exactly do wine now can I). I only ate 1 last night and 2 this morning as a snack. I'm giving half to my friend (probably 2 dozen), and freezing half. I've got 5 cookies left that didn't fit in the containers, so I'll leave those for hubby on the weekend. they're really soft and good cookies, but by no means healthy so I won't share the recipe unless requested.

Oh, and my ham slow cooker recipe, only ok. It looked prettier before it was cooked. The slow cooked cranberries turned sorta grey, plus they were pretty tart with nothing really balancing them out. The ham itself was good. So if the rest was just like a marinate it worked. The recipe was from the cookbook the Big Cook or something like that. It's got tons of recipes for things that you make in advance, (like 8 meals worth), then freeze in ziplock bags and throw in a slow cooker to cook (or barbeque or other things, I just liked the slow cooking). I really recommend the cookbook. Not that the recipes are so great, but just the idea of stocking up on meals is awesome. It actually recommends doing this with a couple friends, making 8 meals of a couple recipes each and then splitting it up. Fills your freezer and you'll eat good for months! (I just do it by my lonesome so far)

Yesterday after work I went shoe shopping with my sister. She bought some black boots, very nice, but $200. She had a gift certificate though so they were half price. Then we hit the mall for a couple hours, mostly just looking since we've got a big shopping trip this weekend. I bought a trail mix pack for $1 and shared that with her, then didn't eat my ham until 8:10! But I only ate my ham and a banana. Plus I didn't feel hungry and munchy like I usually do on thursdays (good tv night). So I call it a success.

No exercise though. Mall walking.

Tonight I've got to pack and get ready. We're only going for 1 night, leaving at 6:30 in the morning to get there at noon. I have a feeling it won't be a very relaxing weekend. At least this was a short work week. I'm planning on blowing a good $200 or $300 on myself. And when I have a hard time buying ANYTHING more than $20, it should mean a lot of loot!