Tuesday: Panic Tuesday, exercise version

Hello George!



I can't believe I am going to say this, but I think I need a new pair of cute black shoe-booties. I have tons of the style, I know, but they're red, grey, brown, fabric, burgundy, everything but simple black. These chunky oxfords are too chunky and heavy for the look I am trying to go for.



Anyway, I liked the rest of the outfit: my Max Studio green print dress, cream silk AT Factory sweater underneath, green Target tights, gold locket necklace, and a cropped balloon-sleeved jacket from Forth & Towne. The waist of the jacket hit exactly where the gathering for the dress does; it was much higher than my natural waist, of course, but I still liked the look. I am just crazy about the fabric and style of the jacket, but the cut makes it trickier than your average blazer. When I find an outfit it works with, it's a good day!



There was no Panic Tuesday at work today, mainly because I was the only one in the office so I was able to crank out a lot of projects. It did crop up during my run this morning; it's only two weeks to my 5K and I haven't yet run more than 25 minutes/2 miles straight. But my rhythm and speed during the run felt better than it did the previous week, and the time was extended to 28 minutes; my final distance was 20 laps, or 2 1/2 miles. I am still taking a lap in the middle to walk and catch my breath and bring my heart rate down, but by the end the panic had faded and I am beginning to think I will be able to complete the whole thing 11 days from now.

My husband was asking me how long I thought it would take me, so he can estimate how much time he has to stand around waiting with the camera (or go fishing at the harbor where I will be running LOL); last week I told him it would probably be at least 45 minutes. Now I am wondering if I should set a goal of 42 minutes. It is my 42nd birthday that weekend, and 42 minutes for my first run of 2010 has a nice symmetry, don't you think? 42 for 42!

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Thank you all for the kind words about yesterday's post. I enjoy looking back through the archives, either photos or words, to chart my evolution. I quit smoking six years ago this July, and since then I have actively worked on various parts of myself, be it my weight or my appearance, learning new hobbies and skills, taking up exercise, mastering new jobs, etc. For many years of my life I felt like change was undesirable, that history and fate and happenstance shaped you into the person you were and there was no way or reason to alter that. Who I was at 25 would be who I was at 40, at 60, etc -- because that's the way everyone in my family was and is.

Obviously, I know now that none of that is true. Consistency and steadiness have its place in my life, but they don't define me anymore. And I'm happier for it!

Monday: If it ain't broke

I am seeing many other bloggers starting to take outdoor photos and wearing lighter outfits as spring approaches. We just got another 4 inches of heart-attack snow dumped on us yesterday; spring is a long, long ways away in my neck of the woods! I have, however, been able to take my white puffer coat to the dry cleaner and been able to "only" wear my long wool coat instead. Yay?

Anyway, it's going to be winter wear here for a while at LFD. Which is fine because I've still got my new fab Alfani dress to enjoy! I wore the self-belt tied in back today so the bronze-brown scarf (a birthday gift from a friend) could take center stage. I remixed the new pointelle black cascading sweater from Target with it; it will kill me to hide those adorable sleeves with a longer sweater so I'm putting it off for another day. No closeup but I double-layered a black patterned tight with an off-black plain pair, and wore my rich brown Franco Sarto riding boots to finish it all off.





The scarf knot idea came from Une Femme d'un certain age, who has great scarf tutorials. This one is ridiculously easy but looks complex, and it's perfect for all the oblong scarves I have (which is a lot). Speaking of which, I've been exchanging emails with a reader about closet size and inventory, and I'm considering doing a post about it. My closet space is actually pretty small so I tend to assume my inventory is pretty small too, but in doing an actual count of items I don't think my analysis is correct. Would a post about my inventory, and clothes inventories in general, be interesting to anyone?

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Diet news: Had my official weigh-in Monday, and I am down 7.8 pounds. That's a killer first week on Medifast! Of course, losses will be much smaller after this, but I do like when that first week is a good one. I feel like it bodes well for the future.

The first week was rough until I reached ketosis on Sunday, but I stuck with it and didn't go off-plan. I suspect this time is going to be mentally much tougher than last year, as the snacking goodies in the office are multiplying. It's a very high-pressure environment of all women, and chocolate and cookies are at every meeting and on everyone's desk. Luckily, there is almost always fruit too, so I'm going to concentrate on that when I am ready to join in again. For now, I bring my tastiest, snackiest bar in with me and leave it right in front of my notebook.

I added running back into my routine yesterday as well, restarting Week 7 of the C25K plan. It's only three more weeks to the St. Pat's 5K, and I will be ready!

Okay, it's only 5:15 but it's about time to start getting ready for work. I have a full plate of internal meetings all morning and a metric ton of desk work to do; going in extra-early seems like a good idea today...

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P.S. Jane at The Small Fabric of My Life has issued the Spring Wardrobe Capsule Challenge for next week. Who's participating? I found it great fun last fall, and will be doing it again. I'm already hemming and hawing over what my 10 items will be. It's much trickier than you think!

Tuesday: Eat Your Heart Out, Lilly Pulitzer!

Wow, hello! Looks like I have a bunch of new readers from that very nice mention of LFD over on My Journey to Fit; thanks Shelley! Welcome, and I hope you enjoy my rambling posts. :) I don't have any hard-and-fast comment policy; I don't reply to all comments because I feel silly when I don't have anything to say in response except "thanks!", but if there is a question asked or I do have something more to add, I'll chime in. But of course, I love getting comments, and I try to either add your blog to my Google Reader and of course comment on your posts when I have time/something to say. Right now time is at a premium for me, but I am doing my best to keep an oar in the blogging water, as it were.

Anyway. Let's move on to why you're here. :)



I always feel old-school preppy when I wear pearls; it's an instant nostalgic throwback to my standard uniform at prep school, and this Donna Morgan dress only added to that ladies-from-the-tennis-club feel. Of course, I live in Chicago, not Palm Beach like Lilly Pulitzer, so I added a cream turtleneck sweater from Nordstrom Rack, brown Franco Sarto riding boots, and another layered-tights experiment, this time navy tights under nude fishnets.





I am sure I have worn this entire outfit before. Yep, I sure did! Even mentioned the pearls then, too. I am nothing if not predictable!

But it's a easy outfit that doesn't take long to put together, and right now I need that. I'm figuring out my new schedule for work, and juggling getting in my exercise with going in almost an hour earlier than I used to. I did manage to get in Week 6 Day 1 of C25K yesterday, which was a big relief, and I am headed out shortly to do Day 2. I can't get off my running routine after only 6 weeks. That's just unacceptable. As it is, my eating is just starting to come back to normal, but there is a lot of little candies around my new office, no convenient cafeteria, and a whole new rhythm to the day to learn. Eating healthy snacks is going to be a struggle there, methinks. I will need to stock up this weekend with plastic spoons and other staples -- they don't even have them around for my yogurt!

The next three days are all meetings with users and executives so I will be dressing up in "professional business attire"...which is pretty much what I wear now, except with less-cute dresses. :) I'll try not to make them too boring.

Oh, and all my new readers need to meet George. He is a frequent visitor to the blog, since he is a complete attention-hog. Hello, George!

Walk or Run?

As I've discussed before, one of my New Years Resolutions is to run 5Ks this year. I am working through the Couch-to-5K program for the second time, getting my lungs and my legs back in shape to run 30 minutes at a stretch; I am on Week 5 now and it's going very well.

But my new co-workers/long-time friend was recently diagnosed with breast cancer, and she asked me (and others) if I wanted to do the Avon Walk for Breast Cancer, which is a 2-day event where you walk a marathon one day and a half-marathon the next. She ran the Chicago Marathon last year, and does triathlons and other events regularly. I was intrigued of course, not just because I want to do something for my friend but also because one day I will walk or run a marathon. That's in the long-term picture, and I wondered if there was a reason why it was coming up sooner than I anticipated.

I have been considering it; if I agreed, then I would need to start training immediately after the St. Pat's 5K, and for the next three months, work on long walks and probably not do 5Ks at the same time. Which meant my New Years resolution probably would not be achieved. I would still be exercising and it would be a new challenge to accomplish, but it wasn't my original plan. But my friend would be thrilled, and I found out another friend was also planning on doing it and we could train together. The appeal was pretty strong.

Still, I felt like I was letting myself down. Walking a marathon for breast cancer is a noble idea, and I know I would have a lot fun doing it and it would be great exercise and a good discipline lesson etc etc etc, but deep in my gut I was disappointed. Jessie and I talked about it while we were out on Saturday, and she pointed out that I do very well with a series of small mini-goals, as well as just having a competitive nature; running a bunch of small races fit who I am much better than training for a marathon. I realized that it isn't right for me right now; right now I want to be a 5K runner.

So that's what I am going to do. I will donate to both my friends who are walking, and I may even join each of them for a couple of miles that day, but I am doing to stick with my 5K plan. I feel better already about my decision.

And there are SO many to choose from! The heart of the season looks like it is in the summer months, but I can find at least one race every month all year long. I am definitely signing up for the St. Paddy's Day 5K Run/Walk and Leprechaun Leap on March 14th; that's my birthday weekend and we will be staying downtown already. Ooooh, that is the weekend of the Dyeing of the Chicago River and the parade; I love being part-Irish and being born 4 days before St. Patrick's Day. It has always been "my" holiday.

After that, I will coordinate my races with local fishing holes that Hubby may want to explore, and see if we can't find reasons for both of us to go to various small towns around the area.

Yeah, I like this plan a lot. It's right for me.

13-in-13 Challenge: Week 7 complete

I am writing the bulk of this post before I head out to my WW meeting, and I will enter the weight loss section when I get back. I had a really good week with food and exercise and mental readiness, and I want to look back at that before I know how that translated on the scale.

Anyway, as you may or may not remember, last week was really rough, and I actually skipped my WW meeting for the first time since the summer. I am thinking of that as a hard reboot; you know, when your computer gets so overloaded after running without turning it off for a long time, and just the act of rebooting it resets all the running applications and cleans up any problems you are having. That's what missing last week's meeting was like for me. I hope!

1. LOSE WEIGHT.
(For continuity's sake, my last weigh-in on January 9 was 182, and that was a -4.2 pound loss. I checked my home scale last week before I bailed on the meeting, and I was up to around 184. I will be delighted if I am close to where I was on the 9th.)

ETA after meeting:
Weight: 180.6
LOSS: -1.4

WooooooohOOOOOOOOOOOO!!!!!!! The reboot worked! Thank goodness.

2. Eat one vegetable-based meal a day.
Accomplished!

I did grab a cheeseburger at McDonald's one day, but it was a salad for dinner so I kept it under control. We celebrated my job offer at Sweet Tomatoes, not some upscale restaurant where I would have eaten all the wrong things ad had some wine to boot.

Interestingly, I had to eat on the run a second day so I stopped at Quizno's, and I ordered the honey mustard chicken salad because on the menu it looked like the most reasonable option with the most vegetables. Then I looked it up on Dotti's Weight Loss Zone site, and nearly had a heart attack: it was 28 points!!!! It was the highest-point item on the menu. Sheesh!

3. Do at least 2 different types of exercise each week.
Week 4 of C25K is complete, and it felt darned good. I purchased some running tights instead of wearing my too-short yoga pants, and I can really see the difference this is making on my dupa in my window reflection. The running pattern in W4 is 3 minutes, 5 minutes, 3 minutes, 5 minutes, and I was starting to feel like I was pushing it at last in the 5-minute intervals. Next week are 3 sets of 5 minutes, and I'm looking forward to seeing how I adjust.

That said, I did not get a second type of exercise in, but I am starting to feel restless. I need to find another routine for my off-running days. Hmmm, will ponder this more...

4. Limit my sweets/dessert/treats to 3-4 per week.
Like I said, I did not go the traditional route for celebrating my new job, and on Friday night, when all I wanted to do was go out to dinner and drink wine with my husband I instead had a big bowl of spaghetti squash and meatballs. Every time I was tempted I thought, "I want a good weigh-in on Saturday, I want a good weigh-in on Saturday," and that was enough to keep me on the straight and narrow.

AND (counting it up in my Tracker) I kept the sweets indulgences down to 4 this week. Wow, good for me; didn't think I had done it, but I did! I've been substituting clementines or flavored yogurt for when I have a sweet tooth and it looks like it's been working. What a Splurge mentioned that one of the new habits she developed last year was to have a bowl of fruit along with her breakfast every morning, and I have been trying to do the same. Those little clementines are perfect for when I don't have time to eat before I leave for work, and I have pineapple and canteloupe to cut up for this week.

So yeah, things are coming along a little better this week. Next week, the goal is get rid of that pesky 8 in the middle of my weight. 170s, I am aiming for you!

13-in-13 Challenge: Week 6 complete

Let's just jump right in and recap my commitments.

1. LOSE WEIGHT.
Weight: ????
LOSS: I doubt it.

I did something I haven't done in five months: I skipped my WW meeting. On purpose.

I just did not want to go this week. I ate horribly all week, and I knew I had gained at least a pound back. I did not want to see that on my tracker, I wanted my Saturday morning to myself, and I decided that I would skip for ONE WEEK ONLY and see what happens. So I did, and I got a lot accomplished at home instead. I wish I had had a better week, but I don't feel guilty about skipping and my commitment is strangely renewed despite not going.

2. Eat one vegetable-based meal a day.
Hmmm, what does it say in my tracker? (I did track eventually, on Thursday I went back and made myself write down everything I had been eating. It wasn't pretty.) Ah, here it is: I did this 2 out of 7 days. Blerg.

3. Do at least 2 different types of exercise each week.
I completed Week 3 of C25K; this meant doing 2 rounds of 90 seconds running, 90 seconds walking, 3 minutes running, 3 minutes walking. It felt good; I am looking forward to increasing my running times next week.

But I didn't get a second exercise type in this week. Hrm. Does taking down Christmas decorations count? :)

4. Limit my sweets/dessert/treats to 3-4 per week.
Oh, hahahaha. It wasn't my sweet tooth that got me this week, it was salty fast food. McDonald's, Taco Bell, McDonald's again...I don't know what caused the cravings -- probably my TOM -- but I fed it repeatedly. Blerg again.

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Okay. Not great. But it's a new week, I'm really looking forward to running, and I want to go back next Saturday to my meeting at least where I was last week. I'm going to keep tracking, keep eating my tasty bag of clementines, and make myself a nice batch of homemade sauce to eat with my spaghetti squash. I am halfway through my 13-week challenge now and I am still 1.8 pounds OVER where I started. 13 pounds obviously isn't realistic anymore, but I do want to have made some headway before I get to my birthday. So...onward!

13-in-13 Challenge: Week 5 complete

Well, this was a much better week than the first 4, on all fronts.

Let's review the commitments:

1. LOSE WEIGHT.
Weight: 182.0
LOSS: -4.2

Well, hallelujah!! First loss in months. Months! Heh, it's amazing what tracking, eating less, exercising, and not drinking boozy concoctions will do.

Of course, future losses will not be as high as this -- they never are after the first week -- but as long as it continues to go down, it's all good.

2. Eat one vegetable-based meal a day.
Completed this every single day, and on some days had two.

3. Do at least 2 different types of exercise each week.
I got in my 3 days of Week 2 of the C25K plan; setting the days to MWF has made a big difference in my commitment. I am actually looking forward to my next run tomorrow!

That said, I didn't exercise much on my off-days; sure on Saturday I did go to the Art Institute and walk all over that place for hours, but it's not the same. However, I have been feeling stiff and sore in my pelvis and back the last couple of days, so I did a half-hour of Wii yoga this morning, and that helped immensely.

Whoo! That makes it two types of exercise in a week! Check mark next to this one too!

4. Limit my sweets/dessert/treats to 3-4 per week.
Sunday -- tiny yogurt cone at Sweet Tomatoes
Wednesday -- 4 squares of Toblerone
Thursday -- 4 squares of Toblerone
Friday -- cookie at lunch, 1/2 brownie and frozen yogurt at Sweet Tomatoes, crackers and Better'n'Peanut Butter at night
Saturday -- tiny cookies and a small cranberry scone at the Russian Tea Room, 2 glasses of wine with dinner
Sunday -- crackers and Better'n'Peanut Butter for lunch

I can do better next week. At least the Toblerone is almost gone. Then there is no chocolate I like in my house; that's the hardest thing.

I am noticing I am falling back on my peanut-butter-and-crackers habit too much, even with the fake peanut butter. It's my comfort food, hands-down. I think I am going to need to banish the fake stuff from my house for a bit. (The crackers are already gone.) It's the only way I can control it. Believe me, I've tried.

Anyway, it was a very good week, and next week is shaping up well too. Now it's time to start prepping dinner: roasted bone-in chicken thighs with 20 cloves of garlic, carrots and sweet potatoes. They all roast together in a pan for an hour, mmmmmm, so sweet and softy and garlick-y...

Can you tell it's my womantimes? I'm so food-obsessed, LOL!

Wednesday: Twirly

I guess the next time I feel all twirly I should make sure my slip isn't showing. Hee.

I loved this outfit. I was warm but it was nicely fitted and, I don't know if I've said this yet, but my skirt was all twirly. I love this skirt.



The sweater is new from BR, a "gift" from "my husband" (read: I bought it for myself, wrapped it and signed his name to it). I don't own a lot of green, but I love a good dark pine. I couldn't resist this.

I paired it today with my ponte Vocabulary skirt from F&T, just one pair of tights (gasp), grey Franco Sarto oxford booties, thick black woven belt, and my mustard paisley silk scarf from Target. I wish I had knotted the scarf; it kept loosening all day, but knotted was too tight. I need to find another way to fold the next scarf I wear with this.



Completed Week 2 Day 2 of C25K this morning. It feels so good to be in an exercise routine again! I think this might be pretty sustainable; I make sure I leave around 6, a little after my husband leaves for work, and I am ready for a shower by 7. It's kind of smugly satisfying getting to the gym before it's even light out, I have to admit.

(Yeah, we get up early. Usually between 4 and 5. I know it's crazy early, but I'm so used to it now I feel like I have wasted the whole day if I get up at 7. And I used to be the girl in college who slept until 11 almost every day...)

Monday: The first of the turtleneck parade

(Not a great photo, sorry. I was running very late!)

It is COLD. When I left for work, it was 5 below with the wind chill. That is crazy cold. Even my white puffer and lined leather gloves weren't enough to keep me warm crossing the parking lot to the office. It's going to be like this all week, so expect a parade of turtlenecks and cozy, thick sweaters.

I'm sorry the photo didn't turn out, because the ON ribbed turtleneck is a great bright fuschia pink, and I loved the way it stood out against the statement M+O jacket. I wore that open today, which I swear looked better than it does here. Added my pewter BR lariat necklace, black Semantics pants, and my sturdy Franco Sarto heeled loafers, and I was good to go.

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Week 2 of the Couch-to-5K plan progesses! This week is 90 seconds of running alternating with 2 minutes walking. I'd forgotten how they ease you into running at first; the pace is reasonable and do-able. You don't feel daunted by the idea of running, you know? And it makes you want to keep going to the next week, when you can push yourself further and further until hey, you just ran a 5K!

If you are interested in the idea, there's a website here. I bought an app for my iPod which announces the pace over my music, keeps track of my time, and tells me when to switch between running and walking. It was like $4 and worth every penny!

Tuesday: The History of the Mustard and Pink Scarf

I was skimming through old posts last night and I realized this is a formula I often adopt when I am feeling lumpy and fat: dress + cardigan + big colorful scarf to distract and cover everything up. This variation is a skirt and turtleneck instead of a dress, but you get the idea. Not that I really care if it's a formula; it's one that works for me and I certainly have enough scarves that I could wear one a day for a month and not repeat myself, and probably longer.

This particular scarf is actually more of a wrap; I bought it two summers ago to wear with a raspberry floaty-tiered dress to my niece and nephew's bar/bat mitzvahs. I spent so much time and effort finding all the right pieces for that outfit; I ordered the dress from Igigi, a large-size online dress store, I found a matching raspberry clutch from another online store, the shoes were a lovely light gold strappy sandals that took forever to find in real stores, and then there was this scarf. This gorgeous, expensive silk wrap with Pucci-style pattern with a fabulous mix of mustard and pink, two colors I don't think I had ever, ever seen together but somehow worked here. I paid a ridiculous amount of money for it, but the color combination delights me to this day.

That said, this is the first time I've worn the scarf since the bar mitzvah. We took family portraits at the party, and my sister-in-law had them all professionally framed and gave them as Christmas gifts to each of us last year. When I unwrapped the photo, I was shocked; all that effort I had put into looking pretty in my perfectly put-together outfit, and in the end all I could see was how FAT I was. How huge my husband and I both were, standing uncomfortable and sweaty in our suit and heels to the side of the rest of the family, how visibly uncomfortable we both looked in our own skins.

A week after opening the photo, both of us had started Medifast and began shaving that weight off. A hundred-plus pounds and nearly a year later, we're far away from that unhappy couple in the photo, but it's a moment captured forever anyway. It's on the wall in our office, it's the main photo visible in every one of my in-law's houses. There is no getting away from that reminder of the moment when reality crashed into my fantasy of what I looked like, and so for a long time I just stuffed this pretty wrap in the back of my scarf drawer and pretended I had lost it. Finally yesterday I took it out of hiding and put it on again. It's not the scarf's fault I hate that photo!



Man, it is still so pretty. Maybe I should think of that when I look at that photo. I'm going to wear this pretty scarf more often, give it new memories. It deserves that. I deserve that.

Lastly, here's a tip for those of you who want to try layering your tights: don't layer two pairs of Spanx together, unless you want to spend all day feeling like sausage casing that is about to explode at any minute and could possibly take out a corridor wall when you blow. (Hee.) A regular pair of tights and Spanx together is fine, but two Spanx makes moving and breathing a chore, and putting yourself back together after going to the bathroom is damned near impossible. Let my torture be a lesson for you all! :)

But I did love the texture combo from the tights and skirt together!



Sweater #1: cream ribbed turtleneck, Old Navy
Sweater #2: Grey boyfriend cardigan, Martin + Osa
Skirt: textured black pencil skirt, Forth & Towne (part of the suit with the ribbon waist, Shopping Friend!)
Tights: floral black and plain black, both Spanx
Boots: black Vince Camuto cowboy wingtips, Nordstrom
Scarf: pink and mustard silk wrap, Von Maur

ETA: Day 2 of Week 1 of the Couch-to-5K plan is complete!
ETA2: The Glee soundtrack(s) are kind of addictive. Don't tell anyone I admitted that.

16-Week Commitment Challenge: Week 6 complete

Before I start my weekly commitment challenge assessment, I want to gloat a bit about my accomplishments this morning. Technically, today's exercise will count toward this week's total, but still I ran a 5K today!

It felt pretty good; I honestly didn't think I was going to be able to run the whole way, and the last half-mile was especially brutal, but I never stopped and I never gave in. My time was 38:01, which was fine by me; I said I would be happy with anything under 40 minutes, and I am. I came in #356, and my girlfriend who ran with me was about 3 seconds faster. She's training for her first marathon, so she's allowed to beat me. :)



I feel great, and I'm definitely going to keep running as part of my workouts, but I won't lie, it was HARD. I'll be ready for another one...eventually. :)

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Otherwise, how did I do this week with my goals?

1. Attend WW meetings every week without skipping any.
I got a Bravo sticker for talking about this challenge; the other members were pretty impressed I've been keeping myself accountable on the blog like this. Hee!

2. Exercise 4 days a week minimum.
I ran Monday, Wednesday, Friday in preparation for the 5K. Whoohoo! I think the next step is to get myself into regular days/nights for workouts; I've been doing it "flexible" style so I could accommodate any meetings, etc, but the truth is our lives are pretty steady. I need a firm schedule.

3. Count my points in my Tracker.
Nope. But I'm going to try this week!

4. Cut back on the alcohol to 1-2 drinks a week.
Yep, just a sangria when we went out for Mexican on Thursday. But I'm realizing that Fridays are VERY tough; all I want to do each Friday is have some beer and pizza, or anything unhealthy and extravagant, and really does take a sheer force of will to remind myself weigh-in is the next day and I would like to see some good results. I'm going to see what I can do to work around that Friday longing.



I am feeling like the ship is finally turning around and may just avoid the iceberg in time; I'm no longer gaining like crazy, and the habits I am trying to create with each goal of this challenge are beginning to settle into my brain and my routine. These are all things I WANT to do differently, but for the first time I am feeling like they're not as far away as they were.

To use a different analogy, I am starting to see the finish line now. BUT. I think I need to remember what happened today when we made our last turn into the park and could see the finish line for the first time. I wasn't able to sprint toward it immediately; I was very quickly reminded that just because I could see didn't mean the race was over. My heart was racing in my chest, my breathing was terrible, and my legs were screaming for me to stop and walk. But I wasn't done; there was still another 1/4 mile to go. There were times as we plodded through that last bit that it felt like the finish line was moving farther away! It wasn't until the very very end, only a few yards to go, that I was able to pick up the pace and run over the line. I thought I would do that from further away, but I couldn't. I HAD to keep my steady pace until I was steps away.

I need to remember that on this journey.

Wednesday: The newest sheath comes out to play

If I could have gotten away with wearing the outfit on the right, I would have. But it's getting a little cool now, especially in my freezing office, so I wore the cardigan to work.

The draped neck of the sheath doesn't work well, or need, a necklace, so I left it bare and wore a gold cuff instead. I loved the smoke blue and the mustard together, but I wore this particular sweater because the detail of the yoke served nicely as a necklace substitute.



The pockets continue to delight me.



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My 5K is on Sunday, my first one in years. I've been going slowly through C25K, and will only get Day 1 of Week 9 complete before then. I think I am ready anyway. :) It will be fun, running through the city early in the morning, and then my husband will take me out for pancakes. Where's the downside? I ask you!

I am so behind on commenting on all the blogs I follow. I need to try to catch up tonight, sorry you guys!

16-Week Commitment Challenge: Week 5 complete

Well, this was not a good week on any of my goals, but I still need to do my weekly assessment!

1. Attend WW meetings every week without skipping any.
This is a regular habit now, thank goodness. I'm even beginning to recognize the regulars.

2. Exercise 4 days a week minimum.
Um. I must be freaking out in some contrary, subconscious way about signing up for the 5K next Sunday, because I exercised exactly ZERO times this week! What the heck?

I'm not going to make any grand pronouncements about it, I am just going to get it done. I will be competing in the 5K no matter if I finish the C25K plan or not.

3. Count my points in my Tracker.
Nope.

4. Cut back on the alcohol to 1-2 drinks a week.
Nope. The worst is that I end up having drinks and tons of salty food on Fridays, which bloats me up in time for my weigh-in the next morning.

I guess it's time to evaluate why I am self-sabotaging. This is not good. I'll work on it.

16-Week Commitment Challenge: Week 4 complete

Another week down! I am really glad that I've committed a 16-week stretch; knowing there's a long-range goal is helpful in accepting small victories or defeats. I'm easing myself out of the 'fast results' mindset of Medifast, and instead starting to aim for the horizon.

In other words, losing a little over a pound this week felt as great as it did when I lost 3 on a MF week. :)

Let's recap the 4 goals:

1. Attend WW meetings every week without skipping any.
Almost missed it because I was running late, but I made myself sit down and enjoy the meeting anyway. I also picked up a new cookbook called "Now and Later", which is two different meals from the same base ingredients. I could use those kinds of ideas!

2. Exercise 4 days a week minimum.
I got 3 "real" exercise sessions in, and then did hours of yardwork on Saturday. which I am counting as exercise since my muscles are sore today. :)

But the true victories here were two: I dusted off the Wii Fit and started doing morning yoga sessions again (which will be great at firming up my core and waist, which has gotten flabby again), and I signed up for a 5K on September 27th. So I definitely have to complete the last 5 days of C25K before then! LOL.

3. Count my points in my Tracker.
Didn't do this at all. Ill try again this week. I need the honest accountability.

4. Cut back on the alcohol to 1-2 drinks a week.
A couple of pear martinis at dinner last night, and that was it.

+++++

I think it's time to drill down and concentrate on better eating. I do well with menu planning, so I'm going to try that this week. I've got today wide open, so there will be fridge cleaning and shopping and maybe a little food prep.

But first, there will be some outfit photos. I've been buying some new dresses and I think some are too similar to ones I already have. So it's time for a deathmatch! Stay tuned for details... ;-D

Monday: New Haircut

It's official: my hair is too short. The cut is fine, but it's just too short all over. I took this side shot so I would remember how truly short it is. Pretty, but too short; impossible to style! It floofs up at the bottoms on the sides, and it's just too cutesy by half. Ugh, now I need to find a new way to style it so it's doesn't floof anymore.

With the last week of official summer upon us, I decided it was time to wear the cute pink dress outfit I didn't wear at the picnic last month. I liked this and I felt cute, but it was strange knowing I was in a spaghetti-strap sundress at the office. The cuteness got me over it. :)

Dress: Converse One-Star cotton sundress, Target
Shirt: embroidered t-shirt, AT Loft
Belt: elastic-and-patent belt, AT
Sweater: cropped bolero, AT Factory
Shoes: Me Too black ballet flats

++++

Did Week 6 Day 3 of C25K today: 25 minutes running. It was brutal, even though I practically skipped through the same workout on Saturday. Today I could barely jog. Weird!