Adventures in weight loss

I promised you all when I started trying to lose weight that I wouldn't let my blog be overran with calorie counts and exercise routines. But I wanted to give you a little update.

Let me start by saying, I've always been the last to care about my weight or others for that matter. I would even get annoyed when people would talk about such things. To me, happiness comes from the inside. If you can't be happy with your inner self, then you will never be happy with the outside.

I have been steady gaining weight for the last four or five years. No losing. Just gaining. For the first time in my life, I started trying to lose weight about five weeks ago.

I allow myself one soda per week versus one or two a day. And let me tell you, that one soda a week is one of the highlights of my week. Every week. I can almost taste it now. Bubbly goodness. Oh wait, back to things I've been doing. I also switched to sugar free red bull. I have one in the morning instead of the regular stuff. I had a regular one the other day and I could barely drink it. And I switched to sugar free creamer for my coffee. Instead of eating whatever strikes my fancy for lunch, I've been eating a lot of salad and soup and whatnot. I drink more water during the day and when I get home. For dinner I've been making a lot of baked fish and chicken.

I've been thinking about cutting red meat out all together. I've done it before, not to lose weight though. I was because when I was in college the first time the cafeteria meat products, except for chicken, were so disgusting that I couldn't eat them. I didn't eat red meat for another year after that. Anyway, as far as what I've been eating and drinking those are the changes I've made.

As far as exercising goes, I try to ride my Gazelle whenever I can. I've had a cold for the last week or two so I've been slacking on riding it but I stay pretty busy so I figure that burns some calories. I've also been trying to sit on the couch less in the evenings. I try to find stuff to do to keep me moving until bedtime.

I have lost 11 pounds to date. My clothes are fitting better already and I feel like I have more energy. At this rate, I'll be able to wear a swim suit by Christmas.

Hope you are all having a good week!

New addition to our family

There has been a new addition to our family. His name is Vinnie. He's 7 weeks old and the cutest little guy I've ever seen. (Well besides Ozzy when he was a baby.)

I tried to stand my ground, I really did. Matt has wanted a puppy since he came back from Iraq. I told him we had to wait to get a house. Then I told him we had to wait until the spring. Then I told him we had to wait until we built the garage so they would have a bigger fenced in area to run around in.

It's been getting increasingly harder to keep Matt from driving me nuts about it desperately wanting one. I caved.

Vinnie is actually Ozzy's grandson. Ozzy is a full blooded Maltese. Vinnie's mom is Ozzy's daughter and Vinnie's dad is a full blooded miniature poodle, making Vinnie a Maltipoo. Matt wanted a wiener dog. I wasn't too fond of getting one because I've heard they have a lot of back problems, not to mention they shed terribly. Ozzy doesn't shed and he's hypoallergnic. I'm guessing Vinnie won't shed.

We got Vinnie last night. The plan was for him to sleep in the pet carrier. I don't want him in bed with us until he is old enough to know to wake us up when he needs to go outside and not to play. He cried terribly for about an hour. He would stop for about two minutes and then start back up. He sounded miserable. Matt said he couldn't take it anymore and he was going to sleep on the couch with him until he went to sleep. I told him to take Vinnie outside and then put him in bed with us. He slept for a couple hours and then woke up and started chewing on Matt's ear. Matt put him back in the pet carrier and then we all went back to sleep.

I'm getting a puppy pen today from work for him to stay in while we are at work. Ozzy is allowed the run of the house while we work and has a doggy door to go out and do his business. He doesn't make messes. (Matt may or may not leave the Animal Planet on for him to watch.) Vinnie is too little for that. I'm afraid he could get out of the fence. So puppy pen for him. He'll get used to it and when he gets bigger he will have more privileges.....

if daddy doesn't spoil him rotten before then.

Award!

I received yet another award this week from Jessie @ What You Wish For and A Lady in Waiting @ A True Long Distance Relationship. Thank you both for the award. I love getting a little inspiration to have something to blog about.

The rules of this one are to list ten thing that make me happy and then pass it along to ten different blogs.

10 things I love:

1. My husband. Duh.

2. Cardinal baseball. Enough said.




3. Spring. We haven't had "spring" here in a couple years so I'm loving this one.

4. Ozzy. He's such a good dog.

5. My parents... They've always been there for me.

6. My sister... my BFF.



7. My little brother... It still scares me how old he is getting. He's so responsible and such a hard worker. I wish I had half the sense he has when I was his age.

8. The fact that my whole family is nuts. (Not in a Jerry Springer kind of way)



9. My friends that still like to have fun.

10. Any and all Texas Country concerts



Now on to passing this along to ten blogs. Well, since I just spent too much time uploading all the pics and I've seen this award all over the place in the last week I might not make it to 10. We'll see.

Missy @ Everything But the Kitchen Sink

Kate @ Sometimes Life is Messy

Christina @ Sugar Sweet Thoughts

Dawn @ Must Love Tots

Rose @ Desert Rose Moments

Mrs B @ FromOurPlaceToYours

Dani @ Hard Corps Love

Bridget @ Always an Adventure

If you round up, that's ten. Have a great weekend!

Home sweet camper

Our Scamp

The kitchen

The other side of the kitchen

Couch in the front of the camper & fridge in the bottom corner

Table folds down into a bed

I picked out the material and beads for the curtains and my mom sewed them for us. They were orange before. I'm not a big fan of orange. Matt's going to give it a bath tomorrow.

We are taking it out this weekend and camping with my parents, my brother and his girlfriend, and a couple friends of ours. Can't wait.

TGIF

This week has seemed like an incredibly long one. School, work, school, work. I had a test Tuesday in my Business class and I got 30/25. The teacher grades on a curve and I have gotten over 100% on every test. I also had a paper due in that class Thursday. I had to evaluate a company's stock. Seriously, I didn't know jack squat about that sort of thing before I started the paper. Google is such a good friend of mine.

My Algebra class is getting increasingly more difficult. It's all pointless to me. I'll learn it but I can't see ever using it in real life. I'm getting an A though so I'm happy.

Honestly, I can't wait for this semester to be over. I'm ready to not have to go sit in a classroom when it's so nice out. This summer I'm taking Accounting for Dummies online. That's not really what its called but that's basically what it is.

I started my new second job. I love it. I sling beers at a Veteran's club. The first night I worked I made $132. On my first night. The thing is I didn't really do this for the money. I just want something to do while Matt does drill and stuff. I'll probably work there like 2 or 3 days a month.

Tonight I'm going on a friend of mine's bachelorette party. She's getting a party bus. She's pretty laid back so hopefully there are no penis balloons or straws or anything like that. I'm not a fan of fake penis paraphernalia. The hubby is going to pick me up when the bars close.

We bought the camper last night. We are going to do some stuff in there this weekend so early next week I'll post pictures. Promise.

Hope you all have a great weekend!

I prefer random posts

* It's drill weekend again. But I'm super pumped to report that I got the part-time job that I wanted. I start tomorrow night. I won't be working there very much until this semester is over. I hope its fun, if not, it probably won't last long.

* Matt's going to school. We went to the community college here yesterday and got all the paperwork done. Illinois has an Illinois Veteran's Grant. So that will pay for his school, and the GI Bill will make a generous deposit into our checking account each month. He's going to do a tech program to be a heating/air conditioning man. He hates when I tell him that I am proud of him or that he's my hero or anything like that. But I can definitely tell all of you. I'm so proud of him. It's something he wants to do and I know school isn't his thing.

* We went and looked at a Scamp yesterday evening. My parent's friend's daughter has one and her and her husband just had another kid and it won't be big enough for them. It's 13 feet long. It's so cute and different and hippie. The price they want is less than half of any we have seen for sale online. We told them we would let them know Monday but we've decided we want it. If/when we get it all make sure to post some pictures. You can make fun of us/it if you want. We like it and that's all that matters.

* I've lost 7 pounds so far. Working out sucks. And I'd still kill for a Pepsi but I guess when I can wear all my jeans again, it will be worth it.

* Hope you all have a great weekend!

Write On! 2nd edition

I'm linking up with Tattoos and Teething Rings today for the Write On assignment. The prompts were as follows:

1) Write about a memory involving food. It can be a happy memory that brings you back to your childhood, or something really embarrassing that you'd rather forget. My vote is embarrassing, but that's just how I roll.

2) Write about your worst personality trait or bad habit. Be honest; none of this "My worst habit is that I'm so kind to everyone...blah blah blah." Time to fess up! (And, since you are aware of this bad habit or trait, is there a reason you haven't changed?)

I'm choosing to write about the 2nd prompt. What is my worst personality trait or bad habit?


Just one huh? One personality trait of mine that ranks as one of the worst is that I'm a worrier. Not a warrior either, a worrier.

I worry constantly.
I worry about assignments I have coming up in school.
I worry about what classes to take next semester.
I worried every day Matt was in Iraq.
I worry about when I'm going to have time to clean the kitchen floors.
I worry about what I'm going to wear tomorrow.
I worry about loosing weight this week.
I worry about running out of money.
I worry about what people think of me.
I worry about things that have happened in the past.
I worry about what the future.
I worry about a big dog attacking Ozzy when we go for walks.
I worry about Matt when he goes to drill.
I worry about having time to do everything I want to do.
I worry about pretty much everything.

I'm not perfect.

Camping

This past weekend, the hubby and I went camping with my parents, my brother, and his girlfriend. Matt and I both got off work early Friday. He got off earlier than I did and had most of our stuff packed and ready to go when I got home.

Friday night my dad cooked some fish in his dutch oven and I made some cheese dip. I went to bed semi-early. Maybe I should tell you here that, to me, camping means sleeping in a tent. Mom and Dad have a camper and we could have stayed in there but I wanted to "rough it." Well, about 4 in the morning it starts raining. Not just sprinkling either.I just knew the tent was going to start leaking at any time. And it was cold. Too cold to sleep. I pretty much tossed and turn until 7:30 when I heard my dad cooking breakfast.

When I got up there was a puddle outside the tent. It stopped raining early that morning though and then it was beautiful out. Before the ground dried up, Ozzy had a blast playing in the puddles and then jumping on my lap.

Once, it warmed up we went hiking and saw a snake. I hate snakes. Dad and I did some mushroom hunting and found zero. Saturday evening my dad cooked a ham and some taters and mom made green bean casserole and cooked cabbage. I'm not usually a big fan of ham but this stuff was awesome.

We ate ourselves into a coma and took a nap until 8 or so. Then Dad and Matt and I sat around the fire and drank a ton of beer. It was a good time. Yesterday we got home and I did four loads of laundry and laid around on the couch most of the evening. I think Matt and I are going to look into getting a camper. I want a Scamp. They are little hippie campers.

Spring break is over and it's back to class for me tonight. Hope everyone had a great weekend!