Maintenance and Wed. Weigh-in

I will start by saying that I was SO happy with my weigh-in this morning!

At 137, I am officially back in my weight maintenance range. This doesn't mean that I'm going to try and maintain this weight, however. I need a little cushion ;)  I'm going to do my best to get back to 133, which is my goal weight.

This is from the Weight Watchers app

The funny thing is, I've never actually reached my goal weight... in my life. When I first started losing weight, my "happy weight" goal was 185. Well, that came and went, so then I chose 153 (100 lbs lost). Then I kept losing, and decided on 126--half of my starting weight. I eventually reached my lowest weight (December 2010, after my jaw surgery), which was 127.5. Once my jaw healed, I went up to 137 ish and stayed there for a while. My weight has been going up and down between 135 and 155 for a couple of years now.

A while ago, I changed my "official" goal weight to 133 (I felt really good there, and all my clothes fit nicely). About a year ago, after my skin removal surgery, I got as low as 134--just a pound from reaching goal!--and then the battle continued. I reached a very scary high weight a couple of months ago, at which point I started Weight Watchers (out of desperation to get back to goal).

And as of today, I've gotten back to my "happy range", but I still want to know how it feels to reach my goal weight! I know it's stupid to get hung up with numbers, but I've struggled with my weight my entire life, and I always dreamed of the day I'd reach my goal weight. Then I would feel like I was officially in maintenance mode, and no longer trying to lose.

I would like to get down to 133, just to have that feeling of reaching goal. And this time, I am going to have a maintenance plan. Since I never actually reached goal, I never had a maintenance plan. I expect my weight to fluctuate, but the goal is to fluctuate between 133 and 137 rather than 135 and 155. I've found that it's the last five pounds that actually make the biggest difference in how I feel and how I look. I was going through pictures today from just a couple of months ago, and I can see a huge difference from the beginning of September to now. I'll try and get a good comparison picture tomorrow.

So anyway, today was very exciting to actually get back in my maintenance range, and still feel strong going into the last four pounds.

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This afternoon, I worked on making a sparkle skirt. I took a ton of pictures, so I will turn it into a tutorial in case anyone else wants to make one. They're easy to make, and very fun to wear in a race. At the marathon, I got a LOT of compliments on it while I was running. Anyway, I made this for someone else, but I liked the color so much that I had to make one for myself as well:

Now I feel like I've got to find a Christmas-y race so I can wear it :)

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By the way, if you missed it a few days ago, I'm inviting any of my readers/followers who have a home-based crafting business (maybe an Etsy shop, or a website from which you sell your handmade crafts of any type) to advertise yourself on a blog post (for free). Just write up a paragraph or two about you and your craft (whatever you'd like) and include a picture or two, as well as a link to your site/Etsy shop, and I will compile all of them into a single post in a couple of weeks. I (obviously) love handmade items, and would love to help any readers who may want some exposure :)  Just send me an e-mail at SlimKatie (at) runsforcookies (dot) com.

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Jittery

Let me just say, I am so glad that today was election day, if only for the fact that the political phone calls will stop! I have Vonage, and one of the options I use is to have my phone calls ring on both my land line and my cell simultaneously. I can answer the call with either phone. This works great when I'm out and someone calls my land line--but it's not so great when I've gotten at least five political phone calls (recordings) a day!

This morning, I woke up at 4:00 and just couldn't fall back asleep for the life of me, so I finally went out to the kitchen to do dishes and clean up a little. Then I made some tea and sat to read e-mail. At around 6:00, I started feeling sick--my stomach felt gross, and my hands were shaking badly, and I was really jittery and anxious.

These are the exact things that happened to me when I used to drink coffee. I think I've gotten so sensitive to caffeine since giving up the coffee that even the caffeinated tea is affecting me in a bad way. The feeling only lasts for a couple of hours, but it's awful. I'm going to switch to caffeine free tea and see if that helps. Unfortunately, I happen to love black tea, which has a lot of caffeine (as far as tea goes, anyway; it still has much less than coffee).

On my running schedule today was three miles at a 10:24/mi (ish) pace. My dad came over to take the kids to the bus stop this morning (they love to play catch with a football or baseball with him before school), so I headed out for my run right after they left.

I ran the same route that I did yesterday (only this time was an "easy" pace, compared to yesterday's huffing and puffing). I had a sense of deja vu, because I came across a woman walking in the same spot that I saw her walking yesterday; and I saw three guys working on a roof in the same scenario as yesterday. My run was totally uneventful, which is usually a good thing.

When I got back to the house, Phoebe was waiting for me to let her inside. She had darted outside when the boys left for the bus stop, and she must have regretted it, because the temp was in the low-30's. I sat outside on the porch with her for a minute, so I could drink my water and cool off before going inside.

She looks pissed, doesn't she?

Last night before bed, I was having my usual glass of wine and Dove Promise, and I was amused when I saw what my "fortune" was on the chocolate wrapper...

Thank you, Dove. If only that were true ;)

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I've gotten kind of sporadic with the Reader Q&A post that I was doing on Sundays. Instead of doing 2-3 in a single post, I think I'll just include one question now and then on my daily posts. Here's one for today...

Q. You mentioned you drink a lot of water. Do you force yourself to drink it even when you're not thirsty? Sometimes I think to myself, "I should drink water now, but I'm not thirsty at all." 

A. I do drink a lot of water every day; sometimes I'm thirsty, but most of the time, I'm not. When I first started losing weight, I never wanted to drink water. I started making myself drink 16 oz. of water right when I woke up, and after a while, I actually felt like I needed it first thing in the morning.

Now, I tend to drink it on a schedule: If I have to run that day, I will wake up and drink 16 oz. Then I go for my run. When I'm done, I drink a full quart (32 oz). (If I'm not running that day, I drink 32 oz. right when I wake up). I have another full quart right after lunch. And most of the time, I'll have a third quart in the late-afternoon. So that adds up to over 100 oz. of water a day (and that's not including my tea!).

I don't think it's necessary to drink that much water, but I like being well-hydrated all the time. If I don't have enough water, my hands get puffy and I feel bloated. At first, I felt like I was constantly having to pee; but my body got used to the extra water after a couple of weeks, so now I'm not making dozens of trips to the bathroom ;)

One of the biggest things I noticed when I started drinking a lot of water is that my cravings for soda and beer went away. When I was obese, I drank Dr. Pepper and beer, because I craved the carbonation. The same thing happens to me now during races--I know I'm getting dehydrated when I start to think of cold beer ;) But as soon as I rehydrate with water, the craving goes away.

I couldn't find a picture of me drinking water, but I found a few where I was
drinking beer. So just imagine that's water in the frosty mug ;)

Here's a fun fact: When you lose weight, the fat gets broken down in a very complicated process, but eventually gets expelled in your urine, as well as carbon dioxide from your lungs (source). I like to use that fact to play mind games with myself in order to drink water and exercise--when I exercise, I'm expelling a lot of carbon dioxide from breathing more rapidly; and when I drink a lot of water, I have to pee more. Whether it's getting rid of fat or not, it certainly motivates me to do it! ;)

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TUTORIAL: Hemming Jeans Without Making Them Look Hemmed

I feel like I had a very productive day today! I love those kinds of days, where I feel busy all day, but not stressed. The morning was a little chaotic, however. I got the kids ready for school and as soon as they left, I had about 50 minutes to do my tempo run, shower, dress, and head out the door to meet Renee and Andrea for tea.

After lunch today, I decided to get crafty. I've been wanting to use my sewing machine for a while, and decided to hem some jeans that I've been meaning to hem for a couple of years. Yes, years. I remembered reading a tutorial on hemming jeans while keeping the original hem on them, so that they don't look goofy when you're done.

So I tried it out, and took some pictures to demonstrate. (I just Googled it to find the original place I read this, and you can find the tutorial here. It's much more detailed than this collage I threw together):

 

You can barely even see where it was hemmed--I love it! I did Jerry's jeans first, and was super excited with how they turned out, so I got out three pairs of my jeans and two pairs of yoga/running pants and did those as well. It was like I had a brand new wardrobe when I was done.


I was actually a little nervous for my tempo run, because I was going to try and keep my pace at around 8:42/mile. That's pretty fast for me, and I knew it would be tough. As soon as the kids got on the bus, I was ready to run. I started with a five minute warm-up at an easy pace, and then when my Garmin beeped, I started running hard for the next 25 minutes.

I loved it and hated it at the same time--it was hard, and I wanted to stop, but I was so happy to be running fast (for me). The weather was awesome again today--34 degrees :) It's funny how 34 degrees is "nice" in the morning for a run, but freezing when doing anything other than running!

I made it back to my house and didn't even get a chance to check out my pace because I had to jump in the shower. Later, though, I was very happy with how I did!

For the 25 minute tempo part, I managed to run an 8:32/mi pace. That's faster than my 5K PR (8:41/mi pace)! I'm kind of excited to run a 5K in the future, because I think I have a good shot at my sub-26:00 goal. It's going to be fun working on new goals now.

Today's run also got me to reach 1,000 miles for 2012!

After my run and super fast shower, I headed out to meet Renee and Andrea, and got there right on time. I ordered a caramelized pear tea, and it was really good. I was excited to hear about Renee's marathon. She had registered for the marathon in Indianapolis  when she decided not to run the NYC marathon (before they canceled it). She said up until mile 17 she was on target to qualify for Boston (she hadn't been training for that, but she thought maybe she could do it). Then her legs just kind of bonked, and it was all she could do to finish the race. She still finished in a great time, however--4:00:xx--just seconds over four hours.

When I got home, I made a "jalapeño popper grilled cheese" (from the HG cookbook). I was very impressed with it, and don't know why I never thought to add jalapeños to a grilled cheese before.

Working on the jeans kept me so busy all afternoon that I didn't even think to stop and have a snack. That almost never happens ;) Since I didn't have an afternoon snack, I had a lot of PointsPlus left after dinner, and chose to use them on a high-PP indulgence...

That would be Peanut Butter & Co. White Chocolate Wonderful peanut butter. What you see pictured is one serving (32 grams). Before my no-peanut butter challenge, I was probably eating 4 of those a day!

Yesterday marked eight full weeks of being binge-free... my longest streak since I was losing the weight. Giving up peanut butter for six weeks helped me a LOT. I have a hard time with having "just a little" of something--it's much easier for me to not have it at all, at least for a while.

I thought I might go a little nuts with the peanut butter once my challenge was over, but I haven't had much of it at all, actually. Today's spoon was the first full serving I've had. It was good, but I didn't feel the wanting to go back for a second spoonful, so that is good progress!

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Loving running again

The time change really screwed me up. I've been having a really hard time sleeping lately, and I wake up multiple times each night, feeling wide awake and ready to get out of bed--but that's not a very good idea at 2:30 in the morning! Anyway, I was watching the clock, waiting for 5:00 to roll around so that I could at least get out of bed at a "normal" hour.

Finally, Jerry came to bed a little before 5 (he works night shift sometimes, so he stays up all night on his nights off). He said, "Don't forget about the time change. The clock says 5:00, but it's 4:00 right now." I managed to sleep a little more on and off for the next couple of hours.

I got the kids up and ready for church with my parents, and then after they left, I went for a run. I had a 3.5 mile easy run on the schedule (10:34 ish pace). I don't really have a convenient 3.5 mile route around here, so I just decided to bump it up to 4 miles.

It was in the mid-30's again, so I dressed warm--Cold Gear pants, tech shirt with a fleece jacket, gloves, and ear warmer headband. When I started running, I knew I was going "too fast" for what my schedule said, but I am so sick of holding back my pace due to marathon training that I just decided to run however I felt like running. It was the perfect running weather! I absolutely love running in the cold.

I have been loving these shorter runs! I ran 5 days last week, and will probably do the same this week. I feel like my love/hate relationship with running is getting back to the "love" part. Running shorter and faster like this gives me that "runner's high" when I'm done, where I feel like I got a good workout. I love the feeling of my muscles and lungs feeling used. 

My knee hasn't bothered me one iota since the marathon. I really think that I am just not cut out for marathons, mentally or physically. My favorite race distance is a 10K. You run hard enough to feel like it's tough, but you still have to reserve some energy in order to make through the whole 6.2 miles. I think I'm going to try for my sub-55:00 (or maybe even 54?) 10K next year (current PR is 55:05).

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I made another recipe from the Hungry Girl To the Max cookbook for breakfast today. She writes about a method of cooking oatmeal that is supposed to increase the volume of the bowl of oats by using a huge amount of liquid to cook them. When I cook my oats on the stove, I usually use a 2:1 ratio of liquid to oats. The recipes in this book use more like 4:1.

I had the ingredients for the Maple Bacon Oatmeal, so I chose to make that. You're supposed to cook it much longer than typical oatmeal, so that it can absorb all the liquid; it took mine about 13 minutes of simmer time.

When I was done, the volume of the oatmeal was the same as if I had just used my normal 2:1 ratio. Obviously when you simmer liquid for a long time, it evaporates; so from now on, I'll just use the usual ratio and forget the whole "growing bowl of oatmeal" idea ;)

Using the bacon and maple syrup in my oatmeal was new to me, and it was really good!

For those of you that asked about the HG recipe book, here are my initial thoughts on it:

Negatives:

*It's not a good book for family cooking. A lot of the recipes are for just one serving, and there aren't many "family dinner" type foods.

*If you're not familiar with Hungry Girl, she uses a LOT of processed foods; so if you're avoiding processed foods, than you almost certainly wouldn't like this book.

*Most ingredients are in tiny amounts, so you end up with lots of leftover ingredients (ex. 1/4 cup of canned beans, or 1 Tbsp. caramel dip, etc). There are also tons of ingredients you probably wouldn't have on hand.

*Some of the recipes are nearly identical to others, with just a single ingredient change or two.

*Because of all the processed foods, most of the recipes are high in sodium.

*Portion sizes are tiny, in my opinion.

Positives:

*There are a LOT of recipes--650!

*There are some very unique combinations of foods that I never would have thought to try before.

*This is a great book for someone who lives alone, or is just cooking for him/herself.

*The recipes are pretty low-calorie, and the nutrition facts are included.

*There are two sections that have quite a few pictures. Not all recipes are pictured, but there are a lot that are. She does have a section on the website where you can see pictures of all the recipes, organized by chapter.

I've only made a couple of the recipes so I can't offer much on my opinions of the taste of the recipes. As I make more, I'll write about them. 

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Handmade with love

Last night, the boys stayed the night with my parents, so Jerry and I spent the entire afternoon and evening watching The Walking Dead--and I am now caught up to the third season. This morning, I woke up wanting to do anything other than watch TV today!

We ended up going to Sam's Club for a few things, and the boys ate lunch at the cafe while I shopped. (Remind me NEVER to go to Sam's Club on a Saturday again. Headache!) Things add up SO fast at Sam's Club! I didn't buy much, but it ended up costing well over $100. Looking at it, you would never think it would add up to that much:

Those grapes will be gone in no more than three days...

The only things not pictured are two coloring books that the kids picked out. I did buy a recipe book, which was expensive--$17--but when I was flipping through it, I thought I would actually make a lot of the recipes. It's the new Hungry Girl To the Max! book. I have a couple other books of hers, and I wasn't thrilled with them. I just never seem to have the ingredients on hand for anything. But this new book looked better, at least from what I could see at the store.

I chose one of the recipes to use for dinner tonight. Southwestern Meatloaf...

I had to change a few things--I used 93/7 ground turkey instead of the extra lean; I didn't cook the onions and peppers first (I just chopped them really small so they would cook in the oven); I used frozen corn; I added 1/2 tsp. cumin; and I quadrupled the chili powder to 1 tsp., instead of 1/4 tsp. I also divided it into four servings instead of five. It ended up being 6 PointsPlus per serving, which isn't bad at all!

A few of my readers have written me recently, asking if I'd like to do a review/giveaway of their crafts/handmade items on my blog. I try to keep all of my reviews/giveaways related to weight loss and fitness somehow, but it gave me an idea.

I absolutely love handmade items, and it would be awesome to "give back" to my readers who have home-based businesses by letting them promote their business or Etsy shop on a single blog post (for free, of course--consider it a "thank you" for reading my blog!). Basically, they can write a little about their home-based businesses for handmade items, and share a link. I will then compile them all into a single blog post.

So, if you are a regular reader/subscriber to my blog, and you have a home-based business that you would like to share with my readers, feel free to send me an e-mail. Please include whatever you'd like about your handmade items and how people can reach you or find your online shop.

Keep in mind, the purpose of this is NOT to bombard everyone with advertising, but to share what your business is about. For example, I know I have readers who make and sell handmade soap, paintings, and running tutus. Tell us a little about yourself and your craft, and include a link to where we can find you (and an example photo of what you make, of course).

You can do this in text format (with or without a photo) or an graphic ad that you create. If you choose to use a graphic, it must be 550 pixels wide or less (photos can be larger, but they will be resized to fit). I'm not going to specify an exact height, but I would think roughly no more than 400 pixels high should be enough.

I haven't exactly figured all the details out yet, but I thought I would at least see if there is any interest first. So if you're interested, you can e-mail me at SlimKatie (at) runsforcookies (dot) com.

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Speaking of handmade items, this is the time of year that I really get the itch to start making things! Yesterday, while watching The Walking Dead, I crocheted a new iPhone sleeve. I have a case for my phone, but it still gets jostled around in my purse, so I use a simple sleeve to keep it scratch-free. My old one was looking really dirty, so I got out some bright pink cotton to make a new one.

I slide the phone in and then use the loop to wrap lengthwise around it to hold the phone inside. It's not the prettiest sleeve, but it gets the job done, and I can still get to my phone quickly.

I also need to make the tutorial for the sparkle skirts that I promised to do a long time ago. I want a couple more colors, so I will try and get that done sometime this month.

Also this month, I plan to write a one-year update on my body lift surgery. I can't believe it's been a year already!!

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Long runs are all relative

If my plans hadn't changed because of the devastating effects of Hurricane Sandy, I would be writing this post from New York right now. But I am very happy with my decision not to go, and I'm grateful to be home and safe with my family this weekend. If you haven't heard, the NYC Marathon was also canceled--that is a very big deal! I've been hoping they'd make the decision to cancel. The whole thing just didn't feel right, with all the stuff going on there right now. I think they should have canceled it sooner than today, however. I'm sure a lot of people flew into NYC today for the race.

Since I would no longer be running the 5K in NYC on Saturday, I had to change up my running schedule. I took the 5K race off and added a long run for today.

Six miles.

It feels strange to call six miles a "long" run, after the marathon training I did, but I am SO happy to have my long runs be the distance that my short runs were all summer! I'll gradually build up my long runs again to 12 miles before the Ragnar Relay. Obviously, I'm capable of running 12 miles right now, but I am looking forward to a reduction in miles for the next couple of months.

I dressed in my UA Cold Gear tights and a long sleeved shirt with a (super bright yellow) t-shirt on top. I was going to be running on the shoulder of a busy road, so I wanted to be visible. It was in the mid-30's when I headed out this morning, and after a few miles, I actually wished I'd left my gloves and ear warmer headband at home.

The goal on my schedule was a 10:34/mi pace, but I just decided to run at whatever felt comfortable. There were a lot of cars on the road for the first couple of miles, and it was irritating to have to keep running onto the gravel shoulder every time a car was coming my way. A lot of cars move over into the other lane to give me some space, but I never trust a driver while I'm running, so I always play it safe and get over as far as I can when I run on the road. I do like running on the road, though--for some reason, the miles seem to go by faster.

I was feeling good for the last mile, so I picked up the pace a little. When I finished, I had that really great runner's high that I love!

When I uploaded my run, I saw that I am less than 8 miles away from reaching 1,000 miles this year. I always thought it would be cool to run 1,000 miles in a year--if you average it out, it's about 2.74 miles every single day. Reaching 1,000 miles will likely never happen again for me; I trained for and ran not just one, but two marathons this year. Since I'm not going to be doing another marathon, my mileage probably won't get up that high.

When you add up all those calories, it is the equivalent of 29 pounds of fat that I burned while running this year!

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Estelle has been obsessed with Noah's trick-or-treat bag. She always loves to climb inside of everything, but she was really into this bag. We picked her up while she was in it, and hung it up on our coat rack. She thought it was SO cool to be perched up and hidden like that. It was hilarious to watch her peek her head out, and then duck back inside.

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I've been watching The Walking Dead recently. I don't know how I agreed to watch it, because I absolutely HATE anything having to do with zombies (I even go out of my way to avoid watching zombie movies, because I think they're stupid). But Jerry absolutely loves the show, and I told him I'd watch the first episode of season one on Netflix.

Well, I watched it, and now I'm completely hooked! I still hate the zombie parts, but the majority of the show is more about the people that are surviving rather than the zombies; I've gotten really hooked on the story lines of the people, and I keep watching to see what happens next. Jerry cannot contain his excitement that I like the show ;)

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13 pounds of candy

So Halloween last night was cold, but at least it stopped raining for the trick-or-treaters. I volunteered to go pick my brother Brian up from the airport in the afternoon, and on the way home, we stopped at Kroger. I got a bottle of wine to have a glass while we sat outside that night. Then we went to my mom's house for dinner and to celebrate Mark's birthday before trick-or-treating.

I wasn't planning on eating cake, but my mom made homemade cupcakes with buttercream frosting, and I decided to eat one. I also planned on eating a lot of candy--I had survived the entire season so far without a single piece of Halloween candy, and I had promised myself that I could eat as much as I wanted on Halloween night.

After dinner, I had to drive Noah and Eli to meet up with Jerry, who was taking them trick-or-treating at his parents' house. Then I went back to my parents' house and sat outside near the fire. My dad always puts copper in the fire so that it makes different colors while it burns--it's really cooling looking, but the picture doesn't do it justice:

You can see a little of the blue and purple there. The fire felt great, because it was freezing outside. I brought a long, warm winter coat, gloves, and a hat, and I was still cold. I was drinking red wine, which you are supposed to drink at a warmer temp (about 60 degrees, give or take) and by the time I was halfway through my glass, the wine had gotten too cold (of course I finished it anyway!).

My parents were giving out Reese's Cups and Kit Kat bars (full size ones), and I chose to have the Reese's. I went home at 8:00, and the boys came home about a half hour later. They had SO much candy! We weighed their bags, and they each had 6 1/2 pounds. They dumped it out on the floor and we sorted it all out.

Estelle was keeping inventory

Eli doesn't like Butterfingers, and I happen to love them, so he was giving me his Butterfingers as he came across them. As I ate the candy, I saved the wrappers so that I could tally up the PointsPlus later. I ended up eating 5 Butterfingers, a PayDay, an Almond Joy, a Tootsie Roll, a Take-Five (all fun-size), and a mini Reese's Cup. I could have eaten more, but I felt satisfied enough to stop when I did. The damage wasn't too bad! I counted those against my weekly PointsPlus, and I didn't even blow through all of them.

It was hard to resist eating any candy today, but I told my kids not to give me any more, even if I ask. They are more than willing to share with me, but I told them that I don't need any more, so please don't let me have any ;)

The kids didn't have school today, so I had to do my run on the treadmill this morning. I had three miles at race pace on the schedule for today. My race pace for the Ragnar Relay is 9:00/mi. So I just set the treadmill to 6.7 mph (8:54/mi pace) and ran for three miles. It was over so quickly! I'm used to doing six miles on the treadmill from marathon training, so three flew by. Love that :)

I got an e-mail today from NYRR about the 5K that I was registered for on Saturday in NYC:

They canceled it. There are absolutely NO refunds or other compensation for our registration ($55). I think at the very least, they should donate that money to the relief efforts to clean up after the hurricane. I know they've already ordered shirts and and bibs, but there is no way those cost $55.

However, I'm glad I am missing the race because it's canceled, rather than missing it just because I chose not to go. The more I read about the aftermath of the hurricane, the better I feel about my decision not to go. I feel so awful for all the people that are still dealing with problems with their homes, and power outages and all that. I read today about the woman whose two little boys died--they had been ripped from her arms in the flood, and were missing, and today, their bodies were found. Reading about that completely broke my heart--the boys were 2 and 4, and as you know, I have two boys that are two years apart.

I hate to end on a sad note, so go check out these pictures on BuzzFeed--26 Truly Inspiring Images from Hurricane Sandy. Seeing things like that makes me feel good!

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Halloween (and Wed. Weigh In)

I had a great weigh-in today! After having stayed the same last week, I was hoping for a nice number this morning.

My weight was 138.5, which is down 2.5 pounds from last week. My body fat is 23.2%, which is down from 24% last week. Waist change is (as always) negligible. When I logged my weight into Weight Watchers Online this morning, I discovered that I had reached the 10% milestone that was set on the day I started WW a little over 7 weeks ago.

Now I am just 1.5 pounds away from being back in my "goal range" of 133-137. It's been a LONG time since I was in that range--I think April? Anyway, I'm very happy with the weigh in!

Speaking of Weight Watchers, I got some good news yesterday! I didn't know this before, but Jerry's work will pay for employees and/or their spouses to do Weight Watchers meetings. Now, I've never had a good experience with the Weight Watchers' meetings, but I'm willing to give them a try again. It's been many years since the last time I went to a meeting, so I'm going to give it a fair shot.

As further incentive to go, if I don't attend at least 8 of the 12 consecutive meetings, we will have to reimburse Jerry's work for half of the fee--so that alone will make me do it! I am just hoping that I don't feel like I'm being judged for being the "thin person" in the Weight Watchers meeting--nobody will know that I used to weigh 115 pounds more than I do now. The last time I went in there, just to buy a journal, the receptionist was really rude and made a remark that made me feel judged.

The meetings certainly aren't necessary, but by being a meetings member, I can get free access to the e-tools (logging my food online) and the iPhone app. The accountability of getting weighed in front of a real, live person over the holidays certainly can't hurt, either.

I think it's awesome that Jerry's work is doing their part to help get their employees and families to get healthy--they pay for a lot of the local races that I've done, and now WW. I hope that the employees use it, so that the company continues to do it.

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Renee decided not to run the marathon in NYC. I feel absolutely awful for her, but she has already made other plans so that her marathon training wasn't for nothing. She's going to run the marathon in Indianapolis on Saturday, and her family is going with her (just as they were for NY). I know she's bummed about missing out on NY, but I really don't think the race will be the same with all the stuff going on there right now. She is able to defer her entry until next year, so she may end up doing that (although she'll have to pay for it again, AND do all the training again!).

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Tonight is one of my favorite nights of the year! For as long as I can remember, at least in the past decade or so, we've gone to my parents' house on Halloween night. We pass out candy to trick-or-treaters, but we also celebrate Mark's birthday. My dad always picks Mark up from the group home where he lives, and then we have dinner, birthday cake, and ice cream; we give Mark presents; and then we go outside for trick-or-treating. My dad makes a little fire in the driveway, so we can sit around it and stay warm while the trick-or-treaters come.

Jerry usually takes Noah and Eli trick-or-treating around my parents' neighborhood, but this year things are going to be different. Noah and Eli are old enough to realize that the neighborhood isn't great for trick-or-treating (there aren't many kids out, and the houses are far apart). So my boys requested to go to their other grandparents' neighborhood this year.

I really didn't want to miss Mark's birthday, and I just learned that my brother Brian is coming in, so I'd like to see him. Jerry is going to take the boys to his parents' house for trick-or-treating, while I stay at my parents' house to pass out candy and visit with everyone. My kids couldn't care less if I go with them, anyways!

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Revolution

Shortly after I finished typing my blog post last night, we lost power. I thought, being in Michigan, we wouldn't feel much effect from the hurricane, but the wind was really strong. The power was going off and on all day, but then at around 7, it didn't come back on.

Normally, once Jerry and I put the kids to bed at 8, we get cozy on the couch and watch "our" shows together. Without power, we were just kind of staring at each other, wondering what to do. It's funny how much we rely on electricity for entertainment! We don't get good cell service at our house, so we couldn't use the internet on our phones. We decided to actually have a real, uninterrupted, distraction-free conversation (with alcohol).

I poured a (large) glass of wine, and Jerry opened a beer. We lit some candles and just sat on our bed chatting. We laughed about the irony of missing the show Revolution because we had no power (if you're not familiar with the show, it's about the entire country losing all power for many years). Chandler, Paolo, and Phoebe were all up on the bed with us. It's rare to have three cats up there! One or two, almost always.

Then a couple of hours later, the power came back on, which was a relief. Usually when our power goes out due to a storm, it's out for at least 24 hours. The wind was still really strong, and I could hear freezing rain hitting the windows all night.

This morning, I immediately turned on the news to see the damage from the hurricane on the east coast. I've been so worried about my trip to NY, and not sure what to do about it. Once I saw that the subways were flooded, and they said it could take many days to get them running again, I started to think that maybe I should call Delta and see if they could refund my flight.

This was from my brother's (pilot) friend's Facebook page

On their website, they were offering refunds for flights up to Nov. 1st--my flight was on Nov. 2nd. So I called and waited on the phone for about 15 minutes until I could speak to someone. I asked about a refund, but they told me no, my flight was non-refundable.

I got a Facebook message from Jennifer, who is still stuck in Florida. She said that her flight was moved again, this time until Saturday. So even if I made it to NY (Newark, actually, is where I'd be flying into), Jennifer wouldn't be there. I decided to try Delta on Twitter--I sent a tweet to the Delta Assist, asking about a refund. They had me message my confirmation number, and then they issued a refund for my ticket! I was so surprised--I thought I'd never see that money again.

I'm sure I could have found a place to stay (a reader even kindly offered for me to stay with her), but with the public transportation being down right now, I was worried about getting around while in NY. I also would have had to get (quickly) from the race Sunday to the airport in Newark, and have my bags with me--a mess.

So anyway, I'm relieved I was able to get a refund on my flight. Now I'm only out the $55 for the 5K race registration (that race is on Saturday). I'm hugely disappointed about missing out on seeing Renee in the marathon, but it seems it just wasn't in the cards for me to go this weekend.

A couple of hours after the freezing rain stopped this morning, I decided to do my three-mile run outside. I thought for sure I would wind up on the treadmill, but I bundled up for the run outside. It was still really windy.

A couple of times during the first mile, I felt a gust of wind at my back that propelled me forward, and I felt like I was flying! But the last mile felt pretty tough, because the wind was blowing right in my face ;)

After lunch, I sent Renee a text telling her the situation with the marathon, and she asked if I wanted to get together for coffee/tea. I met up with her and we talked about the situation. I feel really bad for her! This was her fourth year applying to get into the NYC marathon, and she has been really excited to go. Now, she said she's not even sure if she's going, for a host of reasons that are understandable.

The race is at least letting runners defer their entries until next year, but they will have to pay the HUGE registration fee again ($255). I hope that she's able to go and have a great time, but if not, she said she's going to find another marathon to do so that all of her training doesn't go to waste.

Jerry is off work Friday-Monday (he was going to be here with the kids while I was gone), so now I'm thinking I'd like to plan something fun to do to take my mind off of missing out on NY.

Oh, and speaking of Jerry, he was disappointed that I forgot to post this picture yesterday:

I was standing at the stove, cooking dinner, and I kept complaining that my toes were completely numb from being so cold. So Jerry sat there and massaged my feet while I was cooking. (I think he just wanted me to post this picture so that he can show everyone how good I have it!)

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Speed work on the track

It was windy today! Jerry was off work, so I wanted to get my run done early to hang out with him. We got the kids ready for school and sent them off on the bus, and then I drove to the high school track to do speed work.

On my schedule: 6x400 at 7:51 (ish) pace. That means I would run six repeats of 400 meters (one lap around the inside of the track, or 1/4 mile) at a 7:51 ish pace. In between repeats, I can do whatever form of recovery I want, so I decided to do 200 meters of walking (half of the track).

I could feel the wind pushing on my car, which made me really want to skip my run, but I was kind of excited to do speed work. Once I got to the school, and stepped outside, I was freezing! The wind was really strong, and there was a mist in the air, making it even colder. I considered going home and doing the intervals on the treadmill, but since I was already there, decided to just get 'er done.

I started with a lap of easy running to warm-up. Then I picked up the speed for my first repeat. I had no clue what my pace was, since this was the first time I'd done speed work in a really long time, so I decided just to run really hard.

"Hard" is an understatement! Track workouts are supposed to be hard, and make you feel like you're going to puke afterward, so I knew I was on track (haha) for a good workout. When I was running into the wind, it was hard to even breathe--it was like the wind just whipped the air right out of my lungs.

I was very tempted to call it quits after just three repeats, because it was tough and not "fun" anymore ;)  But again, I was already there and halfway done, so I told myself, "Just one more, then you can quit." I kept going, and finally finished all six 400-meter repeats. I was kind of surprised to see that I was pretty close to my goal pace! Here are my splits for each interval (the first number is the min:sec to circle the track, second number is the pace)

Lap 1- 1:53 (7:34/mi pace)
Lap 2- 1:55 (7:40/mi pace)
Lap 3- 1:58 (7:53/mi pace)
Lap 4- 1:57 (7:52/mi pace)
Lap 5- 1:59 (7:56/mi pace)
Lap 6- 1:56 (7:44/mi pace)

I was so glad when it was over! Even though track intervals feel like torture, they are still kind of fun to me. It's not very often (like, never) that I see a 7 in front of my pace!

When I got home and showered, Jerry and I decided to watch a movie--and I chose The Day After Tomorrow, because I've been consumed with Hurricane Sandy. After the movie, we went to a few stores where I had things to return. At Hobby Lobby, I heard an employee say, "There's an alarm going off at Wal-Mart, and they evacuated the building." That was our next stop, so I was wondering what it was all about.

When we got there, tons of people were leaving the parking lot. I was confused, because there were still people going inside the store. So we parked and went in, and up to the service desk for our return. There, we learned that some guy got mad at the employee working there, so he ran and pulled the fire alarm on the wall, then ran out of the store. So that's why everyone was leaving.

We picked up a few groceries that we needed, and I noticed this:

Let me tell you, that stuff is SO good--but extremely caloric. I, however, cannot drink it anymore, because I associate it with a bad memory. After I had broken my jaw and was on a pure liquid diet (my jaws were wired shut), I had to get a lot of calories somehow. And when I saw this stuff at the store, I bought it. It was insanely good, and I pretty much lived off of it for a week or so. I can't even tell you how many cartons I went through!

Then I noticed that my tongue was feeling fuzzy and weird. Since I couldn't open my mouth, I had no idea what was going on. But it turns out that I had thrush from all the antibiotics I was taking! Thrush was not fun. And since I was drinking tons of this pumpkin spice eggnog at the time I got it, I associate the two, and this eggnog is forever ruined for me :(  Just as well, because it has a million calories per serving.

I have been craving rigatoni for some really strange reason (not any old pasta--it was specifically rigatoni), so I picked up the stuff to make it for dinner. My Ragnar team got into a discussion on Facebook about cottage cheese, and Mary and I both mentioned that we like cottage cheese with pasta sauce. So for dinner, I cooked rigatoni, and topped it with cottage cheese, spaghetti sauce, parmesan cheese, and a ton of fresh basil (I adore fresh basil). It was heavenly!

After taking the pic, I stirred it all together, and it looked really gross after that. But if you've never tried cottage cheese on your pasta, definitely give it a try.

I've been watching the news all afternoon, keeping tabs on the hurricane. It's kind of unbelievable how bad it's supposed to get. I just hope they're wrong. Stay safe, everyone!

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