Casi is right!

My dear friend Casi is right. I should be blogging! There are plenty of things happening in my life that can hopefully provide a little light in someone else's.

To start, last night my darling prince of a son spilled water all over my laptop. Now, my mouse has a mind of its own. It randomly highlights entire pages, clicks on links that take me to new pages despite the fact that I haven't finished the page I'm currently on, and all kinds of other annoing shit. Not only that, the following keys no longer work when I press them

p, y, ?, ', 6, 7, =, :

That means, that for the love of blogging, every time you see one of these letters or symbols, it is because I have gone back through this post and copied and pasted them where they belong. you're welcome. Just don't ask for them to be capitalized because that would mean searching all over the internet for their shift key companion. Frankly I'm just too lazy for that this morning. Especially considering the mouse problems I just explained.

But he is so cute!!!

So in other news, I'm knocked up. That's precicely the reason I stopped blogging about weight loss. I'm afriad I won't be able to discuss that topic for at least a year. To be honest, my inner fat kid is rejocing. I get to eat whatever I want again for the next 6 months. I have been inspired by blogger Mama Laughlin. She has two kiddos of her own and looks FABULOUS! plus, she keeps it real about her weight loss journey.

patrick and I decided to find out what the gender of this little precious little parasite is going to be. Right now, we're (I'm) 13 weeks along. We can find out as early as 16 weeks, which is exactly the date of our anniversary, or, we could wait until 20 weeks and find out for free. The jury is still out on that decision. More to come.

Also, we have a German! Hooray! patrick and I decided to host an exchange student. His name is Thies (like peace, but with a T), and he is amazing! He is very outgoing and fits into our family just fine. Also, the name of his town back home is called Hamburg. you know what they call people from Hamburg? (Wait for it. . .) Hamburger! I KNOW, RIGHT!?!?!?! He's my German Hamburger. Sadly, he does not find it as amusing as I do.

So far, he has experienced tacos, painting a room, the out-of-cotrol BGHS student section, the out-of-control BGHS girls, my out-of-conrol family, Gershwin and Copeland, moving a piano, (Oh yeah, we have a piano!), and good old fashioned chain-sawing! More to come on him too.

AMERICA!

My sister had her baby! He is so stinkin' adorable. As soon as I get permission, I will put his sweet little picture up.

Ok friends, Im tired of coing and asting letters and smbols, so this ost is officiall done.

Week 3

Guess who's down 5 pounds?????

THIS GIRL!

It was a great week for food and exercise, my friends. I think I've found a pretty good balance, but that may all change as this is the first week of school. My job is about to pick up pretty significantly, and so is my husband's. I can tell that it's going to be a hotbed of stress in our home, and that potentially means that I'll turn to food for comfort.

I did discover that weighing in on Saturday allows me to reap the benefits of doing a great job during the week, and gives me a chance to enjoy whatever I want all day (which, surprisingly, wasn't all that much). I pick back up on Sunday with lots of channel surfing exercise, and then I'm back into the discipline that the weekdays hold.

What's super exciting is that TAP DANCE IS ABOUT TO START! Yes, Wednesday nights during the fall, I'll be taking a tap dance class which I am super excited about. HOORAY! It will burn calories and allow me to be the center of attention, which, let's face it. . .is all I really want in life.

I didn't want to tell you, but

I screwed up. There, I said it. It wasn't until Friday and Saturday, but it happened. I will  say that at one point this week I actually made it down to 174. I thought that would be motivating enough to keep me on track. Unfortunately, it was not.

On Friday and Saturday, I ate the following (in no particular order)

Wendy's number 1 meal
a delish concoction of cream cheese, Old English cheese spread and garlic powder
LOTS of chips
deep dish pizza
beer
wine
bourbon
breakfast casserole (which was amazing! I will make it soon, although I'll watch my portions next time)
pasta salad

I think that's the worst of it. All together, that brings me back to 178.8. It's pretty obvious what I have to do in the next week. I don't apologize for this splurge, though. Patrick and I had a chance to spend time with wonderful friends. It was about as much of a vacation as we are going to get this summer, and I would change absolutely nothing.

Week one down!

And in grand style! This week, I'm down exactly 2 pounds which puts me at 176. Woo Hoo! I am excited to see that the hard work is paying off, however, this is how all of my weight loss expeditions begin. So, I have to make sure to actually keep it up.

Side note - I am currently watching my husband feed oatmeal to our dog. . .with our son's baby spoon. It is quite hilarious.

The week wasn't so bad. I mostly had oatmeal with blueberries for breakfast, a Smart Ones with a giant salad for lunch, and a mix-up of things for dinner.

Here are a few of the challenges from this week:

• Why the hell did I make my weigh-in day Sunday? I mean, Saturday night is pizza night for the O'Rourke house. What goes best with pizza. . .well, beer of course. It was SO challenging to stop at two slices and only drink 1 (pint) of Michelob Ultra. I know, I know. . .first world problems. But still, it was very difficult.

• Water, water, water, water, water. I know I need to drink a lot of it, but I easily forget. By the end of the day, I'm like a fish trying to get in my 8 cups.

Here are some of the highlights:

• On my way back from the mountains of Eastern Kentucky, I hit a HUGE rainstorm. Since my car tires need to be replaced, and the defrost dial doesn't work, I was sliding all over the road and couldn't see anything. I decided that I would stop at the nearest gas station, which happened to face a Dairy Queen, which I just HAD to visit in order to wait out the storm, right? Upon entering, I went directly to the bathroom, stared myself down in the mirror, and thought about how good a bacon cheeseburger would be with some fries and the new Candy Shop Blizzard. I then walked up to the counter and proceeded to order. . .a small diet coke. When I got to the fountain, I realized they serve Pepsi products (what a shame). So, I ended up drinking water. That's right, I sat in Dairy Queen for no less that 45 minutes waiting for the storm to pass, and only had water. HOT DAMN! Maybe I am serious this time.

• My love for Dance Central 2 has been renewed. My goodness, the calories I burned playing that game this week number in the thousands! I especially love dancing to the song "Run (I am a Natural Disaster)" by Gnarls Barkley. Also, I have been reintroduced to my jump rope. That thing is harder than I remember that's what she said.

• While working an event Saturday morning, I noticed a school contact walk by me a few times. I was about to stop her when she came over to me and said, "Oh my goodness, you have lost so much weight. I wasn't sure that was you until I saw you smile." Now, she last saw me right after giving birth, but it still felt SO good to hear her say that!

Next week, I think I'll focus on drinking more water, getting more cardio exercise, and definitely more strength training.

Ok folks. That's that. I think I'll do measurements after every 5-10 pounds lost. I leave you with a video of some girl dancing to my fave Dance Central 2 song as mentioned above. As soon as I figure out how to do this, you will see a video of yours truly :)

I did(n't do) it!

It is very important for me to share that during a high pressure lunch buffet at a culinary arts school, I stayed on track, and skipped dessert. BOOM!

That is all.

Clearly. . .

I suck at follow-up. A lot has happened since the last blog post. Patrick and I have an amazing little boy who we named Jesse (pronounced Jes - not Jessie, which irritates me when mispronounced). He is now 11 months old. Haha!  Time flies, right? I'll talk all about him through the blog, don't worry. He is the sunshine of my life! The reason, however, that I've picked back up with this blog is to track my weight loss journey in some way that holds me accountable. I'm particularly inspired by a blogger called Mama Laughlin. She cracks me up! I'm also inspired by my dear friend Casi who looks AMAZING! I'm sure I'll be talking about her quite a bit too.

In January, I picked up with the Atkins diet. It worked beautifully. 12 pounds melted off of me. Then, I decided to eat ice cream and bread. . .lots of it. I didn't gain that weight back (by the grace of God), however I knew I needed to do something to keep myself on track. Weight Watchers had always worked for me in the past, so I joined the online version and dropped another 11 pounds, which brought me to my pre pregnancy weight. I've been stuck here since then. Mainly due to my insatiable appetite for fried foods and cake lack of discipline.

So here I am. Not really at a point where I feel the need to make some melodramatic finalizing statement after which I'll buy a bunch of expensive workout gear, stock my pantry with high-end diet food, work out every day for a week, and then proceed to fail miserably all over again. But rather, I am at a point where I am ready to take things slow and steady. I want to do it right, and I want a record of it.

I'm not sure how this will shape up, but I'll do what feels constructive until I get some kind of pattern going. I'm using myfitnesspal.com as a tool (introduced to me by the fabulous Malazarte family). It seems to work a little like Weight Watchers, except it is free based on calories rather than points.

I'll start by throwing the numbers out there. Here we go:

Height - 5'10''
Weight - 178 lbs.
Arms - 12.5 in.
Thighs - 25 in.
Waist - 39 in.
Hips - 42 in.
BMI - 25.5

Wow. Yep, I just put all that out there. No turning back at this point. If I could find my camera, I would also put an official "before" picture up. Instead, I'll put a few up from the past year. . .and there you have it!

Leaving the hospital

Our precious son!

Me in April (feeling pretty good)

Me this month (Yes, I bought that top!)

Our little man at 11 months

Our little family (Jesse thinks I need to lose weight too)

One day to go?

So, we are nearing the end of this pregnancy journey and I've got a mixed bag of emotions. I'm completely comfortable physically, as the baby has dropped significantly. However, I'm starting to get really anxious to meet the baby.

I believed it. . .I fell for the hype. . .

My doctor (who is AMAZING!!!!) Told me a few weeks ago that my body was progressing faster than usual, and that I could come at ANY MOMENT. That, of course, put me in overdrive. I got everything cleaned and organized thinking that at any hour, I could have our sweet baby in my arms. Here we are almost 3 weeks later, and I'm still pregnant. Don't get me wrong, I feel fabulous, and ultimately want the baby to come when he/she is ready. My due date isn't until Wednesday of this week, so I'm not trying to rush things one bit. I've always known that first time moms usually deliver late.

It's just that with all the excitement, I thought the baby would be here by now, and I'm having a harder time with that emotionally than I thought I would.

I know that all good things are worth waiting for, so I just need to be patient, and let things happen as naturally as possible.