Weight loss, week 6

I had a really good week with my weight loss!  I just have to share, because I'm a little too excited.  This week, I lost 3.4 pounds, which puts me at 16.8 lost total in six weeks.  I'm feeling really good, and anxious to hit 20.  I know it will probably take me two more weeks to get there, but for some reason 20 is a big milestone in my head.

I've changed a lot in six weeks.  My habits are obviously the biggest change, but I've switched and fixed some unhealthy mindsets, had the Lord help me break off some strongholds that have been hanging over me for YEARS, and I'm still learning and growing.  Though not wider.  I'll never do that again (except when I have babies.  I suspect that is inevitable.)

Maybe someday I will get brave and tell you what my starting weight was.  Realistically, I'll probably only have the guts to do that once I've hit my goal, but believe me, that day will come!

I just had to share what I've accomplished in this short time because I am so stoked.  Now I'm off to browse Ravelry for some lacy projects to work on.  =)

The Photographer Side...

One of my best friends, Lisa, is pregnant with her first baby.  This past weekend I was able to head back to Chicago for her baby shower, which was more like a baby downpour.  They are set with baby stuff for years.  Her family is huge and loves to be extravagant, which is awesome.  I've never seen so much baby stuff in one place outside of a store setting!  It was great!  It's the first time I've gotten to see her all big and round-bellied, so of course I had to take some photos for them!  I just wanted to share a couple of my favorites with you.
I can't wait to meet baby Keiler!

Taking a little trip to Ireland, by way of crock-pot

I just wanted to share this amazing Corned Beef and Cabbage recipe with all of you in time for St. Paddy's day.  It's super easy, and I hear less stinky than the traditional cooked-in-a-pot way of making corned beef. If you've never tried this awesome dish, I think now is the time my friends!

Here's the Recipe from Allrecipes.com!  enjoy!

Happy March!

I simply can't believe that today is the first of March!  It is such a beautiful day here in Kansas City.  I've got my windows open, the sun is shining, and birds are chirping away right outside our dining room window.  I love it.  It's making me ridiculously anxious for the full out spring I know is coming, and it also makes me realize how many winter knit projects I never even started!

I've kind of stalled out on Anna's baby blanket.  I'll have to get my groove back today and finish it up.  It's slightly more than 80% done, so I have no excuse here, and then I need to start another one for another friend!  I've got a lot of work to do, and not a lot of time in which to do it (but that's because I'm a world-class procrastinator).

I've been more than a little preoccupied lately with all things weight loss and lots of things baby related (if you haven't read the posts below, so many of my friends are currently expecting, and one of my best friends just had her first little baby girl!  I've got babies on the brain and am trying to get my body ready to have them on board as well!) and knitting has taken a bit of a back seat.  But NO MORE!  ;)

Speaking of all things weight loss, I just weighed in for my third completed week at Weight Watchers, and I lost another pound this week!  I know it's not the 4 I've lost in the past two weeks, but I keep telling myself that it's still one pound I never have to see again, and the third week can be a hard one.  This brings my total weight lost to 9.6 lbs in three weeks!  Less than 1/2 a pound away from 10!  I'm excited.  And pretty proud of myself.

Now I'm off to troll the internet for fun and inexpensive crafts to do this week!  I'll let you know if I find anything awesome.

I now dub this smattering of weight-loss related posts....

my Weight-Loss Corner!

Talking with a couple of my friends, I realized, what's the problem with blogging about trying to lose weight on here, even if I did intend it to be a knitting blog?  (holy run-on sentence Batman!)  This is currently a BIG part of my life and life-style, and if it helps encourage even one person, then I think it will be worth it.  Don't worry, there will still be knitting and crafty posts on here as well.  This won't turn one-sided.  At least I don't think that it will.  =)

Just a little update, and to take a pat-myself-on-the-back moment, I'd like to share that I have lost 8.6 pounds in two weeks!  I'm super stoked, and feeling excited to keep this momentum going!  In the spirit of sharing all about this weight loss journey of mine, I'd like to share a recipe with you all that I just tried tonight for some chocolate-y cookies that are super low in points-plus values, so if you are trying to lose weight, you don't have to feel guilty about whipping up a batch of these.  Unless you eat them all in one sitting.  *wink*

This recipe is off the weight watchers site, and it is SO good.  The recipe says you should be able to get 40 mini cookies out of it, I did 20 slightly larger cookies and it seemed perfect.  Here's the link!

Chocolate Chocolate Chip Cookies

And now it's time for me to go to bed.  It's not even 11pm but I am wiped.  I'm turning into such an old lady.


Enjoy!

I promise this isn't going to turn into a weight loss blog....

But I am just super excited to be losing weight!  I've struggled since I was in Junior High with my weight.  Somewhere along the line I became an emotional eater, munching even when I wasn't hungry because I was stressed, depressed, even bored.  I'm honestly not really sure what set it off, but I did have a rough junior high experience (like most people I think) and that really just set my eating problems into a habit.

I've gone through a lot of emotional stress in the past five years, thank God I have my wonderful husband Nick who stood beside me through all of it, and and awesome family.  But as I said in my last post, it just put me way over the edge with my weight.  I ballooned way up, at one point to a size 18.  I'm not too far off from that now, at least I wasn't before I started weight watchers two weeks ago.  Last week I lost 4 1/2 pounds, and tomorrow I find out how many I lost this week!  I finally feel like I will have permanent success with my weight loss this time, for a variety of factors.  The first and most important is that I have spent some quality time with Jesus praying about how I got to be where I am emotionally, what kinds of wrong vows I made to myself over the course of my life, and asked for help in trying to break free of all of that.  One thing I have learned very clearly over the years is that I just don't have the strength to change this part of my life on my own, and yet I've never really given it over to the Lord to deal with me about it.  Now I really don't know why I didn't have a good heart to heart with Him about this stuff sooner, because I feel lighter emotionally, and I have a confidence that I've never had before.

Another thing that I know is going to really contribute to my success is that I have a really important goal to look ahead to.  Babies!  I am so jealous (and happy for of course!) of all my friends that are or have had babies recently.  Another thing that the Lord has shown me in the past couple of months is that I am ready to be a mom.  My heart yearns every time a cute baby comes through my line at work, every time another of my friends announces they are pregnant, every time I hang out with my little nieces.  So this time, losing weight is not just about MY health, or my vanity, it is about being able to have the healthiest baby possible, about giving my future babies a healthy mom that has the energy to run around after them and play with them all day.  It's about my future, Nick's future, and our little family that we are dying to start.  It's also that I want to have a natural birth, and I don't want anyone telling me that I've made that goal impossible due to my weight.  Have you seen the documentary "The Business of Being Born"?  If you haven't, you really should, and maybe you will see why this is so important to me.  My mom had all of my four siblings at home ( I was the stubborn exception.  I did not want to come out of her womb, and so she ended up having me at the hospital), and It was amazing because I got to be there for every birth.  In the room.  I don't remember screaming and crying and gross stuff like they show in the movies when women have babies without the aid of drugs, I remember the first looks at my siblings, and my mom's face when she held them for the first time.  So that's what I want.  I want my babies the natural way, and I want to be healthy to do it.

The sweater for my nephew

This time I also have my awesome friend Sarah, who has a lot of the same goals as I do, taking the journey with me.  We've joined Weight Watchers together, and it's really helpful to have someone to keep you accountable, encourage you when you feel stuck, and just be able to talk to honestly about what you are going through with someone who will understand.  It's also nice because Sarah is turning into a bit of a health nut, which I say as a good thing of course, and I get to benefit when she shares her research and new info with me.

And lastly there is Weight Watchers.  I've done it before with success, but have always dropped off after a few weeks.  This time I know I won't because they have changed up the way they do things around there.  Some of you may be familiar with weight watchers and how it works, but for those of you that aren't, weight watchers is based on a point system.  The points are calculated factoring in Fat, Fiber, Carbs, and Protein.  You get a certain amount of points in a day, and it's calculated to help you lose a healthy amount of weight each week.  Well before, fruits and veggies had point values that you had to subtract from your daily allotment, which I am sorry to say made me pass them up more often than not.  Now fruits and veggies are points-free, which has made all the difference in the world when it comes to my eating mindset.  Now I eat between 5-7 servings of fruits and veggies a day!  I've NEVER in my whole life met the goal for fresh produce.  I can't even tell you how good it's made me feel.  I have more energy, I eat less processed sugars, so I don't crash halfway through the day.  And best of all, no more digestive issues.  I'm sold.  I plan on eating like this for the rest of my life.  It's amazing.

Pretty soon all of those cute cardis and sweaters I have in my Ravelry Que won't seem like they are a waste to knit.  I won't have to wonder how they will fit me while I am super over weight.  Pretty soon I'll be able to be a healthy weight, and I am going to reward myself by knitting my own adorable cardigan.   In the mean time I will be motivating myself with baby stuff, like the blanket I'm knitting for my friend's baby, and the sweater I knit for my future nephew.  Before I know it, I'll have reached my goal, and more importantly, changed my life forever.

I've mostly written this blog post for myself, to encourage myself and keep record of where I am at, but I hope that somehow it encourages at least one other person to go for it.  To work on their hearts, to lean on Jesus for support, and to change their lifestyle and their life.  All of this is worth the effort.  I totally see that now.

Anna's baby blanket (almost finished) 

Life, and Other Stuff

So everyone around me is having babies.  Lots of babies everywhere.  My sister in law, my two best friends, one of whom just had her baby, and so many of my other friends!  I haven't even begun knitting the blanket for my friend who just had her baby!  So many babies to knit for these days!  Needless to say, I've got babies on the brain, and am currently knitting my first ever sweater!  Granted, it's in miniature as it's for my future nephew, but I'm still pretty proud of my progress so far.  It'll be good practice for when Nick and I start our own little family in the (nearish) future.

Since I have babies on the brain, I'm trying to get my life and self ready for the day when I have my own.  There is so much to do.   The past 4 years or so I have gained a LOT of weight.  Not super proud of that, but it is the truth.  Nick and I went through some stressful stuff, and I have a problem with stress eating and using food as a crutch.  Without getting into the details, we endured quite a lot of crap through our engagement and the first three years of our marriage because of the strangeness of people, and I just let it get to me.  SOOO, quite a few pounds later, here I am realizing that I will have made it quite hard on myself to be pregnant at this weight.  Thus, I have joined weight watchers.  I've done it before and it totally works, I just have never been able to stick with it.  For whatever reason I hit a wall after about three weeks.

Well I'm praying for grace, and asking the Lord to help me deal with my underlying issues, and this time I am going to do it!  I just want to get healthy and lose this weight so that I can have a happy and heathy family (and wear super cute clothes.  not going to lie.  that's also exciting to me!).  It's only been a few days, and it's not going to be easy, but it will be so worth it.  My goal is to lose between 35 and 40 pounds by the end of june.  It's a big goal, but I can do it.  By the grace of God I can do it.

In the mean time I'll be knitting baby sweaters and blankets and booties for all my friends, and counting down the pounds until I am knitting for my own little bean.  And now I'm off to finish my little nephew's sweater!  I'll post pics when I'm done.  Just in case you are interested in the pattern I'm knitting, you can find it here - The Dede cardigan.

Happy knitting!

If only there were more hours in a day for...

Crafting!  I've been on a huge craft-blog kick these past few weeks.  I just love seeing what other people come up with and share with the world.  It's so refreshing and inspiring, and honestly it's great to be inspired by objects and projects in an medium other than knitting.  I've been perusing How About Orange's blog all morning.  She has some awesome DIY projects and gorgeous inspiration on her site.  The other blog I've been enjoying this morning is The Purl Bee's blog.  They feature more knitting, crotchet, and sewing projects.

It all makes me wish I had infinitely more time and creative genius at my command.  Check out their blogs, and be inspired!  I know that I am, and can't wait to make a bunch of their projects.

My husband Nick and I have recently bought our first house, and I have begun to look around and see that far too much of what we've used to decorate with has come from ikea.  I mean, a lot of the artwork has come from me, but just about all of the furniture and bigger pieces are not.  All I can think about lately is finding some beautiful, old, and slightly beat up pieces of furniture with tons of character to de-sterilize our home a bit.  My main desire, a Queen Anne style buffet table, which I shall paint and distress... I get excited just thinking about it!  This is the kind of buffet I am talking about.

And then I will paint it a fun color and distress it like this...

And finally, I am going to hang a ton of mis-matching vintage mirrors over it.  It will be perfect.  I can't wait!  If only money grew on trees!  I've found the perfect buffet on craigslist.  Now I just have to come up with the funds to buy it!  I've definitely come to realize that owning a home is the never ending project.

I haven't been blogging, but I've sure been knitting!

OK!  I promised some photos of all my Christmas gift-knitting, and here they are!  I knit these awesome Felted Slippers from French Press Knits for all my sisters and my momma.  I think they were a hit!

They are surprisingly easy to knit up, and the felting isn't that hard either.  They look a bit more challenging than they actually are.  Also, they are SUPER warm since they are just a thick layer of wool when you're done!  Here's a couple more detail shots...

The other fun thing I've been working on is a hat for myself based on the one Hermione wore in the Deathly Hallows.  If you see the movie, keep your eyes out for the knits she wears in the Godrics Hollow scene.  They are gorgeous.  Here's the movie hat...

And the version I made, based on a pattern a fellow Raveler created.  It's not exactly right, and with a little tweaking, I could probably get it to look a lot closer, but here it is.  I'm pretty happy with it even though it is a bit different in shape.  ok, and I just couldn't resist the Harry Potter-inspired wand shot.  I'm feeling a little nerdy tonight.  What can I say?

At any rate, it's 1 am, and I need to get some shut eye.  There's plenty more knitting to be done tomorrow!

A New Year of Knitting

Four posts this last year in as many months really is a sad thing, but thanks to blogging inspiration from my amazing friend Sarah, here I am again, attempting to be better.  For now.  You know how these things go.

Like a lot of knitters, I have had a really busy Christmas with all of my gift knitting (in fact, there is still knitting to do... oi) and I am ready to get back to doing a couple of projects for myself.  When I'm doing tons of gift knitting, I feel it's easier to get burned out... it's best to throw a quick hat for yourself in the mix to keep the motivation going.

I do have some photos that I will post soon of all my gifties, because what I chose to knit for everyone really is a fun pattern and project to try, and maybe you will be inspired to give it a go.  For now I am just surfing the web trying to find some cheap but luxe yarn (because as much as I LOVE high end yarns, the price tag doesn't love me!) to complete some of the 150 projects in my Ravelry que.  So many of my amazing friends are pregnant right now, that I need to find some beautiful yarn for baby blankets!

At any rate, I just wanted to say Happy New Year to those of you who read this, and just let you know that I pray so many blessings on you as we move into 2011.  I know that Jesus has just blessed my husband Nick and I so much throughout 2010, that I'm excited to see what he does in 2011.  I'm stoked to see what He does for all of YOU as well.

Happy new year, and happy knitting!