Here's the plan.

So, we start on Thursday. and for once in my lazy life I am going to follow through with something! Here's the plan.

switch back to sitting on the yoga ball at work.
start carrying a water bottle everywhere.
Breakfast at work: whole wheat bagels and fruit
snacks: fiber meal bars, special K cereal, fruit, veggies.
watch portions at meals.
no soda.
no fast food.

(Friday Night is my exception night, when I can break my rules as long as I keep it under control.)

Workouts:
Mon-Wed-Fri- P90X videos
Sun-Tues-Thurs- running at school track, pilates DVD
Daily- waist and stretching segments from workout DVD
Saturday- rest, still doing waist workout

the days these are done are interchangeable depending on weather and whatever other factors, as long as I'm doing one or the other every day. I am also free to add in whatever work I feel up to doing.

This is the plan. THERE WILL BE NO DISPLAYS OF WEAKNESS. For ONCE I'm going to be proud of myself for following through.

yay for torpedoing my self esteem!

weight: 162 lbs. 41" around at the butt, 38" around at the widest part of my stomach. 33" at the ribs. that's quite a difference. 24" at the widest part of my thigh. for reference, I am exactly 72" tall- 6 feet even. so yes, I'm never going to be petite. I'm okay with that. what I want is for my belly to NOT look like I'm in my second trimester.

based on a chart I found online here, healthy weight for a 6 foot tall woman with a medium frame is 148-162 lbs. so while I'm not overweight, I'm pushing it. I DO NOT WANT TO BE PUSHING IT. My ideal weight is 150 lbs. so my goal with this upcoming month is to drop 10 lbs. any more than that is gravy, but that's what I want to feel like I've succeeded. along with a smaller waistline. my workouts will be including plenty of focus on the middle. so there's the stats. I will work on a battle plan and get that up here.

again, I know it could be worse. I'm aware. I don't talk about my insecurities around women who weigh more than me because apparently the fact that I don't weigh 400 lbs means I don't get to be insecure. this seems unfair to me. the only people who understand how I feel are women built like me that are just starting to slip. And why should I wait until I'm 400 lbs and need an electric wheelchair to get around to do anything about it? I'm gonna get a handle on this before it gets out of hand. I'll probably still never wear a bikini, even if I lose the weight, but that has more to do with my stretch marks than anything else. I'm at peace with those, though. I had a frickin' baby. yeah, that's gonna leave a mark.

so, here's the starting line. lets see how far I can push this.

Worth a shot.

Turns out I don't have much use for this blog. I didn't really think I would, I'm not a journaller or blogger, and I don't have anything I'm doing with myself to create a blog about, you know, something crafty or whatnot. I am a major knitter, crocheter and sewer, but I'm not really advanced, so I'm not going to be like creating patterns or anything like that. I do have a few projects I'm proud of that I suppose I could post... starting to get in to cosplay a bit, I'm creating the outfits of all the Final Fantasy 8 girls... but that's irrelevant. not why I'm here today. I'm here today because I hate my body.

Now, I have a theory about women. I believe that all women have an angry, spiteful, cruel, psychotic voice in their head that's constantly screaming at them about how ugly and stupid and fat and annoying they are. About what a failure they are in everything. It's why all women are crazy. It's louder in some women than others, and some women are better at muffling this voice than others. Me, I'm not very good at muffling this voice. Especially since I've started gaining weight in the last year or so. not a lot, mind you. like 10-15 lbs at most. Nothing to get too dramatic about, right? Except for that little voice. that little voice points out the way my tummy bulges now when I wear my tight little t shirts, and the way my belly is starting to hang over the edge of my jeans just a bit. I don't look at myself when I'm not dressed. I periodically have panic attacks when getting dressed and I have to go buy myself something loose and flowy so that I don't spend an entire day tensing and cramping up my muscles in an effort to "suck it in". I. Don't. Like. Feeling. This. Way. It makes me depressed and angry and I'm not okay with it. so. am I gonna sit and bitch about it or am I gonna do something about it?

Here's the problem. I have a terrible track record with working out. I don't like it, so I give up easy. What I really think would help is if I could sign up for some kind of dance class, because I would have fun with that, and would keep at it. But that requires money. that I don't have. so, I'm gonna try something. I'm gonna put myself on one of those 30 Day challenges, mostly designed by myself for the workout routine, I will get help for the eating part. I'm blogging this, because I think I need to record it. Goals made in my own head are easily ignored. I'm planning to do this for March, use the month of March to stop hating myself. Now until then is prep.

GOAL FOR TODAY. When I get home, I'm gonna step in a scale, see where I'm at. I'll do this a couple of times before March just to make sure I've got an accurate number. then I'm gonna do something I really won't like. I'm gonna take pictures. Of myself. of the things I don't like, undisguised by loose clothing. perfectly honest pictures. and I will post them here so I can't hide from them. this will suck. but, I will retake the same pictures at the end of March and see if my effort did me any good. (If it didn't I will likely never exercise again.)

I will get my eating and exercise plan worked out over the next week or so. I have a theory that if there is a definite time limit on how long I will be kicking the crap out of my body I will be able to muscle through it. and then I'm hoping I will feel so good about the results that I'll be able to keep it up so I don't lose all my work.

Well, that's all for now. I will update later with the pics.

(Incidentally after looking through older posts I thought I ought to mention, obviously I'm not pregnant. no plans to be in the near future.)

I'm not old enough to have a kindergartner.

I have not yet succeeded in convincing Shannon. I tried convincing her to have a backwards birthday or go bact to being a baby, and she wasn't having it. this is her at her table in her spot in her classroom. I'm not okay with it.

I got up early yesterday morning and got her dressed and fed. We went to the school, and found her classroom. it involved a little wandering around, I had no idea where I was going. Once we found it, her teacher came in. I was really impressed, when her teacher asked her what her name was, she actually answered her. we unloaded her supplies and I took some pictures. I've been worried for weeks that there would be hysterics when I tried to leave her at the school, so I hoped that by going early Shannon would have time to get settled in and be okay.

We went outside and she played on the playground for a while. I just stood there in the cluster of other parents, watching. when the bell rang, Shannon came up, grabbed ther wrong backpack- there was another girl there with a Hello Kitty backpack- put that one down, found hers and got in line. it was kind of hilarious looking at her next to the other kids. She's at least a sold four inches taller than the next tallest one. So I managed to make my way through the other parents, gave Shannon a hug and a kiss and told her I'd be back to pick her up when she got done. She said ok, and followed the line into the building. and then I had to rush to the car so I didn't embarass myself by bursting into tears. When I picked her up, she was super excited, and kept telling me all day that she missed school and wanted to go back. so that it. I have a kindergartner.

Yes, they are. not my fault if you can't hear them.

These boots I just bought are telling me I need more skinny jeans.

So here's a little tmi for you: last night things got a little..... um..... distracted with Caleb and I while we were fooling around, and based on the time frame we just rolled the dice on me getting pregnant. Wasn't really planned. Oops. We'll never get to plan a pregnancy, will we? that'll be our luck and it'll take just the one shot to do it. Not even intentionally! well, nothing to do about it now. I figured I'd blog about it, because no one reads this, and it's not something I can really bring up in conversation.

Not much going on now. Shannon starts school next Tuesday. I may or may not be having panic attacks about this. I'm 25. I'm not old enough to have a kid in school. I took her shoe shopping last night (thus the boots) and got all emotional over buying shoes for her to wear for school. I still need to take her to get some new shirts too. Already got school supplies, which was surreal. And we got her a new backpack last night. we were going to use the airplane one my mom got her a while ago, but she keeps insisting she hates airplanes, and her insistance got louder when she saw the Hello Kitty backpack at the shoe store. so, with Payless' buy one get one half off sale I gave in. She's in morning kindergarten, which is what we wanted. But I'm still thinking I'm gonna see if I can switch shifts with the other parttimer at work, cuz I'm sick of dealing with Katie, Caleb's sister, for childcare. she's flaky and unreliable and always a liar. I'm actually very angry at her- she said she was going out of town for a week, so she couldn't watch Shannon, so I frantically made desperate other arrangements, and she didn't go out of town- but I can't actually do anything about it cuz we need her. And I'm tired of needing her and biting my tongue. so I emailed the other parttimer- Ben- and we'll see if this is possible. Of course, if I get pregnant, that loss of afternoon shift is going to be strongly regretted.

titles are boring.

well, my amazon shirts are here. the teal is darker than I though- for a second I thought it was gonna be black, and then I was going to be annoyed. But they're really pretty, and I'll try them on soon. so far everything looks good. Once I have pictures of me in them I'll put them up here.

Also, Marissa and I went and bought jeans yesterday. You know, those free jeans we got from CrowdTap. I did mention that didn't I? Free jeans? the dark pair on the left, the skinny jeans, are the ones that Marissa got. she wasn't sure about skinny jeans, but since they were free she decided to try it. the medium blue jeans on the right are the ones I got- they're called trouser jeans and they're SO COMFY. The jeans in the middle are ones that I tried on at the store, but they didn't have them in tall sizes, so I just ordered those online. apparently flares are back in and I LOVED it. unfortunately, I am 6' tall and regular length jeans just aren't going to cut it. So, online we go.

We bought tops to go with our jeans, of course. The black and white striped sweater is Marissa's- I am HIGHLY ENVIOUS. it looked really cute on her, and really good with the skinny jeans. However, when I tried on the same sweater, I knew right away it wasn't going to work for me. I put it on and leaned just a little back, and it immediately pulls up to show my stomach. way too short. sigh. The brown sweater is the one I got. (Marissa also got a matching one) It's an interesting shirt- it's a loose open weave, totally see through, so I have to put a tank top underneath. So I just pick a bright color to show through the sweater- I'm wearing it today and I went with pink- and it looks really cool. I also got some new pants for Shannon, since she starts kindergarten this year- figured she could use some school clothes, since Old navy had kids jeans on sale. Turns out Shannon doesn't like skinny jeans. I tried them on her and she did not approve. I thought they were cute, but they were for her to wear so I let her pick what she wanted.

I'm actually starting to be ready for cooler weather. I miss my sweaters, and now I'm getting new jeans, that I won't even wear yet cuz it's too warm. We wore our new clothes yesterday when we got home, but we were both woo warm in them. and I am wearing the sweater I got and because of the open weave it's not really a warm sweater, but I think I'm about ready for the weather to change.

Except for floating the river! Oooh, I'm a fan of that. I'd never been before and Saturday before last we finally decided to go. Of course- I had a meltdown the night before- I had planned to wear my navy tankini, but when I went to find it, the top was missing. I don't know where it is. I didn't want to wear my Hawaii swim suit, cuz the seams are starting to rip out. so I tried on my old leopard printed halter top one piece form several years ago. Yeah, NO. It did the most awful pear shaped thing to my body- my bust looked tiny and my belly and hips looks huge. So I had a massive self-esteem crash. it was bad. Crying and sulking and everything. Eventually Caleb found the correct solution to that- tell me to go buy a new swimsuit. So I got up early, and I took Shannon, cuz her current suit was getting too small, and she and I went swimsuit shopping. we started at Old Navy, but there was NOTHING left there but a few pieces of bikinis, which, after pregnancy, c-section, and gaining 10 lbs, that is NOT going to happen, so we moved on. We walked down that little strip mall, hitting Shopko, Marshalls, Ross and even Sportsman's Warehouse, and then Walmart at the end. Let me tell you what, swimsuit selection is not great at the end of July. At Walmart Shannon picked out a Dora the Explorer suit she really liked and I found a blue one piece with ruched sides (thereby hiding any belly issues I might worry about) that I loved. Nearly fought with Shannon over that, cuz there was a pink one I tried on too that she wanted me to get, cuz she likes pink better, but I wanted the blue.

So, that crisis out of the way, floating the river was really fun. We actually bought our own tubes, cuz renting was only slightly cheaper than buying, and with buying we were able to go again last Saturday and will go again this Saturday and probable every Saturday we can. I very much enjoyed it, and so did Shannon. She will never get to 25 like me and have to admit she's lived in Boise all her life and never floated the river. This Saturday, though, I don't think we will be inviting Josh and Sarah. I nearly slapped her this last time- she has NO patience for children and was snapping at Shannon, just being nasty and mean, and it was upsetting me. So I think this time we won't say anything to them, and invite Caleb's friend David instead. much more laid back. I love floating the river, because with Caleb's job, that has basically eliminated any chance of any more camping trips this summer. we got our 4th of July camping, and that's all. so floating the river gives us something outdoorsy and summery that we can do. I approve.

LOLZ

so, I realized I only feel like posting here when I've bought something I'm excited about. this time it's off of Amazon. These two tops. Now, I was really excited when I first saw them. I took the picture of the red one and posted it on facebook. I was asking for opinions. as you can see, it's a wild shirt. frilly and fancy- I couldn't decide. I loved it, naturally, but I couldn't decide if it was too much or not. Well, based on overwhelming support, I made up my mind that it wasn't too much and I was gonna buy it. However, in the process of my internal debate, I found the teal top. Just as appealing, but without the fancy sleeves. And turns out I couldn't make up my mind. So I bought them both. now, I have to say, I'm a little anxious about what the quality will be like. They are being imported from India. I read the seller's feedback, and only one complains about quality, and that was just a shoulder strap that from the description is easily fixed. If I have to fix something, that's fine. I just want to love them. the other negative reviews were from people who didn't know it was coming from India and was going to take a long time. the estimated delivery on the site says Aug 4-Aug 12. I'm prepared to wait. I'm just so nervous.

Also, once again, on Crowdtap, I have been selected for one of their sample and share programs, this one for jeans. So, free jeans for me! yay!

On a less shallow note-

Things are good right now. Really good. Caleb is so happy at his job. He's working at the prison, in case I haven't mentioned that already. And he loves it. And I love that he loves it. And I have a job that I love. There's a lot of love going around. Of course, my job's not really work, but that's probably why I love it. I'm customer service for a website that doesn't usually need customer service. Which means that I rarely, if ever, do any work. And, based on this, I have Caleb convinced that it's time to start trying to get pregnant. He asked me to give him a month or two to get more comfortable in his job, so I'm aiming at September. Just waiting now...