One of Those Days

Have you ever had one of those days where for some reason you just don't feel like you're firing on all cylinders?  I'm not sure exactly what my problem is today, but I'm feeling inadequate.  It makes me not want to even write a blog post because I'm fighting the thought, "why would anyone even care what I have to say?  What makes me think I'm interesting enough to even be writing a blog?"  Do you ever wonder what you have to offer?  Some days I'm not sure why anyone would be interested in hearing what I have to say.

I'm decent at math, but I'm not one of those amazing super-genius types about which TV shows are made.  I can take nice pictures, but I'm certainly not supporting myself on my photography.  I'm providing a safe and loving home for my children, but I don't have any amazing parenting answers.  I have one child who just does what she's supposed to do (I don't really know why) and another child who becomes defiant and difficult EVERY SINGLE TIME he needs to accomplish something, like a chore.  I'm really working on making good choices, but I fail at least as often as I succeed.  I've been seriously trying to lose weight for 20 weeks and have less than 2 pounds to show for it.

Why, oh why would anyone be interested in anything that I have to say?  Maybe because it really does help motivate other people to know that regardless of how hard I try, I'm still a fallible human being.  Maybe if someone as imperfect as me can manage to make good choices on occasion, then it will give others hope that they'll be able to do the same.  I do hope that honesty and sharing my struggles inspires someone else to keep trying, because it really is about the journey, not the destination.

Weekly Weigh In

If you could hear me, you'd hear the deep sigh I'm fetching right now.  I essentially maintained this week, going up by 1/10th of a pound.  The only thing that's ever really worked for me to lose weight is strictly counting my calories.  I don't know why I just don't want to do that right now; I'll do good a for a couple of days and then it's like my subconscious is sending up a rebellion and just won't do it.  This is incredibly frustrating.  I'm not entirely sure what I need to do to get my head back in the game here, but I hope I figure it out soon, this is kind of pathetic twenty weeks in.

My daughter called this morning while she was enjoying a late lunch in Venice.  Of course it was about a quarter until five here, so there went my day to sleep in.  But it was good to hear her voice after more than a week.  We'd exchanged texts, but this was the first time I'd actually spoken to her.  I get to pick her up from the airport on Friday evening, and I can't hardly wait!  It sounds like they're having an amazing time and seeing some wonderful sights.  Hopefully she'll have a couple of pictures that I can share when she gets back.

My son and I went on a bike ride yesterday morning.  I know this may not seem like a big deal, but my son was a late learner on the bike so it was a real milestone.  My husband wouldn't ever let him use training wheels, and the bike he'd picked out when he was six had a strange design with the pedals in front of his legs, so he couldn't get the proper leverage to really pedal.  Finally last summer (when he was nine) he learned how to ride that bike, but he just never got very smooth.  So for his tenth birthday he got a new bike with a more traditional design, and he rode fabulously yesterday.  Now I need to get a new bike because I was just using my husband's old bike that he'd given to my daughter.  I figured there was no need for all of us to have our own bikes since my son couldn't ride so we couldn't go on a family ride.  Now that's a real possibility, so I guess I need to spend more money.  Oh well!

I'm getting ready to go back to work tomorrow, physically and mentally.  I am really making an effort to have the proper mindset heading into the week so that I'm not so miserable at work, or so stressed out that it manifests in physical symptoms.  Since all of the tests the doctor ran were negative, I'm convinced stress is the cause of all the health problems I've been having, probably including the weight that seems to be here to stay.  So part of being healthy and making the right choices is properly dealing with stress.  Wish me luck!

Successful Day

I've managed to make some pretty good choices today, both with food and with stress management.  My husband and daughter are both out of town so it's just me and my son right now.  My son was very tired this morning when I woke him up to take him to his summer program so I could go to work, and he wasn't moving very fast.  It was stressing me out quite a bit, but I managed not to yell and to stay calm.  He finally started moving and even had a few minutes to play before we had to leave.  So it turned out fine, and it might not have if I had lost my cool and started yelling.

After I dropped my son off I headed into the office.  On most days I ride the bus, but on Fridays I usually drive since we work half days.  I knew that I was getting on the highway at a difficult time of the morning, but didn't realize how bad it was going to be.  It was completely stop and go for most of the drive.  I could feel myself starting to get stressed out again, but was able to use self-talk and calm myself down.  I don't actually have to be in the office until 8:00 on Fridays, I just usually get there around 6:15 because I always have so much work to do if I want to leave on time.  I knew I'd still make it before 8:00, and there was nothing I could do about the traffic, so I just calmed down and enjoyed my music, and still made it to work by about 7:15.

I actually had a really good day at work also.  I got to spend most of the day doing what I'm best at:  trouble-shooting.  My boss was out unexpectedly so I didn't get any interruptions and I was able to configure a change in our HR system that will make things easier for everyone.  So the morning flew by and I left the office feeling pretty good about what I'd been able to accomplish.  This is also why I like to work from home so much, I do my best work when I can just focus without constant interruptions.

I did have one problem with my choices both yesterday and today.  I never wrote a post yesterday because Stephen King's latest book, Mr. Mercedes, came out this week.  I managed to wait one whole day after it showed up on my Kindle to start reading because I told myself I wouldn't start it until I'd finished the book I was reading for work.  But once I started it, I fell into my addict habits and couldn't put it down.  It's actually pretty amazing that I even made it into work today.  I've finished it now, which is why I'm managing to get a blog post written today.  It wasn't my favorite Stephen King book, but as usual it was well written with phenomenal character development, so I'd highly recommend it.  There was nothing supernatural in this one, it was about one messed up, scary dude.

I've been making pretty good choices with food this week.  I'm trying a different approach where I'm not counting my calories so strictly (since I seem to want to rebel against that right now), and I'm focusing more on eating reasonable portions when I feel hungry.  It seems to be working, so hopefully I'll have good results to post on Sunday's weigh in.

Tomorrow morning I'm going on a bike ride with my son.  We have quite a bit of open space around our house and there are eagle's nests that he wants to go look at.  I had been holding this out as a reward for him really getting good at riding his bike, and he's now earned it.  I hope that everyone has a great weekend and gets to spend it doing things you love!

Pictures I took while on a walk with my mom and son last night.

When the Cat's Away...

...the mice will play!

My daughter is in Europe and my husband is in Las Vegas.  It's just my son and me for several days, and I plan to spend as much time as possible playing and enjoying his company.  Which may mean that I need to get my old bike out of the shed, since he got a new bike for his birthday and doesn't want to do anything but ride.

The bike is just slightly too big for him, but the guy at the bike shop said you want to get one where they almost can't reach the ground so they can grow into it and not need a new one next season.  I appreciated that since it wasn't a cheap bike.  I think my son sees the bike as a new avenue to further independence.  I see it as a great way for him to get exercise, so it's a win-win.

Just a little while ago a friend of my son stopped by so they rode off together to go to the friend's house.  I don't know if I can adequately capture what a treat it is to be home alone when I don't have any responsibilities.  I know that I would be lonely if it was like this all the time, but since it's such a rare occurrence, I truly enjoy it.  So I'm off to do whatever I want to do, without worrying about what anyone else wants!

Here's hoping your evening is as enjoyable as mine's shaping up to be!

My roses are starting to bloom

I love snapdragons

Stormy afternoon sky

De Colores!

I realize that we've been getting some nice colors for awhile now, but my flowers are so vibrant and colorful right now and I am loving them.  All winter long when I was taking pretty, but fairly monotone pictures like this one, I was dreaming of colors again.

Today I was just really enjoying the fun colors outside and couldn't resist taking pictures to share.

Leavin' on a Jet Plane

I put my 13-year old on a plane tonight headed to Europe.  She's flying into Heathrow and she'll spend a couple of days in London.  Then she'll ride the chunnel train to Paris where she'll spend a couple of days.  Finally they'll ride the night train to Italy where they'll spend time in Rome, Venice, Pompeii, and the Isle of Capri.  This is a chance of lifetime and I'm so proud of her for being nominated to go on trip based on academic performance and character.  But I've never been away from her for this long since the day she was born, and I already miss her.

Getting her ready this way made me think about when we have to get her ready to head off to college, and I'm freaking out a bit because that's only five years away.  I know that's still awhile away, but the past thirteen years have gone by so fast, I know the next five years will go by in the blink of an eye.  Thank goodness I still have my son here.  I can't even imagine what I'm going to do when he goes to college, I'm probably going to suffer from empty nest syndrome pretty badly.  But maybe I should stop worrying about eight years from now and work on truly appreciating the time I have right now!

Weekly Weigh-In

The good news is that my weight is down from last Sunday.  The not so good news is that it's up from Wednesday when I did a mid-week check-in to try and keep myself on track.  But we did celebrate my son's birthday yesterday, so I'm not really surprised that that I wasn't able to keep it down.

Weigh-In:  134.6 lbs

At least I'm moving in the right direction.  If I can just stay on track long-term I'll be able to get my weight back down.

We finally got our garden in this weekend.  We've just had so much going on this spring that we didn't have time to do it sooner.  Other than the perennial herbs it doesn't look like much yet, but it should fill in nicely with all the moisture and sun we've been having.  We also got flowers planted in our whisky barrels, which always take over the whole barrel within a couple of weeks.  I'll post more pictures as things start to grow.