Hello Blog World!

Yes, I haven’t been around MSJ for a bit.  Here are the recent headlines of the summer life of the Crosby clan.

46 Year Old Housewife Drops 80 Pounds:  Wise choices for health over the last year have produced remarkable results for this average housewife, who is now above average in weight loss success. (Yes, that’s me, but didn’t that sound headliney?)

Water Shortage in Desert Leaves Dying Remains:  This simply means that Rick isn’t watering the backyard grass this summer and it’s all dead.  Why is that headline news, you ask?  Because the wiener dog likes to roll in the dead grass and then come in and roll on the used-to-be-clean carpet.  This is a new cleaning issue this summer that we have never faced before.  It is a constant source of time and energy expended on STUPID stuff. 2012 will go down in the Crosby History Book as the summer of the dead grass. (Hopefully not of the dead dog!)

Summer Movie Fun is Proving Successful:  Yes, I bought the summer fun pack of $7 movie tickets again.  So far, I haven’t seen any of the theatrical selections!  So it’s ALL fun for me!  This week is Mr. Popper’s Penguins.  If you have been an MSJ reader for several years, you will recall how we tortured our children with a sound recording of Mr Popper…. so I’m looking forward to finding out all the information we missed from the skipping CD… IF they followed the book.

Full Time Work is Stressful:   Hahahahaha!  This one makes me laugh.  Our 18-year-old, soon to be college-bound daughter, is working “full time”….. HARDLY!  I think in her first two weeks of “full time” she put in one, maybe two 8 hour days.  This is exhausting!  Never has she been asked to do unpleasant tasks for EIGHT straight hours!  Well, except for school and chores!  She has never taken so many naps.  She came home after a grueling six hours of scanning and filing files to exclaim, “I cannot imagine working eight hours a day, doing something you don’t like FOR FORTY YEARS!?!”  hahahah… real life, baby.  This is it!  See why we have tried to steer you to a career that suits your interests and talents????

Unpaid Worker Scores Big:  This is the story of my life.  I finally found a part-time opportunity that allows me to help others and make cash at the same time.  It is the exact antithesis of my daughter’s job.  In ten hours per week, I’m helping people lose weight and get healthy, get off their meds and live longer!  And they pay me!  It reminds me of when my husband started his initial job as a pilot and he couldn’t believe he got paid to fly a plane!  I handed my first check to my husband, who has been the primary bread earner in this household for 16 years, and he spat out in astonishment, “This is the most money you’ve made in …..   Y E A R S !”   haha!  God provides!

Lagging Teacher Delivers for Hopeful Students:  This simply means that I finally got my American History grades done and sent to my high school students whom I haven’t seen in 6 weeks!  Better late than never.  My child was the only who needed the grade for a transcript, so it’s all good.

Enjoy the Fourth of July, America’s birthday!  God bless America!  Land of the brave and FREE!  yah, baby.

Another Year Older… Another Year Wiser…

My birthday was shared with Jesus’ resurrection day this year.  Awesome!  Another year of my life has come to an end, but I certainly do feel wiser in the health department after my 45th year. I have figured out a few things (that’s the wiser part) that should contribute to living another 46 years (at least!)  Hey, I obeyed my parents and the Bible promises a long life for obedience.  :o)  That’s what I keep telling my kids anyway!  Six small meals a day really does keep the doctor away.  I know I switched that up a bit from the original prose, but it works for me. 

Allow me to share the joy in a photo essay…. then and now.  This coming Sunday I will have been eating six small meals per day for A YEAR!  A whole stinkin’ year!  I can’t hardly believe it either!  Here is my 45th birthday picture….. please refrain from snorting coffee through your nose when you behold my loveliness seventy-seven pounds ago. At least I was sporting a cool jacket and coordinating jewelry.

Here is this year’s birthday picture…. and “the difference?” you ask.  I ate the cake last year… I didn’t this year.  My mom made a darling peeps cake that was reported to be delicious.  I didn’t feel deprived.  It was a major victory in the weight-loss journey I’m traveling.  Next year, I’ll taste the cake, but for right now I didn’t need to.  My new mantra is “Everything is permissible, but not everything is beneficial.”  So true.

So as my next year begins, my plans include finishing writing a book of our adoption journey, getting into a regular fitness routine and daily praying diligently and intentionally for each of my children.  Not that I haven’t prayed for them up until now, but I got the book The Power of a Praying Parent and realized that I needed to up the ante.  Fighting in the heavenlies is where the action is.  I’m all over it!  Feel free to join me!

I’m a Visual Learner

Pinterest led me to this fabulous idea for watching the pounds disappear!  Of course, the one posted was in beautiful glass vases with pink, pearlized white and clear glass gems and glittery hot pink stickers for “Pounds Lost” and “Pounds to Go!”  Mine is the hillbilly-what-do-we-have-lying-around-the-house version.  My eight-year-old wanted to know where her marbles are… that she has never played with …. EVER.  Figures.  “They are being utilized in a highly efficient manner to keep your mother focused on the goal!”

Adjustments.  That is what I made this week…. adjustments to my overall weight loss goal.  When I began this journey, one-hundred pounds seemed enormous…. well, because it was.  It is.  I can’t even lift 100 lbs.  But I was carrying it around every weary-three-pieces-of-pizza-and-the-whole-chocolate-bar-loving day.  So, as I began to study the BMI chart (which I don’t exactly take as gospel truth because it says my stocky-barrel-chested husband should weigh 160 lbs.  He was skinny at 185 when I met him 27 years ago, thankyouverymuch.) I decided to aim for losing 104 pounds.  Down four little pounds from the original goal.  It’s all good.  And I’m okay with it.  My big-boned self-image may make another adjustment in a few months when I get there.  A flashback to high school and my hip bones sticking out made me realize another adjustment may be required as the time approaches.

In the mean time, I’m slowly moving the marbles to the LOST jar!  33 to go!  Whooo Hoooooo!

Progress Report #1

There you have it…. eight months of hard work paying off!  I’m down 65 pounds since April 2011.  It took me a LONG time to come to terms with my before picture, but I have.  I’m ready to share with the world.  I still have 35 pounds to go, but I’m not heading back to the neglected state of health on the left, thankyouverymuch.

I got a facebook message from my jr. high choir director from church (talk about a blast from the past!) who told me that she is a health coach and asked me to spread the word for her.  I said no.  I only spread the word for programs/products/people that I’ve tried and had great success with.  She asked if I wanted to try her program.  Just look at that BEFORE picture!  Does it look like I want to lose weight? (Well, I do look happy, but that’s beside the point.)  Yes!  I’ll try another weight loss program…. why not?  I’ve tried ALL the other ones.

My journey began with aching knees, a sore back and general lethargy due to carrying around 100 pounds that I didn’t need.  (I can’t even lift 100 lbs!)  I began eating five of the meals from the company each day and one meal I prepared (or ate out.)  This is the easiest plan I’ve ever seen.  And the meals are a variety of types of food, all nutritionally equal, so I could eat five of their brownies a day if I wanted to.  Some days I wanted to. But I don’t think I ever ate five brownies in one day.  But I was allowed to and that made me happy.

As with any self discipline issue, it was HARD!  And I didn’t want to follow the program when everyone around me was eating movie popcorn.  I WANTED pumpkin pie at Thanksgiving.  But I realized that eating what I wanted got me into the horrific shape I was in.  (That shape would be a round ball.)  I changed the input to change the outlook.

I’m still on this journey of feeling empowered with the knowledge I’ve gained.  I can go to a potluck and not freak out and fall off the wagon.  I don’t feel deprived, I feel empowered.  It’s a great feeling.  So great that I decided to be a health coach myself and guide others to optimal health and a feeling of empowerment!  Now if I had only taught jr. high choir, I could send them all a message on facebook!  Paying it forward!

2011 in Review

Early yesterday morning about 1:45 am, after bringing in the New Year with most of my family at my parent’s home, I sat on the side of my bed and pulled out my bucket list of 100 things I hope to do…. but I only have about 73 items on my list so far.  This is a common occurrence on January 1st in my life.  During my first day of the new year ritual for the past several years I have used the yellow highlighter to cross off three to four things that were accomplished that year.  This year was different.  I only highlighted one item and it was Read the Scarlet Letter.  Bigg whoopie doo.  It was sort of sad after many years of mucho highlighted crossings-off.

The year-end review was good for my soul, however.  2011 was one of the hardest years of my life.  It was a happy year, yet difficult for me adjusting to being a mother of four children.  It began with the strain of hardly being able to communicate in Spanish with our precious daughter.  After a month home, even with the language barrier, I realized I had not had a talkative seven-year-old kid in my house talking at me all day long for over seven years.  It wore me out!  I haven’t taken this many naps since I was four-years-old…. not even when I was pregnant with child number three with a four-year-old and a one-year-old running around the house.  I love having Nora here, don’t get me wrong.  For the first three months we semi coccooned, always having either Rick or I with Nora… when she was awake.  She needed the stability and the attention.  As soon as her black hair hit the pillow, we did try several escapes for date-nights, but usually I was too tired to enjoy them.

It was at Nora’s Gotcha Day (the one year celebration of her adoption) when I realized that I almost felt back to normal.  It took a blinking year!  When I mentioned this to my thoughtful and insightful husband, he quizzically asked, “Oh.  You think you’re back to normal?????”  I didn’t want to know what that meant, so I never asked.  But I felt like I had accomplished something quite monumental….. surviving the first year of adopting an older child… and not having visible bald spots on my head.  A well-meaning friend and fellow-adoptive mom told me to call her when I felt like I had wrecked our family by adopting.  Thankfully, that feeling hasn’t surfaced and I haven’t needed to make that phone call. That’s a big deal.

Even though it seems like I only read The Scarlet Letter this year, it’s not true.  For the first time in my 45 years, I read the Bible through in a year.  I’ve read the whole book before, but never in a year.  That did my heart good.  If only it had been on my bucket list.  Maybe I should add it so I can highlight it!  (I secretly do that with my daily to-do lists.)  Shhhh.

The second non-bucket list accomplishment is truly a lifestyle change that is in progress.  I gained 20 pounds with each child that came into my life… including the child that came to us through God’s gift of adoption AND the baby that didn’t make it to see the world.  Needless to say, I was not on the top of my health game at the beginning of 2011.  I’m getting closer.  Through the program Take Shape for Life, I have managed to rid my poor body of 62 pounds so far.  I can barely lift 62 pounds…. good grief!  I still have a ways to go, but I feel SO MUCH better.  No more sugar induced headaches, or deep-fried onion ring stomach aches.  No more pumpkin pie comas or entire empty bag of Cheetos guilt.  Part of the success was due to the reading of another GREAT book, Made to Crave: Satisfying your deepest desire with God not Food.  If that doesn’t smack me upside the head, I don’t know what would?  It was real life in black and white.  It was encouraging and heart changing.  It changed me in 2011.

So, Scarlet Letter aside, I’m pleased with my personal positive progress in 2011.  I have big plans for 2012… there will be many highlights this coming year…. our 25th wedding anniversary… (I know!)… our eldest graduating from highschool homeschool…. and three semi-big trips to look forward to.  But I feel the need to up the ante… to choose somehow to serve others… to reach out to hurting people around me… I haven’t figured it out yet, but that will be my resolution.  I’ll keep you posted.

And BAM! 17 Pounds Flew By!

Once again, in my life of up and down, I have started a new and improved eating plan.  Yes, I have shed pounds before.  Yes, I have gained them back.  I think over my post-childbearing years, I have lost and found about 387 pounds.  (That’s 129 pounds per child-birth experience, but who’s counting?) All gains were in small increments over many small dishes of pistachio almond ice cream and bits of spinach/artichoke dip slathered on crispy chips.  Seriously, it didn’t seem like much at the time.  Really.

Then BAM!  I woke up one day and realized my fat jeans were tighter than Superman’s suit.  THAT is tight. Again, a “healthy” plan must be consumed. (Terms used lightly… especially “healthy”.)  My most previous losing plan involved LOTS of protein and vegetables.  Ketosis, it is called.  My kidneys and leg muscles still cry out at the mention of the word.  The plan did work while I was on it.  The results were amazing, but there was no follow-up or follow-through or follow-anything other than the popsicle man as he drove down the street slowly serenading me toward a fudgesicle.

When the student is ready the master arrives.  ~Buddhist proverb.  I find it ironic that the Buddhist proverb is true in my venture toward a healthy lifestyle, being that Buddha could certainly use a healthy eating plan himself. Anyway, as I was squeezing into my fat jeans, refusing to buy that next size that I have NEVER purchased in my lifetime, I received a message on facebook from my jr. high choir director.  Yes, that’s a few years back.  She is a health coach and noticed that I have more than several friends on facebook.  She was inquiring if she could tap into my fat friend list.  Normally I don’t share people or programs unless I know they are legitimate.  So I agreed to be her prodigy before I share the wealth with my chubby chums.

Yesterday was the completion of week number five on the Take Shape for Life plan… and the number on the scale told me that BAM! 17 pounds were indeed missing.  That is a 3.4 lb. per week loss.  My too-tight pants are too loose.  At this rate, I should be my ideal weight right in time for plum pudding, gingerbread men and rum balls.  Only one serving of each, of course.

It’s a wonderful feeling to be under the heavy-weight fighter’s weigh-in number!  The difference between this program and the last 17 is that there is follow-up.  There is a health coach that will haunt me for life.  There is an eating plan that leans toward normalcy in the aftermath of the BMI suggested weight for a woman of my height (where there is no consideration AT ALL to my strong Scottish and Finnish husky bone structure.)

Yes, I’m sure you’re thinking, here we go again. Believe me, I am thinking the same thing.  But there is a glimmer of hope that I will be able to fit through the crack from where the light is shining at the end of the tunnel.

Accountability Group Mtg. #4

(Cheer up, Dad.  You weigh less than Hulk Hogan!)

Yeah, yeah.  You thought I was avoiding the issue, didn’t you?  I forgot.  Here’s the skinny:

Total pounds lost this week:  0   Total pounds lost in 2009:  7.8

And Rickey (the Canadian) is holding at 11 total pounds lost in 2009.  (I WILL WIN! Not that I’m competitive at all.)

So the good news is…. I’m not gaining.  The really good optimistic news is that if I keep up the 7.8 pounds per month… I’ll be down 62.4 pounds by the first of Sept.  Quit rolling your eyes at me!  I’m trying a few new techniques this coming week…. no Starbucks  (I’m finally out of gift cards),  no apple pie (it was only in the house because I forgot to put it in the oven when guests were here), and a few walks in the park to improve circulation and oxygen intake.  Hey, start small.

I also find it helpful when I make a meal list so that I have all the ingredients needed AND I can see the list and pick something that I’m craving.  This pick and choose through the freezer when I’m starving is not working well.  I keep resorting to eating peanut butter out of the jar.  Protein, right???  Have you read how much sugar is in creamy Skippy?  No wonder it’s addicting.

Any suggestions?  I’m WIDE open.

Accountability Group Mtg. #3

There’s good news and bad news.  Which do you want first???  I always want the bad first, so I can end on a good note.  So here’s the skinny:

Pounds lost this week:  -1      Total lost in 2009:  7.8.  

Yes, that was a minus… meaning a gain of 1 pound.  And the good news is…. I didn’t follow the diet plan at all this week and only gained a single pound.  We had company this week and ate out several times… all eating opportunities trying to usurp my past week’s victory.  I even ate Pasta Weezie at Carrabba’s… goodness, that is my absolute favorite… with fettuccine noodles, mushrooms, grilled shrimp and a creamy white Parmesan sauce.  That’s a four pound gain, just talking about it.  Fortunately, I ate only half of it and brought it home for Larisa.  She was the winner who found it in the back of the vegetable bin in the fridge.

Anyway, I’m back on track and look forward to a loss of poundage next week.  Is anyone out there trying to lose in 2009 too????

Pre-Computer Life…

OK, how in the wide world did we survive before computers????  (Mine are still down…. grrrrr.)   Seems our hard drive gave up the ghost.  I couldn’t renew library books or movies…. and the movies are $2 per DAY for each day late.  We had eight of them….. that’s $16 per day, for those who are mathily challenged.  Thankfully I was on top of that one!  Then, glory be, there were F-I-V-E inserts full of $365 worth of coupons in today’s paper…. but can I label them without my Coupon Sense site???? NO!  And where are eggs on sale?  Rick bought me a dozen, but accidentally threw them on the floor in front of the fridge instead of putting them in the fridge.  I’m so lost without my electronic friends.

Anyway, we are still breathing and surviving without internet access.  Hey, wait!  Doesn’t the PSP go online???  I could at least find information…  I’m off to steal my son’s PSP.  No more Madden ’08.  It’s Coupon Sense, baby.

Aaaaand,  along with the majority of North American citizens… Rick and I started an “eat healthier” plan on Jan. 1st.  Well, I did, anyway.  He joined, by his own will power, on Jan. 3rd at 8:00 a.m., albeit half-hearted. I think he went off the plan on Jan. 3rd at 4:30 p.m., but the jury is still out on that one.  He started again this morning… and was off by 1:30 p.m.  He ate some pasta with cheese sauce that was not on the plan…. he told me the pasta looked like chicken.  See what I’m dealing with here?  A blind man.  We did consume some all-beef dogs without the buns, but Rick had to keep his bun on his plate to make it appear that there was more food at his disposal.  I think I’m a nervous, emotional eater.  He’s definitely a visual eater.  We distracted him and removed it eventually…. so it wouldn’t start looking like chicken.  Keeve, our 10 year old, confiscated the bun and put a churro inside.  (Those are deep-fried dough sticks covered with cinnamon and sugar.)  The first ever churro dog.  (Disgusting.)

Churros

So, YOU, my dear readers are my new accountability group.  I’ll post my weekly losses here for you all to analyze and scrutinize and envy.  The first week’s always a good one with bloated water loss…. please stand by for my Thursday posts.  Intimate details will be posted for the entire universe to view at their discretion.  Pray!