Spring Breakin'

I've been off work this week for spring break. Just enjoying being off work. Riding my bike most everyday. Taking Sydney for walks and doing a few DIY things around the house. I think I'm going to get some flowers today for the yard. We have been having the most perfect weather.

On the diet front, things are moving along pretty good. I've lost 14 lbs since January 18th (the day I decided to get back to low carbing). And, while some days I still have a few too many carbs, the next day I cut back so it seems to be working. As long as I stay active I believe the scale will keep moving in the right direction.

Next week at work, I'll be doing the work of two people for about six to eight weeks. (A co-worker is having surgery and will be out.) Going in at 6am and leaving...whenever I get most of it done. I may even be working a few Saturdays. I am looking forward to the overtime (cha-ching) and I'll be too busy to snack, but I'm worried about being too tired to ride in the evenings. And getting to bed early for me will be a stretch. I'm a night owl, so going to bed before 10pm is unheard of in this house. Add to this the fact that we are being moved into temporary buildings this week while we are all off, and you can see the stress meter rising.

I have noticed something lately. Since I've been eating less carbs, I don't feel out of control around food. Well, that's not saying I'm not tempted. But I feel in control. That's what's important.

I hope you are having a great week.

Keepin' On

Just a quick note to say hello and hope your week was a good one. I've been moving right along with the plan to stay low carb and low cal. The weather has been so perfect, except for a few windy days, so I've been on my bike every day this week. The number on the scale is slowly moving in the right direction. Not as fast as I'd like, but I am aware daily and I will keep doing what works and scrap what doesn't.

Have a good weekend!

Wild Kingdom

When I was a kid I never missed an episode of Mutual of Omaha's Wild Kingdom with Marlin Perkins. Does any one remember him? My love of animals began with him, I think. Anyway, it's been feeling a bit like wild kingdom here at my house. More bumps in the night and a few squeals during the wee hours of the morning have made getting a full nights rest rather challenging. So, I called in a wildlife wrangler (actually a pest control guy, but the other term sounds more exciting).

I told him I saw a raccoon on the telephone pole a few nights ago and after he looked around he confirmed that we do have raccoon activity in the attic and around the house. He specializes in catch and release so he put a cage in the attic. Now we wait and see what we catch. The little buggers will be released somewhere north of Houston in a nice location with water nearby and lots of trees. I hope we get them soon.

The picture isn't great, but here's the little critter on the telephone pole.

Here's his/her little footprint.

Of course, the reason they've been able to get into my attic is because I have procrastinated about getting the screens replaced in the soffits and my attic has become grand central for anything wearing fur. The wildlife wrangler will begin to replace the rotted screen with something more durable as soon as we catch a couple of critters. Then when the attic is free of the little varmints, all the soffits will be neatly covered and they will no longer be able to get in. Yay!

Now that we are two weeks into the new year, it seems I've hit a few speed bumps in my intentions for 2011. I wanted to start doing more with my life besides working and sitting at home. But living with my mom has it's own circumstances and I don't always have control. She fell last week and had a terrible wound on her leg that became infected. The antibiotics (two rounds) are working but she's had to be off her feet (which is difficult for her since she's a mover and a shaker) and so I've had to be close by to help her more. Which is fine, I'm glad I'm available. Then she fell again Wednesday and it took us 25 minutes to get her up. Of course after we assessed that nothing was broken, we got tickled and laughed for about 5 minutes at the situation. Still, I'm worried that something like this could happen when I'm not here. I think we need one of those things you wear around your neck for times when someone has (help me, I've) fallen and can't get up. Sorry, but humor is how we get through somethings in this family. I'm thankful we can laugh :)

I've tried to be low-carb, but haven't really succeeded in keeping it low enough to make a difference. Now, tomorrow is my birthday and I'll probably go out to eat and will just eat whatever I want because, again, I have no control over the days events. My mom's friend hasn't made in town yet, but miraculously he will be here tomorrow. I think she planned it that way thinking I'd be excited about his being here for my birthday. I mentioned this to her (that he'd be here on my birthday) and she got all freaked out that I wasn't exactly keen on it. (don't be jealous of him, she said) Really, jealous has nothing to do with it. It's just that it's my birthday. Maybe I'm being selfish or anti-social. Or maybe this is part of the "doing more with my life" thing and I'm just uncomfortable with it. Oh, well. It will be a good day regardless, as long as no one falls down.

Have a great weekend. Don't procrastinate on the big things in life.

New Year - New 'Do

I know I've mentioned before that I've been growing my hair to donate to Locks of Love. I started letting it grow about a year and a half ago and last Thursday I decided it was long enough. It was getting to be a hassle to take care of and my style was reduced to one look: a ponytail twisted up in the back and held firm with my hair-thingy from 1970, lol.

I mean, I love long hair, but letting it all be one length (for donation purposes) wasn't all that flattering on my 50+ face.

When I was a kiddo, I had very straight hair. My mom wasn't pleased with it and so began the years of perms and curlers, etc. I was a tender-headed tot and so it was always a tearful event. I think that's why, even to this day, I feel the drama coming on when I need a haircut.

A little hair history!

Me with a perm. I don't believe it was my first either!

And more curls! Long and short versions.

Then, as I got older, no more perms.

(Then there was the whole "blonde bombshell" era. But that will have to be another day!)

Anyway, back to the new 'do. So, I went to get my haircut on Thursday. The first salon I went to, the stylist barely spoke English and had never heard of Locks of Love. Now, I know they don't need to do anything special about cutting my hair except that it needs to be at least 10" in length and cut in a ponytail. But I got too nervous trying to explain this to someone who didn't understand me...so I left. On to salon #2. It was a Supercuts, they said they don't do cuts for Locks of Love at that location. What? It's a haircut for crying out loud. So, they referred me to the Supercuts that I used to go to and that made me happy. I got there, the stylist was awesome! Her name is Afelia (probably not spelling it correctly) and she knew exactly what to do. It was kind of a neat connection, too. Her nephew is going through chemo right now and that gave us something to talk about. She divided up my hair into four ponytails and a few snips later, it was all done.

Here's the before:

Here's the after:

And here's what's going to Locks of Love:

I think this is the shortest my hair has ever been. It's an adjustment, but I think I really like it. Very easy to style, just scrunch and go! And it was for a very good cause, so that makes it worth it.

The rest of today will be spent planning for the week. I'm going back to low carb. It's what works and I am ready to focus on getting myself healthy this year. I'm working on my list of goals for this year. A big goal is to be more creative. Get the pencils to the paper, so to speak. 

Hope your Sunday is a just what you need. It's sunny here today in H-town and cool and crisp! Perfect.

Happy Memorial Day!

Happy Memorial Day, ya'll! And to my favorite Canadians - Happy Monday :)

Being Texan, we are having brisket and beans and tater salad. I'm having coleslaw instead of tater salad because of the carbs and no bread. I've done well doing low carb and the scale showed it this morning - a loss of 7 pounds my first week! Woo Hoo! Yahoo!

We used to have big family gatherings on these holidays. But now, what with certain family members getting a hitch in their craw (is that a saying?) our gathering has gotten smaller and smaller each year. So the meat was bought from a great little BBQ place and the rest is home made. I'm hungry, too, so I'm off to munch.

Have a great week and don't forget to drink your water!

I can see clearly now.

And it's not because the rain is gone, although it is gone and that was quite a storm that blew through here last night. I can see clearly now, but on Thursday I had a weird thing happen. I was at my computer at work, drinking my coffee, checking work emails and after a few minutes the center of my field of vision was gone. I blinked and blinked and told myself to calm down but I kinda freaked inside.

Anyway, to make a very long day short, the school nurse called my doctor, he said go the the ER, because who knows what this could be. A co-worker took me to the ER at 9:30am. Finally saw a physician at 11am. By this time, I told my friend to go back to work and I'd call when I needed to be picked up. The doc said everything looked good but wanted me to see an opthalmologist. So, I cross the street (by now my vision has cleared but my head hurts, I haven't had anything to eat or drink in hours and I'm feeling pretty crappy) sit through an exam with lots of lights and eye drops. Turns out I had an ocular migraine. Well, I'm thankful that's all it was. Normally, I don't run to the doctor because a) the insurance usually sticks me with more of the bill than I expect, and b) I just don't like going.

When my friend picked me up, I was getting the shakes from not having eaten. I needed something quick and fast so I got a chicken sub sandwich and ate it even though I was very nauseated. So, low carb didn't happen on Thursday but I did my best the rest of the day.

Thursday ended well, though. Some wrens built a nest in a lantern that I have hanging on my patio. We've been watching the mom and dad take care of their babies for a few weeks now and knew they would be leaving the nest any day. Well, Thursday afternoon was their big day. The two little cuties were learning to fly and we got to watch from our den window.

This is where they built their nest.

The nest inside

There's one of the little cuties (top left)

Sorry for the blurry pic, I turned off the flash so I wouldn't blind him/her.

They would hop up the wall and then fly to the ground. It was so cute!

I miss them already. I watched the parents working hard everyday, feeding and caring for their babies and cleaning the nest. It's very quiet now out there on the patio. *sniff*sniff* I think I have empty nest syndrome, lol.

My first week of 30 days of low carb eating has been great. I had a piece of cake yesterday because we had a going away party for a very good friend at work. The cake was homemade from scratch and the girl that makes them is an incredible cake baker. I don't usually care for store bought cakes, but I couldn't pass up a small piece of this cake. And after I ate it, I was okay with it, and the rest of the day was low carb all the way. I'm in control. Finally. (fingers crossed)

Hope you have a great holiday weekend. Drink lots of water and stay cool!