Well (afraid to say something for fear of "speaking too soon") blogger seems to be working again. Here's hoping!

I had a great day. I took today off and got a tonne of stuff done at home. House-worky things that have been piling up. My intention was to get everything done today so I could have a day off tomorrow to veg. I got all my stuff done so I intend to pamper myself, sleep in, read a little, basically relax, all day tomorrow. Should be nice, I deserve and I've been looking forward to a day to myself for a while.

Food and activity wise I did really well today. My folks stopped by for a visit this morning and my mother mentioned that I looked slimmer in the hips and tummy area. I was pleasantly suprised to hear that from her. I hadn't seen her since Christmas...I can't really see a difference when I look in the mirror. I notice small differences in my clothes, mostly in the past week or so. The positive reinforcement is nice, it felt good, I feel good. It was a good day...and on that note, I bid you all a good night!

something totally weird is happening with blogger today. My post from last night shows up in my archives but not on my front page. When I look at the FTP log, it's showing some kind of permissions error when it's writing to the page. Hopefully they'll get it sorted out soon.

I'm at home today, enjoying the sunshine pouring through my windows while I sip coffee and do laundry. Hope the sun's shining on your day too!

today was a very good day. I'm almost 4 weeks into this new way of eating and living and it's really becoming "routine" if you know what I mean. I'm still reading labels and paying close attention to portion sizes but it's much easier now than it was 3 weeks ago. We had an amazingly delicious dinner tonight. My hubby made brown basmati rice with stir fried pork tenderloin, broccoli, green peppers, onion & garlic with some sodium reduced soy sauce and some hoisin. He's been experimenting with different types of rice in our rice cooker and he's really gotten this brown basmati down to a science. The veggies were crunchy and so tasty and the pork was very tender. It was just an incredible, satisfying meal.

Enough about food though! Now that the eating thing is getting really and truly under control, I want to increase my activity. We've been in a real cold snap here lately, and had a tonne of snow, so I haven't been getting outside to walk like I had hoped I would when I started doing this 4 weeks ago. I have been riding my recumbent bike but I'm making a goal to ride for longer periods of time in the coming week. I'd also like to add some kind of fitness tape situation to the mix as well. As I mentioned the other day, I found an old copy of Sweatin' to the Oldies last week and I enjoy it but I'd like to maybe vary it a bit. I'm really easing into this activity stuff as it's been ages since I've done anything resembling serious exercise so if anyone has any suggestions for tapes or dvds that will help me build up gradually and not hurt myself, I'd appreciate hearing about them.

mmmm...midweek. I'm still feeling like a bit of a slug tonight despite the fact that I got a lot accomplished at work and for home today AND I stayed on program even though we went out for Chinese food tonight after work. I don't really have anything exciting to report. I'm really digging the weigh-better and excess matters forums though. Everyone on those two "boards" are very friendly and supportive. If you haven't visited them yet, check them out. I'm going to go and ride the bike while that 70's show is on, maybe that'll perk me up!!!

I'm still dragging my butt around today. My PMS is really kicking my ass this month. I didn't budge an inch off of plan today though so I'm pretty pleased with myself. I really enjoyed my meals today and I'm finding that I'm truly satisfied with the portions I'm eating and I'm feeling good for the better choices I'm making. I don't really have news to report so I think I'll cut this short and hit the bike for 30 minutes before bed (I totally slept in this morning so riding before work was out of the question)!

What a day. It wasn't bad until a couple of hours ago. I had an okay day at work, pretty busy what with it being Monday and all. I had my usual breakfast and lunch. I'm keeping with the piece of fruit for mid-morning and mid-afternoon snack thing. It seems to be really working well. It's totally keeping my appetite under control. After work though, we had to go grocery shopping. Because we had a huge snow storm over the weekend, the roads are still a little sloppy so we didn't go to the store we usually go to, we went to the one which was closer to our house. They are both Loblaws stores but the one outside of the city is much nicer than the one near our house. Anyway, it was kind of busy and full of really stupid people and by the time we were leaving I was really anxious to get home. I could feel PMS hitting me, full-force. By the time we got home and I put the groceries away, I was completely exhausted and on the verge of tears. I know you ladies all know what that's like, it's not because you're sad, it's because you feel frustrated for no apparent reason, and angry at the world...it's so pleasant!

Anyway, I finally got to change into some comfy clothes and veg out in front of the computer for a bit, and chilled out. Neither one of us felt like cooking tonight so we had frozen pizza for dinner. It was one of those President's Choice "too good to be true" lactose & cholestrol free roasted veggie pizzas. It was okay, it had a whole wheat crust on it and some nice veggies but the sauce didn't taste like anything, it could have totally used some roasted garlic and maybe some rosemary.

After dinner, I was craving something...total PMS craving...so I broke down, and for the first time in over 3 weeks, I had a piece of chocolate. Not a bar, not a box, just one piece. I had received a box of Godiva's for Christmas and had tucked them away in the back of the cupboard. Until tonight, I had completely forgotten about them. I opened up the box and allowed myself one piece. It was delicious, and I did not go over my calories today (in fact, I stayed under!) and it has soothed my hormones...I don't know if that is true or not, physiologically I'm not entirely sure that chocolate can do that ;-) It did make me feel better though, in control. I had a craving, and I fed it, in a reasonable way and it's over. I didn't go nuts and eat a large cadbury dairy milk, I had one small chocolate. Now it was very good, expensive chocolate, and I hadn't had one in a month. That's probably why it tasted so good. I'm quite proud of myself for that. I'd feel better about myself if I had gotten off my but and rode my bike today but I didn't. Tomorrow is another day though and I'm going to ride my bike. I'm going to try to do it in the morning when I get up, we'll see how that goes.

Oh, one more thing, I measured myself tonight and I'm down another 0.5" in total. I know that I'm probably bloated from PMS. So that's 8.5" in total. Not bad for 3 weeks. I know that the results are going to be slow to show and I have a long long way to go but I'm hanging in there.

Wow, I just completed day 21! Three weeks, on plan! I feel terrific tonight. I had a great day food-wise and activity wise. We have been working on a huge re-organization / diy project around our house and we finished it today. I hauled boxes of books from room to room and was up and down our stairs more times than I care to count. We can now use every room in our house and we're not overloaded with boxes of stuff. I know that I wouldn't have had the energy or attitude to get it all finished up today if I hadn't been on this eating / fitness plan. I'm so happy with the house now, and happy with myself, I can't express it!! It's been a fabulous weekend!!!