and... more progress!

Well, I'm now officially up to 23 lbs lost, which is awesome. And to be honest, I haven't really been tracking points as intently as I normally do, since there's been a lot of eating out. It's interesting how I can more or less guess what a quantity of something is just by eyeballing it, and it's obvious that I can't be too far off because I'm losing weight.

My big issue with weight is not so much that I don't eat healthy - because I generally do. My issue is with snacking. It's rare that I have take-out or pop in the house, we don't really eat chips that often. It's really just portions and snacking that throws me through a loop. I've also found myself making the same meals over and over again - meat with a side of rice every day for dinner. Which, in itself is healty, but it can be a lot. I know I've frequently had 2 pork chops instead of one. A cup of peas is half the points of a cup of rice, and a 1 point salad is not that hard to put together - which would be a quarter of the points of the rice again.

Or, a small glass of juice instead of a tall glass. Sweetener in my coffee instead of sugar, or milk instead of cream. A slice of cheese instead of an inch-thick cut of it. Weird little things like that will cut down the number of points (& calories and fat!) I consume.

Plus I've found myself eating things I don't normally eat. I'm eating a lot more fruit and veg for snacks instead of granola bars, even though the granola bars are quite healthy. Or cottage cheese makes great snacks too.

Small things do make a big difference!

way more progress! :)

Dietwise, I had a very good week this past week! I'm down another 3lbs, which brings my total weight lost to 19.2 lbs!

I was a bit worried, because again last week I went out to eat. Restaurant eating always weirds me out, since I really can't accurately measure what I'm eating to really measure my points, and the particular restaurant I went to didn't have the nutritional info posted online so I could figure it out when I got home. :(

So, that makes a total of 3 out of the last 4 weeks where I've lost 3 lbs a week, which I know is higher than usual - average weight lost in a week on a diet should be 1 to 2 pounds. I am sticking within my points, and using up some of my banked points once in a while. I must admit, though, I'm greatful that my points range is in the 30 points range at this point, because I am finding that I am using them. I guess that's one of the lessons you learn with Weight Watchers, you slowly decrease down, and learn to substitute healthier portions and more low-point foods into your diet.

At this rate, though, I should hit my next goal of 25 lbs lost in no time!

idle hands are the devil's playground

Growing up Catholic, one is bound to hear this at least once in their upbringing. I've never been particularily religious, but I've heard this often muttered by my teachers when going to Catholic grade school, not fully knowing what that ever meant.

It is, though, something that I often think about while knitting or crocheting. I've always been, by nature, fidgety - so knitting & crocheting was just naturally a hobby that I'd fall in love with. There's a certain satisfaction in accomplishing the large projects like afghans or sweaters, but the small portable projects are great too.

The top I'm working on to wear this summer is still in progress, I'll post photos of that later. What is keeping me busy on the weekends are the itty bitty projects. For example, I finished four duduza dolls (queuable here on ravelry) that were mailed after the weekend was over. This past Easter weekend, I worked on some toe-up socks that I want to finish before Halloween, since they're in Halloween colours.

I weighed myself this morning - despite the holiday over the weekend, celebrated twice - once on Friday with my DB & SiL, and again on Saturday with DH's family - I still lost 1.2lbs. A great accomplishment, despite the weight being minimal!

The unfortuante thing with holidays is that there are sweets everywhere - and I had my fair shair of cheesecake and chocolates! I was sure I wasn't going to lose anything, but the fact that I did was awesome. I wasn't about to bring that big top to knit when DH & I went up north to visit the inlaws, but having my toe-up socks came in handy to keep my mind occupied enough. My hands were busy knitting stripe after self-stripping stripe in my socks to avoid having that third peice of chocolate or that extra handful of chips.

Having some kind of mindless knitting that's easy and small enough to carry around - like socks - are a handy thing to help keep the excess snacking at bay!

PROGRESS!

I've lost four pounds. Four! Well, 4.2 actually. So, this past week I've completely undone the two pounds I've gained from the week before, and lost a little extra.

Yea, I know that most of what is lost initially is pretty much water weight, but it still counts.

Short post for today... more to come later!

start of week two

Well, I've started my diet with a bit of a rocky road. As it turns out, last Monday I started my diet, and last Thursday at the last minute, my brother and SiL have invited us over for dinner to celebrate them selling their house. DH & I were careful in monitoring what we ate and at what volume, and I think we were pretty good about it, although it was hard to calculate our points on things like dessert, which we didn't have a lot of but we also didn't make, so I've no idea what went into it. So, I've a feeling that our points were thrown off a bit because of that. But, we also spent this past weekend at my parents-in-law's place, so the diet went thru a loop there. I like my inlaws a lot, but they tend to always try to feed me, so it was difficult to keep telling them that I'm on a diet and I can't have more food, and they kept trying to give me more food. Eesh.

As it turns out, DH lost about a pound this past week, but I gained two pounds. Go figure.

So, this week there should be no distractions. In fact, if I'm lucky, there should be no diet-distractions until Easter.

I did get my yarn last Friday, so I've started knitting my top for this summer's wedding. This is it so far. It's hard to tell from the picture, but it is a very dark blue. I'm using Cotlin yarn from knitpicks in the colour Plantation for this one. It's a really easy knit, and at the rate that I'm going, I should be able to finish this one plus a black one as well for the wedding. The top is called Vintage Love Summer Top (ravelry link & pattern) and is made from the top down. I can't wait to have it finished! Although I can't model it until I've lost the weight I need to; there's a good chance that I'll have this top done before the weight is lost. Nonetheless, it'll be a good distraction to keep my hands busy knitting instead of snacking, and it'll give me the motivation to stay on track with this diet so I can fit into it for August!

day one

DH & I have officially started Weight Watchers today on our own. We're both keeping track of what we eat in notebooks we picked up over the wknd, and charting out how many points we can both have.

When we weighed ourselves this morning, DH was a bit disappointed that his pre-breakfast weight dropped him down a point group! So, instead of him being able to have 24-29 points as he originally thought, he's down to 22-27 points. His weight this morning fit him in the new point category by just a pound.

I, on the other hand, am in the 30-35 point range. So, I've got a way to go to catch up to DH.

I've decided that the best approach to this diet, this time, is to create both immediate and short term goals. Immediate goals are for right now, to make the short term goals seem a bit more attainable. Long term goal of course is to get down to my ideal weight, which is going to be very far away, realistically.

So, my immediate goal is to lose 10 lbs, which isn't too far away and I think should be easily attainable within the short term. Short term (but not immediate) goal is to be small enough to fit into the top I mentioned yesterday. The yarn for that hasn't yet arrived, and my brother's wedding is 5 months away, so I've plenty of time to work on that.

Already 2 meals down - breakfast and lunch - keeping track of my points and water intake. I've just started but already I feel like progress is being made.

going on a diet...

Well, this summer (August) my brother's getting married. (yay!) I've decided that what I want to do is knit a top - or more specifically, knit 2 versions of the same top - to wear to the wedding. DH has been asked to be one of the groomsmen, and I've been designated as a greeter.

The problem is, I'm larger than the largest size available for the top I want to make, even though the largest size is a 3x. I am 3x sized, but that really varies from one brand to another. Bustwise, I'm actually 1.5" larger than what's asked for in the pattern. It wouldn't be difficult to just add a few stitches to accomodate my size, I've done that before. But what good would that be, really?

I've always been overweight, ever since I was little. My weight has never really been an issue for me, I've never been teased for being fat or anything like that. I was always fine with what size I was. Because I was never really one of those 'girly' kind of girls (obsessed with clothes, make up, etc) then fitting into little cute outfits was never much of a concern for me.

What made my weight an issue was when I started knitting for myself, and wanting to knit sweaters. Even though a lot of great patterns come in my size, buying enough yarn to make these largest sizes can get expensive, even if I go the more economical route.

Wouldn't it be great to be able to knit a sweater for myself and not have to buy more than 10 balls of yarn?!?

So, I've decided to put myself back on Weight Watchers, I've still got all of the points calculators and work books from when I last did it a few years ago, but didn't stick to it for too long. I've joined the weight watchers group on ravelry. My goal is to knit this top (ravelry link) twice, and I've ordered some knitpicks yarn in two colours.

The top two sizes are for a 48" bust and a 52" bust, and it looks like it's a negative ease top... so I want to fit in the 52" bust size comfortably. If I can get myself down to a 50" bust or so, that would be great. That's my goal for August.

DH wants to lose a little too, although he really doesn't need to lose a lot, but he's going to do WW with me for a bit. :) We'll officially start on Monday, which will give us plenty of time to lose the weight we want to for August!

I'll be (hopefully) blogging and knitting to help me keep on track with this diet. It'll motivate me to stay on track, get my projects done, and blog on a more regular basis!