Clothes

TODAY'S MOTIVATION

I bought some work out clothes a little while ago and they were a bit too snug on me and today when I tried them on they fit nicely, even a bit baggy. 

I should have taken a picture, but nonetheless it made me feel good. Fitting into smaller sizes always keeps me motivated. 

RANT OR RAVE

Someone shared this youtube video on facebook the other day. Just another person reinforcing the value of exercise. 

When you are working out it feels good when you can look back on all good things you are doing for yourself. 

RANDOMS

We have a train track that is at the very end of our property and a passenger train goes by every few hours. It literally honks it's horn and zooms right by in a matter of seconds.We figured since we live on a two acre lot it would seem farther away.  But when we have the windows open it is quite loud. When we first moved into our house we were like, "What the heck did we get ourselves into?", but after a few days we stopped noticing it and now we don't even consciously hear it half of the time (unless I am cutting the grass and it scares the crap out of me!). 

But after Maya was born, we started noticing it again because she would stop what she was doing whenever it went by and her eyes would open wide. Now a lot of times when we hear the horn we say, "Choo Choo train!" and she still stops what she's doing and watches or listens for it. 

I tried to take a picture of it so I can write about it in Maya's first year scrapbook,  but it goes by so fast by the time I get my camera it is already gone. Today I happened to have the camera right beside me. 

I imagine "choo choo" is going to be one of her first words. 

Underwear

Yup. Underwear. When I was pregnant with Maya I started wearing "granny panties" every day.  It's eight and a half months since she was born and I still have some in my drawer. It's just that they are so comfy. I would like to broaden my horizons a bit and get back into wearing something more my age.

I'm only 29 years old for goodness sake, not 80 (no offence to the grannies out there!).
If I lose some more weight, I am more likely to feel comfortable in my undies again!

RANT OR RAVE

I got a gift certificate from one of my best friends for the mall and today I am going to go out and buy a new outfit for myself! Yeah for friends who give you free shopping!

RANDOMS

This morning Maya learned her first piece of classical music on the piano - I think it was Clementi or Chopin. She played it beautifully!

Out Of The Closet

 TODAY'S MOTIVATION

Ah, my beloved closet...

When I first moved into this house I thought to myself, "Who the heck needs a closet this spacious? I'm never gonna fill it!"

Then I moved in. This is my side of the closet. Jam packed. 

If I had lots of moolah, I would definitely purchase one of those crazy closet organizers with all the fancy drawers and cupboards where every shoe, blouse, bag, skirt has it's place. But this works for now. 

These two dressers are also jammed with clothes!

You may remember me getting rid of a bunch of stuff in our yard sale this summer where I decided to get rid of stuff. 

Well I decided it was time to tackle my closet, the one thing left to de-clutter. I got rid of all the clothes that are too big, all my maternity wear, and anything that was just UGLY.  When I was going through it, I couldn't believe how long some of the items have been sitting in my closet. The thing is, about half of the clothes were things that I probably have not even taken off the hanger since I lived in this house for the past three and a half years. A lot of it consisted of smaller items I no longer fit into that I wanted to keep "just in case" I lost weight.  There was an array of sizes, some dating all the way back to 2007! The thing is, I would love to keep these clothes except now they are all out of style!  It was actually a bit emotional going through my closet. You would think that it is just a pile of clothes, but really, each item had some sort of memory. The bathing suit I wore on my honeymoon, dresses I wore to weddings, the fat clothes I had to buy after I had Maya (because nothing fit me for the first month of her life).  It really was a concrete way of seeing just how much I have gained and lost over the years. It was weird looking at some clothes that I had worn all the time in the past which now look so small and then others that I wore not that long ago that look so big.  I wanted to save some items just so that I could try them on as the pounds come off but they were so ugly I figured they needed to be chucked. 

As I went through and took things off the hangers the clothes started to pile up.

And this was the final "get rid of" pile. Craziness. About three stacks were maternity clothes, which was sad to get rid off because I spent a lot of money on them and now they will not fit me during my next pregnancy.  Hopefully someone else will benefit from wearing them. 

When all was said and done, this was the before and after shot of my side of the closet. 

Before

After

After

I no longer have a shortage of hangers. 

Last night I lugged these bags to the community clothing drop off box. It was located right by the kickboxing place. Nothing like finishing a fat burning session and then crossing the road to get rid of your baggy clothes. How convenient!  

As I was going through my closet I had a few revelations:

1) My fashion sense has always been non-existent. I am going to have to change that one of these days!

2) I tend to buy the same things over and over again. Sometimes I even buy the same shirt in three different colours. Boring!

3) Fat clothes are just plain ugly. They are just camouflage for the problem areas. 

4) I have way too many "office" clothes. 

5) I need to stop buying black. 

6) Most of the clothes still in the closet are going to be too big for me soon!

Today I am motivated to keep fitting into smaller clothes until everything in my closet goes.  

RANT OR RAVE

Yesterday I made a classic hearty vegetable soup recipe. I have never made soup before, I don't know why - it's so easy!  I added a bit of quinoa to make it a bit thicker since I usually like to put lots of crackers in (but that is not part of my meal plan). It was pretty tasty!

I will head over to the recipe page and post the soup contents soon. 

NOTE TO SELF

Fitting In

TODAY'S MOTIVATION

I was at the mall two days ago killing time with Maya. I didn't go to any clothing stores, just the book store and card store. But while I was there I was thinking about the fact that I do have to buy some new clothes that fit a bit better. Before, I would go a long time between shopping trips because I hated trying on clothes which was not a good thing. I think that it is important to try on new clothes regularly just to keep in check. So I am thinking about shopping today. When I go I want to be able to fit into some smaller sizes!

On another note thanks to those who have given me some pointers on staving off the hunger pangs. It has reminded me to take another look at what I am eating during the day. Turns out there are a few small guidelines in my meal plan that I was forgetting to incorporate. Sometimes when I get comfortable with something I start cutting corners and forget to get all my servings in, etc. Hopefully modifying this well help!

RANT OR RAVE

Last week I talked about turning on the TV for the season premiere of Grey's Anatomy.  About an hour before it was on I remembered that it was Thursday and that I needed to get to a TV. It was nice to just sit on my own and veg out for a bit after Maya went to bed. For the past few seasons I have been getting a bit less interested in the show because, well, it seems that all these unrealistic things keep happening. Like for example a live bomb in the operating room, a shooting spree, natural disasters, boat crashes, plane crashes, doing practice surgeries on interns, and so on. Every character has had some kind of emergency life saving surgery (mostly brain surgery by Dr. Shepperd), most of the characters have almost died, most of their babies / husbands /wives/ parents have almost died, every character has at some point dropped to floor unexpectedly with some sort of medical trauma (and many of the patients for that matter), most of them have done some sort of unspoken action against the ethics of medicine, and all of them have hooked up with each other at some point and most of them have married or hooked up with one of their patients. And lets not forget that every patient bursts into some crazy monologue where they tell the doctors their whole life story in under thirty seconds. Yeah, like that would really happen in a real ER. Every time I am watching the show I am saying "what the hell?", "seriously?", "that is so unrealistic", and so on. Yet I still keep watching it. I don't know what I expect - it is a soap opera after all! But some of the story lines keep me coming for more.

Source

Last night I watched the first hour only to realize after that it was a two hour season premiere. I was busy talking to my BFF so I only caught parts of the second half. Apparently Meredith stole a baby and then brought it back. That's all I remember. Now I am going to have to watch it online to fill in the blanks. Next thursday I will be tuning in again! Everyone has to have some sort of guilty pleasure.  In the mean time, the TV goes back off for another week.

NOTE TO SELF

Lovely Bridesmaid

TODAY'S MOTIVATION

You may remember me talking about my beloved wedding dress and how I want to be able to fit back into it.  Well, there are a few other things that I would like to use as visual reminders to stay motivated. My bridesmaids dresses. You see, I have been mildly annoyed with the fact that it is going to take a while to get back to a healthy weight. I keep trying to tell myself that since it took years to put on the weight it will take time for it to come off. 

Enter the bridesmaids dresses. I have stood up in a few weddings over the years and each time I got measured for a dress I was bigger than the previous wedding. It kind of shows how I progressed over the years, especially because the first wedding I stood up in was around the time I was starting to become overweight. So I figure, perhaps a good way of keeping me motivated is to put each dress on, one at a time, when they start to fit so that I can slowly see the weight loss progress. It's kind of like rewinding and getting into a smaller dress each time rather than having to wear a bigger dress each time. So without further adieu, here are the dresses for your viewing pleasure. I will post pics when I start fitting into them.  

So how about we go with the biggest and work our way down:

July 2011...

April 2010...

July 2008...

October 2006...

March, 2004...

And I'll throw these in for good measure. Here are a pair of jeans I wore in 2002 that I want to fit into again as well. I don't know why I kept them, I guess I have been wanting to get back into it for quite a while and now is the time to put it into action!

After I fit into the jeans I hope to start wearing sizes that I've never been able to fit into before! So stay tuned for that as well!

RANT OR RAVE

I hate, hate, HATE, mommy guilt, it deflates me and gets in the way of my motivation because sometimes it ruins my whole day.  I am always worrying about whether what I am doing is the right thing for my child. When I finally convince myself that I am confident with a decision, someone makes one small little comment and I immediately start feeling guilty about my decision. I know it's not them, it's me. I know what I'm doing to myself when I do it, and yet I can't stop it. I don't know why I'm so sensitive to other's opinions since I have become a Mom.  I was never one of those people and now I am.  I'm lucky that I have a husband who tells me I'm doing a good job.  Ok end of rant. 

NOTE TO SELF

Out With The Old, In With The New!

Out with old, in with the new I say! Since I am trying to establish new eating habits, I think this philosophy should also extend to other areas of my life! This will be my motivation today, to move on forward and quit holding onto things that are no longer working for me.

We have decided to finally have a yard sale to get rid of all of our junk that has accumulated in our house over the last few years. Let this yard sale be the launching of a new era in the life of me! I am metaphorically and literally cleansing myself of unnecessary things, and in turn, I will have more room for a new way of living a more simplistic life! In baby steps of course!

Here is a glimpse of just some of the stuff we are starting to gather for the yard sale! We just keep shoving it in one of the spare bedrooms and it is accumulating fast!

I have definitely been guilty of being an over consumer in the past - needing the newest fabric for the windows, buying yet another set dishes to match the new place mats, having to have the most perfectly decorated nursery, etc.  My husband and I have really had a chance to think about our lives since little Maya has come and it has helped us put things into perspective. Do we really need to have a brand new flat screen TV on the main floor AND in the basement? Do I really need a newly renovated laundry room with cute little cubbies for all of our stuff? We used to need THINGS, but now we realize that these things just cause more chaos in our lives. Yes, our family and friends have always been our priority, but we also used to spend a lot of our time buying and fixing and maintaining and cleaning and redecorating....and then buying some more.  We realized that we could never enjoy a day off because we were always running errands and taking care of our THINGS.  Now don't get me wrong, we still take pride in our home and want to create a nice place for Maya to live, but is not the "end all, be all".  Since my income has gone down with me being on parental leave, we have had to make some cut backs and by gosh, it has actually simplified our lives. I know we will always struggle with needs versus wants (we all do right?), but I strongly feel that in order to eat healthy you have to have a good balance in all areas of your life. I must aim for self improvement and re-evaluate my values and this shall be my motivation for today, my friends!

RANT OR RAVE

I tried on a pair of capri's that were pre-Maya and they fit again! I mean they fit after she was born but were uncomfortably tight. Now they just fit normal. Slow progress is happening....

NOTE TO SELF