No S Diet

Finally getting around to dealing with being over weight! Over about the last 5 years I'd put on way to much. Will be the first to admit that, but just not ready to do anything about it.

Toward the end of this January, I came across the "No S Diet". Are you thinking huh (while scratching your head)? It really is straight forward. The S stands for sweets, snacks, seconds, Saturday, Sunday, and Special days. To follow this diet is simple. There's no counting calories, no taboo foods, no weigh ins, no "lost foods". Monday - Friday you simply eat regular food on a "normal sized" plate (9 - 10 inch plate), don't go back for seconds, skip things that are sweets (to me that's all desserts, cookies, donuts, hot chocolate, chocolate, soda's, etc.), and no snacking (on anything healthy or unhealthy or somewhere in between). S days (Saturday, Sunday, special occasions M-F) allow yourself a treat here and there, possibly a small second serving, or light snack. Keep in mind the more you binge, the harder it will be to loose weight.

What I've found, after two full weeks on this "diet" is:

• I'm not craving sweets as much
• I'm eating slower
• my stomach has shrunk
• restaurant portions are REALLY huge
• there will be days of weight lose and some days maybe gain ~ mostly loss though
• I don't feel deprived of any sort of food ~ healthy or junk
• I've lost almost 10 pounds in two weeks
• I'll be able to stick with this diet for the long haul
  

HAPPY EATING,

Day early . . . .

day early to write about Kevin and mine anniversary. Tomorrow we'll celebrate 13 years of marriage. 13 isn't much, by a long shot, especially when my folks celebrated 50 last June.

Here's a few photo's I scanned in yesterday ~




Since 1997:

• we've lived in 4 different places
• own 5 different cars
• bed rest for 13 weeks
  
• 2 sons born
• learned to talk in code so boys wouldn't understand
• quickly had to relearn code as the boys got smarter
  
• no job changes for Kevin
• 2 different (paying) jobs for Jennifer ~ with last paying job being in 2001
  
• 1 child in public school for a couple years
• in third year of homeschooling
• switched churches once
• 11 different vacations
• 6 different places for those vacations
• one broken ankle
• one gall bladder out
• one child had their tonsils and adnoids out
• boys playing sports
• boys in cub scouts
  

I've enjoyed being married to Kevin, good days and bad days. Look forward to many more years.

And it snows again!!

This round began after midnight today. As of this posting, we've gotten about 3 inches of snow, slush, rain, and more snow. The wind is blowing pretty hard and sounds pretty eerie.

Thing One peeking over one of
the mounds of snow along our pipe stem.

Thing Two near a short mound.

This is a short video from our front porch. The wind wasn't howling when I took this as it is now. May take another video later.

On a cool school note, Thing Two wished "Katy" was here. That would be the Katy from Virginia Lee Burton's book "Katy and the Big Snow".

Delayed Mad Lib Monday

Yesterday felt a bit "off" for school and just didn't get around to posting our "Mad Lib Monday". By the time I realized I hadn't, it was later than I felt like working on the computer. So without much further adu, here it is:

SCIENCE FICTION STORY
(words in bold have been filled in)

Major Zarnak of the Intergalactic Space Patrol deactivated his hyper-building overdrive and landed his spaceship on the planet Florida. On leaving the decompression chamber, he saw a 0-armed monster approaching quickly. He shouted, "CROCOGIRAFFE," the galactic word for peace, but the monster whipped out a disintegrator color and tried to silly him. Major Zarnak ducked and slept the monster with his subsonic hicky.

"Surprised!" said the monster, clutching his icky.

"Funny," replied Major Zarnak cleverly and, getting back into his spaceship, he zipped back to his headquarters on the planet Shazam.

Yet another snow storm

Yes, another storm this season. The second, I believe, this calendar year or maybe I'm forgetting one. Pretty sad that I can't seem to remember how many times it's snowed around here. It truly seems like the snow from December had just finished melting and we got more on January 29th. The roads were fairly clear from that one, and we got another 24" to 30" today. I'm ready for it to be over, for the ground to dry out, and let the flowers grow!!

P.S. Just read some of my blog, this snow storm would be the fourth of the year; 3rd in one week.

Valentine's Day Art

Had a burst of creativity for an art project with the boys. Some was directed toward fine motor skills for both boys (the punching of holes in construction paper), which of course turned into a competition of who could punch the most holes at once. I'm not going to complain about it because it was keeping them happy for a brief moment. Had planned on vacuuming the living room anyway, so a few extra bits of construction paper is no big deal.

Back to the art project, following is a quick directions and photos of what we did.

1. Punch holes in pink and red construction paper.

2. With clear contact paper, sticky side up, sprinkle dots all over the place. Yes, you can see sprinkles on this, but after putting top piece of contact paper on, I realize sprinkles weren't a great idea. Skipped the sprinkles on subsequent "runs".
3. Put a top piece of contact paper on. Would work with smaller pieces than I did, probably more of a square sided piece than rectangle. The contact paper would be more manageable to deal with.

4. Cut out heart shapes, any size you want. I folded the contact paper (loosely) in half to cut out the hearts.

5. Used clear tape to hang hearts on paper. If you look closely at the photo below, you can see what looks like frosted hearts with dots in them.

Enjoy,

Something fun

fun to sew. Wanted to get back into sewing and this was something relatively quick to make; at least it felt relatively quick (maybe a couple hours wortth cutting, sewing, turning right side out, more sewing). Any hoot, used the width of white fabric cut to the width of the chair, plus about an inch, then sewed up the sides. Decided to put loops on the sides for the ties, so that, if the mood strikes, I can change them out as the seasons change.

Multiple things from school!

We're wrapping up our "Owl Moon" week today with the boys working on their Owls. They enjoyed the beginning of building it, but time got the best of us and a week later we're working on them again. Alls well that ends well. At least the starting point, today, is easier than the starting point last week. We know how finicky the owls can be AND most of the remaining parts are very similar, so it should be a breeze to put together (If only I hadn't starting typing this post prior to working on the Owls the second time. Thing Two has given up on his. Thing One's is almost finished. The are just a pain to put together).

Also, on tap are the Owl Pellets we have to dissect. Once again, Thing Two had a blast with this kind of activity, where Thing One couldn't be bothered. Two totally different kids, two totally different interests. Here's Thing Two and the biggest bone out of his pellet. Being so small, it was hard to photograph well. Probably took about 50 pictures and this was the best. It looks like it might be a skull of a small bird. Thing Two was pleased with his find.








Last, but not least, our newest school tradition ~ Mad Lib Monday. Enjoy your reading . . .

REVIEW OF A MONSTER MOVIE
(the words in bold were filled in)

A new movie has just opened called “The Teenage Printer Meets the Blue Vampire from Outer Space.” At the opening, we see the teenage here, played by George Lucas, who is a green scientist. He is trying to build an orange monster out of old Thing Ones and used Thing Twos. The monster has Silver skin and 20 gazillion arms and is played by Scooby-Doo. Suddenly, the monster comes to life and kidnaps the beautiful heroine, played by Carrie Fisher. Then he begins to destroy Springfield. In the end, the monster is destroyed by the vampire, who is played by Mark Hamill. And the hero and the heroine live quickly ever after.