What a Difference a Year Makes

For the past few weeks, I have considered taking up writing on a blog again.  Part of this is because I'm not sure that I want all my thoughts on Facebook, but also because I feel led to share some of this period in my life with others.  When I chose this title in the shower, I did not know that I had done a post with the same title years ago.  Just looking at a few of the things going on then, I can tell you that my life has changed drastically.  

One year ago today, I had just boarded my first cruise ship for an 8 day cruise to Bermuda with my travel partner, Mary.  This was a long awaited vacation.  We had booked the cruise 19 months beforehand.  And this wasn't just any cruise - it was a Crochet Cruise.  We were going to be able to meet the people behind the hugely popular Crochet Crowd.  I am was thrilled - to be able to go on a cruise, to be going to Bermuda and to be meeting Diva Dan and Mikey.  It was a great time.  Very relaxing.  Mary and I met a lot of wonderful people and where thrilled to participate and learn so much about crochet.  Not to mention all the yarn that we brought home.  I was more relaxed than I had been in years.  

Today, I'm sitting at home with Kaliyah, who has been an only furkid for almost 5 years now (in 9 days, it will be 5 years since Madi passed).  I'm not working.  Not by choice, mind you.  But not working nevertheless.  And to explain all that has happened could almost be a book - not a blog post.  The short version is that on September 9, 2019, I walked into my office and sat down to start my day.  I had barely sat when my boss called and asked me to come meet with him.  This was not entirely unusual - early morning and later afternoon where the most available either of us ever were to talk.  I went back to the board room and the HR Director was in the room too.  I was told that a decision had been made to restructure my department and my position was eliminated.  I would be given a small severance package and I could leave immediately.  I was shocked.  There are days I am still shocked.  

Six months later, the entire world changed with the announcement of COVID-19 - a global pandemic that was killing thousands.  The entire nation essentially shutdown and we began to see unprecedented life changes - high rates of unemployment, schools closed, everyone wearing masks, daily numbers about those who tested positive and how many died.  Four months later and we still haven't returned to any sense of normalcy.  The nation is slowly opening back up.  The economy is on its way to likely the worst recession/depression we have ever seen (yes, worse that the Great Depression of the 1930s).  I'm still not working and constantly amazed and thankful that God has provided a way for me to survive during this time without needing to return to live with a parent.  

So that's the really short version of how difference a year makes.  I feel like this post needed to be written in order for me to start getting some of the other things off of my mind.  Those topics will be a lost deeper - racism, poverty, government, and education just to name a few.  I hope you'll join me on this journey we call life.  

I need a catchy title....

This morning I had this wonderful idea about something fun to put in the blog today. This evening I think I am lucky that I remembered to write it!  :)

Since I am no where close to being filled with infinite wisdom and thoughts tonight, I'm going to simply leave my menu - as promised. It's been a good food day - mostly because of the frozen tilapia I found in the freezer that made me not choose one of the turkey/chicken kielbasas I had in the freezer.  Did you know they add high fructose corn syrup to kielbasas?   

On that note - the menu for Day 3.  Once again I did an amazing job of sticking to about 1650 calories!

Breakfast
1c honey toasted oats cereal (organic)
1c 1% milk
banana

Snack #1
Greek yogurt w/nutmeg
1/2c fresh blueberries (which I now want to start growing in the yard!)

Lunch
Same salad as yesterday
Same crackers and 1 wedge of laughing cow cheese

Snack #2
low-fat string cheese
1c black grapes

Dinner
6oz baked tilapia
1 ear of corn (w/ a little butter on it)
1c brown rice
1/2c cucumbers and 12 grape tomatoes w/ 6 green olives w/ 2tbsp roasted red pepper vinaigrette

It helps me to have a record of all this somewhere, because one day 5 months from now I'm not going to remember how it is possible to eat like this and enjoy the food.  Yea - I know, in 5 months it's supposed to be a "habit".  The truth is it takes 10,000 hours of doing something differently to make it ingrained in your head.  At about 5 months - I always hit this plateau and think the world is coming to an end and I need to revert back to what is "comfortable" aka "easy".  :)   Hopefully this blog/journal will help keep me motivated!

Have a great day!

Day 2 - I will survive

There were times yesterday when I seriously thought to myself two things "I'm going to starve" and "There is no way I can do this for 6 weeks".  But I stayed resolute and reminded myself that a) there is enough fat on my body to allow me to survive for several weeks on nothing but water and b) food is fuel.  I decided yesterday to start using MyFitnessPal to keep track of my calories and (soon) exercise.  It is actually a very intuitive program and much like Weight Watcher online for those who have used that before.  Only instead of keeping track of points, you keep track of calories.  MyFitnessPal has a couple other features I like too.  You can get a free app for your phone, so that you can keep your diary portable.  This will be great for nights I don't feel like getting on the computer or I'm not near a computer to check calories.  There is a short questionnaire at the beginning that helps you decide what your goal for calories should be.  Finally, there are lots of fun graphs to play with to track your progress (weight, calories per day, etc).  So as promised, here is my menu for Day 1:

Breakfast 
3/4c Toasted Oats Organic Cereal
1 c 1% milk
1/2c fresh blueberries

Snack #1
Low-Fat String Cheese
Grapes (about 1c)

Lunch
Sandwich on low-calorie Rye bread w/ 3oz turkey, 1 wedge of laughing cow cheese and 1/2 avocado
Apple
1/2 c sliced cucumber

Snack #2
3oz baby carrots
celery sticks (3 medium stalks cut up)
1oz almonds

Dinner
7oz baked boneless, skinless chicken breast
1c long-grain brown rice
2c squash (1 ea. yellow squash and zuchinni simmered with 1 4oz can of Herdez Salsa - YUM)
1/2c frozen peas

All told - this daily menu equaled about 1,649 calories.

Today has been much better.  I attribute it to two things - 1) the protein shake I had for breakfast and 2) the fact that I was so busy at work I had no time to consider whether I was hungry!  I think the protein shake was an awesome start to the day.  It made a full 16oz and was very filling.  At 11am when it was time for my snack, I could have pass, but I knew it's important to keep my metabolism revved up, so I ate it.  So here is the menu for today.  I cheated a little at dinner and had canned vegetables, because I was exhausted.  But they were still all ingredients I could understand on the can!  The other thing that made dinner a little easier tonight is that I made 3c of the long-grain rice last night and portioned it out, so I will have it for dinner the next couple nights without needing to wait 45 minutes for it to cook!

Breakfast
Protein Shake (1c 2% milk, 5 frozen strawberries, 1 frozen banana, 1/4c Chocolate Protein Powder - blend until smooth)

Snack #1
Vanilla Greek Yogurt w/ 1/4 tsp nutmeg
1/2c fresh blueberries

Lunch
Salad (2 c salad mix, 1/2c cucumber, 8 grape tomatoes, 2tbsp sunflower seeds, 3oz turkey)
2 tbsp balsamic vinaigrette 
4 Grains First crakers
1wedge of lite laughing cow cheese

Snack #2
Kashi Mocha Almond granola bar
celery sticks

Dinner
8 oz baked salmon (I put some garlic peppercorn seasoning on it to spice it up)
1c long-grain brown rice
2c canned, stewed tomatoes

All told - about 1625 calories for today.  Pretty close to yesterday.

I know this is a long post, since I neglected yesterday.  I promise to be better!  The other thing I can tell you is that for week 1, I picked out two breakfasts and 2 lunches for the week.  :)  I am the type of person that can eat virtually the same thing every day.  So you have the two breakfasts and two lunches that will be rotated through for the rest of the week.  The plan is for tomorrow to be a cereal morning and a salad lunch. MyFitnessPal tells me if I keep eating like this I will lose 11.5 pounds in 5 weeks.  Not too shabby!

I can do this!

Phases...

It's been a long time since I've written.  But I'm finally out of graduate school and on the way to becoming "normal" again.  Or at least for having time to do the things I like to do outside of work.  For the past three years I have been hearing the same thing from doctors all over - you have to lose weight.  This is not a news flash to me.  I look in the mirror every day when I step out of the shower (only because you have no choice, the mirror is in front of the shower), so I see my naked fat rolls in all their glory.  I'll spare you any further description.  But the reason the doctor's tell me to lose weight is so that my knees don't hurt so badly.  The reason for me has become much more simple - I want to be active again - for longer than 15 minutes without sitting down.  I don't want to "die" at 37 years old because I can't move.  

So tomorrow I am starting a new way of eating.  While I am calling it a lifestyle change, I know my own shortcomings with long-term goals.  For now, I'm committing to doing this until August 1.  That's about 5 weeks. I'm going to take a picture tomorrow morning, then "weigh in".  While I need to weigh in weekly to see my progress, I'm going to give it until August 1 to really see how well I'm doing.  But I'm sure you're real question is - what is this new way of eating?

Well...it's called Eating Clean.  Basically it's cutting out the preservatives and chemicals that are in our food and eating food the way it was meant to be eating.  I think to think of it as eating like they did 40 years ago before all the processed and frozen food came out and everyone got fat.  I'm not a nutritionist or any type of guru on the subject, it's just a belief I hold dear.  This doesn't mean I'll never eat out or that I won't have a "treat", but I want 20 out of 21 meals a weeks to be clean.  If you add in the two snack a day - that's 34 of 35 meals/snacks.  Sounds fair right?  I went the first two months of this year without a single soda.  And while I have cut those back dramatically, I'm going to return to only 1 diet soda a week.  

I've been reading a lot about vitamins, minerals and foods that help with health problems.  The two that I am starting this week are 1oz of pomegranate juice a day for arthritis pain and joint discomfort and 1/4 tsp of nutmeg a day (mixed in my yogurt or breakfast shake) which is supposed to help with mood.  The third one that I've heard a lot about, but I'm just not sure how to get it in is olive oil.  I know I can do it on days I do salad.   

I did my shopping today and managed to only buy 9 things from the inside aisles of the store.  Everything else came from the edges.  That wasn't by design, that was what was on the shopping list for this week.  I'm going to share my lists, meal plans and progress on here.  Mostly to have a journal for myself.  But hopefully to inspire someone to follow me.  :)  There are some things I know I already have at home that are not on this list. My goal for next week is to do my shopping at the farmer's market for as many of my fruits and veggies and possible.  I do think it's important that we support working Americans and not just corporate America.  Especially as a source of our mostly widely used resource - FOOD.

If anyone has done this before and has suggestions or ideas, I'd love to hear from you!  I'm also interested in natural vitamins or foods to help me become more healthy.  

So here is my shopping list for week 1:
Nutmeg
Pomegranate juice
Brown Rice
Pearled Barley
Whole Grain Crackers
Rye Bread
Chicken Breast (boneless,skinless)
12 oz sliced deli turkey
9 oz sliced deli chicken
Avocado
Carrots
Celery
Cucumbers
Musrhrooms
Salad greens
3 apples
5 bananas
grapes
strawberries
blueberries
Cascadian Farms granola bar
Organic Whole grain cereal
Almonds 
Sunflower seeds
Greek Yogurt (vanilla)
Whey Protein Powder (chocolate)
Milk (2%)
Low-Fat String Cheese (5)
Cherry Tomatoes
Squash
Zucchini 
Corn on the cob

The Kindle Cases....finally!

I know I promised weeks ago to post about my sewing endeavor for Mother's Day/Friend's brithdays and haven't done it yet.  I apologize.  I have been fighting a sinus/upper respiratory infection.  I am now on the THIRD round of antibiotics and a second course of prednisone.  Let's just say that this 16 day stretch of prednisone may produce little sleep and LOTS of blogs!  LOL

So...what you guys really want to know is what I sewed for Mother's Day.  Well...my friend Jen had mentioned that she would really like a case for her leather lighted Kindle cover because it was getting scratched so easily in her purse.  And I am always one to rise to a challenge! So I found a link to a wonderful laptop tutorial on SewMamaSew's blog that was also nice enough to give the formula to use it for other types of covers.  This one won my vote not only because it had the formula to adapt for my needs, but also because it had a flap (and not a zipper), used velcro and was nicely lined.  So the first kindle cover I made ended up going to my mom for Mother's Day.  I used a brown, satin quilted fabric I had left over from another project with a brown, turquoise and lime paisley I bought with the Kindle cover in mind.  I did the stitching in turquoise to give it a little pop on the outside top-stitching.

I have made several others since then.  I have made the Kindle Cover Jen requested for her birthday, which was a grey suede material with a satiny lining that was white with pink print and grey butterflies on it.  I think this one turned out very nice.  The suede on the outside and the satin on the inside gave it an exquisite feel.  I think Jen was pleased with it!  I was also asked to make an iPad cover for my friend Mary's mother-in-law for her birthday.  Of course I obliged.  It's hard for me to say that I really like one more than the other because all of them are rather unique for various reasons.  But the iPad cover does have a fabulous color combination.  Just see...

This one started with a lavender paisley that was just gorgeous.  Originally I was going to pair it with a grey that I had, but while I was looking for the brown quilted one I used for Mom's, I found some lavender linen I had left over from a maternity shirt I made my sister as my first sewing project ever!  As you can see, they matched beautifully.  I did the paisley on the outside because I was afraid the solid lavender would show too much dirt and wear.

I feel like all three of these have turned out beautifully!  One thing I learned is that I do better to add 2" to the calculation for measurements instead of one.  Because for some reason, try as hard as I might, the 1" is just barely big enough for the Kindle that is already housed in a case.  I have one more to make for Mary's birthday present (don't worry...it's not a surprise.  I let her pick out her own fabric for her's!  LOL).  She chose the brown quilted fabric with the lime and turquoise paisley.

My next project is cut and ready...  It will be a dress for my middle niece, Kiana.  This is my first time working with a patterned fabric in a garment and I hope it goes okay.  Lucky for me, I picked one that has a "loose" pattern and doesn't necessarily have to match very well (it looks like a tie-dye).  But I will post more once it is finished.

Hope everyone has a good weekend!