Even When I'm Bad, I'm Good

I got on the scale Friday morning not sure what to expect. I'd had the camping where I knew I'd eaten a lot of snacks, including more chocolate dipped biscotti than I will disclose. Then there was the weak evening where I ate a packaged El Torrito chicken caesar salad (with out of control salad dressing) AND a piece of tres leches cake. A large piece. But I also knew my workouts were consistent so I had no sense of whether I'd be up, down or sideways. I was down! .4 pounds down, and happy with it. I am now 13 pounds from my intermediate goal of weighing what I did after Marek was born, 178.4 pounds. I'm moving in the right direction.

And my clothes are getting a little loose. I checked out Ann Taylor Loft the other day in case they had something decent on clearance. I don't want to spend a bunch on clothes that will hopefully also be loose soon. I found a pair of pants for $4.98 but they were a size 12. I'm wearing a size 14 now. I decided to try them on and, while they were a tiny bit snug, they are totally wearable! The sizes at the loft are a bit generous I think but I'll take it. I bought some 14 capri pants at macy's the other day and feel better with them un-bottoned so there you go, sizes are weird.

So I went to loft.com for a link to the site and I noticed the main page picture included women that actually look normal. I love it! Most of the time you see something more like this. Those loft.com ladies don't appear overweight but they don't look like size 0 mannequins either. My "like" for this store just went up a notch. Now if only they'd carry more pants in "big" sizes (i.e. 14, 12) in the petite section I'd be happier!

Oh, I should mention the gym since this isn't a blog about the portrayal of women in advertising (though I'd LOVE to follow a blog about that - don't get me started). I decided to go on Friday, which was good. I did the bike for 25 minutes on Level 5. I looked back in my gym journal and noticed I started a few months ago on level 1, shot up to level 2 pretty quickly and have steadily moved up since then. Back when I started level 4 was unthinkable, but I've already surpassed that. There's some tangible progress.

After the bike I did chest, triceps and core work. Afterward I did the stairs but instead of doing my normal 5 minutes I did 10 minutes to sort of make up for what I missed on Thursday (when I didn't have enough time). The 5 extra minutes were a challenge but not too bad. I won't be doing 10 minutes from now on though, I don't have the time and I don't enjoy those stairs that much. I stretched and man, I am still pretty tight on the inside of my upper thigh. I don't know what that's about but I'll keep doing the happy baby pose, despite feeling a bit funny when I do, and hope it gets better with time.

Today, Saturday, was a day off. And it's a good thing I didn't plan to exercise today because I didn't have time. We drove 2 hours to a baby shower of some good friends and then 2 hours home. It was a good day catching up with friends and there were a lot of kids there so our little ones had fun too.

Tomorrow is the start of a new week and I'm ready for it! I'm doing week 5 for the second time and feeling good about that too. Week 6 is the last week with walk breaks so I'm in no big hurry. Oh, I ordered some vitamin B complex yesterday and I think I'll take some iron before I go to bed. I'm not feeling tired like I was but I can use all the help I can get!

I hope this blog finds you in the midst of a fun, active weekend!!