Weighty issues.

It's a lifelong battle, this weight of mine. I've lost the battle most of the time, gotten the upper hand I think exactly 4 times since turning 12, and here I am, again. Aaaaaagain. I was fit my senior year in high school, at least the first half of it-softball and swimming are fantastic workouts. In college, I did alright after freshman year, but man was a hefty freshman year. Then after college.... ehhhh. Not great shape. My wedding day I was maybe just chubby, but our first year of marriage I was f-a-t, fat fat fat. We ate out often, cooked fatty stuff, drank a LOT of wine and beer and the weight really got out of control. July of 2010 I finally got a grip- I either needed to buy an entire new plus sized wardrobe because literally nothing fit me, or I needed to make some serious life changes. So, I joined Weight Watchers Online program. Loved.It. Their points system was easy for me to easy to work with, I lost weight at a healthy, steady, reasonable speed, I could still eat things I loved within reason.... before I knew it, I was down forty pounds. FORTY. 4-0. Between July of 2010 and February of 2011, I walked 2 miles a day, ran some, but mostly just used WW to get in the best shape of my life. And, I kept it off- easily, even! In November of 2011, I ran a half marathon in a time I could be proud of, fit into a gorgeous dress for a winter ball, and ... got pregnant! I kept active while pregnant with L, and was sensible with eating, and felt fit when she was born. The weight came off quickly at first, but breastfeeding, for me, makes my hormones absolutely rage and I cannot eat enough sweets. It's always been a problem for me, but something about nursing- I could eat an entire frosted cake in a day. Yep, I did that. And chocolate bars... pshh I could keep Cadbury in business. Eventually, the hormones leveled out around 6 months, B deployed, and I cut out the last 15 pounds I wanted to lose. Not down to prebaby weight, but I knew that wasn't a reasonable expectation. A pound or two crept back, but mostly I kept at a comfortable size until I got pregnant again. My pregnancy weight didn't get crazy, but it wasn't as low as L, either. But now. Oh no. Not a pound lost since two weeks after J was born. Well, that's not true, it's gone down five, then up five, then down, then uppp. It's painful. I've been back on WW, though not actually sticking to it at all, which is as good as not being on it. The sweet cravings from nursing are killing me, I just want sugaaaaaaaar! Anyway, all this to say, this journey I'm on is a long, long one. I actually tried to cut added and processed sugar out of my diet totally for three days. I dropped five pounds, felt better, and, I feel ridiculous saying this, but the skin on my face looked more refreshed than it has in a year. You'd think that would be motivation, eh? Not for this girl. Cutting out sugar totally just isn't something I can do for the long term. Those three days of structure and regiment turned into 2 days of full sweet binging afterward, and that's not a healthy cycle to get back into. So now, with J six months old, vacations looming on the horizon, and the weather finally warming (I'm talking into the low 40's, nothing extra special), it's time to get my (big) butt in gear! The war wages on....

Marry someone who will do the potty dance with you

Right now, B and I are in one of the most exciting, special, boring, mundane, frustrating, happy, rewarding times of our lives- kids:the baby years. Every day is both everything new, and nothing new at the same time. We both love these kids more than life itself, and being their parents bring us so much joy. But man, it is exhausting. Ex.Haus.Ting. I know that's not news to anyone. At the end of so many days, it's all we can do to make sure that we have hugged at least one, kissed at least twice, and said I love you probably a time or two. It's always nice to hear "I love you" of course, but do you know what's nicer? Hearing my husband sing the "pee pee on the potty" song and dance while cleaning out the training toilet after L successfully takes another step in the potty training journey. Sitting on the couch, holding my nursing/sleeping/nursing baby, nothing is sweeter to my ears. So, if I ever am asked to fill in one of those "What advice do you have for the bride?" cards as a game at a bridal shower, my advice will be simple: "Marry someone who will do the potty dance with you". Sure, there are a lot of other criteria that are important but.... this one thing really ranks up there, too.

6 Months left! Counting down...

I can hardly believe that we are in the homestretch of our assignment to Ramstein Air Base, Germany. April 4 will mark three years since we landed here as a family of two, and sometime in early August we will return to Wright-Patterson Air Force Base in Dayton, OH as a family of four! We will be in Dayton for seven years while B completes his PhD and then stays on staff as an instructor at the Air Force Institute of Technology (AFIT). It will be so nice to purchase a home and really get to know the community we're living in. We loved living in Dayton before moving to Germany, and I have a number of friends still in the area that I'm looking forward to reconnecting with. I just can't wait (realistically, I just can't wait to get back to the States, the fact that we're going to Dayton is just the cherry on top). Now, with a light at the end of the tunnel, we are planning the last of our trips. Last year, right after finding out we were expecting J, we booked a few very memorable trips. I hope to blog about them at some point, but until then,...we spent five days in Rome, eleven days in London and the English countryside, and four days in Normandy with our good friends, the Perry's (the 12 hour drive when I was 36 weeks pregnant might have been a little long in retrospect, but the memories made there are just priceless). Baby J joined us in September, and once his passport came in, the first stamp (figuratively, of course, they don't actually do that) was to Belgium where we spent the three days after Christmas visiting Brussels and Brugge. Now, we have scheduled a trip to Holland to visit the famed Keufenhof tulip garden (B's mom, Brenda, will join us for this trip as she'll be here visiting), Disneyland Paris as a last hurrah with the Perry's before they leave Germany at the end of April, and finally, a road trip to Venice, where we will hop a seven day Mediterranean cruise hitting Greece, Turkey, and Croatia. That will take us to mid-May, with a whole two months left to fill! Both of us created a "must visit" list when we arrived, and I think most of it has been checked off, with the exception of Poland for me. It's within driving distance, I just have to decide if there is anything there in particular I care to see. So, we will see where the last of our travels take us! Prague? Barcelona?  Ireland? Tic-toc, the clock is finally winding down...