The Goal

Alicakes Sleeping Baby Girl! Shhhh!, a photo by alicakescupcakery on Flickr.

Everything in my life revolves around one goal: a sleeping baby.
Eliza is a great sleeper but I live with the constant fear that she'll stop being one, so everything I do throughout my entire day is in hopes of a good night's sleep.

That's what my life has come down to.

Ugh. Welcome to Groundhog Day.

My Inner Skinnygirl

bethenny.jpg, a photo by caitlinoco on Flickr.

Ok - Eliza is 13 weeks old and I feel that it's about time that I make an active effort to lose the rest of the weight I gained eating Ben and Jerry's during my miserable pregnancy.

As you know from my post-delivery blogs, I swelled to the size of a small whale after she was ripped from my womb. Most women leave the hospital having lost AT LEAST the weight of their child. Not me; I left the hospital having gained the weight of a very large child: I entered at 161 and left at 172.

I am not bullshitting you: I gained 11 pounds of water and bloat after giving birth to 14 pounds of child and placenta. I lost 36 pounds in the first few weeks I was home without any effort (oh shut up - considering I should've left the hospital at around 146 pounds, the majority of those 36 pounds was water) but I have only lost 1.5 pounds since.

Yep, 1.5 pounds. That's it. I weighed 136 on January 13th and I weigh 134.5 now, which is really depressing since I've been starving myself 6 days a week, doing 100 push ups every other day, and walking miles a day pushing a pram.

But one day a week at the new moms lunch, I've been stuffing my face, in addition to drinking A LOT of wine... during the day and at night.* And I haven't been doing the Body By Bethenny workout that I bought to stream on Amazon. As a matter of fact, I'm just now watching it for the first time while writing this.

And I'm kinda inspired. Kinda.

It's hard to find time to work out and frankly, (or should I say Frankely.. lol) I think that for the most part, unless you're interested in increasing your cardio lung capacity, working out for weight loss is a myth, which is why I'm even more reluctant to start doing it.

But it's time. I need to tone and I need to lose 10 pounds if I ever want to fit back into any of my old clothes. And yes, I know that I look "fine" right now. That I even look "great" when I make an effort. But that is not good enough for me because I am 5'2 and ten extra pounds on my frame means that I'm up two dress sizes and that is not acceptable.

Stop - I don't want to hear it, so don't even bother commenting: I don't care how you think I look or what you think I should weigh or blah, blah, blah. I know what I want to look like and what I want to weigh and most importantly, that I don't want to buy an entire four season wardrobe. I realize that the body changes in permanent ways after having a baby and that some things may never fit again but my coats should. My shirts should. And most of my pants, jeans and dresses should if I tone up and lose these last ten pounds.

So that's what I plan to do and I'm going to start making a sincere effort tomorrow because it's too late to start today: The Cheeks is about to wake up from her afternoon nap and this is the last free moment I'm going to have until 7:30 tonight and at that point, Matty will be home and it will be the two of us stuck in one room for the rest of the night and I'm not about to torture him by making him sit and watch me embrace my inner Skinnygirl. Which is another lovely reality of having a baby in a one bedroom.

So tomorrow it is.

*No, I'm not a lush... not yet. When I say a lot of wine, I mean a few glasses every other day.

The Way He Sees It...

Matty: "So that was Connie, right? She's married to Brett? And she grew up near you in Lewisburg? The Greek girl?"

Me: "Yep."

Matty: "Ok, so we've got Sarah and James, Connie and Brett and... who's the other one? The Russian? European?"

Me: "You mean the other Brit? That's Laura."

Matty: "Yeah, ok, she's the one moving back, right?"

Me: "Yep."

Matty: "But that's not all, there's more, right? That other one, from White House Station?"

Me: "That's Tina. Actually, I met Connie through Tina.  The two of them met at prenatal baby yoga."

Matty: "At what?"

Me: "Prenatal baby yoga.  Man, I should've done that.  What the hell was I doing while I was pregnant?"

Matty: "Eh, drinking. Popping pills."

silence

I'm Not the Only One

The Cheeks just went down for her morning nap, so

I thought I would spend some time catching up on 

some blog reading.  While I was trolling the internet, 

I found this article; wow. I guess I'm just one of 

many obsessed with Mormon housewife blogs.  

Me and E

The weather has finally turned a corner, 

so it makes sense that E and I get out and

about as much as possible while the getting

is good! Yesterday we lunched at The Turtle Club

with the usual Wednesday afternoon crew.  On 

our way home, I got really ambitious and decided

to walk to the bank; that wasn't the best idea, as

E screamed her little head off and I had to duck

 into CVS and purchase an over priced carton 

of ready to feed bottles.  I need to pay closer 

attention to the clock when we're out because

 my little girl certainly sticks to her schedule!

We arrived home around 5pm and she played

a bit on her play mat; within the hour, fussy

time commenced.  Luckily, it coincided with

a text from Matty saying he was heading home

so I popped her in the carrier and we walked

over to the light rail station to greet him.  The

weather was so nice that after Matt changed

out of his work clothes, we headed back

out and walked to Washington for pizza.

Good times. Let the fair weather continue!

Ouch

My thumb, my nose, and my lip are 

all slightly split open and all three more

 than slightly hurt. That's all, folks. 

Quote of the Day

Something new to Read a photo by Violet Kashi on Flickr.

Jonathan Franzen on one of his character's emigration:

"He became another data point in the American experiment of self- government, an experiment statistically skewed from the outset, because it wasn't the people with sociable genes who fled the crowded Old World for the new continent; it was the people who didn't get along well with others."

Brilliantly stated; that quote identifies a significant root of today's culture and makes it easier to understand from where many of today's unfortunate core values stem...

Stylish Send Off

Today we got another peek at what's to come,

and it finally hit me that winter won't last forever.

Spring will spring - it's inevitable - but that's been

really hard to believe these last icy months.

I'm ready for winter to end before I completely 

turn against all things cold and snow; as it is 

now, I'm hanging on to what little appreciation

I've spent years mustering up for it by a thread.

I'm definitely a warm weather gal but I've 

always enjoyed the first snowfall - felt it was

magical - but I've come to despise winter this year

for obvious reasons and I don't want that hatred

to become permanent since I'm not moving

south anytime soon.  Now that I've seen the sun

and felt a bit of warmth, now that I've smelled

a bit of spring in the air, I think I'll make it through.

So to celebrate winter and its end, today I decided

 to dress The Cheeks in the cutest of all winter 

outfits and as you can see below, in turn I found

one positive thing about winter: my daughter

is one damn cute Nordic snow bunny!

That's right, girl - here's to the end of winter; 

it's totally worth celebrating with a double fist pump!