Holy Moley Rocky.

I don't want this to be a weight loss blog.  It will HOPEFULLY contain some of that, but it is about our family, our adventures and occassionally pictures of the 2 cutest girls I have ever made.

One of my residents keeps telling me how good I look and how much weight I must be loosing...
So out of curiosity, I got on the scale.

SHE IS A STINKING LIAR.

My OBGYN said WHEN I loose 100 pounds, she'll throw me a party.  In my attempts to start weight-loss since my annual physical, I have gained 10 freakin' pounds.  (& did I mention that Tim lost 15 pounds in TWO WEEKS).

My appointment was approximately 6 weeks ago.  At this rate, by my 2011 appointment, I will weigh 4,950 pounds.  I BET she won't throw me a party, but indeed an intervention & a trip to Jillian Michael's Fat Camp.

Unless Tim turns into a frog, I don't think I will be very fashionable.

So, It is ON.

Tonight, I took the girls to the exercise room tonight. 
Screw the RULES.  (#1, NO CHILDREN ALLOWED IN EXERCISE ROOM). 
I'm going to interpret that as - do not send your 13 year old grandson up here alone because you don't want to entertain him.  I also read that as "if any other resident comes to use the room, pack up and  leave as fast as you can."

The girls sat quietly watching me jiggle on the treadmill for 1 minute and 29 seconds before whining about being bored, wanting to exercise with me and why can't we ride on the Tony Little's Gazelle?!?!
(apparently the 5 books and 4 Barbies weren't enough to keep them busy).
Thankfully, someone left some free weights in the corner.  So I had them lifting weights over their head and count to 20.  Then had them do sit ups and push-ups. Hayley tried to teach Hannah how to do a "proper bridge".  But Hannah assumed the "Crab-walk position" and declared "I will do NEW push-ups."

Our exercise room is about the size of most people's bathrooms.  It is TINY.  There is a very nice bike and treadmill.  There is a rinky-dink bike, a crunch/row machine thing...

There is also a Gazelle! You KNOW you have seen the infomercials for these... a superly mis-proportioned, long-curly blonde hair "Ken" doll, wearing a baseball hat - skin-tight tank-top and biker shorts...

The gazelle is like an eliptical machine.  Whatever.  We have one. I almost successfully tipped it over.

Did I mention that this little closet-of-an-exercise-room has no air conditioning? There is a ceiling fan (that is approximately 2 inches from the top of my head when I'm on the treadmill).
BRING ON THE SWEAT!

So, tonight I walked for 12 minutes.  I Gazelled for 5 minutes & rode the nice bike for 5 minutes.  Then the girls were getting a bit antsy, I was sweating my butt off, so we left.

Tomorrow I hope to get up to 30 minutes.  I will bring the girls' DVD player.

I don't feel like anyone needs to know the number I weigh, so I'll just say I weigh 110 pounds.  When that number gets to zero, we'll have a party at the OBGYN office.

(I have 110 pounds to work on a different location...)

The Great "Barbie" Challenge ...or... To Make a Short Story Long...

My girls recently asked me, "When do we get to play with Barbies?".

Let me explain something.  When I turned 15, I decided it was socially unacceptable for me to continue playing Barbie.  I was forced to box them up & stick them in the basement.  Under the guise of "getting rid of a few things" I would go to mom's house, pull the box down & "sort through" - ALWAYS ending up brushing out all the Barbies' hair, switching their clothes around, making sure they were rotated so not one Barbie got too much time with one of the Kens...

Coinciding with "Barbie" fever has been "Disney Princess Fever".  Not long after that question, I was at the thrift store and I found all the Disney Princess "barbies" - Belle, Ariel, Aurora, Snow White, Cinderella and even the newest Princess, Tiana.  For $2 each.  (The package of those same dolls @ Target = $60.)  Then the girls got on this crusade: "Mommy.  The Princesses miss their friends Jasmine, Mulan and Pocahontas."  Thanks to Once Upon a Child & Ebay The Princesses are all reunited.  We even found Giselle from "Enchanted".
I decided that the standard Princess dresses are a bit non-practical for daily wear (reserved only for Grande Balls and Prince-getting Parties).  Plus, Belle & Jasmine arrived naked. I started shopping for Barbie clothes.  Those suckers are EXPENSIVE and not so nice.  Barbie has become quite the Hoochie since I was a girl.

(this is the part where you can start to get nervous for me):
One night, I was at JoAnn Fabrics & saw "ALL PATTERNS $1". 
So I found the pattern pack for Barbie clothes.
I spent $15 on remants and quarter-yard cuts of fancy Prom-dress fabrics.
I embarked to clothe the Princesses myself.
Here is how my first dress-making adventure went:

1. Didn't read pattern where it said "Cut Two pieces".
2. Sewed one piece to the bodice before realizing, I needed 2...  & of course I used 120 stitches per inch and didn't have a seam ripper.
3. Figured that out, cut the 2nd piece, re-sewed to bodice.
4. As I'm sewing the skirt pieces, the fabric rests itself on the mini-iron my mom lent me for this project.
The bottom of the fancy prom-dress fabric melted into pretty little scallop-shapes.
5. While trying to iron a seam, the side of the iron rests on a piece of the bodice & melts a small hole up there.
6. As I try to readjust the position of the iron to be far away from my fabric, I drop it on the bag of bread that Hannah brought me... melting the bag & coating the iron with plastic.  Which smells delicious.
7. I turn off the iron, but before it cooled down I set my middle finger down & burn myself.
8. I think some bad thoughts about my situation, but persevere.
9. I get to the hem!  I'm almost there!!!

10. Then the bobbin strikes. 
For those who don't know sewing machines: The bobbin (on my machine) is hidden within the machine and you don't see it.  It provides half of your stitch & without it, you get nothing but little holes in your fabric where the needle went in & out... You forget about the bobbin. At some point, it runs out of thread.  The curse: as you are sewing/quilting... it runs out of thread approximately 45 minutes before you realize it.


So, unaware of the bobbin bailing on me - I proudly pull the dress off the machine!!!! And 1/2 the hem is missing. Really?  So, there is a partly completed, kind of burned purple sparkly dress behind my couch right now.


Would you like to hear a cooking story next?