I don’t know what’s wrong with me lately. It seriously took everything in me to sit down and write this blog entry. I think I’m coming down with a cold too and that never helps any situation.

Because of the snow and ice Neil’s school has been called off like every two or three days and although I am REALLY enjoying all this time with him I know that once winter is over it’ll go back to how it was before: seeing him an hour during the day in between school and work and an hour at night when he gets home from work, before he goes to bed. Those times when he’s actually home he’s either sleeping, eating, or working on something for student teaching. None of that is his fault either so I can’t get all whiny and needy. It’s stuff he HAS to do. Just another reason why I’m ready for summer.

Speaking of summer, I am not missing it for the same reasons as others. Yea sure, things are easier when the weather isn’t in the negatives and there isn’t ice covering your car every morning but none of those things really bother me. One of the things I LOVE about Kentucky is that we have experience all four seasons. Last Tuesday when we had our big snow my mom’s friend Ellen spent the day with us so we took a morning walk. It was so beautiful!

In other news: I’ve been thinking about bringing back the daily themed blogs. At least for a little while until I get out of this rut. What do you all think? Any theme suggestions?

Yea sure, every wife has been heard saying that she has the best husband in the world at least once in her lifetime and I know I’ve said it more than just a few times. What can I say, I love the guy.

Seriously though, he does the sweetest things and treats me so well that sometimes I feel like I don’t deserve him. What did I do to keep such a catch?

Background story time! When my mom and I were planning my wedding my dad gave us a set amount and whatever we didn’t use Neil and I got to keep. Sweet deal right? So needless to say I cut corners on everything I thought I could with still having a kick ass wedding, the wedding of my dreams. A friend of the family, fellow church member, and seasoned photographer answered one of our prayers when he said he’d love to photograph the wedding free of charge and just give us the disc of the photos and we could print off whatever we wanted. That right there saved us $2,000+ and on top of that a friend and former client of my dad’s offered to pay for the honeymoon. You just gotta love connections! After saving money on the two most expensive items of a wedding we decided that was enough penny pinching and my mom and went back to going all out. FUN!

Being as particular as I am meant that every aspect of my wedding that I had a direct hand in, aka everything, turned out exactly how I imagine it would. Everything was perfect. Except my pictures. I guess my photographer assumed since he wasn’t charging us that he didn’t have to listen to us. He just did whatever the eff he wanted that day and boy does it show. I never cared too much for his work really but thought I could guide him along that day as to what I wanted and things would be dandy. WRONG.

I am a designer. Creative and art inspired. Lover of all things musical and fun. I feel like my wedding pictures should have shown my personality a bit instead of lacking in personality completely.  Yea, yea, yea, I got them for free so I shouldn’t complain. Had I known he wasn’t going to listen to a damn thing I requested/suggested all day long then I would NOT have gone with him, free or not. My mom and I had so many ideas, looked forward to so many great pictures to chose from. I think we liked 3 out of more than 400. I’m not kidding. The pictures you see on this site and on my facebook are all from friends’ cameras.

Two and one half years later and it still upsets me. I don’t have any pictures that I love. LOVE. None of me in my dress, of my dress at all. My beautiful, one of a kind dress. None of me and Neil together that shows how happy we were that day, how much in love we are. Yesterday, as my mom and I were cleaning out my keepsake chest at my parents’ house, I was reminded again how important it is to me that I have those beautiful pictures now and on down the road to remind myself of that day. When I came home last night I whined to Neil about it for like 10 minutes. Sweet boy, he gets points just for staying in the room with me while I complained. But he did more than that.

This afternoon I received this text from him:

Hey babe. How has your day been? Mine? It’s been slow and boring so I got to thinking. That thinking turned into searching and that searching turned into phoning. I thought about what you said last night. You’re unhappy with how our wedding pictures turned out. I can’t say that I see why, you’re beautiful in every one of them, but that’s why I’m me and you’re you. You wanted something more than just pictures, you wanted memories captured. I can’t turn back the clock to 2.5 years ago and punch that dude in the face for not listening to you and taking the pictures you wanted. I can’t fix that for you and I hate that. But I can make hire a better, more “artsy” photographer to take pictures of you in your dress for our anniversary this summer. I can and I did. Since my day has been so slow I searched the internet and found a photographer whose work I think you’ll really like. I called him up and explained the situation and got you an appointment in July. I hope you don’t mind. I just want you to have pictures you love to look at. I’m sorry it took me this long to do it. Happy 3 Year Anniversary….early.

I couldn’t reply right away because I was shocked. He’s never done anything like this before and I’m finally going to have the pictures of my dreams and….I’m just so excited. This is SO important to me and Neil understood that he’s making it right even though he’s not the one who made it wrong. Thank you baby!

Some were curious as to how I was going to losing 20-25 lbs before my Destin vacation in May. Instead of writing a mass email to those people I decided to write a brief blog entry about it. If you’re looking for ideas to meet your weight loss goals please keep in mind that every person is different. What works for me might not work for you, and vice versa. Or you and I could be twin anatomically. You never know.

That being said, I first accomplished this three years ago and my anatomy could have changed even since then. That would be my luck, but I’m hoping the same methods will work.

First a little background:

This picture was taken my sophomore year in high school. That’s me and, you guessed it, Emmy trying on prom dresses in Dillard’s for the heck of it. Do you see how tiny we both were. Where did those days go? If I remember correctly I wore a size 0 in jeans, probably smaller.

In high school I did color guard like it was my job and because of that I was jazz running approximately 4 miles and twirling and tossing a flag till my arms fell off. On the daily. I loved every minute of it so I never fell like I was working out even though that’s all it was, just more graceful. I never worried about what I ate. In fact those were the days when I’d eat pepperonis, cookie dough and coke like it was going out of style. And pizza. Oh man did I eat a lot of pizza. My point is that I ate bad. Way bad and didn’t care because I didn’t have to.

This picture of my younger brother and I was taken my freshmen year in college. Looking at this picture is kind of crazy because my brother has changed so much since his freshmen year in high school. He’s now a sophomore in college. Wow, time you sure are something.

So back then I wasn’t doing anything active but had only been absent from guard for about 9 months? I was still eating the same. It’s really apparent in my upper arms and mid section. Yea, this blog entry is going to feature me, criticizing myself. Get ready.

Fast forward a few years…

Summer 2006, a month or so before Neil proposed to me. Oh God, just look at my face. Chubby cheeks were never hard to find with me around. Yea, I may be being too harsh on myself but whatever. I deserve(d) it. I did jack crap as far as exercise goes. I think I had started eating a little better but I couldn’t tell. Guessing I weighted about 135-140 here.

After years of getting fatter and fatter I finally started to pull myself together when Neil proposed. This was Christmas 2006 (bobviously) and I had been taking my depression/anxiety meds for almost two months now. I know that helped me lose some weight but I’d also started paying closer attention to what I was eating. I think I weighed about 130.

My 21st birthday, April 2007. Notice the lack of chubbiness in my cheeks. And my arms. They are actually toned! By now I hadn’t been too concerned about my diet but more so about my exercise routine. My best friend Amy and I would go to the gym at least every other day (but mostly every day). We would do cardio and lite weight lifting. Nothing to strenuous, just something every day. That’s all I needed.

June 2007. Because I was home from school and planning a wedding I didn’t work out really any for most of May and all of June. Thankfully I maintained my weight during that time.

My wedding day, July 7th, 2007. I weighed 118 lbs and fit into my size 4 wedding gown perfectly. Notice I had Wendy’s for a late lunch/snack. Still wasn’t too concerned with my diet. By then I had already made a habit of eating a well balanced diet. Something my mother, the dietitian, had always wanted me to do. Heh.

I add this picture to also show my arms because I’m still in awe over them. I’m not trying to be full of myself it’s just that I had no idea how toned they were back then and now, looking at the pictures I’m really pissed at myself that I didn’t keep up all that good work.

Exactly a month later Neil’s aunt got married in Lexington, which is where this picture was taken. Still looking the same. hadn’t work out since the beginning of May.

Fast forward to Summer 2008. Emmy and I at Jasmine’s before the girls went to see Sex and the City the movie. It always starts with my face, arms, and mid section. Ugh. I never picked back up on exercising. I’m a damn fool. I’m right back at 135 lbs I think. This is also the summer I decided I no longer needed to be medicated for my depression/anxiety. Yet again, I’m a damn fool.

February 2009. Yea, you guessed it. Emmy is taking the picture and I’m yet again trying on prom dresses. I don’t think I will ever grow out of it. I maintained the same weight for about 6 ish months because I started working at the nursing home and I did nothing all day except lift 250+ pound people all over the place. My thigh had never been thicker.

End of summer 2009. Face, arms, mid section, thighs, 140 lbs.

October 2009. OMG y’all. I hadn’t been working at the nursing home for a month and a half and it was SO obvious.

December 2009, at Kelly’s baby shower. Since I started working as a web master/designer I’ve really put on the pounds. Of course I didn’t expect less. How could I when all I did all day was sit on the couch with my laptop. Never exercising. Hardly even moving.

I’m going to be straight with you guys here, as of today I weigh 143 lbs and it’s the heaviest I’ve ever weighed. It stops now.

Things are going to have to change:

• I’m going to eat out a whole lot less. Like once or twice a month. This is doable because another resolution is to be smarter with our money, I love to cook anyway, we live 10 minutes away from the closest restaurant, and school starts Monday (OMG, totally different blog entry!).
• I’m not going to stop eating any kinds of food. This is why many diets fail. Yea, yea, yea I’m no doctor but my mom is a dietitian and I think I know a thing or two about it since I was raised in “the way” for 21 years plus I’m a nursing student. If you can maintain portion control and eat a balanced meal you’ll be fine. Many people’s problem is that they don’t know what a balanced meal is.
• I’m going to exercise. Holy cow who would ever had though that exercising would help you lose weight? Heh. My parents’ bought an elliptical for the lake house because my mom exercises every single day of her life and she didn’t want to stop that just because she stays up here for a few days, and also because I told her I would use it. And I’m going to. I hope to get up to 1 hour of moderate exercise on that thing a day but since I’m so out of shape (because I’m a damn fool) I’m going to start with just 20 minutes. I’ll increase by five minutes each time I feel like I can go on. They say it only takes 5 weeks to make something a habit. Let’s hope that’s true.
• I’m going to do more than just exercise. I’m going to be active again. My classes start early so I’m going to leave my hour long cardio for at night but in the morning I’m sure I can spare 30 minutes. Or even 32 minutes!
• And finally, I’m going to get back on my medication. Gosh, it’s been so long since I took it and I’m a damn fool for thinking I was OK. Depression and anxiety are tricky diseases and I’m ready for them to be managed again.

This is my path. Feel free to try mine or follow your own. Whatever your resolutions are I bid you good luck and hope you succeed!