nancia

plainpat-- is that a christmas cactus or a crown of thorns in your avatar? either way it looks gorgeous! my mom used to have those, along with african violets. that's what she did with all the ash trays after my dad quit smoking, and before my sisters and i were old enough to start. they make great saucers. my aunt who was a smoker,on visits, used to run around the house muttering, where's an african violet? anybody seen an african violet? i neeed an african violet!
beachbound-- i think weightloss is the only competitive sport where you actually slide uphill and climb down. i can not watch competitive weightloss. i cry for the losers who don't lose enough. i ache for the ones who stress and strain and their bodies won't give up the weight. their issues become my issues, their excuses, my excuses. there was one about fat kids that were sent off to a school for fat kids and they followed 7 or 8 of them thru several months. the excuses the kids made, and the parents made were so sad. one girl's application listed her at about 150 lbs less than what she actually weighed and they had to drive her from class to dorm because she couldn't walk that far. she ended up doing really well. she didn't make a lot of excuses, she just really wanted to get out of her situation and there was only one way out. makes me wonder how true that might be for a lot , if not, all of us!? wishing isn't going to make it so, but it's a start. if we don't go any further than that, then it's just a wish and nothing more. i have to go to the grocery store tonight- need too many basics to ignore it and dan'l is in town (here) for the 3 day weekend (seems silly to me, i'd rather at his age be in the city) so we will go thru lots more food than normal. the good news to that is, we'll have someone who enjoys cooking it! i will pick up the makings for veggie soup and he'll pick up ice cream and we'll have a mexican stand-off! i'll hopefully break even! lol. tomorrow i have an mri of my back. the back dr found nerve involvement from the L5 (chronic) on the left, and the L3 &4 on the right leg, acute, and was not too happy with that. i told him i wasn't too happy with it either, duh. anyway, interestingly, the right side rarely hurts and the left side almost always does. don't know if that's a good or bad sign. from my perspective any pain is rotten. but i can't live in a purple morphine haze every day and i can't spend every day in bed, and i can't spend every day in pain. sooo.... now that i've laid out the can't s i would very much like a list of the can s. i am ready for some good news and some things that i can do on a daily basis to have a happy and full life. chatting with you helps a great deal toward that goal, so thank you very much, friends, for being there! skype-ing with olivia and her mom is also high on my list and i have missed that for the past few days as they have been travelling and returning from the new england states to texas. i hope they left a little bit of lobster in n.e. for other visitors. and of course, the rest of my family and pets (who, as we know , ARE family). i am not unaware of my blessings, i do, however, feel closed in and unable to enjoy them, and alright, yes, the main participant in my own personal pity party. sorry. i honestly try not to, but that particularly pantomiming pretty pungent purple passion pajama pity party hat just calls my name! (ok, i'll stop. but it was fun adding all those p's !)
OH, GOODNESS! i didn't realize i had gotten so carried away! not just with the p's (that i knew) sorry!

irishrose

My pajamas are leopard print, so I'll bring the Ls to the party.

No pity party here, my second daughter drove 125 miles to take me to lunch at Ruby Tuesday because I gave birth to her. Works for me. She loved table runner that I worked on until 3:30 this morning. Friday the 13th is not unlucky in this family. I made her husband two loaves of banana bread with chocolate chips. He's another celiac and C doesn't bake much, so that's a gift to him. His b'day was earlier this month.

DS is back in Mich between jobs and doesn't have time to come up, but he'd like to buy me dinner at a halfway point tomorrow evening. Just tell me when and where, sweetie. I will bake him some cookies for his trip to southern Illinois.

My weight is a little stuck, but at least it's stuck on a downward swing. I will have just vegetables for dinner. I had a big turkey burger and broccoli for lunch. I'm glad there's no ice cream in the house because I'm tired and that's an overeating trigger. Another is stress over starting the quilt for my oldest daughter, which is silly because she will like anything I do for her even if it isn't matchy-matchy. The light fabrics are in the washer right now and the reds are next. I will be running back and forth between the computer and the cutting table because the pattern is online and my Epson printer quit. I don't feel like crawling around and hooking up my old HP right now. I need to do it soon because the pattern is only free until Feb 12.

We are socked in with snow - the first day off school this year, which is so late. I love watching the dogs run and leap in the deep snow. Of course, little Moira has to jump or she'd be snowed under. Lily Longlegs can just pick her feet up. It made for a nice walk - so pretty out.

nancia, Google SI joint brace. It's a narrow neoprene band with adjustable straps and a lumbar pad. There are times I can't function without it and I always wear it walking outside or shopping - those heavy carts are not fun for me. Nerve damage is such fun. Mine is unrepairable. When I lose the use of my left leg, then it's full time in my wheelchair after surgery to alleviate the pain. The neurosurgeon doesn't feel he can restore mobility. I love that little brace and my Lyrica. I am not good, but so much better than 10 months ago!

Here's the Spicy Spiral. As usual, it is not this pink - more of a rusty cranberry. I wish the I had been ambitious enough to use two colors of binding. I don't care for the dark binding on the light side. Maybe that's why the pattern says to sew the top and backing right sides together and turn, but I know I don't want that look. Ah, well, it's finished and delivered.

Beachbound

Now I like the same color binding!! I think it frames it nicely!

createfourpaws

we have been a quiet bunch this week. I will be working this weekend, building up stamina so I can get back to full time hours.

Irish- always good to be stuck in the downward direction. Love the colors of your spiral

Plainpat - thanks for the link for WW receipes.

purplemem

Glad to be back!
I have been floating back and forth to hospital, first my blood's too thick, then it's too thin, then too thick, today too thin. Who knows what tomorrow brings?
I started WW this week. I used my birthday money and pay by the week, it was $30 to join and $12 a week.
This seriously depletes all my extra money, like that was ever an issue.
I told my dh that I WANT TO LIVE!

This will help my isolation as our expenses/budget is so tight we don't leave the house for weeks at a time except to go to the hospital or doctor. It was nice to see a new face last night. I stayed on target today.

They said I wasn't eating enough food and had moved my body into starvation mode. Crazy! Over 275 pounds and I'm starving???

createfourpaws

Yes it is crazy that being overweight we can put our body into starvation mode. Good Luck with your journey on WW.

You have been in my prayers. I understand about the isolation........I have been there. I am grateful to be back to work and now need to get some sleep since I have to get up at 430 am to get ready for work.

Have a wonderful day............remember we chose what we do.

irishrose

MJ, I think you'll enjoy WW - just don't go out for hot fudge sundaes afterwards. My youngest daughter is a server in a nicer restraurant. There is a group that 'celebrates' every Monday after the meeting with food L doesn't consider WW fare. She says their sizes never seem to change. H-m-m. Is there a correlation? No, she has never used names so I don't know who they are.

I didn't know blood changed consistency that quickly. You really are on a roller coaster, aren't you? Take care, J

Wishing y'all a healthy eating day tomorrow. I'm having dinner at a Smokehouse. I hope the pulled pork is good. A pulled pork sandwich with no bun and a salad will do it for me.

meanmom

Mj glad to hear you are doing somewhat better. Yes it is weird that you can be starving when you are overweight. I like WW because I can eat whatever I want. If I know I can't have something I will just crave it. I love sweets and have cut way down but just knowing I can eat them if I want seems to satisfy me most of the time. I seem to be eating more since joining WW but loosing more. I am making better choices.
Nancia so sorry to hear about your back pain. I sure hope there is something doctors can do for you. There is noting worse than daily pain. It really drags you down. I hope you can find something to pull you out of it.
My pajamas are covered with flamingos. I just love them. My powder room has about 50 flamingos in it. I will keep everyone in my prayers.

purplemem

Thanks, group.

When you are on Coumadin (as I am) blood can change by the hour, literally. My brother is also on coumadin and they will test you before they do dental work. He can leave home and have a normal reading and be too high when he gets in the dental chair 2 hours later. I've seen it happen to him at least a dozen times.

Today's INR (blood thickness) was exactly on target! Yippee! No test again until Tuesday.

I'm really liking WW so far because of the freedom of choice. I went kicking and screaming but maybe that was all about having to change and not really about the method of change?

Important thought of the week:
If you want to meet a goal, you have to have a plan. Failing to plan means planning to fail.

This resonated with me because I realized that by failing to think and plan I was giving myself permission to keep on failing and this is no longer acceptable.

Today I have a plan and a goal. I will eat my # of points and I will move 5 times today. I'm not allowed yet to exercise, hopefully I will get permission to move more than 20 feet this Thursday at the lung spclst, but I am allowed to move. So, today I will move 5 times...

Have a great Saturday and don't forget to sew! Hopefully, I will have another blue block to show off tomorrow!

plainpat

That's a Christmas cactus.It did real good for THGIVING.Think we all have our own pity parties at times.All we can do is hitch up our britches & get on with what works for us.