Diet Works!

In my last blog entry I mentioned that I was on the Michael Thurmond 6 Day Body Makeover diet which consisted of eating meat six times a day, a difficult feat for an herbivore like myself. I followed it precisely until Thursday where I substituted one of the meat meals for a protein drink which isn’t really a bad thing but MT really wants the animal protein to build muscles. By Friday I had completely lost my appetite and skipped a meal which isn’t a good thing because that causes your metabolism to slow down. So technically I quit the diet a few hours early by eating some gorgonzola cheese and two scrambled eggs on Friday night. Miraculously, I woke up Sunday morning (not Saturday morning) to a significantly reduced muffin top. Pretty amazing I would say. It was worth the suffering. I’m going to try to keep going with more protein in small meals throughout the day.

Since this was the first diet I had ever been on in my whole life (other than my restricted eating during the time I refused to take the 3 hour gestational diabetes test when I was pregnant with Ty—whole other story), I was not used to handling lunches out with people. I got to work on Monday and realized that I had lunch scheduled with a co-worker I see about once a quarter. Fortunately, she was OK eating in the cafeteria so I could eat the lunch that I brought from home. Tiffany isn’t a close friend but is my contemporary at work (same grade level, similar type job, similar type skills, and similar type personality), so it’s good to compare notes with her every so often. We talked about our dreams to work for a company that more suited our interests. She is more interested in non-profits and for myself, I think something in the health care side of things. We will see what the lay offs bring.

On Tuesday night I went to Pilates at the YMCA. I’ve always suspected that Pilates is a great exercise for me and now I am getting addicted to it. I love doing it. The class at work on Thursdays is great and two co-workers-friends went with me. After doing the Pilates class on Thursday and then playing an hour’s worth of grueling four-man volleyball outdoors and then doing the ROM, I was really beat on Thursday. On Friday I had a pot luck at work where I didn’t eat anything because of my diet. No one noticed. Or at least, they didn’t say anything. I then when to hear our diversity leader talk about results from women’s survey they did here. They would like to get to parity with the female employees here—we are below parity in several areas. Having worked here for 10 years, I never really had a problem being the minority but I would say it gets a little more difficult as you getting into the higher grade levels and for me personally, after having kids and not being able to or wanting to work all night long. I used to not mind doing this because the work is interesting and challenging but now I want to spend more time with my kids. On Friday night, Jack and I made blueberry muffins for Ty’s 1st birthday. I didn’t want to make a cake because I didn’t want Ty to have all the sugar, plus I didn’t want the cake around because I would eat it all myself. We sang Happy Birthday and opened his presents. It was very low key but perfect for us.

On Saturday morning, Yvonne and Colton came over with their overnight bags to stay with Jack and Ty until the next day. For a Father’s Day present, I got Brian an overnight stay at the Camelback Inn and two Swedish massages. We have never spent the night away from the kids so we were very excited. We went to lunch at Postino’s where I broke my diet with a great Cabernet and some bruschetta. We went to the resort and spent the afternoon at the pool relaxing followed by a great dinner. After a full night of uninterrupted sleep, we got up and went to the spa where we had a light breakfast and spent an hour in the relaxation room before our massages. After massages we had a snack and then hung out at the spa pool. It was time to check out around noon so we checked out and went to the Nordstrom Café for lunch and bought some jeans for Brian. I was eager to get home and see the boys by then. Yvonne and Colton didn’t have much trouble with the boys. Ty is going through his stranger anxiety phase right now and cried a lot when we left. When he realized it might be a while before I came back, he clung onto Yvonne like a koala hangs onto a tree (he hooks his arm tightly around your arm). We went to the mall late in the afternoon with the boys because I wanted to try out our new Sit N Stand stroller. I’d been eyeing these strollers since before Ty was born and my sister saw them for sale at Target so I went to get one. Jack can stand on the running board or sit on the jump seat on the back of the stroller so he can come and go as he pleases. I really like it. Jack welcomed me back home by waking up 5 times last night. It will be a long day today!

Oh, they canceled the Tuesday Night Book Club TV show. I'm not too disappointed because it didn't seem like it was going to be very interesting. My book club is way more interesting than a TV show ever could be.

Sick of Meat

Brian was gone for three nights last week which made my life very challenging. I can’t remember if I said this before and I’m too lazy to look it up but I am doing Pilates twice a week now. I missed the Tuesday night class because Brian was gone but I did the noon class on Thursday and wasn’t sore the next day for the very first time. My abdominal muscles are getting stronger but you can’t tell because of the layer of fat on top of my abdomen. Our nanny stayed a little late on Thursday so that I could play volleyball. Otherwise, I didn’t do too much other than take care of the kids and chores, followed by collapsing on the couch at 9:30 PM.

I did get a chance to have lunch with Jill (who had a baby mere days ago) and Liz (whol just moved to the east coast and was back here to deal with the house). Liz moved to the east coast to be closer to family and her parents signed up to take care of her 3 year old and 1 year old while she works part-time. She says it’s an adjustment because you go from paying a professional to not paying family members and to some extent, you get what you pay for but I am sure there is no question as to whether her parents love those kids.

We did our usual dinner out at the mall on Friday. This is now our routine… leave work just a little early so we can beat the crowds at the mall and then walk around the mall with the kids. Jack just loves the bookstore and Pottery Barn Kids. I like people watching… it gets really interesting on a Friday night. There are lots of Goth kids that hang out at the mall which seems a little strange. Malls are so mainstream and kids that dress to get attention are trying to not look like the mainstream. It doesn’t make sense to me.

On Saturday I got my hair cut. My hair was the longest it’s been in 20 years. For some reason I’ve been able to keep it longer than normal and it’s not flat and stringy. But it was starting to get flat so I got it cut. I got my favorite turkey salad at the News Café at Kierland Commons beforehand. I don’t know why I like turkey salad so much. After getting my hair cut I checked out this 1 cent sale at a children’s boutique. Buy one get one for 1 cent. But one T-shirt was like $50. I guess some people will spend that kind of money on kids’ clothes.

On Sunday, Father’s Day, Brian hiked Camelback which is one of his favorite things to do. This is nuts to me. I cannot comprehend something so physically exhausting is a “favorite” activity.

We both started the Michael Thurmond’s 6 Day Body Makeover diet. Brian had promised to do this with me after I weaned Ty. I am trying to get rid of the layer of fat that sits on my abdomen, one of the remnants of my two pregnancies. I can’t say that I am hungry doing it but because I have to eat meat for breakfast, snack, lunch, snack, dinner and snack (6 times a day) it’s a little tough for me (generally not a big meat eater). I am more dissatisfied than hungry because I could really use some oil or fat right now. A donut would be excellent. A chunk of blue cheese would be amazing. But I have followed the diet to the letter with the exception of one grape that Jack insisted that I eat. The idea of the diet is really charge up your metabolism to burn fat. I will report out on the results at the end of the week. Menu:

Breakfast – pile of beef + ground turkey
Snack – Chicken on lettuce (no dressing of course)
Lunch – Chicken, rice and beans and vegetables
Snack – Beef and strawberries
Dinner – Chicken, rice and beans and vegetables
Snack – Chicken and berries (I can’t just eat the berries—I have to eat the protein with the berries!)

So I Think I Can Dance

We are having my company’s version of a layoff right now with more to come. This is always kind of scary especially when it’s not performance based but based on the role you currently have. If they are doing performance based cutbacks then that shouldn’t be a surprise to you but you never know what roles they are going to cut. Lately I’ve been interested in diversity or women’s initiative type program management jobs but these are the “fluffier” roles and tend to be cut first. I’ve always tried to stick to the roles that aren’t very specialized. Right now I’m a program/project manager. We will see.

Monday night I went to the final dance class of the series (cha-cha and swing). This was a 2-hour class that was combined with the Level 1 class (I am in Level 2). Taking a group dance class is always a gamble because it’s hard for a group class to match your current level unless you are a beginner. The Level 2 class was boring for me because I didn’t really learn anything new and I had to dance with beginner dancers. I don’t mind teaching some but I don’t want to pay money to walk the guys through the dance moves. Well, I thought Level 2 was pretty bad… combined with Level 1… it really sucked. Towards the end, the couples wanted to stick together which left 2 guys for 4 women to share and Mandy and I had to share a guy who was horrible. He held us too close which pitched us forward and I could go on and on with all the things that were wrong. I finally decided that it was Mandy’s turn to dance with him and then disappeared so she couldn’t find me to rescue her, which was cruel but required for self-preservation. After class, we commiserated and I was laughing so much I started crying. The class was going to field trip at a local club “Graham Central Station” and Mandy and I both agreed that our idea of fun did not constitute going to a club and dancing with some really bad dancers who were twice our ages. The teacher pulled me aside and asked if I would take her class again in the fall and assured me that she had a guy who was really good signed up to take the class but I don’t know if that’s good enough. I told Mandy that I wanted to dance with hot young guy, especially if I was going to be paying for lessons. So if I take lessons again, they will most likely be private. They are more expensive but I can learn a lot more in one hour with a really good male lead than I ever could in a group class.

I’m more advanced than the average person with ballroom, Latin and swing dancing but have a huge inferiority complex dancing with people who practice all the time and have been doing it for years so I am stuck in a dancing limbo… if I took private dance lessons, then I could gain the confidence to dance with some really good dancers and enjoy it… and not worry the whole time that they think I’m a bad dancer.

Right now I love the show “So You Think I Can Dance”. I was only able to watch bits and pieces of last year’s version because of conflicts but there is one show from last season that has been clogging up an hour of our TiVo for about a year. It has a 2 minute samba on it that I absolutely love. Fortunately Brian understands my love of dancing and does not push me to delete that show, even though we lost the Alias series finale from the lack of space.

In the interest of getting rid of my post-baby tummy bulge, I decided to up my Pilates regimen to 2x/week. Pilates is weird in that you are not sore from the class until 24 hours later and taking two classes a week with one day in between means that you do the second class with everything being sore. But I persevered through the class. I am also doing the ROM about 5 times a week and will probably do 6 times a week since my dance class is over. And finally I have increased my protein consumption during the day drinking protein shakes. If my stomach doesn’t decrease in size in the next two weeks, I will have to start walking a few times a week. As a very last resort, I will diet. I have never been on a diet in my whole life and the thought of depriving myself of anything makes me want to eat all these things that I wouldn’t even normally eat. Which is why it’s a last resort. Just talking about dieting makes me want to run to the vending machine to get a candy bar which I almost never eat anyway. That is how my brain works.

I got my car detailed for the first time ever and it’s just awesome. My car is 6 years old and I still love it and now it looks brand new. $125 is much cheaper than buying a new $30,000 car. We went to two birthday parties on Sunday. It was Jagger’s birthday at Chuck E Cheese and I took Jack while Brian went to the other birthday party with Ty. This worked out well because the other birthday party was for an adult and they don’t have kids and their house is a nightmare for parents because of all the nice breakable things at a toddler level. Jack had a great time at Chuck E Cheese although I made the mistake of giving him some HiC with water in it. He thought that was the best thing ever and didn’t eat anything else other than a cup cake. This is what happens when you deprive your children of sugar on a regular basis. They are slaves to it when they are around it. But he was really good and had a great time (Thanks Tracy and Jagger!). After we left the party we met up with Brian and Ty at the other party. I spent the next hour having sporadic conversations with the adults punctuating every other word with “No Jack!” or “Don’t touch that, Jack” or “No, I don’t want to go outside/inside with you.” I had a good time in the short time I was there. Unfortunately my stay ended with…

Kelly: What’s that? [Pointing to small brown glob on the floor, thinking it was a raisin or prune]
Joe: Poop. [Casually handing me a napkin]
Kelly: Sh*t. [Grabbing Jack and dragging him into the bathroom and using 25 wipes to clean up the horrific mess]

Jack never does this at home. Only at other people’s homes. In fact, the last time it was at Jill B’s house!
Finally I want to say that Jack officially does nothing I say unless it is coupled with threats of time out, taking toys away or just walking out of the room. This just drives me nuts because our lives would be so easy if he just did what we said!

Kids Cramp Your Style

Congratulations to Jill M on the birth of her baby Luke Ryan on June 4, 2006! I got the opportunity to see Luke a few hours old. He was cute but the foremost thought on my mind was thank God I will never having to go through that again. I cringed when the nurse asked Jill how long she breastfed the baby so they could log it. That always stressed me out because the formula nazi’s seemed to be looking for proof that I wasn’t feeding my child adequately. This was more of a problem with Jack and not so much with Ty so maybe things are better now.

I’ve been very restless lately. I have been struggling to figure out why and a few friends have made suggestions that have been interesting and complex. I think the answer is actually quite simple. I went from having 1 – 3 social or sports engagements every night of the week and weekends packed with activity to a life that has a fraction of this level of activity. Almost all of my activity time has been replaced with child care and child centric activities. Having two kids under the age of three (coupled with miserable pregnancies) hasn’t lent much time to actually dwell on this reality so I think it’s just now manifesting itself. Assuming this is true, I have a couple options:

- Accept this as reality and get over it
- Do more stuff
- A combination of the above

Right now I’m leaning towards a combination. The “do more stuff” has its limitations because of all the “mother’s guilt” that comes from working but I can use the time after the kids go to bed and Jack is now at the age where we can spend hours out together doing something fun. Weaning Ty has also been liberating, just as much mentally as physically. I’ve pretty much spent the last four years pregnant/breastfeeding/pregnant/breastfeeding and now I am done and it’s very exciting.

In fact, I celebrated this milestone by going to Los Dos Molinos on Saturday with a group of 20 people that we used to go to Mexico with twice a year to play volleyball. After two margaritas, I was technically classified as intoxicated and announced it was the best time I had had in a long time. Brian clarified that it was only time I have been intoxicated in the past 5 years. It just felt great to go out and have fun like that. After 8 glasses of water and 2 Advils, I managed to wake up with a minimal hangover. While I had a ton of fun, I do not think I can physically handle binge drinking more than once every 2 – 3 years.

Over Memorial Day Weekend, Jack and I met Tracy and Jagger at the splash park close to our house. Two hours flew by and the kids seemed to like the water. I can see us going back there a lot because it’s so close to the house and it’s a great place to go when it’s hot. On Sunday, we went to the zoo and rented one of those four person bicycles. It wasn’t as fun as it could have been because Ty got sunscreen in his eyes and cried a lot. Sarah came over for dinner and we had a good time playing with the kids and catching up. On Memorial Day, Brian took Jack back to the zoo and they had a great time together.

Yesterday, I went to my monthly brunch with Missie. After brunch we went looking for shorts for me. A friend had a pair I liked and I asked where she got them and she said Abercrombie & Fitch. I had never been into that store and had avoided it because the music seemed very loud. Missie used to work there when she was in high school and she said that they play that music to disorient the customers. I was definitely disoriented and felt very silly yelling at Missie and the cashier to be heard over the blasting dance music. I did find the pair of shorts I was looking for and paid full price to get the hell out of there. I was measured for a bra at Victoria’s Secret and the news wasn’t too depressing but there is still time to go down in size even further. I really like the IPEX no underwire kind they are selling but I am very anti-underwire. We then went looking for maternity clothes for Missie. I always hated shopping for maternity clothes and it still brought back bad memories although I was secretly gleeful that I would never have to spend money on clothes that would have a 3 month useful life.

And finally congratulations to Kathleen on her pregnancy and subsequent shot gun marriage. :-)