Catching Up

After my last post, i sort of "checked out" for a week or so! I think i needed a break from everything structured and busy. The kids and I enjoyed their last week of break - relaxing, playing board games, getting together with friends, going to the pool, sleeping until after 9 every day, seeing some movies (17 Again was great, although if you're conservative about movies, you might want to skip it because it's somewhat "mature", Hannah Montana was dumb and my kids thought that even more than i did!).

Harrison's birthday was low key after his big weekend, but we did spend the day with some good friends at the pool and then went out to dinner and he got to have a sleepover.

It also took the rest of the week to do a lot of the "post bar mitzvah " tasks, like put the centerpieces away, unload the car, unpack from the weekend, etc.

I gave Harrison a break on his thank you notes and let him enjoy the last week of his very busy spring break. Now, though, he has a goal of a minimum of 5 per day until they're all done. I hate thank you notes that are just one little sentence, so these are "meaty," full of substace and from the heart. Please know that he is working on them (in no particular order other than the order the gifts were openened) and yours will be coming. In the meantime, Marlon and I would like to say thank you so much for your generousity. Harrison has opened up a savings account and deposited all of his Bar Mitzvah money into it and he will be saving it for college. He did use some of the many gift cards and a couple of cash birthday gifts to buy himself a new (and somewhat expensive) DeMarini baseball bat, which is apparently the ultimate in bats. let's hope he hits some homeruns with it! lol

Soon i'll return to posts about the Bar Mitzvah. I've had several requests that i post our speeches, the candlelighting ceremony script and of course pictures, so i'll work on all of that!

Oh, by the way, a brief update on my weight loss/maintenance. I've been on regular foods now for about 3 weeks. I still use their products as part of my intake, but i also eat a wide variety of foods. During the long weekend of the Bar Mitzvah, I didn't really count calories at all, ate whatever i wanted, and enjoyed the delicious foods we had at all of our events. i must admit, i was also not careful at times when i could have been more careful, but i had been strict for so long that i guess i just needed a little break from it. i didn't keep track of anything and didn't exercise, but i didn't miss any of my classes - i went right back tuesday morning, even though i knew i had gained. Sure enough, I had gained 6 pounds (i had anticipated between 2 and 10, so i wasn't surprised by this.)

i got RIGHT back on track last tuesday, still eating regular foods, but counting calories, trying to keep it low, weighing and measuring, writing it all down, back to exercise (although not the gym yet, just swimming and the elpyp at home) and as of today i lost 7.2 pounds so i lost everything i had gained plus an additional 1.2 pounds! yippee!

ok, that's it for now. more later!