Feelin A Little Tipsy

Remember that Tip Of The Day that I promised a little while ago? Ummm, yeah…about that…..I’m sorry. I kinda fell off the wagon with it. Sorry about that. So I’m going to make it up to you today with lots and lots of little things we can do to “Nix Fat, Not Flavor” in our daily food choices. So, here goes…..

*Opt for spray butter on whole grain toast or use spray salad dressing on fresh salads.

*Add a spoonful of Greek yogurt and salsa to a baked potato. Or bake potato skins in the oven and sprinkle with Parmesan cheese or drizzle with ketchup.

*Drink nonfat or 1% milk. Mix whole and 2% milk gradually changing the ratio of both until you are solely drinking 2%. Continue this process until you are drinking 1% or skim.

*When eating out, ask for a side salad or fruit dish instead of fries or onion rings.

*Purchase lean cuts of beef including top round, sirloin, or 93/7 ground beef. Remove the skins and cut off excess fat.

*Try using ground turkey instead of ground beef in spaghetti, burgers, chili or wherever else you typically use ground beef. The turkey is less expensive and better for you.

*Prepare tuna or chicken salad with non-fat Greek yogurt or sour cream instead of mayo.

*Add spray butter and Mrs. Dash seasonings to unflavored popcorn rather than buying the extra butter flavor.

*Use egg whites instead of regular eggs. Replace 2 egg whites or ¼ cup egg substitute for every egg.

*Instead of using butter, shortening or oil in cakes, brownies and other baked goods, use applesauce or prune puree. Decrease baking time by 25% to avoid a dry cake.

*Steam vegetables and add fresh garlic, low sodium soy sauce, or other herbs and spices to enhance bland side dishes.

Ya Can't Judge A Book By It's Cover

I'm taking a timeout today from the normal boring weight loss stuff and giving you another of my weekly Saturday night craft project blogs.

A few weeks ago, a very generous crafter friend of mine blessed my fuzzy leopard print socks right off when she gave me 2 GINORMOUS boxes of crafting and art supplies. They were overflowing with all kinds of goodies, some of which I still haven't figured out how to use yet! There was so much stuff that I was able to share with my sister and a set of young budding crafter triplet sisters from my church and still had so much left over that I had to get another Rubbermaid 7 drawer storage cart to hold it all and that still wasn't enough storage space. Among the loot were 12 books on all kinds of craft techniques and projects...enough to keep my little hands busy for a very long time! My favorite at the moment is one titled "Altered Books Workshop" by Bev Brazelton. I could not wait to get started on some of these techniques. So off to the local thrift store I went where they had hard cover books for 25 cents each. JACKPOT! Oh my, the selection they had! My favorites were the Readers Digest books. What amazing covers they have! Absolutely beautiful just by themselves, but I knew I could make them even more stunning using some of the techniques I learned. I couldn't decide what to try first. I mulled it over for a week before I settled on something. I will try my best to give you a step by step how to even though I forgot once again to take pictures of each stage of the process. I'll try not to bore you. Like most of my projects lately, this one took me 2 days from start to finish keeping in mind I have 3 little boys who require my constant attention. The first step was to choose a book. That was easy enough. This is one of my favorites... The book said to use PVA glue. I had no idea what that was and after searching for it at 3 different craft stores, I decided that good ole Mod Podge would do just fine!

The next step would prove to be the most difficult of the process and as my luck would have it, the most dangerous as well. You need 3 small match boxes for this stage. You can use the regular kind you find at the grocery store, but I just happened to find 3 white ones in the stash of craft supplies my friend gave me. Hold the short side of a match box next to a group of pages from the back of the book and add more until the thickness of the block equals the thickness of the matchbox. Apply Mod Podge to the edges of the block of pages with a foam brush. Let the glue dry. Hold the pages together with bulldog clips until the adhesive dries. Next place a matchbox on top of the block of pages, aligned with the edge of the page, and trace the shape with a pencil. Do this for each of the other 2 "drawers". Remember to space them out evenly.

Place a cutting mat between the block of pages and the back cover of the book. Cut along the pencil lines, removing a few pages at a time. Don't worry about the cuts being super neat. They won't be visible on the finished project. Make sure you have extra craft knife blades. This technique involves a lot of cutting. Start with a fresh blade and replace it for each of the 3 holes. It will make the whole process much easier. Occasionally as your cutting, drop the matchbox into the hole to check that it fits. Continue cutting until you've reached the cutting mat through all 3 holes.

BE CAREFUL OR THIS COULD HAPPEN......

Not to worry though, it was nothing a roll of paper towels, a tube of Neosporin and a box of Spiderman bandaids couldn't fix.

Next, paint the matchboxes. The book suggested you use spray paint to get a very thin layer so that the drawers would still slide in and out easily of the sleeve of the matchbox, but I only had red spray paint, so I very carefully applied a thin coat of brown craft paint.

I didn't need to cover the whole box because only the edges and inside would be visible.

Next, apply Mod Podge to the sleeves on just the sides and bottom and drop into the holes. Hold in place for a few seconds. Don't insert the drawers until the Mod Podge dries or you may glue it shut. Don't ask me how I know this.

Next apply the Mod Podge to the tops of the page and matchboxes and glue the preceding page to cover the mess.

At this point, I chose to decorate the front and back covers. I didn't have to, but I wanted to give it extra oomph! I just used bits of scrapbook paper and inked the edges to give it an aged look. I used Mod Podge to adhere the paper. Oh, I forgot to tell you that you should give the cover a light sanding to remove any grease or dirt left from fingerprints and handling of the book. This gives the cover a more uniform look and makes it better suited for adhesives.

Next I chose some word trinkets to put into the drawers. You could just place them in the drawer and let them jiggle around, or adhere them. I chose the latter just in case little hands find their way to my new project.

You can anything you want to make the handles on the drawers. I found that beads worked beautifully. I found some that matched perfectly.

I added some additional trinkets, ribbon and ephemera to the front cover because you know, More is always better!

I used brads on the binding to add a little bit of interest.

And this is the back cover... "M" for my last name.


I didn't completely finish the project yet. I plan to decoupage something or paint or maybe do something else to these pages so that when the book is open it is beautiful too.

Isn't it fabulous? I think so. I hope I didn't bore you or lose you completely in my explanations. Tell me what you think! Until next week......

What Goes In Must Come Out

Tonight for the first time since my surgery, I got sick, vomited, hurled, puked, blew chunks, up chucked, threw up, heaved. Whatever you want to call it, I did it. After surgery, this can happen for one of two reasons - if you eat too fast, or if you eat too much. I’m not going to lie, I ate too much. If you remember, I had to go for 48 hours with just clear liquids. Well, my 48 hours was up and my kids had pizza for dinner. I ate some. More than I should have. Not anywhere near what I used to be able to eat. I ate less than 1 slice, but it was still too much for what my stomach can hold. I knew it when I was eating it, but it was just soooo good. I didn’t care. Then I started to feel uncomfortable. It’s a hard feeling to explain, but I could feel it coming. I tried to stifle it, but no matter how hard I tried, up it came! Oh man! I hate throwing up! Why did I do this to myself? Worse yet, each time you throw up, you run the risk of your band slipping or twisting. If I remember correctly, if I ever get the flu or some kind of virus where throwing up is involved, I’m supposed to call my doctor’s office to get a prescription to stop the vomiting. Thankfully, it just happened one time. I’d like to say that I’m never ever going to overeat again, but I know that would not be true. I will do my very best and I’ve done very well so far, with the exception of tonight. But I can guarantee that there will be another time when the food will taste too good or I’ll be incredibly hungry, or emotional, or whatever and I’ll want to eat. And when that time comes, hopefully I’ll remember my experience tonight and that will be enough to make me stop, but I’m not making any promises. I’m finding that just taking it one day at a time is too long for me to think about. I have to take it one meal at a time, moment to moment. And sometimes that’s all we can do. Your issues may be different than mine, but I’m certain that everyone has something that they struggle with. But even though, our issues may be different, one thing is the same. When we call out to God to help us, He will be right there. When we are weak, He is strong. When we fall, He will be there to pick us back up. When we can’t stand ourselves, He loves us unconditionally. And just when we think we can’t make it any further, He gives us the grace to make it one more day. This is my testimony. I’ve come too far to go back now. I’m moving ahead. I’m not letting this one little slip up get me down. Tomorrow is another day and I will make it! And you can too!

The Wheels On The Bus.....

When I woke up this morning, I felt like I had been hit by a big yellow school bus. Seriously. Every muscle in my body ached and I was completely and utterly exhausted and weak. But there was no sympathy to be found in my house today. Sorry honey, but you really weren’t very nice about it. I’m just sayin. But I have to give the man some credit. At least he did get our oldest son on the bus for school and took the little ones downstairs so I could sleep longer. I woke up at 10:30, came downstairs for about 3.5 minutes and promptly went back upstairs to bed for another hour. I guess it’s a combination of working out really hard with my husband yesterday, getting the fill on my band, and being on a clear liquid diet again. But I just felt like crap today. There’s that word again. My apologies. But I’m really not in a very good mood today. So don’t cross me, ok? I know, I know. This is not very becoming of a good christian woman, is it? But I’m just being honest. Displaying the traits of a virtuous woman are far from my mind today. I’m feeling more like Peter when he cut the Centurion’s ear off in the Garden of Gethsemane . (John 18:10)

FIERCE!!!.

Have you ever wanted to punch something? I mean really hard? I wish I had a punching bag right now. It sure would help me to blow off some steam. I’m becoming very tempermental lately. Moody even. I sure hope tomorrow is better. I better stop for now before I say something I shouldn’t, huh? Goodnight!

Fill 'er up

Today I had my first "fill" on the band around my stomach and this day couldn't have come fast enough as far as I was concerned. I mentioned several posts ago that when I first had the surgery, the band that was placed around my stomach didn't give very much restriction at all. My body needed time for everything to heal internally before anything else could be done. Today marked 7 weeks since my surgery. I hope that today I can help you to have a better understanding of what is involved with the lap band surgery and all that occurs after the surgery is complete. This is me being weighed in......

The nurse totalling up my weight loss since the surgery. I was kinda bummed that their scales showed that I've lost 26.5 pounds when my friendly scales at home say that I've lost 30. But I'm not gonna split hairs over a couple pounds. I'm just so happy that for the first time in a very long time, the numbers are going down instead of up!

Having my blood pressure checked. I've never had a problem with it, and in fact I always like to rub it in to my husband when I have mine checked because his is on the high end. Mine today was 116/64.

And what you've all been waiting for......This is what is inside of me now. On the left side is the band that is around my stomach and attached with stitches. On the right is the port that is directly to the right of my belly button just under the skin. In fact, you can feel it if you press on my stomach just barely. This port is where the saline is injected to do the fill, but I'll get to that later. The tube in the middle is what connects the two and how the saline gets from the port to the band.

A closeup of the band....

Ooh, now I'm gettin scared! This is everything laid out to do the procedure.....

Ok, now for a little bit of humor. My wonderful sister went with me to my appointment to be my photographer and we were sitting in the procedure room waiting and waiting and waiting..... for the surgeon. He was 1 hr. 15 min. late for my appointment, but who's counting, right? We were just talking and laughing when she looked down and saw my leopard print socks peeking out from under my now famous camouflage pants and she just had to take a picture of them! Just wait until you see what the bottom half of her legs looked like! You'll have to check out her blog...The Vintage Attic in a few days to find out just what it was!

Alright, back to business. This is the man who was responsible for my surgery. Anuj Prashar, DO. He's just too friendly for me to be mad at him for running so late. He is prepping my stomach for the injection of saline.

Almost ready.....

And here it is....OUCH! Well, it wasn't really that painful. It felt just like having your blood drawn. He injected 4 c.c.'s of saline into the port. Just to give me an idea of how much that was, he explained to me that from now on,I will only receive .5 c.c.'s of saline in future fills.

I really can't believe I'm actually showing my stomach to the whole world! Really, I think I'm going to regret this, but I promised in the beginning to share the good, the bad, and the ugly, so here's the ugly......

A closeup. Here you can see my largest scar directly above my belly button and above them, you can see 2 of the smaller scars. The other 2 are on the other side of my stomach.

Before I could leave, Dr. Prashar had to be sure that I could tolerate some water without getting sick. I had no problem.

Now, he saved the bad news for last. This is him explaining to me that I had to go back to a clear liquid diet for 48 hours. HUH? ARE YOU SERIOUS????? I didn't know that! Well, too late now! It's already done!
Oh yeah, and after the 48 hours are over, I am only allowed to have one bite of food every 5 minutes. It is very important to eat super slow because it takes awhile for your brain to get the signal from your stomach that it's full and I don't want to risk stretching my stomach. Yeah, it can happen. That's how people who've had weight loss surgery can sometimes gain weight back. If your not careful, just a little bit of overeating at a time can stretch the stomach out to where it can hold more food and then the surgery was a waste. Well, not totally, but I don't want that to happen to me, so I'm doing my best to follow all of the rules. Anyhow, Dr. Prashar explained to me that at first, I may be full on only 2 bites of food, so it is very important to eat very slowly. For some people, they can hold more. It's just trial and error until you find the right amount of restriction on your band. Everyone is different. I may only need 1 fill, I may need 3 or 4. It just takes alot of tweaking to find your "sweet spot".

And were done! This is me with the incredible and talented Dr. Prashar. But I'm not biased at all!~

If you or someone you know is interested in weight loss surgery, you can contact Dr. Prashar at

The Weight Loss Clinic
1110 Professional Court

Suite 201

Hagerstown, MD 21740

301-714-4044

My New Friend

Food used to be my friend. It’s what I would turn to on nights when my husband was working and my boys were tucked snuggly in their beds. It kept me company, never talked back, and never ever looked at me disapprovingly. With my surgery, I had to say goodbye to my old friend. And it was a very hard goodbye to make. But just as quickly as I said my goodbyes, I made a new friend. She’s been wonderful to me and just what I needed in this time of my life. She has always been honest and truthful with me and most importantly, has told me exactly what I want to hear. We communicate with each other first thing every morning. She is the first thing I think about when my feet hit the ground. It's a brief exchange each morning, but she leaves me smiling all throughout the day. But it turns out, I’m not liking my new friend too much lately. She’s turned on me. And it almost makes me want to turn back to my old friend food. Want to know who she is? It’s my scales. We’ve had a falling out and I’m mad at her. For the past 7 weeks, I have weighed myself every morning without fail. And almost every morning, I had lost at least 1 pound. But for the last week, the scale hasn’t budged. And I don’t like it one bit! I liked weighing myself every morning because it kept me motivated and proved to me that my hard work was paying off, but now I’m just working hard with no results. I consulted with one of the trainers at the YMCA where we are members. Her advice? INCREASE my calories and do cardio 6-7 times per week for 1 hour. Not gonna happen! First of all, I’m not supposed to increase my calories above 1200 per day and secondly, I have a life. And that life does not include loading my children up 6-7 times each week to go exercise. So, what do I do? Well it’s a good thing that I have my first “fill” on my band tomorrow. I’m really hoping that this gives me the boost that I need to continue losing weight. And of course I can’t wait to speak with the surgeon to get his input. Stay tuned tomorrow for pictures of what my band looks like and hopefully I’ll get some shots of the actual fill taking place too. Should be interesting. And maybe, just maybe, my good friend and I will make up and be kind to each other again! Keep your fingers crossed!

I Ain't There Yet.....

……But Look at me now!

I was at the gym today doing my usual 30 minutes on the elliptical and listening to my music on my MP3 player and honestly, I didn’t want to be there. That song “Rainy Days And Mondays” kept going through my head. Today we had both. Lots and lots of rain. I really didn’t want to even get out of my pajamas let alone leave the house, but my dear husband pushed me to go. He really wanted to go and insisted that I go too. So, being the obedient wife that I am (oh dear when he reads this, he’s gonna gag!) I went with him. And we drug our 2 littlest sons with us in this awful weather. The oldest one was at school. After we dropped the boys off at the childcare area, my husband went off to do his thing and I was dragging my feet to get to the fitness center. My husband usually lifts weights first and then does his cardio while I like to do it the other way around. Except I usually use the machines instead of free weights like he does. But I think he took pity on me because he came over to the cardio side and got on the elliptical right next to me. Well, not being one to be shown up, I felt like I had to work out hard with him beside of me. I decided to do something different this time. Instead of working the elliptical manually, I set it to do a program for me. I chose the one for weight loss. This particular one gives you several minutes of intense resistance and then a few minutes of no resistance and over and over again. I started out alright, but by about 15 minutes, I was ready to be done. Then something happened. A song started to play. It’s one by my favorite artist, Kirk Franklin. I’ve heard it a million times. But this time, I really listened to the words. My inspiration was kicking in! I played it over and over again and before I knew it, I was at 40 minutes! More than I’ve ever done on the elliptical! It was just what I needed to hear to get me through the morning! So I wanted to share it with you. I know that I have much more work to do and I’m only 1/3 of the way towards reaching my weight loss goal, but when I look back to 2 months ago, I can truly say that I’ve come a very long way! And I just want to say to all of those people, yes even some family members that doubted that I would ever make anything of myself and that I would be successful in this new season of my life…….


LOOK AT ME NOW!!!!





Persecuted, criticized, been denied and abandoned
Pushed away, given away, some days I couldn't imagine
Getting harder, getting colder, was hard for me to see
Tired of runnin', tired of hurtin', even got tired of me
Tired of cryin', tired of tryin' to forget my mistakes
Tired of bein' in this storm, how much more can I take
Many nights in my life, tell me why
I shed more tears, my eyes would allow
And after all that

Look at me now!
I'm stronger this time around!
Not because I was so good, but somehow
You looked past where I was
And you knew I'd come through cause You loved me
Look at me know!
So many didn't make it through
That's why this heart belongs to only You!
How can I complain 'bout the pain I went through
Cause it grew me
Look at me now!

Had no hope, had no future, even too hard to dream
No one told me, “boy, you can be whatever you want to be”
Then You saved me and You gave me reason to breathe again
Not perfect, ya'll, but I'm gon' run 'til I make it to the end
(It ain't easy when your life's filled with wounds that won't heal)
And you fight through the lies trying to find what's for real
Everyone wants the prize but they can't stand the pain
The strength I needed it came that night I cried out Your name
To my people in the struggle, all my soldiers and believers
To my survivors of Rita, Katrina and even FEMA
(All things are working together for our good)

Look at me now!
I'm stronger this time around!
Not because I was so good, but somehow
You looked past where I was
And you knew I'd come through cause You loved me
Look at me know!
So many didn't make it through
That's why this heart belongs to only You!
How can I complain 'bout the pain I went through
Cause it grew me
Look at me now!

Yes, I've seen some hard times
Some bad choices that I've made fell back on me
But now it's time to move on, move on
Can't let my past hold down my destiny
And even though I don't always know
Why you allow the night to last so long
But when I see the sunlight
It was only to make me strong

Look at me...
Look at me...
Look at me...
Look at me, look at me

I'm better now! I'm closer now!
I'm thankful now! I'm happy now!
Look at me! Look at me!
I'm stronger now! I'm patient now!
I'm grateful now! I'll praise you now!
Look at me! Look at me!