[This post brought to you entirely by my phone... I'll be back home eventually.]

I had several goals going into Saturday’s race in Disney World.

Goal 1: don’t get swept for not keeping the 16-minute-mile pace. Once I started timing myself, I figured I should be able to manage that as long as I was able to do SOME running (and not break an ankle).

Goal 2 was the one I really had in my sights: no walking. I completed the Couch-to-5K training program, but have started to get some significant leg pain after my runs. And while I finished my 30-minute run, I hadn’t yet made it to the full 3.1 miles.

I couldn’t decide if I was confident or nervous. What if I had dragged my whole family to Florida for a race I couldn’t even finish?

But then I went to pick up my race pack, in true Disney fashion, and got all kinds of excited.

That night, I got to meet my fellow Shredheads, most of whom were running the half-marathon. I got my race shirt, and set it all out for our early-morning start.

The morning was early. On the bus at 5:45. An hour before sunrise. 45 degrees. But the bus was crowded, there were costumes and tiaras all over the place. There were bright lights and a DJ pumping loud music. I jumped and danced to stay warm.

The sun started to come up. We pushed into the starting area. A few hundred feet and a few thousand people between me and the starting line.

Behind us, a preview of what awaited us at mile 3. Pumped.

Fireworks marked the start. It was a mob, but a happy one. We wound around the parking lot and entered Epcot at the one-mile mark, between Mexico and Norway.

There were volunteers cheering us along. Disney characters all along the route, and people stopping to wait in a line 8 people deep to take pictures. Not me. I had a goal.

My pace was slower than I expected. In classic Disney Imagineering, I thought I was close to the finish and the route took a few more hidden turns.

One last turn: finish line. I ran across it. 37:14. Fast? Nah. But I ran it. I ran. The whole thing. 3.1 miles. I earned that silly rubber finisher’s medallion, god dammit.

Alright, so my leg hurt like a motherf–ker for the next two days and I’m still limping down stairs. But I have an appointment with a physical therapist next week. I have another race in May. I’m looking for longer ones. Despite the stabbing pain in my right shin, I found myself jealous of the half marathon runners I saw the next day.

Bring it.

Two weeks ago, my brother’s son was born.  Charlie is my brother’s first child, and my first nephew.  So when I saw a cheap weekend airfare to Chicago, I had to pop out there to meet him (and deliver his quilt in person, of course).

A friend on Facebook teased me, “look out! Newborns are contagious!”

How can you resist the power of the yawning baby burrito?

The funny thing is that, of the various baby phases, I’m not generally a “newborn” person. Cute though they may be, they don’t DO anything. They eat, they sleep, they fuss. Meh.  Fast-forward to six months (or nine, ooh I liked nine months), and I’m all over it.  But newborns don’t do a darn thing.

Well, OK. They inadvertently make really funny faces. And that’s cool and all.

But I will say that there was something strangely appealing, or comforting, or something, about feeling so confident in the presence of a 10-day-old baby.  I knew how to hold him, I knew how to swaddle him.  I knew that all of those weird grunts and squeaks were normal, and not true fussiness.  I knew how to bounce and rock and sway.  I was calm. Laid-back.  I remembered.

Oh, sure. I have the advantage of not being completely hormonal, sleep-deprived, and freaked out by breastfeeding. I was only there a couple of hours. I got to leave. And I didn’t have two 2.5-year-olds to contend with at the same time. I know that.

But I also have the benefit of knowing, first-hand, that these phases are limited in their duration. They come and go. The days are long, the years are short.

Yes, I think I want a third kid. No, M does not.  We are, as they say, at an impasse.  And in this debate, the “no” wins.  I may or may not be able to sway him. It remains to be seen.

One way or another, in my head, I’m giving it to the end of this year. Logic being that, if I were to get pregnant at the very end of this year, that would put a new baby right around my kids’ 4th birthday. Past four, for me, is getting to be too large of an age separation.

Anyways, that’s what has been on my mind since visiting my sweet nephew this weekend. Thanks, Charlie, for giving me baby brain.

Pretty much every day, my kids nap from around 1-3pm. Sometimes a little more, sometimes a little less (or, as in today, seemingly NOT AT ALL).  But generally, I have a 2-ish hour break in the afternoon.  As most other moms I know, especially those who are at home full-time, I live for naptime. I need the quiet time, I need the break from demands and tantrums.  Delightful and awesome though my kids can often be, we all know it’s exhausting.

As much as I love that time, though, it’s never ever long enough.  On any given day, for any given naptime, here’s what’s probably on my to-do list:

• Sew
• Shred
• Shower
• Laundry
• Dishes
• Blog/Email
• Catch up on DVR
• Sit still
• Read
• Clean
• Cook
• Sleep (almost never)

On a really good day, when I’m feeling efficient and the kids take an extra long nap, I might touch on two of those. Maybe three (Shred, shower, email).  And, obviously, I can only do things during naptime that I can do inside my own house.  I can’t go for a run, pick up groceries, or anything else.

No wonder I feel chronically behind.  If I use the time to exercise, then I’m not getting any sewing done.  If I use the time to sew, I don’t have time for a blog post. I can’t keep up with the very few shows that I like to watch.  And despite getting a Kindle for Christmas, I have spent almost zero time reading.

There isn’t exactly a solution, of course.  Sure, some of those things can be done when the kids are awake (throw in a load of laundry, prep dinner, etc.).  And many of them are hardly necessities.  But still… if only there were a few more quiet hours in the day, right?

Well, OK, two years and five months, but whatever. As of this morning, I am back to the weight I was when I got pregnant. Three years ago.

This goal is only sort of a mid-point to me.  A good goal. An important one.  One that I’m proud to have achieved. But far, far from the end.

Five months ago, I weighed 226 pounds. Two hundred twenty six. There, I said it. It’s out there. You know. I can hardly describe how ashamed I am of that number, not to mention how long I sat there.  And how long I looked like this:

August 17, 2009. That’s me. HUGE. Horrified.  But however long it took, a switch flipped. Time for a long overdue change.

Weight Watchers, EA Sports Active, Jillian Michaels, my gym’s childcare room, the Shredheads, Twitter, and Couch to 5K. Five months. Twenty-six pounds.  And now I am here:

The thing is, I still weigh 200 pounds.  I am still, by all objective measures, fat. Obese, even. I’m way, way heavier than I ought to be. I am not proud of my weight. My body is distributed completely differently than it was the last time I was at this weight. So much more belly, now. And the loss of volume is revealing some rather alarming “twin skin.” I am not happy with where I am right now.

But.

While I’m not setting any speed records on weight loss, but it has been steady. In the 20+ weeks I’ve been counting, I have lost something all but about three weeks.  I am proud of that.  This weekend, I finally was able to buy some new jeans. It took more than 20 pounds, but I went down a pants size. I am proud of that. I am stronger, happier, more in control. I have not purchased a pint of ice cream since August. My kids see me put on my sneakers and say “you have on your exercising shoes!” I am proud of that.

I am proud of this:

And this is why you take a “before” picture. I hate mine.  It makes me want to cry.  But you know what? If I didn’t have it as a comparison, then today’s picture would also make me cry.  Putting them together lets me see progress, however gradual, however slow.

Onward.

I’ve already written about my current exercise/fitness goal, but I also need a new weight-specific goal.  So here it is: I want to have a BMI that is simply “overweight” instead of “obese.”  That’s 21 more pounds.  For a rough timeframe, I think I should be able to do it by June.

Bring it.

It was over four months ago that I began my most recent battle of the bulge. First, it was a wager among friends as to who could lose the most weight in a month.  I won (though I have yet to cash in my prize – dinner on them).  Then, a slightly larger competition amongst other blogging types, Biggest Loser rules (% of weight lost in 6 weeks). I came in second.

And then, in October, I became a Shredhead.  In addition to the ass-kicking provided by Jillian, I found a great support system via Twitter, and that has really helped carry me and push me throughout the fall.  Exercise became a routine. Weekly weight loss became the norm.  If it weren’t for that pesky 2 weeks in Chicago, I might have even made my weight loss goal (I’m close, just a few weeks later than I hoped).

I’ve started to get into a rut, though. A little bored with my exercise routine.  A lot of Shredheads, I noticed, took up running.  Oy, running. I have always hated it. I have always sucked at it. I’ve even tried the Couch-to-5K (C25K) program once or twice, and failed miserably. I’m not sure I made it to the second week.

But that Jillian, she gets into your head.  While still overweight, I’m getting a lot more fit. I started to think about running again. A 5K is 3.1 miles.  I can do that. I can do that.  So I decided to shake it up and do the C25K again. Treadmill, this time, to control my pace. Not that I planned on becoming a runner, but more as a straight physical accomplishment.  Something I should be able to do. Something I will do.

Well, I don’t know about you, but I do better if I have a goal in mind. A fixed point towards which to move.  Clearly, I need a race. One in the vicinity of the end of this training program.  Except, well, how many 5Ks are there in Massachusetts in March?  Seriously, it could be 75 or it could be a blizzard, there’s just no telling.

Enter the Shredheads, several of whom are running the Disney Princess Half Marathon in March.  In Orlando.  Oh… would you look at that… there’s also a 5K as a part of those festivities!  Florida in March is nice, not cold but not too warm….  And would you believe it, kids under 3 don’t need a ticket to get into the parks…?

Last night, I signed up.

I don’t yet know how exactly we’re getting there, where we’ll stay, or any of those other pesky details.

But I signed up for a 5K. In Disney World.  On March 6. Nine weeks from today.

I’m on week 4 of C25K, and that five whole minutes of running is kicking my ass.  Did I mention that there was ONE time, in high school, that I ran a whole mile?  ONE TIME. EVER.

I have lost my mind.  But, hey, I’ve also lost nearly all of my baby weight.  Might be an acceptable trade off.

Staying at your parents’ house as an adult is a weird thing, isn’t it? Some things you see with fresh eyes, and other times you revert back to an awkward preteen.  I’ve noticed some habits working both for and against me this week.

On the positive side, it would seem that 4+ months of regular exercise is actually becoming an ingrained habit.  Oh sure, part of it is that I’m only about three pounds away from my first weight-related goal, and I don’t want to get completely sidetracked while I’m here.  But really, when have I ever brought an exercise DVD with me to (either of) my parents’ house(s)?  When have I ever used the treadmill they have in their basements?  That would be a big, fat never.

And yet, here I am.  I have done the Shred. I have progressed to Week 3 of the Couch-to-5K program (yes, I’m trying to run… more on that later).  I have exercised more days than not.  And I’m glad.

I’m particularly glad, because the flipside is that old eating habits die really hard.  I’ve been reasonably good with my eating these last few months (hence the 3-pounds-from-first-goal thing). But much of my success has come from controlling what foods I have access to. I haven’t purchased a pint of ice cream since the summer. I have baked shockingly few cookies (by my standards). I don’t keep crap in the house, so I can’t eat it.  I have a pretty limited menu, but it works for me.

And then I get here. Without even thinking, I walk into my dad’s kitchen and open the doors to the pantry to peruse the junk food. Cookies. Chips. All variety of things that I don’t ever buy, but find almost impossible to resist when they’re right there in my face. No control over what is served at big family dinners. Dad buys a dozen bagels (from my favorite bagel shop) for breakfast.  Ugh.

I’ve tried to keep some of my go-to items on hand, and have tried to stick to my 8PM rule.  But, clearly, four well-behaved months have not cured me of 30 years of bad eating habits.

But still, I will try to keep fighting the good fight, and not beat myself up too much for what happens here, away from home.  Just a few more days, and I’ll be back in my own space.  In the meantime, pass the cookies…

Yesterday, I left my kids.  My husband, too.  Walked out the door, drove to the airport, got on a plane, and flew most of the way across the country. I ran away. And I’m glad I did.

It was about a month and a half ago that I was nearly crawling out of my own skin with the need for a break. Within a few days, I found out about a quilting retreat and booked the trip before I could have second thoughts. Just what the doctor ordered.

Last week, I was making small talk with a woman at my local quilting shop about the fact that I was looking forward to going on this trip, and made some comment about being just as excited to get away from my kids for a few days.

“You’re so bad!”, she said.

I know she was partly just teasing me, but I also know that there is some truth behind most jokes.  I could tell there was a part of her that was chiding me for being excited to leave my children.  And there was a part of me that was doing the same thing.

I got home from that shopping trip and vented to M. Don’t judge me, lady! Moms need a break, too! Taking care of kids full-time is stressful! M nodded at all the right times, reaffirmed my right to a weekend of my own, and mostly just let the issue drop.

But I would be lying if I said I felt no guilt as I packed for my trip. Part of it, I think, was the fact that I know this all came about as a way to run away. Escape my responsibilities. All of a sudden, I felt overwhelmed. I’m so lucky to have really wonderful, sweet, smart, healthy, happy kids. I’m so lucky that I get to be at home with them full-time. How could I act so thankless and just leave them, as though they’re nothing but a burden?

Intellectually, of course, I know that’s faulty logic. The fact that raising two kids is an enormous source of stress does not negate the fact that it’s also an enormous source of pride and joy.  Being a stay-at-home mom is an incredible opportunity. But even people who work at their dream jobs still go home for the weekend and take vacation days.  This weekend away is an indulgence, but not an undeserved one.

And so, here I sit. In my four-poster bed in a quiet room at an inn in Colorado. Downstairs, the innkeeper is making pumpkin french toast for breakfast. There’s a dozen or so of us who started chatting and sewing and geeking out about fabric from the moment we got here yesterday, and we will spend all of today doing the same.

M is at home with the kids, rocking the “dad about town” thing. He took them to the Children’s Museum, a bookstore, and out for dinner yesterday. Today they’re going swimming (after they get their H1N1 shots). M will be exhausted by the end of the weekend, but everyone is having a great time.

Tomorrow evening, I’ll fly back home. I’ll sneak into the kids’ room when I arrive and be so happy to see their sweet, sleeping faces.  And Monday morning, though I’ll be tired from my late flight, I’ll have a little more energy and patience.

Guilt or no guilt, we will all benefit.

October is done, which means that the October Shredheads Challenge is complete.  I have to say, I’m pretty proud of myself!  With pretty much only a single exception, I stuck to my plan of doing the Shred 3x/week, and going to the gym 2x/week.  I did pretty well on my food/Points, too.** The end result in numerical terms is that I’m down 5.5 pounds from October 1-31, for a total of 15 pounds overall.  Only about 11 more pounds to go on my end-of-the-year pre-pregnancy weight goal. Woot!

The big asterisks on that one was our weekend away.  The food was a total disaster because I made virtually no effort to stick with the plan and just ate whatever the hell I wanted.  The payback was a pound and a half gain. Boo!  It was also surprisingly difficult to get back with the program after I got home. I was feeling pretty defeated for a few days last week.  I think the big difference was that I went whole hog off the wagon that weekend.  Other days that I’ve allowed myself indulgences, they were pretty limited. Maybe a single bad day, or single bad meal, but otherwise I was pretty good.  Last weekend, it was a free-for-all, and I paid for it.  Thankfully, I found my way back to the plan and have erased the gain.

I have noticed something very interesting recently, with regard to eating. We were taking the kids out for lunch at a nearby Tex-Mex restaurant (not a good diet choice, of course, but I survived).  As I was sitting on my hands and biting my lip to avoid the bowl of chips, I started to say, “but I’m just so huuungry!”  And then I stopped halfway through my whine and realized that it simply wasn’t true.  I wasn’t hungry.  I’m just not really that hungry anymore.

Obviously, I get hungry.  But not as often as I think I will.  Not as badly as when I first started counting my points (when all you can think about is how fricking hungry you are).  And most of the time, when I start to have the thought I’m hungry, I’m actually not.  I’m munchy. I want.  But that’s not the same as being hungry.

And that, I suppose, is where the larger struggle actually lies.  The hard part of sticking with a weight loss plan is not hunger.  It’s those munchy, snacky, WANT feelings that got you to this point in the first place.

So, I will continue to fight the good fight. Drink more water to stave off the munchies. Exercise or sew or catch up on the DVR instead of eating. Exercise some more.  And exercise a little more after that. There is much more work to be done.

This weekend, M and I had the very rare treat of taking a weekend to ourselves.  Oh, the freedom!

My mom and stepdad arrived on Thursday for a visit and to stay with the kids.  Thanks to impressive recall and liberal use of Skype, the kids had almost zero adjustment time when they got up from nap to see Grandma Annie and Brucie.

And then, Friday morning, M and I hopped in the car and away we went! Wahoo!  The wedding was on Long Island, so we drove through Connecticut with the requisite stop at Rein’s Deli.  Yes, the weekend completely trashed my weight loss for the week, but that Corned Beef Rachael was worth it.  Foliage was a bit past-peak, but made for a lovely drive.

The wedding itself was lovely.  Small, not too formal, and tons of incredibly good food.  Including a tower of cupcakes and an ice cream sundae bar instead of a regular wedding cake. (Again with the weight loss sabotage.)

Reports from my mom were universally positive.  She took them up to her sister’s house on the north shore, and the kids got to play with my cousins, throw rocks into the ocean, and generally have the undivided attention of about seven people.  No complaints or upset to speak of, they handled the new-ish people and a sleepover at my aunt’s house with no problems at all.  I did not attempt to talk to them on the phone.  At this age, I think it was just as well, as a phone conversation would have had minimal benefit and potentially unpleasant fallout.  And while the adults were generally too busy to take pictures, I did get a funny video courtesy of my aunt’s phone.

We came home late Sunday afternoon, and I braced myself for the meltdown.  We all know how it goes with toddlers.  They can be on their very best behavior with other people (seriously, my mom and aunt and stepdad couldn’t stop with the glowing compliments), but as soon as mommy returns, they lose their minds.  Clingy, acting out, all of the stuff they were holding in while you were away.

Or, you know, not.

They’ve been great. They didn’t turn on my mom the way they did on my mother-in-law last June (once we returned from our weekend in Maine, Rebecca refused to talk to her grandmother for the rest of the trip).  They were not in total meltdown mode for the rest of the night, or even the next day.  They’ve been totally within the normal range of their day-to-day behavior.

Anybody else want to get married?  We’ll be there. Without the kids.

You guys are awesome.  I love how many people came out of the woodwork for a pair of salad scissors.  In fact, people were so enthused, I decided to give away two of them.  The first winner, thanks to Random.org:

#24: Mommy, Esq!  For the record, she votes for candied nuts in a salad.  I LOVE making candied walnuts and mixing them with greens, granny smith apple, craisins, and goat cheese.  With a balsamic-dijon vinaigrette.  Super tasty, though not as friendly as I might like for the ol’ diet.  Ah well.

Winner the second:

#14: Nancy!  She votes for the heavy stuff at the salad bar, thereby increasing the percentage of your paycheck that you fork over to Whole Foods (cucumber, garbanzo beans, etc.).  Yum.

And, seriously… you both live about 10 minutes from my house.  So instead of paying Williams-Sonoma to ship them, I’m just going to hit the mall and drop them off at your front door.

Thanks to everyone for entering along!  I could hardly believe I had so many people reading.  Leave comments more often, would ya?  And get thee to a Williams-Sonoma and get yourself a pair of those scissors. I’m telling you, I LOVE them!