I'm a LOSER!

An almost 3 pound loser. Not bad. I'm happy. Could have done a *bit* better this weekend but I didn't go wild and crazy. My water intake this weekend wasn't what it really should be. Monday - Friday, I drink 100+ ounces of water a day because that's all I allow myself to drink and I'm sitting at my desk, working. So it's right in front of me. On the weekends, I'm out and about so I may sneak in a soda or juice here and there or not drink anything at all. I have to keep a special eye on that.

About 8 years ago, I lost 75 pounds on my own with diet and exercise and I kept it off until I had Punkie (darn "eating for two!"). I was a heavy soda (and NOT diet Coke) drinker back then. My first week dieting, I totally cut out soda, only drank water and lost 12 pounds my first week! Tells you how much extra, empty calories you can take in in just sugary liquids!

I made Sharon's Tequila Chicken recipe last night for dinner... can you say YUM?! Very good! If you haven't tried it yet, you must. It's delish! I also made a big pot of chili yesterday - with 90/10 ground sirloin. I'm having some for lunch today. Can't wait for it!

Alright! Alright! I'll post a picture, for crying out loud but I'm not happy about doing so. Here's a picture of myself and husband at my cousin's wedding, June 2007. As you can see, I was part of the wedding party. I *think* I'm about the same weight now as I was then. I'm going to use this as my "before" picture.

That's all I got!
Enjoy your day!
Jen :)

PIF - Pay It Forward

I joined RachelJane and Sharon in their Pay It Forward quests and now I have a question. Each of them asked for 3 people to join them and since I joined TWO... do I now need SIX people for my PIF?? I just want to be fair, you know?

So, I guess now for the rules... in a nut shell, these two kind ladies will hand make me a giftie and instead of paying them back, I return the good deed to others (whomever would like to participate). Those that received gifts from me, in turn post on their blog (I guess you need a blog to join) that they are participating and choose three people to which they will pay it forward (and so on and so on). Oh! And I believe you have roughly 6 months to get your gifts made and out to your participants.

So? Do I have any takers to join me in the Pay It Forward quest? I guess I would need at least three and possibly six so that I cover all the rules for myself (since I joined two of them).

If you're interested, kindly respond to this post.

I have put my lap quilt project aside for now so that I can get started on on my Show Some Sewing Love swap items. Things are going pretty good. I would like to get them done in the next couple of week so that I'm ready to put them in the mail by the deadline. And I need to get a fleece blanket sewn for my god-daughter so that I can get that in the mail for her birthday; which has past already. I sent her a card though with an "IOU a Birthday Gift" note inside. The pillow case to match the fleece blanket is done. Just have to get to work on getting the fleece sewn.

That's all for now.
Enjoy your day!
Jen

It's Thursday

Not much to report. It's been pretty quiet on the sewing front. I did get a chance yesterday to work on piecing more blocks of Punkie's lap quilt. I think I have 16 more blocks to go and then I can lay them out in a nice, visual pattern and start assembling the quilt top. Very exciting! I need to order the fabric for the border, binding and backing. Waiting for my next paycheck to do that. Then I can commission someone to quilt it for me. I'm so excited that the quilt blocks are coming together that I don't want to mess it up by trying to quilt it.

On the Diet Challenge, mid week update... I've been doing really good! I was home all day yesterday due to an ice storm and of course the kitchen is very accessible but I stayed away! I stayed out of my husband's chips. I stayed out of my chocolate chips; I don't normally snack on those at all but I needed a chocolate fix but I drank some tea and the idea went away. I snacked on some blueberries instead. Logging my Weight Watchers points. I jumped on the scale this morning and the numbers are moving in the right direction but I won't post that information until the "official" update on Monday. Need to make it through the weekend first!


That's all for now.
Enjoy your day!

Jen :)

Amelia - Lap Quilt in Progress

Here are some blocks that I worked on for my very first lap quilt. It's for Punkie since the fabric line is called "Amelia".

After my fat quarter issue, my husband figured out the math for me; along with tips from others and everything is working out. But (there's always a "but"), I'm short fabric. I don't know what I did wrong or what I did right but I'm short. There is good news though. I have some leftover yardage from this fabric line that I intended to make into a pillowcase - I already made Amelia one but I was going to make two of them. I will use the extra yardage and create the strips that I need. Hopefully I can mix the blocks up enough so you won't really see the repetitiveness of the strips that I'm going to use. I doubt you will. There's so much going on in the pattern, I don't think that's going to be a problem.

Since I'm back to work, my sewing will only happen on the weekends now unless I get a few moment here and there during the week. I hope to have the top pieced together in a couple of weeks and then I can order the yardage for the border, back and binding. Then I need to figure out how to quilt this sucker. I have decided that my machine is just too small to quilt large items (that's my way of hinting that I really need a new machine) or that I'm just not talented enough to figure out how to quilt large items on my machine in an easy way. My machine is good for small stuff but I think I will have major headaches trying to quilt this. So, I may just have it quilted by someone else. I have some time to decide.

I'm just excited to be working on a lap quilt, my fabric issue was figured out AND my blocks are actually coming out (pretty close) square! BONUS! LOL.

Enjoy your day!

Jen

Diet Challenge 2009 - Starting Today

Okay, I'm starting today. I logged back into my Weight Watchers online account that I have ignored since April 2008 and tracked my breakfast points. Should be an okay day. I'm working from home today so that may be a little challenging for me. We had icy roads this morning and I travel 40 miles to get to work so I decided to stay home. I also caught a cold over the weekend and I just don't feel like coughing and sneezing on everybody today.

I'm going to try to be good today. I made my lunch last night, a salad and piece of grilled chicken so I'll have that this afternoon. Haven't decided what we're going to do for dinner yet.

On the sewing quilt front, my husband figured out my piecing and block sizes for the lap quilt that I'm working on that was giving me troubles a couple of days ago. Things are going together nicely. I have a portion of the blocks done. I meant to take some pictures yesterday but I forgot. I hope to take some today and post them up here.

Well, it's telecom time. Back to work I go!

Enjoy your day!
Jen :)

Whirl into Winter Blog Giveaways

Go and check them out. 60+ bloggers giving lots of stuff away like Crafty Janie! She's got lots of goodies up for grabs!

Good Luck to everybody who plans to enter! I've already done my fair share of commenting!

Jen :)

First Day of 2009 and I don't like it

And I'm ready for the day to be OVER! I've decided to tackle my very first quilt using a pattern and fabric from my little stash. I washed my fat quarters and pressed and spent an hour yesterday cutting all my quarters to length so that I can start piecing tonight when Amelia is in bed for the night.

Today, I have some time during Amelia's nap so I decided to sit down and start on the first couple piecing steps. All my strips are 2 inches too short length wise! WAH!! Okay, it can't be me. I could not have precisely cut all my fat quarters two inches too short! So either my fat quarters shrunk in the wash OR they weren't cut right to begin with. I can't say for sure because I didn't measure them beforehand to begin with.

Someone tell me not to panic and all will be well! The pattern I'm working from is "Yellow Brick Road" by Atkinson Designs and I'm supposed to have strip pieces that are 21 inches long. Mine are all 19 inches.

I should get two 6.5 inch units and two 3.5 inch units from each strip... and my ultimate block size should be 9.5x9.5. I'm thinking of cutting off the 1/2 inch everywhere and get two 6 inch units and two 3 inch units from each strip and whatever my block size will be... I don't know. I'm very bad at math. But I don't want to scrap this fabric as I love it and bought it for my Punkie Girl and it's already cut for this pattern.

Please, please, please... someone tell me it's going to be fine and what I'm thinking of doing is okay! I'm not a seasoned quilter so it's hard for me to think outside the box when I'm following a pattern.

Big Sigh.
Jen :(