I bet there are quite a few guys who have said to their wives, thinking they were complimenting them, 'Have you lost weight?' only to end up with the reply 'Oh, so I needed to lose weight did I? ', so its not surprising he didn't bring it up. But it just goes to show, you have made a difference and it is noticeable. Also, if he has noticed your eating and drinking habits aswell, you must be making some very significant improvements in your lifestyle, which is great!!

Keep up the good work!!

Oh Men. Sometimes they are such....men. Haha. But at least it's all kind of out in the open now? Right? Well hope your day is going well!

Yeah, I guess he has always figured he wouldn't say anything about my weight. Good, bad or inifferent

I'm still working on making those smoothies, two days running now, and I'm not crazy about them! This morning was 1/2 C OJ, 1 Cup Vanilla non fat yogurt and 1/2 Cup strawberries. It was lacking something...I don't know what, so I threw in some ice to froth it up and it still wasn't there.

I'll keep experiementing!

Do you use frozen fruit, because I find that if I use fresh fruit it is a bit of an unusual texture. I use plain yoghurt or milk, add some pineapple juice for sweetness, maybe a mango or an apple, and frozen summer or black forest fruits. I also add seeds and nuts for zinc and selenium (trying to conceive!). You can add more or less frozen fruit depending on whether you want it more like a drink or a slushie.

Hi Mrs. B I bought vanilla non fat yogurt, next time, I'll buy plain (when this is gone).

Yesterday I used 1/2 c non fat milk, 1/2 c frozen peaches and 1 c vanilla n/f yogurt. It was kind of bland, but the milk gave it more creaminess then today's OJ mixture, but today's OJ mixture helped the flavor.

I have frozen raspberries to try tomorrow and try for a slushier type smoothie.

Thanks for the input! I really want to figure this out, since when it's all whipped up, if feels like I'm more full then when I just have yogurt by itself with a side of fruit in the morning.

I'm used to eating a big breakfast, so feeling full is really important. Although, this smoothie has lasted - I'm only just now getting hungry and it's been about 3.5 hours since I've eaten.

I am glad your husband said that he had noticed. It will surely be more fun for you now that the big frustrating question mark is not hanging over your head. And now he will feel more free to compliment you as you go along - not that he might necessarily think to do that on his own, but here's hoping!!!

Hey you.. bunch of comments on a bunch of posts. lol

You're a homeschool mom??? I am too! I homeschool my 7 yo daughter and 3 yo son. I was homeschooled all my life and I loved it. I couldn't do it any other way for my own kids.

Secondly, what a great bunch of ladies!! I think it's so awesome. I wish I had a group of friends like that to drink with! Mom's night out would be so much more relaxing if you threw in a cosmo or two!! I don't drink often, but most of my friends are uptight about drinking so my husband and I mostly drink alone.

Next, Go M2M, issyer birthday, we're gonna party like issyer birthday, sip bacardi like issyer birthday ... Yay you! I'm so happy that you told your husband. How exciting. I'm glad he knows so he can be encouraging you and complimenting you on your successes!

Smoothies are sounding so good right now! I feel your pain, though... I've never been able to get it as creamy as I like it without putting ice cream in it! lol Defeats the purpose a little, doens't it??

You're doing so well... keep up the great work!

Hi Everyone
So far, it's been a really good day.

I figured I could eat a half a cucumber and there's hardly ANY calories in it! Who knew there was food out there that didn't take a bite back

Oh, and with the sandwich I made for lunch, I sprayed the griddle with Pam (don't tell me this stuff is bad for me, I don't want to know!) and grilled two pieces of bread, one tomato, a slice of low fat cheese and it was delicious! Without the butter I would have used in the past! Woo Hoo, grilled cheese sandwiches again!

A girlfriend of mine dropped off her daughter for a sleepover tonight, and she noticed - it seems so vain, but man is it good hearing positive comments. She lives about two miles from me, so Thursday morning, we plan on each leaving our house at 7:00 am and meeting half way for a morning walk! I would love to get two walks in a day! Her daughter and mine are becoming such good friends, and the mom is an amazing lady, so I'm very excited to be walking towards her in the mornings

Anyway,
Adriana, yes, we homeschool. I started a support group where we live back in 2000, and it has grown to over 200 families, it really is amazing. We have weekly park days, monthly kid's book clubs (3 age categories) geography & science days, field trips, group camping trips, family nights - we spend more time out doing stuff then we would ever have time for with traditional schooling. I couldn't imagine ever doing it any other way

Several years ago (did I mention this is going to be a long rambling post?), anyway, several years ago, after reading _The Red Tent_, I realized that what was missing from my life was a group of women who I respected and spent time with. I started the mom's book club we have today in order to create what I was missing. That female commradrie. There are 6 of us who are very close, my husband nick named us The Graces after watching us all dance to Dave Mathews one night in honour of the Three Graces times two

So collectively, we're the Graces and between the 6 families, there are 25 of us who regularly do things. It has brought so much richness into my life. I have no family to speak of and Bob's side only really has his mom - so this extended family is very important to me.

It's like having 5 sisters - it's not all perfect, we go camping and some will be grumbling at me because I'm not doing what they think is my fair share of the dishes, but you know, if we didn't have the opportunity to grumble and vent, it wouldn't feel like home

Anyway, I better stop before I take up an entire page with just one response!

Thanks to all of you for stopping in and reading, the motivation I get here is AMAZING to me!!

oh. my. god.

a dave matthews radio.

seriously...thank you. there are no words.

have you gone here: http://www.dmbalmanac.com
its amazing. all the lyrics (alternate ones also) and all the info on their tour and what songs are played, etc. so so so amazing, especially for people like me who are obsessed with when he improvs lyrics at diff live concerts.

i'm listening to the dmb radio right now..its playing The Stone which is amazing..its the live version. somethings wrong with my windows media player though and it won't show me what song is playing which is a bummer

i read about your husband! i agree with everyone else..he probably doesnt know what to say about your weight. i think he's just treading softly because he prob knows that weight/body image is a huge iffy subject for us women. besides, you are TOO CUTE with your margs and girlfriends! what a cool mom, seriously. congrats on a 1200 cal day! i'm super jealous of your control

as for smoothies, i just follow the directions on the dannon yogurt tub, but i add a scoop of protein which makes it a little thicker, as does using banana as your fruit. try that out?

Hey M2M! Just stopping by to check in on you. You are doing awesome!

The Graces sounds like so much fun! I wish I could do something like that too. We don't live near any of our family and most of them we wouldn't want to be around anyway.

Hi Summer - that is a great site! I too listen to every version, from every concert I can get my hands on - I've got another site I'll get for you soon that a friend sent me. I can't get it to work on my archaic computer, but you might, it's supposed to be AMAZING at getting concert recordings/videos? (not sure since I can't SEEEEE it) Did I tell you one of my friends went on the Dave Mathews & Friends Cruise in February.

It was wonderful to live vicariously through her!

Oh I love that band/MAN!
:::drool:::

As for the smoothie, I'll add the banana with my frozen raspberries tomorrow!

HH, it was *really* important to me to create a circle of women friends. My mom died when she was 48, her sisters were all 14-19 years older then she was, and not around in my youth, so I never had that. I also never had many girlfriends growing up - I played with the boys, so it wasn't until after I had my daughter that I really came to appreciate myself and women and *needed* to have that bond.

As for my daily intake today:
Totals 1154

I input everything at fitday.com and I won't do the complete breakdown tonight, but I have eaten all day and I still can't believe I didn't top 1200!

The short of it:
Breakfast
1/2 smoothie (daughter got the rest)

Lunch
Grilled cheese with tomato (used PAM, lowfat cheese, life is good)

Dinner
Homemade Cheeseburger (lettuce, 1/2 avocado, peppercinis, pickles, 2 tsp 1000 Island Dressing)
1/2 baked beans

Snacks
Smart Pop Popcorn
1/2 cucumber
Beef Jerky

Looking at this reminds me I didn't add the peppercinis or pickles to the fitday.com total, but I don't think that would bring me to 1200!

I've been eating all day LOL!

You got a lot of eating in for so little calories. That's really good. I blew a lot of calories on nuts today, but I really, really wanted them. I kind of regreted it later as I wanted to eat more and thought best not to. Let me know when you master that smoothie.

Thanks for all the DMB links, Ladies.

I love the pics! Thanks for sharing. It's great to have friends that are like family isn't it? I don't know what I would do without my friends. The pictures of the coast made me home-sick. I lived in Northern CA for 20 years. I really miss it.

Hi Pineola,
Yeah, I couldn't believe how much I ate for comparatively little calories. I had to tink with the portions on fitday.com to get the calories to correspond with the whatever I had the exact amount off a label in my hand for but geesh, it FELT like a lot of food!

And, I got my 2 mile walk in (it's still taking 20 minutes a mile, but I'll get better)

Calories burned:
446

Hey!
If you only knew how so ridiculously lazy I can be you wouldn't think twice.
You are doing wonderful. I need to learn how to cook like you and I should be doing much better.

You're leading me, huh? Okay, you've got me motivated now!