Put down that Poptart!

The decision has been made. I made it while in the shower last night. The shower is where I get a lot of my thinking done. It might be an odd place for thinking but my bathroom is the one place that the kids leave me alone. I have never told them that it was off limits but, for some reason, the kids respect my bathroom time. With that in mind I have a little stool in there, (no pun intended) and I keep my iPad and magazines there. I will sometimes sneak up and sit and read or play a game of Words with Friends if I just need a 10 minute break. No one has ever questioned it & even if I don't need my "refuge" it's comforting knowing it's there... So, anyway, while washing my hair last night, I made the decision to try a modified Atkins diet again. I did a very strict Atkins diet off and on last year. The longest stretch was for 14 weeks and during that time I lost 9 lbs. I felt that 9 lbs was not enough for such effort, so I quit. Then I gained back the 9 lbs + who knows how much more... Now I want to give it another shot. I am ready and truthfully kind of excited because once I make a decision I pride myself on putting 100% behind it. And right now that means there is a lot of behind behind it... So this morning I kicked off my Atkins effort with the breakfast of champions: . An Atkins bar and a sugar free Cinnamin Dolce Latte. Not too horrible. I can do this...





So we had a great weekend here at Irishopian. We did a tailgating party at our Homecoming game Friday night for all the German exchange students. That ended up being really fun. Sadly, they left on Saturday and we will very much miss our Pauline. She was a sweetie and both Finlay and Reece ended up very close with her. Finlay will go stay with her family in June and hopefully Reece will get to go with the group if there is an openning. For a girl who comes from a quiet, organized life in Germany, Pauline sure adapted quickly and fit right in to our chaos. She went everywhere the kids went which meant that Saturday morning she came with us to a music festival at one of our favorite churches. Finlay and Reece were "backup dancers" for Fr Mark who was the MC Hammer figure. Here are a few shots of their Hammertime dance to open the festival:
After the dance most of us got to hang out & play for a bit. Then it was time to take Pauline to the airport pickup and time to get ready for the Homecoming dance and for my 25th class reunion. One thing about celebrating 25 years of graduation from high school, at least for me, is that you don't have anything to prove. It's quite liberating. I have always liked my graduating class and a lot of us have connected on facebook so we have forged new/deeper friendships these past few years. But there is always that history with a few people that used to be "issues". Well, now at 25 years, there are no more issues for me. You don't like me? Fine, don't like me. It's all good, we are all equals, we have all battled, struggled, failed, succeed, loved, lost and hopefully loved again. I am sure that we have all been through quite a lot in our 25 years and one thing it's taught me is to just be happy that those of us who are still here are just that, still here. We lost a dear, sweet friend this past summer to cancer - she was 42. Too young to go. But more and more I think the rest of us realize that every day we have, especially every healthy, happy day is a true gift. So, sermon over, it was a good night. I enjoyed seeing my former classmates and hope to see even more of them at our 30th. And who knows, if I stick to this new plan maybe I will even be a size 6 then...