Hi all

Been very busy with party prep and a few other distractions but couldn’t not pop in and wish Neil a happy birthday and good luck for the ride. I’ll try and catch up next week when everything should be more normal. Also Intesha, another October birthday, hope you had a good day. I haven’t even been lurking so I hope all is well with all of you. Did see a peep from Thin, glad she hasn’t forgotten us.

Ooh Klondi, so pleased to see your post, and thanks for the reminder of Inteshas birthday! The week has flashed by.
Was your party prep for the family party catering to a diverstiy of eating needs?

I meant to say re the warrigal greens, you can keep them in the pot and let it flower and seed in summer, they are meant to be very easy to grow from seed. Or if you decide to get it out of the pot and plant it in the garden, I do hope it growns well. They do grown big when they are happy. One plant is plenty for me. If it dies and you would like to try again, let me know and I will gather seeds or try a cutting.

Intesha I had it in my mind to ask after your stomach pains when I was commenting on LJoyce’s stomach pains (Oh my deficient brain!). Is the pain gone? I hope you are feeling beautifully ready for your birthday.

We’ll change of plans. I burst a tyre 38 kilometres into my ride and I had to walk the last 6 kilometres with my bike to the camping ground that I’m staying at. The place that used to do repairs has closed down and I don’t have the gear to fix it, so tomorrow I’m going to literally walk a marathon to get back to my car, I’ll drive back to the camping ground, stay tomorrow night and then on Monday I’ll head back home as planned. I can’t believe how fit I am though. It only took me an hour and a half to bike the 38 kms before I got my puncture and then another hour to walk the last 6 kms with my bike and I’ve still got plenty of energy left.

It’ll likely be an 8 hour+ walk tomorrow to cover the 43-44 kilometres back to Lawrence

Good evening everyone!

Well, as expected, I ate more today, having happily weighed and measured this morning. Unfortunately, the measurements haven’t caught up with the recent decrease in weight yet, but I know they will. Just need patience and to persevere. Slightly over my current TDEE, but will ensure I’m under it tomorrow, and back to CDs on Monday. Around 1960 cals today, which is 300 cals over my current TDEE.

Great, LJoyce, to see you maintaining your accountability – you’ll note that I’m just writing down my calorie intake here, but it’s still a form of accountability.

Klondikekween, hope the party goes off well, and everyone finds something they can not only eat, but enjoy.

Cinque, yes I agree with you re bread. My local Coles store has stopped stocking rye/sourdough lunch rolls and instead are promoting the Yves(?) Laurent ones instead – decided to weigh the one I got out of the freezer to eat – 150 gms, which is about 360 calories. Eek! The normal ones I’d been buying were only about 100 gms. So, I’ve 2 more to eat, and any time I eat one, that and filling will have to be about nearly all that I eat in a day. If I buy them again, I’ll cut them in half and freeze the halves. I have to buy the rye/sourdough ones; with the plain sourdough ones, I get a dizzy “off” reaction about 2 hours after eating one, which doesn’t happen if there’s rye as well.

Happy birthday to all the birthday gals and guys celebrating around this time.

Neilithicman, what a disaster of a bike ride. Hope you make it back to your car okay tomorrow. More to the point, will you be able to watch the rugby?? 🙂

Enjoy the weekend!

Good morning all, a quick post to say hi and HAPPY BIRTHDAY to Neil and Intesha. How are you feeling now Intesha? I hope the tummy pains have gone away

Working today (from home) but it is all going well. The Blunder Of The Century is long behind me and I received so much support from all kinds of places I decided to just let it go. Did I mention that in having to do a retest we found two other issues (from other teams) that we wouldn’t have found otherwise that would have caused a lot of disruption? Silver lining indeed

I was very thankful to be able to WFH on Friday as it was so hot. Also, Mr Anzac had a big cricket lunch with his old club in town and so I was able to keep Maxx indoors with the air-con. He (Mr Anzac) hardly ever goes out so I was glad he could have a nice day with his old friends.

Not eating badly but also not that well so am still maintaining around the low 83’s. Next week we go into full business support which involves my team sitting in a meeting room waiting for cries of help from the users. This is a good thing when trying to stay low calorie as you have more accountability when sitting with others. If that makes sense? They all know I’m trying to lose weight

Bad luck about the puncture Neil. I’m sure you are as upset as Mr Anzac about the Rugby results

Sorry to hear about your horrible gastro LJ, glad it was short lived.

Besty, you sound like you are doing really well and I will take lots of inspiration from you. 5 weeks today until F day (flying day) and I still want to be in the 70’s.

Good luck with your FD today Cinque, not that you need it. I’m with you about bread; if I overdo it I really feel BLERGH and bloated.

Quacka, whoo hoo for your B2B2B and losses. I too sleep better after a wine or two and I don’t know that it is such a bad thing. So long as it isn’t a wine or twenty of course.

Hi Klondi, lovely to hear from you

Ok back to work. Hubby is cleaning the pool so I am looking forward to a swim later. It’s only going to be 23 today after being 32 yesterday and 36 on Friday.

Anzac, there always silver linings I find. I’m glad this phase of the project is over for you in a way that has resolved itself rather well. If you are shut into a room next week, just make sure you take your bag of suitable foods with you to get you through.

Betsy, I occasionally buy those Laurent sourdough rolls – mine usually weight 140g, which is why I try to eat only half. Yesterday I invited a friend for lunch so it easy to limit myself to half. Best to cut them before freezing I find.

Cinque, I’m joining you in a FD today.

Neil thinking of your long trek today. Please let us know that you safely made it back to your car after that all day walk.

As to the rugby, commiserations Neil and Mr Anzac and congratulations Penguin.

Near the end of the week I struggled a bit with the 1000cal target, although it was ok while the days were hot. This week has the same roller coaster weather forecast, with a 19-20C weekend, steadily rising to very high 30s by Thursday before sharply dropping to 19-20C again. So this week I’m setting a NFD target range of 1200-1400cals (just under my TDEE) and I expect that to be easier on the hot days. The next couple of weekends present social food challenges with a supper, a concert-picnic and a birthday meal, so I’m going to have to be particularly careful through the week.

Have a nice Sunday all.

This is going to be a short one because we’re one of the hundreds of thousands of people without power because of the fire danger. There is no wind here yet but it is dry and we’re probably on the same grid with people far away that are experiencing wind. There’s a huge fire up northeast of where we are, near Geyserville and over 50,000 people have been evacuated. We are far enough away that we don’t have any smoke here. From what we hear we may be without electricity for 2 or 3 days. Luckily we bought a generator last week which is big enough to power a few things, mainly a space heater in the bird’s room.

Happy Birthday to Neil and Intesha! Hope you had a happy day.

We’re having the two upstairs bathrooms remodeled next month and we’re getting down to the wire for selecting tile and a tub. That’s one of the reasons I have been absent from here for a few days. I’ll have catch up soon.

Hope everyone is having a wonderful day!

Cali, that sounds completely terrifying for the poor people who have been evacuated and may lose their homes.

I hope you are safe and the electricity comes on again soon

Neil – glad you were rescued!

Thanks LJ yes, there can always be a silver lining found if you look hard enough. This weather is crazy isn’t it? A friend in Melbourne said they woke up on Friday and it was already 28 degrees but then yesterday when they woke up it was only 8. Madness. Let’s both have really mindful days during the week as I also have some social events coming up so I need to put some low calorie days ‘in the bank’.

Enjoy the rest of your Sunday all

Hi everyone, hope you’re doing well. My CD today was around 1200 cals, and pleasingly, the scales were the same today as yesterday despite the over TDEE day I had then. Plus, the measurements have dropped slightly by today, as well, All positive news. The other good news is that I finally bit the bullet and contacted a lot of the folk who had volunteered to be interviewed, and now have 12 folk lined up for interviews in the next 15 days. That, plus the 8 done already will bring me to 20, which is the minimum number I wanted. An extra 5 would be nice, but not essential.

Neilithicman, so glad the biking/walking problem got sorted out in a way that meant you still had an opportunity to do some good riding, even if not on your own bike. My commiserations on the rugby result.

Anzac65, isn’t it great how sometimes good can come out of what seems to be disaster. Being able to find those other 2 problems before start-up is going to save such a lot of hassle. Hope the next couple of days go relatively smoothly, and with good food control.

LJoyce, yeah, I’d not realised how much the Laurent rolls weighted until I had to weight one for my calorie counting and was shocked. The ones currently int he freezer will have to be thawed as they are, but hereafter, I’ll cut them in two before freezing. Glad you had a good FD today, and hope the infusion goes well for you tomorrow.

CalifDreamer, pleased to hear from you and to know that you’re all right, though sorry that you’ll have a couple more days without electricity. Hope the fires continue to stay away from you. Glad you didn’t have to face evacuation. Do you have a “fire ready” plan anyway, and all your important documents, etc., ready to be grabbed if you do have to move out? That’s something that gets emphasised here late spring each year.

Cinque, yay for a good FD.

Sleep well.

Good morning, quick post from the ‘war room’ here at work. It is eerily quiet but I guess still early.

Thanks LJ, yesterday went remarkably well for the project. I only had a small part to play and my part went splendidly. We are now on full time support for the business users.

I have all my wintery clothes ready for the trip but yesterday turned my attention to the final week where we will be in the Seychelles and therefore needing summer clothes. Well. I live in 3/4 pants in the summer but every pair is too big! Not even a little bit big but waaaaaaay too big! I do have some shorts that fit as I bought some smaller sizes at the end of last summer when Target had a big sale. But, dear me, I now need to go shopping for some pants. I hope I can find some cheap ones because I intend for those to be too big a few months

Glad you are enjoying your DAFD brekkie Cinque, I agree there is nothing better. My next FD is tomorrow

Oops, I hear someone asking some questions. Must go

Good afternoon everyone

Anzac, but clothing is a good issue. You could try to find some second hand clothing – if you only need this size for one season it’s the most economical option.

Neil, I’m all admiration for your efforts. It shows you just how fit your months of dieting and exercise have made you. Well done, I hope you really enjoyed it.

Betsy, you really are on a roll with your CDs. I hope we can both manage that this week too.
I hope those interviews go well. You may find that people you interview may be able to recommend someone else who would be a good interview subject if you want to increase your numbers. This is a very flawed sampling method, but if you are using the interviews just as qualitative data, it would not matter. From the work you have described previously, it sounds like you have already done the quantitative data collection and analysis. I always think of the qualitative data as adding personality, personal experience and heart to a research project. It reminds that that the quantitative data we analysed is about real people and their personal experience matters.

I just turned a 1kg tub of plain Jalna greek yoghurt (my favourite) into raspberry yoghurt. I thawed and mashed 3/4 packet of frozen raspberries with a few fresh strawberries, added stevia, a little maple syrup and vanilla essence and then mixed it well into the yoghurt. The result is far nicer than any fruit yoghurt I can buy and contains real fruit and a fraction of the sugar. I also do the same thing with frozen blueberries or fresh/frozen passionfruit. I might give peaches a go in the summer – perhaps mixed with passionfruit. I find with commercially flavoured yoghurts they either have low fat and loads of sugar, or full fat and loads of sugar or artificial sweetener and low fat. I can’t get a full fat yoghurt with stevia, so I realised I’d just have to make my own. As it blows the flavour of the commercial ones out of the water, I’ve kept doing it.

The nurse was meant to come at 1pm, but she switched that to 5pm so I’m changing my afternoon plans. I’ll do some cooking.

FD went well, but I’m feeling rather hungry today and I’m trying to talk myself out of snacks.

Here’s a few pics from my trip

https://www.flickr.com/photos/43493775@N06/48972469606/in/album-72157709225372313/
https://www.flickr.com/photos/43493775@N06/48972470066/in/album-72157709225372313/
https://www.flickr.com/photos/43493775@N06/48972643752/in/album-72157709225372313/
https://www.flickr.com/photos/43493775@N06/48971917283/in/album-72157709225372313/
https://www.flickr.com/photos/43493775@N06/48971917648/in/album-72157709225372313/
https://www.flickr.com/photos/43493775@N06/48972642627/in/album-72157709225372313/

Good morning SHs from the NH,

Yes I DID read your reply thank you Cinque, as well as Anzac’s lovely message, Neil’s, LJ’s, Lindsay’s. Hi Betsy, Quacka, Klond, PerthGirl, and who have I missed?

Cinque, too much of anything isn’t good for you, otherwise it wouldn’t be ‘too much’. I continue to keep my bread consumption to nil unless I’m only having soup and then I allow myself a small portion if it’s very good bread. I read before that you were feeling tired, I hope that was a one-off from baby-sitting and not an on-going product of your illness.

My FDs seem to have moved to Mondays for the first time ever. Mondays always seemed a droll enough day as they were without adding a FD. But, now that I’ve lost track of the days of the week, it doesn’t really matter. OH has discovered pub Sunday lunches so Sundays are no longer an option. Total blowout yesterday, or should I say ‘feast day’ before today’s famine.

I weigh 58kg on my veretta travel scales which equals 57kg on my scales left in Perth. Happy with that but can’t let my guard down. There were two ‘Hairy Dieters’ books left on the boat and I found some suitable recipes that we can both eat on my FDs. I’ve trained myself to go all day without eating on FDs (I miss my cauliflower soup) but I have also added two frothy coffees. It seems to be going fine but I am concerned by the number of pub meals! Surely not sustainable.

Anzac, well done with your pants being too big. Trip to the op shop to drop them off? There are so many charity shops in all the towns here, some have beautifully presented items. Not long until your trip now.

Intesha, thank you for your email before I left Perth. I’m sorry that I don’t have a good enough connection to reply individually. I am writing all this elsewhere and then waiting for a connection to post. Happy belated Birthday to those celebrating.

CalifD, sorry about the power outage, OH was telling me about it. Now that we are living in a marina near a village with one Co-op (like an IGA 30 years ago), 3 pubs and a PO, I am seeing the value of Amazon! Often think of you as I browse. Having expended all that effort in downsizing though, OH and I decided that we require two signatures for any future purchases, ha ha! I love my minimalist life owning only what I actually need.

The weather is cold by Oz standards but it’s surprising how warm a 12C sunny day can feel here. We manage a good walk every day through soggy fields, over stiles and between hedge rows. We pass healthy, content looking cows and herds of skittish deer. Our boat is toasty warm and we are very comfortable. Prism windows in the roof make it very light even on an overcast day; I am often trying to turn off lights that aren’t actually on. We have now ventured out into the canal all by ourselves, OH managed to turn the 57′ beast around and I steered through a narrow tunnel without hitting anything – so we are learning. It’s like steering a log. We have to pinch ourselves to remember that, when we get too cold, Spain is now £25 and 2 hours away, not $1500 and 23 hours!

That’s it from me, there’s so much to do so I am trying to spend mimimal time on the internet. Thank you for letting me post in the wrong hemisphere. And all the very best to all of you.

Hi all,

Nice to hear from you Thin. My OH managed to hit the canal wall and take out a tyre bumper the first time he turned our 57′ rental boat around, and I fell into the canal trying “pole off” a muddy bank, so well done on your first outing.

Neil, congratulations on achieving your goal (albeit the hard way) on the weekend! If I can offer two words of advice for cycle ‘touring’ it would be Schwalbe Marathons. In about 8000 km of cycle touring in Europe we have never punctured an inner tube. We have them on 6 of our bikes and Schwalbe Marathon Plus on our two mountain bikes.

Best wishes all

PG

Wow! Weighed in this morning and I am now under goal weight!!!! I weighed myself before I left for my trip and I was 90.8 kilos, this morning I tipped the scales at just 88.8 kilos! That’s the best birthday present I could give myself.

Great to see Thin back on the thread again, looks like you’re having plenty of adventures on your barge life.

Perth girl, It was more than a puncture, I managed to hit the top of a rusty Waratah that was sticking out of the ground for some reason, I’m not sure any inner tube would have coped with it 😉

Betsy, yay for moving in the right direction!

LJoyce – yes that is Pinders Pond, I used to spend many hours swimming in there when I was picking fruit in central in my teens. It’s actually an old gold mining pit that filled in when they abandoned it in the late 1800s. It’s probably a bit chilly for swimming at this time of year though.

Have a great day everyone, and I’m definitely going to be enjoying my celebration sausage roll today. 😁

Good morning – another sunny day 26 degrees in Sydney

Thin! Hello!!! (some welcoming exclamation marks tee hee). So lovely to hear from you and what an adventure you are having. I do wish we had more time in the UK so I could track you down and meet you; but sadly we only have a few days in London to catch up with my nephew and also some of the lovely people on the little Labrador forum I am on. I am very excited about that because, just like here, they have become like family

Neil, yikes – you will have caught up to me soon! That is an incredible result. I suddenly have a hankering for a sausage roll, but not today as it is a FD. I couldn’t open your photos as my work laptop blocks it but I’ll have a look either on my phone later or at home

Yesterday’s first day of live production went really well. A few glitches but considering it has been a 3 year lead up we were all amazed. We had very senior management wandering round the floor as this project has a very high visibility both at board level and with the regulators. I was home by 6.45pm last night whereas the last big implementation in 2014 I didn’t make it home for 3 days. Hubby had to bring clothes into work and we all slept under desks. I did 16-17 hour days for 6 weeks and it nearly did us all in. It was the most stressful thing I’ve ever experienced. Never. Ever. Again. At the end of it we did a trip to Sri Lanka and hubby said he put a pale, trembling wife on the plane and came home with a normal one (ha ha). Our first 3 days were at a tiny place where you live in your own hut (open sided) next to a lake and the only people you see are the owners who bring you food and water. We had Christmas Day there, just the two of us and a few curious dogs and it was the most healing thing ever.

Intesha, thank you for your lovely words and I’m glad you are back in the swing of things and heading back in the 60’s. You are inspiring me to forge ahead and get into the 70’s for the trip. You also sound a bit more positive and I’m so happy to ‘hear’ this.

Enjoy your pub lunch today LJ, I’m sure you will find something healthy. There is a large Op shop not far from me so I am going to have a look on Saturday for some summer pants to take away. I figure two pairs will be enough as I will live in shorts during the day. I also need a new cozzie but I will buy that one new of course.

I bought a Huawei health band and it arrived last night. I managed to get it going and synced to my phone. I’ve wanted one for ages. It is the FitBit that you have when you don’t want to pay a lot of money for the same thing. It measures steps, heart rate, sleep and lots of other things. I mainly want to measure my steps and aim for 10,000 per day. I know it will inspire me to move more plus I want to see how many steps we do when we are away.

Hey Betsy, you are also really getting back into the swing of things. Whoo Hoo!

NNNNFD today. I’m just having my second black coffee and have had 600ml of water already. I have the usual small thai beef salad for lunch, an apple, a kiwifruit and will have chicken and vege stir fry for dinner. The scales crept up this morning but they will be smashing back down by the end of the week. I. Will. Be. In. The. 82’s.

Take care all, will check in regularly and post if I can

Good Morning everyone

Monday’s FD went well yesterday even though I was still very tired after a big weekend. It was probably around 400 calories for the day with eggs and salad for dinner. Have I mentioned how much I am liking eggs for FD’s? They really are amazing food, and tasty as well! I am having a NFD today but it is going to be very controlled. I have lunch of some more boiled eggs and salad and dinner will be steak, asparagus, mushrooms and maybe a little salad as well. I’m making the most of the Australian Asparagus season for sure.

On the weekend we drove four hours up to the Blue Mountains to spend a couple of days with my parents. We found out the week before last, that my father is not well and I have been very worried about him and Mum also. We couldn’t get up to see him until Friday because my OH’s work has been crazy busy and he is under a lot of stress with it all. So that is why I wasn’t sleeping last week. I just needed to see my parents! I actually managed to sleep on the two nights that we stayed with them (not perfect sleep but way better than none) and the last two nights at home I have also slept.
We got to spend some quality time with them on Friday before the onslaught of visitors arrived on Saturday. Mum and I spent the morning cooking which is always nice and I was glad to be there to help her with it all.

I started doing my walking early in the morning again last week as I thought it may help deal with the stress and maybe help me to sleep. I’ve been for a lovely long walk again this morning. I always feel so much better when I can get out for a walk. It’s very soothing to the soul to be up watching the mist rise over the water and the sun peeping over the top of the headland. Just beautiful.

OK enough about me.

Neil, your bike ride was definitely an adventure! I’m glad it managed to work out in the end and that you had a great time. Thanks for the photos and congratulations on your new low weight! You are proof that exercise AND diet are the key to dropping the weight. Well done.

Thin, it’s so lovely to hear from you. It sounds like you are having a great adventure too. yes, I hope the thing that fell off the front wasn’t important too! lol 😉

Anzac, yay! So good to hear the project has gone live, without too many glitches and that you didn’t have to spend 3 days at work….wth??? Good luck with your FD today, not that you will need it because I think you sound like you are in the right frame of mind. It’s great to hear that.

Intesha, lovely to hear that you had a nice birthday. I love Japanese food and I always feel full but still light after a meal at a Japanese restaurant. I’m a big fan of sashimi but I also love the Octopus balls they make, oh and the seaweed salad and, and…….I best divert my thoughts I think!

LJ, your veggie pie crust sounds really yummy. DO you put egg in the mixture or does it just manage to stick together without it? I hope you enjoy your pub meal today 🙂

Hi Penguin and PG. Good to hear from you both. Hi Betsy, Cali, Cinque and Klondi too. Also to anyone just lurking, hello!

I best go and do a bit of work. Black coffee has just been ordered so I’m looking forward to that in a few minutes. Have a really happy day everyone xx

Quakka. Our posts crossed. How nice you could get to see your parents and have that quality time together. Hope that they stay well. You are sounding as if you are very grounded and making good decisions around your health and well being. Keep it up.

As promised here are before and after pics. This was me at Christmas this year when I was around my heaviest at 131.5 kilograms

https://www.flickr.com/photos/43493775@N06/48978779676/in/album-72157709225372313/

Then this is now at 88.8 kilograms, around 43 kilos lighter

https://www.flickr.com/photos/43493775@N06/48978960037/in/album-72157709225372313/

And to prove how comfortable I am with my body now, my first ever pic without a shirt

https://www.flickr.com/photos/43493775@N06/48978221718/in/album-72157709225372313/

And then some fun with my old trousers that used to be tight on me in January

https://www.flickr.com/photos/43493775@N06/48978960167/in/album-72157709225372313/
https://www.flickr.com/photos/43493775@N06/48978960257/in/album-72157709225372313/
https://www.flickr.com/photos/43493775@N06/48978222308/in/album-72157709225372313/
https://www.flickr.com/photos/43493775@N06/48978776076/in/album-72157709225372313/

Hi everyone, just checking in.

So many posts to read. Thin, I missed your last 2 posts, especially the first one, as I think you and I must have been writing at the same time. You sound like you’re having a ball on the boat and it must be such a relief after the neighbour stress you had over the past year or so (or longer?). And to think that you and OH can buzz over to Spain for a measly 25 pounds and a 2 hour flight! Almost sounds like a day trip coming up to suss out the winter retreat. But, where will you moor your boat when away?

Good to hear from the lurking penguin. Made me think of how Albert Hitchcock always made a cameo appearance in all his films. Blink and you’d miss him. 🙂

Klondi, like you I am impressed with the LJoyce yoghurt, but you did bring up a good point – how long would it last if fruit is added? Any feedback, LJoyce? By the way, I think the turn-around has been from the calorie counting, and actually documenting what is going into my mouth.
Which brings me to a point – I’ve begun reading “The Obesity Code”, just the first couple of chapters so far, and it seems that unlike Michael Mosley with his 800 calorie 12-week start-up eating for quick results, Jason Fung is definitely opposed to it, warning of the slowing of metabolism after only a brief period of consistently reduced calories, and that such a slowdown doesn’t reverse with time. I haven’t read far enough yet, but I imagine that he favours 5:2 or 3:4, some form of intermittent fasting, while warning of low calorie diets. He tells of lots of people giving advice, some the opposite to others, and now I see him doing the same compared with Michael Mosley. I’m sure the IF part will be useful, but now? I’m a bit concerned, as a consistent lower intake is what I’m doing at the moment. Does anyone have any observations about this, please?

Neilithicman, wow and wow again at the photos. What a transformation! And what a lovely family, too.

Cinque, good that you’re feeling up to op-shop browsing, a real turn for the better.

Anzac65, enjoy your Huawei health band. I have a Fitbit, and it really helps keep me on track for my exercise and sleep.

Quakka, lovely to hear from you, and great that you had a good FD. I’m still bracing myself to get back to proper FDs, but maybe having a few boiled eggs on a FD would help??

Oh, just an extra note – 915 calories today, so almost a FD800, and the scales this morning had me 1 kg below the start of October, so really good movement in the right direction, which is why the book by Jason Fung has concerned me. Also, some not so good news – cholesterol from Monday was 6.0, so I suspect my doctor on Thursday will be pressuring me to start Lipitor, and I just don’t want to!

Great to hear from so many, hi Intesha and Perth Girl, but it’s almost pumpkin hour, and I have to be up relatively early tomorrow for another interview. Did two today, but five scheduled tomorrow will be more wearing. So, good night all.

Morning all

LJ – On the yoghurt, I think the supermarket yogurts add sugar when they cook their berry fruit to make almost a jam/conserve consistency to help it keep longer, so not ideal for home made yoghurt if you’re trying to cut down on sugar, your method sounds good. It also reminds me that I need to get out and prune my raspberry canes.

Thanks Betsy, I do have an older boy who is 13 and almost as tall as me, but because he’s a teenager he was too cool to do something lame like pose for photos with Dad.

I indulged in one slice of cake yesterday and then back on a fast day today. I’ll likely try to trim a few more kilos but I’m definitely not in a hurry. I’m going to be cutting one of my fast days and move from 4:3 to 5:2.

Have a great day everyone

Another beautiful morning in Melbourne, Wednesday.

Quacka, I am so glad you got to visit your precious parents on the weekend. It is so hard when you need to be with someone you love and are restrained. It sounds like a very big family weekend, and I’m sending good wishes to your dad.
I hope you can sleep now, a bit better every night.

Klondi, good idea re the warrigal greens. I can see little yellow flowers on mine already, and bees visiting them.
What a great celebration you had, and I guess it was good that DIL’s accident didn’t happen until after it, but oh dear, what an awful thing to happen. As if she hasn’t got enough on her plate! I am so glad you are able to help and I do hope she heals nice and quickly.

Maintenance seems a current theme here at the moment, with you and Neil working out how you want to manage it and Thin sorting out maintenance at her new normal after that busy time and all the upheaval.

I found it confusing and a bit up and down, but 5:2 is right there to get back to if needed and I have a feeling that you and Neil (and Thin, it goes without saying: years of practice) will manage it more neatly than I did, and even I only wobbled around for a bit.

Okay, I’m still wobbling, but not such wild wobbles any more.

Hmm I think I will post this and write more when I have my pot of coffee beside me.
See you soon dear ones!

Good Morning everyone

It’s Wednesday FD for me. My controlled day yesterday ended up being about 1000 calories and that was NOT due to the food I ate! Oops 😉

Betsy, I think being on a consistent very low calorie diet would probably adversely affect your metabolism but in the short term I think it would be ok. Just look at Neil! I don’t think controlled days of around 1000 calories would be considered too low but I think it’s important for our motivation and mental state to have some days where we can be a bit more free with our eating. I don’t mean gorging ourselves, but just not have to worry about staying under a certain limit. For me, the key is how many of those days I have and even how many in a row. FD’s definitely help me there.

Eggs, where do I start. I have read quite a lot about them and even considered doing the egg diet for a few days but haven’t worked myself up to that yet, mainly because 5:2 is working fine so why fix something that isn’t broken. On a FD when I start thinking about dinner and I am having eggs, I always say “ok, three eggs and salad” or whatever else we are having and then make sure I am under the calories for the day. I put two on my plate with the salad and then usually I don’t even need the third one. It’s really important to eat slowly and savour what you are eating. I’m not sure if it’s the psychological thing of knowing I can have another one if I want to, or if it’s the filling properties of the eggs, but they really work for me. Give it a go Betsy!

Neil, amazing body transformation! Loved the pics, keep up the great job you are doing!

I’m just going to chime in on the fruit in yoghurt idea. Personally, I would be very careful about doing that. Anyone remember the rockmelon problem that was making everyone sick? As Neil, said sugar is usually added to the fruit in commercial fruit yoghurt and then it is cooked to make it safe to keep in the yoghurt for an extended period. Raw fruit has all sorts of nasty stuff on the surface which sometimes even washing can not remove entirely. Then the washing itself poses another problem as there is often water clinging to the fruit even if you think you have dried it properly, and that water can breed bacteria. I would just add the fruit to the yoghurt when I was going to eat it. Not trying to sway anyone, just looking out for you all so you don’t make yourselves sick!

Cinque, thank you for the good wishes for my Dad. Unfortunately he won’t get better and so it will just be a matter of keeping him comfortable until the end. I just found out this morning that it will probably be a lot sooner than I first thought but having never experienced this before, I had no idea really. I am devastated but at the same time I am keeping myself together for now. I really wish I was closer, just so I could be there with them and also just to be there for my Mum. Anyway, we will be going up to see them again soon.

So on that sad note, I’m going to go and get some work done. I very almost gave up on my FD today but have decided to stick with it, I don’t know why really. I suppose because I don’t really know why I should give up either.

Oh, I went out for a walk this morning again and there was the most beautiful pink sky. It was changing so quickly and so many different shades of pink. Just before the sun came up there was even a shade of green in between the pink layers. My boss said there is smoke around from the bushfires in Northern NSW so I’m guessing that’s where the green came from.

I hope you have a lovely day everyone. Make the most of whatever you are doing and enjoy x

Quacka. Sorry about your dad. I hope your family can spend good time together and make some great memories.

Sorry I haven’t been posting for several days. We are a long distance from the big fires but had a planned safety power shutdown from Sat afternoon until Monday afternoon. DS’s Birthday was Monday so the celebration was simple and we’ll go out for dinner later in the week to celebrate. But she was happy to see the lights back on when she returned home from work.

I think I mentioned before that we are having 2 bathrooms renovated in a week or two. We’re still selecting tile and just ordered a smaller tub. All of that got pushed back because of the power outage.

We had to buy a generator to keep the bird room warm as the nights are cold even though the days are warm. They aren’t used to cold temps. So a for a couple nights I ended up being awake most of the night tending to the noisy generator and starting and stopping it when the temp in their room got too cold. It’s noisy, like an electric lawn mower so I try to run it as little as possible during the night so we don’t disturb the neighbors. We used a little space heater in the bird room. We were able to plug in the frig and coffee maker and electric teapot, so that was nice. Just a lot to learn about generators and keeping a couple of spare propane canisters on hand and getting them refilled to run it. We had to do an oil change after the first 5 hour break-in period so that was a challenge. Extension cords all over the place. People are very angry that the shut down something like 941,000 homes, many of which had very low wind, as a preemptive measure.

I hope everyone is going well with 5:2. I’ve been off of it for about a week with all that is going on and doing some stress eating. I plan to get back on track soon as my jeans are getting tighter!

I’ll go back and read everyone’s posts and catch up soon. Take care.