end of year

When I woke up this morning I immediately felt relieved. I can have fruit again. I don't have to eat sugar, but I can if I want to.

Since writing my last post one month ago, I have had to eliminate all dairy from my diet. Anything derived from milk, including butter and cheese, I can't eat anymore. That combined with the gluten free, fruit-free, sweetener-free, dessert-free has been tedious to say the least and quite stressful and overwhelming.

In my last post I said this year has been a failure, and that has not changed with avoiding fruit this past month. I had too many other limits on my diet to be able to appreciate what I was doing, and I have been concerned more for my health this year than any other in my life, even without the sugar. So being worried in general did not help.

I began this year being inspired by my friend Melissa, who dropped refined sugar and then subsequently dropped something like 55 pounds, most of it in the first few months. I did not expect that to happen, and it has not. I did lose 20 pounds,but that was the result of several periods where I counted calories (30 more to go!). Quitting sugar did stop me from gaining weight, however, and it was one less thing to worry about during reduced calorie periods.

Fruit-free has made a little bit of difference in terms of cravings, making them a little less. But going fruit-free after 11 months of sugar free was not the best planning, since I'd already used up most of my enthusiasm. It would have worked much better to do fruit-free/sugar-free/dessert-free from the start, and have it last a much shorter time, like 6-8 weeks. (I like this book, I Quit Sugar, that outlines a program like that).  I will probably do that program in the future, after I have figured out some of my other health issues.

I hoped to be able to say that I didn't care about sugar anymore, but I do still care. I learned that to me, unrefined sugars like honey and maple syrup are just as bad as regular sugar. And I know now I need to limit fruit intake to 2 servings a day, since more has negative effects on me.

Would I do it again? No. Would I recommend it to others? I don't know. I did learn a lot this year. I think going without added sugar for a few months would help any person struggling with their relationship to sugar.

My new mantra going forward is not to avoid any types of sweeteners, but rather to eat treats only after dinner.

the end.

1 month to go

I have about one month left of my sugar free year. So far, the experiment is a failure. I have not lost my cravings for sugar at all, even with avoiding dessert the last 5 months (including over thanksgiving and christmas--which was brutal). Some people do well with honey instead of sugar, but for me it seems to make no difference at all. I always craved sugar, even when I had not had it in months.

And so I will do one last attempt before the year is up. I will continue to cut out all sweet things (which I did for 5 months except for one week in there I had unrefined sweetened treats again), but now will no longer eat fruit. I know I get sugar cravings when I eat more fruit, so I'm interested to see what happens without it. I eat enough vegetables that I am not concerned with any loss of nutrients.

I may extend the year a few weeks so that I give fruit-free a good run.

random stuff

Ila peed in David's shoe a couple weeks back. I know I should be upset or something but it is the best place she could have peed, seriously. Like the proverbial dog:) It was hilarious!

Clyde is 1 now. I sorta skipped posting that. In fact, tomorrow he is 13 months. He has finally started to feed himself a little bit, which is great since it makes things easier for me. He still pick up bites I put on his tray, but if it is something really tempting and I put it into his hand, then he'll eat that. And he can drink from a sippy cup now, and can hold his bottle! He would not have anything to do with either until a couple weeks ago. I finally bought a new sippy for him to try and it helped a lot.

Ila sings or talks all the time. She has long convoluted sentences with multiple clauses and has a large vocabulary. I'm thinking of trying to teach her to read in a home schooling format soon. She already knows all the letters and sounds, so maybe she could do it. David supposedly started reading at age 3, so maybe Ila will too.

6 months later

Today is 6 months exactly since I first started no refined sugar. I have changed the commitment from no refined sugar to be no treats or treatoids.  I haven't lost any weight, but I did discover that I have fructose malabsorption (thus honey is a bad sweetener choice for me) and that I don't think the Costco brand of maple syrup is worth eating (or buying) compared to other brands I've tried. I think my lack of weight loss was because I was just replacing regular treats with honey sweetened ones. Which is really not helpful. So the end of that. I think I will be ok with still eating dark chocolate, so long as it is 85% or more. That stuff is not a big temptation for me. Also, naturally occurring sugars in carob and whole fruit I think are fine. But not fruit juice.

the end.

Things of note

I was running last saturday. Out of nowhere a 60 year old woman comes jogging up to me and starts running with me and talking. "You were my inspiration this morning," she says. She goes on to say how when she saw me running so slowly, she knew she could do that. She gets frustrated with running and getting tired too fast, but at my pace, she could go for a long time.
Well. I am glad to have inspired a 60 year old woman with my slowness. Though I had not thought to inspire anyone by running slower than my husband walks...I am glad I did:)

Clyde is happy again. He was sad for a while. He has 7 teeth now and is 10 months.

My 3rd half marathon is coming up on saturday. This one looks to be the worst time ever, considering I didn't run for 2 months and just started again last week. I don't really care though. I'll just stay ahead of the SAG wagon. (The wagon that picks you up if you are below 16 min/mile pace.) I will try not to SAG. The run last saturday (where I inspired the lady) was only 6 miles. And it is my longest run in 2 years. So we'll just see about 13 miles on saturday.

Also. Four months after moving into our (purchased) house, our rental contract is finally over at our old place. I am SO glad to be done with mean landlords and subletting. Hopefully never again.

There were more things of note but I have forgotten them. Alas.

----
Update: I did finish the race ahead of the SAG wagon. 3h 15m total. Not bad for hardly any training and walking half the race! Also. Clyde is 11 months now and has 8 teeth:)

relentless

After a recent discussion with friends, I decided to give up something for lent this year. I'm scrapping added sweeteners, refined or not, from my diet. I'm shooting for 10 grams or less each day of added sugars. (This includes fruit juice. Whole fruit is ok.) After lent I'll allow unrefined natural sweeteners to some degree, but I am going to continue to avoid refined sugar for a year, staying below the 5 or 10 gram/day mark. (I'm still working out what is feasible without making everything from scratch.) I'm hoping that during that time I will totally lose my desire to eat it so that when the year is done, I won't suddenly rush out and buy a bunch of treats, and will instead want to continue avoiding it.

I know this is sort of drastic, but smaller measures don't seem to work on me and I'm tired of the ill effects on my health and well being. It's all or nothing, and I choose nothing.

For the record, lent began on 3/5/2014. Wish me luck.

song

Sometimes I just get really enamored of a song. My latest is Leon Redbone's My Walkin Stick.

Hope you like it.

a visit to work

Ila and I surprised David earlier this week by showing up at his work. I haven't been to his office since before school started last year, like 1.5 years ago. 

It was a cold, windy evening. Ila and I (let me pause and say, it is weird to use this phrase "Ila and I" all the time. It's like a tongue twister) tried to get to David's building walking via stroller. I had to look up where his building was on a map. I somehow managed to come to a dead end (for strollers) as I chose the path that ended in stairs. So we went another way and finally made it.

Ila wore her R2D2 hat, which rocks. David didn't seemed surprised at all, which is weird, since I haven't been there forever! And I've never seen it with actual stuff in it. I last saw it when it was empty.

Look at the scrawl on the white board. He must not have been faking it all this time, I guess he's an econ professor after all.

Ila pushed a few keyboard buttons, but hopefully didn't mess up his spreadsheet.

The end.

shoes

Today, Ila and I we went to the store, one I've never shopped at before. Though I did go there a couple weeks ago to pick up santa suits for the run. (By the way, those suits were in tatters by the end of the race! Mine tore along the inseam before we even got in the car to drive to the race and had to be safety pinned.)

We lost Ila's shoes. If I'd been paying attention and not talking on the phone, I would have noticed Ila pulling off her shoes and dropping them in the middle of isle 3 (the one with the chocolate oranges, which are very important. Did you know that I had already checked 2 stores and they weren't there? I thought everyone had them...but no.)

Sadness followed, and a hasty goodbye to phone friend.

Then I ran back (with the cart) to where I suspected she had lost them. I looked everywhere we had gone, and finally made it back to isle 3 where I'd first discovered them missing. If I had only turned around and looked behind me, I would have seen them on the floor at the other end of the isle. But instead I got to run circles around the store. Oh well. At least I found them. They are Ila's only pair of shoes, after all. Though they are more "bootie"-like. I'm postponing buying real shoes until she starts walking.

By the way, David's least favorite christmas song is the one about the shoes. You know. The shoe song. Just so you know.

Cookie of Shame

David has eaten the Cookie of Shame. 

Go Utes!

primeness birthday notes

When I was 23 I had a crush on a 29 year old. I told myself, it must be fate if we are both prime numbers. In the intervening years, I have struggled with enjoying these numbers. What is 24 compared to 23? Nothing. (Mathematically 24 is deadly dull comparatively speaking. Even the illustrious perfect square 25 or perfect number 28 does not compare to being prime.) 23 was my golden age after all, as they say. You know, born on the 23rd and turning 23 makes for a golden year. But before the year was even halfway over, I'd switched targets. To DH. yep. I got him good. Woot.

Now I'm 29 and though I dance a jig at my primeness, I can't help looking back to my last prime year of 23 and be so grateful I did switch targets. yay for me and dh!

the end.

blog stats you may or may not find interesting

So. Google keeps statistics on pageviews of my blog, at least since May 2008 (but this blog has been going since 2005). Sometimes I amuse myself by looking at these statistics. There are two posts that have consistently been the top two in number of views (at least according to data collected since 2008, mind you. No doubt there are other posts written before 2008 that are unsung.)

The # 1 hitter is a post known as tags shmags, which has 986 pageviews, an exponentially higher tally than most blog pages of mine. (and when I say exponential, I mean exponential. Not just lots. Nope. Hope you enjoyed this aside DH.) Now why is this page so highly read when most other pages have less than 50 hits? Are people searching for "tags shmags" all the time? Shmags was a word I made up on the spot. But it could just as easily be spelled schmags. So you see the popularity of this page is an unexplained phenomenon. Though I must say it is one of my finer posts. Maybe. Perhaps I should ponder that a bit longer. Maybe I should do a post about my favorite posts. Hmm.

And the # 2 hitter (with 311 pageviews) is my Event Horizon post about the Hadron Collider news report. This post is not even very interesting. You might even say it is completely uninteresting, especially considering it is four years old. But the picture is nice. Maybe that's the draw.

1-ply

Who invented 1-ply? Does anybody actually like it?

David has unfortunately come home from the store with TWELVE rolls of 1-ply toilet paper. I'm thinking of leaving some surreptitiously at friends houses.

Happy Birthday David!

David is 31 today. There are many reasons why I love him. Here is one of them.

Buttered Scones for Tea

David has certain songs he likes to sing over and over again. Here are some of the latest:

I'm a Lumberjack

If it doesn't have a tail its not a monkey

Friday

this post

So clearly I have not been blogging. In the 3-4 or so hours in the day when Ila is sleeping, I am either sleeping, exercising, showering, reading, working, and even occasionally cleaning and cooking (though very rare). I probably clean as much as I used to. Which is hardly anything. The dishes when mandatory, the bathroom when mandatory. My cooking now consists of buying ready food or making semi-homemade things. Or nothing. I often do nothing. How do mothers cook and clean with a baby? I may never know.

I have been posting pictures of Ila on facebook once a month. Nothing much on the blog though. But here is a token cute picture:

Am I supposed to be blogging more about baby? I never wrote about babies before. I don't feel inclined to share her poop schedule though. I know some of you may be disappointed.

I am still training for a half marathon in June. Next week is mile 8. I do my long run on the weekends alone, and do short runs with Ila in the running stroller on weekdays. This races motto: I may run slow, but at least I am doing it.

newsletter

I posted our family newsletter on my facebook wall on Feb 9. Take a look if you haven't seen it! It is not quite a christmas newsletter, but I have every excuse in the world for the delay:)

the end.

costco

So it happened. I gave in and bought a costco membership. Mainly because of the tiny human. I never joined in my Stanford days, when a lot of "roommates" would split a membership. Before last saturday, I had been inside of Costco only twice.

The first visit was 4 years ago to return wedding presents that we couldn't fit into my car for the drive from Utah to California. However, this visit got me no further than the returns desk at the front of the store. Resulting from this visit I became the proud owner of a "cash card," which I realized was code for gift certificate. The second visit was to spend what was on the cash card. I used it to purchase things for my wedding open house in California. Two things remained in my memory from that visit: 1) giant container of frozen cream puffs & 2) huge tray of shrimp, neither of which I purchased.

And so last Saturday was technically my third time inside Costco, but really only the second time I purchased anything, and in reality the first visit as a real member. And alas I saw neither cream puffs nor shrimp. But I wasn't really looking.

To my surprise I discovered there is no such thing as costco grocery bags. Instead they give you a huge apple packing box that miraculously fits in the cart, and even more miraculously, in my trunk. Which we filled to maximum capacity. And naturally we didn't leave without spending hundreds of dollars.

Reija's Rapunzelness and pink-like things

I was struck recently by the parallelism between two photos.

In this shot, I am wearing Reija's hair. I look quite dashing. It seems Rapunzel-like to me the way I am using her hair.

And here is little Ila wearing the baby blanket Reija made. Which is very long and Rapunzel-like.

Both blanket and hair come from Reija, and both are long and pink-like. (Pink-like indicating that Reija'a hair is actually red, not pink, and is only pink-like for the purpose of this paragraph.)

And in the spirit of pink hair (which Reija does NOT have), here are some pictures from David's 26th birthday party that I threw for him while we were dating:

Which of David's hats do you like best?

And of course I must include Karren's scandalous moment with pink hair and a bottle of (root?) beer:

Presidential Cabinets

David has some issues with our kitchen. It has more than twice the amount of cabinets and drawers that our kitchen in Palo Alto had.  He claims not to understand when I tell him where something goes. If I say "it goes in the left corner cabinet" he things there are just TOO many cabinets where that description could apply. 

So one day he takes some of my post-it notes and labels each and every cabinet and drawer in order of the US presidents. Starting with Washington.  He calls them the Presidential Cabinets. David is enamored with puns. (obviously).  

These new labels have their own difficulties. First of all, I don't remember which president goes with which cabinet. And the labels are too small so I have to lean forward and squint (since I never wear glasses in the kitchen).

Clearly our camera is not good at closeups. But if you squint you can sort of read the labels.

The "Grant" cabinet

The "Johnson" cabinet

etc, etc. There are 20 cabinets/drawers total, labeled in sequential order going from left to right around the kitchen. Just FYI, silverware is in Madison.