Comments (20)

By kilax, November 30, 2008 10:24 pm

Unfortunately, yes.

Unfortunately, no.

I am really embarrassed that I am bad at painting. And that I hate it so much. I mean, I am an architecture major. Shouldn’t I be good at these “home improvement” sort of things?

I just like to think this means I am better at telling people where and how to paint, than actually doing it myself. Ha!

Okay, I’m not really good at that either. I am not an Interior Designer, after all.

I really love the way the paint is turning out. We painted our bedroom a dark greenish/brownish/gray – Valspar’s Seine. We have an accent wall behind the bed that is even darker – Valspar’s Italian Leather. That is the color we painted the bathroom today – the Italian Leather. I LOVE dark rooms, so I am super excited about this.

Seine and Italian Leather. They look nothing like this in real life.

But why no photos? Because the bathroom isn’t finished, and because we have no bed (just mattress and frame) and the ugliest bedroom furniture you have ever seen. So I estimate you’ll see a photo of the bedroom in about… 6 months, and a photo of the bathroom… maybe later this week.

On Friday we hung out and spent the night with my friend Alejandra and her husband Sony in Des Moines. She is the other bridesmaid of mine that I have not seen in over a year! AHH!

Anyway, we obviously had a great time and I really, really wish we could see them more. We both do. They are a unique couple – she’s from Puerto Rico, and he is Chinese, but from Venezuela… they are fun to be around. We have a lot in common, but they have a different perspective on some things.

Yes, this has a point. They moved into a new-to-them townhome in July and I could tell they put a lot of thought and hard work into decorating it and making it homey. They were talking about the last time they saw our place and that we didn’t even have a dining room table. Ha! Steven and I have done so much work together on our home since the wedding, it really feels homey, like it is “ours” now (instead of just his). It was fun to talk about all the work we have done with them because they could relate and… I could tell they were actually listening (another reason I like them!).

It’s amazing to see your home come together. Because, unless you are rich… you can’t really afford to get everything/do everything you want all at once. But maybe I wouldn’t even prefer it that way. I like that we have made it what it is. Even if I haven’t loved every minute of it!

Comments (14)

By kilax, November 29, 2008 10:55 pm

It’s back.

That “I don’t care about me” feeling. That “I’m just going to eat whatever I want, who cares?” feeling.

I was afraid this would happen. I mentioned before that I had no idea what changed in me to make me WANT to be healthy. And not knowing what was allowing me to finally live a healthy life scared me that it wouldn’t last.

But I do know what is making me feel this way now. No, it is not Thanksgiving, or the stress of the holidays. It is guilt.

I feel guilty for making a few decisions* lately that benefit me and not others. I feel guilty for putting myself first.

Really.

I realized this the other day. I am punishing myself for feeling guilty. Punishing myself by EATING. How do you punish yourself with food? You eat and eat until you feel so stuffed that you are uncomfortable. A lot of you may have never done that, but I bet there are a few of you out there who know what I am talking about.

I’ve only had a few incidences when I’ve felt that super uncomfortable feeling, but it’s scary.

Guilt is not the only emotion that has driven me to overeat this past week. I’ve also been bored, frustrated and uncomfortable… and eating to cover those emotions. Guilt just happens to be the big one – the overriding emotion that is making me feel super stressed out. The feeling that is always in the back of my mind.

And yeah, yeah, yeah… I am happy to have “figured out” what is causing me to feel so out of control, but that is not stopping me from feeling out of control. Or stressed out. Or anxious, all the time.

I’m just worried. Worried about giving up. Worried that I am not meant to be healthy. Even writing that now, it isn’t logical, but that is how I feel. Like I don’t deserve to be healthy, and happy and guilt-free.

*I apologize for being so vague. I want to give more details, but not right now. I already feel uncomfortable enough, writing all this!

Comments (17)

By kilax, November 28, 2008 10:25 am

Do you use coupons?

A few weeks ago on the train, I saw a woman spend an hour organizing coupons into a little plastic box. She had all these ads out, as well as her scissors, and was cutting and filing away. I was intimidated by the amount of coupons she had – it must have been hundreds!

I don’t go out of my way to obtain coupons. If one comes in the mail that I think I’ll use, I hold on to it. I look through the Sunday coupons to see if there are any for products we already use, and I save those. But that’s about it.

But I know there are whole websites and clubs devoted to using coupons to maximize savings. I know for some it is a hobby! Are any of you in that group?

Comments (15)

By kilax, November 26, 2008 12:30 pm

When I was decorating sugar cookies on Sunday, I said “I like how Grandma Ilax’s sugar cookies always look so spontaneous – one will have a smear of frosting and a few random sprinkles – they all have so much character!”

So I decorated mine that way.

Apparently, my mom and grandma didn’t like that too much. They went back and added little frills to decorate them and make them look nicer. I wish I had a photo to show you how awful they looked before, but I don’t.

There was a particularly awful gingerbread man I decorated. He had purple pants, a yellow top, a white face, two chocolate chip eyes, and sprinkles for hair. My mom went back and gave him a red belt and a red smile, but there wasn’t really much she could do to make him nicer – he was UGLY.

I put him in the basket for my older brother, and told my mom to tell him I made that one special for him.

She must have told him. When I opened my email this morning, I had an email called “Cookie Adventures” from my brother.

I guess the cookie didn’t survive his big adventure, but it looks like he had some fun along the way. I think we need some captions for these photos!

This email from my brother made me laugh out loud at my desk for a long time. I really needed that this morning. I was already pissed off when I got on the train at 6:25… and my day hadn’t even started.

I am realizing more and more that I have not been handling stress very well lately. We all have stress in our lives on a daily basis, but I feel like this has been a particularly stressful month for me. I have a lot going on at work. And just having a busy social schedule has been making me stress.

I seem to just sort of… shut off when all of this stress hits me. I can’t think straight. I am angry. I don’t want anyone to talk to me. I want to be left alone. I try to do some deep breathing to get over things. I get anxious. And jumpy. And nervous.

I need to figure out how to handle this, because I kind of doubt things are going to die down at all between now and New Year’s.

I do know that writing things here helps. At least for the moment it distracts me.

All of this stress has been holding me back from looking forward to Thanksgiving AT ALL. Yeah, I am excited to have the time off from work to relax and see family, but that’s it. I feel sad that I am not looking forward to this holiday. That I am viewing it as more of a burden. I hope I snap out of this.

Comments (10)

By kilax, November 25, 2008 12:30 pm

That’s normal, right?

Extra credit to anyone who can figure out what movie was playing in the background and tell me how many cat toys are in the video!

(Sorry for the double post. It seemed like Christina and Steven were going to be upset if I didn’t share this video)

Comments (18)

By kilax, November 25, 2008 5:24 am

Last week I only ran ONE DAY. Not because I was lazy, or not in the mood, but because all of my nights were occupied with painting our bedroom, being sick, or having a migraine (wonderful week, right? And yeah, I still owe you some photos of the new paint).

On Thursday (the day with the migraine), I decided I HAD to run on Friday. All week I could feel the urge to run in my legs – when I was walking to work in the morning, I would wish I was running. I ran a little bit on the train platform (to get around some slow people) and I didn’t want to stop. But the only way to run on Friday was to do it in the morning, because I was going to be with my family all night.

So on Friday, I got out of my warm bed at 4:00 a.m. to go run in the 20°F weather. Steven made sure to call me a “crazy runner” when I woke him up to tell him not to be startled when I opened the garage door.

I felt like I was crazy, putting on long running tights under my pants, thick cold weather socks, Under Armour under a long-sleeved shirt under a jacket, along with gloves and a hat. But I knew I would warm up.

And I did. I walked a cold 5-minute walk to warm up then started my run, and felt fine after a minute or so. I had my mp3 player on, and the upbeat tunes made me feel energized. It was actually a pretty good run, despite being so gosh darn early and so gosh darn cold. The only bad parts were that my thick socks kept making my shoes untie (duh, I need to double knot them) and that I got cold when I stopped to walk back to the house (I’ll just run home next time).

When I got done with my run and got home, I felt completely energized. I ran up the stairs to take my shower. I thought, “This is a great way to start my day! I feel great!”

Yeah, it’s a great way to start my day… if I could be in bed by 9:00 every night!

So, I’ll try it for a few days this week, and whenever I need to, because of time constraints. But I really can’t do this all the time. I feel too exhausted by the end of the day.

It’s a shame, because I really prefer to exercise in the morning. I have that great, “I exercised this morning!” feeling, and I feel just the right amount of tired when I go to bed at night. And my stomach doesn’t get upset because I am running right after dinner.

But it just doesn’t work with my schedule all the time. And I DO prefer to run with Steven. So I guess I just need to fit it in whenever I can.

Comments (20)

By kilax, November 24, 2008 1:17 pm

When I went to bed last night, feeling like I was going to throw up from sugar overload, I said, “I don’t want to bake, see or eat another cookie EVER again.”

But when I woke up this morning with a splitting sugar-induced headache, and went downstairs to feed Data, I almost ate one of the cookies sitting out on the counter.

What is that about?

We ended up making 7 different sweets this weekend – caramel popcorn, frosted sugar cookies, caramels, kringla, snickerdoodles, fruitcake and no-bake cookies (we also had toffee and crispix mix to put in all of the gift baskets).

My favorite treat we made – Sugar Cookie Reindeer!

All the sweets we made

Some of the wrapped gift baskets

We had a few issues though. And that made the day a lot more stressful. The first batch of caramels took over an hour to make and turned out too hard. The fruitcake wouldn’t bake, so that ended up being a waste. The kringla got burnt because the temperature was too high on the recipe – only half the batch turned out.

Ugh. At the end of the day, I think all of us were thinking, “Why did we want to do all this?” We still had a ton of fun, but it was too much work. My back has hurt all weekend from standing on my feet so much. And I am dead tired. Oh well. That’s why I took the day off – to catch on rest.

We talked about getting together again next year around this time – but not doing all the baking. Ha!

And now…

… so forget everything I wrote on Saturday about being in control of my eating. Yeah, I was on Saturday, but yesterday was like a free for all with the cookies and sweets we made. I don’t know WHY I thought I would be able to resist. I tried for awhile, but that didn’t really amount to anything.

I am sick of thinking about it and writing about it, but it really helps. So bear with me.

I loved Diane’s comment on my post on Saturday:

Try not to worry too much about gaining weight. I mean, I think it is sort of inevitable that we are all going to do that this week, and that lots of sugar and comfort foods will bloat us up a bit. But real substantial weight gain happens over a long period of time. Get back to your routine as soon as you can and you will be fine!

I felt a lot better after I read that. Because it’s true. I AM going to eat more during the holidays. If I didn’t, I would feel deprived. And all I need to do is get back to my routine as soon as possible.

I realized that there are at least two patterns to my overeating – my crazy, “out-of-control” binges where I stuff my face with whatever is in the house for a short amount of time (like 30 minutes), and the all-day free for alls where I pick and eat at things all day long – never getting uncomfortably full, but always eating, eating, eating.

I’m actually excited that I am learning what is bringing on these beahaviors. I just wish I didn’t have to deal with them to begin with. I think we all have problems though. It’s just… being human. Or… American. Or something.

Comments (14)

By kilax, November 22, 2008 11:25 am

Ask…

… and you shall receive!

My parents arrived bearing gifts last night. Yes, I know I am spoiled!

I am so completely exhausted right now. I don’t think my body has felt this physically exhausted in a long, long time.

My sister, mother, grandma and I got up early and took the train to Chicago My grandma had never been to downtown Chicago! We mostly shopped, but I also had a chance to meet up with my friend Clare, WHO I HAVE NOT SEEN SINCE SHE WAS A BRIDESMAID IN MY WEDDING OVER A YEAR AGO! (Yeah, I was a bit excited!)

Kim, Clare and Katie (a college roommate of hers)

It’s really crazy that you can feel so close to someone, after not seeing them for an entire year. I meet Clare the last semester of college, and I always wish we had gotten to know each other sooner. We immediately clicked. That doesn’t happen often. I wish we could have visited longer today, but she was in town for a conference and had to leave.

We had a lot of fun in Chicago, going to the shops on State Street and Michigan Avenue. We took the train home very late. I am so happy Steven had dinner started when we got home. We cooked, ate, did dishes… and started in with the treats! I made all of my sugar cookie dough so it could cool in the fridge overnight, and my mom started in on the caramel popcorn!

Yummy… cookie dough! I resisted!

It’s just as good as it looks!

Even though it was a somewhat stressful day – not because I am unhappy, but because a lot is going on – I still managed to be in control of my eating. Yes, I ate more than I do on a daily basis, but I didn’t stuff my face. I suppose I just hope to make it through this weekend and next week without gaining weight. It’s going to be hard though. I cannot do my normal exercise for a few days this week, and I get pretty stressed about food around Thanksgiving. But, like I’ve said before, I am just going to keep going and trying.

Comments (18)

By kilax, November 21, 2008 5:42 am

When you were in high school did you eat dinner with your family or on your own?

I was thinking about this the other day. About midway through my freshman year, around the time I started theater, I began eating dinner on my own or with friends. Then I started working at McDonald’s the following summer, and I think I ate dinner there EVERY night I worked. I became a manager after working for a year, and then I got FREE McDonald’s food every day I worked. Ha!

I remember I used to go to soccer practice or theater or WHATEVER after school and then go to work to do the closing shift. I would eat french fries, ice cream, tortillas with cheese, cookie dough, shakes… basically whatever I wanted, all night long. Wow. I can’t believe I didn’t turn into a blimp!

I don’t remember ever eating diner with my family on a school night during high school. But it was just because I was busy and doing my own thing. Is this typical?

Comments (9)

By kilax, November 20, 2008 10:40 pm

Every once in awhile, Steven and I go to Sweet Tomatoes, our favorite buffet. We like it because they have a huge salad bar right when you walk in – that is the focus of the place. You make your salad and pay, then there is a little baked goods counter, soup counter, pasta counter, and sweets counter.

I have such a hard time going there.

Even though I make my healthy salad, and steer clear of the baked goods and grab a little dish of pasta… I just gobble it down. I get into some weird “buffet-dining” mentality that I need to eat my food as fast as possible so I can get up for more. And I always get more.

I’ve actually gotten better at eating slower at Sweet Tomatoes (and at home, and other restaurants), but every time I go there, I eat a lot more than I should. I don’t get a stomach ache or anything like that, but I just eat too much. Because it’s a buffet. And I feel all weird and rushed. And I feel deprived. And sad. Sad that I am not eating as much as I used to at a buffet, before I started caring about my health.

Today I was thinking about what it would be like to stop counting calories and just listen to my hunger. What would happen if I ate when I was hungry, rather than sticking to the allotted meals and snacks I have set up for myself throughout the day? Would I eat less? Would I eat more? Would I lose weight? Would I gain weight?

I really want to do that – stop counting, stop worrying. Stop thinking about it. But I don’t think I am ready. I really don’t think I am ready to live that guilt-free of a life. I have been having some binging issues lately. I’ve been avoiding some emotions, and eating them out instead. I feel that, until I conquer emotional eating, I may not be ready to listen to my hunger, because I am not really listening to it. I am letting my emotions dictate my eating patterns. And that just feels awful.

I am just going to see how the next few weeks go. This is a stressful time for me. I’d still like to lose some weight, and I think counting calories may be the way to do that. Oh, and avoiding the buffet.

On the side: PLEASE PLEASE PLEASE someone help me with wordpress. I could not login to my admin panel tonight for a very long time. It just kept resetting every time I entered my login and password. I tried a million things to fix it, and nothing worked very well. I am not sure what finally got it.