Weight Loss Wednesday

 Good News: I'm down 1.1 pound since last week. Very happy about this. I am trying to eat more mindfully, paying attention to whether or not I am actually hungry, and only eating when I genuinely am. (and only eating what is necessary, not as much I as I want!!)

Overall Loss: Down 4.1 pounds. That's cool.

All kinds of reasons to lose weight: I want to stay healthy. I want to keep up with my grandchildren. I want to go easy on the aging joints. And I want to be good to the body God has given me. I want to honor His gift by taking good care of it.

God is good. All the time.

Weight Loss Wednesday

 Good news! I'm down 3.4 pounds! That's over two weeks since I didn't post last week.

Why didn't I post last week? Because I was very sick with a gastrointestinal bug. Yeah, very sick. Yes, yes, that does account for some of the loss. But a loss is a loss, right? I didn't gain it back after my recovery.

Note to self: Keep eating mindfully. Do NOT eat when you are not hungry and DO stop when you are full!

 Am I serious about want to lose weight or not. Being serious means not trying to eat as much as I can get away with. It means eating as little as I need. :-)

Here's moving forward!

Weight Loss Wednesday

 OK! Good news. I am down. I am down two pounds from last week and 2.8 overall. (Because I had a gain one week.)

Note to self: Good job eating mindfully. I have to continue not just eating for fun, but only if I'm hungry. Also need to stop when I'm full. Keep reminding myself that this is not a matter of eating as much as I can get away with. It's a matter of eating healthfully and only as much as I need.

Weight Loss Wednesday

 Well, it's another Weight Loss Wednesday. I've lost a measly .8 pounds from last week. Pretty pathetic.

Overall, I am still a pound up from when I started two weeks ago. This is not good. Time to wake up and remind myself, maybe many times a day, that I will not lose weight unless I eat less food. 

I must eat only when I'm hungry and stop when I am full. That's it.

Hopefully this week will go a little better. Time to get serious. Do I want to eat whatever I want, whenever I want, or do I want to lose weight? That's the question. I hope I know the answer.

Weight Loss Wednesday!

 All right. I have to confess. I am UP 1.8 pounds. I write this having just finished a small bowl of sweet potato chips that I did not need.

Notes to Self: 

Eating when I am not really hungry is not in my best interests. If I want to lose weight I must stop eating for fun. God does not want me to waste food by putting in my mouth food that I do not really need.

Time to get serious. My daughter is getting married next year. Wouldn't I like to wear something in a good size, instead of looking for a dress that does not look too bad at this weight? Yes, I would.

Extra weight is hard on the joints. Nuff said? I'm getting older. I want to be able to have maximum mobility.

OK. Next week I hope to do better. And I pledge to work a little harder this week. Bottom line? No eating for fun.

Anyone else working on this? How is it going?

Weight Loss Wednesday

 My daughter has pointed out to me that years ago I had a blog post thread called Weight Loss Wednesday. She read me some of the posts. Hehe. Could hardly remember writing those.

Anyway, I've decided to start it again. I will not tell you my weight. But I weighed myself today and next week on Wednesday I will confess to either a loss or gain or no change.

Feel free to join in in the comments. I think even this little bit of accountability (having to put it in writing) will help me stick to my goals.

I don't have as much to lose as last time but good health is important, especially as I get older. Well, everyone is getting older. Let's face it.

I told my daughter how old I would be on my next birthday. Her response. Haven't you been that old for the last 5 or 6 years? I am not lying about my age! She is revealing her perception of me as, well, pretty old. I am, after all, more than 40 years older than she. Yeah. Bonus baby. And a lovely one at that! I have two bonus babies actually. Unusually special gifts from God. Unusually special because they are rather rare. I am blessed with three daughters, but two after my fortieth birthday.

God is so good!

Heirlooms Revisited

This is my grandson. As he made little lines by pulling his fingers against the nap of the fabric on this chair my thoughts went back some sixty years.

I used to do the very same thing when I was a little girl. It was fun. And all you had to do was brush your hand over the fabric again and the lines would disappear.

My brother and sister and I had all done it. Then I realized not only did I do that myself but I did it on this exact same chair which was in my grandmother's living room. I can remember it so clearly. The chair has been reupholstered several times, but it's the same chair. I explained to my grandson that I had also done that when I was little and that the chair belonged to my grandmother then.

I tried to explain to him who my grandmother would be in relation to him. I was kind of shocked to realize that the woman I remember so clearly was his great-great grandmother! Two greats!! I think it was kind of hard for him to imagine that his nana had a grandmother.

Yeah. Started feeling kind of old. Just kind of. ;-)

And check out this picture! I think it's better than I ever remember drawing! Both of those grandparents were artists-- musicians. My grandfather also made oil paintings in his retirement. I bet they're both smiling at this work of their great-great grandson on the furniture that used to grace their living room.

Somehow we remain connected by threads of memory to those who went before us. And somehow, I am quite sure, they must be pleased. God rest their souls.

The Weeds and the Flowers...such is life

Sometimes I like weeding in my garden. It gives me the joy of absorbing the glory of God all over every flower.

                                                                                      

Here is a dwarf butterfly bush blooming. I love it, although it is a little weedy-looking.

And this is a dwarf hibiscus.  Lots of enormous, delicate, beautiful flowers. The petals look like tissue paper. And each blossom only stays for a couple days. A gorgeous and poignant reminder of the brevity of life.

So I love to be around these beauties, even if the reason is because I'm weeding. Even if I should have weeded many weeks ago.

Look at this king weed (not a proper name). Incidentally, the weeds are not going to get links. They have enough advantages. :-) How did I not notice this monster? Or this guy.

                                                                                

Or this!

It's not really that I didn't notice them. Sometimes it was that I was too busy to get out there and pull those things. 

As I weed, I am reminded of how important focus is. I can think about God's gorgeous gift of flowers of enormous variety and how the greatness of God is mirrored in His creation. 

Or I can bemoan the fact that I did not get to the weeds earlier and that they've gotten so big and invasive. I could even do worse and criticize myself for letting them grow so wild or decide that I should just resign myself to not being a very good gardener. Or I could sink into self-pity that I don't have more time to devote to gardening. No, I must not do any of these things.

Instead, may my focus be on God and His glory. May I block those negative thoughts with prayers of thanksgiving and praise for the gift of creation.

And may I apply the same principle to my life. There are weeds. And there is plentiful beauty, grace, and blessings. Let's focus on the blessings.

Thanks be to God. He is so good.

 For the first time, I attended last week the Catholic Writers Guild in-person conference. It was a delightful experience. I met many other catholicMom contributors, including some I have "spoken" with extensively online but have never met in person.

What a treat it was to be in the company of so many like-minded people. There was an Adoration chapel! There was an exhibit hall full of companies marketing products to Catholics-- book sellers, statues, Catholic devotional items. children's items....The day started with Mass and the rosary!

It was so wonderful to put faces to names. There was grace! There was a positive, warm, friendly spirit about the entire event.

The articles I've shared on social media, the zoom get-togethers, the faces are now assigned to the writer.

Fantastic experience. If you are a Catholic writer I highly recommend attending next year.

Annual March for Life Is Today

Sixty-two million persons have lost their lives to abortion since 1973. Yes, I am using the word person intentionally because living things only belong to one species. They don't change species. When a human being is conceived they are a member of the human species. Thus each one is a person. This is science. This is basic biology.

In 1972 the people of Michigan, my home state, defeated a ballot measure that would have made abortion legal in Michigan, up until 20 weeks gestation. It was defeated by a wide margin. I distinctly remember my parents working against this measure and their great relief that abortion would remain illegal in Michigan. Then, only a few months later, the Roe v. Wade decision was handed down by the Supreme Court overturning every law protecting the unborn in all fifty states. My parents were livid. How could a court overturn the expressed will of the people.

Every year since that infamous and rogue decision by the Supreme Court pro-lifers from all over the country come to Washington to protest this raw exercise of judicial power. They come to defend the unborn.

Now that we may be on the verge of overturning Roe it's important to remember what such an action by the Supreme Court would do and what it would not do. It would not make abortion illegal across the board in the United States. Individual states would decide if abortion would be legal for that state or not. In my state of Michigan the former laws forbidding abortion would go back into effect. In other states, like New York, the prior law allowing abortion would stay in effect. An overturning of Roe simply returns the matter to the states where it belongs.

Those of us who defend the unborn would still have much work to do because many states would still allow abortion.

Roe v Wade is hardly settled law, as some claim. The first March for life was in 1974 and hundreds of thousands of people have traveled across the country to protest ever since.

The crowds are incredible. I have been there many times. It's cold. It's crowded. And it's difficult. Yet people keep coming every single year.

Find out more about the history of the March at this link.

To see the list of speakers check out this link.

You can watch the March for Life live streamed at this link.

You can also watch it on Facebook.

Oh Lord, please bring an end to the scourge of abortion in this country. May all come to recognize the humanity and personhood of the unborn child. Our Lady of Guadalupe, pray for us.