my next new thing...

let's see how long this will last.  I'm famous for starting stuff, not too good at finishing though.

I'm disgusted by my weight.  My belly is beyond description.  The other day I tried to do a crunch, oh, the embarrassment.  If I'm going to have little boobs, I'm going to have to have a little body to go with them.

I don't diet.  Oh, I've done a couple of diets in my day, but they seem to cause that horrible rebellious backlash resulting in many pounds regained.  However, I have picked up on a couple of good habits.  Like drinking water and walking daily.  I just cannot make myself journal what I eat, because I lie, and I can't bear the thought of counting calories and weighing and measuring.  And the minute I cut a food out, that's all I want to eat.

So I'm embarking on making my own diet.  I'm going to trick myself somewhat.  Hey, tricking myself worked with the spongebob thing, so maybe it'll work with establishing healthy eating habits.  Here's what I'm going to do.  I'm an all or nothing kind of person, I've discovered.  So I plan on implementing one "rule" a week.  Or every two weeks if necessary.  Flexibility is key.  How hard can it be to stick to one thing?  Instead of following 20 rules, failing at 1 and then throwing the whole thing in the trash, I'll do just 1 thing.  The failure rate would be so much slimmer. (hey, I didn't take statistics for nothin')  Plus, I plan on mixing up negative rules and positive rules.  Too many negatives makes for a grumpy gal.  Some of the rules have to be hard for any weight loss to happen - like reducing portion size or <shudder> let's not go that far yet.  But discipline is good, even for a short time.  I figure that along the way, I'll establish a few more good permanent habits that will help me for a lifetime, not just the meantime.

Okay, the tricking part.  I'm going to try to word these things as positively as possible and trick myself where I can.  For example, this week the rule is "no eating after 8 pm".  Here's the evil genius part (in my mind, at least).  I didn't put, "no food after supper" because that's too restrictive and negative.  I still have the option to have a little dessert if I need/want it - but at least it won't be right before I go to bed.  Plus, I'm too busy or full to want to eat until after we put the boys to bed at 8:30.  So, if I get that little craving after the boys go to bed, oops!  It's after 8, can't eat!  Therefore, I end up not eating after supper anyway!  Semantics, in a way, but it's worked for me so far!

I might set up a spot on the sidebar here to list my rules as time goes on.  I really don't plan on this being a dietary journal, so I may put it on my myspace blog (which I hardly ever do anything with). 

If you have a good rule that you think I should implement, leave a comment please.  I can always use some good ideas!

The other thing I'm going to do is collect my favorite recipes that are healthy, quick and tasty and make my own personal cookbook.  I've got so many cookbooks.  Maybe not quite a 100, but I haven't counted.  Too many.  Plus I have tons of loose recipes.  I keep tucking away my favorites and forgetting about them.  But if I combine my love for scrapbooking and cooking, then maybe I will come up with a bunch of recipes that are handy dandy and will reduce the excuses and need to go out to eat so much.

Maybe it'll keep me from journaling so much about the "girls".  LOL!