Whew! And a whole lotta Congratulations!

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Me, Nitro (golden retriever), Brianna, Sheri, Briscoe (black lab)

Some people did some amazing things this weekend.  First, my friends Judy and Kim ran a 15K on Saturday.  Then on Sunday Kim completed the Willis Tower Climb.  Seriously, these ladies are awesome and both inspire me so much so CONGRATULATIONS to both of them.  On Sunday my friends, Sheri and Brianna, and I hiked two miles to raise awareness for canine cancer (Briscoe had a tumor removed from his thigh last year so he walked with me and Nitro had a tumor removed from his thigh last week so he walked with Sheri and Brianna)

My best "coming to the finish line" photo (so far)

There was also a little marathon in New York City.  A couple of the bloggers that I follow were running in it and I read a recap of the marathon on the Carrots 'n Cake blog today and giggled when Tina said that each bridge she crossed she told her running mate, Theodora, that she was going to make the bridge her bitch.  The mantra kept them both motivated and Tina and Theodora had amazing PRs.  So obviously CONGRATULATIONS go to them.

Before I got on the scale today I said I was going to make the scale my bitch because I was tired of the measly losses I'd had the past couple of weeks.  I wanted to see the numbers really moving again.  I did!  I was down a whopping 3.4 pounds this week.  I really bumped up the effort and amount of activity I had, not even using weather as an excuse one day last week. I was active on 5 days last week and racked up 26 activity points.  Clearly, when I took a short break from the activity (because I was sick and the weather) the weight loss decided to take a break too.

During the meeting Karen asked the group how many people have trouble losing weight during the holidays.  Lots of nodding and raised hands and then she issued a challenge for us.  Her meeting groups would compete against each other to see which group could lose the most weight.  Awesome.  I like a good competition as much as the next guy and this will, hopefully, help keep things even more in check over the holidays.  I mean being accountable to yourself is one thing but to be accountable to a whole group of people?  Yikes!

Have you ever been a part of a contest like this?  How did you do?

PS - Big thanks to Bob for the great photos

Disappointing or Encouraging?

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My weigh in yesterday was something I'm not entirely comfortable with.  I lost 0.2 pounds which isn't a lot but at least I lost(?).  The last few weeks have been a little odd - first I was sick so I pretty much didn't work out for 10 days.  Then I had my 9K race and after that I sort of took a few days to rest up (that's what I interpret the scale telling me last night).  So I'm determined to get the scale not only moving in the right direction but moving at a pace that I am more comfortable with.

A few weekends ago Mom was here visiting and she brought me the mother load (no pun intended) of squash from Dad's garden.  I've been roasting about 4 per week and eating lots and lots of vegetables.  I mean, yummy freshly roasted squash is amazing.  I like to boil a potato to have with it and that is just so delicious and very satisfying except that I think with all the vegetables I'm actually eating too much.  So I'm going to have to get that under control.

I'm also planning on getting a lot of activity this week and I'm hoping that Mother Nature will cooperate with me.

When you get on the scale and don't see what you expect, are you disappointed or encouraged to try harder?  If you try harder, what do you do?