Memorial Day Weekend

First off, thank you to our Veterans! We owe them our lives, freedom, families and so much more. Thank you for your service and sacrifice, you deserve so much more than just my thanks.


Last week I forgot to mention my out of control cake craving. I couldn't think about anything than eating some chocolate cake all week and eventually I gave in. Now, I did this in a way that only allowed me one piece of this deliciousness... I made someone else bake it :) Bridget, a friend from work, is a wonderful baker, don't let her tell you otherwise. This is what she made me and IT WAS SO GOOD! It looks like it would be dry, but my friends, I promise, it was the most moist and absolutely wonderful cake I've had in years.



I went home for the weekend to enjoy some family time in the Dirty Dusky. I took Friday off of work so I could be home for a full three days. Please enjoy the ride home with Colbie and I...


Once we made the drive safely, the weekend began and boy was it jam packed! Friday my Mom and I went grocery shopping and she bought me a lot of wonderful food to eat over the weekend. For example:


She is so good about keeping the house full of good food that I can snack on and gerat meal options too. We found bread that is AWESOME! It is Sara Lee's Delightful bread and it's only 45 calories a slice! I can now eat a normal looking sandwich and am eating less calories than the sandwich thins! Observe!


After we shopped we just chilled at home together and then I went for a run. Friday night saw me eat a couple tiny pieces of good pizza. Columbus has crappy pizza so I couldn't say no ;) Saturday my Dad, Mom and I went out for an awesome sail to Put-in-Bay and back, about five hours total. At first the weather was a teensy bit crappy only because it was cloudy and cold due to the nice breeze, but about two hours in the sun came out and I started stripping. It got to be quite warm and I got a bit of a sunburn! Next on the list of to dos was Cedar Point. My sister, her two friends and I went to the park for the starlight pass which allows you to go in for a discounted rate after 5PM til the close of the park. This is usually the best way to go during the peak summer days as most families are heading home by 7 and it's way cooler once the sun sets. We rode Raptor, Millennium Force, Magnum, Witch's Wheel and Maverick. It was a fun time and I was totally bad and had half of an Elephant Ear and shared some fries with my sister. Then the next day we went to Toft's Dairy, a local ice cream parlor, and had Red Velvet Rush and Praline Pecan ice cream... and I ate the whole thing!


One of my side activities was to see how some old clothes fit on my smaller self... and by clothes, I mean my old prom dress. Let me defend this odd and seemingly creepy statement by saying that this dress cost an arm and a leg back in the day and my mom and I didn't have the heart to just chuck it or sell it at the last garage sale. I actually wanted to try it on as I plan on being Holiday Barbie for Halloween this year. The good news is it fits! It's a bit tight and I obviously has four boobs when you count the rollover occurring in this photo BUT the zipper zipped and I could breath a teeny bit so I think the Halloween plan is on schedule, just imagine a blond wig and elbow gloves ;)


I leave you with this last thought. Cramps, headache, bad hair day and spilling coffee and soda down my front and across the floor can be overcome by this miracle that was sitting on my desk this morning :) And yes, I've chowed down on this and have already killed half a bag... ah!

13 to go my friends

I have successfully lost two more pounds this week and now have 13 pounds to go to be under 200 for the first time since highschool. This can not come soon enough. Part of me wants to fast and work out like a freak to reach that mark, but we all know that that is not healthy nor smart. I will continue to beat the shitza out of my fat two pounds and a week at a time.

This week has again been hectic with volleyball and softball. I will not be comitting to four days of work leagues again next session... it's just too much! Not for me as much as for my dog. She is home alone the entire day and then the night if I have a sport, it's not fair to her :(

I did find a moment to clean out my closet with the help of my roommate. I don't think she quite realized how many items we'd be sorting through (my entire closet of 5 years worth of clothing). It took about 45 minutes and by the time we were done, this is what my floor looked like!


This next one just shows how bored Colbie was with the whole clothes sorting process. She could give a rat's ass about clothes, but when it comes to flip flops, sign her up cause they are her favorite chew toy!


I'm so excited for this weekend. Today is essentially my Thursday as I leave for home tomorrow after work. I hope that the weather turns out to be nice because it's one of my few weekends that I'll be able to get some sailing in. If this should happen, I will be sure to take a few pictures that show off the voyages of Ariel and the Ramhoff family :)

Happy Memorial Day weekend everyone! Remember, if you are tempted, take a teeny bite, savor and enjoy then pass it along to someone else and chug a bottle of water ;)

Holy Changes Batman!

:::peeks around the page::: I don't know think anyone noticed my lack of updates since it's been pretty quiet in these parts lately. I was supposed to update last Thursday, then I was supposed to update yesterday and finally you are getting some information today.

Last week was a little rough, this week too for that matter. Volleyball started up and I play on three teams, three different days. Monday night's team is with CYP (Columbus Young Professionals). It's a great way to meet new friends that are in the same boat as myself, younger business adults that meet up for drinks and conversation. The team itself is decent if we can get everyone to show up at the same time.

Wednesday and Thursday night are both work leagues, so I can to reconnect with some of the ICC consultants that I don't see often. Both teams hold their own, so it's been a good start to the season.

The problem with playing volleyball three nights a week is that I now drink three nights a week. I only had one beer each night and I made sure to calculate that into my daily intake. Somehow something went wrong and as of yesterday, I had only lost one pound. I did make some other not so great choices the past two weeks that might have contributed aka 1/2 piece of Red Velvet Cheesecake from THE FACTORY of Cheesecake. But again, I made sure it fit into my diet for the day and worked out as much as possible. I didn't work out with Heather last week as we were both too busy to get together, but she kicked my ass last night.

She brought this odd looking heavy leather ball that proceeded to kick my abs so hard I fell over. Literally. I couldn't hold myself up for some of the exercises... just goes to show how much further I still have to go to get my muscle regiment going strong.

The good news for all of this is that we took measurements and pictures last night to document the midpoint in my journey. I started on January 5 and as of today have officially lost 40 pounds, 24 inches and feel wonderful. Looking back it sometimes seems a slow journey, but then I realize that by doing this the right way, I'll never have to see those pounds again. They are gone for good because I'm taking the time to learn the proper ways to fuel my body, to never reward myself with food and instead go out and reward myself with clothes or something else I can wear or enjoy that reinforces my dedication to my newfound health & body.






This first photos of each set shows me that first week in January. I've always had self confidence and a pride in my appearance. I always felt super attractive walking out the door in my outfits from Lane or other speciality stores that cater to the larger woman. I was sexy and hot in my own way, but then I would see a picture and realize that I wasn't healthy and my confidence would tank. Pictures definately tell the truth most of the time and I didn't like what I saw. This set shows a girl that disliked what she saw of herself in pictures.

Now the second photo in each set that you see, shows all my sweat and hard work. Literally, you can see the sweat of my warm up jog... my poor trainer had to take my measurements and the tape measure kept sticking to my sweat and me, gross! I am so totally happy in what I see in these photos. I see the girls are smaller (and lower, that part I am not happy about). I see myself shrinking in a proportional way so I still feel like my womanly curves are showing but in a smaller way :)






LOVE IT!!!!

Hokay so....

Hello and welcome back from a week long hiatus. I apologize profusely for my inadequate updating techniques. In my defense, I have some fun and not so fun things to share avec vous. Pardon my french... ha!

Last week I hit that gym hard and hit it every day. I sweated like a beast and ran like... myself. My hair was super bouncy and happy while running, the complete opposite of my face. There isn't a mirror in front of the treadmills and ellipticals, but I'm pretty sure that I'm not all rainbows and butterflies in my facial expressions. I'm pretty sure I look like I'm pooping or having a bad cramp day. Moral of the story, I won't be picking up anyone at the gym anytime soon. BUT what I'm doing in the gym will surely produce "manly" (haha I'm on a roll) results soon!

I decided that I didn't need to work out after my weekend part time gig, it made my feet hurt for days afterword, so in an attempt to save myself unwanted physical anguish, I went shopping again! I bought jeans, real jeans. And by real, I mean expensive. Seriously Macy's? $60 for one pair of jeans that won't fit me by the end of the summer? Grrrr! They look nice and I don't have to worry about the droopy/long crotch issues I have with my jeggings, but still, I feel broke!

My sister and I had a girl's night after work on Sunday and indulged in an hour and a half of drooling over hot guys driving fast, hot cars. My precious readers, Fast Five may seem stupid and redundant, but it was totally worth it to see Vinny, The Rock, Tyrese and Paul Walker rock it out on the big screen. May I also say that there were some new hot exotic women featured this time... one day I will look as hot as them, just a lot whiter as their tans will forever escape me.

Did I mention the movie theater popcorn we scarfed? I didn't? Oops, cats out of the bag kids, I totally dove face first into the popcorn bucket and came up about three cups later, butter and all. It was delicious and fit into my allotment of calories for the day. So there :)

I weighed in this morning and am down another 2 pounds, woot woot! That was after a night of indulgence yesterday. A friend and I met at the Cheesecake Factory. That in itself was a feat as I thought we were meeting at Polaris, she thought we were meeting at Easton and neither of us thought to call to verify the location. I ended up driving back to Easton and ordered the Spicy Chicken Salad off the weight management menu. It comes with rice, beans, chicken, corn, onions and then a small pile of leafy greens. I skipped the rice in preparation for my half of the red velvet cheesecake. So delicious. SO DELICIOUS! At the end, I wasn't too full, so I felt good instead of guilty as I would have when I used to order the meatloaf, eat the whole thing on top of a loaf of bread, followed by the entire piece of cheesecake. We've come a long way people, a looooooooong way.

Tomorrow I am working out with Heather for a half hour, so I expect it to be intense and jam packed full of horrible things to make my body hate me. I kid, I kid. I recently have noticed my ability to do these exercises so much better, to be able to go longer and harder... cliche statement, but true. Heather kindly informed me that it's midway documentation time. We will be taking another picture and measurements tomorrow to see what all the changes are with my body since the beginning of this journey. I'll be sure to check in to share the results as well as post the before and midway pictures because we all know that numbers can only go so far. We are visual creatures and it makes a much bigger impact to see results than to read about them. I will be sure to wear my waterproof makeup as I acknowledge that my sweaty self will be hard enough to handle as is ;) let alone to see my hot self sporting raccoon eyes.

Losing it slowly but surely!

I'm not much of a morning person. I'm not grumpy, but I'm definately not coherent during the first ten minutes upon crawling out of bed. Hence why I thought I lost 6 pounds this week... I really lost 3, but my brain couldn't do the math. Maybe weighing in immediately upon waking up is a bad thing?

So I lost 3 pounds, woot woot! I'll be honest, I was hoping for a little more since I got to the gym every day and was careful of what went into my mouth. It's quite alright, I hit the 2 mark and added one, that's more than my weekly goal. Think positively! It helps that I completed 3.16 miles on the elliptical last night in 25 minutes, sweated balls and then attacked some weights! It also helps that I bought new clothes and have been wearing them all week... I feel attractive again :) I have always been comfortable with myself, but now even more so... I don't know how to explain it other than feeling like I have Super Mario Brother's Star Power!

I have a headache but whether it's from the currently dreary weather or waking up every five minutes thinking my dog was barfing I will never know. I've spent the last three days hovering over my pup as she threw up five times on Monday and wasn't eating. I caved and got some canned food which she slurped up faster than I eat mac and cheese. She seems to be keeping it down just fine but I can't help my listening for her gagging and then grossness hitting the carpet, ew!

Can we also rant about groceries and how f-ing expensive it is to eat healthy and as often as I need to?? I spent $93 at Kroger on Monday in addition to $23 at Aldi. I feel broke just from trying to eat healthy for two weeks. I can't wait for the farmer's markets to kick in so my produce is that much cheaper, argh!


One last tangent, I promise. 22 days until Memorial Day. I can not wait to go home and get out on the lake for some quality sailing!! I was only able to get out once last year since the boat wasn't in the water until August. This summer I hope to sail at least four times since I'll be home often for wedding stuff for Laura.

Va-Va-Va-Video!

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You can follow Micha's journey here!