Centennial party time!

Y’all know I love a good before and after! And if they tell me it’s formal, you can be damn sure my tiara is coming out!! (We were celebrating the 100th anniversary of the Agate Harbor Land Pool.)

Time for pics since we were all dressed up!

Owen didn’t even know this was on his bucket list until we got here and discovered Liam is a distant cousin. He was giddy. Don’t feel bad is you have no idea, either—I don’t do sportsball so I had no idea either…but it’s Liam McHugh.

He is a sports announcer for NBC Sports coverage of the NHL as well as Notre Dame Fighting Irish football and the NFLNBC Sunday Night Football. He is also perhaps the face of NBC Sports Network, anchoring much of its staple programming, including the NHL, Tour De France, college football, college basketball and the Premier League.

Who?! 😂 It’s okay, it made me feel like I was 14 again (which is the age I last saw some of these people)!

iFly again!

Today is the day I redeem my free flights from them messing up me not getting any photos the last time! And what better lipstick color to wear for flying than Fly Girl? (Though it’s a tiny bit too deep for me on its own so I layered it between Cocoa!)

Since I missed out on any pictures the last time, I made sure to have Tom take a ton of them this time around—which he certainly did!! I had about 100 to sort through! Here are the best of them…I am making excited faces in most of them because I was smiling and making faces for the kids when I flew around by them. (Click on any of them to see a bit bigger version!)

The instructor knew I had flown before and had told me that we could try a new move or two, but since I only had short flights (two one-minute flights instead of the two two-minute flights I had the first time) we wouldn’t be able to do too much. That said, almost as soon as I got in, I flew way above her head! I could sense she was a bit nervous (they generally keep you at chest level or below so they can grab you if they need to) but she saw I was okay so she let me go!!

Taking me up for the High Flight!

Owen was the videographer for these! He did a great job!!

And the actual pics they took! The instructor said she put me in front of the camera A LOT to make sure I got a good photo!

Post-flight success pics!

It’s funny. While I was waiting (and it was a looong wait today) I was like “Ugh. Is this really worth it? All the travel time and all the wait time for two silly minutes in the chamber…” And then I did it and YES, it was totally worth it. It’s SOOOO much fun. I can’t wait to use my 10 minutes in Chicago!!

Ahhhh. I love the feeling of a fresh cut…

Especially after my hair nightmare earlier this week. She definitely saw lots of breakage but thankfully my hairstyle hides it well.

And this is what it looks like when my hair is being dried and styled—since I have so much hair, my stylist grabs anyone else available to help. 🙂 (I had the kids with me—and they had their iPhones since we were in Occoquan—so I texted Owen to take the picture.)

And look at what we found on the walk to the salon…

And testing a new lipstick when I got home.

Pokemoning with friends!

Since the Marine Corps marathon is this weekend our normal hunting spots were closed…so we headed to Old Town Alexandria!

Fighting a gym! We kept getting errors so we just moved on.

A birch!

Success fighting another gym!

This was a Japanese maple—so absolutely gorgeous I had to get a picture! (We saw about 15 different photographers and families out this morning!)

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These two were best buddies all day.

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These bullet points are great.

Relaxing with a delicious lunch at TJ Stone’s Pub in Alexandria.

Last day at the pool and saying goodbye to the lifeguards!

Labor Day has become a somewhat sad day at our house because it’s the last day the community pool is open. The kids love eating down there, but it’s bittersweet because we know the hot weather will continue and there will be no fun escape! Unfortunately, Tom wasn’t feeling that great, so he only lasted about five minutes before he went home.

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Then I gave Owen the camera…

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Katie found a mermaid tail and was in heaven!

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Her second bag of chips!

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Then one of the lifeguards came over and asked if he could take a picture with the kids at breaktime. Of course! What a sweetie. He would play football with Owen in the pool, always said hi to Katie, and always knew who we were. I emailed them to him right from the pool (I love technology).

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Pirate’s Cove, Take 2, NO POOP!

We convinced Tom to take the day off work to come play with us!! We were there right when they opened, so I tried to take a bunch of pictures quick before the background was overrun with people!

Owen wasn’t thrilled with stopping to get his picture taken!

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I even went down the slide!

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A Pokémon gym was right at the entrance, so Tom took Owen over to battle!

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I didn’t have my camera with me when we were closer, so this is a quick pic from the other side of the park. I even went down the red slide! (I have to admit, I was actually a little nervous at the top—I haven’t been on a slide in a long time—but it was fun!) We never did get Katie to go on it, which is a bummer because I know she would have loved it! (As it was, I had to practically BRIBE her to go down the little blue slide above—she wanted NO part of it. But once she did it, she loved it!)

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So we had a nice, relaxing day…and best of all, there were no poop incidents!!

I’m finally normal…BMI!!

I DID IT!! I finally reached my goal of normal BMI (the top end of which is 169)!  I know you all know by now but I have to say it again: I couldn’t have done it without Naturally Slim!!

Oops! That’s hard to see on that background…so off to the garage!

And then I didn’t want to wear that out and about so changed into a new shirt (with my new jeans from the other day).

And the collage I posted online…and Naturally Slim shared!

Now I have to see if my body thinks it should lose another 15 or so so I can claim that I lost half my body weight! 🙂

The dress in 1991 and 2016.

Okay, folks, who wore it better? Yes, here’s a DOOZY of a Then & Now. I first wore this dress to my high school Senior Awards Night and then to my graduation party (as seen in the photo, 1991). I loved the dress and kept it at my mom’s house all these years, wanting to get back into it someday. And that day was today to celebrate our 15th anniversary! And I traded the single-strand pearls for the pearls I wore with my wedding dress!

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Sidenote 1: Owen took the picture from tonight.

Sidenote 2: When Owen saw me working on the collage, he said “WAIT. YOU HAD THAT DRESS 25 YEARS AGO?” 😯

We’re on top of the world!

None of us had ever been up Brockway Mountain, so we did that after mini golf.

Brockway Mountain Drive is an 8.883-mile scenic roadway just west of Copper Harbor in the Upper Peninsula of Michigan in the United States.

Click for full size photo.

Owen took a selfie!

 

She’s definitely my daughter.

I don’t remember loving the pool (and water) this much at this age, but I know I did later on. She has to be my daughter. I’m actually amazed at everything she does in the pool. Even just two weeks ago she couldn’t get a ring that had sunk to the bottom of the pool and now she dives down no problem! And of course, she still jumps off the side like a crazy person!

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Owen took the camera. He has no idea how to hold it and every single picture has his fingers or hand in it.

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Let’s go to the movies!

A shirt from the shopping trip I had with my friend a few months ago (that I haven’t worn yet) and one of my new XS (!!) Lularoe maxi skirts!

It’s still feels a little weird to be “dressing up” just to go to the movies, but this is what I wanted—it’s not really dressing up, it’s just looking put together. 🙂

Getting ready to see Finding Dory and splurge on delicious hot buttered movie popcorn!

 

65 in 18 weeks!

    

Friends who are also doing Naturally Slim joke that it’s voodoo because it’s SO easy to lose… Where else can you eat what you want and lose weight? I even felt like I wasn’t doing too well this week…and I lost 3.2 pounds! And I never once felt deprived! And I ate homemade ice cream with Oreos, homemade mac and cheese (twice!), southern biscuits and gravy potato chips, honey BBQ meat sticks, apple pie… 

And I agree! It IS voodoo! And it’s amazing. I’d honestly be happy if I never lost another pound because I feel awesome and I think I look good (which rarely happens)..but I’m just over half done (my first goal is 100, but my real goal is 130). 

It’s so awesome to be able to go into a store, grab an XL (in a top or a bottom) and most likely have it fit! I’ve gone through my closet again with a harsher look and taken out probably another 1-2 garbage bags full. (It’s hard because some of the clothes still fit and I like them…but they’re really too big and don’t look nice.) One of my newest favorite shirts (bought the day I decided to start losing weight back in May) is SOOO comfy—but makes me look SOOO frumpy! In the pile it goes! I did keep a few bigger [long- and short-sleeved] tees to wear as PJ tops, but that’s about it. I can’t even fathom what size I will end up when I reach my goal?!

We dug out the “skinny clothes” bin!

Tom tried his stuff on last night and found a new wardrobe! I found a ton of stuff, too—some things that are already too big, quite a bit that fits now, and a smaller stack that will fit in another 10-15#. After that, I get to donate everything and buy a new wardrobe!

I haven’t worn these since maybe 2005. It’s fun shopping in your own stuff. 🙂

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My total loss as of yesterday was 43.4# — still 56.6# away from my first goal, but almost halfway there in just 12 weeks!