30 Days Eating At Home

I'm failing...still.  Not dwelling on that.

New Challenge.  Since buying a house, we are hemorrhaging money.  Between the new A/C, garage door, furniture, etc.  Money is super tight right now.  Beginning yesterday, no eating out for 30 days.  I can do this, I can do this.  Not only will this help from the healthful eating aspect but it will also help the pocketbook immensely.  This is merely a personal goal as Hubby may still buy breakfast and lunch in his company cafeteria but the beauty of working from home is that I have no such temptations.  Breakfast, lunch, dinner and snacks...all at home 24/7/30.  This will be particularly tough on the weekends when we tend to buy bites to eat while we're out and about and running errands.  Not for the next several weekends.

This shouldn't be that difficult.  We have no major events happening in the next 30 days and a great celebratory night out will be October 18th...at which point...I am seeing Garth Brooks in concert!  :)  Super excited and I think that's a perfect occasion to go out for a nibble and then a concert.  That's how eating out should be.  It should be an event, not a necessity.  So I'm committed.

We are now moved into the new house but most things are still in boxes.  The kitchen and living room are complete but my office (where my treadmill is) is a mess.  Hoping this gets taken care of this weekend.

Speaking of this weekend, Hubby signed us up for the Heart Walk.  A 5k.  I haven't done a 5k in over a year.  Yes...I used to do them at least monthly.  I even had a goal once and actually attained it to do 2 5k's in one day.  Alas.  I haven't done any but one since moving here.  Needless to say we'll be walking it but it's a start.

Hope y'all are having a good week.  Will post progress on the eating out goal soon.

Reminders

Every now and then you need a kick in the ass to remember why you must always fight for you health and fight for YOU.

My dad has been overweight for as long as I can remember.  I vaguely remember him trying Slimfast and stuff like that when I was in elementary school but I mostly remember his killer spaghetti sauce.  He had a triple bypass surgery when I was in 8th grade and that motivated him to stop smoking.  One more stab a diet but it didn't stick.  Throughout the years, he's had stents put in his legs, his heart, etc.  Throw in a Type II Diabetes diagnosis and almost-sugar coma even after the diagnosis and that gives you an idea of how much my dad has worked to NOT get any better.

Earlier this month, he had a stroke in his right eye.  He's now blind in that eye...buildup of plaque behind the retina.  Did it come from his heart or brain?  They aren't sure yet.

Yesterday had an angiogram to look to see how bad his blockages are at this point.  He had to get 2 stents in his leg and they looked at the heart.  One of the bypasses he had done years ago is blocked beyond repair.  Open heart surgery is not an option, neither is another bypass.  No doctor will put him under because they are certain he would not survive the procedure and no doctor will risk him dying on their table.  So now he's stuck.  The blockages will just get worse and eventually he'll either have a massive stroke and be incapacitated or a massive heart attack and die.  It could be several years down the road or tomorrow.  There's no way to know.

I don't know if this will be the much-too-late wake up call he needs but I can tell you it's

Any Gardeners?

I'm struggling with my eating.  Some days I'm spot on, others I flail.  I need to get more consistent.

We had the garage door replaced on the new house on Saturday.  Yesterday, the new A/C was put in.  Now I've got an HOA problem.  Apparently, former owners (a bank - it's a foreclosure) have an HOA violations (maybe 2?) where they didn't get the landscaping change approved years ago so now we have to deal with it.  Our options are to remove the privacy hedge and mulch bed and plant sod or apply for approval for these to be there.  We're going the approval route first and if they reject it, then we'll remove them.  The hedge is easy enough...it's done.  The mulch bed is dead.  Anything that's been planted there is dead and it looks like crap.  I was going to address this in the Spring when we were planning to resod the yard and plan flowers and all that.  My time table just got moved up.  So I'm scouring the internet trying to figure out what to do with this mulch bed I have.  It's pretty big.  I want pretty flowers but also want some ground cover.  Do any of you have any ideas?  I'm not opposed to planting in both fall and spring so annuals would be fine.  That's where the ground cover comes in...my thought is that the ground cover buys me a couple weeks when the flowers die off to replant.  Then I think perennials may be the way to go but what would look good?  I've never had a garden before so I just don't know where to start!  I was hoping to have more time to plan.

Buying a house is seriously stressful.  Between work, the kids, the kids' activities and this house, I'm feeling incredibly overwhelmed.  I'm trying to take deep breaths and keep it together but when the doorknob broke on the door from the house to the garage on Monday, I lost it!  We're going shopping for furniture and appliances this weekend to take advantage of the labor day sales.  I'm hoping I can get past these anxious feeling so I can enjoy it.

We struggled financially for so many years and now that we're finally in a great spot with no debt and now a home and everything, maybe I'm just uneasy about spending this kind of money or worried that every decision will be wrong.

I'm stress eating.  I know I am.  I'm eating my feelings and using food and wine to calm me.  I know that needs to stop.  It seems every time we fall off the healthy wagon, it's harder and harder to get back on.  Why can't we just stay on?  Why do we continuously fall?

I know this post is disjointed and rambly.  I just had to get it out there.  So I implore you...any advice on planting in North Florida in the Fall?