Spurred on by my impending move to a new house, I went through my closet and took a hard look at what I really want to take with me. Asking myself "Even when I get down to a small enough size to wear this again, will I want to?" Maybe I just don't like the style anymore, or maybe it was an ill-fitting item to begin with and no sense wasting a moving box on that. Then there are the "I really only wore this because I felt like I could hide in it" pieces that are too big and still just as disliked now after 40 pounds of loss. It feels freeing to have mostly clothes that I feel good about stocking my closet and now I have no choice but to continue my downward trend - all my XL's are getting donated!

So I know I've been AKA for quite a while this winter, and it probably won't change too much this spring and summer, but I will try to get updates for you occassionally

I haven't been losing because I haven't been any good at sticking to deficit; in fact, I admit I haven't even been logging consistently for the last month. However, I can take one good thing from that because my weight has been running consistently around 232 lbs, meaning I am maintaining, so I should consider this plateau to be a good exercise in practice for long term maintenance. I was thrilled to get my walk in on Tuesday and wish I could do it again today, but I have too many things to do today that need my attention, and tomorrow will be the same.

But Saturday I plan to work outside, even if its going to be cooler - I need to do some serious cleaning out my storage shed and may go ahead and even put together my chicken house so I can have it ready to start painting. I also need to take a bed in my back bedroom apart and either take it over to my mom's if my sister is going to use it or put the frame and head and foot boards into storage here, not to mention also cleaning out what I call my storage room, moving tubs, sorting some of those tubs, and breaking down boxes that are good for packing things and burning the ones that aren't.

The fiancee has sent notice to his employer that he is moving down this way and would like to discuss with them the option of either making his position permanently remote so he can work from home anywhere in the US, or finding him one that can be done that way, which frankly should not be hard since the full time employees he works with have been doing that for months now anyway. But right now he's a temp looking to move into a full time job, and needs to discuss with them those details. We have set a couple of tentative wedding dates - either April 24, our first choice, May 22, our second choice, or end of June, which neither of us is really happy with but will tolerate if need be. Which date we use depends on what his employer gets back to him with - if they say yes, but we'd like you to train for another x amount of weeks, then we'll work with that.

We've become very good friends and are very secure and sure of our decision to marry. And since he needs to relocate 1,000 miles, and we both agree that living together before marriage is not an option (we are both conservative in our values on that topic), and because it makes much more sense for him to move straight in then temporarily to an apartment only to move AGAIN when we did marry, we thought it just makes sense to marry early. Also, we realized that since we are combining incomes, the sooner we are together the better off financially for both of us - I own my own home, so no rent, no mortgage, meaning if he can maintain his current salary, then that is a big extra wad of cash each month he would be saving and that can be put into savings for us.

But in all honestly, we are ready to be married and get our lives together going. Neither of us are young people just starting out, we know who we are, what we want in life, and we've been extensively talking about things like day to day life, our expectations and beliefs and attitudes toward politics, religion, friends, family, all that deep philosophy topics because we both were not in this to play around but to seriously consider each other as potential marriage partners. And those friends of ours who have gotten to know both of us agree and support our decision to go ahead with the wedding. I just find it rather funny since I never dreamed I'd be the kind of person to marry something within 6 months lol

I am flabbergasting some family and friends, though. We have not announced a wedding date y et because we just don't know, but a friend of the family reached out to me the other day to ask if we had one, and when I told her that we were tentatively hoping for 4/24, she just about died on me. "Wait - 4/24 as in next month?!!!!! This year?!!!!! You can't plan a dream wedding in 7 weeks!!!!!" And the church secretary, when I called to find out what needed done to reserve the fellowship hall and how soon did we have to know to get in for it, said the same thing lol

But I responded that yes, actually, you can when all you want is something very low key. I don't need bridesmaids, groomsmen, flower girls, ring bearers, or any of that entourage. I don't want monogrammed napkins or fancy dishware or flowery invitations or a ton of fancy decorations - I want simple and homespun. I am making my own dress and my own cake. I've already made my bouquet though if the right flowers are in bloom the day before the wedding, I will switch to real flowers picked out of my and my mother's gardens. I just want a family meal and we would plan to contact family members and tell them "bring this dish or that dish", my brother to cook the meat, my sister in law to do makeup, another friend to do my hair, and her mother to do a little bit of decorating the evening before using whatever she already has on hand - no need to go out and buy a bunch of new stuff, other than perhaps enough of my chosen flowers to fill 2 baskets to set on either side of the wedding arch. That's it. I'm asking his parents to record the Lord's Prayer to bring the bride in on, have a short and sweet ceremony, enjoy dinner with the family, and call it good. that's my dream and what I want. I'll send notifications out on my own printed out card stock to those I want notified. No caterers, no gift registry, no bridal shower and if people insist on gifts, we ask they contribute to the house remodel/ him moving fund lol

If we can have it in April like we want the ceremony would be closed to close friends and family and we would then have a reception/open celebration for more far flung friends and family later in the summer, once he's moved in and we're all settled. If we have to bump it to May, the same thing may apply because his parents cannot make it down until the end of June but neither of us really want a mid-summer wedding; its always so hot that time of year!

Meanwhile, once we know for sure what his employer is going to do and that we can live in my house, we have talked through remodeling plans and I have a contractor lined up to start. I have money set aside from my bonus and income tax refunds this year to do the work. Which is why I need to spend this weekend cleaning rooms and the shed out lol

So that's my update for you; we'll see when I get a chance to provide another!