I’ve decided it’s time to lose it. The baby fat, that is. I’m joining the 10-week “Losing It (not just our sanity)” competition, hosted by, among others, my friend Ashleigh. Not to lose weight, mind you—I’m still a nursing mamma—but to lose that bulge of baby fat from around my middle…
When our first little pumpkin was one year old, I finally fit back into all my old clothes. Even my super-duper-skinny no-stretch Lucky brand jeans (size 8—but they fit like a size 4 of any other brand!) that my hubby had bought me when we were courting. It was a tight fit, but I could wear them. My hubby celebrated and bought me a pair of Carpenter style Carhartt jeans that he’d been thinking I needed for quite some time (cowboys buy their girls Wranglers, farmers buy their girls Carhartts, what can I say?). My stretch Levi 515’s were still my favorite jeans—not to mention the most forgiving—but I was thrilled to be back down to the weight I’d been on my wedding day.
And then I found out another little pumpkin was on the way! So much for being skinny (which I never really have been—I’m not exactly built skinny—but my hubby liked to tell me I was, and I liked to think he thought I was). I gained about 35 pounds with each pregnancy. Half of which melted off immediately after the little person was born. But somehow, this time around, the second half has not melted off quite so quickly.
I’m blaming it on the fact that it’s been winter and I haven’t been quite the active farmer’s wife I was the summer after my first little pumpkin was born. I’m blaming it on the stress of remodeling and the exhaustion of having a new baby (chocolate chips are my stress relief food). I’m blaming it on the weather and the two little people who have kept me inside. I could even blame it on the fact that I didn’t order a size 4 bridesmaid dress for my brother’s wedding three and a half months after my second daughter was born—the dress was so forgiving, in fact, that I didn’t want to lose too much weight and have it look too big!
I have ten more pounds I’d like to lose. But I’m a nursing mamma who is acutely aware of her milk supply. I’m planning on the nursing making the rest of the weight melt off in time. It’s the tummy muscles I want to do something about. And, oh yes, the chocolate chips I consume constantly—those probably have something to do with that last ten pounds hanging on, too.
So I’m not planning on winning any prizes for losing the biggest percentage of body weight. But I am planning on the prize of seeing my rediscovered tummy muscles. And possibly even seeing a smaller number next time I step on the scale at my in-law’s (there’s no room for a scale in our bathroom, which handily means I rely more on my jeans than a scale to tell me when I need to eat more carefully). Not to mention my hubby’s look of pride in his wife’s appearance.
I can squeeze in some of my old jeans, but I’d like to be back to my normal wardrobe come summertime. I mean, I’ve practically forgotten some of the cute clothes I bought that summer I wasn’t pregnant. I adore my maternity clothes, but I’m looking forward to wearing real shorts and normal capris this year. And I know my hubby would like it, too. And that means some of this baby bulge has to go.
It’s one thing to casually mention in a blog post that I’m going to start doing sit-ups. It’s another thing to actually have to blog each Friday about whether or not I’ve done them. Accountability and all that, you know. So…here’s to losing it!
My goals?
- Drink more tea, less coffee, less hot chocolate (I make to-die-for homemade hot chocolate, okay?).
- Drink lots more water each day.
- Focus on eating smaller, healthier portions at meals.
- Eat healthy, protein-packed snacks (instead of my survival stress food of chocolate chips).
- Exercise five days a week—even if it’s just a few sit-ups or leg raises, or a short walk. (I dreadfully disdain exercise. And that is an understatement.)
Care to join us in losing it?
I dreadfully disdain exercise. 
