Five weeks has passed quickly!

Our long trip up north is almost over.  Today we are on our last full day at Cindy's house, and later today we will pack a suitcase for the road trip that will start tomorrow.  We are driving to Herkimer, NY tomorrow morning to stay two nights with our friends Ron and Barbara.  We haven't seen Ron since Evey's wedding.  We saw Barb in January of 2012 when she came to Florida.  It will be great to see them in their new house in Herkimer.  Saturday and Sunday we will be in Buffalo for Mark's cousin's daughter's wedding.  (Geez, that's a mouthful.)  Sunday afternoon we will visit our friend Ellen before heading to WV on Monday to visit my step-mother, Jackie.  Tuesday I'll have the chance to visit the graves of both of my parents before we return to Cindy's for one night before taking the auto train on Wednesday back to Florida.  The six week trip is down to its final week.  It's been absolutely amazing.

Yesterday Mark and I spent six and a half hours planning our next big trip.  We are leaving July 31 to fly to CA where we will visit Evey and Eric for a week, including spending my birthday with them.  Then we will take a train to Anaheim for the D23 Convention and two days at the Disneyland Resort.  Then the Arizona trip begins.  We planned each day of the trip, booked all of the hotels, the rental car in northern CA for the first week, and the flight out to San Francisco.  We still have to book the return flight and a second rental car out of Anaheim.  No rush on those two things.  One of the best things we did was splurge on a two night package in Williams, AZ. We will stay at the Grand Canyon Railway Hotel and take the train up to the canyon with a motorcoach tour of the south rim.  It's going to be great!  It sounds just like a shore excursion from a cruise ship!  LOL!

Of course, I really would be naughty if I didn't talk about my weight today.  After all, this is a weight loss blog, supposedly.  I should have changed the name of it a long time ago to a weight GAIN blog since that's all that I seem to do anymore.  I've really lost all interest in exercise or curbing my food intake.  I gained 2 1/2 pounds this week, up to 273.  I didn't get on the scale all week, so I was actually surprised by that this morning.  I hadn't even realized I was doing that badly. I am obviously out of touch with my eating!  I went from 295 to 220, 75 pounds lost, from April of 2009 to November of 2009.  Now I've gained from 220 up to 273, 53 pounds gained, from November of 2010 to May of 2013.  Yes, it's taken longer to come back than to take off, but that's no excuse.  I've put back almost all that I lost.  Crazy.

I know I will eat well for the two nights at Barb's house because she and Ron have been on a strict diet for several years.  They have both lost a lot of weight, so there will be healthy dinners Thursday and Friday nights.  We will be eating lunch on the road tomorrow, but that's usually a Subway salad.  I don't think tomorrow will be a bad day either.  I am not packing the scale for this little road trip, so I will be surprised again when I get on the scale next Wednesday.  I hope it's a good surprise next week.

I had high hopes for this trip when I left on April 26.  I had convinced myself that I'd lose weight on the trip.  Haha!  NOT.  As of this morning, I have gained a smidge over five pounds since we left Florida.  Now I have to try to get back into some good habits and routines when we return home.  We will have 8 weeks at home before we fly to California.  Except for the five days with Lowell and Emily, there are no special times with other company or reasons to eat out or celebrate anything.  It could be 8 weeks of behaving myself and exercising.  I just hope and pray that I can find the strength to do it.  I know that a two pound loss per week is a good loss, so in 8 weeks, I can reasonably expect to lose 16 pounds.  I want to set that as a goal, lose 16 pounds before California.  Wouldn't that be nice!  And even if I do that, I will STILL be about 8 pounds heavier than when we went to California last summer.  Sad.