Summer Fun

In an effort to spend the rest of my roll of Kodak 400TX (the only bad thing about film, in my opinion: you might not burn through a roll during your shoot but you have to spend the rest to get it developed), I took some photos of my daughter and her friend next door, Toni, and Toni's brother, Leland.  This was one of the first days this summer that the pool was out so they were quite happy to be splashing around!

(In fact as I type this, Maraea is resting after an afternoon in the pool.  It's a wonderful way to get your kids tired enough for a nap!)

Eastern State Penitentiary II

Some more photos from my recent trip to ESP.  This place photographs really, really well in black and white.  I didn't even get to use a color roll there - and I didn't even feel the need to.  All these shots are straight out of camera.  Film for the win!

My beautiful friend Courtnee

One year later...

It struck me the other day that it's already almost July.  Like where did the late spring/early summer go?  I blinked and missed it.

But it's almost July, and I realized that it's almost a year now since I started Weight Watchers.  And I'm only just over halfway to my goal loss of 40lbs.

I started thinking about everything that has happened in the past year as far as my diet is concerned.

Last July, I made a commitment to work out every single day - and I think I only missed one day.  I was also borderline psychotic about tracking my food and my calories/fat/sugar/etc intake.  By September I had decided to start 'eating clean'.  I found some happiness and success in that.

And I realized, that was the last time I found happiness and success in what I was eating.

Let's face it - Paleo was fun and all.  And it was helpful in that I dropped 10 lbs.  But sticking to it has been damn near impossible.

For one thing, to truly be Paleo, I needed to be spending a lot more time in the kitchen.  Time that, quite frankly, I didn't have before I started my Paleo journey.  Also, I don't like nearly enough of a variety of proteins or vegetables to sustain me as a Paleo follower for a long period of time.  Not having any variety in my diet means that I end up cheating.  When you eat the same stuff (chicken, pork chops, broccoli, carrots, sweet potatoes, etc) over and over and over again, you get bored very quickly, and suddenly cheesesteaks sound good for dinner.

So for a while now I've been "claiming" that I'm "Paleo" "most of the time" but that I "allow myself cheat meals".  Unfortunately what that grew into was the cheat meals were what was putting the variety into my diet.  And after a while I just started feeling icky again.  Sick of my bad food choices and tired of not being in the gym (still being repaired). 

Granted, Paleo led me to try plenty of new foods. Foods I never would have ever tried otherwise (cauliflower, anyone?)... but something kept nagging at the back of my head, preventing me from falling head-over heels in love with new vegetables and stuff: I don't need to be Paleo. There is no medical or dietary reason for me to subscribe to the Paleo diet.  There is no reason that I can't have brown rice.  Or cous cous.  Or white potatoes.  Or organic whole wheat bread.  Or peanuts, for Pete's sake.  I got tired of looking at foods and thinking "I can't have that unless I cheat".  I got tired of denying myself of food items that are otherwise perfectly healthy in moderation, for fear of failing, or not being 100% Paleo.  I got tired of trying to identify myself with any group of dieters - including Weight Watchers.

So enough's enough.  I'm done with restricting myself.  I'm done with trying to identify as one type of dieter or another.  I just want to get back to basics.  For me, that started with clean eating.

Eating clean, I think, for me, is the best path forward.  I adopted some habits when I started clean eating that I still keep to this day - shopping the perimeter of the store; making my own versions of processed foods, like mayonnaise; reading labels and eating more whole foods.  But going Paleo took just enough variety out of my diet that it sent me chasing cheats far more often than I did as a 'clean eater'.

I think this will also be my last session of Weight Watchers.  I feel as though I'm obsessing too much about food.  I don't want to live my life like this anymore.  It actually adds another layer of exhaustion to my life that I just don't have the time or energy for.  What I really want to focus on is eating real, whole foods, and exercising.  I don't want to obsess anymore about how much I'm eating or how many points it is or how many calories it is or whether or not it's Paleo.  I just want to eat real food that I love to eat, regardless of its adherence to one diet plan or another.

(Except for pasta, though.  I learned my lesson with pasta.  Pasta is not for me.  I will miss it dearly, but honestly I don't even want to cheat with it anymore.  I might try orzo again, but even my most favorite, healthy dish of angel hair with garlic and parsley is off the menu, pretty much for good.  Sayonara pasta!)

Film is not dead.

I love taking pictures with my film camera.  I will never, ever give it up.

I love the grain.  I love the look and feel.  There's just a mood the film gives to photographs that digital can't, unless you photoshop them.  (And if you know me, you know how I feel about photoshop.)

The pictures below were taken with Kodak BW400CN film at Eastern State Penitentiary.  It's only half the photographs I took there, because the other roll was a black & white roll that has to be sent away for processing.  I should get it back within a week or two.  Can't wait!

These are my favorite shots from ESP.  ESP, by the way, photographs really, really well in black & white.

I guess I liked photographing everything in Portrait at ESP, ha!

Incidentally, I found a few old pictures on this roll from when I went day-drinking and bar-hopping with Aaron and my BFF Jackie back in February.  Here's a pretty cool shot of a random street by Jefferson at night:

I Really Don't Like Facebook.

Like, really.

I have had my love-hate relationship with Facebook for a few years now but I have been swinging wayyyy over into the hate camp for the last several months.  I don't think I can really pinpoint what I find so aggravating about it though.

I have tried to hide and scroll past and ignore the people and posts I'd rather not see.  I've made lists for if I wanted to share something with, say, one group of people but didn't want another group of people to see it (similar to Google+ circles).  I made many lists actually and it just got to be too hard to maintain.

And then I started to ask myself, why would I share something with group X but not with group Y?  And I started to get to the root of the issue... that I felt that I was oversharing my life.  That I felt like it was more impersonal to share my life that way.

(Says the girl with a blog.)

Yeah but, I have to think long and hard and deliberately about what I want to share on my blog.  Facebook makes it so easy for you to put your every thought or feeling or emotion up there, even if it's really better left unposted.  And I think to some degree, this takes away from human interaction.

Hey, you know, I haven't talked to my friend Bubba in a while.  I wonder what he's been up to?  Let me go have a gander at his Facebook page.  Oh!  Look at that!  He got a new girlfriend!  She's pretty.  I hope he's happy.

Wouldn't it have been nicer if Bubba and I had an actual relationship where I didn't need to find out about his new girlfriend on Facebook?  Where maybe he and I had seen each other, or talked to each other, and we actually shared what was going on in our lives with each other?

I guess in my old age I am just starting to prefer more personal interactions.  Especially with my friends.  I decided that if I wanted to know how my friends were doing, I would contact them directly.  And likewise, if they want to know how I am doing, I am sure they will contact me directly as well.

Life is actually so nice and easy without Facebook.  I still have Instagram and Twitter but to me they are different.  For one thing, there is pretty much zero negativity in both places.  What a weight that is!  On Instagram - who doesn't love looking at pictures?  Plus I follow a lot of food accounts.  On Twitter - there's just not enough room to be negative!  140 characters is not enough for a Debbie Downer to really get everything off her chest!  I find that not being surrounded by so much negativity means that it doesn't weigh on me.  I dig my Facebook-free life.

In other news... good news left and right this week, keep it comin' Universe, I ate the proverbial toad at the beginning of this year and am ready to start seeing some good.  Signs, signs, everywhere signs...

Getting My Fight Back

You guys!

I'm so excited.

Aaron told me over the weekend that he is going to start working out again.  He does P90X.  He does it in our basement, which is really small.  But he goes through phases where he does it like every single day and then something happens (injury, life, what have you) and he stops and then he picks it back up again.  So the other day, my already-studly hubby said he is on a mission to have a beach body by the time our September vacation to Virginia Beach rolls around.  (But, if you've met my husband, you know he already has a beach body.  Guys get so self-conscious about the little stuff.  Like, if all the fat I had in my abdomen could be pinched between my thumb and forefinger and be about as thick as an Eggo waffle, then I'd be pretty darn happy with myself.  But guys are way different than girls.)  I have kind of been on the same mission, but I've been in a holding pattern.

My gym at work is out of commission.  A water heater broke or something and flooded the whole gym.  In fact, the irony of the situation is this - JUST as I was rebounding from starvation mode - I walked into work that day and thought, I think I am ready to go back to the gym next week (it was a Friday).  Then I open my email and BOOM - "The 1701 gym will be closed for repairs for at least 1 month, possibly more".  Wah. 

(Why doesn't Blogger have emojis?  This post is ripe for emojis.)

That was so long ago now that I don't even have the email in my deleted items anymore.  It was definitely over a month ago at this point.  They offered us a 30-day membership with the possibility of extension at Philadelphia Sports Clubs next door, for $30.  But I am cheap and didn't want to pay for it.  (Plus, PSCs are nice, and what if I fell in love with it?  Then I'd want to join, and then I'd start rationalizing the normally-$70/month membership in my head... no.  Best not to ever go.)  So I've been sticking it out, trying to eat well (*cough* when I'm not eating cheesesteaks or Mexican *cough*), just waiting for the gym to come back. 

I suggested to Aaron that he go Paleo with  me, so we can get back on a healthy track of eating, and he says I'M READY.  LET'S DO IT. 

Eeeee!

So I did some menu planning for the next couple of weeks (we will have to start on June 1st as I have already done my shopping and menu planning for this week) and I will be making some new recipes that I'm excited about.  Mmm food. 

Speaking of food - I have three (yes three) Instagram accounts now.  @sasmstr is my personal account; @thesasmstrcooks is my food accounts; and @sasmstrphotography is my duh photography account.  I have gotten tons of love on my photography account.  It makes me really happy.

But anyway.  So yeah.  I will be incorporating some lessons I learned from the last time I went Paleo - I am going to allow myself 1-2 cheat meals per week.  If I restrict myself too much and then cheat, I go way overboard.  So allowing myself 1-2 meals per week where it doesn't matter what I eat will definitely help.  I will also be making things that I can eat for lunch as leftovers, and I will also be doing a fair amount of prepping on the weekends.

And hopefully at some point I can get back in the gym, but until then, I have some workouts I can do at home, and I will just have to keep an eye on my food.  It's exciting to go back to Paleo and have Aaron totally on board.  Nothing compares to the support of your spouse!

Do what you have to do until you can do what you want to do.

For the longest time, I have been feeling as though I'm in limbo. Like I'm not "where I'm supposed to be". Like I'm not "doing what I'm supposed to be doing". 

It leaves me feeling restless and dissatisfied. 

I step back and look at my life and think, this is it? Is this all there is to life? A taxing, stressful job and a little row house in northeast Philadelphia? This is what I've worked so hard for up to this point? My college degree and his skilled trade and our six-figure income only get us this? This is the best we can do for us - for our daughter? This can't be all there is to life. 

Don't get me wrong. I know I'm blessed. I have a beautiful, spirited, amazing daughter, and I have a strong rock of a husband. I have a large, crazy, loud family and my friends are true anchors. I have a job, and my husband has a job, and we have a place to live. I am blessed, and this is not lost on me. 

But there are still areas of my life where frustration and dissatisfaction remain. I need to fix this. 

About a month ago we had a realtor out to give us some input on putting our house on the market. The feedback was discouraging. We would likely have to bring money to the settlement table and essentially pay someone to buy our house. So we made the decision to wait a year and see where we were. We talked about renting the house and moving in with my parents to save money. We talked about renting the house and getting a second mortgage for a new house. We even talked about letting our house go into foreclosure. 

But I really don't want to do any of that. All our plans, put on hold. We were being held hostage by this little row house in northeast Philly. There was no bright future for us. All the options were risky, undesirable, or time-consuming. 

We were hostages. Stuck. 

I drew up a meager budget and savings plan for the next year. If we stuck to it, we'd have over $10k saved to do something next year. Key words: "if we stuck to it". Anyone reading this knows that the middle class struggle is real. The reality would probably be that we'd save nothing at all. 

But yesterday, my rock of a husband called me at work to pitch a solution to me. As he spoke, I could feel the hope rise up into my chest. I saw that light at the end of the tunnel start to flicker into life. For the first time in a long time, my future did not seem so stressful and bleak. There was an end in sight. We hung up the phone and I broke down in tears. The solution he proposed would require him to make a sacrifice, and the fact that this man would make this sacrifice for me, and his daughter, just to get us out and get us started on the path we are supposed to be on... It brought me to my knees. 

So now, my dream is alive again. The light is on at the end of this long and winding tunnel and I am racing towards it. There are so many other things in my life that have become more bearable, knowing that the end is in sight. I really feel like I'm standing on the brink of something big, and my life - the life I am supposed to have - where I am supposed to be - what I am supposed to do - is about to finally come together. 

I can finally see it. And that light is so bright and so beautiful.