10th September 2007 – Day 110

I’ve been starting to get a variety of reactions to my weight loss recently, the most bizarre of which was that ‘I looked weird’ from one of the guys at work. My reaction was ‘Oh thanks!’ and laughed when all the girls in my office piped up with ‘how can you say weird, typical man’. He did a serious amount of back tracking saying he meant weird in a good way, not a bad way. I did say to him this was probably because you’ve only ever known me as big’. I suppose, going by my before & half-way photos, I can see what he means.

Also today, one of the girls in my office, who’s been off sick & then on holiday for the last month said how much I’d changed and that I was looking quite petite now. I was quite amazed as I’ve never been called petite in my life or even thought of myself as a petite person. I suppose though, if I do actually get down to my goal of 9 stone something, going by my Mums frame, I could be quite small. Still can’t get my head round this though.

The weekend was good, although only got out for one of my early morning walks, as Saturday, we went early to the fabulous farm shop to get some meat for Allan to BBQ, and then we took Barney swimming. I can’t actually remember what we did for rest of the day, so it couldn’t have been that exciting, probably just everyday stuff.

Sunday I went on my early morning walk, came back & had my vanilla latte, then we set about the front garden. I was de-weeding the lawn & then went round on my hands & knees getting all the weeds out that were growing against the house & in between the block paving. This took hours as there were so many and I still have a bit more to do in the drive, but its all clear round the house. Then I was spraying weed killer round the house, sweeping up and was really pleased with my efforts and must admit, it looked good, so much better. This morning though the backs of my thighs & bum are really aching.

While I was doing this, Allan cut the grass, then washed both cars, so it was a very productive morning.

After lunch, we went blackberry picking, well tried. Allan drove us up to where he thought there would be loads, but there were no brambles at all, tons & tons of sloe trees, so I know where to get these for making sloe gin. We did a nice bit of off-roading, so when we got home his car didn’t look like it had just been cleaned and then popped up to Barbury Castle to have a quick wander round & let Barney have a good sniff. We did spot loads of elderberries, so have just had a quick look on the internet to see what I can make with these. I found quite a few recipes so may go picking next Sunday.

When we were nearly home, I spotted a whole load of blackberry bushes, teaming with berries, literally a 2 minute walk from Allan’s house. Couldn’t believe it. So as soon as we got home I grabbed my tub and set off to finally pick berries. Got a nice tub full & now, with the ones I picked last week, that are in the freezer, I think I’ve got enough to start making my jams. Can wait, but I’ve never made jam before so hope it turns out OK; otherwise I’ll have to re-think Christmas presents.

Tonight I'm off out walking with my Mum, which I haven't done for a while now since the LL class has changed days, so I'm really looking forward to that.