Honey, I Shrank the Kids!

For Christmas this year Ron and I decided it was about time for us to get a bedroom suite. We have been married 28 1/2 years and have always had a miss match of odd and end furniture for our bedroom. When we first got married we had a bed that we bought for $65 from his great aunt and it was an "antique" and was what they called a 3/4 bed. It is a little bigger than a full size bed but a little smaller than a queen size bed and you can't find a matress to fit it now days. We had that bed for the first 16 years we were married. How in the world we fit in that bed I have no idea, I know we were smaller but we also had kids that climbed in bed with us if you can imagine. When we moved into our new house in 1995 we bought a waterbed frame from a friend but actually just put a queen matress in it. We had this bed until December of 2007 when we broke down and bought a king size bed with matching night stands, dresser, and chest of drawers.

I think I have died and gone to heaven. After 28 years of marriage I finally had a matching bedroom suite! Half the time I don't even know if Ron is in the bed because there is so much room. After they put the bed together I went up to see it for the first time and was a little bit shocked and all I could say was "Wow! That's a really big bed". Not only was it big because it was a king size bed but it was very, very tall! The bed frame is 12 inches or so off the floor, the box springs is another 10 inches or so and the matress is another 16 inches or so. That is a total of more than 3 feet off the ground. It hits about my waistline and I'm glad that I lost the weight otherwise I'm not sure I could have gotten into my new bed - I almost need a step stool to get into bed. I almost feel like I belong in the movie "Honey, I shrank the kids". I love my new bed - thank you Ron and Merry Christmas to us!

No need to Diet!

I just loved this and had to share it with everyone. I think this answers a lot of questions and a lot of needless diets.

Charge it!

The other day Dawn was cleaning up and Alli wanted something to drink, and for those of you who know Alli you know how persistant she is. Dawn told her to wait until she was done and she would get it then. Well in typical Alli fashion she asked again and said "Mommy I want something to drink" and so Dawn responded in a typical mommy fashion and said "Alli I want a million dollars but I don't have that". Well later that evening Alli got her library card (thinking it was a charge card or something) and took it to her mommy and said "Mommy if I give you a million dollars will you get me a drink?" Now how could you turn that down!

Chip off the old block

For Christmas this year Alli asked Santa Clause for a bowling ball, bag and shoes (among many other things). Every Sunday evening she goes to the bowling alley to watch mommy, daddy, mama, papa, great aunts, great uncle, and some of her cousins bowl in a league. She has wanted to bowl in a league with kids her own age so starting January 5, 2008 she got her wish. Alli and her cousin Nicholas started bowling in the Saturday morning bowling league at Expo Bowl. Dawn and Crystal started bowling in this same league when they were 4 and 5, it is like deja vu. The Saturday morning bowling leagues was actually where Dawn & Adam first met many years ago so I guess it is only fitting that Alli start bowling in them. The first week Alli bowled a 66 and an 88 (Marvin Harrison as she sees it), and Nick bowled a duplicate (64 both games). They use bumpers when they bowl but Dawn & Adam are trying to get Alli to roll the ball without hitting the bumpers (come on mom and dad, she's only 4!). I think we have the future pro bowlers starting out - we'll just have to wait and see.

They sure left a mess after the first ball but that didn't discourage them to keep trying.

How about a high five for that one! Good job!

What a difference 8 months can make

I don't usually like to brag on myself but this time I really have to because I'm very proud of what I have accomplished. It has been 8 months to the day that I joined Weight Watchers. It is probably one of the best decisions I have ever made. I had always said that I didn't like diet food, I didn't want to do WW because I didn't want to count points and I didn't want to have to think to eat. Well I was wrong on all accounts because you don't have to eat diet food, counting points was much easier then I thought, and you do have to think about what you are eating in order to succeed. In many ways it was much easier than I thought and I wish I would have done it long ago. When I joined WW my reasons were to get healthier and lose weight so that I could feel better. I was tired of being tired, and not being able to do some things I use to do and not to mention I didn't want to move up to the size 18 that I needed to wear. I decided to take control of my life and do something about it, so with the encouragement of my friend Tina (who reached her goal in June) I joined WW. Not being mean but being truthful, Dawn & Tina said they never thought I could do it and I was the first to agree with that. I reached my goal on November 7 and then was on maintenance for the next 6 weeks and I reached life time on December 19 - what a great Christmas present! To date I have lost 61 pounds and I was wearing a size 16 (needing to move to size 18) and last week I actually bought a size 4 (in misses)! I would never have thought I could do it and I just want to say thanks to my family and friends who supported me in my efforts. I hate the before pictures but it is what it was and I hope that I don't go back to that - I hope that it truly is a life changing experience for me.




















This picture was taken at Crystal's graduation on May 13, 2007 - 3 days before I joined Weight Watchers.


















This picture was taken this New Years Eve, December 31, 2007 .

Blue Day turned out not so blue

Well I may have more time to post because after yesterdays loss I'm not sure I want to watch football for the rest of the year! It was very disappointing and made me in a very bad mood. However it is amazing how easy that mood can turn around in just a few minutes with the help of a certain little 4 year old girl. Somehow Alli can always make me smile. As many of you know we play a little bit of Texas Hold'Em (okay maybe it is a lot). We usually all chip in $5 and play for the "pizza money". Alli came over before the game and reached in her pocket and pulled out a dollar and said "Mama, I got some money from my piggy bank so that after the game we can play some poker". (Does anyone see this as a problem?) Well even though we were upset after the game we all put in a dollar and played a game of Texas Hold'em, and low and behold Alli won (hey guys it's for the college fund). She was very excited and had so much fun - lets just hope that Dawn & Adam don't get a call from pre-school saying that she has started a lunch time poker game with her classmates!

Family Ties

Sunday was an eventful day for the Dwenger family. My nephew Brian and niece Katie are in the Navy and they were both home at the same time for 2 days so we only had a short time frame to try to get some family pictures taken because we aren't sure when we will all be able to get together again. We had to get 24 people together with work schedules and other events and try to pull together this amazing feat and we actually did it! We all donned our Colts gear for a fun family picture. It was unbelievable that we actually did capture one shot where everyone was looking at the camera. GO COLTS!

Ringing in the new year

We had our annual bunco night for New Years Eve and had 7 tables which meant about 28 people playing. We also had 10 kids 7 years old and under and they were all so good. We had lots of food and had a really good time. Unfortunately we missed the ball dropping because someone tried to change the channel or something so we got it switched just after midnight. We still rang in the New Year.

It's going to be a busy 2008

We had a very good (and busy) Christmas & New Years. As you can see I started to do my blog and already haven't kept up with it but I'm going to try to do better.

Crystal & Todd got engaged on Christmas and we are probably looking at a March 2009 wedding. My niece Jessica also got engaged on Christmas and they are looking at a spring/summer 2009 wedding so we will have a very busy 2009.

The other news we received on Christmas is that I'm going to be a grandma again in July - Crys & Todd. 2008 will be a baby year because Dawn & Adam are due March 6 but we will probably have a baby a couple of weeks before that because they said that they would probably induce around 38 weeks. Our family is growing by leaps and bounds.