I have a couple of topics in mind to blog about, but this morning after I spent time responding to comments and e-mails, there wasn’t much time left, so please forgive this random listing. 🙂

I’m trying to be better about responding to people. With most of you with whom I visit back and forth regularly, I don’t necessarily respond to every comment unless there is something specific that needs a response because we do touch base often. But with someone new I do like to visit their blog or send them an e-mail and thank them for stopping by.

Last night I was preparing a stir-fry with chicken, shrimp, and fried rice (and a few stray vegetables). Suddenly I realized that what I had just liberally doused dinner with was Worcestershire sauce rather than soy sauce. The only thing I knew to do was get the soy sauce and douse it even more liberally, hoping it would cover up the Worcestershire sauce taste. I decided not to tell my family and just see if they noticed anything: I figured if I told them the mistake ahead of time, they’d approach it with an “Ewww!” attitude. It must not have been too bad because almost everyone had seconds. Jim did ask me if it was from a mix. 🙂 After they were pretty much done, I told them about it. It did have more of a tang than stir-fry usually does, but it wasn’t horrible. I’m just glad it wasn’t completely ruined.

I wonder if Curtis Stone ever has moments like that. Somehow I doubt it.

In other news….Jesse got a car. A truck, actually. My oldest son says we’ve “gone native” Tennessean. But we’re ok as long as he doesn’t drive it without a shirt — I don’t know how many men I have seen driving trucks without shirts on without their shirts on driving a truck. Weird.

Jeremy is coming to visit next month! 😀

School starts in a couple of weeks. This will be the last year of high school for my last child. Sniff, sniff. 😦

I am definitely ready for cooler weather.

I am not sure how I am going to get exercise in, though. I like to do it before my shower, because, of course, I get sweaty. But with the usual routine I get up at 5 to have devotions, shower, dress, get ready for the day, etc., before school starts. I definitely don’t want to get up any earlier. I suppose I could do the exercise before the shower and have devotions later in the morning. But I do like to have them first before my mind starts going multiple directions. Of course, once Jesse starts driving himself (still working ion getting his full license) I won’t necessarily have to be ready for the day when he leaves school, though I’d like to be in case something’s wrong with a car and I need to run him to school. I’ll figure it out eventually.

Speaking of exercise, I’ve tweaked my routine in a way that is working out better. I had been doing 40 minutes, but on the Biggest Loser Kinect game, sometimes a 40 minute routine ended up being two 20-minute routines repeated. I didn’t like that, particularly if a given routine had a lot of unfavorite exercises anyway. So I cut it back to 30 minutes, and most days I do an additional 10-20 minutes with one of the other videos or games I mentioned or on this game’s “Freeplay” section. That’s working out pretty well. I’m just about to raise the intensity from “Light” to “Moderate.” I’ve been choosing “Moderate” for the Freeplay exercises, and that’s been going ok.

I’ve been disappointed that the weight loss has not been greater. I’ve only lost 8 1/2 lbs. in 7 weeks. But I am getting stronger and increasing stamina. I’m able to do exercises that I couldn’t or could only barely do in the beginning. One day I did the Wimp Aerobics video: a couple of years ago when I was trying to use it, with its segments A-H, I never got past E. This time I did the whole video easily without feeling tired or winded at all. So all this exercise is accomplishing something. Just not the main thing I want it to yet! I have been cutting down in a couple of areas, but I probably need to start keeping track of calories. I just hate to do that because it is so tedious, but it does help.

Well, time to stop rambling and get to the list of things to do. Thanks for stopping by to visit!