How it all started...

So I had been thinking for AWHILE I wanted to keep a blog... then I realized I had already started a couple and had to backtrack a few years and find my old Xanga and Blog Spot from old email addresses (which brings me to mention a common trend you will likely see throughout these posts social media is creepy).  It was nostalgic to read all the old posts I had made 5+ years ago, and I also concluded (not surprisingly) that I was not as put-together as I am today.

I started a blog a week or so ago on Tumblr. however I realized instantly Tumblr. is BEYOND my technological experience and I had NO IDEA what I was doing.  Then my friend Jesse posted on her blog and shared it with Facebook and I realized this is where I need to be.  I'm just going to brief what my Tumblr. said (then I'm going to go back and figure out how to delete it...).  I had set a goal this year to lose the 30lbs I gained since I joined the Coast Guard and got married, and I'd love to blame it all on becoming a chef and that when you're happy - you're fat.  After getting fat, I realized this is actually far from the truth...

Kyle got motivated to join the Coast Guard after spending his first year here playing video games waiting for calls from the construction company that they were starting a new job, but due to miserable weather (freezing rain, wind, snow... etc) spent most of his time sitting on the couch waiting for me to come home.  He gained about 50lbs during the process, and collectively, we were fat, and happy... or not.  He spent the next year working at a liquor store and KNEW he needed to do something to start moving forward.  He started running, watching what he ate, I stopped cooking dinner every night and only once a week at home (and limited what we ate to super healthy meals - grilled chicken, ground turkey, whole wheat, steamed veggies... etc), and taking GNC burn 60 and fish oil every day.  He quickly lost 60lbs and got his foot in the door to go to Coast Guard basic training.  I on the other hand had hit a plateau, which I knew I would since I had my thyroid to blame for my slow weight-loss.  I felt defeated and stopped trying, we spent the summer working and playing and I did little-to-no exercising just kept saying, "I can't lose weight", when really I was just lazy and didn't want to work extra hard.

Backtracking a little... we had NOTHING when we moved into our house on Nantucket after getting married - we had responded to an ad in the classifieds that someone was giving away a bunch of free crap (from what I can remember, mattresses, directors' chairs, a dining room table with a chunk missing out of the top of it, a rickety old night stand...etc) so we went and loaded up our truck and filled our house with all this hand-me-down furniture... it was perfect.  I instantly had this instinct I needed to nest egg and went to the dump a couple times and found some fabric, old pictures and frames people were getting rid of, and made our house 'home'.  Over the next couple years we upgraded and re-handed down some of the free furniture and (with the help of some of our family) finally had our OWN nice stuff.  We had also accrued a little debt from buying, traveling, etc. etc.  We sold both our old cars and upgraded those too.

Not to digress, I'm getting to the point... why I am blogging.  We are finally due to transfer off of Nantucket to the "real world".  While we are really excited, it will be a whole new experience for us as a married couple (moving... new distractions outside of this little bubble... new jobs... new house... new friends...). 

Kyle leaves for Coast Guard basic training on Tuesday, two days from today, and graduates in March.  I will get orders to find out where we are going (destination X) by the end of February.  We will move to destination X by mid-June, and he will go to his advanced training school in July.

In the meantime, I decided to take this opportunity for new beginnings and set a couple goals for myself (and us).  While Kyle is in his 8 week training program, I am doing my own bootcamp at home.  By the time he graduates I want to be in the same (or better) physical shape I was in when I graduated basic training (which means losing an additional 20lbs - additional to the 10 I already lost since Thanksgiving - because I decided not to have a New Years resolution and start early).  By the time we transfer I want to get rid of 3/4 (if not all - but I'm being realistic) of the current debt we have.  ALSO - we want to travel, haven't decided where yet but by 2014... so we're saving for that.

We have also made a collaborative decision to kick our 20's in the ass and have the BEST time we can and settle in our 30s.  A lot of people want to know when we're having kids, etc. etc.  we decided "no cupcakes or children"...