Hey Ab!!  I was wondering where you were-- I hadn't heard from you in a while and I was bit concerned.  I'm so sorry you had such a bad headache, sounds absolutely miserable!  But it also sounds like you're doing what you need to do to fix the problem and I'm so glad.  The massages sound awesome and I know a lot of people that swear by chiropracters so if it does you some good, it'll be worth it!

I'm glad to hear about all the good stuff you and Stu are doing, it's awesome!  And I'm seriously impressed that you vacuum daily, although with Emma all over the floor I can understand it.  I'm mostly impressed, however, at how engaged Stu is.  I cannot even express to you how crazy lucky you are!!  I recently had to come up with a list of basic household chores because Zach and Trista are going to be moving in and we're going to have to figure out how to divide things.  It was actually a very good exercise for me because I've been a lot better about doing the things I need to do on a regular basis.  It's just me though, for the most part.  Seth does take out the trash and recycling on Sunday night and sometimes he'll empty the dishwasher during the day, but other than yard work that's about it.  Cleaning, laundry, cooking, cleaning up from cooking and eating, etc... that's all me.  At first it frustrated me, but it's weird how I take pride in "keeping my house" so to speak now.  Sometimes I get annoyed.  For example, last night, I got home from work, changed, went for a run, went downstairs to do some core stuff, then came back up, got the laundry started, and changed the sheets on the bed all before the life insurance guys came at 6:00.  The whole while, Seth was playing xbox.  I wasn't mad about him playing xbox or not helping me clean up, I was mad that he's lost 10 lbs to my 0 while sitting around playing xbox for an hour a day while I'm running around like a maniac!  So unfair!  But then again, if I really stop and think about it, it's my own doing because of the way I've been eating, which brings me to my next bit of good news...

I ATE LIKE A NORMAL, HEALTHY PERSON FOR THE ENTIRE DAY YESTERDAY!!!

Can you even believe it?  I felt so good going to bed knowing that I'd eaten so well all day and even better waking up knowing that rather than "starting over" I could just have another day like the one I did before.  So far, so good... although I see Aimie has filled her dish with Heath bars.  Dang her!  I really think she might be Satan in disguise, she seems so nice, but is she?  issss shheeee???  So my mission for this afternoon is to get out of here without indulging in the candy dish.  Fingers crossed!  So far I have eaten well and I don't feel a craving for candy since I just had a granola bar after lunch.  I'm a little disappointed in this batch, to be honest.  They taste ok, but the texture is no good.  I read on a blog that steel cut oats hold together better in granola bars than rolled oats.  So I bought steel cut oats and tried it.  Not only do they not hold together better, but they're also kind of gritty.  Oh well, you live you learn.

Before I forget!  Chocolate chia seed pudding recipe:

2 Tbsp chia seeds
1/2 cup unsweetened almond milk
1 Tbsp cocoa powder
sweetener (I use 2 packets Truvia)
1/2 tsp vanilla
Mix well (it'll take a minute for the cocoa to really mix in) and let sit on the counter, covered, for approximately 20 minutes.

I never actually pinned the recipe for that pudding... I think because I just wrote it down when I found it and never bothered.  Now I don't know where I got it from, oops.  I guess that's the whole point of Pinterest, huh?  But there it is for you.  It is seriously one of my favorite desserts, healthy or otherwise-- it's just so good.  I've been eating it like every night.

Last night I started a little weight loss jar that I saw on Pinterest (this one I didn't pin because I didn't want to advertise plans for losing weight all over the internet).  I want to lose 18 lbs so that I weigh 150, which I think is a nice reasonable weight for me... especially considering I've been down to 158 lbs before.  So I have these two little jars and in one I put 18 sea shells (it's what I had on hand) and I left the other empty.  Every time I lose a pound I can move a shell from the one jar to the other.  A nice little visual representation of my goal.  I hope it will be anyway.  I can also see myself getting frustrated and smashing the little jars with a hammer.  No weight loss from yesterday to today, still 168, but that's probably a good thing because it's probably not good for me to get the idea in my head that eating well for one day equals a pound of weight loss.  I did get a nice run in yesterday, so even without weight loss I lost some seconds on my mile time.  We didn't have that much time since the insurance guys were coming over so I just went a mile and a half and did my first mile in a little over 9 minutes, which is much faster than I've been going.  I tried to keep the pace up and I certainly felt like I was moving faster than normal.  Yay!

So anyway, I have been crazy swamped at work and I think I may be procrastinating right now because I'm working on some stuff that I really don't want to do.  I am so frustrated with this paper-- I've literally been working on it since I started, so over a year.  I'm caught in between the PI and the biostatistician on the project and just to make it worse, my boss keeps yelling at me for spending too much time on it.  I would definitely have spent less time on it if that were possible, but it's been one disaster after another and I've been mediating a whole bunch of arguments that are, quite frankly, somewhat over my head because they are so statistical in nature... and it takes a lot of work to teach yourself statistics!  I guess I had better get back to it.

Love you!  I'm so glad you're feeling better!  Feel free to send a picture of Emma if you should be so inclined!