Well folks, I’ve come to a decision.

Yes…?

Okay, fine, if you want to get technical, it’s a decision I’ve made about a trillion times in my life thus far. But that DOES NOT INVALIDATE IT THIS TIME AROUND OKAY?!

I’m listening.

Yep, I’m forrealsies getting back on the weight loss wagon. Cue the groans. I know, I say it a lot. And while I have been doing okay since my post-holiday weigh-in announcement–cooking at home more, making conscientious choices, balancing my plate–I haven’t REALLY sunk back into things, not fully. But that’s all about to change.

I think I’ve mentioned before that I’m a “works best under pressure” kind of gal. Give me generic, non-time specific things to aim for, and I’ll procrastinate for pretty much ever. But give me a deadline? A finite time, an actual goal, a finish line to cross? And I’m so down the rest of the world seems up. Which is why in the past, my weight loss has been most successful when peppered with milestones and goals to hit and surpass. These could be any number of things–something as literal as a 5K race I need to train for, or a little looser. And my next deadline is definitely one of the latter, but it’s a goal that I intend to reach nonetheless.

On May 11th of this year, my big brother is getting married. And because his fiancee is awesome and has excellent taste in friends, I am one of the bridesmaids. On MLK day, we went shopping for our bridesmaid dresses and I found one that I actually think is pretty awesome. It’s flattering, it’s comfortable, and it ACTUALLY has re-wearability potential. Now, I obviously love my brother. We’re pretty close, even as far as siblings go–we live together (own our house together, actually), and we do it without wanting to kill each other on a daily basis (most of the time). And on his wedding day, I want to look as good as possible standing up there next to my future sister-in-law, so that I’m not feeling self-conscious or out of place or awkward about my body. So that I feel nothing but pride and love and admiration (and, sure, a little bit jealous) for the happy couple. So, I did something that you’re totally not supposed to do. I ordered my dress a size too small.

Now, TECHNICALLY, the dress fits. But it doesn’t, uh, fit… good. (The term “back fat” comes to mind.) And in order to make it fit without pinching or pulling or being generally unattractive in the arm/underarm/upperback area (it’s strapless), I know I should drop about 10 libbies. I know that doesn’t sound like a lot, especially not for something that’s 4 months away. Not that tough of a goal to hit, in the grand weight loss scheme of things. But we all know my body doesn’t quite lose weight the way it used to (I guess that’s a good thing though, when you really think about it), and at least this IS a goal. Something concrete to really strive for. And obviously if I end up losing more than that, then great! But I think that 10 pounds is a really good goal for me. It’s attainable and not impossible. It’s finite. It’s definite. And it’s NECESSARY.

So here we are. Starting anew (again). But I know what I have to do this time, and even though I don’t always LIKE the sharing and the accountability and the giving other people license to call me out (I mean, to be fair, who DOES like that?), I AM GOING TO DO IT. And do it right. With the three c-words that have come to be more evil to me than the ACTUAL c-word: calorie counting, cardio, and carb-watching.

Oh, my precious carbs…

Now, the timing of this revelation and remotivation actually came quite fortuitously (or not-fortuitously, depending on your feelings on “last hurrahs”) because I had already made plans with my friends Lara and Sabrina to have a huge baking party at my house this weekend. Full scale, with cupcakes and me getting to try out the new donut pan I got for Christmas and everything. Heh, oops.

But as I said, it worked out quite fortuitously because it definitely gave me the ability to feel like I was going out (of maintenance mode) with a bang. You know, it put a real finality to the maintenance/I-still-say-I’m-trying-to-lose-weight-but-really-I’m-not phase that I’ve been in for the past… year. Made it feel, I dunno, a little more momentous. Which I honestly think will help with my transition back into the thick of things (soon to be the thin of things. Get it? Eh? Ehhhhhh??).

So I made baked apple cinnamon donuts (I’ve decided that the recipe needs some serious tweaking before I can really post it on here, but for those of you who are looking for one, I was making modifications to this Tasty Kitchen recipe) and enjoyed every last delicious morsel of my sugar rush.

And Sabrina made chocolate-banana cupcakes…

… that had TWO delicious layers because she all fancy.

And Lara? Well, she made something out of this cookbook:

So at least I wasn’t the only one stuffing my piehole.

I HAD SEVEN.

Now, you know when I say that this was my “last hurrah,” I don’t really mean that I’m never going to be able to eat cupcakes… or donuts… or dog treats (FINE I TRIED ONE OKAY?!) every again. You know that I am actually pretty against any kind of deprivation-style diet, preferring to plant myself squarely in the realm of moderation (like, you can eat any fracking thing you want, just as long as you keep track of your portions) instead. So I won’t be cutting anything out of my life completely, but I will be monitoring things more carefully. And I’m not going to be able to bake with reckless abandon, or go through my day snacking on this and that, or being like, oh, just let me pop into the fridge to see–oh hey, that looks good!

So you’d all better hope I enjoyed this donut. Well, okay, it’s pretty obvious that I did.

So here we go. I’m launching myself straight into the wild blue yonder… of weight loss… or something… and propelling straight towards that finish line I can just baaaarely see lingering on the horizon. May 11th, 10+ pounds. Allons-y!

(Now, if only I could dream up the same kind of deadline to propel me towards actually getting my crap together with regard to writing book 2, eh?)