First Week on the Diet

First off, I hate calling it a 'Diet'. It has such a negative feel to it. So maybe I'll call it an 'exercise plan' instead. Exercising is part of it. Yes, that's what I'll do.

I jumped on the scale this morning for my weekly weigh-in. This is my first week on the new exercise plan. I didn't think I was going to have anything to report, as I got an error message. I couldn't believe my eyes. I thought "What the .....?" I got off, let it shut itself off and tried a second time. Got the same thing. The scale is digital and apparently needs a new battery. I tried it a 3rd time after my shower and finally got a reading. I am down 2.8 lbs for my first week.

Last night I met up with Anita O. at knit night. We are planning on being partners as we both have a little weight to loose and it is sooo much easier to have a partner. I took my books along that I follow, specifying that she didn't have to follow the same ones. We had a great conversation where she made it clear if this diet book required her to give up her morning coffee with creamer, she just wasn't going to follow it? LOL I assured her she didn't have to. If you have to say "I can never have this again" your not likely to commit to the diet anyway. We are going to report into each other every 2 weeks. Of course if we have stuff to share in the mean time, we will definitely be in contact. Although I forgot to give her my phone number, I will be sending it to her.

On the knitting front, I got all of my stitches picked up around the neckline of my Tomato Sweater. I was a little thrown on how to evenly space them. Talked it over with Kathi at work and realized I had to do the ratio thing. I haven't thought about ratios in almost 20 years. Couldn't really remember how to do it. But since she has high school kids, she reminded me. So here is how I figured it: (not sure if it is the correct way to calculate it, but it came out)

I had 40 stitches to pick up and I have 55 stockinette rows. Divide both numbers by 10 and you get a ratio of 4 to 5.5. So for every 5.5 rows of stockinette, I have to pick up 4 stitches. To make it an even number and easier to fiddle with I multiplied both numbers by 2 to get a ratio of 8 stitches for every 11 rows. Since I'm a visual person, I drew a graph with 11 boxes and played around with where to 'skip' 3 rows that would make it look even. I came up with this: KSKKSKKKSKK Repeat. K= pick up/knit stitch & S=skipped row. It worked perfectly on the first side of the neckline, but I had to fudge it a bit on the second side. Might have been because I was doing this a knit night and trying to do this plus follow several conversations at the same time. I then got 1 row of ribbing done before we had to leave. I'm planning on taking a couple days off from knitting as I am going to a quilting thing this weekend, but I can't wait to get it done and be able to wear it!