It was a good week

Thank God in heaven I'm back home from my eight days in Denver with my in-laws. I'm so tired that I just want to crawl in a hole and sleep for a year.

Don't get me wrong, I had a total blast. My in-laws, all of them, are a lot of fun. They treat me like I'm one of the family. My sister-in-law is like a real sister. We did lots of girl stuff, especially the shopping, which normally I hate but she made it fun and had me laughing my head off.

My father-in-law is a Wii fanatic. Every free moment I had he was challenging me to Guitar Hero (and I still suck), or Wii Fit, where the balance test said I was 63 and he was 41. He's 70. What the hell was that about?! Stupid Wii.

My 21-year old niece is a blast. She's working on her Masters and was home on break. We hung out together a lot and she made me feel like a kid again. She spent five months in Italy on a study program and got back in July so we had lots of pictures and stories to catch up on.

The younger kids that believed in Santa were a blast too, especially on Christmas Eve night when everyone was at the house. Seeing their excitement and hearing what they wanted from Santa was truly magical.

On Christmas day I even caught my husband with a tear in his eye. This is a man who never cries or gets overly emotional about anything. I asked him if everything was okay and as he wiped away the tear he said "I'm just happy to be with my family". On Christmas Day what he wrote in my Christmas card made me cry. The week made me realize what we have is real, and I'm the luckiest girl on earth.

About me staying on plan and exercising. I have say, I did pretty darn good. I passed on the dozens of Christmas cookies my mother-in-law made, including the Russian Tea cookies that I love. I passed on all the gravies that my mother-in-law made at each meal. She makes incredible gravies and sauces, the kind people rave about. I saw how she does it, she uses ALL the pan drippings and often uses whipping cream. No wonder that stuff is so rich and people love it.

My sister-in-law, bless her heart, was really sweet and made sure the gravies and cheese sauces were always on the side. There was always things I could eat, and fresh vegetable and fruit trays were out every day with low-fat dips, mainly for me but other people ate them too.

Of course there was the pecan pie, my favorite with the famous lard pie crust. I had one forkful of pecan pie, and yes, it was heaven on earth. I could have eaten the entire pie by myself.

My husband and I also hit Ballys every morning for five of the eight days. The guy at the front desk at Ballys got to know us. We worked out for an hour each day. I even managed to make it to a spinning class, which was about a 100 times harder than the spinning class at my Ballys here at home.

I had a few alcoholic beverages, maybe three the entire time. My father-in-law is a little heavy handed with the booze so I suspect each drink was a triple (maybe that's why his balance is so good). I usually didn't drink the entire drink, except for the Bloody Mary. He makes the best in the world, and I could have drank several but I didn't. Just one.

I think the week was a success on all levels. I had fun with my in-laws, I stayed on plan and I'm more in love with my husband than ever. I may have lost a pound or two. I'll find out Monday. Even if I stayed the same, I'll still be happy. It was a very good week.