Week Two I called the doctor to figure out how to not lose more weight on my diet (does this not sound right?). Turns out if you only eat fruits and vegetables you're gonna lose some weight. I ended up adding more calories with hummus and rice cakes for some snacks and more protein. Now I've added a few pounds back.

My mom, the kids and I headed to the suburbs of Portland to see my Grandpa. (I couldn't resist adding the photo of the kids playing with Gramps.)

I packed a cooler in the car and ate from there when the rest of the family was eating at fast food places or mini-marts. You know, road trip food. For our dinners we ate at Heidi's, a fake chalet. I was able to order salad without the croutons or cheese. What a sorry situation, but I am proud to say the only cheat was the Scooby Doo orange sherbet push up pop I ate in an emergency on the car ride back up. Seriously, it was an emergency.

The day after the roadtrip we went to Andy's parent's house for a few meals. I passed up a homemade blackberry pie. How do I have so much will power? I ended the week not happy about dieting but I was feeling so good that I knew I had to keep going. I hit the PCC hard on Sunday so I wouldn't feel deprived for Week 3.

Karsten fell in love on our camping trip -- with my best friend's older daughter, Geneva. With Geneva in 5th grade, and Karsten in 1st the romance seems an unlikely match. But this did not stop Karsten from serenading her* over the campfire and writing her love letters. I don't think she was able to read his hand writing, but he told me one note said, "Meet me by the old stumpy tree after dark." Brenda and Geneva seem to be treating the crush with nonchalance.

My little guy is growing up! I shopped for size 8 clothes for him for the Back to School shopping which means he is not even in the little kid department anymore.

DIY

Britta is growing up too. One of my favorite things about this summer was the ability to yell at the kids, "Do it yourself!"

She'll yell from her room, "Mommy, I need some water!" I yell back, "get it yourself!" My new favorite words.

She and Karsten are so good at playing together now too. They can entertain themselves with stuffed animals for a good hour or two at a time.

This should be the best summer ever if it weren't for the...

Pain

There has been a shadow cast over our what should have been stellar summer. The man has been in constant back pain. Diagnosis: ruptured disk. The steroids had no effect whatsoever and now we're waiting impatiently for one of the many doctors Andy has seen this summer to cut him open and fix his back. I want the Fun Andy back, and more selfishly I want him to be able to stay awake and help out with the household.

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* Karsten also improvised a song about the chicken bomb (my mom's rooster timer for her kitchen) and a cat.

What Karsten ate for dinner: Chicken with the green curry and peas scraped off. And drowning in ketchup.

I would have taken better "before" shots had I seen the meal bastardization coming. I should have guessed.

Me: We should have one of these as a summer guest cottage and moor it on a buoy off of our house. Our friends would love to stay in something like this. They'd have to take the rowboat to get to it.

Andy: We'd have to have a motor on it. Wait, this should be what our cabana should be like on the inside.

Then he Andy started drawing plans for a fancy new cabana.

We won't be doing either of these ideas any time soon, but it is fun to think about it.

There are more amazing photos here but the site appears to be in Swedish (my guess).

Today I discovered a neighbor made a Lupe memorial for her window. So sweet.
. Lupe went on walks with her and her dog all the time.

Jerry, the publisher of the local paper gave him a nice write up in the Highline Times. Thank you Jerry!

And yesterday we got in the mail a notice that Linda Plein, another Lupe fan (and a neighbor I am assuming!) made a donation in his name to the Washington State University Veterinary School. I plan to upload a photo of him to the site soon. I have some great photos of him I want to scan in first (like the one LB gave me from the professional photographer). Awesome idea! We were so touched. I didn't know that was possible.

Ursula made a Flickr slideshow of some classic Lupe shots. She even got a shot of him in the jail break costume the neighbors put on him for Halloween. Watching the video of him with the cone on his head made me cry. Here it is:

Here he is on a snowy day wearing one of the coats that Margi bought him.

See all the photos here.

All of these gestures make us so happy. We still look around for him in his favorite spots. Andy said he thought he saw him the other day when he saw some yellowish beach grass near the road that looked like his fur. Karsten is really sad about Lupe, and Britta keeps telling everyone that our dog has died.

Lupe is a dog that won't be forgotten! We miss our yellow dog.

Not so bad, huh? Fancy flank steak from the PCC (best flank steak ever), blanched green beans with olive oil and garlic. Green leaf lettuce with spicy pumpkin seeds and apples with an apple cider vinegar dressing. Notice the lone glass of wine though.

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As I type this blog post my stomach is wrapped in castor oil, a sheet, towel, plastic bag and heating pad -- as I sip diluted apple cider vinegar and chase down some supplements. I just finished my skin brushing to stimulate the lymph nodes. Doctor's orders!

If you've been reading my blog for a while you probably know this hasn't been the healthiest year for me. Around June I took action and made an appointment with a naturopath to see about getting myself a new immune system. And to get rid of the migraines and skin issues.

The naturopath has me on a 30 day diet to kick my liver back in action (which she thinks probably isn't working as well as it should be.) The diet is called the anti-inflammatory diet. I should have been concerned when she said, "just how far are you willing to go to get healthy?" The diet is mainly this:

no alcohol (notice how I list this first. Bearing bookclub without wine was a true test.)
no wheat or gluten
no dairy
no corn, potatoes, tomatoes or citrus fruit
no sugar
no dried fruit
no shellfish
no caffeine
eat 2 T of ground flax seed every day
eat pumpkin seeds and sunflower seeds
drink diluted organic apple cider vinegar before meals
eat one green meal a day (like a salad or steamed vegetables)
get 20 minutes of sunshine a day
stretch every day
no limit on how much I eat
everything must be organic. Any meat must be grass fed.
Lots of weird supplements multiple times a day, some with food, some without.
7-8 hours of sleep every night
laugh every day
don't eat the same thing more than 4x a week
No ice water, only room temperature or warmer. Water should be fancy water but I can't remember what. I'm cheating on the fancy water part.
No liquids with meals. I am supposed to only drink water or green tea for the next 6 weeks.

Yep, pretty much everything I eat is on the list to exclude. As Andy said, "there is nothing worth living for with that diet." I was reminded of a Mark Twain anecdote of a woman who tells her doctor, "I don't drink, smoke, or swear but I feel terrible." The doctor replies, "Lady, you're like a sinking ship with nothing to throw overboard." (I am paraphrasing because I can't remember the quote exactly.

That's me, the sinking ship with nothing to throw overboard. Salt is my new vice for the next 21 days.

Let me know if you can see my bones sticking out. I'm trying to eat enough so I don't look gaunt. As a side effect of my weird diet even Andy is looking too thin. Hopefully some coconut milk I bought today will fatten us up. I tried dieting years ago but just ended up getting fatter. With this diet that will not be a concern.

Wish the whole family luck! Everyone gets to suffer along with me on this one.

This little video went around the design alias at work yesterday and then Kyle emailed it to me too. Scary funny stuff.

Sadly the reason I enjoyed my weekend so much was because Andy has a ruptured disk in his back. My extroverted husband wanted to stay home, sleep and pop pain pills (which means the man is really, really hurting). But it also makes me realize that I need to make sure I finagle my way out more often once he is back to Fun Andy.

Thursday we kicked it off with a fancy lunch at the Seattle Tennis Club to watch the Blue Angels. Laura Beth invited us.

Friday night was the Lupe Memorial Celebration and it was done up right. Almost 60 people were there to share wine and Lupe stories. I didn't know everyone there, which is quite the tribute to the Luper. It was just the type of party Lupe loved, with lots of treats. (See all the photos here.)

After the party I stayed around the fire with Laura Beth, Scott and Denise to continue the memorializing and wine drinking.

Saturday was Heidi's pony birthday party. The kids were in heaven! (See all 117 photos here.)

And then Saturday night I went on up to help finish up the ice cream at the B-Town Scoop. It was Ashley's last night of scooping --and my weekend of gorging before I start my Insane Diet.

Sunday was the perfect way to wrap up the weekend. We watched Elvis in Blue Hawaii and roasted s'mores with Movie Club on the beach. (More photos here.)

Well he has been one for almost two weeks now but I just doctored up this photo in picnik to make it blog worthy.

What a cutie! The cake and smile on face say it all.

Here is what the kids had for dinner tonight: Garden Pasta with Spinach Pesto (disguised with marinara from a jar.)

I'm going to start taking pictures of my disguised meals and put them in a cookbook using either Blurb or Tastebook and call it Good with Ketchup. I think a collection of our family-friendly recipes disguised in ketchup would make nice gifts for my friends having babies.

At my current rate of getting things done, the estimated completion date for this project is 2020!

BB guns. Sling shots. Panning for gold. First aid training. Egg drop. Camp songs. Skits.

BOY STUFF.

I have a very happy cub scout on my hands!

Wow, even the graffiti gangstas are remembering my dog. At first my blood started to boil when I saw the graffiti but then I realized it was a memorial for my dog. My heart warmed, and I cried for a second time today.

We held Lupe's head on our lap and said our good byes. The kids brought him toys and pillows. Karsten made him a sign.

I realized I had not seen the smile on his face (my dog always smiled) nor the wag in his tail in a long, long time. Amazingly he woke up every morning and headed on his rounds up and down the street. Sometimes he fell over and couldn't get up, but he always managed... until today.

I'll forever remember Lupe as doing things his way. Like giving the Dog Catcher hell. Wrestling with a raccoon or two in our front yard. Killing the neighbor's rooster and plucking a chicken. Breaking out of so many layers of fences. Going commando down the side of our house with broken ribs and a cone on his head. All of his trips to the liquor store in White Center. Following all the kids to school and meeting them at the bus stop. Breaking into the neighbors' houses to sleep at the foot of their bed. Getting car sick all the way to Mexico.... and then puking up steak and us wondering where he was getting better food than we were eating.

Good bye Lupe! We will forever miss the dog we called ours but really belonged to the hood.

More Lupe here.

We're planning a celebration of Lupe's life maybe next week. Andy wants to make it a bring a bottle of wine and your favorite Lupe story.