Why the blog?

Hi.
I don't know who I think I'm kidding, but I decided to start a blog. I love to write, and I have a lot to write about. Now, what you might think of what I write is a different story. Here's the deal. The title of this blog is "Confessions of a Chubby Newlywed." I created this blog to document my quest to return to the weight I was when I was a senior in high school eight years ago. That was 27 pounds ago. You will never find out what weight I am now, nor what weight I want to be, only that I have 27 pounds to go.
I started the actual diet the beginning of June, when I tried on my wedding dress. Wouldn't you know that thing wouldn't zip up?? It scared the fool out of me, so I went on a diet I titled "Operation Starvation." I put myself on 1200 calories a day and ran 30 minutes every day. I lost 12 pounds in six weeks and looked great in my wedding dress.
However; it was a struggle! Every calorie I took it, I analyzed. If I didn't think it had a good nutritional value in my body; I didn't eat it. My adding skills GREATLY improved; as I had to document EVERYTHING that went in my mouth, add it up, and then subtract that number from 1200. Honestly, in that 6 week period, my outlook on nutrition changed. I look at each calorie as a precious unit of energy that will sustain me. I had to let go of useless calories and embrace the ones that would be beneficial to my body.
Now, I understand that this was a very extreme diet. Many nutritionists think that this is borderline starvation, but I had to be drastic. I had a wedding coming up, which was perfect and beautiful and I'm married to my best friend. I believe in my heart of hearts that MGK would love me at any weight, but I owe it to our marriage to be the healthiest weight possible.
Now that the wedding and honeymoon are over, I will continue the diet. It won't quite be "Operation Starvation." I'm going to slow the loss down a little. I'll be moving myself up to 15oo calories a day, and will continue my 30 minutes of cardio. My goal is to incorporate more types of exercising in my routine; I just love running so much! But I'll do more weight lifting and vary my exercise.
As far as goals go, I expect this to be a long process. If I did it quickly, that would mean the weight would come back just as quickly. I'm doing this so that I can teach myself a new way of looking at food so as to KEEP the weight off. I have some checkpoints though; and here they are:
by Sept. 27th, I hope to have lost another ten pounds. Why this date? Well, that day is important to me for two reasons: it's my husband's birthday and it's my brother and sister in-law's wedding. I want to look my best for their wedding, and for MGK's big 29.
Another checkpoint: by Christmas, I hope to have lost another 7 pounds. The holidays will be super hard; as everyone I know including myself loves to cook all sorts of fattening deliciousness. I'll be researching ways to curb holiday eating, that's for sure!
Finally, the last checkpoint: by Spring Break in March 2009, I will have lost another 10 pounds. That will be the 27 pounds I want to say bye bye to. By the end of this journey, I will have lost a total of 39 pounds. Later I'll go into more detail as to why it's so important to me to get back to that weight, especially as it started out as a panicky scramble to fit into my dress.
So, this is the start of my journey. I don't expect it to be easy, but I am lucky enough to have an awesome support system; my beautiful husband; who loves me just the way I am. :)