Zachary (I notice that's how you sign your sigs so maybe you prefer it to Zach?),
I think you're on the right path. Let me throw out some advice, but remember it's worth what you paid for it.
I'm pretty early in my weight-loss regimen but I've found two points that were tough to overcome:
1) When I started a year ago I had to go on faith that I was getting in shape, losing weight and getting stronger. What I mean is that it was hard for me to get out and ride (once the newness had worn off in a couple weeks) knowing that I was getting worn out ride after ride at 13 MPH average over 15 miles while my friend who has been riding for a decade was easily able to go 50 miles at 18 MPH. It seemed like week after week, month after month I didn't improve my distance or speed and it would have been easy to chuck the whole thing and go back to sitting on the couch watching TV. But you know what? I was improving. I look back on those first few months and realize that getting sore and tired was just part of building up my base conditioning. After 5 months I was able to do 30 miles at 14 MPH and now I'm up to 50 mile rides at 15 1/2 MPH. The key here is that it happens slowly. So slowly, in fact, that you don't notice it happening. Have faith that if you put in the work it will pay off...but it's gonna take some time, so don't give up when you get frustrated, because you will get frustrated!
2) After some amount of time (6 months for me) you'll lose some weight and start to notice improvements in strength and fitness. Don't fall into the trap that I did - coasting along and not paying as much attention to the details as I should have. I basically went from last December until the beginning of May without losing any weight and without significantly improving my fitness. It was just easy to ride the rides I've been doing at the same twice a week frequency. And as for diet, well I was finding myself treating myself to burgers or pizza or whatever way more often. Hey, having one little cookie that my co-worker brought into the office won't hurt, right? Yeah, well it's not the one cookie that's the problem, it's the rationalization that's the problem because it leads to more and more calories and less and less exercise. So, to help me overcome this I've set a reward for when I reach 200 lbs. I'm going to get a new set of wheels for my bike. This keeps me focused on improving. Yeah, it's kind of juvenile and materialistic to have to use bribe like a new set of wheels to get me to do it, but sometimes the overall good of my health and taking care of my wife and dogs for the long run just don't cut it as motivation. Hey, at least I realize my flaws...and can use them in the good fight against weight.
So congratulations on taking the first steps. Hopefully you won't fall into the same two traps of frustration and complacency that I described above but from my year on the forum I can tell you that they are not uncommon traps for people to fall into. Hopefully you'll never need to use this advice and you'll be successful on your weight-loss journey without any hiccups!