A New Year

This morning my friend and I talked about positive thinking. She has continued to tell herself she can't lose weight and she is always going to be the weight she is at now. For the New Year she wants to break that thought process. I told her I had the same thought 2 months ago, and now I'm 10 lbs lighter and I feel great. I don't count calories and I'm not hungry. We went to McCormick's for our anniversary. I had stuffed lobster, which was stuffed with shrimp, scallops, and more lobster. It was amazing. I don't eat this way every day, it was a special occasion. Many of us start the New Year out saying we will exercise and eat healthy. But by the end of January, most people stop going to the gym and go back to their regular eating habits. Why is that? I know for me it is usually the Super Bowl. I love super bowl food, potato skins, mozzarella sticks, chips & dip, and beer. You just have to figure out what works for you. If you can eat healthy all week and take Sundays off, try it. Eventually the days you go crazy and eat the "bad" stuff, you will feel it and not want to anymore. Exercising, be realistic what works with your schedule. If its really important to you, make it a priority. When you eat healthy you don't have to exercise as much. Make small goals like 3 days a week. And do something you enjoy, if you dread every time you go to the gym eventually you will stop going. For me its classes at the gym, I really enjoy them and I go for the entire hour because its a class. If I was out in the gym by myself I'd leave after 30 minutes. Another reason I believe we stop doing both is because we don't see results fast enough. I know I'm in that category as well. Take a before picture and save it. After a month take another picture and compare the 2. Its hard to see progress when we see ourselves every day. Its a New Year, anything is possible if you believe it.

The Secret

Today is my 18th anniversary with the pilot.  Anytime I tell people how long we've been married inevitably I get asked "What's your secret?" I've given different answers to this question, one being separate bathrooms, another being laughter. But there truly is one answer which I will share at the end of this. I don't ever give people advice on their relationships because I truly feel that every relationship is unique. I just know what has worked for us. Early on I learned to not say things I will regret. I believe that their are  certain things you can't take back. I may have to calm down first before I talk about why I'm upset but I'd rather do that than say something hurtful. I've joked with the pilot that at times when I'm mad I would say "So when is your next trip? And when can I drop you off at the airport". Its funny if I'm joking but not if I'm serious. I still tell the pilot thank you for things I appreciate. He took my car the other day to wash it and buy me flowers. When he cooks dinner, I tell him thank you. I want him to know that I am thankful for those thoughtful gestures.  Every time we talk on the phone before we hang up we say "love you". The days he is on a trip we talk everyday and text. I don't ever feel like he is too far away. We got married at a very young age (19 & 20) and really we were still teenagers. Early on it was a lot of learning about each other and growing up. I love that we grew up together and built our lives to what it is today. He is my best friend and when I said I do I knew we had become one. When I thought about what the real secret was to our happy marriage the answer is respect. (And a hot husband ;-)

Friday Folder

This is something my son made at school this week. I have no idea what it is and he doesn't either. I asked if it was a bowl and he said "yeah, its a bowl thing". Now my question is how long do I have to keep it?? The better item he made was a cute ornament for the tree that has snowmen on it. Now that is a keeper. Every Friday he comes home with a folder filled with drawings and his work from school. I have to say I hate clutter, if I could I would just throw it all away. But once in a while my heart melts over something he drew. The digital age solution for us is to scan the picture and save it on the computer. Then I don't feel as guilty about throwing it away. I have to admit I've been caught on several occasions by D-boy and yet I have not learned my lesson. He will look in the trash and say "Mommy, why is this in here?" I have started throwing things away in our trash outside so he doesn't see it. Its not that I'm not sentimental but did you read about how we get this folder EVERY Friday. That is a lot of Fridays over one school year. It all started in preschool when they would send home the things he made. We do hang some of his stuff up on the fridge. Right now I have a drawing of flowers he drew for me. See sometimes I just have to keep it and when I look over it reminds me just how lucky I am to have such a sweet boy.

Christmas Traditions

I've really been in the Christmas mood the last couple weeks. Lots of Christmas music and an overload of Soy Eggnog is probably helping with that. One of my favorite gifts was from my best friend, it was a Santa ornament that had a scroll inside. The scroll was to record that year looking back and looking forward to the next year. The best part is we've continued to write each year on a piece of paper what we did that year and what we look forward to in the new year. We've done it for about the last 10 years. I love that every time we put up the Christmas tree we get to read all of them. Looking forward to 2013 we are planning a family trip to Hawaii. The pilot and I went before we had D-boy and I think it would be so amazing to take our son with us. He is at that fun age that he will enjoy it and remember the adventure. Although I will try not to remember that Chuck E Cheese was the best day of his life. Since a trip to Chuck E Cheese is ALOT cheaper than a trip to Hawaii. When he had a chance to draw his favorite thing he did in the summer, it was the park down the street. Ok, lets not focus on those things. I loved when we went to Maui and I know D-boy will enjoy it as well. This last year the big event for me was quitting my job to become a stay at home mom / desperate  housewife. It was one of the best decisions I ever made. Without a job I've truly had to learn who I am as a person and who I want to be. I had a couple rough months at first but now I'm thankful I can stay home to take care of my family. Enjoy the season and some of your own favorite traditions.

Santa Claus is coming to town

When I was 5 years old I told all the neighbor kids that Santa Claus was not real. That didn't go over so well with the neighborhood parents. My parents raised us on the bible and I knew Christmas was about the birth of Jesus Christ. I still believe that but when my son was born I had to think was I going to let him believe in Santa. The pilot said he wanted to let D-boy have Santa in his life but I wasn't so sure. I definitely didn't want him to ruin it for other kids that believed in Santa like I did. The bad part is the dilemma for me is that I don't want D-boy to believe Santa gets him expensive gifts. I am making this about me as usual, I don't want Santa to take credit for a gift that I spent money on. So last year Santa got D-boy a truck (the price was probably $10 or less). This year Santa has "bought" D-boy an angry bird from space stuffed animal. Again this was only $9.99 at Costco. D-boy started to make a book about Christmas and the first thing he wanted to write was that Christmas was all about presents. Not a good way to start, I told him Christmas was about the birth of Jesus and about giving. I love that he repeats this to others now, because they think "Wow, this kid has great parents". Of course I've left out that originally he said presents. This year we are celebrating on the 24th since that is when the pilot will be home. A bonus for me and D-boy we get to open our presents a day early. This also means on Sunday we will be making cookies for Santa and the pilot will take a bite of some so D-boy sees "Santa" ate the cookies. It is fun and now I'm not regretting that we decided to let Santa be a part of our son's life.

Weight Loss Update

I've been sick for about a week. I haven't exercised but I have continued to eat healthy. I've decided I won't be vegan anymore. Eat to Live is basically vegan for 6 weeks and now I'm past that. I would like to continue to be vegetarian though. Although this week doesn't count cuz I've been eating lots of chicken noodle soup. I tried the "fake" chicken noodle, after one bite I threw the soup away. When I got on the scale this morning I couldn't believe the number, I was thinking the scale was lying. So I got off and got back on. I've lost a total of 11 lbs, I tried on clothes and I'm down one dress size. I guess I thought I would be more excited. I am happy but I'm losing some of the curves I loved about myself, the pilot says its all proportion.  I've been giving away some of my clothes that are too big to my friend. I told her tonight though if I gain the weight back I want my pants back! Its funny that this is what I wanted and all I can think about is when am I going to ruin it. I tend to do that though, it has to do with not having very high expectations of myself. Sometimes its a good thing sometimes it is not.  I have to admit reading the book Eat to Live truly has changed my perspective on food. And the author is smart by having people try it for 6 weeks. It is a lifestyle change. We have saved several hundred dollars by not going out to eat as much as we used to. I'm slowly finding places that we can go that have healthy alternatives that actually taste good. For example Noodles & Co has a great vegetarian med sandwich, Panera Bread has low calorie vegetarian options, and Wahoo's Fish Taco now has tofu. So for now I will put this topic to rest (until I lose another 5 lbs ;-))

All I want for Christmas...

Do you remember when you were younger and you had that one gift you really, really, really wanted for Christmas? December 1st rolled around and you either wrote a letter to Santa or pestered your parents every day until December 25th. D-boy wrote a letter to Santa, he wants a Wii and an Angry Bird from space. I thought the second request was oddly specific. Of course the stuffed animal will be from Santa because their is no way I'm giving Santa credit for an expensive gift that I purchased! Anyway back to the gift I wanted when I was little. I wanted an original cabbage patch doll, one with a birth certificate that told me exactly when my kid was born. And it had to be in a box exactly like the one above. Even if it was a cabbage patch baby I would've been happy with that. Well apparently my parents decided to tell my grandparents to buy me the cabbage patch doll for Christmas. I was so excited and I just knew I would get exactly what I asked for, I'm sure I wanted one with blonde hair. When it was time to open my gift I couldn't wait, the box seemed to be just the right size. However when I opened the box it did not say Cabbage Patch kid, it was a non de script box with a doll inside. My first thought was "What the heck is this????" which of course I did not say out loud. My grandmother had made me a doll that looked like a cabbage patch doll. She had brown hair, a little dress, and no birth certificate. Looking back what I should've said was Thank you very much for making me a beautiful doll. But I didn't, I was sad.
Its funny how things change when you grow up. This year all I want is for the pilot to be home for Christmas, unfortunately he will be working. However, he will be here for Christmas Eve and we will see if D-boy's gift that he really, really, really wants makes it to our house.

Volunteer Fired

Last time I volunteered I joked about being the only volunteer that would actually get fired. I had to do a craft project and I can honestly say I suck at crafts. I did my best but definitely was not proud of my work. I tried to foster puppies but after the first experience we got the puppy we wanted and I quit. I have a good reason though, the organization I was trying to help was completely disorganized. I was told they needed me to take care of 2 puppies, I was given a huge crate and NO other supplies. When I went to pick up the puppies 2 turned into 6. On a Friday morning they asked me to take the puppies to an event at 10 am, when I got there nobody was there. We waited a while and at 11 am somebody finally showed up. They didn't say a word to me and I had to introduce myself and ask who they were. I do want to help but so far the experiences I've had have not been the best. When I was volunteering downtown I got a parking ticket for $25. I have issues with parking, if I can't find a place to park I get angry. I'm not sure why this bothers me so much. And I hate parking tickets even more.
Truly the one consistent volunteer activity I've done that I've enjoyed is going to my son's school for one hour each month. Maybe because I just walk to the school and kids really don't have high expectations. My motto is have low expectations that way you are never disappointed. It probably helps that I don't have to go in until 1:10 in the afternoon. I will continue to search for a volunteer job that fits me. As long as "they" don't have high expectations of me, it'll work out just fine.

Hello Motivation

I'm not sure why I didn't think to do this earlier but I just tried on all my pants I used to wear to work. Guess what?? They are falling off. I thought my jeans were feeling a tad bit big but I didn't realize just how much. This morning I walked a mile before I went to my body pump class. I've been trying to stay away from the scale since I'm sure the pilot might be a little bit upset if he came home and saw that it had been thrown out his bathroom window.  It is very easy for me to quit, in fact I wrote an entire blog about my formula for it, its hard = time to quit. I'm definitely motivated by results, luckily for me the results have happened quicker since I changed my eating habits. I remember about a year ago when I was working out all the time and not seeing the scale move, how easy it was for me to give up. I truly believe whatever change we decide to make in our life good or bad it has to be our choice. I can't force my ideas on anyone else. I know the pilot has been waiting for me to make the choice of eating healthier. We are going out of town next week and I won't be using that as an excuse to eat bad food. I will try even harder because I have worked hard the last 5 weeks and I'm not willing to give all that up. Initially I decided to give up coffee, well that lasted 4 1/2 weeks.  I need to make this a reality of what I'm willing to do for the rest of my life.
What type of change do you want to make in your life and what would motivate you to make it a reality?