Fitness Friday - Summer Edition

(daffodils in my front yard that have decided summer is already here)

(cue light and airy music with chirping birds) (In cheesy announcer voice) Ahh, the sweet days of summer. How we enjoy the warm air, singing birds, blooming flowers, and buzzing bees. Notice the smiles on all the faces, and (cue "Psycho" shower scene music) cellulite on the thighs of the fat and thin alike!!!! Run for cover! The cellulite is taking over!

Well, that pretty much sums up how I feel about summer. Oh, and it's really, really hot. Obviously summer isn't my favorite time of year. However, whether I like it or not, it is just around the corner. So when Brenda made this week's topic to be how we are preparing for summer, I cringed. But I shouldn't, because this year I actually am preparing for summer physically. Remember my goal about having sandal ready feet? I am faithfully working on it, and have kept my toenails painted ever since then (which my husband really likes!). I am also eating healthier and losing weight, which will help with the "I cannot stand the way I look in this outfit" syndrome that always accompanies summer. And as for swimsuits...I feel that they are a necessary evil. I have a modest one piece suit that I wear with shorts. I used to be able to get through an entire summer without wearing one, which was fine with me; but now that I have kids who want to swim but cannot do it alone, my suit is a necessary part of my wardrobe. I should probably actually spend the money to get a decent suit that I like this year, because it does make a difference to wear something that I feel good in.

As for the rest of my goals, I am making slow progress. The last few weeks have been tough as far as exercise because my kids and I have been sick. I am still on antibiotics and now the baby has RSV and bronchiolitis, so I'm pretty worn out. Hopefully I will get more rest as Andrew recovers and get back into my workout schedule. Even so, I lost another pound this week. I am very pleased with that. I am slowly making the transition to more nourishing foods for my whole family. Any of you who have tried to change your kid's diet know it can be tricky, but they are responding well. So far, we have eliminated cold cereal at breakfasts and replaced it with eggs, oatmeal, and toast (not all at the same breakfast). This sticks with them so much better, isn't loaded with sugar and refined grains, and has so many more nutrients. I have also not replaced some of the sugary snack items as we have finished them up. So far, so good!


For more Fitness Friday posts, check out the links at Brenda's site!

Finally

I just finished making a fabulous gift for a wonderful friend who just had a precious baby girl. What? Oh, my...OH, MY! It's been how long? ::sigh:: That's why I am on my hands and knees with my face to the ground pleading, "Please, PLEASE forgive me my neglect, my beloved friend. For I am tired and addled of brain...or something like that, showing that my brain no longer functions as it once did and is all scrambled up." :o)

But look, here's a sneak peak bit of proof:

This picture includes the part from my mom, too. They'll be arriving together - in two to three business days!



I hope you love the gift, even if it is a bit tardy in coming sweet Jo!

We're Three for Three

Sometimes it is good to be three for three. As in, "When it comes to getting the winning lottery ticket, I'm three for three!" Now that would be cool - of course you have to play to win...but I digress. I am three for three in something no one wants to be. As in, "When it comes to having my babies get RSV and bronchiolitis, I'm three for three." Ugh. Andrew started wheezing last night, and I just knew. Sure enough, the doctor confirmed it this morning. On the bright side, his ears are no longer infected!

Alphabet Books

Mom and I realized recently that Rachel is going to start reading this coming September when we start the next school year. How'd you like my alliteration? Pretty darn good, eh? Anyway, we better get a move on with her letters then. She's slow to admit she's learning. I thought she was color blind for the longest time because she was so slow to learn her colors. She's just now really getting a good grasp on them. I think she knew the colors, but liked the attention that NOT knowing got her, so she would pretend she didn't know for a long time. I found this website that has little alphabet books. You color the coloring page and the little "stickers" and then make a book, staple it together and then paste the stickers in the book. I spend the whole time whispering the letter and the sound that it makes in her ear. Then we read a big book after she's done with the alphabet book and she has to find 5 big letters and 5 little letters and for every letter she gets a penny. So at the end of the day she gets her dime and puts it in her piggy bank. Very motivating for Rachel. She likes it because of all the attention she get (poor middle child) and she really enjoys getting the coin and depositing it in the bank.

An Interesting Lunch

What do you serve your kids for lunch when you realize that you are out of almost everything lunch-worthy? Why Banana Dogs, that's what!

Now don't look at me like you've never wanted to eat a banana in a hot dog bun smeared with peanut butter and topped with chocolate chips! You know you have! :o) The kids loved it. They couldn't stop smiling while they ate it.

I hope they enjoyed it, too, because another thing this lunch did was help get rid of yet some more preservative filled food. I am currently ridding my pantry. It is going to be a sad day for my kids when it is all gone, but I am tired of feeding my family things that aren't actually nourishing their bodies. I have dabbled on and off for the last four years with organic foods, whole foods, and basically eating in a way that nourishes our bodies instead of just filling us up. I cannot afford to go totally organic, nor do I think one has to in order to be healthy. But I have done a lot of research lately and what I am finding is motivating me to make small changes. I'll be writing more about this later, but one place I have been doing a lot of reading is the blog The Nourishing Gourmet. There's some really interesting stuff there. One change I have already made is adding some coconut oil and coconut products back into my diet. I used to do this, and stopped for some reason which I cannot now remember. I already am noticing some benefits. Read a bit about it here.

Here We Go Again

You know that movie "You've Got Mail"? At the very beginning Kathleen Kelly writes to Just-Call-Me-Joe that she's read Pride and Prejudice about 200 times, at least once a year. I nearly jumped off the couch the first time I saw that movie because that's me. I watch the A&E version at least a dozen times a year and read the book at least once but more likely two or three times a year. And then Kathleen says that she's always in suspense about whether Mr. Darcy and Elizabeth Bennet will ever really get together in the end. THAT'S ME!!! I know they do, but I'm always in suspense. I *really* like this book. Plus it's got the best opening line in the world!!!

There it is with my latest sewing project and my empty hot chocolate mug and my lens cap.

Cookies for Cheaters

I think it is way too funny that my first post after my Fitness Friday post in which I admit that my greatest struggle right now is with chocolate is a post about making chocolate cookies! :) But, you know, sometimes you need to make cookies. The day we made these, I actually needed to make cookies. I read If You Give a Mouse a Cookie with my younger son, so we needed to make cookies for school that day. I purposely chose to read that on a Wednesday, too, so that we would make the cookies on the day that we have our church small group over to our house so that they could eat them and expand their hips.

Anyway....I have to give credit for this cookie recipe to my sister-in-law, Stephanie. When I was visiting her in Houston a couple weeks ago, she pulled out a cake mix to make cookies for the ice-cream sandwiches she was letting the kids make. (She's the cool aunt.) Perhaps I've been living under a rock, but I have never seen cookies made with a cake mix before! But it is a great recipe! It is fast, easy, and only has three ingredients. Oh, yeah, it is really tasty, too!

All you need to make these cookies is:

• one cake mix, any flavor
• one stick of butter, softened
• two eggs

Mix all these together, then drop in spoonfuls on a cookie sheet and bake for 10-12 minutes at 350 degrees. That's right, couldn't be easier! That's why I feel like I am cheating when I make these cookies. And just look at the results:

For my cookies, I used a dark chocolate cake mix and then mixed in one bag of Andies Mint chips. My, my, were they good. I was good and only ate two of them, for which my hips thank me!