Updates, Updates

I'll do this as a bullet point, since it's been soooo long :)

* I found out recently I'm definitely allergic to wheat.  It's something I've known, but it's nice to have the proof.  Also found out I'm possibly allergic to corn, which might be the reason for my chronic hives, which I still have.  Lame, I know.
* We are all set to start homeschooling T this fall.  SOOOO excited!!!  He's excited, too. 
* L is talking up a storm and it is the cutest thing!  He has a sweet little voice and I love to hear him.  Everything is about food, usually.  Go figure.  He's my little piggy.
* T has started soccer and loves it.  He's really good, too.  He's moving up to the intermediate class for his age group.  We might sign L up.  We are going to a free trial class this week to see how he does.
* OBX was AMAZING, as always.  I can't wait to go back in August after my sister's wedding.
*J is enjoying his new job.
* I made it up to running 4 miles, and did it at a 12 minute per mile pace, which is what I need to get my dog when I run the 10 miles.  I felt great on that run!  I did it on the beach.  Bad idea!  I did it barefoot.  SUPER BAD IDEA!!!  I busted my knee and haven't been able to run since.  It's been three weeks and it still hurts if I have it bent for too long.  PLEASE PRAY that nothing serious is going on.  I see a specialist this week.
* J painted my kitchen blue.  I love it.
* The rest of my house is beyond out of control.  We have spent this past weekend rearranging things and organizing.  We have company coming so I'm working hard to get everything in it's place before then.

Ok, that's it for now.  I'll leave you with a picture :-D

Updates, Updates

I realized it's been forever since I've updated this blog.  I've been BUSY!!! 

Children:  The boys are doing great!  T is finally out of his rebellious stage and back to the sweetheart he used to be. Sure, he has his days.  But I don't feel like I'm going to snap every second of every day.  He has also asked Jesus into his heart!!!!  PROUD MOMMA!  I realize he's only 3 and might not understand, but he has a desire to serve Jesus and already has a love for him.  Today he told me he wanted to go to Heaven so he could say "hi" to God.  So sweet.  Little L is also a much happier kiddo these days.  He has the BEST laugh and the BEST smile.  It melts my heart!  He is finally starting to talk more.  He can of course say Momma and Daddy.  He can also say More, Tyler (sort of...), Doggie, and Truck.  He is really trying to say a ton of other things, but I don't understand yet.  He went pee on the potty three times yesterday!!!  How amazing is that?  He hasn't asked to sit at all today and I'm not going to force it, but I still think he's amazing.  He figured out how to climb out of his crib, and has not slept well since...  it's been rough!  He is starting to do better.  It just takes him a while to adjust to new things. 

J:  Hubby got a new...well, sort of new, kind of old...job.  He's back to the old company...well, sort of, again, HA!...  The old company was bought out by a new company, but they kept a lot of the people he worked with.  They all love J and wanted him back, so they made him an offer we couldn't refuse.  Leaving Lockheed was scary for me.  I was comfortable with them and felt like they would always take care of J.  J is much happier at this job, and overall, it was a smooth transition.

Walk with God: My devotionals are hit or miss these days.  I don't go to the Bible study anymore, either.  I need to do better with that! 

House: Another area I need to improve...big time....

Health and Fitness: This is probably the area with the biggest improvement.  My wonderful sister and I joined a gym.  Then my mom joined.  Then I started taking classes.  A friend from church convinced me to go to the bootcamp class with her.  It's HARD but I am so happy I've started going.  My muscles ache after, but I feel like I leave there with a good workout.  I've started meeting weekly with a friend who is a nutritionist.  She's trying desperately to help me feed my family healthier meals.  I feel bad because I'm not the best student, but I'm definitely trying!  I'm also running, again.  J gave me until the end of the year to go 10 miles in 2 hours for my dog, and by golly, I'm doing it!  I'm up to 3 miles at 11:30, but I can also run a mile (single mile...) under 10 minutes now!  Woop Woop!

Ok, that's it for the update, I will try to start blogging more regularly again  :)  Good Night, all!

Caramel Apple Pork Chops

I made the caramel apple pork chops last night.  J's comment when he walked in to door?  "You'll find a way to add sugar to anything!"  It was so good, though!  Definitely worth a try!   HERE is the link if you want to give it a try.  Don't forget to read some of the comments to see what other people recommend doing.  For example, a lot of people recommend doubling the sauce.  The boys even loved this meal! 

Stacy and I tried Zumba today.  It was fun!  Tomorrow will be the second time I step on the scale at the gym.  I don't think I've lost weight yet, but hopefully I haven't gained any!  I walk past the scale every time I leave the locker room and it's been very hard not to step on it and take a peek at my progress.  I don't think it would be good to weigh myself all the time, though.  I will allow it once a week, but not more than that.  And I am making myself promise not to be upset if it doesn't show any change for the first month or so.  It took more than a week to put it on, it will take more than a week to get it off. 

Personal nightmare, I mean trainer :)

My gym gave me one free session with a personal trainer.  I was really nervous about going, but excited too.  I can now understand why people spend so much money on meeting with them every week!  I learned how to use a lot of the equipment and it was motivating because I didn't want to embarrass myself in front of him.  I felt like I HAD to work hard instead of giving it a half effort.  I don't normal give it a half effort, but I tried harder than normal.  I learned that some of the things I was doing were not correct.  For example, my goal is to burn calories.  I thought it would be best to do the elliptical at a decent pace for 30 minutes instead of burning myself out and then slowing down.  The PT said that if I do the elliptical on intervals, I will actually burn more calories than if I just went at the same pace the whole time.  By a lot.  I used to do 50 RPM with a resistances level set at 6.  He had me doing 70 RPM at level 8 for 2 minutes, and then I was able to slow down and lower the level for a minute, then back up.  Like I said, he also showed me how to use different pieces of equipment.  Not sure how much I'll actually take advantage of that, but I think I'll do some of it.

I've been doing ok with my eating too.  Not great, but not terrible.  I stepped on the scale at my gym and found out that my parents' scale is 5 pounds off.  I weight more than I thought.  Bummer!  Oh well.  Just means I have to work harder.  I'd like to lose about 9-10 lbs before out trip to the beach this summer.  At this point, I am not sure how realistic that is.  But I'll do the best I can.  I feel like 1/2 a lb a week is good for me.  If I am able to do that, I'll be close but not quite there.  I'll be happy with that :)

My family tried a "Green Smoothie" this past weekend for breakfast.  It was pretty good!  It needed more fruit, but that's easy to do.  Even the kids drank it.  Not a lot of it because they had already eaten some cereal, but I think I could get them to have that for breakfast a couple times a week.  For those of you who don't know, a green smoothie is green from spinach.  You can't taste the spinach though.

I've fallen back to just planning our main meal for each day.  With all the other areas I've fallen behind on, I'll let this one slide until I get back on track with everything else.  Our dinners this week are:

Baked Chicken with some yummy seasoning
Chicken Fajitas
Shepherd's Pie
Tacos made with ground turkey
Caramel apple pork chops

Monday's are usually my day to go grocery shopping, but I've got two kids who are acting like they're coming down with something.  J is a wonderful husband and agreed to go for me :)  Hopefully my kids stay healthy.  Maybe they just needed a day to rest from the fun we had this weekend.  That's what I'm hoping, at least!  Did I share what we did this weekend?  We went to a local college basketball game.  It was a lot of fun!  The kids and I didn't see much of the game (we played out where they had other things set up), but we still had a good time.

That's about all for me.  I hope everyone else had a wonderful weekend and is off to a great work week!

Counting Calories

I've started doing something this week that I thought I'd never do... counting calories.  As I've already shared, my sister and I have started exercising more but for some strange reason, I seem to be gaining weight instead of losing it.  In fact, my clothes are actually getting a little snug.  It makes me want to cry, but I'm trusting everything that I've read that says I will start to see results soon.  J has been exercising for a few months now and looks great, but he decided to count calories with me.  It's nice doing this together.  We are using a site called my fitness pal.  We log everything we eat and it tells us how many calories we've had that day.  If we exercise, we get extra calories.  I was really surprised at first as to how many calories I actually eat.  It was a lot more than I thought!  As far as exercising goes, I love my gym!  We (Stacy and I) have been going about 3x a week.  It's not as often as I would like (I want to go 4x), but it's more than before!  We've gone to a Pilate's class and tonight we are trying out Zumba!  I'm also getting my free personal trainer session tomorrow.  Yay!!!  I was really nervous at first but now I'm more excited.

My house work has not been going as well as my diet and exercise.  In fact, I had an unexpected visitor yesterday and was so embarrassed!!!  But, she has kids and understands :)  The house looks a lot better now.  Not going to let THAT happen again!  But I'm still way behind on where I'd like to be. 

The kids are ok.  Sick again, poor guys!  T has some sort of infection.  The dr took a strep test which came back negative.  She said it's possible he had a false negative, or he has some other type of infection.  Either way, he's on antibiotics and feels better.  L has been such a fun little guy lately.  His personality is really developing.  He's much more adventurous and outgoing than I thought he'd be.  After I got over the initial shock of have two climbers, destroyers, and crazy kids, I have been able to enjoy watching them play.  We have lots of tears, broken toys/furniture/gates, and bruises, but they have a blast together. 

Time to get dinner going. Tonight, we are eating Lasagna rolls.  Mmm

Meal ministry

It's been a while since I've shared where God is working in me, so I'm going to take this time to do that :)  J took the boys to his parents' house for a little while and I get a much needed and long overdue break.  With J starting classes and our schedules filled with birthday parties and ministering to others, it's been a long, long time since I've been able to just relax.  Not trying to complain, I feel like God has been working in those areas and it's fun to sit back and see where He's decided to use me.  Before I get into how He's been encouraging me in my attitude, I want to talk about how He's used to me to minister to others.  Remember that Bible study I did last year about letting God use you where you're at?  It was based on the book, You Matter More than you Think.  I felt like God was calling me to do more, but that He has placed me where I am (being a stay at home mom) for a reason and THIS is my ministry, raising my children to be God-honoring and wise men, responsible and selfless.  Still, I felt like I should be doing more, and started praying that I would clearly see the opportunities He has given me.  My sister's a nanny.  The father of the boys she watches recently took a civi job in Afghanistan, leaving behind a wife who doesn't cook and two small boys.  My sister moved in during the work week and takes care of their meals, but the wife still had a LOT on her plate and I wanted to encourage her and let her know I was there if she needed anything.  The best way I could think of was to bring over a meal.  Turns out, the thing she was most stressed out over was cooking dinners for her children (Stacy didn't "move in" till a week later).  I saw this sweet mother the next morning at church and she gave me the biggest hug and was so grateful.  It blessed me to know how much God had used that one little meal to bring her a little bit of peace while she tried to figure out how to be both mom and dad, all while missing her second half.   I did the same thing for a pregnant neighbor who was having some contractions at 22 weeks.  Thankfully she and baby are ok (we are thinking they were simply braxton hicks), but having dinner prepared for her allowed her to stay off her feet and relax.  Not to mention stress over figuring out what to feed her family.  She said that she has been able to use the leftovers for lunches too.  It's amazing how God has used these two little meals to bring peace to two friends who were having rough days.

Ok, I've changed my mind about sharing how God has been working on my attitude.  I want to go relax a little :)  I'll share soon.  Happy Weekend!!!

I miss blogging

Looks like I'm already slacking this year when it comes to blogging.  I have actually been slacking off in a lot of my goals for this year.  My house is a mess.  We only have dinners planned (instead of all meals and snacks).  And I have been yelling at the kids more than I'd like to admit.  But you know what?  Today I will do better.  I have recently found that if I sing "This is the day, this is the day that the Lord has made, that the Lord has made.  I will rejoice, I will rejoice and be glad in it, and be glad in it." every time I start to feel frustrated, it helps me calm down and remember my purpose for this stage of life...to raise my children.  I don't want to just deal with them,  I want to train them to be Godly young men who are responsible, kind, and leaders who walk the path of righteousness.  I need to set a good example for them.  Time to get back on track!

On a side note, the one area I haven't been slacking in is my exercising.  My sweet sister and I joined a gym last week and I love it.  We have gone a few times and tried out our first class this morning.  The boys seem to enjoy it, especially the older two.  Our gym has a huge maze with those tunnels that McDonald's and Chuck E Cheese have.  The difference is that our gym puts those other places to shame.  It's every kid's dream :)  The babies tolerate it.  Before joining the gym, we were doing videos several times a week.  We are determined to get in shape!  Hopefully before bathing suit season :)

On another unrelated note, GREAT NEWS!!!!!!  My sister's boyfriend was deployed on a ship for the past 11 months.  Any deployment is hard.  Really hard.  But her man couldn't call as often as he had expected (she averaged a call once a month), he wasn't able to skype unless he was stopped at a port (in other words, not often).  It was an 11 month nightmare for her, probably worse for him.  BUT HE'S HOME!!!!  Yay!!!!!!!!!  I'm so so so excited! 

Ok, that's all for now :)  Oh, and our meals this week (since I forgot earlier) are chicken tacos, chipotle chicken, lasagna rolls, ham and escalloped potatoes, and pizza casserole.  Mmm...