MIA

I'm sorry I disappeared.  This week has BEEN NUTS! 
I got a new calling at church which has put stress on me because I feel lost & confused and with all the added time away to be with the young women.  Our presidency meeting the other day was 3 hours!!!  My poor kids were starving for lunch when everyone left and I felt a ton of bricks on my shoulders as to get organized and get things done.  BUT I am very happy and willing to serve.  So far being with the girls teaching them lessons, getting to know them and activities have been worth the added stress. 

So on top of that we have Paparazzi.  This month of February I had 6 parties!  It was nuts.  From getting inventory, organizing, parties, books & phone calls.  It was a lot.  I thought I could handle that many with being a mom & my new calling and ya....NO!  I backed my parties back down to 4/month which seems to be perfect for me.  I love my "job" though.  It's fun having extra money to had Craig a $20 for whatever he wants.  I can't complain.  I get to go ga-ga over cute stuff, talk, eat & make money.  It's always a good break in the day I have parties. 

Craig has been stressed too at work.  In fact, woke up with cold sores today.  That's when you know he's stressed.  The girl that "started" the Oregon office and pushed, pushed, pushed for us to come out and get this office staffed QUIT.  She's going to work in Boise.  Which should be interesting considering she's a VERY liberal person in ALL aspects and has lived in Maine & here her entire life.  That should be interesting.  Anyway, so a lot of stress has been added to Craig & Jeff on getting work & schmoozing clients.  He had a conference last week in Portland for 3 days-goes tomorrow for another one-and in April he'll be gone for 7 days driving from Boise to Montana to Northern Washington visiting clients and trying to get work.  So if you know any one wanting Hydro work LOL    They're kicking strong though back in all their other offices but they want this OR office to be their new 'strong" point.  It's put a lot of pressure for Craig to step up in project management.  I feel bad for him.  He does love his job though.  And K treats our family really good.  I tell him it could be worst and he could just be a "pee-on" in a big firm.  Here he is really stepping up. 

The girls are good.  They are taking the brunt of it all by being deprived sugar  haha   They're my little buddies & always wanting to help mommy.  The other day Jaycee was frustrated at something and says "It's really making me stressed out!"  I laughed, and realized that she really is a sponge to my every action.  This week has calmed down a little bit so I'm hoping to do some fun things for them since last week was rough! 
Jaycee's birthday is next Sunday and she is super excited.  She was looking online tonight with Craig for ideas for her birthday cake.  We get to have a "splurge" day on holidays & birthdays.  You better believe I will enjoy that piece of cake.  She wanted to have a birthday party but then insisted on going to Chuck E Cheese instead.  She's a funny girl.  I'm excited for her this weekend to have a fun time.  Hadi is growing so fast.  She's still tiny and EVERYONE likes to remind me of that.  She is almost 15 months and walking like a champ.  It's so funny cuz her and Jaycee will play and Hadi actually can get "running" pretty fast until she topples over.  It's cute.  She's a 'sassy frass" as we say.  Man, she is spunky!  She screams over everything!  If she's not happy about something, you will know.  I curse Jaycee everyday for teaching her to scream.  Also her thing right now is if she wants something it's mama.  She'll look at her cup and "mama, mama, mama"  food, etc....anything!  It's cute but annoying at the same time.  I wish it were dada. LOL   She says "na-night" and waves (it's adorable), "bye", "dan-do (thank you)", bah (bath), mama, dada, hah (hot), doh (dog), pooh (poop) and jibberish all day long.  She also signs "please", "thank you" "milk" "cracker" "food"
She a cute little monkey girl.  We sure love her. 
Izzy is Izzy.  Digging holes in my rose bushes!  Make my backyard a muddy mess.  Yup, she's Izzy.
Milly is our dream dog that we should've got years ago.  She's really a part of our family is our "other child" 

So there's life in a nutshell lately.  I won't bore you anymore.  I'll post again soon with Jaycee's birthday and more random pictures. 

8 days down and more to come

Well we've made it over a week!  YAY!  It doesn't feel as strange lately but it still makes things a tad harder with everyday life.  Mostly because I make everything from breakfast, lunch and dinner and now snacks.  I don't mind though.  It's fun making new recipes.  We did have a "cheat" day on Sunday.  We were fasting all day and got invited to a family in the ward for dinner.  They knew we were trying this new way of eating and I give them props for making a yummy dinner.  It was funny though because she made enchiladas---they were devine!!!---and after the first bite I could tell instantly that there was sugar in them.  We also had a little brownie for dessert.  I felt guilty for giving into peer pressure but maybe once in a while it's good to "splurge" so I don't give up. 
We've made some real yummy dinners & meals.  From banana/wheat pancakes, to turkey/avacodo sandwiches to a mongolian style with veggies and noodles.  It's been really fun to see that there still is LOTS to eat.  Tonight Craig and I made homemade granola bars & lemon/honey roasted almonds.  Mmmm...
Also I found that I LOVE WINCO!!!  I can find so many things there like coconut oil, coconut milk, fresh peanut butter with no sugar, veggies, bulk nuts of every sort, jam for sandwiches with no sugar added  and all these things for good prices.  I was afraid of that when we started this because I do love Trader Joes but I think it's a bit pricey.  Oh and we started a detox with eating chia seeds & lots of green veggies.  haha. That's a fun time. LOL 
So overall it's been a good week and I'm feeling great.  I have energy.  I wake up rested.  And if you know me well enough I lived on caffeine.  Today is day 8 without and I'm loving this!  The caffeine headache really sucked too!  I'm very impressed with the way the kids have been handling it.  At the store today I was looking for some type of cracker I could give them and shopping takes forever.  I have to look at all the ingredients.  So then Jaycee picks up a box and says "No sugar. right mom?"  Then a lady by us (who was bigger) picks up cookies and Jaycee tells the lady "Those aren't healthy.  They have sugar in them"  Oh I was embarrased!  It was kinda funny though.  I'm glad I'm teaching them good eating habits and to realize what's good for them.  I'm also impressed with Craig.  He is pretty easy to please with most things.  He loses weight pretty fast too.  But he does love his food so I feel bad some of his favorites he can't have anymore so I'm always trying to find recipes for things he'll love so we keep with this for a lifetime. 

So there you go.  No Sugar added can happen!  It's hard I won't lie.  But I know this is better in the long run.

SUGAR, SUGAR, SUGAR

So hopefully you won't hate my blog now because most likely I will talk about more healthy eating. 
Day 1 was actually pretty easy.  Maybe because it was new.  I did go and buy LOTS AND LOTS of veggies.  Craig thought I was going vegan/vegetarian/zen on him because I watched that show at night and text him the next morning my plan and asked if he was on board.  He's very skeptical when it comes to some things but this makes sense to not only me but him.  Going to the store I realized...SUGAR IS IN EVERYTHING!!!  It really is hard to find things that sugar hasn't been added in.  This is going to be a struggle but I will conquer and find good things.  My first quest is jam with no added sugar so the girls can have that for lunch.  Peanut butter is actually a good thing for them and honey has no added sugar but it a natural high sugar food so gotta limit that.  It was pretty fun to see my girls munching on cucumbers with me.  We even had a wheat pasta for dinner with a huge salad---let me clarify; we had a huge salad with a side of pasta for dinner.  hehe.  Craig and I both went to bed feeling great and actually not even hungry at all.

Day 2  Today was a bit harder.  I woke up with a headache.  I wonder if sugar can have that affect as it clearly is addictive like any other thing: caffeine, alcohol, drugs.  I did okay and stuck good on my food until around 3.  I was grouchy!  I wanted to cave in!  Those left over M&M from last week YW sounded so good.  I held out strong and grabbed the banana and enjoyed every bite. I did a lot of research today on articles of why sugar is not good and how to get it OUT!  I also stumbled across an AMAZING BLOG!!!
TheGraciousPantry.com   I was feeling like a lost puppy.  I had the motivation.  I had the information.  I bought the veggies.  Where to go from here?  We had a delicious dinner of fajitas.  Red & green pepper & onion sauted with a TB of EVOO (this is new for us too as we usually DID vegetable oil) spices and chicken.  Then I made my own guacamole-avacodo, lemon juice, seasoning-along with a tad of Kyle's homemade salsa.  All wrapped up in a whole wheat tortilla oh and a side of black beans.  We were shocked we could have such a yummy dinner and not feel deprived.  We went for a 2 mile jog pushing the strollers and I needed a tad of sugar so I had 2 strawberries.  I'm feeling so good right now.

This is going to be a process I'm aware.  We are taking it cold turkey with the sugar and not adding and finding foods without them adding in and cycling with better choices.  I'm hoping to find a recipe for homemade granola bars as the girls love these.  Also I'm working on banana/wheat pancakes for breakfast.  It's going to be an adjustment but from what I've read: give it 2 weeks and you'll realize you CAN have foods just need to add the GOOD ones in.  Also I'm excited for the freedom of not writing calories down.  Eating healthy requires putting good things in, listening to your body and going from there. 

Healthier Living

My body is in a vicious cycle.  

When I got married I weighed in at my lowest of 155.  I exercised all the time but I didn't necessarily "eat" right.  In fact, I was sooo busy with working full time, school & dating my hubby that I didn't eat much at all and when I did it wasn't healthy by any means.  Craig introduced me to the wonderful idea of breakfast, lunch & dinner LOL  I quickly gained 15 pounds.  I got lazy and hardly ever exercised and if I did it was a mile jog maybe 2x a week.  I was still doing school now full time & working until around 11 almost every night and so the idea of being healthy was not in my mind.  I knew I needed to lose these wedding pounds but also knew I would be getting pregnant soon so was looking forward to having an excuse to "be fat" 

With Jaycee I remember weighing in around 175 and when I delivered I was 220! !!!  I had gained 45 pounds!  I tried a little bit to eat good but I couldn't resist the crap.  After she was born and at around 8 weeks old I weighed in at 201.  I did lose 19 with delivering & nursing but still had lots to go.  I started jogging a lot and then added in Biggest Loser work out videos to help tone as well as the cardio.  I got down to 193 and she was 1 year old.  I had the working out part down...but the eating was horrible!  We then moved across country which included a week of eating food on the road and quickly so came 5 pounds!  I was 198 again and Jaycee at this point was 16 months and I knew something needed to change.  I was working out 4 days a week and hard work outs but just wasn't losing weight.  That's when Craig and I went on the journey of eating better.  We cut out hamburger almost completely, lowfat/diet everything, counting calories, whole grain breads & pastas.  Needless to say from July-November I went from 198 to 175.  23 pounds!  We were looking so much better and feeling better to.  BUT THEN it was time to get pregnant again!  I got my IUD taken out in November and the whole "dieting" was getting exhausting.  I reached my pre-baby weight and didn't try for more.  The holidays came & I kept working out so I kept it off but I didn't try for more or to improve my eating habits.  In April I found out I was pregnant with Hadley.

I vowed I wouldn't gain as much and that I would be better.  The beginning was rough thinking I miscarried & told that and remember indulging in cake because it drowned my sorrows.  My weight gain in the beginning was actually really slow & good because I hardly ate because I felt like crap.  I walked, walked, walked!  Probably about 8 miles a week.  Then the 2nd trimester hit.  HOT SUMMER so I hated being out in the heat while walking so that stopped for a bit.  Along came ice cream sandwiches & not healthy stuff.  Then the 3rd trimester and I knew my weight gain would be the same.  At my last appointment the doctor even made a comment that I needed to stop my weight gain. I wish they would've put me on a diet but I was 39 weeks and done!  I did start the walking up again once the weather cooled and that made a huge difference I feel like with labor as I did go natural and was actually not bad at all.  At the end I was walking about 6 miles/week through contractions.  I weighed in at 230 at my last appointment-55 pound weight gain!!!  I knew this would be rough.

Hadi was born right before Christmas and my labor was actually pretty easy with the recovery.  I did eat bad things with the holidays and at 5 weeks I got on the scale.  215.  I had only lost 15 pounds since she was born but knew that batch of toffee I made sure didn't help.  I started working out.  Craig didn't like that since it'd only been 5 weeks but I felt ready to go.  I did try to count calories but with nursing I would get light headed and wasn't worth the fight.  Instead I decided to try really hard to eat better.  Hadi is almost 14 months and I'm proud to say I weigh in at 188.  I've lost 27 pounds in a year and I'm ready for more!

My goal is still 175 for my pre-baby but I'm going to try hard to get down to wedding weight at 155, which still is 20 pounds overweight according to my BMI.  Craig has been a huge support to eat the healthy things and miss the other things I used to buy.  Also I watched a documentary last night on Netflix about eating healthier because there's so much crap that we put into our bodies.  We've already made the switch to whole grain breads & pasta.  Next step is the whole grain wheat & brown jasmine rice.  BUT MOSTLY VEGGIES!!!  We are really bad at those.  We're pretty good at eating carrots & corn but we need more!  We're also good at fruits.  Also today is DAY ONE of no soda!  I probably drink 2 a week so this will be a struggle but it'll be worth it.  Also the top 3 things to help relieve stress (stress causes the body to go into a "famine" mode of storing fat) is more sleep, more exercise (I'm doing 5 days a week now but there's more room for improvement) and more laughter :)    I really know this is a good thing and that it'll help to raise more healthier children and to make us feel happier and better.  I recommend everyone watching that show to learn more.  So here's to 2013 and dropping weight, eating healthier & feeling better.  Also helps that we aren't in a huge hurry to get pregnant so no deadline although my 175 goal is April. 

Everyone can do this!  Let's help each other to feed our bodies what they need!