One down...

I actually lost a pound this week! Woohoo! I really didn't think I would. I ate donuts this week. Three of them in one day. I don't even know why except that they were there for the taking. My kids ate some of them, so I guess I didn't eat all three myself, but still. I feel like I kind of pigged out this week. I don't know why, I was just really munchy. I have been walking in the mornings this week. I think I would have gained weight if I hadn't been, but apparently, the walks help. Yesterday, I got in a toning session as well. I'm feeling a bit sore today. I guess that's a good sign though, right? It means somethings happening! And apparently the scale agrees. So, one pound down this week, 12 more to go!

Note: sorry no picture. My photographer left before I got him to take one. Really, I don't think I look much different from the last one though.

Pride and Prejudice

I am a relatively new fan of Jane Austen. I had never read any of her books or seen any of the movies until December of 2005 when I went with some friends to see the Kiera Knightly version. That was the beginning of my love for Jane's novels. I think I have now read and/or listened to all of her completed novels. This movie is the reason why. Since reading the book, I've watched the movie over and over. I've seen other versions as well. Long time fans of Pride and Prejudice will probably argue that the BBC version is better and more complete. Well, it is more complete, but that means longer. Much longer. Since I know the story, I don't feel like I'm missing anything when I watch the newer, shorter version. And actually, I think that as a film, the 2005 version is far better. It has more life. The cinamatography is absolutely amazing. It's not instantly stunning, but the more I watch it, the more I appriciate the complexity of each shot. I also love the music. It's so perfect for the film. The acting is faultless as well. It was a wonderful cast who excelled at breathing life into their characters. I don't think anyone could have done a better job on a theatrical release of Pride and Prejudice-at least, not one of the same length. It has become my favorite movie. If you haven't seen it, I recomend it. If you have, I still recomend it!

No change

I weighed myself this morning, and if you can't tell from the title, I still haven't lost or gained anything. The good news of course is that I'm not getting bigger. I bought myself a pair of capris this last week, and was excited to find out that I have dropped two pants sizes! Yay! That's encouraging. I also have started walking in the mornings again. It gives a good start to my day. I do feel better this week than last. Even though the number on the scale hasn't changed, I feel like I've been doing something to improve my health. And since I've been getting up earlier to walk, I've also been going to bed earlier. I feel more rested and more energetic in the morning. Overall, I'm feeling pretty good. I still want to be smaller, but I still feel like I'm heading in the right direction. I've lost all the weight from Renee's pregnancy. I'm still carrying around a large portion of what was left after Leonora was born. I'd like to lose all that, but like I said, I feel like I'm moving in the right direction.

Continued... (see previous post for first installment)

Hello everyone! I'm back, and hopefully blogger is too!
So here are some more of our fabulous tupperware sales!
This cute lunch set is 40% off right now. The water bottle has a compartment in the bottom to stow keys, change, or anything else small that you don't want lost. On sale now for $14.40

35% off our "Expandable Storage Set." It includes an eight cup flat out (smashes flat for storage, pops open for use. Also washes in the dishwasher flat.) and two stuffables. One is eight cups, one four. The stuffable lid is made to expand to fit whatever is in the bowl. Great for when your leftovers are just a little too much to fit.
On sale for $29.25

Here is a great product! They are called Heat and Serves. This set is 25% off right now. See that red dot? Cute, huh? But it's also functional. It's a little vent that automatically opens when there is too much steam preasure inside. These are great for microwaving or freezer storage. They are shaped especially to help microwaved foods to cook more evenly. This set has both a five cup and an eight cup square container.
Sale price $25.88


Okay, those are the sales. Now, I just want to show you a recently released line of products. These are now available at the introductory prices. The soaps and lotions smell wonderful and the microfiber dishcloths are dishwasher safe! That's right, just toss it in with the dishes! Very cool in my opinion. Anyway, here's the flyer:
(Click on the flyer to see a larger copy.)

Another Tuppeware Post

Hey Everyone! I've got some goals I'm trying to reach this month. My deadline is Friday night, so I thought I'd just let you all know about the sales going on right now and a few new products that I'm very excited about! Just so you know, these sales end Friday also, but if you miss out on these, we'll have more next month! :)
There are some great kids toys on sale:

And some other great products (up to 50% off!):
This Modular Mate set is 50% off.
$56.00 with blue or red seals

I have more to show you, but blogger isn't cooperating, so I'll get back to you on the rest!

Hello Chocolate Face

The prospect of no more diapers!

Leonora is showing definate signs of potty-training readiness! This is very exciting! She has been running around without a diaper the last few mornings, and hasn't had any accidents. I'm discovering that she's pretty good about going to the bathroom when she needs to. This is very exciting! If I'm repeating myself, it's just because I'm excited! :D We are getting low on diapers, so yesterday I went ahead and got her some pull ups. Yes, I know, they aren't all that different from diapers, but they have the little pictures that disappear when they get wet. I'm hoping that will encourage her to go to the potty when she's wearing them. She'll go when she's got nothing on, but if she has a diaper on, she just goes in it. I'm hopeful that I'll only have to buy the pull-ups once. Maybe next month for her birthday she'll get big girl panties!

Something I made

Aaron and I went shopping for some nice fake flowers on our date last week. We were lucky and caught the last half hour of the 60% off sale at Micheal's craft store. We picked out a heart shaped wreath and some flowers. On Sunday, I spent a little time putting it all together and later took the wreath to Renee's grave. I thought it looked nice, so I took a picture.

Weigh in

I weighed myself yesterday. I weighed myself again today in case it had changed. It hadn't. Actually, it hasn't changed since last week. Oh, well, at least it isn't going up, right? I'm going to have to work harder if I want more to come off though. I need to exercise. Is that spelled right? I really don't know. Anyway, it's something that I have not been doing consistantly-hardly at all in the last couple of weeks-and I'm going to have to bite the bullet and do it if I want to look and feel better. Eating better has been helping, but I've got quite a ways to go.
Yep, gotta start moving!

Walk through the desert

Leonora and I went for a walk this week. It was HOT! I'm dreading it getting hotter, which of course, it will! Since our walk, we've had a wind storm come through and cool us off. It's been nice. While we were on our walk, I took some pictures of some of our desert flowers that are blooming. When I went to Las Vegas a couple of weeks ago, there were all kinds of flowers blooming along the freeway. It was so pretty! I haven't been able to find quite as much diversity or quantity of flowers here, but here are a few that I found.
This was our first find. It's one of the bushes that grows along the river here. Most of them are just green right now. I love the feathery look of these bushes when they bloom.

We had been walking for a bit, and I was anxious to find more flowers. I saw a few along the top of the hill we were walking around, but none of them were close enough for a good picture. When we got to the other side, we were rewarded with these blosoms.

Here's a closer veiw.

As we walked on some more we found these small purple flowers growing out of the loose "red" dirt hillside. On the road to Las Vegas, there were large patches of purple flowers. I assume they are the same kind.

Here are some cute daisy-ish flowers we found. There's a little purple one in there too!



On our way home, we saw these flowers growing on an outcropping of rock.



I hope you enjoyed our little walk! It's certainly not as lush and green here as a lot of places, but it has it's own beauty. Seeing the desert in bloom is one of those things that reminds me of what a miraculous world we live in.


Note: This was my first attempt at trying edit some of my pictures so you could get a better veiw. A camera with more zoom would be better... hopefully they look okay though.

Aaron is in reading a bedtime story to William. I just got back from driving Leonora to sleep. It's a terrible thing to make a habit. I try to only use it if I'm pretty sure she'll fall asleep quickly. Or as a last resort. Anyway, she hadn't had a nap and had been very clingy all afternoon. I think she's teething again/still. She's also gotten a little spoiled with being sick. She's also almost two. We sat out in the parking lot of the apartments for about 10 minutes to make sure things had calmed down inside. Leonora slept in her carseat, and I sat thinking and listening to the radio.
I realized that tomorrow is Wednesday, and that I've been weighing myself on Wednesdays. (I admit that I'm not looking forward to this week much.) Then I remembered that the last time I posted was my weigh in! Hmmm... I haven't been posting a whole lot lately, have I?
It's not for lack of subject matter. I just have been busy... I think... Hmmm... what have I been busy with? Good question. Then I realized... I've been listening to a book on Aaron's Ipod. Garlic and Saphires: The Secret Life of a Critic in Disguise. It's a memoir of a previous New York Times food critic. She's a fantastic writer. Her descriptions of the food she eats always make my mouth water- well, the ones from good restuarants do anyway! I've been enjoying it.
... It's getting late. I don't know if this post makes much sense. I'm being distracted. I think Aaron needs to go to bed. He's getting strange. I have more to post-some pictures even! but I'll have to get to it tomorrow. :)

Weekly weigh in

Was anyone anxiously waiting to see if I'd lost any weight? :) Well, I did! I lost 4 more pounds! Yay! :) Here are some things I learned this week:

Water is good. When I'm drinking more, I have more energy, and I don't get munchie. I don't crave junk as often when I'm well hydrated.
A little is okay. I've tried not to ban anything completely. I've had chocolate this week. I even had one peice of chocolate cake Saturday. It was really good! The two things I can't seem to go without are chocolate (obviously) and pizza. I don't know why, but I've always had a weakness for pizza.
I heard a few questions that I've been trying to keep in mind when I'm deciding what to eat. Is what I'm puting into my body going to be good for me? Is it going to help me reach my goals? and if not, is it worth it? Gourmet pizza is worth it. Papa Johns comes close. Little Ceasars, not at all! Jelly beans are not worth it, but a piece of dark Dove chocolate (just one!) is.
Portion size is important. I went to Las Vegas with my mom for a Tupperware convention. We were served a delicious lunch! It was set up buffet style, and we were given huge plates! Everything looked great! I picked out what I felt would fall into those questions above. I was a little tempeted by some things, but knew I didn't want to overfill my plate. When we sat down, my mom said, "You didn't get very much!" But I got enough to fill me up without stuffing myself. Then, I felt like it would be okay to get one desert. I watched what everyone else was bringing back from the desert table and made my choice before I went over. I was very pleased with myself for making good decisions! Did I splurge a little, yes. But I didn't binge. I watched most of the people at the table come back with 3, 4, or 5 different deserts after eating a huge plate of food. You know, I wasn't jealous of anything they got that I didn't. I wasn't disappointed about any of my choices. And I didn't feel guilty. The splurge was worth it! This is how I want to live! I feel like that lunch was a milestone. I proved to myself that I can enjoy good food without having to feel bad about it. Yay! :)

Hello, can we all be healthy for 5 minutes!?!?

Leonora is sick... again. Aaron just got over a nasty cough. I've had a slight sniffle (hopefully it's related to all that beautiful spring pollen floating around). Before Aaron's cough set in, Leonora also had a little cold. Nothing serious, but anytime I call the doctor's office with a list of symptoms, they say, "You'd better come in." So, I took her in when she had her little snifflie cold. (It was just a cold.) And again yesterday when she threw up. (Just a flu bug.) And again today, because her fever hasn't gone away. (Hmmm... we don't know what this is. Could you bring in some poop?) My alergies/cold/whatever hasn't been too bad, but William seems to be the only one who continues to avoid whatever case of the sickies seems to be going around. Ironicly, he tells me almost daily that HE is SICK, and needs some kind of special treatment. Hmmmm...

It's Wednesday

Okay, I did weigh myself today, and I'm not terribly excited or surprised. After all, I "cheated" (can you cheat when you're not really on a strict diet?) a few times. We went to a funeral last Thursday, and I stuffed myself with rolls, ham drenched in brown sugar, and "funeral potatoes." Oh, and a piece of chocolate cake. What can I say? It was 4:00 in the afternoon, and I hadn't had anything but a shake up to that point. (It was a good shake too! A berry smoothie (with protien powder) from Emerald City Smoothies. Any of you Seattle types been there? Aaron was excited to see one put in here. Previously, there wasn't any place to get a smoothie that wasn't made with ice cream. Or otherwise loaded with sugar. At least, we hadn't found any place. Anyway, I'm distracting myself.) The point is, I didn't eat all that great. (They also handed out chocolate bars in Relief Society! I couldn't NOT eat it!) On top of not eating as well as I could have, I also didn't exercise much. I went on a short walk yesterday with Leonora, but that was it for the entire week! Pretty terrible if I do say so myself. So, as I said, I was not terribly surprised to see the needle on the scale pointing in exactly the same spot as last week. My not perfectly accurate scale told me 3 consecutive times that I didn't loose anything. Ah, well, "Nothing ventured, nothing gained," as my Grandmother has been known to say. Or in my case, "Nothing ventured, nothing lost."

Bigdog, worlds most advanced quadroped robot

Aaron was watching this video earlier. I can't get over how strange this is! I mean, okay, it's a robot that walks on four legs. Not too weird right? But you have to watch the video. This thing looks man made, but moves like an animal. The combination is what makes it strange. Anyway, watch this clip, I think you'll see what I mean.

Weigh in Wednesday

It's been a week since I last posted about loosing weight, and I'm excited to say, I'm still loosing some! Yay! I've lost another 5 lbs in the last week for a total of 12 lbs! Yay! :) I had a couple of requests for picture last week, so I had Aaron take one of me this morning.

William's favorite video

Spring has sprung!

I'm so excited to be seeing more of this around my apartments!

The Ant and the Grasshopper

Earlier today I recieved this in an email. I don't usually post about politics or related topics, but my in-laws have been visiting (they like to keep up to date and to discuss political issues), and I've been reading The Entreblog, and I like a good discussion. So when I got this in my email, I thought it may make an interesting one.
The email follows:
Subject: The ant and the grasshopper


There are 2 Versions - Read Both

TRADITIONAL VERSION:

The ant works hard in the withering heat all
summer long, building his house and laying up
supplies for the winter.

The grasshopper thinks the ant is a fool and
laughs and dances and plays the summer away.

Come winter, the ant is warm and well fed. The
grasshopper has no food or shelter, so he dies out
in the cold.

MORAL OF THE STORY: Be responsible for yourself!


MODERN VERSION

The ant works hard in the withering heat all summer long,
building his house and laying up
supplies for the winter.

The grasshopper thinks the ant is a fool and
laughs and dances and plays the summer away.

Come winter, the shivering grasshopper calls a
press conference and demands to know why the ant
should be warm and well fed whil e others are cold
and starving.

CBS, NBC , PBS , CNN, and ABC show up to
provide pictures of the shivering grasshopper next
to a video of the ant in his comfortable home with a
table filled with food.

America is stunned by the sharp contrast.

How can this be, that in a country of such
wealth, this poor grasshopper is allowed to suffer
so?

Kermit the Frog appears on Oprah with the
grasshopper, and everybody cries when they sing,
'It's Not Easy Being Green.'

Jesse Jackson stages a demonstration in front
of the ant's house where the news stations film the
group singing, 'We shall overcome.' Jesse then has
the group kneels down to pray to God for the
grasshopper's sake.

Nancy Pelosi , John Kerry & Harry Reid exclaim
in an interview with Larry King that the ant has
gotten rich off the ba ck of the grasshopper, and
they all call for an immediate tax hike on the ant
to make him pay his fair share.

Finally, the EEOC drafts the Economic Equity and
Anti-Grasshopper Act retroactive to the beginning of
the summer! The ant is fined for failing to hire a
proportionate number of green bugs and, having
nothing left to pay his retroactive taxes, his home
is confiscated by the government.

Hillary Clinton gets her old law firm to
represent the grasshopper in a defamation suit
against the ant, and the case is tried before a
panel of federal judges that Bill Clinton appointed
from a list of single-parent welfare recipients.

The ant loses the case.

The story ends as we see the grasshopper
finishing up the last bits of the ant's food while
the government house he is in, w hich just happens to
be the ant's old house, crumbles around him because
he doesn't maintain it.

The ant has disappeared in the snow.

The grasshopper is found dead in a drug related
incident and the house, now abandoned, is taken over
by a gang of spiders who terrorize the once
peaceful neighborhood.


I have to say that I think this is a bit of an exageration, but it did come in the form of an email forward, so I think that's to be expected. However, I do think it illustrates the entitlement attitude that many seem to have. If you notice there's a moral to the first story, but not for the second. If I were to choose one, it would be that Success cannot be given away. However, it can be learned. If we wish for our lives to be different, we should learn to aply the principals of those who have the lives we wish we had. (This is something I'm always working on myself.)
What moral would you give the second story?

Good News!

Leonora had a check up with the doctor today. He said that although the numbers from her most recent blood draw were not perfect, but good enough that he thought it was time to end her antibiotics! Yay!! So, tomorrow she will get her picc line out with the home health nurse, and we will see the doctor again in two weeks to see how she is doing! This is great news for me as well as for her. I don't have to stay up late or wake up early to make sure she gets her dose at the right time. Yay!! More sleep! or at least a choice between staying up or sleeping...