Happy hump day! Shocker I know, multiple posts! They may or may not be a more frequent thing, but only because I am trying to hold myself accountable for goals, parenting, and other stuff. Here were my goals yesterday: 1. Drink 1 gallon of water 2. Get to bed by 9pm 3. Stay within my eating plan 4. Focus on my words Here is how I did: 1. I did it!!!! 2. Was in bed at 9:30 probably asleep by 10 but I could have slept by 8:30 3. Did pretty good all day long. Slipped a little last night but was still down in weight this morning. 4. Daily struggle - But for the most part did good. Today's Goals: 1. Drink 1 gallon of water 2. Get to bed by 9pm 3. Stay within my eating plan 4. Focus on my words the rest of the day 5. Put into practice some new methods of dealing with an angry little boy So here is what the deal is with my angry little man. Lately he gets really angry when he gets mad, and angry over nothing. What I have been doing is working so I need a new approach. I've been doing a bunch of reading because I honestly hate yelling and I feel like I am spinning my wheels at times. So I am going to really focus on staying calm and giving him his moment and then speaking with him. Also I am going to resort to oils in the air to see if that helps. But I think that what is really going to make the biggest difference is the talk I'm going to have with him tonight and what we will be focusing on over the next few weeks. This morning I noticed when he was upset and angry in the car I didn't say anything and I put a song on the radio by Jeremy Camp. Give me Jesus. After the song had been playing for a minute I could tell that his anger had dissipated. My baby loves Jesus. We prayed and I thought we would have a great day but something else set him off when we got to school (he wasn't listening and I told him I was going to take his sharing home with me because he wasn't listening about it). This resulted in a ten minute tantrum back out in our car. As I drove to work I really got to thinking about what might work with him, something different. As I thought about it I really thought that the best approach with him right now is to focus on his love of Jesus. His love is fierce and he will ask you if you believe in Jesus and tell you why you should and exactly how to get into heaven. I decided that I'm going to ask him if he wants to be a "warrior for Jesus". I printed some color pictures to put up in his room. I'm planning on explaining that when we love Jesus so fierce that sometimes we get attacked and don't even realize it. And that our anger is a result of that attack. And that we have to fight back against the attack by putting on God's armor. I will explain that and explain that prayer will help. But I think I would also like to create a space for him called his war room. This place will be where he can go and have his moment and focus on fighting his battle! I'm not sure that this will work, but I'm willing to try. I think that if this does work it will give him an outlet and a way to battle on his own his anger. I'll let you know how it goes. Anyway I hope you have an amazing day!!! XO

Still sleeping awesome! Just sayin! I am really excited actually about how great I am actually sleeping. I found myself looking forward to going to bed last night so that I could get sleep! Last night we were in bed by 9:30 but my goal tonight is to be in bed by or before 9pm, and if you know me you know that I am a night owl so that is early for me to be in bed. Here is what I am hoping by this extra sleep. I am hoping that it helps me lose weight. Not that sleep makes you lose weight but I have read that extra sleep does assist in weight loss when you are trying to lose weight. Which I am as always. I swear one day I will be happy where I am and stay there. I am also hoping that the extra sleep will help my face... lets face it... it needs help. Ha ha. But seriously, I'm drinking a gallon of water a day to help my weight loss and also to help my skin. Extra sleep can only help my skin look better and more rested. I'm focusing on small goals. Making them and making myself hit them. I think sometimes we set ourselves up for failure by giving ourselves these crazy goals that we just cannot attain. Tuesday Goals: 1. Drink 1 gallon of water 2. Get to bed by 9pm 3. Stay within my eating plan 4. Focus on my words (I failed yesterday, will do better today) Honestly, the words we say really do make a difference. For example yesterday someone annoyed me (someone close to me) and instead of just letting it go like I told myself to I made a remark to that person and it felt good for all of two seconds because that person responded with remarks as well that were in direct effect of what I said. So a situation that could have just gone away by me being the bigger person and keeping my comment to myself turned into something lame because I ignored my better judgment. This will be a struggle daily so I am REALLY REALLY going to be working hard to be better in every situation. At work, at home, and in my daily life. I'm also super excited that I ordered my Young Living oils yesterday. I have heard awesome things about them and am so excited to try them out at home!! I'll let you know what I think after I try them out a few times. I'm hopeful! Anywho, hope you have an amazingly great day!!!! XOXO

So I guess I should start out this post by stating that I am so excited to say that since my last post back in February I started a new job! I am so happy to be doing something I love! I actually wrote the previous post entitled "Change" as a writing sample for my new job. The people are wonderful and I feel like this is going to be something great. The only thing I can honestly say that I am unhappy about is the fact that I completely set aside my goal of getting back into shape and losing the weight that I gained. In fact I gained some more. I am really unhappy about that. I am really hoping that I have the resolve to commit myself back to being where I want to be. My goal for the month of April is to be consistent. Stick to my plan and hopefully see results. I've added a few things into my plan to help me out hopefully. I'll let you know more as I go. I am not doing any craziness, but I would like to see how things progress before I put it out there. I will say I am back on my gallon of water a day. This picture is my new head shot for my new job. I am please with how it turned out! My little buddy broke his arm about a month ago which threw a wrench in our baseball season, but we are hopeful he will get to finish the season. I had my birthday! I was very nice! Got some flowers, dinner and fun! Ok well this is a short post... gotta run get my mom and dad at the airport. But I will keep you posted about the month ahead! But I'll leave you with this sweet pic. XOXO

Change is a tricky thing. Sometimes it's intentional. Sometimes is happens on its own. Sometimes you don't even notice it until you take a breath and say, "wow I didn't even realize". Change can be exciting, but it can also be scary. For me, change has always seemed like something that I didn't really care much for. Not that I spent much time really thinking about it. I like things how they are most of the time and just stay the course. This year though I feel like that is changing for me. How ironic. It's funny how the turn of one year to another can make us reflect on the time that has past and what we want for the future. Life is evolving and changing and I'm ok with that. I want to embrace that. As I look back on the last year and years past I am proud of the things that I have accomplished and the times that I have pulled up my boot straps and pushed through. I think that being a mom changes the way that you look at life and everything that comes your way. Even Easton has gone through change over the last year. Going from his safe and loved Montessori school to public school has been an adjustment. Together we are navigating through this and adapting to the new ways of learning and moving forward. Every day is not easy, but we keep going. I continue to encourage him through his tough days and tell him that I know that he can do it. It’s these things that I say to my son that also encourage me on my hard days. I know that every day is not going to be a cake walk, but I also know that if I just keep on going it will get better. I sit here today happier than I was yesterday. Hopeful that the days ahead are going to be brighter. I have big goals this year. I feel more equipped than ever to achieve them. I was listening to a song the other day and I thought it was just the perfect theme song for me this year. It was I lived by OneRepublic. It’s funny how music can speak to the places that you are in your life. The song talks about taking chances, not looking back, doing it all and living. This is exactly how I see the year ahead for me. The whole idea of just going full steam ahead and reaching out for my goals, making positive changes, growing and watching the old fall away excites me. The awesome part about all of this is that I don’t think I have been this excited about where I am before. Good things are in store this year. I feel it. I was talking with a co-worker the other day and he was telling me about something that he and his daughters do every year. They pick a word to represent their year. A word that will be their theme for the year. I told him that I have done the same before. But what was different about what they do than what I have done is that they also pick a word that they want to get rid of. A word symbolic of what they are leaving behind. I loved this idea. For 2015 I really have two words that I feel are the essence of who I am and what I want the theme of my year to be. Obviously, CHANGE but also INSPIRE. I want the positive changes that I make to be inspiring. Inspiring for me, but also inspiring for others. I cannot even put the words together to explain the anticipation that I feel for the future. I can only describe it as the feeling that you feel when you first meet someone and you feel that excitement and anxiety all at the same time. All the good butterfly feelings. I feel butterfly’s for the next chapter. I am happy. Then there is the word that I leave behind this year. I really had to think on this and decide what I wanted to let go of. The one thing that really stuck out for me was settling. I don’t want to settle anymore. I don’t want to settle for half of my dreams coming true, for being ok with just being ok. I will not settle in 2015. Big things are ahead. I feel it. I am on the verge of greatness. I am excited and I know at the end of this year I will be able to say I lived!

I absolutely hate when I get off track! And how sad is it that I got off track in week 3??!!! I have no good excuse, I hit that time of the month, but seriously if that is what is going to derail me... Bottom line is I didn't stick to my plan and I didn't keep my promises. However, I really am committed to losing this weight. I want to wear leggings this winter, I want to feel good about myself! Surprisingly at the request of my 6 year old we went to the gym last night. I did a decent ab workout, with some dead lifts and squats thrown in. I work with two different trainers (when I work out with a trainer) Crazy that in the last two days I have spoken with both. One at the gym last night and the other one contacted me, ha ha probably because he knows I've already paid him for 5 training sessions and haven't seen him in months. (insert scared face here) I told Anthony (my main trainer) last night that I had really just lost my motivation. I still am struggling to get back in the gym and to work out. Last year when I felt and looked my best I was working out 3 to 5 days a week. So here is my plan... eat right and get in my water (i have sucked at that the last week) and get into the gym. I made two training appointments and would like to try to jump into the boxing class my gym offers. There is basically a week and a half left of the diet bet so I need to get on it. I'll let you know how the weekend goes! My fingers are crossed! But so far so good today!

Ok so here is the run down, Friday through Monday. Since I'm covering four days I will not go over everything that I ate, because honestly its not crazy important. I will tell you the facts about those four days though. I've been at this now for a week, I'm down 5.2lbs. I weighed in this morning at 144.4. I am completely ok with that. I focused all week on eating lots of protein, veggies, and not many carbs. My main focus was getting in a gallon (or as close as I could get in) of water a day. I did VERY good at this during the week, and by week I mean Monday through Friday. For some reason I just have a harder time getting in my water durning the weekends. Probably because I'm running around and it just is not as handy. Food wise I did really really good. I ate exactly how I wanted. I had one cheat meal on Friday night and it was so yummy! Calazone from our local pizza place. I'll be honest, I jump on my scale almost every single day. I'm just one of those people. I plan on changing that a little through this process. Part of the reason I do it is so I can see how each day shook out, but honestly you really should only hit that scale once a week. I know this, and like I said I plan on sticking to that more throughout this process. I will still jump on it, but maybe not every.single.day. I can tell you that Friday I weighed 143. something, (right now I can't remember if it was 2 or 4) and on Saturday morning after my Calazone I weighed 145. I was not discouraged by this at all. Here is why, first off I enjoyed my dinner! Second, if I limit myself forever I will never stick to anything. I know this about myself. And lastly, I knew that I planned on eating good the rest of the weekend, and I did. I packed in lots of protein and veggies/salads. I was super proud of myself by the end of the weekend, they have always been the hardest for me! We headed down to the beach on Saturday and stayed until heading to work/school yesterday. We had such a nice weekend trying to escape the heat. 104 at my house all weekend! The beach was great. We rode our bikes there on Saturday, 8 miles round trip. So I was happy I got a little exercise in! I do plan on doing more of that, the exercise thing....but the heat here has been almost unbearable. I will do it!________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________ So this week I am going to be setting some small goals for myself. I started reading Choose more lose more for life by Chris Powell, and I will be starting the carb cycling soon. I would like to read a little more so I can't say for sure whether it will be sometime this week or next but soon. In the meantime I will be sticking with my protein cuz it works for me. One thing I read that I really liked was making goals/promises to yourself that are within reach. Not huge or vague ones that are untainable. I'm not going to say I'm going to lose 40 pounds or that I'm going to go to the gym every single day. It is not something that will ever happen and then I've just set myself up for defeat. He talks about SMART goals... Specific Measurable Achievable Relevant Time-Bound, this makes a ton of sense to me. So while I'm still getting further into the book I plan on setting some SMART goals for this week. I actually will also be setting some daily goals as well and I will keep you posted on how I do. I plan on starting each day with a promise to myself! I'm holding myself accountable through this blog even if I'm the only one who reads it. Ha ha... So here are the first of my SMART goals... __________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________ Today's promise to myself____ I will do something ACTIVE!________________________________________________ *****This weeks goals/promises***** 1. NO soda this week (yikes, I love me some diet dr. pepper) 2. Exercise at least 3 times this week 3. Be at 136 by October 7th - that equals out to 2.8 down per week 4. Get in my gallon of water (even on the weekend) 5. Goal weight for 9/23 (next Tuesday) 141.6 Here's to a great week!!! XOXO

Oh day 4 how i love you!! Ha ha just kidding. It was just an average day. I'm gonna keep it short and sweet, and lets be honest...I'm the only one reading these posts so you (figuratively speaking) really don't mind if all i tell you is what I ate yesterday and what I weighed in at this morning. So here goes... I weighed in at 143.4, I am down 6.2lbs. since Monday. I feel good, less bloaty and contrary to what you may think I am not hungry at all. Yesterday I had a protein shake for breakfast, talapia and Kale salad for lunch, and hand full of dark chocolate covered blueberries in the afternoon to cure my sweet craving, and I had green chili fajitas for dinner (this was beef fajitas, green chili's, jack cheese and salsa, so yummy) I drank just about the full gallon yesterday, plus one Trenta Green Tea from Starbucks! Quicly I will say that my protein shake is 8oz. fat free milk (I used to use almond milk, but regular milk has more protein), PB2 (powdered peanut butter), honey, and ice. It tastes amazing!!! It tastes like a bit o honey candy, so yummy! My talapia is Gortons, easy peazy! 80 calories for each piece and I just pop it in the toaster oven at work. So today is Friday which means you will most likely not get a post from me until Monday. I am going to work really hard at staying on track, but typically how the weekends go for me is this... I don't get all my water in (i'm lame) and its way easier to cheat on food. I will try my hardest to be consistent. That is my theme word for this little endevor, consistant! I'll let you know how it goes! Also, this weekend I will finally be getting some exersize so yay me! Talk soon! XOXO

Ok, so I will start with where i landed on the scale this morning. I was at 144.4! Down 5.2 as of today. Again, I feel like i have to emphasize that I know that this is going to slow WAY down. I'd drinking almost all of my water ( I was a little short yesterday, but I picked up the boy from school, got him a quick dinner took him to church, headed to back to school night, hit the grocery store, Starbucks for and Iceed Green Tea, picked up the boy from Church and arrived at home by 9pm) So I missed a little water, but not much! Here is what I ate: 1. Eggs, low fat mozzerella cheese, apseragus, tomato scramble 2. Salad, gyros, chicken (2 squares of pita) 3. Handful of Almonds 4. Handful of dark chocolate covered blueberries 5. 1 cup of coffee with sugar free vanilla creamer, 1 diet dr. pepper, 1 green tea I know, I need to eat more food. I'm working on it. All of the water this week has made me feel pretty full! Yesterday there were cupcakes at work... I didn't eat any. Win for me! I was extremely tired yesterday and got woke up in the middle of the night. So I'm tired today. I feel like tonight is my night for an amazing nights sleep though! I definitely feel less bloated. You figure, I'm a carb o'holic and I was pretty bloated so that 5.2 and water are making me feel a little better. This weekend I am planning on getting busy with the exercise, so I'm hoping that I have a great week next week too! (In reality though, I'm only expecting 1 or 2 lbs. but I'll be ok with that). Anywho, that is it for today. XOXO

So the top picture is before I went on a little road trip a few weeks ago, I am definitely not happy with the legs or the giant roll when I sit down...hence this journey/challenge :) So day 2 was a good day. I finished all of my water yippie (and I'm off to a great start today! Half gallon down and its only 11am) I jumped on the scale this moring after legit being in the bathroom all day yesterday. And was at 145.4, so I am down 4.2lbs as of today. I am completely aware that is water weight and I'm totally ok with that this week. It will tapper off I know. All the water definetly makes me less hungry which is good because I have sorta become a snacker (grr...) I did not snack yesterday or cheat at all!!! Win for me! You will find as you follow this if anyone ever follows that I don't eat conventional so I just thought I'd tell you up front. Here is what I ate: - 1 Cup of Coffee with sugar free vanilla creamer - stew meat (i cooked in the crockpot on Sunday) and Kale salad (Breakfast) - stew meat and kale salad (lunch) - Protein Shake (dinner) So, was this enough food? Well the portions were big and honestly I wasn't hungry so for yesterday it was enough. As I move into next week i will be adding more food intermittently but my focus this week is getting in my water and lots of protein and low low carbs. Buddy had tball practice so there really was no physical activity yesterday either. I pretty much suck! There you have it. The next time I take a picture on that rock I want to look thinner dang it! For reference these two pictures were clearly around Halloween last year, I believe in these pictures I weighed in about 134. I felt good! I am searching for that again! Until tomorrow... XOXO!

Don't flip out because I have posted for the last three days. Even I have surprised myself! I realized that I did not post Buddy's interview this year so here it is! What you will notice is that Buddy doesn't change much but is a cowboy through and through! 1. What is your favorite color? Black 2. What is your favorite food? Pizza 3. Who is your favorite person ever? My mommy (obviously!!)** 4. What is your favorite show to watch? Cheyenne (Cowboy show) 5. What is your favorite dessert? Ice cream cone ** 6. Who is your best friednd? Max ** 7. What is your favorite thing to do? Dress up as a cowboy 8. What is your favorite song? Ole Red 9. What is your favorite toy? Leggo Cowboy's 10. What is your favorite snack? BBQ Chips 11. What is your favorite thing to eat for lunch? Spagetti 12. What is your favorite thing to wear? Cowboy stuff ** 13. What is your favorite animal? Puppy 14. What is your favorite thing to do outside? Play cowboys 15. What is your favorite cerel? Lucky Charms ** 16. What do you want for dinner on your birthday? Spagetti ** 17. What do you want to be when you grow up? Cowboy with a puppy * 18. What do you take to bed with you? My nanni 19. What is your favorite holiday? Christmas and Halloween ** 20. What do you want more than anything? A puppy ** All of the ** = the same answers as last year! XOXO!!

The nice thing about a blog you seldom post in is that you can post something random and chances are almost no one is going to read it. So why post? Well, I actually plan on posting more. But I want to get back into it by starting with a little challenge for myself. Last year I got really focused on my weight and working out. I was working out with a fit group and really liked the results that I was seeing. I hit my goal weight just before Christmas of 129lbs. That made my year! So much so that I'm sure I treated my self to something yummy! On top of that yummy treat, my job slowed down and I had to cut out my workouts with my group, add in a holiday and you have a recipe for disaster :( So, now here we are 9 months later and guess what. I weigh what I did when I started my weightloss a year and a half ago. I'm so sad. And I've honestly not been super motivated. We do lots of hikes but eating a lot and not working out regularly have killed me. So, that being said I am going to start over. Today I weighed in to do Mama Laughlin's diet bet it runs until October 6th. I don't want to have a huge goal other than the 4% you have to lose in that time to win. So by October 6th I need to be at 143.6, I'll let you do the math ha ha! Here is the reality: I guess it could be worse, but then it would take twice as long to fix. So, my plan is to do my diet bet but also to hold myself accountable I will post everyday to update my blog and myself as to my progress. Hopefully this will help me. So each day I plan to write, good or bad what occurred the day before. What I did activity wise, and food wise. Starting tomorrow I will be shooting for drinking a gallon of water a day. (i've done this before and it is totally doable) I'm also going to be doing a cleanse So I guess I should tell you (ha ha as of right now there really is no you) to stay tuned. I'm hoping to have this miraculous transformation. I'm going to label this little journer #fit2fab so if you find this somewhere sometime you can follow the whole thing by searching that label! See ya soon! xoxo

So in my never ending quest to better myself I am going to be doing a month long better me experiment. This month will include trying to better me all around. I'll post updates weekly so you can see if you care my progress. I’m already dieting (let’s get real, when am I not dieting, I’m doing Jenny Craig so I am expecting good results), and going to the gym regularly. In addition to these I will also be trying out some suppliments to see if they change my overall health. I will be taking 2000mg of Evening Primrose oil per day, and calcium cuz’ my mom told me I have to. I will be washing my hair with shampoo and baking soda (1 part shampoo 2 parts baking soda, I’m actually really excited to see if this makes a difference). Drinking all the water I’m supposed to. Whitening my teeth with baking soda and hydrogen peroxide (via pinterest) and doing a bible study. Whew I think its gonna be a busy month!

I hate resolutions. I have every intention of keeping them I work really hard at them for about 4...hours and then I think maybe tomorrow. Needless to say, I have not lost the 10lbs. I wanted to for the last four years. I was not as crafty as I wanted to be, although I must say I did a couple kick butt things this year, and even surprised myself at how my vision for my cookie exchange desserts came out. Its really no fun to get halfway through the year and be discouraged because you didn't stick with your dumb resolutions. Last year my theme was "New". I did take this theme seriously. I got a "New" hair cut. A new job. I tried lots of new things. I thought my "New" theme worked out pretty well. A theme is much better than resolutions in my opinion. This year I would like to do something completely different. My theme for this year is "Inspire". I feel like there have been so many sad events over the last few months. People that I love are hurting and I feel at a loss in how to help them. I truly feel like God has put it on my heart to do something. Is this something new, no. I have felt this for about the last two years. But I have pushed it aside and not done anything about it. I think part of this years theme is that I want to inspire others, but also inspire myself. I still have a lot that I want to accomplish this year,and of course I'll list those things shortly but really I want this year to be about others. Hopefully I will look back at the end of 2013 and be pleased with this years theme. I don't have any details about how this theme will unfold, but I ask that you would please be patient and follow along and I am hopeful that it will be "inspiring"! Along with my whole inspire theme, I would really like to accomplish a few things. No these are not resolutions but they are things that I would be excited to get some of them done and checked off my list. It would make me happy! So here is my list of things I'd like to accomplish: 1. Hit my goal weight 2. Start and stick to a budget 3. Save money 4. Have more date nights with Little Joe 5. Do at least 2 large scale "craft like" projects that i have on my list 6. Couch to 5K (dang, I just put that in writing) 7. Do at least 2 bible studies 8. Really listen to what God is telling me 9. Blog more! 10. Be more positive in 2013 11. Have the bulk of my Christmas shopping done by October Each of these things can be accomplished. I just need to do it. What I plan on doing is a running list. This is the beginning with 11 things. As I check them off I'll add another. I may also add them as I think of them, but this is a start. I will try to hold myself accountable here :) I hope that you will follow along with my "inspire" theme. Let me know what you think. Anywho, two posts in two days. Already working on one of the things on my checklist! We'll see what happens tomorrow! xoxo