Journey to Health

I think it's safe to say I have struggled with my weight my entire adult life. I probably would have struggled with it during my teen years, but I'll be honest...I did drugs. So eating was not a priority to me, therefore the weight stayed off. It wasn't until I became pregnant with my now 12 year old son that the weight started piling on. I did not make healthy eating choices. It was from then on that I started the terrible habit of eating for comfort. I would eat if I was happy. I would eat if I was sad. I would eat if I was confused about a problem. I always thought everything could be solved with food. I self sabotaged. I really wanted to lose weight but deep down I hated myself for the way I looked therefore I punished myself with more food. It was a vicious cycle.

This continued for years. I am now in my early 30's an have finally found myself in a place where I just want to change. I'm tired of feeling the way I do. I know the only way I'm going to be able to change is to end that vicious cycle.

So on New Years Day 2013 I started going to the gym.

I have not gone everyday. But I have gone quite a lot since then. I take Yoga at least once a week and I try to get my cardio in by walking on the treadmill for 30 minutes a day. I am proud to say that just the other day...I actually jogged. I was so excited, I started looking around at the other people at the gym. I just wanted to scream at them "DID YOU SEE WHAT I JUST DID!!!"

I know I have a long road ahead of me. I try not to pay too much attention to that blasted scale. With my thyroid disease, it doesn't want to budge much anyways. So I've been paying attention to how all this exercise is making me feel.

To tell you the truth, at first I hurt. A lot. For a good month or so I was constantly in pain. My muscles hated me. I could hardly walk one day. But I pushed through it. Yes, I am still sore most days. But I FEEL stronger. I can walk to the park with my boys without feeling like I'm going to die when I finally get there. And that's why I'm doing all of this. I want to have a healthier life. I want to be able to play with my boys. I want to give them the mother they deserve. I just wasn't doing that before.

This is the beginning of my journey to a healthier me.

I'm not there...but I'm on my way.

Gun Safety & Target Practice

This morning we went out with 2 other home schooling families to learn about gun safety and to do a little target practice. I had only shot a gun 1 other time in my entire life so I was pretty hesitant to get out there. But I did it, and {SUPRISE} I was actually a pretty good shot!

The Marshmallow Experiment

I have to give credit where credit is due. Matthew found this experiment on Youtube and came to me asking if we could try it on David. 

Obviously I jumped right on that bandwagon!

It starts off kind of rough. I had a hard time trying to explain it to him what he was supposed to do and after watching it I realized I explained it kind of wrong.

But either way the end result is pretty funny. 

If you don't know what the "marshmallow experiment" is I'll explain it briefly before you watch the video.

You take a child, preferably a young child, and you give them a marshmallow. You tell them they can eat this one now or wait 5 minutes and get another marshmallow. 

Train a camera on them, leave and let the fun begin!!

David's Story

While going through my previous posts I found this draft that I had not finished. So I figured I'd go ahead and upload the whole shebang. 

These were taken at the Armory Christmas party last year.

I'm not really sure what I was going for when I put this together.

 I think I remember that I was going to make up a story to go a long with the pictures. 

This last picture cracks me up. I'm pretty sure this started the whole thing.

Moral of the story: Don't mess with this boy while he's eating or he will give you this face. 

Storytime

I used to read to the kids every night before bed. But we have the same books and I really got tired of reading the same ones over and over and over again. (really need to get some new books)

It was then that I remembered we used to do story time with Matthew when he was little because we would giggle at the adorableness that would come out of his mouth. 

So I've started back up this tradition of storytelling with David. 

We usually do the back and forth storytelling. I tell a little bit until he feels like filling in. 

This was his story the other day. 

A:Once upon a time, there was a little boy named...

D: DAVID!!

A: David and his mommy decided to go into the garden to pick some vegetables for a salad!

D: then they found a worm!!

A: yes, they found a worm and David picked it up and the worm crawled all over his arm.

D:  then David climbed on da worm and they flew away!! (makes flying noises)  Then the worm fell out of the sky!! (AAHHHH!!!) And David broke his foot.

A: So then his mommy picked him up and took him to the doctor to get his foot fixed. The End.

D: Awww....Phank you Mommy.

My Lovely Purple Breakfast

Saturday was my birthday. If you remember my last birthday post, I wasn't too  thrilled on becoming a year older. It was not the case this year. I simply did not mind another birthday had snuck up me.

I was pretty bummed when I found out Matt had drill the day of my birthday (Saturday) and even more bummed when I found out he had to spend the entire day and night in Kansas City and wouldn't be back until Sunday afternoon.

He made it better though.

I received a beautiful bouquet of roses.

He also organized a party with our closest friends. It was nice to sit and talk and watch little ones play.

The next day, my birthday, I got up early to drop Matt off at the armory. Somehow during the night I had developed a nasty head cold. So I came home to still sleeping children and put myself back to bed.

At some point I hear the rustling of wakening children and thought for a moment that maybe I should get up and fix them some breakfast. But I really didn't feel good and felt better knowing there was bread and peanut butter in the house. They would have to fend for themselves until I was able to drag myself out of bed.

Much to my surprise, I was awoken to a platter of food being placed next to my head.

Matthew then very timidly said "I wanted to serve you breakfast in bed."

It was so sweet. He had made a cheese omelette and toast. I was a little unsure about the omelette, it was, well...green.

Come to find out he got out the food coloring and attempted to make me a purple omelette. (Purple is my favorite color)

It was all so sweet I almost couldn't stand it.

So aside from a stuffy AND runny nose (how does that happen!?!) and overall icky feeling, my birthday was absolutely PERFECT!

Lesson Learned

Another awesomely funny story brought to you by my dad. Before I tell it, I'll let you know how the telling of this story came about:

A couple of days ago I went into town to run some errands. On the way home I stopped at the gas station to refuel my car. It was windy so I grabbed my jacket and wallet as I was getting out of the car. I paid for my gas and started fueling. I put my wallet on the top of my car while I put my jacket on and told myself not to forgot it was up there. The fuel stopped pumping at 2 dollars in. I knew that I needed more gas than that so I went to adjust the pump. It was at that point that I completely forgot about my wallet. I drove on home completely oblivious that my wallet was still up there. I didn't even realize until I got home that it was gone. Luckily, just yesterday I got a call that my wallet had been found. 

So Matthew was talking to my dad on the phone the other day, telling him how I had lost my wallet. He then produced this story, which we all thought was pretty funny.

One Sunday morning he was leaving to go to church. He had to strap a toddler Amber into the car seat, so he put his bible on top of the car. He then drove off, heading to church. As he was driving down the freeway he looked at his rear view mirror to see paper flying all over the place. Come to find out his bible was still on top of his car, but the pages were coming out one at a time. 

He spread the gospel all over town that morning.

So now I don't feel too bad about my wallet fiasco. Apparently it's pretty common. A friend even told me she once left an entire cake on top of her car. 

But I will never, ever put my wallet on top of my car ever again. Lesson learned.