A Little Peace

Is it sad that I don't mind waiting at the doctor's office because it means a little peace and quiet? Same with the dentist - 45 minutes of reclining in a position where it's impossible for any of my four children can bother me. Now, I do love all my little ragamuffins. But after a week full of crankiness, fevers, snot, barf, arguing, fighting, a nosebleed, all on top of me being sick, I'm glad for a few minutes of serenity while the man is at home with the kids. It won't last. Tonight I'll be back in full mommy mode for "family movie night" complete with popcorn. But for now I'm savoring the sound of the radio, the hum of the a/c, the light chatter of the receptionists. These are such calming noises compared with what I left behind.

Wordless Wednesday

A Morning Run

courtesy of morguefile.com

I went for a run this morning. And when I say morning, I mean morning, as in 7am morning. If you know anything about me, you should know two things. My morning is somewhere between 8am and 9am and is defined by a warm breakfast followed by a hot tea. Not being outside 10 minutes after I've woken up. The other is that I don't run. "I hate running" has always been my motto. If you ever saw me running, you'd know something or someone must be chasing me. So why in the world would I purposely wake up early to go running before starting my day??

The answer is part of my new found love of exercising. See, I've never liked to sweat either. In fact, I hate sweating most of the time. If I'm at the beach, outside for a walk, or exercising, sweating is tolerable. But it's still not my favorite. So for me to love exercising, well this is just a brand new world. But part of the "new me" for 2012 is adopting a healthier lifestyle and we all know healthy and exercise go hand in hand. So I joined a gym and quickly became addicted, er, obsessed...um, dedicated to cardio. The first week or so felt like death, but now I can easily do an hour on the elliptical. So where does the running fit in? Well, part of being healthier is the mental and spiritual side of it, not just physical. I decided that I wanted to challenge myself. To do what I've always thought I couldn't do. And running fits right in. My sister has been asking me to run a 5K with her for years now and I've always shrugged her off as being crazy. You run for fun, just because you want to? Crazy, I say! But now that I feel the need to challenge myself, a 5K sounds doable. We are going to sign up to do the Tampa May Classic 5K on May 5th. That gives us almost 2 months to train and be completely ready. I've looked at some of the Couch25K and know that interval training is the way for me to go. So I'm taking the idea of the C25K, but modifying it to best fit my strength and endurance levels. I'm ready to spend the next 7 weeks training myself to be able to run 3.1 miles without dying. 

So back to this morning's run. I knew I wouldn't make it to the gym today, but I still wanted to get a workout in. Especially considering how many calories I have and will be consuming this weekend. So I set out a few minutes after 7am and ran 2.37 miles in 35 minutes. About a 14 minute mile. Now that may seem slow to some, but let me tell you, it's a huge improvement over the 0 miles I was running a few months ago.

I started writing this yesterday, but didn't get to finish and didn't want to publish it without clarifying that this morning run was on Saturday. I ran again this morning. I still hate it.

My Goofy Girl

Liberty is fascinated with getting in the clean laundry and putting on as many extra layers as she can. At least she's learning to dress herself, right?

Wordless Wednesday

Catching Up

It's been awhile since I've actually blogged anything and I've been making a lot of changes. Since the experience of my juice fast, I've made some lifestyle changes in order to be healthier. I joined a gym and now workout 4-6 times each week. I'm eating a lot better than I was. I've been asked if I'm on a diet or meal plans and the simple answer is no. If I'm truly going to lose weight, keep it off and become a healthier person, I have to make sustainable changes. Starving or depriving myself won't work. So I'm making changes I can live with. I switched from 1% to skim milk and cut my breakfast serving by half. Let me tell you, that was hard because I love my milk! I cut out almost all white bread and have switched to Ezekial 4:9 bread. No more sugary evening snacks! This is a tricky one for me. On the nights that I'm hitting the gym, I come home and have a post-workout snack and am satisfied. But if I don't workout at night, I'll want some kind of dessert-y snack. I did make the switch from ice cream to lowfat frozen yogurt so I can still enjoy a treat every once in awhile. Lunch mainly consists of spinach, avocado, hard-boiled eggs and other veggies. Sometimes in a salad, other times in a quesadilla. Basically, the biggest thing was taking the processed, refined sugary foods that I was eating every day and making them "sometimes foods." Do I still love a good mountain dew? Heck ya! But instead of having one (or four) every day, I'll have one every week or two. Another big thing was taking the time to actually think about why I feel the need to eat something. Planning out special "cheat" times helps keep "impulse" eating at bay. I'm able to tell myself, you don't "need" a dew. You want one because you think it will help you feel less stressed. Instead of giving into the temptation of satisfying my needs with food, I can turn to God with a quiet prayer asking for strength to deal with my daily stresses. Much better choice! 

Liberty playing with my 8 lb. "abs" workout ball

I am now eating to live rather than living to eat. I still feel sad about giving up my old lifestyle. I mean, c'mon, I love to eat! But I spent too many years justifying my habits. And if I'm going to spend hours working my booty off at the gym, I'm sure not going to wreck it all for a few moments of false happiness.

New Beginnings

I've decided to combine my homeschooling and foodie blogs into one blog about me. I want a place I can blog about homeschooling and my food journey, but also about life as a wife and mom, my thoughts on things and pretty much anything in general. I'll post more later, but for now, I've imported all my posts from the other two blogs so everything is still in tact. I welcome you to follow my adventures with life, love and laughter.