Tis the Season!

It's hard to believe that it's December 23rd already! Only two more days until the big day! I'm so excited, I absolutely LOVE this time of year!!! This year, to go along with my pinterest obsession, I decided to do a {mostly} handmade Christmas! Nearly all of the gifts that we will give to our friends and family this year were made by us! Unfortunately, I can't share pictures just yet of all the things we made - but I will. There is one picture that I can share because the receiver of this gift isn't quite 2 and can't read yet. Yup! I'm talking about Izzy's play kitchen! This kitchen turned EXACTLY like the vision in my head! I'm beyond excited about this gift, I just hope she likes it as much as we do {Aaron's just as in love with it as I am!}.

Here is what we started with, way back in October:

Then we cut the top off, removed all the doors and drawers, sanded the whole thing down and added the back "wall". After a couple of coats of paint this is what it looked like:

{Notice the hole for the sink? I cut it myself! :)}

Next we painted and added the doors for the "appliances" - microwave, refridgerator, oven and dishwasher (every girl needs a dishwasher!).

Finally we added the accents - picture window, lights, curtains (yup, made those too!), and shelves and here's what we got - I'm seriously in love with this thing!

I'm so excited to give it to Izzy! There are so many wonderful things about this gift... it was upcycled and repurposed, it's homemade, it's sturdy, but my favorite part is that Aaron and I made it together and it truly was a joint effort!

If you are curious for a preview of the other gifts that we made this season, check out my "gift ideas" board on pinterest. I will post updated gift and other Christmas photos after Christmas. :)

Merry Christmas to all!

Laundry

I am pretty certain there is nothing that I despise more than laundry. When I sit back and think about it logically, I'm not really sure why I hate it... it doesn't smell too bad (usually), it's not terrible dirty or disgusting. I think the problem is that it is so mundane and NEVER ENDING - that's the kicker, never ending. We have a fairly small household - two parents and one baby, but we consistently have MOUNDING piles of laundry. I like to blame it on my husband - he does wear a lot of clothes, but really it's both of us. The baby's clothes don't count, yet. She has little clothes and they get done separately. While I'm writing this there is one large basket of clean laundry staring at me and I can hear that both the washer and dryer have stoppd (although I'm ignoring the silence) and there are 3-4 more loads lined up ready to go.

I can't decide if it's better to save the laundry and do it all on one weekend day, or do a load or two each night. Usually I decide the weekends is better- better to get it all over with in one day than to prolong the misery.

Oh well.... here I go, off to be the laundry fairy!

Live life the fullest, and don't be stupid.

While driving down the 17 (the road from Flagstaff to Phoenix) we came upon a car in the median that had obviously rolled multiple times. There were no emergency personel on the scene, only a couple of cars had stopped, but we could see a small group of people gathered by the car. I immediately stopped the car and Aaron jumped out to go help, however he could. He could tell that the group was moving very quickly or with much panic. He was pretty sure that the people had died. When he got to the group he realized that the driver AND the passenger were out of the car, walking around and talking. They were fine, not even a scratch. One guy had watched the car pass him going at least 95 miles an hour and then watched the car flip over at least six times. There was no way these people should be alive, let alone walking around. We were shocked. All night we kept saying, "can you believe those people were fine?!" (Clearly they were both in shock, however that is NOTHING compared to how incredibly terrible it could have been.) Aaron stayed with the group for five or ten minutes, then the emergency personel arrived. It was simply amazing.

So the moral of the story? Live every day to fullest, no regrets. And don't be stupid!!!

Bloggers Anonymous

Hi, my name is Megan and I am OBSESSED with blogs!

Everyone in unison: "Hi Megan!" ;)

I seriously LOVE reading other people's blogs. I mostly like blogs about people I know, but even people I don't. Blogging is such a strange thing. It's basically an online public diary and for a nosy girl like me, they're perfect! Reading other people's well written and inspiring blogs makes me want to write my own well written and inspiring blogs. I think ultimately this means that I need to have more kids so that I have more things to write about - right? Seems like a GREAT reason to have more kids, ha!

So speaking of the one fabulous kid that I do have....

Halloween is just around the corner (literally, it's 2 days away!). I don't particularly enjoy Halloween itself, however I do feel like it is the gateway for the rest of the seasonal holidays and I LOVE LOVE LOVE all of the fall/winter holidays! My husband on the other had LOVE LOVE LOVES Halloween - everything about it! He loves scary, spooky and creepy and everything else that goes along with the "holiday" (I hesitate to even call it that). We are of course VERY ready for Halloween, we have the spooky decorations outside, along with my not-so-spooky scarecrow and fall wreath, we have the Halloween advent calendar (a new addition thanks to pinterest) and after a trip to Sam's Club we are full up on candy!! Izzy's costume is all set to go! She's going to be the most adorable little ladybug ever! (I promise there will be a blog post with pictures next week.)

Speaking of Christmas (well sort of...) Aaron and I were able to work on Izzy's play kitchen this morning a bit. It has been fully reinforced and the backing has been added. The next steps are to add doors, shelves, paint and we are o our way! It's quite an undertaking, but I'm so excited about it! I'm still not exactly sure how she's going to be able to reach it, but I'll get there. If you have any ideas let me know! :)

See? This is why my blog posts are not as well written and inspiring - they're so random and all over the place! Oh well...

One last thing, I'm planning to run another half marathon in a little over a month. The Las Vegas half marathon - on the Strip AT NIGHT! Can't wait! Although I should probably start training... hmmmm....

Goodnight!

New Look

Since my obsession with http://www.pinterest.com/ I am pretty enthralled with reading other people's blogs. I love reading random people's crafting and recipe blogs and even more than those, I love reading blogs about people I know! It's such a great way to keep up to date and to document life! So, I noticed that other blogs seemed more happy and upbeat than mine - hence the new color scheme! And also, I'd like to post more often!

So... Izzy's new FAVORITE activity is coloring. All day, "Color?" and "Mommy, color?" It is pretty cute. Although I do get a little nervous, I do NOT want to repaint my house because of crayoned walls. So far *fingers crossed!* she has been very good about keeping her crayons on the paper.

Each new stage is fun and exciting. This particular stage is really fun because she is just now really exploring and learning about her world. It's really fun to watch!

The Pumpkin Farm

Check this out - 2 posts in one week!

On Sunday we went to the Freeman Pumpkin Farm (http://www.azpumpkin.com/). I have been excited about this trip for quite awhile now. We went with our friends Jose and Jill and their two kids. This pumpkin farm was very quaint and authentic - they grow ALL their own pumpkins right there on the farm! There were all sorts of fun actvities for the kiddos!

First, there were the mini-tractors... they were real John Deere tractors! Izzy loved them, although she was too short to reach the pedals, that's why she brought Daddy with her!

There was also a merry-go-round... I was really surprised by how much Izzy liked it! I thought for sure she would be scared. I was wrong, she loved it! (Ok, she's not exactly smiling in this picture, but trust me, she LOVED it!)



Next up, the petting zoo. Every four-legged animal that we saw Izzy said, "Puppy?!" She didn't exactly understand goat, horse, etc. :) I think she liked playing with the goats because they didn't get over excited and run away like puppies tend to do. She was pretty obsessed and she cried when we had to leave. (Doesn't she look like a little person??)

There was also a tiny train:

An a corn maze:

and of course a hay ride:

Another "puppy" as Izzy called it

Last, but certainly not least, we picked out some pumpkins... It was a BIG pumpkin patch, so Izzy hitched a ride:

g

After a long, hard search we finally found two pumpkins to take home! P.s. a lot of the pumpkins were still green because we had an early freeze this year. Don't worry - they will "ripen" and turn orange... so Aaron promises... :) Oh well, it was more about the size anyway!

At the end of the day, we were one exhausted, but VERY happy family!! It was a WONDERFUL day -I just love things like this, can you tell?!

We are ready for Halloween... well mostly! I still need to finish Izzy's costume and we have to CARVE our new pumpkins... but we'll get there! :)





It's officially Fall...

Well apparently my last post was in June which means that I've totally missed the summer. Oh well - it was great an I'm always a little bit sad when it's over. However..... it means that Fall (and more importantly Christmas) is on its way!

I've recently been sucked into pinterest (http://www.pinterest.com/) it is FULL of crafty inspiration and lots of yummy recipes! Despite spending hours upon hours "pinning" ideas to my board, I have actually made a couple of things:

Alphabet Magnet Board for Izzy:

Paper Pumpkin Decorations:

And (possibly my favorite) a Halloween Advent Calendar:

Izzy helped to make yummy (and NOT super terrible for you) pumpkin muffins:

 We are really getting into the holiday spirit around here. My pinterest addiction has led an obsession with DIY play kitchens. So, of course, I am creating one for Izzy for Christmas!!! I'm beyond excited about it!!! Today we picked up the "entertainment center" (appropriately named as I hope it will bring hours of entertainment in the future!) I have been drooling over pictures of these things for weeks now and I just hope ours turns out as cute. My goal is to make it as adorable as possible for as cheap as possible (just for fun!). So the total so far: $25 for the entertainment center and $4 for sand paper. Here is what is looked like:

 Of course I spent all day working on it so it doesn't look like that anymore, although it doesn't look much closer to a kitchen either. I have't decided if I will post progress pictures or make you wait until Christmas to reveal it. (Chances are good I won't be able to wait that long!!) If you've never seen these, you can go to my pinterest page - I have an entire board devoted to DIY play kitchens. (I did realize today that I am going to have to create a matching step stool for my tiny little girl since she won't be able to reach anything yet, but that's okay.... someday she will.)

Tomorrow we are off to the pumpkin farm! Aaron and I are SUPER excited - I'm pretty sure Izzy will be once she gets there! Maybe if I'm really on top of it I will post a blog with pictures about that tomorrow.... I wouldn't hold your breath! :)

Times up - the timer for my 5th and 6th loaf of zucchini bread is going off!

Run, Mama, Run!!

It's been quite some time since I have posted a new blog, which my dear friend Ashley reminds of quite frequently. So I suppose I should update this... :)

One of my original intentions was to use the blog as a way to keep myself accountable during the Body Back program that I participated in back from January through early March. Well that program was fairly successful, however I still wasn't where I wanted to be. So what did I decide to do?

Well, RUN, of course!

I joined "Moms on the Run" - a running group of fabulous women who are out there trying to make themselves the best they can possibly be. When I started this "journey" I had decided I would work towards completing a 10K (about 6 miles). Each Saturday as the runs got longer, I became more enthusiastic about the whole thing. So enthusiastic that I decided to bump up my training and train for the Big Brothers/Big Sisters HALF MARATHON!!!! (For those of you who knew me in high school, or at least before Izzy - you will know this is quite an undertaking for me!!!) The farthest I had run before diving into this challenge was about ONE mile - and that was tough for me. But each week I was running longer and longer distances.... this last week I ran the farthest distance I have ever run in my entire life: 8.13 miles. It was awesome!!!! Of course it was made easier by the company of Ashley, and the beautiful scenery - not to mention it was a good 7,000 feet lower than I'm used to! :) Just today, after work I ran 6 miles. It's still a little shocking for me to think about. I'm really incredibly slow - but at the end of the day, I get the mileage in and that's what it's all about. (The fact that I had to buy all new pants this weekend because mine were falling off is an added bonus too!!)

So it's a lofty goal - but so far it's been a really fun challenge. The plan is to do the half marathon in August and to hopefully train through the Fall and Winter to do a FULL MARATHON in January..... CAN I DO IT?! YES I CAN!!!

In other news:
Izzy is so incredibly close to walking - I really think she wants to, she's just kind of a chicken. But she is still the cutest little squishy ever! This whole toddler thing is kind of intimidating - but don't tell!!

Aaron is finishing his thesis (right now, while I'm typing) and he will defend at the end of this month. Starting in September he will be in Phoenix Monday-Friday attendng med school at Southwest College of Naturopathic Medicine (http://www.scnm.edu/). It will be an adjustment, but he's thrilled about starting what is hopefully his last stretch of formal education (for awhile at least...). 

Oh, and as if there wasn't enough going on already, I'm starting classes to get my master's on Monday. YIKES!! :) I decided that if I'm going to work for a university and they're offering to pay for it (ok I have to pay $25 each semester...) then I had better take advantage of that! 

That's all she wrote!

One year ago....

Today is March 2, 2011. Exactly one year ago today I drove myself from work to the hospital expecting to have some tests done. Instead, they handed me a gown and told me to get comfortable. I had no idea I would be living in the hospital for the next three weeks.

I can hardly believe that tomorrow is Izzy's first birthday. So much has changed in one year - it's amazing!!!!! To think that one year ago the question was whether or not Izzy and I were going to make it and today the question is, "What is she into now?!" :)

Next time I'll believe everyone who says that it goes by too fast!





HAPPY BIRTHDAY BABY IZZY!!!!!

THE RESULTS ARE IN!!!!!

Tuesday we did our final body assessments for the Body Back program. We've been weighing ourselves every week since we began, so I had an idea of what the weight difference was going to be, so it was too shocking. I lost a total of TEN pounds in the last eight weeks. Hooray!

My favorite changes were in inches! I lost a little over THREE inches in my hips and THREE inches in my thigh and the BEST one: I LOST SIX INCHES IN MY WAIST!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! YAY!!!!!!!!!!!! :)

Physical Assessment changes: I was able to increase the number of sit ups, squats, bicep curls and push ups! I knocked off 47 seconds off of my mile time and I increased my plank time by 27 seconds!!!!!!

Overall I'm pretty happy with the results! :) I'm not quite to where I want to be yet so I'll just keep going!!! I will be continuing the workout part of the Body Back program and I'm excited to see the results continue to change and move in the direction that I want them to! It's been a great experience and it was exactly what I needed to get back on track to getting back to where I was!!!! :)

ONE

Hello friends!

This blog is brought to you by the number one. :)

I'm not sure I should say this, because it's sort of embarassing, but at the same time - I'm very proud of it, so here is goes.....

For the first time in eighteen months probably, the first number of my weight is a ONE!!! YAY!!!! Ok, there I said it. :) I am pretty excited about it. Today I was down another three pounds - for a total of EIGHT!!!! YIPEE!!!!!!!!!!!!! :)

The other one is Izzy!!! She is going to be one in a month!! YIKES!!! Everyone always says that it goes by too fast - and they're RIGHT!! I can't believe it.... my baby is turning one!

As part of her party we are creating a time capsule. The idea is that everyone brings something that represents 2010 - her first year of life. Then Izzy will get to open the time capsule on her 21st birthday. Isn't that fun?! I'm excited to see what people bring. I'm also toying with the idea of having each person who is at the party (or maybe anyone who wants to) write Izzy a note that will also go into the time capsule. Any thoughts or ideas? Anyone want to write Izzy a time capsule note?

Long Time, No Post

It's been a while since I've posted here. The Body Back program is going well. I lost another 2 pounds last week!! wahoo! Tomorrow is the next weigh in - so hopefully the trend continues! :) We've been put into teams and we all get points for eating correctly, working out, doing our "homework" and doing the fun extra credit activity for the week. Then the team's points are combined and whichever team has the most at the end of the week, WINS! The prize: a 4oz glass of wine or a small sweet treat. THIS WEEK MY TEAM WON!!!! Sweet treat - here I come! :) Some of the women were very sad about having to give up the alcohol, not me, I want the sugar!!! :) So I can't wait to "spend" my treat! I don't know how I'm going to spend it - but it'll be good!! So the fun extra credit activity this week: Buy sexy and fun underwear (or throw out old granny panties)!!! That was fun! It's always good to have an excuse to go shopping!

Onto other things....

Work is getting so much better! I finally have something to do!! Today I even had things left in my inbox when I left - so I have something to do tomorrow! wahoo! I've also started taking a step class during my lunch break with some of the other girls in my office. It's great! I love spending my hour off doing something fun and active - the rest of the day is spent in a chair that has been approved by a "registered ergonimist" (you didn't even know that existed, did you?)

Most importantly, Izzy's first birthday is coming up!! I have decided that we are going to have a "Carnival Extrordinaire" for her party!! I told my mom about the theme and she said, "Are there going to be any kids?" Well duh - Izzy... and the rest of the guests are just going to have to act like kids! :) I desperately want to work on the invitations that I've designed, but life keeps getting in the way!! This week! They will get done THIS WEEK!! :)

Stay tuned... :)

Tuxedo Layer Cake

This weekend I went to a baby shower for a friend. It was a beautiful shower at a cute little luncheon place. I had a wonderful salad for lunch and I enjoyed watching her open cute little boy presents...... and THEN... the waitress brought in the cake. Oh my gosh - it was a BEAUTIFUL cake! It was a multi-layer tuxedo cake. It had yellow cake with chocolate mousse filling in between each layer and the outside was white chocolate and dark chocolate.... it looked AMAZING! But, I was good - I didn't even TASTE it! Can you believe it?!?!?! I was sort of surprised myself. I had a mental battle with myself - I kept thinking, well I could just have a bite, I've done really well this week, one bite won't hurt. And then I just decided - nope, so not worth it! And I was able to control myself! WAHOO!!!!! :)

We had a homework assignment this week for Body Back and it was to imagine what our life will be like after we make these lifelong changes and to write about it. So I said things like I will be able to shop at Loft again (which I'm SUPER excited about!) and I will not feel self-conscious, etc. And the second the part was what will your life be like if you don't make these changes - that's not an option for me, so it doesn't matter! :)

Yay! Looking forward to my next weigh-in on Tuesday. Stay tuned to see how this week went....... :)

First weigh-in today ......................................................... and....................................................................................................
I LOST THREE POUNDS!!!!!!!

So three pounds doesn't sound like that much to me either... but I just keep telling myself that you have to start somewhere! I'm just happy that I didn't GAIN weight!! I think I would have been REALLY upset if I hadn't lost anything. It's been pretty challenging for me this last week. I think the hardest part was definitely the food. I thought it was going to be time and just being overly stressed out, but I managed to keep that under control. I did something very out of character and I took things OFF of my "plate" and asked some other people to step in and help with teaching the Jazzercise classes. It was really nice to get my workout in this morning and then shower and go to work and then be able to come home as soon as I was done with work - what a novel idea! I might even explore the option of doing an early morning Jazzercise class (instead of the evening one!) I never really thought of myself as a morning person (and maybe I'm not...) but I definitely like getting up and getting my workout over with in the morning!

Ok, back to the food. :)
So this program only has FIVE recipes each for breakfast, lunch and dinner (there are other "grab and go" and "restaurant" choices). So for breakfast and lunch that's fine because the "grab and go" things work for me - or I just have leftovers for lunch. However, dinner is really the tough one. First of all, one of the recipes is bean soup and Aaron is allergic to beans, so that one is out! Now we're down to four. And Aaron is not a big fan of having the same thing every four nights - I say that, but I'm not really a big fan of it either! So I've decided that for dinners I will make the specified recipes but I will also use other recipes. I have a HUGE book full of "Cooking Light" recipes, so I intend to use them! The recipes in the program book are just recipes from the woman who created this program and there hasn't been any explanation for why we can only eat those specified things. So a tiny part of me feels like I'm cheating - but the other part of me says that I'm modifying the program to fit my family. Anyway... but everything else I intend to stick to!

The workout this morning - SO HARD!! Although our instructor ran a marathon on Sunday - 26.2 MILES. That's pretty cool. It makes me want to run a marathon, but then I start to think about how I feel after running ONE mile. I'm sure I could do it if I had the correct training, etc... however, I don't think I will be adding that to my plate this month... :) But maybe someday in the future... Anyone else want to train with me????

Attitude Adjustments

Body Back Day 2: Completed!

This morning started off better than expected... I got up a few minutes earlier so that I didn't have to rush. Aaron made coffee, so I enjoyed a cup of coffee in the early morning quiet and it was great! I felt like it was going to be great.

However....

The workout was really HARD!!! I'm not sure if it was because it was 6AM or because I felt hungry or because it was just plain hard! We did "rounds" which means that we did sets of exercises - cardio, strength and core. There was definitely a point when I thought, I can't do this - I might just fall over and cry. I sort of got irritated with myself though because I thought, "I teach Jazzercise classes and I don't totally suck at that," but I definitely felt like I sucked at the workout this morning!!! It was rough. So during the meditation/relaxation part of the class I had a little heart to heart with myself... I realized that this is more about my attitude than anything else. I can go through the motions and participate in the program - but if I really want to get the most out of it then I'm going to have to put the most into it! So I had to make an adjustment....

After making one adjustment, why not make two! So I decided that I needed to also make an adjustment with my attitude toward work right now. So far I've been really irritated that they don't seem to be ready for us yet and so we can't really do anything. So I feel like I'm just wasting time and that there are other things I could/should be doing, but after today - no more! I have decided that it doesn't matter - if they are moving slow then it's their fault but I'm still getting paid for it, so whatever! :) 

So I feel like the journey really began for me today because today is the day that I made the decision to really do this! So today I was a lot less hungry than yesterday - and I think with more planning it will be even better! This weekend I'm looking forward to having time to plan and to get the groceries that I need to stick to this!

Here we go!

Body Back Day 1

Today was day one of my Body Back program! It started VERY early this morning with me waking up every hour because I was so worried I would miss my alarm! So I was up at 1am, 2am, 3am, 4am and my alarm finally went off at 5:15AM. Of course today it was the kind of cold where your legs hurt when you walk outside, but nonetheless I got out the door by 5:40.

So there are 8 women participating in this program and one leading it. Today was just sort of an introduction day. We talked about goals, challenges and the basics of the program. My goals include: losing weight, and more importantly losing inches! My biggest challenges will be time - I'll be working full time and teaching 4-5 Jazzercise classes on top of all of this, so I'm nervous that I will get overwhelmed (oh ya, plus I have Izzy and Aaron too!!!) My other fear is not being able to stick with the food plan, because I like to eat! :)

Anyway, we did our initial assessments today. I couldn't even do ONE pushup!! They had to be "real" pushups, no knees! But, I did do 25 bicep curls and 33 squats!

I have to tell you though, by the time I left work to head to Jazzercise it had been 12 hours since I had left home and I was POOPED!!! But I had to power through and my Jazzer-ladies were wonderful and very supportive so that helped!

The most surprising thing to me about the women in this group is that many of them were concerned that their husbands were not going to be supportive. That made me very sad! My husband on the other hand, packed me breakfast and lunch for today. Then he went online and found a "Body Back" recipe to make for dinner - but the BEST part was that he went to the grocery store and bought everything and then he MADE IT!!! :) Brownie points for him!! So we had very yummy tequila lime chipotle shrimp tacos, they were really good!! (He was quite proud of himself - and rightfully so!)

So I'm not sure that this blog will actually be interesting for anyone else to read, but it will serve as a way for me to document the program and the changes that are occuring!

Stay tuned!

First Blog

I have decided to start blogging! Rachel Gallo has inspired me with her interesting posts about her students, her husband and her bugs.

I'm getting ready to start on a new phase. Next week I will start a new job and a new workout regiment. Monday is my first day as an Academic Advisor at NAU! I'm really excited to get started, I think I will really enjoy this new job. It's something different than I've ever done before, and the commute is WAY shorter than driving to Williams!

Next week is also the beginning of my "Get Your Body Back" class! This is an 8-week results based class! It involves workouts from 6am-7am two days a week, extra workouts and a meal plan, along with the support of all the fabulous women who are also starting on this journey. The instructor for this class just finished actually doing the class and she lost 17 pounds - but more importantly, she lost EIGHT inches and TWO dress sizes!!! That's the part I'm most excited about - fitting into clothes! The number on the scale matters a lot less than the image in the mirror to me. My plan is to keep you updated on my progress as we go through the program!