Weekend Randomness

Friday: Levi and team played two baseball games, won one and lost the second. Their season is over but they came in third in our area. Levi is catcher in this picture.

He made the paper!

Sunday I helped the kids with a fundraiser car wash to earn money for their trip to Boston. 

Judith and her green tea something drink. 

My Story

This picture, taken on Thanksgiving Day 2014, was the breaking point for me.  When I saw this picture I knew that I had to do something to get this weight off, for good. I had tried exercising for seven months with little to no results.

On December 28, 2014 I ordered "the" book. Yes, I am talking about Trim Healthy Mama. I had read about THM here and there and just knew it was not for me, but I was wrong. I ordered my book and tracked it daily until it arrived on my doorstep. In the mean time I started reading all I could online and on Pinterest I created a secret THM board and pinned like crazy. When the book arrived, I read it quickly and was thankful for cold winter days to read. I think my book arrived on a Friday so I had the weekend to read as fast as I could. 

On January 5, 2015 I began my journey. I weighed and wrote my weight down, wrote it down people. I owned my weight. I also did some sort of weight calculator and faced the fact that I needed to lose about seventy-five pounds. Ouch! 

I started small and my goal was to have on-plan breakfasts that first week while I read more of the book and read parts for a second time. I even had spaghetti and pizza that week, yet I still lost weight.

I had an instant support group as two other friends were starting at the same time and a third joined a couple of weeks later. (We get together every month or so to chat, ask questions and try new recipes) I dropped six pounds in the first three weeks. Then I hit a wall and stayed the same and even had a couple of pounds come back but after those few up and down weeks I hit my stride with figuring out meal types, learning to love Good Girl Moonshine, finding a couple of on plan desserts and enjoying food without guilt.

Five months have now past and I am still enjoying this way of life. I do not feel as though I am missing out of anything because I can eat so many great things. Life pretty much has us eating all THM meals for dinner with off plan side offerings for the family members that choose to partake of such things. 

Judith has joined me and she has lost weight and makes excellent choices the majority of the time without feeling like she is restricted. When the time comes for pizza and other such foods when she is somewhere with friends she can eat the food available and then get back on plan next meal. She chooses this, she saw what was happening with me and she read the book and started making recipes from the book. She has introduced me to many great desserts and is quite the thm kitchen whiz. 

 Elisabeth is now interested and she jumps in when she can with our meals, so I would say she is at fifty percent on plan. Breakfast is her favorite on plan meal of the day.

What I love about THM is that it is not extreme, it seems like it at first, but once you are on plan it really does seem to come easier than the first month. My girls can do this and they are not wrecking their metabolism, starving themselves or setting bad habits. They are learning to live a healthy lifestyle and still enjoy food. That makes a Momma happy.

Here I am five months into my THM journey. I am about half way to the finish line for weight loss but I have also learned skills to maintain this weight loss when the goal has been met.

It's Friday

Friday was sunny

The garden is 99% in.

We are diying our version if high tunnel gardening. It is a work in progress.

Onion sets are growing

I have not done a Friday picture in a while. Here I am, thirty-nine pounds lost.

Levi's team played two games of baseball tonight and their season ended tonight as well. 

Why I Do Not Do Busy Crafts With My Children

Children, they are truly a blessing. They are full of energy and curious. I do not provide kid crafts for my crew, nor did I when the older ones were little ones (which was yesterday). I do not believe children enjoy being drug through useless crafts that serve no purpose other than to keep little ones busy.
What did I do? I provided raw materials like homemade play dough, paper, paint, markers, colored pencils, stickers, stalkers, cardboard boxes, etc. They had items to keep them busy but I did not do much telling them what to do. I allowed them to get bored. I also worked on crafts in front of them and when interested I showed them how to do what I was doing. I taught them crafts that had a purpose.
I am pretty sure it has worked out well. I have a wood worker in the making. My girls can knit and know basic crochet and have dabbled in pottery and jewlery making. As I speak one is looking online for items to make and sell because she wants to earn some money. Crafts for money making have a purpose.

My Oldest

Almost seventeen years have flown by, sigh.

Life on Thursday

'Tis a rare occasion that I take off on a school day and have a pedi/lunch outing with a friend, but that is just what happened today. We went for a falafel pita for lunch. Yummy but off plan, and that is okay, because I can start again in three hours and falafel pita beats burgers and fries any day of the summer. Falafel really isn't that unhealthy just 

not something I would eat weekly. Although, it is that yummy. 

On another note: I have never liked spicy food, NEVER. Since eating the THM way I can now tolerate a little spice. I ordered my falafel spicy today. 

Fun

It is always a good day when a box like this arrives!

Friday Update

I put together a quick collage of the progress so far. Some of the pictures are no makeup, no hair fixed days, sorry about that, I did not mean to frighten anyone. I guess I was skeptical as to whether or not this would work because I guess I never thought these pictures would need to be seen and shared.

 I need to get a picture this week, maybe that will happen this weekend. I have reached the half way point of the journey and all I can say is wow! THM has been such a blessing to me. I love eating this way and I love my new view and attitude toward food. I also seem to be at the point where others can see that the weight has come off. I can navigate a potluck, party, restaurant menu and what not now pretty well. On occasion I will have to eat off plan but really those times have been rare and for that I am thankful. I have energy now and that is amazing.

Friday Rambles

Today is Friday, here I go...

• We had an extra little guy at our house this week, I called the boys the "twins".
•  I like having two littles around at the same time, they keep each other busy.
• They go almost non stop all day long and they are loving being outside
•  I am exhausted on this Friday evening and it is not because of the littles.
• The week has been a good kind of busy.
• I bought the next size smaller of pants, well, capris. 
• I can finally wear something beside jeans.
• I bought a cute knit skirt as well.
• I am half way to my goal. Half way!!!
• I did not get anyone to take my picture today because I slept in and the rest of the day was busy.
• As soon as these kiddos go to bed I am going to my bed.
• My big kiddos are at a friend's house for a bonfire.
• My house is quiet.
• The littles have been to two playgrounds, played outside at home, had s'mores and are now watching a movie.
• I did not have s'mores. I do not like them.
• Pre-THM I would already be laying on the couch by now. 
• The little are camping in the fort that Levi built for them under the kitchen table. It may be an interesting evening. 
• We shall see if they last in there all night.
• This is all, happy Friday!! Alaskan daylight is longer each day and I am enjoying soaking up as much vitamin D as I possibly can.

Lockdown

Over the last few weeks there have been many local schools on lockdown. The article I am linking to is the school closest to our house and is the school in which Levi plays baseball.

Reading at Bedtime

I picked this book from the bookshelf the other night to read aloud to Benjamin and his friend, who is spending the week at our house. The book isn't over the top wonderful BUT the vocabulary is priceless. The words used are quality words, descriptive words. The children in the book have a father and a mother, and while they take a  backseat to much of the story, they are there and they are respected and they are essential to the story. I look forward to each chapter at bedtime and I am thrilled that Benjamin is ready for bedtime chapter book reading.

Survival

I rarely remember to take group photos but I was determined to get a group picture on Mother's Day. Here we are.

We brought home an extra kiddo for the week, his parents are hiking in the Grand Canyon this week. 

Boys eat a lot when they get up early and play all day. 

I made healthy boy drink for the boys. Herbal tea, apple cider vinegar and sweet blend. 

Mother's Day

A day set aside to celebrate Mothers. I cannot be with my Momma but I am thankful for her. 

I do have the blessing of having all my Blessings with me to be celebrated today. 

The laughing picture

The straight faced picture.

Shadow

Weight update: still losing and I am at 34 pounds lost.

 Today I post a shadow pick because I am at the playground with Benjamin and there is no one to take my picture. 

I am looking forward to my mother's day meal;   slow cooked moose tips, cauliflower bake, grilled peppers, onions and mushrooms and some sauteed vegetables and thm cheesecake. 

A video

Here is a link to oarts my Son's baseball game Saturday. He is #13 playing catcher on the blue team

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=C7NO8R3uX9E&feature=youtube_gdata_player

Waiting Rooms

Today I am having an echocardiogram. Nothing is wrong, my doctor heard a heart murmur and she wanted a baseline for future reference. I keep trying to remember if she has heard this in the past. She had no notes of it in my record and neither of us could remember if she had heard it before.

So, I am waiting in the outpatient waiting room. The television is on. There is some daily "news" show on, I think a Today something show. Oh my. This is NOT news this is noise. Just saying.

You see all kinds in the hospital. I rarely go to the hospital and for that I am thankful. 

Echocardiograms are interesting and quite personal. You never know how these things go when you leave the tech because they do not tell you anything unless there is an emergency. They let me leave so no emergency. 

Mom School

Today and tomorrow I am attending a local home school curriculum sale and workshops. I sat in the back and spread out to wrap my head around what I have seen and heard.

And there may be a change for my little guy for first grade. Thinking and praying.

I used to be a coordinated person, I was a little more picky about pretty much my entire life. Then, I gave up. I chose to go with function and ease of living over my expectations. I have loved Mason jars for many a year. I love canning the harvest and I love drinking my daily water and Good Girl Moonshine in quart Mason jars. I use glass jars and Mason jars around the house for holding pencils and paint brushes and now I use them for holding toothbrushes in our bathrooms. The upside-- when the jar gets covered with toothbrush yuckiness, I just go get another jar out of the cabinet and toss the toothbrushes into a clean jar and put the dirty jar in the dishwasher. Makes my life easier, just a tiny bit,but yet easier.