A sloooooooow start and a toasty finish!

Hmph. It turns out that telling the kids we MUST be out the house by 11:30 am at the LATEST means we'll still be here at 2pm. *tsk*. It is so frustrating when that happens but that seems to be the way things go around here this time of year. I can't WAIT for the sunshine and waking up to blue sky and warmth.!! I could TOTALLY live in California or Florida. Sure, it's nice to have snow once in a while, but you know what? I could live without it. I would get so much more done over the year if it were sunny out when I woke up!! ;D Ah well.... whine whine whine! ;D

So the day started out veeeeerrrry slooooowly.... I got the kiddoes to the grocery store ( whoopie ) and to the Hallmark store.... which is a test with Jack I'll tell you! :D We bought cards and stuff to make a poke cake for Daddy! ( I've never made one so we'll see how it turns out. I'm thinking cake, jello and pudding??? what's not to like!!! )

Anyway, once we got home hubby arrived not long after. I made dinner, totally cheated on my diet by eating not one but TWO cornbread muffins straight out the oven. And it was totally worth it !!!!!!!!!! ;D ymmmmmmmm!!!

Now the kiddies are sleeping, the fire is crackling in the other room and I am going to sit with my hubby! ;D

Hope everyone has a lovely Valentine's Day!

Changing my mood, getting stuff DONE and finding a babysitter!! YEAHY!!! :D

So I promised myself yesterday that today would be so peaceful... remember?!?! Rex went out at 5:30am (!!!) to have breakfast with some friends of his. I love that he does that, it's so neat! AND I get to go back to sleep!!! ;D And sleep I did. It was 9am before I even managed to drag myself out of bed. I was feeling really... bleurgh. Unmotivated really. I plobbed around for an hour or more before remembering something The Marvelous Risa told me about....
Improving your mood in one hour.
We threw on some great music from the radio, acted happy, contacted some friends and, most importantly, rid myself of a TON of nagging tasks! Ahhhhh.... I feel SO much better now... and so do the fish!! Man those tanks were nasty ( Weren't they, Mary?!! :D ) !! Now I just need homes for 14 female guppies! ;D

The most important nagging task I had been putting off was to call the folks who moved in across the street this past Christmas. I wanted to know if their teenage daughter would like to babysit! Guess WHAT!?!?!?! She WOULD!!!!! I asked he to come over and meet Rex and the kiddies..... she came!!! She didn't run away screaming AND she has a cousin with Down's !!!! Perfect!!! She also plays drums and guitar....!!! I KNOW!!!!! AND Jack and Jessie LOVE her!! I knew they would! She sounded lovely on the phone and the kids are suckers for lovely young ladies!! ;D We made a plan for Rex and I to have her babysit next week sometime and I.Can't.WAIT!!! The fact that she lives so close and her folks are near should she need help... well... what more could we ask for?!?! I've decided that we need to make this happen. If it's a choice between Boot Camp and a babysitter... well, I'm afraid the babysitter is going to win out. ( Sorry Lisa... : } )

I read a blog a while back that some friends had lead me to somehow, ( maybe they can remind me what it is again??! *thanks, Ree.... here it is..... creating-the-year-2010 ) and this lady had two children with disabilities. One was deaf and the other was disabled in some rather profound way. The lady and her family would, each year, pick a theme for the year ahead. The year of Traveling, The year of debt free etc. I'd like to make this the year of Can Do. We aren't in a great financial position, things are really tough right now, but this is the only life we have. We need to live it, grand finances or not. We are still cutting down our debt every month ( which is really amazing considering...! ) so we're not going to go wild with our money, but the money I make from my articles etc... well that can go to the babysitter for sure!! TOTALLY WORTH IT !! ;D

( and no, you can't have her!! ;D )

Off to work out and then do some couch loafing!! ;D Happy Friday, folks! ;D

A Valentine's party, never vacuum naked and answer the phone at the same time, is there such a thing as too much exercise?

Thursday?? So soon?!?!!? I knew this week would go fast! I had something going on everyday this week... tomorrow is going to be sooooo peaceful!!! ** I know, I know, famous last words!!**








So today I ran around like a maniac to get the house ready and decorated for a Valentine's party. We really made the house look lovely and had treats, a card making station, games, crafts, candy, cookies, healthy treats, strawberries, red peppers, tomato roses....!! It looked lovely!! I had to get it all done ( with the help of the kiddoes of course! ) before 10 am as my boss was coming over to have a conference call at my house. At five minutes before 10 I was to be found in the bathroom, vacuuming ... and ... um.... well. That's all I need to say isn't it?? Suffice it to say I was about to have a shower. Anyway, the phone rang and it was my boss asking if I was busy baking for my party...! I scoffed and said "hardly!!" but then rather rashly told him what I had been doing instead!! ;D LOL!!! We are friends, but really, it's just not right to know that the party to which you are trying to have a reasonable conversation with is in the altogether on the other end of the line!! I do have a tendency to open my mouth and the truth falls right out!!! Anyway, enough of that I think! ;D

MOVING ON!!!




So anyway, we got all our party stuff ready, the conference call was rescheduled, the children made cookies all by themselves and seemed to enjoy it. We had a lovely afternoon with good friends and the smell of cookies if nothing else!! ;D Only two more weeks and I can eat crap again!!! ;D ( you know what I mean I hope!! ) I did introduce Lisa to the joys of Soy Bacon, cooked mushrooms, spinach, slivered almonds and cranberries..... I don't think I could ever tire of eating that!!! SOOOOO good! ;D





I didn't get my morning work out in this morning so did my evening one after the mentalist... I'm getting better folks!! Not so shaky, strong strong strong....!! Lisa almost has me convinced to try the boot camp...... uh oh..... I'll keep you posted.... of course! :D

A beautiful morning, a comedy of errors and my lunch..!

We woke up this morning to a bright blue sky. I'm always tempted to run out into a blue sky day but thought to check the temps first.... um.....-4f. Chiiiiilly! I stayed in and instead took a pic through the window.....



Can you see the ice shining on the trees?? ***happy sigh***

This was about as peaceful as our day got..!! After that....

The daft dog decided that she should go walk about in this weather so if you'd looked out your window and you lived on my street you would have seen me in my pajamas, snow boots, columbia coat and gloves chasing the mutt back home. Happily there was no wind at all so, though so cold that the snow squealed and squeaked like styrofoam I was not chilled to the bone. Still, I would have preferred to stay in the warm house!!

The cat threw up on the floor....

The toilet overflowed all over the bathroom carpet....

The dog peed on the bed.....

Work stuff that you wouldn't believe if I told you came up....

Hubby had to drive to Iowa to collect a stolen trailer that ended up not so much being stolen and not so much being driveable....

Jessie and Jack have friends here for a sleepover and we thought doing some crafts would be fun.... so did Jack..... he thought it would be fun to decorate for Valentine's day by sprinkling glitter all over the chairs!! ;D Pretty!!!

Anyway, the day had it's good points, and looking back it was more good than bad... there was just a lot of headshaking and eye rolling going on today!! ;D

Jessie made scrambled eggs with cheese for breakfast for her and Jack.... Yeahy!!!



I made myself a delicious lunch...... oh yum yum yum....



I got two work outs in today ... the one this evening had Jessie and Charlotte helping me! I always thought I preferred to work out alone, but it's actually fun with more than one... it goes a lot quicker! ;D

Anyway, the kitchen needs cleaning again, Rex has a movie to watch and I want to knit at least one more row tonight before I fall prey to complete and utter exhaustion! ;D

Night folks! ;D

A work out or two, a busy day, a late night and a short post! :D

Well!! Today shot past!!! I decided to add some Umph to my work out / diet regime and work out aerobically in the morning and strength and yoga~y in the evening!! It did help my day get straightened around this morning since it started out with the dog peeing on Jack's bed ( AGAIN ) and the cat puking on the floor, not to mention misunderstandings and miscommunications to boot. Bleurgh! Anyhoo.... it all worked out!! We gathered up our library books, cares and woes and eventually made it out the house about 2:30 pm!! Normally if I'm not out the house by noon, why, it's not going to happen, but I kept pressing on! ;D We're hosting a little valentines party for some kiddoes on Thursday and I wanted to pick up some things for that so Super Target was calling!!! :D

We made it out to Target, spent HOURS there as usual and got home in time to make supper! I was so hungry that taking pictures of my plate was not an option tonight, but I had left over soup from yesterday and a spinach salad with mushrooms cooked with just a smidge of olive oil wiped over the pan, a delicious Gardenburger Portabella mushroom burger, some avocado and some roasted red pepper hummus. Followed by a banana. Yeah... I WAS hungry!! ;D I topped all that off with a 34 minute workout on the Wii and boy, I feel GOOD!!!!!!

The kiddies worked out with me ( by "worked out" I mean mostly lay on the floor and squabbled!! )then I put them to bed. Now I'm supposed to be watching a movie with Hubby AND I was trying to put a How To post together for you to show you the neat Valentines I'm making for a swap.... but.... eh.... it's not working out so well! ;D Maybe tomorrow!!; D

G'night folks! ;D

Don't let the sunshine fool ya....it's really cold out there, one shouldn't do the recycling at 12 degrees without gloves and boy my thighs ache!

Another SUPER day!! ;D Seriously! Since I finally remembered I'd not been taking my Vitamin B for months and started taking it again, life is PEACHY KEEN!! ;D **note to self, and others, if you don't eat meat and don't eat enough leafy greens, you DON'T get enough Vitamin B. That's some bad juju right there. **

So, I asked everyone I work for or with to not call me today so I could get some work DONE and some things around the house done, you know, little things, like raising my children, digging us out of the laundry mountain, FEEDING OURSELVES!! ;D **second note to self, did you know that 2 cups of spinach, one third of a yellow bell pepper and 2 tablespoons of Roasted Red Bell Pepper Hummus is a whopping ( and I'm being sarcastic here... ) 100 calories !!!!!! That's tons of food and power packed nutrition for barely the calories of one dry slice of bread!!! WOWZAH!! Oh and PS... it's flipping delicious!!**





So I spent the day working and focusing more on the children, and we really did seem to have a lovely day. The sun came out and the sky was blue again. Jack played with his toys making shadow puppets



and Lucy flaked out catching some rays.




I looked out the window and saw this.....



A vision of sunshine!!! I suggested we all go out for a walk, to blow the cobwebs out. It's a good job I thought to check them temps.... um .... 12. Degrees Fahrenheit. Ya. Dat's cold. That's minus 11 centigrade. hmm. It would do more than blow the cobwebs out that's for sure!!! Darn sunshine and blue sky! I decided that it would be best if I quickly took the van and picked up some stamps from the post office and dropped off the recycling by myself whilst the kiddies stayed home in the warm. I realised once I was in the car that I had forgotten my gloves. I debated going back in the house to get them but didn't want to take the keys out the ignition to unlock the front door. Yup. That's what it will say for the record. Bone idle. Anyway, I shrugged it off and drove to the recycling. Well. It may have been only 12 degrees, but it was also windy. Hmm. Wind at 12 degrees, for those who may not have experienced it, well, let's just say it's really unpleasant. I only had a couple of bags of recycling to drop off but truly, it was so cold, SO cold, my fingers started to curl up. The skin went red and began to pucker as the blood retreated from my extremities. I could NOT feel my fingers. I soldiered on, because I AM an idiot and put away the last few things. It seemed like an eternity before I got back to the van and then I couldn't feel my fingers to open the door. Never. Again. My hands eventually recovered but the feeling of the blood returning was quite painful. LEARN FROM ME FOLKS!! **sigh**

Anyhoo!!! Once the feeling returned to my phalanges I was able to make a delicious dinner ( when did this turn into a food blog?!?! ) of roasted vegetable soup using some left over roast veggies from the other day, more spinach, onion, garlic and some stock made up to half concentration to cut the sodium down. I also added some canned tomatoes and some chick peas. Jessie came down whilst I was cooking and said, and I QUOTE here...." What is that DELICIOUS smell!!!!! " Everyone LOVED this soup and we all snarfed it down despite the very obvious vegetables floating in it! I was going to puree it and started to, but the color went a little, um, odd, so I stopped. Jack wasn't thrilled at the idea of all the veggies so I told him I'd make him another kind of soup and pureed his! He did question the color, which I thought was funny, but then he ate the lot! It was SOOOO tasty!! ;D Totally on the diet sheet, looooow calorie and high in fibre and nutrition!! AND VEGAN. Man I rock! ;D



After dinner the kiddies and I did another Wii work out! I thought of Risa as this time I programmed a 30 minute workout, 15 minutes strength training and 15 minutes of Yoga. Both workouts were almost as hard as each other!!! My muscles are ACHING tonight!!! ;D I'd never have believed that a "virtual" workout could be as effective as this is!! ;D This ain't no boot camp for sure, but it IS doing something!! My legs are testament to that!!! ;D

A great day, eating out whilst dieting, a trip to the sports show and leaving the camera in the car..... tsk.

We had a GREAT day today!!! YEAHY!!! ;D Jack was a REALLY GOOD KID all day long!! ALL DAY!!!!! ***swoon!!*** Rex needed to go visit his Mum and we hadn't been out the house for a week so I asked if we could go along for the ride. We always pack things to do in the car as whenever we are out with Daddy we need to be prepared for anything! Jack took his huge backpack full of toys and his MagnaDoodle, Jessie took a book she was reading and I took my knitting AND crochet. When we got to the home the children waited in the car whilst Rex and I went inside. His Mum was looking well which was a nice change. We visited for a short while then we left and Rex suggested lunch at La Paz. I can usually eat Vegan food their quite easily, the Fajitas are delicious, but this time I not only had to have Vegan food, but also no carbs!!! LOL!! Oh what fun!!! So, I opted for black bean soup, no chips, sour cream or cheese and a side order of guacamole. Oh my... it was SOOOO good! ;D After our yummy lunches we then went to the grocery store to pick up all manner of delicious food that's on The List and even found the elusive Ezekiel Bread! ;D The children came into the store with us ( sounds like a small thing, but this is HUGE people!!! ) and they were so good!! ;D Yesssssssss!!!

After the store we went to the Sports Show at the event center.....! Not really my idea of a fun time usually, but hey, it's February and we'll take any amusement we can get!! The kids and I had so much fun trying out all the RVs and the enormous vacation buses !!!! MAN those things are fantastic!! Some of them have more counter space than my own kitchen!!!!!!!!!! Jack couldn't resist trying his hand at fishing for a trout and much to my horror he caught one. He was delighted and I was mortified. I made sure they let it go again...! Poor fish. I thought Jack just wanted to watch the fish but a very helpful lady took his hands, thrust a pole in them and basically helped him out. It was very nice of her.....!?!?

Whilst at the sports show we saw a gentleman herding geese though the displays.... quite a number of geese.... all wearing diapers. I kid you not. It was only then I realised that my camera, that I had specifically brought to take pics for my blog, was NOT in the bag I had with me, but rather was languishing at the far end of a wet and cold parking lot in the van. ** sigh** I did what I could with my camera phone....




LOL!

Anyway, after the sports show we headed home, lit a fire, made dinner ( I had a grilled portabella mushroom with olive oil and garlic along with a wilted spinach salad with balsamic vinegar dressing topped with soy bacon pieces! MAN it was delicious!!!!) watched America's Funniest Videos, worked out on the Wii for about 35 minutes, bathed Jack, put him to bed and now... here I am!! ;D

We're going to watch Sean of the Dead tonight and I'll no doubt do some more of my knitting and crochet!!! Got to get those dishcloths made!!