Sunshine, oh glorious sunshine!

The sun, the sun, the sun is SHINING! Oh how I love the glorious sunshine. Today is a beautiful day and my mood is really good and the sun is shining! There’s definitely something to having better moods with better weather because even though I’m not doing anything super fun today, going anywhere spectacular, whatever, I’m just overall really happy and in a good mood… don’t spoil it for me, ha!

I am officially done with my clinical placement for the semester and I’m kind of bummed. I looked forward to going to my clinical placement during the week and catching up with my supervisor and seeing the patients. I think I’m going to miss the patients that I've come to know over the past couple of months the most. But, it’s time to move on to my next placement, learn more, make more mistakes, and take away another wealth of knowledge. It’s how it works… I have to say though that I couldn’t have had a better first semester off campus. And now one of my classmates will be at this placement and I hope that she enjoys it as much as I did! And… on my last day my supervisor, two nurses, the receptionist, the ENT doctor, and myself all went out for Chinese for lunch in honor of the ENT doctor’s birthday. To top it off, my supervisor paid for my lunch. Heck yeah! It was a good way to end the semester! (And I managed to escape the temptation of the ice cream dessert!)

My sister and her friend came up last night and spent the night. Her friend had an event here in town and instead of having to get a hotel room or drive to and from Green Bay all in one day, they stayed here. My sister’s friend is super nice and gave me a gift card for some Culver’s ice cream for letting them stay here. How awesome is that?! Especially when it was no skin off my back for letting them stay, isn’t that was family is for? Besides, it’s not like I don’t enjoy getting to see and spend some time with my sister. It’s not like I get to see her everyday and I know that she liked seeing Ayden as well.

Here is a family picture that we had taken the other weekend. I think my brother might have taken it for me. Of course Jay has his typical scrunchy face and squinty eyes and Ayden has perfected the ‘fake smile’ and I look semi okay, but with a little editing, I rather like how it turned out. You know, for a quick snap shot. I shaved my legs today. Okay, maybe that’s just a typical normal everyday thing for most woman, but not me, haha! TMI?! Maybe, but remember, my blog, haha! I HATE shaving my legs and in the winter months it happens a LOT less than it should. In the summer, I shave them every few days, I mean wearing shorts means that I pretty much have to, lol! I also tried out waxing today, um, yeah. Haha! I’ve had my eyebrows waxed once or twice before. It hurts. I deal with it, but still. Ugh! I wanted to try it at home. Um. Yeah. Worked great, hurt like… wow! Needless to say, shaving every few days just might be worth it.

I get the house to myself this weekend! Yeah! And I don’t really have any homework to do. I have a short presentation to finish up, but I did most of it already and its pretty informal which is nice. So that means a weekend to myself doing what I love to do best, read and watch TV! It’s definitely what I need after the last few weeks of constant assignments. I found out that my last Geriatrics test (which I thought I did okay on, but not great) resulted in an ‘A’ and that my business plan (which I finished up with a few choice words and lots of ‘BS’) resulted in a 24.9/25 which is pretty fabulous as well. I don’t even think that the teacher read half of what I wrote because I don’t know that I would have graded myself that good either. And to top off the great grades, I got an ‘A’ for my clinical placement grade too! A few more to end the semester would be great!

I had Ayden’s IEP meeting today with his speech teacher and his regular teacher. It went really well, both teachers are super nice and answered all of the questions that I had. His speech teacher even went to Point for her undergraduate and graduate degree. Ayden will most likely be in speech throughout second grade as well, but I know that it is good for him and he enjoys it.

Best part about today… getting to sit outside on my swing and read in the warmth of the sun! Heck yeah! It felt SO nice and my book is getting really good. Think I might just head off to go read some more of it!

CIAO! LOVE ME!

Oh SHOOT!

*Okay, so I’ve had this blog post sitting as a draft for the last three days, I think it’s finally time to finish it up, don’t you?!

Here are a few before and after pictures for you before I get to the meat of this post.

             BEFORE                                         AFTER

                                           BEFORE                                            AFTERI have so much fun playing around in Photoshop and finally getting some pictures that I am semi in love. Although the ‘afters’ aren’t professional by any means, I actually kind of like them. I mean it’s all about personal taste

It was Easter weekend this past weekend and that meant a ‘trip’ back home. Who doesn’t enjoy those?! It had been quite a while since we had gone home (well Ayden and I that is) and stayed over night at Jay’s parent’s house. What can I say, it’s definitely been a busy semester around here and the time just seems to fly by!

The weekends aren’t any less busy, especially when we go home. Our hours are pretty booked up while we are home and there isn’t much room to deviate from the original plan, although Jay tends to find time to do that here and there. This weekend was no exception. We were up and going at 8am Saturday morning for Ayden’s first soccer game of the season and moving and grooving until we got home at 8:30pm Sunday night. We live the ‘on the go’ life while we are gone.

Overall, it was a good weekend. We thought that Ayden’s first soccer game might be cancelled because it was raining slightly on Saturday morning, but they still had it. Ayden did good, although I think that he needs to be a little more aggressive with the ball. The Y offers skills practice on Monday nights and I think that we may try and hit a few of those up because I think he could benefit from those, and they are free so that is always good!

Ayden had another first this week (me as well) and that is shooting a gun. Jay’s brother, Steven, had his pellet gun out and Jay thought it might be a good idea for Ayden to try it out, especially since he is going to be try out a bb gun this summer at his cub scouts camp. Either way, I think my six year old is WAY too young to be shooting a gun, but if he was going to try it anyways, I couldn’t pass up a good photo op, right?!

Here are just a few pictures of Jay helping Ayden with the pellet gun.Jay telling Ayden all about the different parts of the gun (I got the same ‘lecture’ before I shot it). And no, neither of them are wearing ear protection, although I do have to say that a pellet gun does not have much noise associated with it so I wasn’t too worried. Yes, I know, I’m a bad future audiologist.

Ayden had SO much fun shooting at the little squirrel target that he didn’t want to stop to come in and eat supper. UGH! What has my future hubby turned my precious six year old into. (Apparently we teach them how to shoot young here in Wisconsin?!) Anyways, there was never a point where Ayden held the gun by himself or was by himself shooting it. Jay was ALWAYS sitting right next to him helping him hold the gun and teaching him about gun safety. (Sidenote: I do not plan on letting my precious Ayden shoot anything other than this for a LONG time and we had a LONG talk with him about gun safety.) It was a fun thing for him to do at this age WITH his daddy.

I did shoot the pellet gun like twice and hit the tiny squirrel once, but not in the center so it didn’t fall over. Boo! After the boys were done playing with the little gun, it was time to move on to the big guns. I had told Jay a few weeks ago that I had wanted to shoot a gun at least once just to say that I had done it. Little did I know that he would get so excited about it and want me to do it right away.

Jay’s brother had two 20 gauge shells left for his shot gun and they both thought that that one would probably not kick me back on my butt with the recoil and that I should start out with that one. Okie dokie, if you say so! We got some clay pigeons out, went out into the field and had at it. I have to say that it was quite the experience and I would like to try it again at some point (although probably not anytime soon). It definitely recoiled into the shoulder pretty good and was super loud. Naughty future audiologist again wearing no ear protection! But it wasn’t for lack of looking! Jay and his brother scoured the house for some ear plugs and couldn’t find any. And unfortunately I didn’t have any in my purse. I did only shoot it twice, but its no excuse, I know.

Here is a picture of me after I took my two shots (and I missed the clay pigeon each time, although Jay said I was close on the second one). At least I can say I did it now, right?!It was nice to get my camera out again after a while. I hadn’t had it out in probably over a month so I enjoyed it. That and I got to get it out the next day as well for my mom’s Mother’s Day gift. Here is one of the pictures from that outing (obviously I didn’t take it because I’m in it) and my lover boy has that stupid scrunched up look on his face, ugh! Oh well, I really like how it turned out!Okay, time to post this before I get sidetracked again and leave it as a draft for another umpteen days.

CIAO! LOVE ME!

ME… A to Z!

Before I get into the ‘ME… A to Z’ part of this post (because I’m SO sure that is what you are waiting for), I wanted to post a new picture of me, you know, because I hardly get in front of the camera. A friend of mine had posted something on Facebook this past weekend about attempting to curl her hair with a flat iron. I kind of questioned her thought process… I mean, aren’t flat irons made to make one’s hair flat?! Well, apparently they are pretty versatile in their function. She told me to google flat irons and curling hair and I found a bunch of YouTube videos showing me how it was done. I looks like it worked in the videos and so I had to try it out.

Here is the result…I couldn’t believe it… it actually worked and it was pretty fast and easy! I don’t have the best luck when it comes to working with my hair and so something that I could get to work, didn’t take a lot of time, and actually turned out… well I was hooked! It doesn’t make one’s hair super curly, at least my flat iron doesn’t, but that wasn’t what I was looking for either. I like the soft big curls that it gives me and they actually stay in pretty decent throughout the day. My hair often doesn’t hold a curl to save it’s life. What do you think?! Yeah or nay?!

Okay, enough of that… here is the ‘ME… A to Z’ portion of this post I’m sure you’re just dying for!

I’ve seen this floating around on a few other blogs and since I have nothing else exciting and over the top to blog about I thought I would just fill this out. Enjoy!

A. Age: 24… 25 on August 18… UGH, that’s halfway to 50 already! Okay, so it’s not really old at all, I just like complaining that it is. I can’t believe that I am going to be 25 though! I remember being 16 and wishing I was this old and thinking it would never come. Time flies! 
B. Bed size: Queen… although I wish it was bigger! According to my lovely future hubby, I am a bed hog. Well… he is a blanket hog, hehe! Someday we’ll have a super large king sized bed that we both can sleep comfortably in, lol!
C. Chore you dislike: Doing the dishes and cleaning the litter box… that’s why they are ‘Jay’s jobs’. In return, I do the laundry (and most of the other stuff in the house). I actually don’t mind most cleaning/chores because I’m pretty anal about how I want things to look and once I get started, I usually just  keep going  until I feel done. 
D. Dogs: Not right now… we do have one lovely psycho cat though named Diesel! Would love to have one (or more) dogs someday when we finally get our own house! 
E. Essential start to your day: A bowl of cereal for breakfast! Definite must for me (or some other sort of food in the morning, otherwise I start to feel sick!) 
F. Favorite color: Don’t really have one, green maybe?! It used to be forest green, but at this point I don’t really have a favorite color, I like most of them! 
G. Gold or silver: Definitely silver!!! I have a few pieces of gold jewelry, but definitely prefer silver and my honey knows it! 
H. Height: 5’5” or 5’6”… I just measured myself last week and it’s somewhere between there because I’m sure I wasn’t 100% accurate with my measurement method, haha! 
I. Instruments you play(ed): I used to play the clarinet in high school, haven’t picked it up since then! 
J. Job title: Mommy, future wife, fiancé, student, office assistant.
K. Kids: One precious little boy (and hopefully more at some point in the future)!
L. Live: Some random duplex in town… LOVE it! Although I wish we could own our own house and be able to do whatever we wanted with it and it was more of what I wanted, versus what it currently is, but oh well, still love it! 
M. Mom’s name: Wendy
N. Nicknames: Honey, hun, honeykins?! I don’t really have any other nicknames.
O. Overnight hospital stays: Just when I had Ayden. Two nights I think?! 
P. Pet peeves: People saying they are going to do something and then they don’t get around to it until weeks or months later, things that get left out and are not put away, running late, disorder/disarray… I have a lot of little pet peeves, but I try not to let them get to me any more than anyone else’s would get to them.
Q. Quote from a movie: I can’t think of any good ones right now, so apparently good movie quotes are not my forte.  
R. Righty or lefty: Righty
S. Siblings: Sister three years younger than me, brother six years younger than me, and half sister 18 years younger than me! 
T. Time you wake up: This semester of school it has been anywhere between 6:00 and 7:00am, although I wish it could be a little bit later, I LOVE to sleep in and don’t get to do it enough! 
U. Underwear: Um… whatever I happen to pull out of my drawer each morning, lol! 
V. Vegetables you don’t like: Anything that is out of the ordinary… ie: spinach, etc. I LOVE peas and corn on the cob! 
W.What makes you run late: Run late?! I don’t know the meaning! I am habitually on time and/or early! I can’t stand being late, it makes my anxiety rise! 
X. X-rays you’ve had: Just my teeth. 
Y. Yummy food you make: I’m supposed to cook?! I don’t make any yummy food that usually doesn’t come in a box, so I don’t know that I am qualified to answer this question, lol!  
Z. Zoo animal favorites: The lions and tigers! Love being able to get up close to them (albeit through a piece of glass) and see how majestic they are!

CIAO! LOVE ME!

Stagnant

I don't feel like I've made any progress on my weight loss goals this week. I weighed myself last Sunday morning and I weighed 126lbs (OMG... yes I am putting my weight out there, I don't care anymore) which is not the lowest I've been since I started this whole 'journey'. I started at 133lbs and at one point I was down to 124lbs (for only a day). I don't know if it was scale error that day or what (although I weighed myself numerous times to make sure the number I saw was actually right and it stayed the same like three or four times), but the next day I was back up to 126 lbs. Who knows...

Anyways, I didn't want to weigh myself again until this coming Sunday morning, but I caved and weighed myself Thursday morning after breakfast and with my clothes on... scale verdict was 128lbs. So, I'm assuming my actual morning weight was 126lbs sans clothes. Boo, I wanted it to be lower. However, I haven't been as diligent with going for bike rides this week and eating like I have been. I am trying to stick to 1200 calories per day with at least two bottles of water (which equates to about 4 of the 8 cups they say you should drink each day, but have you actually ever tried to drink 8 cups of water per day, thats a lot and even with 4 cups of whatever I'm peeing almost three times as much as I was before!) So, without any snacks and being good, I've been able to stay at least 200-300 calories below the 1200 most days. (I have this wonderful calorie counter on my phone!) But this week I caved the last two nights. Jay made some ultimate chocolate brownies and I just couldn't let them sit there. Do you really know how small a two inch square brownie is?! Like less than half the size I'm used to! It doesn't sound small, but it is! Well, one small bite of chocolate is NOT enough and I HAD to have two brownies... TWO nights this week! UGH! I do have to say that even with two brownies on Wednesday night, I was still under my 1200 calories for the day by like 100, but last night I went over by about 40. Oops! And this morning I discovered why my chocolate craving was so darn high these last two days... that'll explain it, ha!

I SO want to continue on this path, but some part of me just wants to be gluttonous one day and pig out again and not worry. I know I shouldn't worry so much about the number of calories I'm ingesting, but what I'm actually ingesting itself. My goal weight is 115lbs by the end of May... just before summer... That is plenty of time because they say that a one to two pound loss per week is healthy. But, its getting towards the end of the semester and I just seem to be getting busier and busier and more and more stressed out. And I'm sure that's not exactly conducive to healthy weight loss.

Anyways... this weekend is supposed to be Ayden's first soccer game of the spring. It looks like it just might get rained/sleeted/snowed out. Boo because the seasons is only seven weeks long and he only plays on Saturdays and I paid $35 for it and he'll be missing a different Saturday because he's going home with Jay that weekend! I totally want to get my money's worth out of it! Oh well... that just means I get to sleep in this Saturday! I got to sleep in until 7:45am this morning. That was pretty nice! I have been SO tired lately... going to be around 9pm! Although, I do have to say that I haven't been as tired in the morning when I go to bed that early which is good.

I'm currently reading the book Water for Elephants. The movie previews for it look really good and when I found out it was a book, I just had to have it... you book lovers know how it is. Besides, the books are ALWAYS better than the movies, trust me on that one!!! I could have easily ordered it on my Kindle, but I was at a point where I wanted an actual book in my hands to read. My fellow e-reader reader's, do you ever get that feeling?! I love my Kindle to death, but the feel of a good solid book in your hands never gets old either and sometimes I just need that feeling. The book itself a little more expensive than it would have been for the Kindle, but oh well. Actually, I made Jay go buy it for me yesterday while I was at clinic. I also made him get the Wii game Just Dance 2 for me. I had read good reviews about it, and it looked like lots of fun. Jay and Ayden wanted me to play it last night, but I didn't want them laughing at me and said I wouldn't play it in front of them, mostly just Jay because I knew he would just sit back on the couch and laugh because I was doing it wrong. I'm a geek like that and can't take him laughing at me. You'd think after being together for so long it wouldn't matter and for the most part it doesn't, but I need to play the game myself alone and get the hang of it before I let anyone else see me. Now, if I were with my friends and they were trying it for the first time with me, that's a whole other story. The thing is, I know that Jay will probably NEVER play the game because he's just like that. We traded in a bunch of our other Wii games that we no longer play for this one and another game for Jay's Xbox.

I’m trying to hang in for another couple of weeks… almost summer time!

CIAO! LOVE ME!

Dream on IT…

Have you ever woken up in the morning and thought… dang that was one weird dream?! Have you ever woken up in the middle of the night scared you-know-what-less from a nightmare you had?! I’m sure you have! I definitely know I have… to both of those questions.

Normally, I don’t listen to the radio very often in my car because the amount that I am in it each day amounts to about 20 minutes… if that. Ten minutes in the morning and ten minutes at night. If I were to listen to the radio, my luck would be that those ten minutes that I am in the car would be filled with radio commercials. If you know me, I HATE commercials! I cannot stand them on TV and I cannot stand them on the radio. So, normally I just jam to one of my cds while I am driving… that means NO commercials!

Because I have been driving to and from Rapids twice a week, that leaves me LOTS more car time. Well, it equates to about an hour of driving each day which really isn’t a lot. I’ve been listening to the radio a little bit more on Tuesdays and Thursdays for that reason and the station that I’ve been listening to has had this guest speaker each Tuesday morning. Her name is Lauri Loewenberg and she is a dream psychologist. People would call in and she would analysis their dreams for them. I thought it was the coolest thing. I actually started looking forward to Tuesday mornings to listen to her analysis dreams. Anyways, she has two books out and had just came out with a new book called Dream on It: Unlock Your Dreams, Change Your Life.

This is what amazon.com had as their description of the book say about the book…

‘Your dreams hold the key to a better, fuller life. There is a reason we dream at night. It’s not random nonsense. When we are dreaming, we are thinking on a much deeper, more insightful level than when we’re awake. When we’re dreaming, we’re actually problem solving...it’s just in a different language. Our minds are speaking to us in codes: warning, helping, and guiding us through our constantly evolving situations in life. The mind, through dreams, is trying to alert us to problems it wants fixed. The truth is, our best thinking isn’t done in the shower, it’s done while we dream. In fact, when we say, “Let me sleep on it,” what we’re really saying is, “Let me dream on it.”’

I pretty much HAD to have this book. I checked at a few local stores and they didn’t have it and I’m notorious for not being able to wait for things that I want. I really wanted it in paper form so I could reference it since looking up things on my Kindle is not as easy as flipping through a book. However, I didn’t want to wait for it to arrive from Amazon in the mail, so I just went ahead and got it for my Kindle. Best part… the book (in paper form and on the Kindle) is at a totally reasonable price right now. And I have to say that I am loving the book!

Lauri goes through all sorts of things that people dream about and why we are dreaming about them. Then she writes about real dreams people have had and then dissects them for the individuals and then you get to read the individuals’ responses and how what was going on in their lives at the point in time actually corresponded well with the dream. It it totally awesome!

I had no idea that our dreams could hold such hidden meanings for us! It’s all about our unconscious telling us what we should be doing that our conscious mind won’t. And some of the way the dreams play out and their actual meanings is quite astonishing! And the best part is that there is a dream dictionary at the back of the book that you can use as a quick reference to look up your dreams. I’ve tried dream dictionaries before, but never quite knew what to believe with them. However, I am very inclined to believe what these interpretations are telling me because the author has quite and extensive history of dream interpretation and has study it for many many years… and the fact that when she is interpreting dreams on the radio she is pretty much SPOT on!

I’ve been meaning to try and interpret some of my own dreams each morning when I wake up in the morning, but for the past couple of mornings I have not been remembering my dreams as well as I would like… that and like I said, it it harder to reference things on my Kindle. I did manage to get the dream dictionary into a word file that I can print off (with a lot of screen shots of my computer and copy/paste/crop) and so now I can print it off and have it next to my bed in the morning.

I  just find this whole thing quite fascinating… I’m sure not everyone will, but oh well. If you happen to go get the book from this post, hope you enjoy it and are able to unlock some of your dreams! I know I’m looking forward to it!

CIAO! LOVE ME!

Back to the big blue park!

Ayden and I had a pretty good day today (while Jay was off visiting with a friend). Actually, one of my friends called in a bind about halfway thru the day asking if I wouldn't mind watching her son for her. The plan already was for him to come over just before supper, but something came up and she needed someone earlier and of course it was okay with me. Ayden and his buddy had a great day together and they didn't want to stop playing when it was time for his friend to go home. I'm really happy they had such a good day together because his friend is almost four years older than him.

We went to the infamous big blue park and played outside for almost two hours this afternoon. We threw sticks in the river, 'hunted for alligators',played basketball and hide and seek, and overall just got a lot of energy out! We didn't go for a bike ride though because it was cold today and I didn't want to push Ayden's friend because he's been having some energy difficulties lately (no worries, his mom has already been to the doctor about it and they are running tests). But it was definitely fun to get some fresh air for a while! Except I wore my cloth like shoes and ended up walking through some mushy ground and my feet were instantly soaked (and cold)! Oops, my bad!

When we got home, the boys played a bunch of Wii, ran around in the basement and built with legos. And we made rice crispy bars and covered them in chocolate... just what I need in the house, right?! A full pan of rice crispy treats! I won't lie, I had two small squares today. I've been good all week and deserved it and boy did it taste yummy! You know what I like most about rice crispy treats?! How easy and fast they are to make! I literally made them in like 10 minutes total and then we were enjoying them and the mess was minimal because I melted the butter and marshmallows int the microwave instead of on the stove. And melting the chocolate chips for on top was super quick and fast too!

I managed to get all of the laundry done and even folded today! I was very motivated, hehe! Plus it leaves me tomorrow for homework stuff that I would like to get done. I don't have to get anything done, but there are a few things I would like to get motivated on. The end of the semester is definitely coming up fast, that is for sure... and definitely a good thing too! Can't wait! Although I am getting anxious to see what my summer clinic schedule is going to be like.

CIAO! LOVE ME!

Weight Loss

I’m pretty sure I mentioned in my last post about how I’ve lost a couple of pounds. That number has increased a little bit since then. I'm more than a teensy bit excited about it, but when I posted about it on Facebook today, I didn't get the response I was quite hoping for (not that I ever expect some sort of reaction to my status changes). Instead I got a bunch of 'you don't need to lose any weight' comments. That bummed me out more than I thought it would because I'm pretty proud of myself. I've been working pretty hard at being healthy these last two weeks. I'm not crashing dieting or working out every spare minute, I've been doing good healthy things.

Yes, my starting weight (according to the BMI index for my height) was in the normal range, but does that mean I'm healthy and should weigh what I do?! I honestly don't think so. I started this whole get healthy thing because I was truly unhappy with the person I saw in the mirror at the end of each day. I would stand in front of the mirror each night in my pajamas (which really is just a t-shirt) and I would look three or four months pregnant my stomach would stick out so much. My thighs were yuck and I would think about how unhealthy I looked. I don’t say ugly or fat, because I didn’t (and don’t) think I’m ugly or fat, just ‘letting myself go’. And what made it worse was that my stomach would still be sticking out still the next morning... I wanted that flat stomach back I had a few years ago without having to REALLY suck in ALL DAY LONG. I wanted to sit down in my favorite pair of jeans and not have my 'love handles' hanging over the sides of my jeans. Most of all, I wanted to like what I saw in the mirror at the end of each day and be more healthy.

It wasn't and isn't so much what number I see on the scale each time I step on, it's how I feel about myself when I look at myself in the mirror. I could weigh 145 and be in great shape and love what I look like or weight 130 and be in sucky shape and hate what I look like, you know? Am I going to lie and say I'm not happy to see the scale numbers dropping... no, because I'm pretty much ecstatic. I love that I am seeing some results not only on the scale, but in the mirror as well.

Like I said, I’m not crashing dieting, taking any dietary supplements, doing some sort of diet plan, nothing like that. I’ve just quit drinking soda and started drinking A LOT more water. They say eight glasses of water a day… that’s a lot if you think about it. I’m up to about four without hating water yet. I’ve also cut out most of the junk food I’ve been eating and am now eating smaller meals throughout the day. I have decreased the number of calories I eat each day, but its not drastic. I’ve also started taking a multi-vitamin (although that’s more for just being overall healthy than weight loss because I know that that isn’t contributing to any weight loss).

So, instead of being down about those who think I don’t need to loose weight, I’m going to be happy for myself. Happy for my results! Be happy!

No matter what it is… everyone is going to have an opinion on whatever you are doing. Oh well, I don’t give a hoot (or at least I try not to give a hoot).

Jay went to go visit his ‘boy toy’ in Minnesota this weekend. He hasn’t seen his best friend in more than just a couple of months (although they talk on the phone like umpteen times a day) and so I was fine with him going. He needs some guy time every now and then and he hasn’t gotten any of that since sturgeon spearing and that was a couple of months ago. I think they might try and get out and do some golfing. I hope they enjoy their man time together, haha!

Ayden and I are just chilling at home for the weekend. I have some school related things that I would like to complete by the end of the weekend, but that won’t happen until Sunday. I’m going to have another relaxing day tomorrow because it is supposed to be pretty nice out. It’s supposed to rain and what not on Sunday so that will be a good day to sit inside and work on school work.

Time for supper… left over brats or pot roast… both sound pretty yummy, but I think I might go with the brat tonight.

CIAO! LOVE ME!

Date Night!

Jay and I don't have a 'regulated' date night each month, although I've heard from many couples that as parents it's an important thing... to get that quality alone time with your significant other. Most of the time when we go out, it's as a family... a family dinner at Pizza Hut, a family bike ride, always family... and it's mostly because we don't have any other family in the area that can watch Ayden if we were to want to go out and babysitters cost money. But tonight... tonight... we are dropping Ayden off at my friend Kristi's house and we are going to go to a movie. We are going to go see Insidious. My sister has warned me against going to see this movie. She says that it is super scary and that it is probably the worst idea ever, but after she said that, we pretty much had to go, haha! And... Jay and I haven't been to a movie, just him and I, in like the last three years! At least, I don't think so... we've been to movies since then, obviously, (me more than him) but not just the two of us. So... we're going, even though movies are expensive, haha! And, I'm excited.

My Wednesday is starting off pretty good. I might have mentioned in my post last night that I am done with class today at 2:40pm instead of my normal 6:30pm. That means I get to be home when Ayden gets home from school and we get to go on our family bike ride early tonight. I'm thinking we could probably pull off another four miles tonight since it is less windy out and Ayden did so great with it last night. I really like that Jay wants to go as well because so often I want to do things as a family and he doesn't want to do them. I'm hoping that this keeps up and that by the end of the summer we have biked over 100 miles together as a family. I definitely think that that is doable! I mean, an average of four miles a night would mean we'd have to bike that route 25 times and that is definitely not a lot for an entire summer... maybe I should make our goal higher, lol!

Jay has grand plans to go golfing a lot this summer as well. Although, I tend to think that he usually has these plans and then never follows through with them. I'd like to go more often though, at least to the driving range. We all have a set of clubs now and it would be another fun thing to do together. We found a set for me last summer for SUPER cheap and they were in pretty good condition and I think I used them maybe twice (although we did get them kind of late in the summer). We wouldn't have gotten them in the first place, but they were SUPER cheap. Now I told Jay that I need to get a cute bag for them and a cute golf glove. They did come with a decent bag that even has wheels on it. He wasn't too keen on the new bag, but glove definitely (since most gloves are only around $10 for an okay one). I wanted a bright pink glove though and the store that we were at didn't have anything but white with a little pink on it. That was definitely not going to work for me. Listen to all this golf talk... I can barely even hit the ball when I swing. Dare I say that my six and a half year old son is a better shot than me?! It's true!

I have been soda free for the past ELEVEN days! That is HUGE for me! I was not a full blown soda addict per say... but I usually had at least one a day. I tried to keep it to one a day and with a meal and I would usually feel bad if I had more than one a day. I didn't really go through any caffeine withdrawals, or I don't think so. I did have a huge headache last Friday, but that was already almost a week since my last soda so I didn't really contribute that to my lack of caffeine, so much so as how I was feeling that day (which was overall pretty cruddy). I've also been trying to eat less. I tried counting my calories one day and it is hard so I've been just eating smaller portions at each meal and not having any unhealthy snacks (although I did have a piece of super yummy Grandma Hoerth cake and a cupcake that Jay made on Saturday, and two cupcakes on Sunday, and a small handful of M&Ms last night, shh, yes I know that was three days of 'cheating'). My chocolate craving just got the best of me this past weekend and last night, but I don't think that you need to cut it out completely, right?! I weighed myself on March 27th and I weighed (ha, I'm not really going to make that public) and then when I weighed myself again on April 3rd (a week later) I weight (insert lesser number here) and had lost just about five pounds. I will attribute a little bit of that to the fact that I weighed myself the first time half way through the day after I'd eaten both breakfast and lunch and the second time was in the morning before I'd eaten anything and a little bit due to differences in clothing, although I tried to wear the same light stuff on both days. In any case, even if all I lost was two actual pounds last week, that's great! I am that much closer to what I would like to weigh because my starting weight was about fifteen pounds more than I would like to weigh... which is pretty much what I weighed in high school.

My friends and I are trying to plan another girls night/get together. Once again, it's been WAY too long since we've all seen each other. I think it was right before Christmastime that we all got together last with the kiddos and then probably twoish months since our last 'just mommy' lunch out... definitely time again! I really don't want to lose touch with these ladies! They have what it takes to keep this mommy sane and their kids are all just SO adorable! It's amazing that we can go for such a long time without catching up and then we get together and it seems like just yesterday that we were last together. I wish we all lived a little bit closer together and had better schedules so that it didn't have to be so long between when we see each other, but such is life I guess, right?!

There are... only 899 days left until Jay and I get married. I better get started on some hard core planning, right?! Lol! Wedding planning is pretty much at the bottom of my list and will most likely remain there, I mean... isn't that what my mom and Jay's mom are for... to do all of that for me?! Honestly, it just doesn't even seem real to me yet because it is so far away. Yes, I do have a ring on my finger... but I sort of already think of us as being married. I mean, in our case, nothing is really going to change after we get married so the whole actual wedding thing just hasn't gotten me super excited yet. I’m sure it will as the gigantic amount of days dwindles lower and lower, right?!

Two more hours on campus and then its off to enjoy the nice weather outside! YEAH! Can’t wait!

CIAO! LOVE ME!

Blogging from bed...

This is a first for me... laying down in bed and typing out a blog post from the keyboard on my phone. Hmmm... I'm currently waiting for a new show, Pregnant in Heels, to start on TV. It looks pretty good and kind of funny because it it about a bunch of rich pregnant ladies who haven't a clue about kids. That just screams funny to me!

We went for a four (probably longer because I don't think my trip counter on my bike was quite accurate) mile bike ride tonight as a family. Third or fourth one already and I'm loving it.tonight was the first night that we went this far though. It was Ayden's idea to do four miles. He said he wanted to do more than just two and I asked him how many and he said four. And he only had to get off and walk his bike up one small hill and I don't blame him because we were totally biking against the wind at that point. But we all made it and I hope we can go again tomorrow!

One more day of class for me this week! Yeah! Well, actually Wednesdays are always my last day of class each week, but because of the national audiologist conference this week (of which I'm sadly too poor to attend this year) two of my four classes are cancelled for tomorrow and I don't have clinic on Thursday.

Okay, blogging in bed is going to come to a close for tonight... my wrists are getting sore and my show has started.

CIAO! LOVE ME!

Mobile Blogging?!?!

Tyring out this mobile blogging thing... wonder if maybe this is something that could get me to blog a little more when I don't have access to my computer? Who knows...

Until next time.

CIAO! LOVE ME!

Felt like crud, but better now!

I slept like crap Thursday night... I couldn't stay asleep, I couldn't get comfortable, I was either too hot or too cold (I'm too young for hot flashes, hehe)! And I'm definitely felt it on Friday! I thought I was getting sick. I had a bit of a sore throat and I'm was very achy and freezing cold all day. I just could not get warm. Like, I could feel that my face was warm, but the rest of me felt really cold. I took my temperature and I had a low grade fever, which was just great! And my lower back, the back of my thighs and my rear end just plain out ached! I don't know why... I thought maybe it was because I have been sitting so much this week, but honestly, I haven't been sitting any more than I usually do. I think that had a lot to do with why I didn't sleep good Thursday night, as well. I was only comfortable when I was standing or laying down on my stomach. Oh well, just me complaining like usual, eh?!

But I ‘toughed’ it out on Friday, worked, did a bit of shopping, and then spent the better part of the afternoon on the couch. I had one killer of a headache Friday night, but I slept much much better Friday night which was GREAT!

Ayden's favorite show started a new season this past week and we let him stay up an hour past bedtime to watch it. It was on from 8-9pm and he is usually in bed around 8pm. We recorded it on DVR as well, just in case he was getting crabby and needed to go to bed early. He behaved really well and stayed up throughout the whole thing. What is the show, you ask, because I haven't said yet... well, it's Swamp People on the history channel and it follows a bunch of rednecks down in the Louisana bayou who go alligator hunting during a 30 day season each year. I kind of like it too... haha!

Jay made himself a new fleece tie blanket last night. It's a Michigan Wolverines one. He loves them and the blanket turned out good and is nice and warm. I really like new fleece blankets, they are super soft!

We went for a two mile bike ride on Thursday night as a family and it was lots of fun! We did find out that Jay needs a new bike though because he can no longer change gears on his current one (which is probably almost 15 years old) and that his back tire rubs when he tries to brake. We found a nice one at Walmart for a good price. I can’t wait to go for more bike rides as a family once the weather gets more stable. We couldn’t go on Friday because it was rainy out (and I felt like crap). The weather was pretty fabulous yesterday, but we were gone all day long, and today the weather is once again crap. I especially loved that Ayden asked if we could go even farther on our next ‘adventure’ so that is awesome!

We got new phones! Yippie skippy! Actually, I really like the new phones, but I don’t like the fact that our crappy phone company would not let us out of our contract. Oh well, the new phones were free! They are touch screen phones and have the Android operating system and the best part is that now I can download all of the free apps that everyone is talking about! Hehe! I think I’m in love! And there is GPS built into the phone and we tried it out yesterday and it works and is super awesome and is free! Bring on some Angry Birds and Ant Smasher! Addicting!

Time to go be productive again, I pretty much finished up my presentation for tomorrow, just requires a few practice reads, and I’m about done with an assignment due on Wednesday. Yeah for productive Sundays!

CIAO! LOVE ME!