A night out

A nice dinner out to celebrate my friend Ashlee's b-day. I made her little birthday crown and she was such a good sport she wore it all through dinner!

Ear Tubes

We arrived at 6:30 in the morning.
And they still have a sense of humor.

Before the surgery.
After.

Both the boys got these cute little teddy bears. Mr. E grew really attached to his.

All went well. Except on the way home when Mr. E threw up in the van. Poor thing he was so hungry from not being able to eat. He was able to drink apple juice after he woke up but it didn't sit well. We went for a follow up yesterday. Mr. E's ears are great but G-man has to return in 3 months. Part of his eardrum is resting on the bones of hearing which isn't good. If it doesn't get better he will have to have another surgery to fix it. =(

Week One

One week ago I started my "sugar free" eating habits. I thought I'd let you know how I did. If you're not interested skip it, but I told myself that I would blog about it to keep myself accountable for my actions. So I'm just following up. Day one was great, no problems. Day 2 was tricky as we had people over for dinner and dessert was brought to help celebrate a guests birthday. I couldn't be the only one NOT eating dessert so I caved and had a small slice of pie. Of course, not wanting to bring the temptation home to her house, my friend left it at mine! By Saturday night there was little sliver left that I was anxious to see go, so I had to eat that. By Sunday, with all the treats gone from the house, I was ready to start again. Now it is thursday and I haven't had any treats. Did I define my definition of treats? By going "sugar free" this means to me that I'm not eating cookies, cakes, a tub of frosting, pastries, ice cream, chocolate, candies, things like that. I don't drink soda, so that's not a problem for me. I will, however, still eat my Activa yogurt (9 grams of sugar) and my cliff bars, they help me get over that mid-day hurdle. So far it's worked well and it hasn't been that bad. I know it's not completely sugar free but I have to be realistic. Baby steps. Just in case you were wondering I didn't eat the Sees peppermints, but my friend did get her b-day present early! We'll see how I do this next week.

Yesterday morning was spent in the hospital with Mr. E and G-man. They both were getting tubes put in their ears, AGAIN. Mr. E's 2nd time and I think we are up to G-man's 8th. I got some cute pics of the boys with their hospital garb on but it's on my phone (because I never remember my camera) so I'll have to do that later when I figure it out.

Happy Fall!

I Love this time of year! Even though we live in California and we don't have the beauty of the East Coast foliage. If you look hard enough you'll find it. Even if it is man made. You can walk into any Joann's and purchase any variety of leaves you want! Growing up on the East Coast, it was as easy as going into your own backyard to pick up any color of leaves. It's a little harder to do that here. Just the same, the temps are cooling (in the 70/80's, 50's in the morning) No more air conditioning, windows are open, fans are on and it's beautiful. You can go outside during the middle of the day for more than 5 minutes and not feel like you are dying. Now is the time of year to stop sweeping your porch because it's chic to have the leaves blown up by your door, a little dust and some cobwebs. Even the smell of the air is changing. I just love it. Hope you, too, find the beauty around you and embrace it. Enjoy your day.

Last night after posting my blog, I indulged myself, (no not with chocolate covered rice krispies treats, I already did that remember) and did a little web/blog surfing. I am just in awe at the talented women out there that do so many creative things, not only on their blog but in their life! Then there's me, way down on the other end of the spectrum, but today this isn't about me. It's just fun to look, get ideas and a little inspiration and hopefully some motivation. Anyhow, on a few of these pages I noticed that there was a common link. So I clicked it and read a tragic story about a couple who were in a private plane crash and are in an intensive care burn unit in Arizona with severe burns over their bodies Him 30% her 80%. Unfortunately, I was too late to participate in the group fast but still felt like I wanted to do something. So I thought I'd at least talk about it here and bring it to your attention so you can decide a way you might be able to help too. Through prayers, donations, whatever. Many bloggers/websites are donating a portion of their sales to Christian and Stephanie. (Look for the link on the right of my blog) Even this morning when I checked my email I had received my LDSLiving update and this couple was mentioned there and how this story and her blog have reached across the world. Hopefully we can keep it going. Just reading this women blog you could feel the love that she has for life and her children. We just never know how we can influence or affect another human being and Stephanie obviously has touched many people lives which is evident from seeing how many people are helping them. Amazing.

Sugar!

Again, my time has been spent elsewhere (doing what, I don't know) but I have hardly spent anytime on the computer. Just enough time to check emails. My life is not busy by any means but I've been a bit apathetic lately. It's been a struggle to do anything. I'm just so happy to get a load of laundry done. Well, that just means I've washed and dried them. More than likely they are still in the dryer, unless, of course I needed to dry another load, then they are in the laundry basket next to the dryer. Tell me you can relate and I'm not the only one. I think the cause is because my running has be drastically reduced. I think my running buddy and I just got burned out. We still go out 4 times a week but two of those days we are walking. We rationalize that at least were moving, right? What frustrates me the most about running or exercising in general is that if you slack off for even just a couple weeks you have just sabotaged everything up to that point. It takes months for me to get to a happy place with my exercising and the results that come from it but it's just a matter of weeks to be right back at the beginning. I've been trying really hard to eat healthy, and most of the time I do. But a couple weeks out of the month I have an uncontrollable need for chocolate. Shamefully, I usually give in. As we speak, I have a box of See's peppermints in my pantry calling for me. I went there on Saturday to buy a gift for a friend. Trying to think ahead and be prepared, I buy the peppermints for another friend whose b-day is next week. Well, that was a dumb idea. Now I can't get those candies out of my head. I'm going to have to give them to her early. Either that or I'll be buying her another box. The internal struggles we women go through to look good. UGH! Strangely, I can tell a difference when I eat too much sugar. I really feel crappy and I can literally feel the fat depositing on my thighs. Logically you would think that would help me stay away from the stuff. But, alas, it doesn't. So I run. To at least try to counter what my mouth is unable to control. But by doing this, all I'm really doing is maintaining my current body position. I KNOW that eating right trumps exercise, but it somehow doesn't make it any easier. When I do gain control, and it does happen occasionally, I feel the difference in a matter of days. Again, you'd think that would be enough to motivate oneself. *sigh* So I'm trying again to go sugar-free. I don't know if I can go completely without because I'd have to throw out everything in my house. Sugar is in everything! But I will try to eliminate the sugars I can control. Like the chocolate covered rice krispy treats I had tonight. oops! So anyone with me? I figured if I blogged about it, I'd be more accountable. I know I don't have too many people reading my blog but if you do, I sure could use your encouragement so feel free to post any comments or advice. I'll try to keep you posted.

Birthday Wishes

This birthday shout out goes to my wonderful husband. We enjoyed a couple days of celebration as the two of us enjoyed a dinner out one night. Breakfast out another day. Pizza with the parents on yet another night and ending with a nice low-key family dinner on his birthday. It's nice to celebrate an adult birthday and eat a cake that doesn't come from a box! My wish for you is that I can be the person that you deserve and I can give you back even half of what you have given me. Thanks for loving me.

Scary!

I thought it would be scary when my 14 yr old started driving, well, it's even scarier when it's your 4 year old! I was little motivated this morning so Little A and I went out to wash our van that it so desperately needed. I was just finishing up vacuuming the back seats when the van started rolling down the driveway! I jumped up so fast, (I don't even move that fast when I'm running) moved Little A out of the way and slammed on the breaks just before we rolled out into the street. (My neighbors BMW parks across the street.) He was able to move the gear shift from P to L. OH MY GOSH! Talk about scary! We had a nice long talk about NOT playing around in a car. Hopefully, it scared him enough too, that he won't try to do that again. I'm just so grateful I wasn't cleaning behind the van when he did that. Apparently it's never too early to talk to your kids about playing around in a car.