30 Days to Lose Weight - Day 3

Well, surprisingly I don't feel that bad. Not that I feel great,  I still hurt a lot, but the pain is actually less than it was yesterday. I was able to do the DVD again  - though I had to pause some because my calves were on fire. I haven't really lost any weight, but that extra 1 1/2 lbs seems to have magically dissapeared according to my scale. It likes to mess with me, I've noticed. One day it will tease me into thinking I've lost weight and then others it says I've gained. I'm convinced there is a very tiny, cruel man in there getting a kick out of tormenting me.

Anyway, I did fall off the wagon a bit. I went to McDonald's - the root of all evil, I  know - for lunch. I blame my friend Heather. She is a terrible influence (he-he). I did stick with water thought, and I got a chicken sandwich. I did get french fries, but it is McDonald's. You can't go into McDonald's and not get the fries.  I swear I didn't like it. (I'm totally lying. They were wonderful!)


I'll keep the updates coming. Though at this point, I may just put them out at the end of the week.

Have a nice weekend.

30 Days to Lose Weight - Day 2

Oh my God! I think I might die.  I am completely stunned by how a little 20 minute workout could so thoroughly kick my butt. Every muscle in my body hurts, but my legs are the worst! Every step up to the second floor of my house kills, I am completely unable to squat down for anything, and trying to use the toilet is an act of torture. I knew I was out of shape, but this is ridiculous. 

Even so, I somehow managed to do the video again today though I had to take breaks here and there. I actually did better than I expected. My fear now is what tomorrow will bring. If I feel this bad today, I'm afraid that I may not be able to walk tomorrow. I guess we'll have to see.

Oh, and as for my weight... Well, It seems that I actually gained a pound and a half when I visited my parents this weekend so now I have 8 1/2 lbs to lose - lovely. 

But I'm staying positive. 

Can't you tell. 

Here's a picture of us working out:

I got both of the kids to do it with me today. They were really cute. See their dumbbells, they're actually tinkertoys my husband made to look like my dumbbells.

If I Don't Laugh, I Might Cry

I think, as moms, we are conditioned to pay attention to the little things, whereas, the men in our lives are more "big picture" so to speak. Case in point: I found out today that my husband's been bathing our children using dog shampoo. The funny part is... we don't have a dog. Actually, we haven't had a dog for 3 years.

When our dog died, I just left the shampoo under the sink in case we got another dog, and forgot about it. Somehow, in recent months, it migrated its way into the basket holding the children's bath products, and my husband's been using it off and on since. In his defense, it says "For Dogs" in really tiny letters on the bottle. I just find it hilarious that I drive myself crazy making my own cleaning products, reading product labels, scouring the internet for ways to keep these kids healthy, and my husband bathes them with dog shampoo - cheap dog shampoo at that.

Oh well, at least we can rest assured that they are flea free.

 

  

Can you see where it says 

"For Dogs"?

 

 

How about now?

30 Days to Lose Weight - Day 1

I'm not super overweight or anything. Like many of you, I am just not where I want to be as far as my weight and appearance go. When I was younger, I could drink and eat anything I wanted and remain thin. As I got older that started to change somewhat, but it wasn't until after having my two kids that my body seemed to just give up. The thing that kills me is the belly fat. If you have belly fat you know what I mean when I tell you how nasty it is when you sit down and your stomach touches your boobs. Sooo gross!  The thing that pisses me off the most is that I eat a heck of a lot better now than I did in my twenties, but my body doesn't seem to care.

To make matters worse, I'm going with my husband to visit his family in Miami in exactly one month. If you've ever been to Miami, Fl you know it petty much only contains only 2 types of women: ridiculously beautiful and troll. It is my goal to NOT be a part of the troll group when I visit. Unfortunately this is made more difficult by all of the ridiculously beautiful women in my husband's family - one of which was a Hawaiian Tropic model. Seriously, I'm not making this up. As you can imagine, standing next to these 5'9" goddesses, I really do feel like a troll. Not one of the Lord of the Rings types, more like the troll pencil toppers. You know, the ones with frizzy hair and boobs hanging over their bellies. Yep. That's me! Except with clothes, of course.

Anyway,  I started trying to work out earlier this summer, but then I hurt my back and subsequently fell of the wagon. Now I only have 30 days left to get my butt into shape so I am going to do it over this blog. Why? Peer pressure. If I put it out there that I am doing this then I actually have to do it, right?

So here's my plan:

1. Drink water. I have been drinking diet for a while, but recently discovered research showing that diet drinks may lead to more abdominal fat. I have to, unfortunately, admit this might be true since this is the worst belly fat I've ever had. So I am forced to drink water - and coffee, of course.
2. Eat more fruit and salads. I actually eat a fairly healthy diet already so I'm just going to try to step it up a notch.
3. Less crappy late night snacks. (FYI: I am eating Ramen as I write this. Oh...the hypocrisy)
4. Do the Jillian Michaels - 30 Day Shred DVD everyday (at least every day I can walk). It's a 20 minute video which is about all I have time for, but it really kicks your ass. I was shaking after doing it today. 

Here are my goals:

I would like to lose about 7lbs and 4 inches off my waist. I realize this is unrealistic for one month, but it is my ultimate goal. We'll just have to see how close I come to it.

Here's a picture of me exercising with my daughter today. It was soo cute. I wanted to upload a video, but couldn't get it to work. I'll try tomorrow.

Yes. My house is a mess. I'll get to that tomorrow too...maybe.

Duh Moment: Children’s Detangling Spray

I try to use all natural products for my children including their shampoo and conditioner, but all natural detangling sprays are quite expensive so I was using a cheaper brand. It worked well, but smelled awful, and I worried about all the toxic chemicals I was potentially spraying on my daughter's head.  


Then one day I had an epiphany… detangler is just watered down conditioner. Duh! I got a regular spray bottle, filled it with water, added a few squirts of herbal conditioner, shook well  and voila - all natural detangling spray for pennies. And it works great!

****Just make sure you clearly mark the bottle or you might find your significant other cleaning the countertops with it.****

Awesome Product: The Tick Key

I suck at removing ticks. 99.999% of the time I will end up just decimating the body while leaving the head perfectly intact and still attached. It was after one such incident that resulted in me having to take my little girl to the doctor, that my friend Heather shared this super cool product with me.  It's called the Tick Key. Like you, I was a bit skeptical at first whether it would actually work, but given my track record with ticks, I figured it was worth a try. I am so glad I did. This thing really does work! I've used it twice and it worked like a charm both times. The first time, My son got a tick on his chest and my husband got it off super-easily. This was not a new tick either because it had been a number of hours since he'd been outside. The second time, I got the tick on the back of my leg - behind my knee - and I took it off myself. Now considering I can hardly get a tick off of an area I can see properly, this was pretty awesome.

This is how it works:

Images taken from the Tick Key website.

You can get these for about $3.00 at most outdoor stores like REI or directly from their web site: http://www.tickkey.com

And if you were wondering.... No, I have not been paid by the company to say these things. No one is going to pay a brand new blog with zero followers to review their product. (However, if they would like to throw a little money my way, I would happily accept.) I'm sharing this because I thought other moms would appreciate learning about it.

Give it a try and let me know what you think.

Play dates are the Antichrist

Okay, so perhaps the wording is a bit strong, but I felt it was needed to get my point across. You see, it is my opinion that just about every issue surrounding raising children these days stems from our attachment to play dates. Call it the Kevin Bacon effect of parenting. The problems we see with children today like: lack of socialization, not enough outdoor play, too much TV and video games,  as well as parental issues such as: permissiveness, negativity, overindulgence, depression (mother's not kids) all goes back to play dates. The issue is not with the" play", but with the "date." In our society we are so detached from each other and so over-scheduled that even our kids have to schedule in time for play.

When we were kids and asked our moms if we could go play at a friends house, she wouldn't say "Well lets see if we can work out something for next Tuesday," but that's exactly what we do everyday. Exaggeration? I think not! I only have one friend that I can just call and say "You want to hang out?" One! And thank God for her or I might go nuts! Every other parent I know requires me to schedule play date days, if not a weeks, ahead of time. In  our mom's day, they had a community of friends - usually that lived in the same neighborhood, and they just got together on a  daily basis and hung out while the kids played. How nice does that sound? The kids got to be play all day with other children and their moms had a network of friends and support (i.e. adult interaction) that they could rely on to help keep them sane.

Case in point, my mom once told me a story about how, when my brother was a toddler, he painted the walls with his dirty diaper. Think pristine white walls covered in poop, and you can imagine how my mom might have felt. By the third time this happened, she was ready to lose it.  So she called her friend who quickly came over and took my brother off her hands, possibly saving his life. Now I want you to ask yourself, What would you do if your child pushed you to the edge? Who might you call for help? Your mom? Your husband? Your doctor for an increase in your Zantac prescription? I bet calling a friend for help wouldn't even be on the list. And if it would, you are very lucky because for most of us this just isn't the case.

Its no wonder we are all on anti-depressants and Valium and whatever else helps us get through the day. We are too afraid to ask for help. The funny thing is... most of us want to make these connections with other families, but are afraid of crossing some invisible line of acceptable behavior. 

So now the question is: how do we fix this? I'm not entirely sure. I know there are a lot of mother's groups out there trying to help connect moms and their kids, but as someone who was a member of one of these clubs, it didn't really provide the kind of  circle of support I really needed. Maybe we just need to be a bit more formal about it. Start our own mother's group that requires us to meet at least 3 times a week, or just schedule a daily get-together time. I'm not so sure what would be the best course of action, but what I do know is that things have to change. It's time to start a new mommy movement for our kids health and our sanity.

Now we just have to figure out how in the hell to do it.