Sugar Baby

Daddy left the sugar bin within reach of the baby Saturday afternoon.  While Daddy was out running and Mommy was busy making trays of cut fruit and veggies for a church social, Annie quietly found her way to the sugar and had a little party.  She finally came out to show Mommy once her face, hands, and the pantry floor were covered in sugar.  Holy. Sticky. Mess!  Our "sugar baby" was in heaven.

Sunday Shenanigans 03/25/12

This is not what it looks like.  Well, OK, maybe it is.  Annie disappeared into the bathroom while eating a snack.  The brown mess on her face is Nutella.  Still can't figure out why she always wants to sit on that potty - even while eating.  Maybe she'll be potty trained before Lily.  As long as she never tries to eat anything out of the potty we'll be fine.

Mommy was busy this week making invitations for New Beginnings.  While I was up to my elbows in scrapbook paper, glue, and an unruly Cricut machine - the girls decided to start emptying the pantry of its contents.  We made the most of it and had races rolling cans down the hallway.  It was actually pretty fun.

 Annie the carb addict.  She loves my homemade bread.  She couldn't stuff it into her face fast enough before bed Tuesday night.

The girls spent most of the week sick.  Both had bad colds with lots of coughs and nose blowing.  Then Lily also had a 24 hour stomach bug.  We stayed home the whole week and tried to rest and recover.  Sleeping and watching tv and reading books were the highlight of our days Tuesday through Friday.  They are both healthy again, but Annie has a lingering cough.

What are all those feathers?  A chicken blew up in our yard!  Our neighbors raise chickens for their eggs.  Some dogs came and killed or ate 5 of the 7 chickens.  One poor dead bird was left in our yard.  We had to call the neighbors to come and remove it.  YUCK!

 I just love Annie's expression in this photo.  She is really starting to look like a big girl.  Remember how Lily used to need her blankie wrapped around her when she ate lunch?  Annie has entered that phase.  Thankfully I know it passes, so I don't mind indulging it.  I do laundry all the time anyway.

Saturday morning the girls were starting to feel better.  We made them banana smoothies for breakfast and they stood in the living room to watch Caillou on t.v. while drinking them.

Annie wants to wear panties.  She goes to the basket in the bathroom where we keep them and asks us to help her put them on.  They look so funny and cute over her pants that we allow it for own entertainment.  Silly girl.

In other family news...Mommy lost 3 pounds this week.  I am almost back to where I was last July after completing Biggest Winner.  Just four more pounds to go.  Still a way to go for my goal weight, but I'll get there.

Our offer on the house was accepted.  We are trying to decide if we want to move forward with the purchase or not.  We'll keep you posted.  As Tigger would say, "TTFN! Ta ta for now!"

Happy St. Patrick's Day!

Lucky the Leprechaun came to our house early Saturday morning and left us with a bounty of leprechaun treasure.  He also left a magical rainbow trail to lead the girls to the treasure.  The kids were so excited they didn't know what to open first.  Until they realized the gold coins were chocolate.....there was no looking back after that.

Happy St. Patrick's Day from our redheaded little treasures!

Sunday Shenanigans 03/18/2012

Still working on potty training Lily....sigh.  Feels like we're not getting anywhere.  But she had a successful day on Monday so we let her have a popsicle in the bathtub.  Annie got to share the spoils.

We enjoyed the last bit of snow piled up in our yard.  The girls climbed on it for almost an hour one afternoon.

"Warmer" weather means more trips to the park.  This tunnel is Annie's favorite thing to climb on.

Lily is still Mommy's little helper.  This week she helped do the dishes and clean the bathrooms.  All while wearing her apron that matches Mommy's.  Thanks Erin!

We got a note in the mail from Grammy and Grampy Hall.  Lily loves to open her own mail!

 Friday night we had spaghetti.  Annie cleaned her plate and still wanted more.  Our girls LOVE spaghetti.

Lily is really interested in how words are spelled.  She was really excited to learn how to spell Uncle Brady's name this weekend.

 Mommy ran her first real 5k race this weekend in Rexburg.  The long uphill was killer especially since we were running into the wind.  But we were happy with our time and Daddy stayed by Mommy's side the whole way.  In weight loss news, I am down 0.7 pounds this week.  Not a great big number but every little bit helps!

This is the girls talking to Grammy and Grampy in Hawaii via Skype Saturday afternoon.  Thank goodness for modern technology.  The kids never last very long with the computer chats, but seeing and hearing their grandparents really helps the girls remember them.

Silly Annie in the tub.  I love bath time.  Maybe because it means bed time is only 1/2 an hour away.  The girls love bubbles and the water.  They stay in until the water has no warmth left and their fingers are all wrinkled.  Then we warm up with fuzzy jammies, a cup of chocolate milk, stories, snuggles and sleepy time.  I love our bed time routine.  I try to keep the following quote as my focus at bed time:

Time to Wake Up!

Those of you who have been supporting me and tracking my weight loss progress, have probably noticed (thanks to my weight loss ticker at the top of the blog) that I gained back some weight.  Between Thanksgiving and Valentine's Day I packed on 10 pounds.  Yikes!  I had totally stopped tracking my food intake and let myself stop exercising.  I used the excuse of the holidays and adjusting to my new time consuming responsibilities at church to allow myself a respite from active weight loss.  Big mistake.  My clothes weren't fitting, I wasn't feeling good, I had a wake up call.
The truth is, life happens.  There will always be something I need to do and somewhere I need to be.  I am the only one who can control whether or not I succeed with my long term goals of health, fitness, and weight loss.  I have to make the time to be active and prepare healthy food.  I know that I need to exercise to keep myself emotionally healthy.  I know that I need to journal my food to keep myself from overeating.  It works for me and I need to keep at it.
Two weeks ago I started using www.myfitnesspal.com again to help myself.  I signed up for a Zumba class 3 days a week with two of my girlfriends.  I started running again and committed to run a 10k with Jeremy in June.  I am feeling so much better.  I am down 2 pounds.  I am sticking to it. 
If you are working on losing weight too and need ideas for what to eat, check back during this month for meal and snack options.  I eat between 1200 and 1500 calories a day - depending on how hungry I am and how active I will be.  Good luck to all of us!

Too Smart!

Saturday night we had breakfast for dinner.  We were eating oranges and pancakes.  Lily's hands got very sticky and she asked to leave the table to wash her hands before she was finished eating.
Mommy said, "Right now in the middle of dinner?"
Lily said, "Not in my dinner Mommy, in the bathroom!" 
Mommy and Daddy started laughing so hard.  Lily didn't know what was so funny but she laughed with us and then ran to the bathroom to wash her hands.....in the middle of dinner.

Sunday Shenanigans 03/11/12

Just a normal week for us.  No exciting events...other than Lily's crash on the bike.  Monday night Lily wanted to be rolled to bed, so we rolled her from the family room to her bedroom laughing all the way.

Lily left the Snow White phase behind and wanted to be Cinderella this week.

 Here is Annie playing the piano and wearing her favorite hat.  She is into hats lately and wants to wear them all the time.

We got some snow this week.  The girls and I went out in the dark before bedtime on Wednesday to enjoy it.  We love the snow!

This is Lily's lip two days after the crash.  The swelling went down a lot.  Poor little one.

 And she was ready to hop back on her bike.  I was so amazed by her courage.  I wish I could pick myself this fast after I fall down.

Annie in yet another hat.  Thanks Justin!  We get a lot of entertainment value out of the bear hat from Korea.

Lily four days after the bike crash.  Her lip is almost back to normal and her nose is healing quickly.

We actually had sun and above 50 degree temps this weekend!  We took the girls to the park for a couple of hours Saturday afternoon.  They loved playing in the sand with their shovels (thanks Grammy Hall).  Annie loves that she is big enough to climb on the equipment and get down the baby slide by herself.  She says "weeee!" every time she goes down.

Mommy lost two pounds this week!  Mommy and Daddy went on a date to the gym for spinning class but it was cancelled so we ran on the treadmills instead.  We are considering doing a 10k together this June.

Mommy went to the Idaho Falls temple with the youth from church on Thursday and had a wonderful time.  It is a blessing to serve the youth of our church and see them learn and grow in the gospel.

No news on the house yet.  We are still waiting to hear from the seller's lender if they will accept the selling price.  That's all for now.

Crash! Boom! Bang!

Lily had her first bicycle accident this afternoon.  She was riding down a gentle slope in our driveway and went head first over her handlebars.  Her upper lip took most of the fall.  Mommy was worried that Lily had hurt her teeth or cut through her lip.  After stopping the bleeding and cleaning and calming Lily, the owie was inspected.  Luckily she just has a scratched nose and a fat lip.  The swelling seems to grow and shrink depending on how active Lily is..  Lots of ice, popsicles, and ibuprofen have helped calm everything down.  And a one hour snuggle with mommy helped too.  Get better soon Lily.