My Coming Back Party

So, I hope some of you are still around. I haven't been blogging for a LONG time. Our time in Europe has been fun, but it has almost come to an end. It just seems like we have been so busy, and life has gotten in the way of blogging. However, with a HUGE move coming up in a month, a headache issue, and many other things going on, I thought getting back to blogging would be good for me.

What have I been up to? A little of this and a little of that. I made a quick, unexpected trip back to the US in April to visit my Aunt. It was a nice trip home, but as always, it's great to get home again. Right after that we had hubby's parents here for their vacation. The highlight was our trip away.

We spent two weeks away with them. The nice thing about the resort down in Garmisch is that they have tours to take. We didn't want to take any, but they were perfect for his parents. We spent our days hiking around the hotel, and swimming. One day we all (parents included) went to the gorge right there in town. It was an easy hike through the gorge, and we all sat by the river for a quick snack. After the men decided it would be fun to take the long hike back. It was really the LONG way. It took us forever to get back. When we were 90% done with the trail there was a sign that said, "For experienced hikers. Not recommended for children" Oops! They really should have put that on the other side too. We did many other things, but we still all joke about going on another hike. :p

After we spent the week there, we took off and headed to Italy. While we were there we were able to see the Leaning Tower of Pisa (pizzas as the kids like to call it). While it was fun to go see that, we had the most fun just sitting on the beach. We went every day we were there. One day we couldn't get in the water due to the waves being so high and strong. We still had fun playing in the sand and collecting shells.

More recently I have been trying to spend as much time with my friends as I can. I really am going to miss living here when we leave. This place has really grown on me. I usually am okay with leaving, but this one is going to be hard.

Anyway, now that I have my iPad, it is much easier to do blogging and such. I hope to be updating on a somewhat regular basis. I hope you all don't mind ... I'm back!!

One Month Down

As of this past Tuesday, I have been dieting for a month. I say dieting, but it really has become more of a lifestyle change. To me a diet is something you do for a short amount of time. It is a short term fix for something that may or may not have been a long term problem. For me diets have always come and gone. I have always lost weight, but I have always seemed to gain weight back. So I have really worked hard to make more of a lifestyle change.

So after 30 days of my lifestyle change the results are in...dun dun dun....18 lbs! I never thought it was possible to loose that much in a month but here I sit as proof that it can be done. My first weight loss goal is 20 lbs, and I have been waiting for about 1 1/2 weeks for that pesky 2 lbs to come off. It just won't come off. However, I figure in due time it will come off with I hope about 3 or more other lbs. :)

Tomorrow I'm going to do a Green Smoothie Only day again to kind of jump start my body again into loosing weight mode. I hope that by getting back to basics again, maybe I will start to loose some more weight. Maybe next month I can report that I have officially made it back to my wedding weight :)

Oh My Word!

So yesterday was day 1 of Green Smoothie Detox. That was one of the hardest days in awhile that I have had food wise. I never realized how much I ate just because I just wanted to and not because I was hungry. It was funny how my stomach seemed to want to run me and not the other way around. I got to the end of the night, and I thought I was going to kill over from not eating all day. Most people would say something along the lines of anything is fine in moderation, and that I should have just eaten a little of something. However, it was important to me to make it through one day. I needed to make it one day. If I could make it one, I could make it two...or so I thought.

I spent the morning thinking if I really wanted to continue with this. I went to my Wednesday morning Bible Study. Some of my Smoothie buddies are in the Bible Study with me. I watched all of them sipping on their smoothies and wondered if it was so hard for them to resist the bagels, cheese, and meat over on the table. It couldn't be....could it?

When I finally made my way home, I just wanted to cheat. I wanted to be bad, and I wanted to eat something solid. Today in the plan we add in rice. I don't like rice, and I wondered if it would be something that'd fill me up. Most wait and eat it for dinner. I have to do a sleep study tonight, so lunch time rice it is. It isn't something that rocks my socks, but boy does it feel nice. :)

Before I ate the rice, I had a wake up call. One of my smoothie friends told me this morning that she lost 4 lbs in the process of yesterday and this morning. So before I cheat I get on the scale. I have lost 5 lbs in just the first day. With that knowledge, I decided to stick with it today. I do know that I'm going to slip off the Smoothie Detox a couple of times in the process. My husband and I have a couple of planned nights out, so I'm going to still do that. However, I hope that by the time we do something like that, I will have better control with telling my stomach to lighten up.

The Smoothie Detox lives another day!

You Want Me to Drink What?!

About a year ago I saw a woman bringing her son into the childcare room with a cup. Upon further inspection of the cup, it looked like the most horrid stuff I had ever seen. I didn't know if she expected her son to drink that stuff or not, but I watched as he did. It looked like a dark green slime drink in a cup. I couldn't believe that this kid was drinking it.

As the weeks pasted, this woman finally mentioned something about these green smoothies. I was glad to know what they were, but it still didn't make them any more appealing to me. The idea of spinach, lettuce, or any other green veggie in a smoothie just didn't sound good to me at all. In fact I wondered how anyone could even stomach it.

Later on in MOPS, she did a smoothie demo for everyone. I tried one (with my eyes closed so I couldn't see the green goo I was about to ingest), and I wasn't too impressed. I just couldn't get past the fact that there were veggies in my smoothie. That just isn't natural. you aren't suppose to drink green slime stuff. You just aren't.

Well it has been a year since my first encounter with a green smoothie, and today I am starting a Green Smoothie Detox. This friend of mine decided a few weeks ago to send out an email and ask if anyone was interested. I don't know why I said yes, but I did. Maybe I was still jet lagged when I read it. She said in the email that if people do things as a group you are more likely to have good results, and I know she's right on that. So I gave into peer pressure and joined the Green Smoothie Clan.

I will keep people up to date about how the smoothies are coming along, and I will even posts some pictures as the days go on with my own concoctions of mixed greens and fruits. This mornings smoothie consists of spinach leaves, raspberries, strawberries, blueberries, bananas, and water. I think I'm going to do some more of the same this afternoon. It's going to be a wild month while I'm doing this, but I hope that after all is said and done, my tastes have changed (for the better), and I am in more control over my eating and appetite.

So bring on the green goo! I'm taking you on! I can do this...I can do this...

Seasons of Live

Yesterday was one of those changing of the seasons days for me. A lot has been going around here, and it has been hard not reflect on the changes that are happening in my life. It's amazing how little things will trigger moments where you reflect on life and how you really got to where you are. I haven't been going that in depth with my refections, but I have had a few bittersweet days.

It all started several months ago when one of Genevieve's best friends moved away. This girl's mom and I were friends too. It made me sad to see a friend go. When you live the lifestyle we do, leaving friends and having them leave is just another part of life. It isn't something we enjoy, but we expect it. I have also learned that in the military it doesn't have to be goodbye. People often run into others down the road. With the new advances in the web, Facebook, e-mail, and other things make it so easy to stay in contact.

Anyway that one move started our season of change. By the end of the summer I will have 5 or 6 friends move away. I'm usually pretty good with people moving away and moving away myself, but this time it seems different. It seems harder to loose so many of the friends I have made in just a few months. I will still have some friends here, but loosing some always is hard. I told my Mom a few weeks ago that I felt like I wouldn't really have any friends when the summer ends. She then reminded me that she has NEVER know me not to have friends. She reminded me about a wonderful trait I have to be able to walk into a room and make friends with just about anyone there. She is right, and life moves on. To my friends that are leaving, I will miss you. However, like I said before, it's not goodbye, it's see you later.

Yesterday also brought about a new season in motherhood. I have embraced the season of having a toddler and a preschooler in my midst really well. I know that my kids will grow up, and that doesn't really bother me. I am looking forward to the upcoming seasons in life with them. However, I realized yesterday just how fast they come.

Genevieve cannot start Kindergarten this year. She won't be 5 until the end of November. They recently changed the cut off date to earlier in the year. Even without the change she is no where near the dates to enter this year. I was telling a friend of mine that I think most parents think their kids are smart enough to go ahead and go, and I'm no exception. I believe that Genevieve is at a place now, where she'd have no problems in school next year. However, I have decided that I'd rather just leave things be, and have her one of the oldest in her class. With our life right now, she will have a lot to deal with as a kid. If we keep on our current path, she will encounter moves, times where Dad is away a lot or for long periods of time, and many other things. I would rather her be more mature than one of the younger in her class dealing with these things.

She has been in a Part Day Preschool class for over a year now. She loves Ms. Susan's class. She has had so much fun at school. However, with her growing and learning so much, she is now too advanced for the class. Because of this, we decided it might be best to look for something new for her. We found something we think will be right up her alley. We have enrolled her in German Kindergarten. I went to see the school last week, and it is amazing. She is going to have a blast! I'm so excited because I know she will now be challenged in a new setting. She will be able to pick up another language, and she will learn to interact with a whole new group of people. She will also switch to an all day program instead of just a few hours a day.

I just think how if we were not in Germany, she wouldn't get this shot at something so neat. She will be able to tell people now that she went to a German school. How many people can say that? I'm excited for her, and I hope that she will love it as much as I think she is going to. Watch out German school, here comes Genevieve!

Deals, Deals, and More Deals

So I know I posted a few weeks ago about all the soap I got paid to take out of the store (and I actually got some more this past week). I don't want to make a habit of only blogging about deals that I get, but I have got a few these past couple of weeks, and I just have to share.

I am big on saving money when we can. My husband and I have worked real hard to get out of debt, and now that we are there, I'm pretty intent on staying that way. When I can find a deal or something that is a great buy, then I will take advantage of that. I scan the clearance racks, look at fliers before shopping, and several other things. I'm not as hard core as some other people I know, but I tend to think of myself as a pretty smart shopper.

First deal happened last week. It was totally by accident though. I really can't take much credit. I have a friend who let me use a portable DVD player for my trip home last time. She told me I could use it anytime I wanted. When getting ready for my trip coming up, I mentioned to her about her DVD player. It was bound to happen, and it did, that we would be gone at the same time. I loved her DVD player. Most portable players I have used only last about an hour or two before you have to charge them again. This does me no good on our long flights. This DVD player has a 6 hour battery. When you add in take off, landing, meals, snacks, and naps, that is about how much time I need a DVD player for.

Anyway, I took off last week to look at the store to see how many were left. It is a 190 dollar DVD player (worth every penny if you are flying with my son), and I wanted to wait until the last second possible to spend that money for it. When I went in last week, there were only two left. I knew my luck, and if I didn't go ahead and get it, it would be gone when I needed it. So I went ahead and picked it up. When I got up to pay, it rang up for 67 bucks! When I asked about it, they let me know that it was the right price, and that I got a good deal. It's not a good deal, it's an AMAZING deal!

Yesterday the deals came too. I went to the store to look for another set of PJs for Samuel. Carter's makes these wonderful sets that come with a t-shirt, shorts, and pants. I love them because they can be used in the Spring, Summer, and Fall. I get a lot of use out of them. I had already got one set, and I wanted to pick up another. A friend of mine had told me they were having a sale on shoes, so I went over to that area too. That's when I hit the jackpot. I got both the kids new shoes yesterday. Original price was 40 bucks each pair. I got Genevieve's shoes for 9.50 and Samuel's shoes for 8.45. I think I might actually go back and get another pair for each of the kids in the next size up. It is so hard to find velcro shoes for Genevieve's shoe size. These are, and I am so glad.

With all the deals that I have been blessed with, I'm ready to share some blessings of my own. I have a lot of toys (about 4 bags worth) that I'm needing to get rid of. I think I'm just going to drop them off at the recycle center instead of trying to sale them. I love the idea that maybe by me giving toys away, they can bless someone else. I hope that whoever takes the toys enjoy them the way my kids have.

Wine or Not to Wine?

Tonight, I think it's wine. I have had a LONG day. We all woke up early this morning. It wasn't a bad wake up early. Usually when my husband is gone, I sleep really bad. I stay up really late, and I have to get up early with the kids. I seem to get in a cycle, and I can't get out of it. However, with our schedule during the week, I have been trying to go to bed earlier. I don't mind going to bed before others, but I would much rather go to bed at the same time than later than my husband. Since he has to be up so early (thus going to bed early), I have started doing the same. I worried that with last night being the first night of him gone, I'd be up late. Not so much. I actually went to bed at a decent time.

Anyway, the kids and I got up early, and we did "morning baths." The kids usually take baths before bed, but sometimes when alone, I like doing them in the morning. I don't usually have to fight them as much, and only having one set of hands, sometimes it is easier when we aren't fighting with bed time. While the kids were in the tub, I got a phone call. I totally forgot that there was a MOPS event today.

Today we were doing an easy cooking night. We were going to have our Rachel Ray moments and demoing an easy meal. We all brought meals we could show or something already made. We then got to have our moments and show our dish. We then got to sample the dishes and eat. There was childcare, and we just got to hang out with our MOPS friends. I love these events because it is always nice to just hang out with other moms. I had an easy recipe that is a pasta bake. I can put it in my crock pot, and it doesn't heat up my whole house. In the summer that is a HUGE plus.

We got home late from the event, and it was already past the kids bed time. Of course they were acting like it, so it was a long hour or so until they went to bed. We did PJs, medicine, brush teeth, and Blue's Clues. Both are now out, and fast asleep. So it was with the day I had, I have decided that a glass of wine is in order. So here I sit blogging and drinking my wine. I think I will also go to bed early again so maybe I won't have issues with sleep while my husband is gone.