Where did summer go?

It is the last day of August and I find myself wondering what exactly happened to summer? I feel like we did not do half of the things I wanted to do.

It has been so hot that it is not even enjoyable to go outside for a great length of time. This means that trips to the park had to happen early in the morning, late in the evening, or not at all. I wanted to go to the zoo, which never happened. We made it to the beach once. We never had a BBQ with our friends. We never had my SIL and her family over to swim at the subdivision pool and it will be closed after this weekend.

Shawn is finally off on weekends right now and I feel like we try to cram everything in to the 4 weekend he has off but we still never seem to get to do all of the things we want to do. We spend those weekends doing things around the house, running errands that are not possible with two kids in tow and not really enjoying  life like we should be.

I know that there is still plenty of warm weather left to enjoy time outside, but I still can't help feeling like I somehow missed summer.

Suprise Pictures from Grandma and Grandpa

Here are a few of the pictures my parents had taken of the kids.

Suprise

My parents are in town all week so the kids are staying home with them instead of going to the babysitters. Yesterday when I got home form work my mom suprised me with new pictures! She and my dad had taken the kids to get their pictures taken and they turned out so cute. They actually got one of both kids smiling at the same time!

The made the appointment 2 weeks ago so they spent the morning taking pictures and then took the kids out to lunch. I will have to upload some from the disk later but I can't wait to frame them!

Recipe Fail #1

I have been experimenting with recipes attempting to make them healthier. I tried to make Tolehouse Chocolate Chip cookies using half the amount of butter. I substituted 1/2 cup of unsweetened applesauce for 1 stick of butter. The cookies were too cake like for my families taste. They were not horrible but they were not what I was hoping for. My husband has informed me that this attempt should not be repeated. I figure next time around I will try to use greek yogurt instead.

Crock Pot Love

Lately it has been so hot outside that I have been doing quite a bit of cooking in the crock pot on the weekends. I would love to use it during the week while I am at work but we are gone too long during the day to use it and my husband is paranoid about leaving it on while we are gone.

I have tried a few new recipes and have a few pinned on Pintrest that I can not wait to try. Some of my old go to crock pot recipes called for cream of ( mushroom, chicken, ect. ) soup which I am trying to avoid using. Last weekend I did Italian sausage which turned out great.

My brother just moved into his own apartment and made chicken legs in his crock pot with barbecue sauce. He said it was good so I figured it was worth a try, besides with only 2 ingredients it is my kind of recipe.

4 chicken leg quarters (or any type of bone in chicken)

bottle BBQ sauce

salt and pepper

Rinse chicken and pat dry, lightly salt and pepper, place in crock pot then pour entire bottle of BBQ sauce over chicken. Cook on low for 5-6 hours.

My brother was right it was yummy!

Progress....

I have not been the greatest with the diet and exercise lately but I still have reached a milestone being back in the 100's. I finally go around to taking pictures to show a comparison from where I was to now. I am glad that I took pictures pretty close to the beginning of this journey because even though I am currently down 42 pounds I still feel huge when I look in the mirror. I know that I  have body image issues so it is nice to actually see the difference in photos.

off the wagon

Ever since we went on our trip to Wisconsin I have been having a hard time getting back in to the swing of eating and exercising. Last week I worked overtime all week and got home too late to get to the gym. This week has also been a bust. I have eaten horribly some days and not gotten nearly enough exercise. I finally made it to the gym today and let me tell you I can tell that it has been a few weeks. My arms feel like jello and my time on the elliptical seemed harder then I remember, but I did it. Now to keep going.

I was doing so well now is not the time to lose focus.

Lack of Protein

I am at a loss with Hailey's eating habits right now. I feel like she will not eat anything but pasta and fruit. We have always given her whatever we are eating for for dinner unless I know it is something she will not eat because it is too spicy or to difficult for her to eat. I am not a short order chef and i don;t want to start down the path of making her something else for dinner ever night but I am not sure what to do.

Hailey has never been a huge fan of meat. She would eat chicken, chicken nuggets, hot dogs, eggs, meatballs and MAYBE some fish. Lately when we give her dinner she politely says " No thank you mommy I don't like it" and pushes the food off the plate. We try to encourage her to try at least one bite but we just get the same response. She will eat the fruit and the pasta or rice off of her plate but nothing else.

I am starting to worry that there is not enough protein in her diet. She drinks plenty of milk but really lately the only protein I feel like she is getting comes in the form of peanut butter and even that can be hit or miss. I know the pediatrician said that toddlers sometimes eat everything in sight and then don't eat at all but I feel like she needs to eat something. I know she is hungry.

Less than an hour after dinner she will be standing at the pantry asking for a snack. We usually try to tell her no because we don't want her to get in the habit of not eating dinner only to fill up on cereal later. I want her to learn that she needs to eat dinner but I feel guilty not giving it to her if she is hungry so I am at a loss. I may pick up some Pediasure hopefully she will at least during that to get everything she needs for now and hopefully her appetite will change.

Any suggestions that moms who have dealt with this might have would be greatly appreciated.

A Little Adventure

 

Last weekend my mom flew down to watch the kids so Shawn and I could get away for a long weekend for our five year anniversary which was earlier in the month. We never went on a honeymoon when we got married. We decided to buy a house instead, which seemed like a better investment at the time however I am thinking we should have taken the trip and skipped the house as it is worth ALOT less then we currently owe on it. ( I'll leave that rant for another post)

We flew out on Friday afternoon and went to Wisconsin to visit a friend of Shawn's. Our flight was delayed on both trips so we had to sit in the airport. Picking up our rental car was disastrous and the drive from Milwaukee to Sheboygan was horrible but the time in between was great.

We hung out, relaxed, met some great people, and enjoyed meals that I actually got to eat while they were still warm since I didn't have to cut up anyone elses food first. I was looking forward to sleeping in but for some reason  every morning I was staring at the ceiling at 7:30.  Shawn and I decided to go running along the lake in the morning. I didn't pack any sneakers or workout gear or sneakers so a short shopping trip was called for. It was so nice to run outside and not feel like I was going to die from heat stroke. We did 2.2 mines each morning in just over 20 minutes which isn't bad considering I never really run outside, just on a tread mill.

One of the people we met told us about this great garden that just opened called Book Worm Garden so we decided to check it out. It was amazing and really made me wish that we had the kids with us, the both really would have liked it. Maybe someday we will go back and take them to see it. Each area in the garden had a theme. It was so well though tout and maintained, it is hard to believe that it was free to go to.

It was a nice relaxing trip minus the travel but I missed the kids. It was nice to get home they were so excited to see that we were home when they woke up Tuesday morning.