Here's to a Healthy New Year

Some people (including my wonderful Husband) think that New Year Resolutions are somewhat of a waste of time. Not that goals are a bad thing, just setting a bunch at the beginning of the year, only to stop doing them in a couple days or weeks. I on the other hand believe that any time something motivates you to get going on a goal it is worth while. But because I am lazy didn't want to look to geeky, I waited to start my goals until half way into January. I also decided that I was going to be really original in my goals and think of something that no one else would do. What are my new goals?? Simply put.....To be able to wear a swim suit in public this summer.

I know that goals take planning and hard work to accomplish so I set out chatting with all my friends about losing weight. This didn't help me lose anything, but along the way one of them suggested that weight loss is mostly in your head. I grabbed on to this with both hands and meditated every day about losing weight. How did I remember to meditate about it?? It was easy, it's amazing how getting in the shower can remind a person of their weight loss goals. Unfortunately simple meditation didn't do much either (I did lose a couple of pounds which I think was a direct result of the meditation, but might have had to do with retaining water.....) So at last I was forced to fall back on good old diet and exercise. Here is a little update on how it is going.

Part 1: Eat Healthy and Drink Lots of Water

I bought tons of fruits and vegetables at the store so that I could have stuff on hand that was more healthy to eat. I also switched to as many whole wheat products as I could. I have stuck to this now for a couple of days. But I am not a hard core "I will never eat sweets again" type of person so I would allow myself lets say one gold fish cracker. Unfortunately the urge to eat my one gold fish cracker came as I was taking my 9 month old out of the van. You see he had been eating said fishy crackers and I don't know what came over me but I reached down, grabbed one off his lap and tossed it in my mouth. It wasn't until I was chewing that it occurred to me that the fishy cracker may have been sucked on by the baby and spit out again. Oh well, live and learn right?

Part 2: Get limber and keep moving:

Exercising has been going well also. I have been going to a dance aerobics class at the gym. At first I felt awkward and uncoordinated but as the weeks passed I started to feel better about my performance. I purposely positioned myself in front of a door instead of the mirrors that line the class room so that I would not have to watch myself "dance." I even worked up enough confidence to try out a Zumba class. This strategy worked until today. My sister came with me and she stood in the spot in front of the door!! "No big deal" I thought. I will just not look in the mirror. I didn't work. I looked. I saw myself. It was not pretty. The moves that I thought I was doing right, I was most definitely doing WRONG. I looked like a spastic fish out of water. I don't even want to think about what I looked like doing the Latin moves in Zumba! My nice "child bearing" hips just don't move like they used too. (truth be told they never moved very well to begin with) Oh well, live and learn right?

Part 3: Get plenty of rest:

Part 3 is not a problem. Sleeping sounds good all of the time. Lived. Learned.

I intend to keep up on all these goals, and yes even continue to go to the dance classes. If you happen to see me there though, please don't let me know that you saw me.

Ho Hum

So another year is starting out and things have gotten quietly loud around here. I am glad that my life has slowed down to a fast pace and that my kids have gotten calmly rowdy. I have several goals for the new year such as to sit around and lose weight, keep my house messily clean, and only whisper when I yell at my kids.

Because it has been a while I will do a quick update on the kids:

Blake:

Blake is now 9 months old and has decided that life is only worth living if he is eating the crumbs out of my garbage pile when I sweep. I tried just not sweeping for a while thinking that this would solve the problem, but he turned to his second passion which is to eat all the crumbs that have not been swept up. He also eats a steady diet of baby wipes, candy wrappers and remote controls. (the baby wipes actually bother me the most, I understand the crumbs...at least they were once food, but a baby wipe?? Doesn't it taste nasty?? Maybe it doesn't, I have not actually tried one so I guess I shouldn't judge)

Blake is such a joy to have around. He smiles a lot and keeps us going, but he also sleeps through the night and eats well, so no real complaints.

Ashton:

Ashton turned 3 this year but is still under the impression that he is 18 and should be able to run his own life. Ashton enjoys a variety of activities (anything with a flat screen or controller usually works) and doesn't understand why he can't have his own iphone. He has recently decided that clothes are ok to wear for longer than 10 minutes and that there is more to eat than just cold cereal. Ok, fine, that is a lie, he still only wants to eat cereal for every meal, but he only gets away with it when he is tired and grumpy, or if he throws a big enough fit. (there is nothing wrong with giving into fits....right?)

Ashton loves the movie How to Train Your Dragon (I do too, the scene with Toothless and Hiccup learning how to fly together makes me cry every time....not sure why, I don't cry at many movies, in fact the only other one I can think of is Brother Bear)

Nathan:

Nathan is loving Kindergarten and has learned to read several words. He has published 2 books. (I debated weather to put that fact in the blog, you see I have a friend who just signed a deal to publish her first book and I didn't want to make her feel bad being so far behind my genius children and all, but I went for it anyway) Nathan has decided to keep his room clean and to do everything that I ask him to do. (no joke) I am pretty sure it is my parenting skills and not just his personality that has brought this about....the other kids?? We will just blame their messy rooms on their father.

Nathan just had his 6th birthday and had a small party at Chuck-E-Cheese with a SUPER fantastic cake that was made by my friend (it was actually the same friend that is publishing a book....maybe I should take out that first reference to her to say thanks....nah) Nathan has quite a collection of Mario characters and enjoys playing with them.

Kaylee:

Kaylee is 8 years old and is becoming quite a young lady. She is funny and fun and smart and shy all at the same time. (the split personality comes from me...or maybe it comes from me....hard to tell which) She has decided to join a Destination Imagination team this year and has really enjoyed working with her group. She is keeping up with her piano and I like to hear her practice. I wasn't able to post video of her winter recital because her piano teacher had a baby the day before the recital so we had to cancel, otherwise I would have posted the videos......yes I would have.....I am a blogging maniac.

I am thankful every day that I was blessed with a sweet little girl to call my own.

Trevor:

Trevor is still my oldest child, even though he thinks his opinion should be counted as an equal to his parents. Unfortunately the other kids agree with Trevor. If they have to choose to obey us or Trevor they almost always choose him. It drives me nuts. Here is one example: Ashton was going to say the dinner prayer the other night and I was going to help him...apparently Trevor was planning on helping him too and we both said "Dear Heavenly Father" at the same time. Silly me thought that Trevor would realize that I was going to help him and therefor stop talking, but no, I said "thank you for our day" as Trevor said "please bless the food" and as Ashton quickly repeated "please bless this food" I realized that my fate was sealed. Oh well, at least he has taught Nathan to keep his room clean.

Trevor is also doing Destination Imagination again this year and auditioned for and was accepted to participate in the school talent show for playing the piano. He is really a good kid and tries hard in everything he does.

I know you were expecting a "short" update, and this was kind of long, but when you have had as many kids as I have it takes a while to update on everyone.....either that or it makes you go crazy and you tend to ramble on and on and forget that you said it would be a short update in the first place.