You Probably Already Guessed

When the blog is silent most likely it means the blogger is in trouble. I still have tons of pictures and stories that I want to share from our vacation, but every time I sit down to write or choose pictures I lose my mojo. I feel overwhelmed, guilty, tired, etc.  A good portion of the vacation I worked to be active and ate decently.  I want to share those successes, but now that I am not in a good place I feel like I have failed...again.  Hey look what I did...and now I sitting on my butt eating like I have a hole in my neck (my 2.2 pound gain this week would suggest otherwise). I still plan to share all of that vacation goodness, but I have to get my head back in the game. For the sake of "this stuff is hard" honesty, brace yourself for an emotional dump ahead....or come back next time for a hopefully more positive report.

Our vacation was a wonderful diversion from my "issues".  When we got back real life seemed to settle back around me. I want to be happy and carefree, facing everyday as a new adventure or opportunity. So I make plans to get it together.   In the past, I have made a "to do" list each day. It made me feel really good to see my accomplishments and to not forget random tasks that needed to be completed. Then I got out of the habit and got further behind. I buy pretty notebooks....with the intention of focusing on my plans. One of these notebooks (purchased this week) is supposed to be my running "to do" list.  Now if I could just decide which one....I am learning elephant...

It has been blazing hot since we have been home. I feel like the heat and humidity suck the life out of me and all I want to do is stay in air conditioning. I don't even want to leave the house to grill food or go to the gym. Yes, I know I could do workouts at home in the a/c, but I would rather veg in front of the tv after work. We made some changes in the bedroom that has made it even harder to get out of bed in the morning. My husband finally wore me down on adding a room a/c unit to the bedroom. Our house doesn't have the greatest insulation and the central air just wasn't keeping the bedroom cool enough. Then because he goes to bed early (in the summer it is still light), we put up room darkening shades. I seriously don't even see the morning coming anymore. Even if I set my alarm I don't want to leave my little nest. 

In addition to my MS aversion to heat, I am struggling with a few health issues. They aren't the biggest most tragic things, but they are bothersome and weigh heavily on my mind.  I have been fighting my skin forever it seems...something always itches. Over the winter, I had a spot on my arm that has turned into quite the ordeal. I saw my GP and she thought it was ringworm - OTC and RX medicines failed to clear it up. I would think it was starting to go away and then it rages back. I also have a patch of eczema on my hand that I saw a dermatologist for about 18 months ago. Not to rehash it but that whole experience was a frustrating waste of time. Anyway, I am still fighting that EVERY day. Now I have this other issue that I don't know what it is and it is driving my crazy. My GP has nothing, so I have to find a specialist, but feel very burned by my dermatologist experience. Obviously, not all doctors are the same, but I have never been a fan of going to the doctor and the thought of finding another one makes me crazy. Meanwhile, my arm gets worse. In a desperate moment I posted my cooties on Facebook. I got every imaginable diagnosis..from scabies to allergies to my beloved dairy.

Another issue I have that more directly affects my blogging is my eyesight. Old lady eyeballs are in full force and I need to ditch the readers for good and get some real glasses. The last time I got real glasses from the optometrist, they actually made it harder to see. I took them back and got a replacement pair. When they still didn't help the optometrist just chalked it up to I wasn't giving them a chance. I am now wondering if it would be better to go to an ophthalmologist and get a complete eye health exam. Multiple sclerosis can also manifest in the optic nerve, so that is always in the back of my mind when I have eye problems.  My point is, that blurry vision and difficulty reading print is affecting my desire to spend time reading and writing...that makes me sad.

Both of these issues really bother me on a day to day basis. So why am I sitting here frozen and not storming doctors' offices in search for the help I need??  Perhaps it is my lack of confidence that these issues can/will be fixed based on my past experience trying to have them treated. I hear you all screaming at the screen....."Try again!!  You have to do this!!! Get to a doctor!"  

July has been emotional for me on another front. This gets hard so bear with me.  Many of you remember my husband and I suffered a miscarriage a couple of years ago. My due date had been set for July 12. All the "what ifs" or "should have beens" are so much louder around that date.  I am not sure there is a way around this and I just have to get through it time after time, wondering when it won't hurt so much. This year there is a new layer of tears. Our foster children had their final courtdate that released them from DCFS oversight. (Our foster daughter went back to her family in January and DCFS follows them for 6 months after the last child returns home, unless court determines additional oversight is warranted).  I was completely enamored with our little sidekick and sending her home was extremely difficult. I got through it by believing we would have a continued relationship with her.  As I have mentioned, that has not happened - we have been completely shut out by her mother and partner. I was able to get little updates from our caseworker, but now that they are released that door is closed too. I don't say this to be one bit dramatic, but it feels like a death to me. I loved those children completely and now I have nothing but the memories. I was talking to a relative this weekend about missing them and her response was "you just can't get attached."  It is my firm belief if you don't get attached you are not doing your "job" as a foster parent. All children need to be loved and feel attachments in order to have the ability to have/make healthy relationships later in life - foster children even more so. There is a price to be paid and I have found it to be expensive. It is hard to come to grips with the loss and know there is nothing else I can do.

So all that to say, my mindset, affects my eating and my working out.  I have made half-hearted attempts to be healthy and fan the flame that was my on-fire June. This is some of what I am eating. Obviously I don't take pictures of the non-healthy options....

I got this salad from Walmart the other day trying to avoid eating out. It was okay, but again a bit sweet with the cranberries and a poppyseed dressing.

 I paired it with some bread and cheese....at least the salad made me feel like I was trying....

 Since I haven't been cooking much...I am leaning on sandwiches a bit more than usual.

My husband has been in a post vacation slump too with workouts and food, so I offered to get up and go to the pool him early one day this week. This is a 4:15a in the gym parking lot selfie.

I didn't have my June drive, so I was already out of the pool and taking pictures of him while he was still working to get his mile swim completed.

I felt good about getting up to do the swim, but my lack of drive kinda bummed me out. I just didn't get my full endorphin boost to get me through the day.

Despite the tone of this post, I am not giving up. Hopefully, sharing some of this emotional baggage will help me process and move another step forward. Not to mention, now you all know where I am so you can encourage me (aka give me a kick in the hiney). I want this to me something I can look back and say I got through it. I want to not just be a starter...I want to be a finisher.

And to end on a happy fun/note....yesterday was Millie's 4th birthday. It is hard to believe how quickly time flies by. I am not sure she enjoys her birthday photo shoots as much as I do, but here is her latest.

Checking the bag for presents....

To celebrate we took her for a ride AND ice cream

Millie even shared  with her sister....more than she wanted to.

I don't think Millie understands how cones work. She treated like a bowl.  I had to break it in pieces before she would eat it.

Wait! One more thing....my husband has decided to join the blogosphere.  He has done such a fantastic job with his transformation, I am excited for him to share his experiences. Please check out his blog Time Under Tension here.

Working in a Workout

I have to figure out a way to get up and moving in the morning to do my workouts. When I get home from work the last thing I want to do is be worrying about still having my workout to do. So, Friday night I begged my trainer to let me do it in the morning.

Then Saturday morning happened.

A quick trip to the farmers' market to get more asparagus. I had enough of the quiche ingredients to make another one like the one I made last weekend. I also bought some kale. I actually thought I bought some last week, but it wasn't in my bag when I got home. The greens in the bag are what the seller was calling "goosefoot". When I was a kid my mom called it "lamb's quarters".  So pretty much weeds. My mom would cook them like any other greens. For nostalgia's sake I thought I'd give them a go. I haven't decided yet how I am going to eat them.

After the market we had to run a few other errands.  My husband, who doesn't know his own strength, accidentally broke off our door handle. Guess I need to clean up that outline of the previous handle. We also stopped at a restaurant we had been to a few times, but is now closed. Terrible location and inconsistent food. The first time we went there they had the most incredible wings. Turns out once the chef they brought in to get the place up and running returned home they were never the same :(  The restaurant is now a Saturday only resale shop. I know that restaurant was the failure of someone's dream and that makes me sad. The whole resale shop thing just magnified that feeling.

When we got home from errands I got the quiche in the oven. It was so good. Fortunately, I split it between my mother-in-law and my sister before I started eating it, otherwise, I might have gone completely crazy!!

Still no workout....

Then Saturday afternoon happened....

Our local volunteer fire department had their annual fish fry.

 I wonder how many pounds of fish they "caught".

Since it was written right on the wall I am assuming this is not a secret recipe :)  Feel free to give it a try if you have who knows how many pounds of fish to fry.

The Filet-o-Fish has nothing on this sandwich.

My niece invited us to a paddle fest. For $5 you could use the kayaks, canoes or paddleboards they supplied as much as you wanted during that afternoon. I was tempted to take something out for a spin, but that was quashed the minute I saw a snake on the beach. Someone tried to shoo it with an oar and it reared up, jumped in and out of one of the kayaks, then swam off into the water....nope! Swimming snakes give me the heebie jeebies like nothing else. And yes, I know they are always out there, but if I don't see them...

After the paddlefest we headed out to the farm to visit with my in-laws for a bit.  As soon as it is time to leave the farm, Millie runs straight to my mother-in-law....every time.  She works grandma like no one else and manages to get her invitation extended. I think she is coming home Monday...or Tuesday.

That brings us to Saturday evening...
.
...and still worrying about having my workout to do. More begging and promising to do it Sunday morning...no excuses.

6 a.m. my husband comes in to tell me that he is bringing me breakfast in bed. (I am not sure what time he got up, but I thought I was going to get to sleep in.) Don't be fooled this is NOT a bowl of Fruit Loops my love brings me.

It is a big bowl of his pumpkin oatmeal.  He adds a half a cup of canned pumpkin and half of an apple (chopped) to the oatmeal as it is cooking. Then at the end, he sprinkles in walnuts and cinnamon. Most of the time he actually puts ground flax seed in it instead of the walnuts. However, he thought I would like the walnut texture better. It isn't the most attractive dish, but I definitely felt healthy eating it :)

You know he is not going to bring me a power breakfast in bed and then let me put off the workout again. So, Sunday morning I finally did my Friday workout. I am not sure, but I think my trainer pushed me a bit extra...call it retribution?  Maybe. This definitely felt like the most challenging workout so far.

Instead of a set number of reps, he has me go to failure. The idea is to keep pushing myself. If I do a crazy number of reps he will increase the weight. If I can only do a couple the weight is lowered. Ideally, he wants me to fail in the 10-15 reps range. Some exercises were closer to that than others. He kept a close eye on me during the "skull crushers" (named for what happens if you drop the weight)...nice.

With the workout FINALLY out of the way, I turned my attention to celebrating my nephew's high school graduation. Life goes from this....

 to this in the blink of an eye.

Proud of that kid. He starts a two-year school/work program this summer, that will end up with him certified in a variety of auto systems. I am excited for him to have a career he loves and affords him the opportunity to have a happy and fulfilling life. Congratulations!

Week two of Double Light is mapped out and ready for execution. I am determined to also get in a couple of walks this week.

Dinner and a Walk

I got the latest issue of Cooking Light a week or so ago. I immediately started planning to try the One Pot Jambalaya. I think I was attracted to it right away because of the awesome ladies in my group who either live in Louisiana currently or have spent significant portions of there life there. I wanted a little taste of their cuisine. Admittedly, this recipe is not completely authentic I hope it is a fair representation.

The smell of peppers and onions sauteing with the andouille sausage got things off to a great start. "I don't know what it is, but it smells delicious" was called from the other room by a hungry husband.

The recipe was super simple and quick. My biggest concern was the rice. The recipe calls for packages of pre-cooked rice (of which I am not a fan). So the night before I made a batch of rice in my steamer. I tried to estimate how much rice is in the packages and used that much of my rice. I think in the future this would be a great use for leftover rice (or maybe I should make a bit extra when we are having rice another night). In my opinion, there should have been more liquid used for cooking. I ended up using almost all the juice from the tomatoes. In the future (and there will be a future because SPOILER ALERT my husband loved it), I would add some chicken broth. I used Slap Ya Mama seasoning. When I read the recipe I didn't notice it called for a "salt free" seasoning, so I was glad when one of my ladies warned me of the salt content. In the end, it was still a bit salty, but that I can fix that next time. We are happy to have another nice cool weather dish in the dinner rotation :)

After dinner, my husband offered to ride herd on the small fry so I could take a walk  Millie was super excited to go with me. She didn't know I was actually "using" her to speed up my pace a little. 

She did a good job keeping me moving.

Headed to the home stretch I was treated to a pretty sunset...bonus!

When I got home the small fry was bathed in her jammies. It was so nice to have some snuggle time with her while looking at my giant encyclopedia of mammals.  Thank you, husband :)

Overall, I was happy with my meals for the day (calories totally on point). However, when I ran to Walmart these chips jumped in my cart (I categorically deny any assistance from me). I am the poster child of the Frito-Lay marketing department. Make a new flavor of chips and I will have to try it. The past several I have tried have been complete fails. However, this one was quite yummy. I felt the urge to strap it on my face like a horse's feed bag. Truth is I ate more than a serving (more like 2-3 servings over the course of the afternoon). Later, I read some online reviews and discovered I may be in the minority. So, the silver lining is the temptation should be gone soon since they won't be making more.  

Sadly, as often happens, after my salty indulgence I wanted sweet. There was available candy and I ate that too - ugh! Overall, my calories for the day were much better than they have been recently (between 1800-2000). However, this can't be happening every other day if I want to be successful.

The important thing is even though I didn't do everything right, I didn't throw in the towel. Today I will do better.

Throwback Thursday

For Throwback Thursday I am sharing a couple of pictures from our first visit with baby Millie.  Actually, at this time her name was Rogue - the litter of puppies were named after characters in superhero movies - Batman, Lois Lane, Rogue, Wolverine, Bruce, etc.  She might still have a bit of Rogue left in her, but when we brought her home we renamed her Millie. After that first visit we had to wait two more weeks to take her home. We adopted her through a humane society and their procedure is to spay them before adoption and they wait until a certain age to do that. It was so hard to wait. More Millie.

This morning I walked about 3.5 miles. For some reason I just can't seem to get my time back down under 15 minute miles like I did several miles in the 10K a few weeks ago. Maybe it was the competition of the race that made me walk faster than I realized. We have a 5K scheduled for next Saturday so I can test my race speed theory.

There always seems to be something new and interesting on my walks.

Yesterday I had a bit of a confrontation with a guy delivering newspapers. He kept driving right up behind me and throwing the paper too close for my comfort. Not to mention Millie did not like it one little bit.  Unfortunately, the guy didn't agree it was a problem since he was just doing his job. Seriously??

Today, I had a couple "things that make you go hmmm?" moments. These vehicles where parked at the end of a driveway with these pieces of asphalt piled in the seats. Where they being used to transport the broken pieces of asphalt?  Is the asphalt expected to keep someone from stealing them?  Are they for sale?  And at 5:30 a.m. there isn't anyone out to ask my burning questions. To tell you the truth, I really wanted to take that green one for a spin...I would have brought it back :)

Much more puzzling (and a little disturbing) than that though was this situation.  Is this ladder placement intentional?  Did someone use it to sneak out of the house in the middle of the night?  Is it an invitation to creepers to peek in the windows?  Either way, in my opinion this ladder placement is a definite problem.

And sometimes there are just pretty things to look at that don't create questions.  I wouldn't mind having these in my yard.

Tonight's dinner is a go to favorite Skinnytaste's Salsa Verde Chicken Tostadas, but with homemade salsa verde this time.  We will see if it is as good as the jar.

Whew - Busy Weekend!

We live in a great neighborhood and walking/running/biking around it is nice, but the way it is set up we end up doing several loops and it can get a bit boring. On the weekends we have been trying to make our workouts a little more interesting.

Saturday morning we chose the levee.  My husband planned to run 5 miles and I thought it would be fun to take my bike and ride with him while he ran. I made games of riding ahead and then back to him or letting him get ahead and racing to catch up.

I ended up getting very sidetracked by a barge going through the lock. I had never seen that before. It is incredible they can steer that massive barge through the lock. Of course, I was too far away to tell for sure, but it looked like there was only a few feet clearance on both sides of the barge.

Is he going to make it??

No problem!

I had to really move to catch him after I had dillydallied around watching the barge go into the lock.  He was probably a mile ahead of me. I don't think it was possible for my feet to pedal any faster.

Sometimes when you are taking pictures while riding a bike this happens. A couple of times I thought I might go over the edge of the levee down to the road..yikes!  Maybe as dangerous as texting and driving.

I caught him!!  This is actually one of my favorite pictures so far.  Love the lock and barge. Love how strong my husband looks.  Love how I felt riding along with him.

After our workout we came home had breakfast and headed out to the farmer's market. Going to the farmer's market has become one of our favorite activities. We take the dogs and just wander around checking out the new in-season produce. It seems they are just a little ahead of my garden. We bought some of our favorite tomatoes - yellow cherry (Sun Gold).  We grow them in our garden, but they won't be ready a week or two. Seriously, they are like eating candy (without the guilt!)  The farmer's market has more than produce - lots of plants and other crafts.

Daylilies 

I am loving this rings - especially the blue stone in the center and the orange one above it. I am thinking of a goal...one (or two) of these rings will be my reward.

My in-laws live out in the country.  The dogs LOVE to go out there to run and play with their dogs.  Well, Millie loves to run and play.  Zommie more likes to follow my mother-in-law around waiting for treats to "fall."

Millie had a great time chasing sticks in the creek.

Zommie is more of a sit on the beach kind of gal.

Before we left the farm my mother-in-law walked down the road about a 1/4 mile to take some pictures of a beautiful sunflower field.  And of course, I founds some other flowers I couldn't resist taking a few shots of too.

Queen Anne's lace.

In the evening, I went with my sister, mom, nieces and a friend to see Tarzan (musical).  It was a good production.  Before the show we had a picnic in the park.  We call it our French picnic - bread, cheese, fruit, pastry, sparkling grape juice.  It was so good.  I stayed in calories but it was hard...love, love, love, bread and cheese!! In unrestricted eating I can only imagine how many calories I would have eaten!

Sunday morning I lazed in bed while my husband went running. He left about 6 a.m. I should have gone, but I was so tired after not getting to bed until midnight. I am trying to find balance. If I am working out everyday I think it is okay to take a day off. I just fear falling off the wagon...first one day, then another, etc.

When my husband came back from his run he made breakfast and brought it to me in bed...awww!  He made me an over easy egg on toast and some apple slices. One of the best breakfasts ever!  He has definitely paying attention to how many calories I like to use for breakfast and hit it perfectly.

By the time I'd had breakfast it was almost 9 a.m. and I realized I wanted to do something.  I just didn't want to lay around like a slug :)  I suggested taking the bikes to one of the many bike trails. We chose another part of the trail that goes on the levee. This particular part actually had limited river view. We rode south a couple miles then back to the start...then north for a couple miles and back to the start. Let me just say the final two miles was ridiculous - a head wind came up.  I couldn't believe the difference it made going into the wind. I could not wait to be finished. We ended up having ridden 9 miles...and my hiney survived!

This part of the bike path needs a little work.I didn't really like riding under all those power lines...you could hear them sizzle.

We are not going downhill - just the crazy angles of a biking photographer.

I would have liked to show you a picture of me on the bike.  I had my husband take a couple.  But oh my, I did NOT like the way I looked on that bike. I will keep those pictures for the dramatic before/after post. I did have him take this picture of me standing by the canal. You get the idea of my shape without my feeling mortified at the thought of it being on the internet forever.

And a lovely rear view :)  After the bike ride I was debating going into this fountain.  I chickened out.  I didn't realize I was being photographed so this is authentic as it gets.

It was a wonderful weekend filled with fun activities and good food...and no guilt :)