Humidity Relief

No, not a break in the weather. It hit 37C (98F) here today with the humidex (heat index I think in the US). Ewwwwwww. However, I had a light bulb moment and suddenly remembered my brother-in-law giving us a kiddie pool a couple years back. I had tried to refuse it, saying we had a perfectly good one, but he insisted since we may need it later. Well sure enough, last year our pool got a hole in it and it hit the trash. We found a similar one, but with Lee laid off, $40 is a little out of budget. I swear the kids wanted to kiss Uncle Steph's feet this afternoon LOL

Brianna wouldn't even wait for the pool to fill up!

Once she got over the initial shock of "this aint my bath!" Olivia looooved it!

Apparently "swimming" for 20 minutes is very tiring

Menu Plan Monday

Last week got slightly side tracked toward the end. Mostly cause I forgot what I had planned and didn't bother checking here lol

Monday - Ground Beef Stew (vegetarian with TVP instead) (from last week)

Tuesday - Stuffing Quiche (from last week)

Wednesday - Ham Steaks w/ Primavera Potato Bites

Thursday - Spaghetti with Garlic, Olive Oil and Chili Pepper (made with regular pasta) (from last week)

Friday - BBQ including Turkey Stuffed Burgers (but with ground beef)

Saturday - Pork Roast w/ carrots and potatoes

Sunday -Lazy Lasagna Roll Ups

Hopefully I'll get around to making....
Breakfast Cookies
Pineapple Bliss Cupcakes (without the icing)
Stuffin Egg Muffins

Check out hundreds of other menu plans at Organizing Junkie!

12 Week Sprint to the Finish!

I've joined in with one of my homeschool friends, Kris, on her weight-loss blog in a 12 week challenge. I forgot all about it until now and have failed miserably for today *blush* So we're starting this as of tomorrow lol

My overall goal for the challenge (which ends Aug 22) is to lose 15lbs. I actually do hope to lose more than that, but I know how ill my body reacts to summer and humidity so I don't want to kill myself trying to push for 20+lbs. I also want to have my 1.86m route down to 23 minutes or less. Right now I'm over 25 minutes.

My goals for the week are:
Nutritional: I will start tracking in Daily Plate again. I have totally slacked off here, and while I *have* lost a bit of weight, I feel I would have done better if I was tracking. I will drink 80+oz of water each day. With the hotter weather coming I really need to do it anyways, but I noticed I was losing easier when I had a lot of water in my diet. I will eat breakfast everyday *before* 10am. I stopped eating breakfast for a few weeks (a life long bad habit) and have noticed even after eating lunch I am starving by 3pm.

Physical: I will walk at least 6 miles this week. I've gotten lazy lately and have not even hit 4 miles in recent weeks. I will do 2 days of my walk/run program. I've started doing this in the park and find it much more enjoyable than the treadmill. I will do at least one days of weights. My main motivation for this is to keep my skin flexible as I lose weight so I don't get as much sagging.

I even wrote my goals out on a sticky so I can see them without having to remember to check my blog

Five Question Friday

 Yeah, I'm awesomer this week and am doing my Friday questions on Sunday.... I'm behind in reading my blogs....

1. Do you apologize to your kids? Absolutely, if I did something wrong I say I'm sorry. It's hard to teach apologizing if you're unwilling to do it!

2. What color are your nails right now? An awesome teal color :D

3. When you were growing up, how difficult was it for you to stay home from school sick? (As in, did you have to vomit or just say "I don't feel good".) For me it was more how could I pretend to be healthy so I didn't have to stay home! I loved school so I'd whine to go in when I was sick.

4. When is the last time you bought a new comforter for your bed? About 3 yrs ago. It sucks and we need a new one.

5. Favorite website(s)? Well, I'd say my daily visited ones would be facebook, blogger and several random homeschool ones.

See other people's answers at My Little Life!

Exercise Log - Week 15

Not horrible, not good. I had hoped to get in a walk today, but the evil humidity bug hit. I know, I know, I coulda gone this evening once the heat was better, but by then I was pooped from cleaning and organizing all day!

Mileage: 3.94m
Time: 1h 27m

Also spent about 2.5 hrs putting in the garden. Tilling by hand and planting.

Milestone

The day Isaac was born (almost 12 years ago) I weighed 176lbs. This morning I weighed in at 175.8lbs! I haven't been so light in sooooo long!

I have a weird thing happen after I have kids. Rather than lose weight (and I nursed all of them), I gain it. I mean sure, the day my kids are born I lose about 10lbs. But by the time they're like 4 mths old I've gained more than I gained through my whole pregnancy! I've struggled so long with the roller coaster that is my weight.

Isaac
Pre-pregnancy weight - 137lbs
9 mths - 175lbs
Brianna
Pre-pregnancy - 187
9 mths - 200lbs
(Here there was a 7 yr stretch where I had lots of weight ups and downs)
Olivia
Pre-pregnancy - 202lbs
9 mths - 209lbs (Funnily enough, I had weight loss issues during this pregnancy)

This time around I'm actually seeing my weigh going down, and not just by a couple pounds. This time I'm down over 30lbs. Not UP 30lbs, but DOWN. I've never had that happen before.

I also discovered today, that in 1.8lbs I will officially be out of the obese category! Never in my adult life have I been simply over weight. I've always been obese. Never has "overweight" sounded so good!

Questions....

A questionnaire is floating around blogland and I thought I'd post it if anyone has any interested in the oddities of me :) Feel free to post it yourself, leave me the link to yours in my comments!

What is your middle name? Lynn... I hate it. Especially with my first name (Sandra), you say them together and it sounds like a hick name. Which my sisters loooove to make fun of *gee thanks* :P

How big is your bed? Double. A lot of people's jaws drop at this, but I'm happy with my double. Me and Lee and my giant body pillow fit just fine in it. Oh, and don't forget the cat....
 
What are you listening to right now? Other than the radio, blissful silence

What was the last thing you ate? Supper. And amazingly, what it (----->) say I was supposed to make for supper today!
 
How is the weather right now? Clear and getting chilly not that the sun has gone down. The clouds are supposed to be rolling in for rain tonight (and the next 3 days *sigh*)
 
Do you want children? I *have* children, but that's not the question... Most of the time I want children... course there's days that Olivia's teething and Brianna's refusing to do school work that I don't want them! (j/k!)
 
Hair color? Which layer? The part that's dyed is dark reddish brown. The 3 inches of roots is dark brown with growing amounts of gray.
 
Do you wear contacts? I'll stick with glasses, I'm not a fan of stabbing myself in the eye several times a day
 
Last Movie you watched? Um... in the theater? 21. About 2 yrs ago lol Any movie at all? Um... ah... oh yeah! Shut Up and Sing. Do documentaries count?

What books are you reading? Do Brianna' school books count? Amazingly I'm not reading anything of my own right now (that would explain why I'm a month behind on my reading challenge!)
 
What were you doing before filling this out? Delivering Avon books for my sister
 
Have you ever fired a gun? Nope, and I hope that answer never changes!
 
If you could go to any place right now where would you go? Into my bed with a laptop. Course then I'd need a laptop with internet connection... then I'd never leave my bed... maybe it's better this way....
 
Are you missing someone? Well I hope not! Everyone here is accounted for other than mom, who I know is at work!
 
Are you hiding something from someone right now? I'm hiding from myself how much I ate for lunch *shhhh*
 
3 things you can't live without? Family, music, books
 
Stuck on a deserted island, and can only bring one thing? Since it's a thing I guess that doesn't include my family, so I'd say an MP3 player with like 500 songs and unlimited powered batteries
 
What do you usually do when the alarm turns on? Why is it set?!?! I don't use an alarm
 
What do you think about before you go to bed? Ok, stop moving, breathe even, pretend that doesn't itch, cat - get off my feet! (or something similar)