Hippo for the Holidays

As you can probably guess from the title, this has been another BAD week. Why is it that as soon as I PUBLICLY commit to weight loss, I go from doing okay to just blowing it constantly?

In my defense, and it is a pitiful defense, my life has just spiraled out of control. It has been right on the brink lately but I have managed to hold on to one tiny thread and keep going. Not this week.

I have posted in the past about my desperate need for a time management course. I even asked Tigerfan for a personal assistant for Christmas but he ignored me! Well, my lack of organizational skills has finally hit me smack in the face.

For several months now, my schedule has been something like this:
5:00 a.m. get up and do cardio for 30 minutes
5:30 a.m. breakfast and quiet time
6:00 a.m. shower and get ready
6:45 a.m. get the children up and begin the day, fix breakfast, do morning chores, etc. I also use this time as our "read aloud" time for school so while the children eat, I read to them from our current novel.
8:00 a.m. (hopefull) officially begin school. We usually begin by starting the laundry, doing pledges, learning a song for church choir, reciting our heart verses, and doing our Bible lesson. All of which I need to be present and involved in. Then, the children can choose what subject they work on next and we get started.

I assist with school where needed and try to keep laundry going. However, by keeping laundry going, I mean realizing one load is through, putting it in to dry and starting another...going to pull clothes I do not want to dry all the way...putting them in a basket to take upstairs to hang up to dry...getting distracted by a child needing assistance...realizing the dryer is through...putting clothes on the couch to fold...getting distracted by a fussy baby... by the days end, I usually have a basket of wet clothes weighing approximately 500 pounds and a couch so full of unfolded clothes that no one can use the living room!

11:30 a.m. we would break to fix lunch
12:00 eat with Daddy and then the kids take a break while I visit, clean, and probably find myself something to eat because in all likelihood, the baby needed to eat, then Tigerfan came home and needed lunch, and then the kids needed something, and soon everyone has eaten and left the table and I have a mess to clean and have not yet eaten, as a result in a frustrated and half starved craze...I grab whatever carbohydrate is close by and devour it. Most recently, that has been the Halloween candy stash! (this is not one of my prouder confessions)

Anyway...the rest of the day goes much like this. We often do not finish school until 4:00 at which time, it is time to fix supper, get baths, prepare for the next day, do night time activities...etc.

By the time the children go to bed, the house is a disaster, the laundry isn't done, I have not prepared for teaching at the tutorial, etc. So, I begin trudging through it all. Folding laundry, hanging wet clothes, ironing, ironing, ironing, cleaning the kitchen, preparing tutorial and on MWF doing my strength training. The result? Most weeknights, it is between 11:00p.m. and 1:00 a.m. before I go to bed and then it all starts over at 5.

I am not whining, I am not proud of this...it just is how it is. But this week, I have hit a wall. My body just physically can not take this much more. I am tired and cranky and stressed and my faith tends to waver a bit. The problem? What do I do? This week, I overslept 3 days! 3! That means no exercise and no quiet time and that means a scary mom! I know I am failing in certain things. I know the kids should have to help out more. But, usually, while I tell them they are helping that day, we get entrenched in school, and housework becomes undoable. By 4:00, they are tired, I am tired and the work involved in getting them to do chores then is just more than I can do!

So, here I am. The scale tells me I lost another pound (although one day this week it also told me I weighed 119 pounds). I do not see how that is true. Unless chocolate, muffins, and chips have become a healthy food group, I think there is a mistake! Regardless of my weight, however...I want to live a healthy, balanced lifestyle and I am not. I just do not know what to change or cut out to make life more manageable. And the busy season is just about to start!

I did not mean to make this post a whine fest, but I am REALLY frustrated. Any advice out there? I would love for it to include a weekend retreat with my husband and an unlimited amount of fat free, calorie free chocolate, so if you could incorporate that, it would be great! Hope all you other Hotties out there had a better week. And there is always next week, right? I'll get started on that...right after we celebrate the candy and calorie laden Fall Fun Fest at church tonight!

**I forgot to link to the host site! For more Fit Friday posts go to It's Almost Naptime!

Conviction

You may have noticed that I am not exactly a deep thinker. I am that one in Bible Study who actually writes down exactly what is in my Bible or on a particularly profound day in my Bible commentary. I am the one who sits in awe when someone who read the same exact thing I did comes up with this profound meaning while I begin checking to see if we are reading the same Bible...cause I just didn't get that! I am a true Beth Moore wannabe! But, I "ain't!"

I have never aspired to be a great theological blog or really an inspirational one. I just started blogging as a way to stay connected with my family and the outside world, a way to stay sane. I have tried to be true to my faith and occasionally have made mention of what God is doing in my life, but certainly have not been profound in what I have said.

You can probably continue to expect that same level of mediocrity, because, that is just who I am. But, yesterday we had a revival speaker at church, and ya'll, he NAILED me! We live in some scary times. The economy is SCARY, the elections are SCARY, our education system (at least locally) is SCARY, the international issues are SCARY, the threat of terrorism is SCARY! But, we have a God that is more powerful than all of those things and I am not sharing him with people. We have a hope that is far greater than a president or a great teacher or even a Nobel peace prize winner. We have the Author of Peace, the Creator of the World, the Great Physician! The One and Only True God, there is no other, not money, not fame, not political power, not a great prophet or and under god. Just One and HE is in control.

I think of reasons all the time why I don't share my faith. I am home with my kids, I don't know any lost people, I live in the Bible belt...everyone knows God around here. I have shared a bit with my next door neighbor and I teach S.S. and tell my tutorial kids. But I am not passionate about telling people or sharing my faith with people. Yesterday, our preacher said to turn to the person next to you and just ask, do you know Him? I will show you. I will go with you. I will lead you. Do you want me to go with you? I looked around and my family was all around and I know that they know. So, I sat quietly and did nothing. Last night, he talked about our apathy. We live in a world that just doesn't really care that much, we don't have a passion. He asked, what could make me stop loving, serving God. Of course, the right answer is nothing. But in the middle of the night last night, I woke up from a dream about my sweet Dancer. My first thought was, God, please not my little girl. I will serve you, I will honor you, but please NEVER take my little girl...I am not willing to give her up. Then I heard Tigercub, stuffy and struggling to breathe in his baby bed and I thought, "not the baby, please never the baby!"

And I realized, I am not sold out 100%. Am I really willing to serve Him in thick or thin? In good and bad? What if something happened to a child? Would I still be faithful? Because really, I am not faithful now. I am apathetic, I find excuses, I go through the motions. But I want to be sold out. I don't ever want anyone to wonder where I stand. I don't want to get so bogged down in day to day that I forget the eternal.

So, in case you are wondering, this is where I stand. I believe in God the creator. A God, who through His own amazing power created land and sea, heaven and earth, animal and man in six days and rested on the seventh. I believe in His one and only son, Jesus, who left the glory of heaven and was born in poverty on earth, who lived a perfect life, who died taking the punishment of MY sins and who raised again to overcome death for ME...and for you. I believe that we are separated from God because of our sin but that He loves us enough to forgive us for those sins if we will just confess those sins and ask for forgiveness and I believe He has eternal life for us in Heaven if we will accept this free gift!

One day soon, I hope to add a page sharing my testimony and sharing my beliefs for anyone who may wonder or question, but for now, this will have to do. My prayer is that if ANYONE reads this blog and doesn't know Jesus, they will begin to ask, begin to question, begin to read their Bible. And, if anyone wants to ask me, I will always be here to share my faith and scriptures to back it up. If you don't have a Bible...I will get you a Bible. If you have a question, I will TRY to answer a question or point you to someone who can. So, thank you for letting me let it all out today! I feel much better now, and you can too, if you will only trust Him! So, I must ask: Do you know Him? Would you like me to go with you and show you how you can?

And now, in keeping with the lighter side of things, as our speaker was talking about apathy last night he made this comment which, do to my love of all things amish, I found hilarious: Sometimes when he begins sharing about Jesus, he can just feel how little people care, Like a bunch of Amish men in Circuit City! I'll just leave you with that! :)

Calling Flylady...Someone needs your help!

To those who had a wonderful first week for Hot For the Holidays...I curse you! Okay, not really. But my week, not so good!

Did you see the great ONE blog I posted? My blogging tells the tale of all success stories this week!

I did most get in my required exercise (according to Sparkpeople) by Wednesday, but have not done one bit since then, although I totally plan to today. Sometime.

Eating has not been so successful. I have found I just do not have the time to track my food through Sparkpeople. I guess I need to just do it the old fashioned way...with pen and ink (gasp!) I always do great at breakfast, but then things quickly decline. I think my problem is not having a lot of healthy choices around here. Which I would, if I would get them at the grocery store. Which I would, if I would make a list. Which I would if I could get my life organized and find time to sit down and write one instead of realizing that I cannot feed my children because there is NOTHING in the cabinets to feed them with and if I do not want a visit from Social Services, I must go to the store NOW! And I probably could get organized, if I could just get my house in order and find that darn household notebook I started 5 1/2 years ago! Which I could if Flylady would fly over here and homeschool my family, fix meals and give me life changing lessons until they all became a habit and we would all live happily ever after in a clean, well stocked home with lots of healthy food options and a skinny mommy everyone would be jealous of.

Thank you for letting me rant. We will now return to trying to do better this week. In all fairness, this week had been plagued with projects for tutorial, Extra stuff to do for church and I had a HORRENDOUS headache Wednesday that just sucked the life out of me. But, today is a new day!

Despite it all, the scale reads that I lost about 1 pound, although if I weighed at a less opportune time, it would probably have a sadder tale to tale. However, I did not gain any, so I guess I can't complain. Good luck fellow hotties and may this week find you eating right, exercising, and becoming your inner hottie (okay, when I first typed that, I accidentally typed hootie which leads to a whole new post subject about how the little weight I have lost seems to be coming from the "hooter" area, which is just wrong!!!)

That's Gotta Hurt!

I am about to throw this @#$* computer out the window. I hate it when machines outsmart me. A decent post must wait for another time because my HOURS of time spent here today have been fruitless and my children are going NUTS. So, just to tide you over until another quality post from me is possible, let me leave you with this little ditty.

Dancer has been entertaining Tigercub for me while I fought with this beast of a computer! They were wrestling in her little playhouse when she exclaimed, "Mommy, help! He is pinching the guitar out of me!"

If I let them play a little longer, we could be a regular Partridge Family!

Hot For the Holidays

I am joining in with It's Almost Naptime to try to finish off my weight loss goals. I started out great this summer but after vacation and trying to get back into school, I have sort of fizzled out. So maybe this will keep me accountable because heaven knows Tigerfan's sweet gifts of chocolate to eat after the kids go to bed are appreciated but not figure friendly.

So, here it is: the ugly truth.

When I married, 13 years and 4 kids ago, I weighed about 115 pounds. After a little summer weight loss and on a good morning, I weigh about 138. I should have taken a good let it all hang out picture but those who have been around awhile know my technology issues so I am just putting in a couple of recent pictures that highlights some unflattering rolls (oh, please be kind!).

Do ya see 'em? The rolls? Yuck!

Okay, so here is the plan:

Continue to do cardio at least 30 minutes a day MWF and 20 minutes on T and Th. Strength training on MWF and hopefully a little cardio on the weekends. I already do this but have "missed" several days this week, like this morning because I am nothing if not dedicated to being a "hottie".

Okay, I will also get back to eating between 1200 and 1500 calories a day with guidance from Sparkpeople and will start tracking my calories again because as a dedicated rule follower there is NOTHING worse than having to write down an offending food and I therefore will not eat it!

I will, however, continue to rebel on Thursday nights for popcorn and Peanut M&M's because, there are limits, people!!!

Other than Thursday nights, I will stop eating late night snacks, especially while ironing and watching Project Runway which will be relatively easy because Project Runway is now over (and, may I add that the WRONG designer won, although I ALWAYS choose the wrong designer, but Korto (or however you spell your name,) the win should have been yours!).

I have also gotten a little lazy about my water consumption so I will try to get back to my 8 glasses a day (I have been doing about 5 glasses lately).

Okay, so there it is! Feel free to hound, heckle or guilt me into being faithful to the cause! And feel free to join in yourself because everyone knows that misery loves company!!!

Happy Friday!

5 Year Old's Guide to Style

This morning Dancer was in my room as I got ready for tutorial. When I finished dressing the following conversation took place:

Dancer: Mommy, where did you get that shirt?

Me: I am not sure, I've had it awhile. Why? Don't you like it?

Dancer: Well, really, it is kind of ugly.

Me: Should I change?

Dancer: YES!

I changed!

This is the Reason They Put Warning Labels on Appliances

I knew I loved the Amish for some reason, and now I know why! Electricity has not been a friend to the youngest in our clan this week.

Saturday night, we were doing the bath routine. Luckily we began early. Dancer got out of the tub and came to get her hair dried. I love to do goofy things to her while drying her hair so we were being silly when Tigercub crawled into the room. I got a little distracted and was not doing an adequate styling job, so Dancer decided to take over. Just as she grabbed the dryer, sparks began flying EVERYWHERE! She was frozen in place screaming but apparently unable to make herself let go until I was able to jerk the cord out from the wall. She is no worse for wear although I think it may be awhile before she allows her hair to be anything but air dried again. I suppose the lesson learned here is if you have a hair dryer that is as old as your marriage, you might want to take caution when handing it to a five year old. Needless to say, I am now the proud owner of a new hair dryer with ionic something or other and a sleek new design! Oh, if only other things that were tired and worn out were so easily replaced.

Today, Tigercub decided to have a little action of his own. I did something completely quirky and off the wall and pulled out the vacuum! Oh, I kid, I get that pesky thing out about once a day now that Little Man has begun self feeding. He self feeds himself, the highchair, the floor, the wall...anyway, today I decided to do the unthinkable and leave the beast out so I could run it all over the downstairs after supper.

Now, the boys have once again lost every privilege known to man because they are having mouth and obedience issues and as a result they are very obliging...hoping to lure me into giving back at least a privilege or two. During these times, they volunteer for all sorts of jobs that would otherwise cause them to groan, roll their eyes and swear they had nothing to do with it! And so, when I went to the laundry room and heard the vacuum switch on, I thought nothing of it. Until I heard the screams. It seems that Tigercub had figured out how to turn on the beast and then been terrified of it...which is completely understandable, because the sound of a cleaning instrument in use is quite foreign around here! He had crawled into a corner and was screaming and staring at the vacuum as if it was headed in for the kill. This paired with the "screaming monkey" a friend of mine gave him to play with a couple of weeks ago have pretty well insured the poor child WILL be in counseling one day!

I wonder if there are any good therapists in Amish country?

Why Do I Feel Compelled to Share These Things?

I know you have probably been losing sleep over my Project Runway dilemma so I would like to put your minds at ease! I was wrong (shocking, I know) The show was not two hours, the second half of the finale will be next Wednesday so I really had no dilemma at all other than I am a dunce AND I have one more week of highly pertinent and worthwhile T.V. to entertain me while I iron! Whew!

In other news, I talked to my sweet Mommy and Daddy and Grandma last night. I know, for most of you out there that would not be news but my parents are a little difficult to get ahold of. Especially Momma. Especially if I call her on her cell phone which is really futile. Because, she doesn't answer it. And, if you leave a message, she doesn't know how to retrieve them so it just goes out into cell space forever.

Anyhoo, I got to talk to them last night and I was very excited, especially Momma because she started a different job this year and I wanted to hear how it was going. She has been a teacher for lo these many years now and has enjoyed it. However, this year, they asked her to be the reading specialist. She wasn't sure she wanted to leave the classroom, but agreed to do it for this year. I had not talked to her since she started so I checked in last night.

Unfortunately, she hasn't had much time to decide if she likes it because not long after school started, a kindergarten teacher quit quite suddenly. Guess who had to fill in the gap. My mom. Which, if it was me would not be a big deal because I LOVED teaching kindergarten. My mom, not so much! You see, she started college after all of us girls were in school and trudged through while working AND taking care of a family of five (she is awesome)! When she began, she would have liked to go into medicine because she LOVES science but decided she would be too old by the time she got through and went into education instead. When she graduated, her first job was a kindergarten class. She HATED it! Now, let me tell on myself just a bit. I remember her coming home one day a couple of weeks into school and telling us the story about this HORRIBLE little girl (5 years old) that she had. She was naughty and every day on the playground, she would go around flipping birds. My mom continued on saying she just didn't know how to make her stop or what caused her to do this but it happened every day!

People, I promise, this was my response:

"Momma, how does she catch the birds?"

I was at least junior high or high school by this time. And as my mom described the scenario, I was picturing this little five year old running around the playground catching birds and flipping them and I was STUNNED!

My mom then had to explain to me that she was not, in fact literally flipping birds. She was giving children "the finger", "flipping them off", you get the picture!

Anyway, she is now back in kindergarten purgatory for the time being. Thankfully, a new teacher has been found and starts Monday so after a week of transition, Momma will go back to her reading specialist duties, full of thanksgiving I daresay!

She did offer me the hope that if I were to move back to Salt Lake, I could almost certainly find a job in the school system since they are so desperate they are even hiring non certified folks to teach, however, the thought of putting my sweet princess into a kindergarten class with 30 (yes, 30) other students makes the thought quite horrifying!

I guess we'll stay put for now. Keep homeschooling the clan and watching baby ( who will hereto fore be referred to as Tigercub due to his affinity to growling at everything) grow. And I will NOT, under any circumstances teach my kiddos to flip birds!

A Little of This, A Little of That

I can not come up with even one thing blog worthy right now. Not one thing.

And so, a list of rambling thoughts going through my head.

1. I have the BEST Daddy ( my momma is pretty great, too) he faithfully checks in to the ole blog about once a week to keep up with things around here and even commented on someone else's blog just cause I told him to, isn't that sweet! He has always been a good Daddy. Someone I could talk to, share with, call for advice. God blessed me with such great parents and I am soooo thankful!

2. Baby has decided that sleep is highly overrated. He likes to sleep about 1 hour at a time. All night long..up and down, up and down, trying to convince him that sleep is a good thing and will make mommy a much happier person. This morning, he decided that he had absolutely had enough of it! At 4:45 a.m. Yes, I had to get up BEFORE 5:00 and I don't even have the satisfaction of knowing I exercised. I wonder how much Benadryl you can give to a 9 month old?

3. Tonight is the season finale of Project Runway!!! I am so excited. However, it comes on at 8:00 while we are still on our way home from church. Usually I DVR it and watch it at 9:00 when I start ironing. But tonight I think it is 2 hrs. So I cannot start watching at 9 or it will stop recording and then I won't see the end. Which means I can't start watching til 10 which will make it midnight when it ends. What a dilemma! And, what will I watch when it is over?

4. Why is it that when the economy is going to pot, so is our insurance. Until this year we have had AWESOME insurance! Not anymore. We got the bill yesterday for Tigerfan's yearly mole removals--over $500 and they have not yet sent us one for Football boy. AND, Tigerfan has to go back to get more removed on one. And insurance--not paying a dime! Not till we reach $2,200. We will reach $2,200 on or around December31, I feel certain!

5. I should be doing school. The kids are on lunch break. Also referred to as time for mommy to regain her sanity (I use the word loosely). They are using this time well by stuffing pillows in their shirts and wrestling one another. And people wonder if we homeschoolers can really give our kids a good education!

6. I think Tigerfan has successfully begun grooming his fourth little LSU fan. Baby crawls all over the house growling at anyone and everything he sees. Right now he is growling at the hard drive and playing with the pretty green button that turns the computer on. I think it might be time to go--before my littlest Tiger erases more than just my blog post (which really is mediocre at best and would not be life altering if destroyed).

Have a great day!.. I'll be back eventually with something enthralling I am sure. For now I would like to leave an encouragement. So many of my blogging friends are down and discouraged right now, going through far worse trials than time management issues or being too busy. So, for those who just need a little word remember:

...Weeping may endure for a night,
but Joy Comes in The Morning.
Psalm 30:5

The Weekend in Pictures

Yes, I said pictures! Because I can post them now! Yay, me!
We're off!

Shopping for purple and gold!

Three boys and a "feaux"hawk

Visiting Mike:

Sliding down the Indian Mounds:

Sharing peanuts with Papaw before the game:

Saturday Night in Baton Rouge!

Lessons Learned from Blogging

I have been tagged for yet another meme. Some people might frown on being repeatedly tagged for memes. I, myself, am quite appreciative! It gives me something to blog about that requires very little thought or creativity on my part and that is exactly what I need at this stage in my life.

I was tagged by my bloggy friend, Aimee, from The Mother Load. And, people, she needs some love right now. So, before doing anything else, jump over to her blog and just tell her Jesus loves her or something because I know EXACTLY how she feels and I wish I could just hug her, hire a babysitter and get away with her and enjoy some peaceful away time. But I can't. So, this is the best I can do!

Okay, now down to business. The meme is simply to tell five things that I have learned from blogging.

1. I have learned that just because the whole free world likes to read Big Mama and Boo Mama and I like to read them, it does NOT mean they (the whole free world) want to read me. Now, I know that probably seems obvious to you, but in my early blogging career (hah!) I was quite saddened that I did not have a following, in fact, I still do not have much of a following. But now I am at peace with that.

2. While at one point, I was striving for a feeling of significance, I have learned that what I love about blogging is not being acknowledged by hundreds (okay, not even tens) or having a "super blogger" comment, it is the relationships that I have begun to build, the bloggers I truly think of as friends, even though I have never seen them or even heard most of their voices. It is reading a blog from another person in the same place as me and not feeling so alone or like such a failure, it is reading someone's blog who is past this stage and seeing that there really is light at the end of the tunnel and that maybe, just maybe, I will not completely screw up my children!

3. I have learned to post pictures!!!! I know, for many of you, that is not a big deal but for me, on Wordpress---ugh!

4. I have learned that no matter how tired you are, if you have a really good story or idea for a post, somehow you really can muster enough energy to stay up just a little longer and that, often that leads to checking other blogs, which can lead to finding a new blog and before you know it, you have found the energy to stay up MUCH longer and you now have to be up in 5 hours and yet, you don't regret it a bit.

5. Blogging is addictive!!! Why is it so interesting to read about other's lives? Why does what would be mundane if it happened to me seem so amusing when someone else talks about it? I now think of everything in terms of "Can I blog about this?" "I wonder if I should take a picture so I can post it?" "Should I ask this person if I can write about their embarrassing moment or just do it and hope they don't read it?" I have learned to prioritize but in my early blogging days, I spent far too much time reading, commenting, posting almost daily and searching for other blogs to read, etc.

6. Okay, I know the rule is five, but I just thought of one more I HAD to include. Everyone loves to get comments. Before I had a blog of my own, I lurked on many. I NEVER commented. When I began blogging, I longed for someone to say SOMETHING. Of course my daddy and sister commented me through the early days but I have now learned that it isn't just me. And while I can't always comment (usually because I am feeding the baby while I read the blogs) I do as often as I can even if it is just to say I am still there. I used to think what was the point of commenting if I didn't have anything "profound" to say, then I started commenting EVERYWHERE because I heard that is how to get readers. Now, I read a few blogs, comment as much as I can and do the "Happy Dance" anytime I get a comment on my own blog.

Now, I must proceed with tagging some others. You may notice a trend with me, how the same people are tagged every time. That would be because they are the only people I know who will read this blog and might actually do the meme. So, without further adieux, I will AWARD (that is for you, CJ) the following bloggers the tag:

Purple Diva
Happy Mommy
P.S. He Loves You
Four Little Penguins
Growing With It