Category: Uncategorized (Page 11 of 201)

We had a delightful weekend.  Included was:

• Josiah had flag football on a gorgeous fall morning
• Family pictures with Tara!
• Dinner at a friends house
• Cleaned out under both bathroom cabinets (I even remembered to take a before and after picture this time… see below!)
• I made Pumpkin Bars that were absolutely scrumptious (to bring to our friends house–I know better than to make a whole pan just for us right now! 😉 )
• Chloe and I drove all around Shakopee looking at the stunning fall colors

Weight loss update:  The first part of the week went very well, but I hit my one month slump this weekend.  I’ve been at it long enough that some things are starting to feel too easy, and I’m staring to feel like it’s depriving me of my favorite foods (trust me, it’s not).  I know it’s a mental game.  It was an excellent weekend, but with that came wanting to kick back and relax and eat everything in sight.  I didn’t gain, but I also didn’t lose. Tim reminded me that is not a step backwards.  It’s still progress to hold steady.

Today I made Chicken Rice Soup and it was scrumptious. Pretty easy to pull together with stuff I normally have on hand (except the celery I don’t always have…) and it makes a nice big pot so I can keep eating it for a few days.

I will say, it is a rather ugly soup.  But what it lacks in appearance it makes up for in hearty thickness.

I really love a thick soup in the Fall (like Potato soup and split pea soup) so this is right up that alley.  After cooking the chicken I toss it in the food processor, which makes quick work of dicing it up.  And I like how the brown rice and chicken are kind of the same small size so you never know what you’ll get in each bite.  Yum.

Want the recipe?  Well here you go!  (It’s from the site www.reciperebel.com.)

Sunday morning was rough.  We were all short-tempered and grumpy.  By the time we loaded into the van to head to church everyone was crabby.

I was not my best.

So, I decided to do better.  I told everyone to look outside quietly.  I asked everyone to look for 3 things outside that they liked.  It could be anything. Then we went around the car taking turns saying things we like.

It was amazing.

I could actually feel the mood shift in the car.

Very slowly everyone waited their turns and by the time we all finished saying our 3 things we were laughing and enjoying each other.

It was glorious.

Curious what our 3 things were?

Maddie: Red Leaves, Water, Ducks

Josiah: Electricity, Target, Baseball Fields

Chloe: Purple Leaves, Clear Blue sky, Kids Playing Soccer

Levi: Red Leaves, Orange Leaves, Brown Leaves

Me:  Red leaves, Caribou Coffee, Crisp Autumn Air

We are into October!  Wheeeeeee!

We’ve had tons of fun.  Here are a few bullet points from our last week in no particular order:

• Maddie finished her colors unit in Kindergarten.  She wore a specific color every single day for the past 2 weeks and finished with rainbow color!  Her amazing teacher made them a mask in almost every color.  This one is her favorite.  It’s pink on one side and has candy on the other.
• Chloe and I cleaned out the downstairs craft room
• I was able to donate our broken bikes to an organization that will help restore bikes for kids so I didn’t have to take them to the dump.
• I made cheddar broccoli soup and it was delicious
• Chloe is going to youth group now on Wednesday nights at church
• We walked down to see the haybales (see picture!)
• Our church had a food truck after the service this week to celebrate 22 years of being a church.  Yippie!
• Josiah is in a flag football league with his friends from church.  He’s having a blast
• Chloe and Josiah have decided that they both want to start using the elliptical like I am in the mornings so we each watch a show of our choice and run for 30 min.  Who knew I would need to fight for time on the exercise equipment!?  Ha!
• I also cleaned out the linen closet as well as the downstairs kitchen cupboards and organized the hat/mitten bins for each person to have their own bin now.  Slowly but surely I’ll make it through the house!  Next up this week is the cabinets under the bathroom sinks… that’s a doosey.

Weight loss update:  Things are going very well.  I’m down another 2 pounds this week bringing my grand total to 11 pounds so far.  I’m feeling much stronger and overall so much happier.

I’ve started having the kids drink a small dose of homemade Elderberry Syrup every morning with breakfast.  We line up all their little medicine cups in age order and they each trot over to take theirs.  They are such troupers–they even remember to remind me if I forget.  They call it their morning medicine.  I figure the chances of getting sick this Fall are pretty good, so we might as well get our bodies ready to fight off anything.

I’m making the Elderberry syrup in the instant pot.  It’s so incredibly easy!  And one batch seem to be able to last us about a month.  I call that a win in my book!

I told you I would post pictures this week, so here goes!

We went to a wedding a couple weeks ago and took a picture of us looking spiffy.  Awwww. we’re so cute!

But my favorite was Levi hopping in for a photo too.  It was on his Birthday, so we had to leave him for most of the afternoon with Auntie Jen.  I felt a little bad about that… but he had a blast with her, so all was forgiven.

Tim bought me a new phone this month–mine finally bit the dust.  I haven’t had a new phone in a few years (I think since Chloe was a baby).  I normally get to take Tim’s old work phones as they wear out.  It has been so exciting to have a new phone!  And we realized right away that the camera is super spiffy–which resulted in a silly picture!

It’s Monday.  The kids headed off to in-person school today.  We’re starting to get into a nice rhythm.  I’ve been watching home organizing shows as I exercise in the morning and it is making me want to organize my house!  So… this week we deep cleaned the garage on Saturday (that took me a LONG time).  Over the past 2 weeks I’ve also cleaned out my bills drawer, my storage pantry, a cupboard in my laundry room, my bathroom counter and the side shed.  I have plans to get to the linen closet and my dresser this week.  I know, you’re jealous of my crazy exciting life.  😉

Weight Update:  I’m 2 weeks into my weight loss challenge and officially down 9 pounds.  (I’m only tracking my first number on here, not the decimal.)  I’m feeling really great.  It’s nice to get back on a plan.

I plan to start putting more pictures on again this week.  So stay tuned!

(Photo Credit “Dreamer”)

I know that we are actually mostly through September, but I do love the change of seasons.  Especially Fall.  Which I’m sure is EVERYONE’S favorite… but I still love it.

The other day when we were walking to the bus (and it was quite chilly.  Cold enough that we dug out some coats…) Maddie happily sniffed the air and exclaimed, “It smells like snow!”  I had never stopped to think what snow smells like, but she was really on to something.  It definitely had a crisp smell to the air.

In other news, I have decided to a weight loss challenge again for myself.  Tim and I have talked and we have agreed that if I lose 50 pounds we will go away for the weekend.  We’ve never had a weekend away with no kids–so I’m super excited.  I completely understand that it will take a good amount of time to accomplish 50 pounds, but I needed something pretty significant to get me motivated.  I’ve been back on track now for a week and a half and am amazed (as always!) at how much better I’m starting to feel already.  And in full disclosure, I am documenting that I started this journey at 204 pounds.  The other day I went searching my website to find out how much weight I lost after each pregnancy–because it was a lot every time–and I never posted any actual weights on here.  I’m sure it was purely out of embarrassment at the number.  But it’s just a number.  And I’m sad that I can’t figure out how much I actually weighed when I felt really good about myself… so I’m writing it down this time.  And I’ll keep you posted on Mondays as to how much I’ve lost each week.

Happy Tuesday everyone!

With the hybrid model of school, the kids are on a rotating schedule of in-person and online classes.  So one day they are in-person and the next day they are online.  EXCEPT Madison, who is in Kindergarten and gets to attend every day in-person (thank goodness!).  It’s going pretty well.

The teachers have learned a lot from the mistakes of last Spring’s transition to all online (traumatically all thrown into it at once) and the online portion is going a bit better.  The in-person is a little strange because they have limited so much of the student access to other people (only 2 people per lunch table, no group projects, no field trips, Maddie eats in her classroom and masks all day).  But don’t get me wrong.  We are THRILLED to be in person even if it’s not normal.

The hardest part is that we can’t quite get on a routine with the schedule the way it is.  Chloe is really struggling with anxiety.  She thrives on routine and she’s just not getting it.  Our numbers are steadily going down, so there is a possibility that we will move to more in-person as the weeks/months progress, so we are optimistic that we will eventually get on some semblance of normal again!

Heyo!

If you’ve found me here, you’ll notice I’ve moved from my previous webspot (that’s not a technical term) and now have a new web address.

I am hoping to get back into writing again. There has been a lot of crazy stuff over the past 6 months and part of me is sad I didn’t document any of it, and another part of me just wants to forget it… 😉

But here we are. It’s September. The kids are pseudo-back in school (hybrid style) and I am back to teaching (mostly in-person with masks on). Tim is finishing up his work season in the next month to month and a half. Cheers to a new season and a fresh school year!