What the Fuck is Balance in Life?

Hey y'all, I am still kicking and haven't totally fallen off of the wagon for a while now.  Well not the weight loss wagon at least, just the blogging wagon!  Wow, time is falling by me faster then I can even imagine and next thing I know its weeks since I wrote a post. Hmm, I have been trying to find a balance of work (oh fuck what work.... its wetter then hell out here and none of my full time kids are coming due to that!), family life and my weight loss/exercise life.  Ok don't go bitching me out yet, I know its all one life I live, just different areas I am trying to keep a float right now.

So for working life.....

When I have kids, which like I said is very few and far between right now, because my full time parents all work out side and well when your work site is flooded out due to water from the freaking snow we had all winter and then the bloody rain that seems to keep coming, it kinda hard to work.  But there is the odd day in the week I have one extra little kiddy running around my house.  I am hoping soon things will pick up again, money is getting really tight, and no so easy to pay off loans I took out for this daycare business when I don't have money coming into to pay them.  Thank the lord, most of the loans were from family member's that understand and are willing and able to wait a little longer to get their money back.  My I love my family, just hate the thought of having to keep them waiting so long..... any who this paragraph really has shit all to do with weight loss or anything in general!!! Sorry for boring you about all that crap.

Family life.......

At this time isn't all to bad at all.  One plus on my side with the fucked up Spring we have had, I get to see my husband more then usual.  Cause lets face it again, they aren't out seeding cause all of our fields are under water!  So instead of coming home from his full time job in the city and have the quickest supper one could imagine and then running out to the field to relieve his dad for the evening, he gets to just stay home and help out with the kids.  On the other hand, if (and that's the biggest fucking IF one could say) the weather co-operates we really wont be seeing much of him cause they will be working 24-7 to get those crops in.  As for my own kids, lets just say they are keeping me very busy too.  Both my oldest son and my daughter are in soccer this year, which runs twice a week, so that eats up a full evening, seems how we live a good half hour from the town we play in and they are practicing for an hour and a half.  Good thing soccer season here only runs for a few months!  It wears me out and I am just the momma driving not the kids playing.  And wee one.... wow, does he get into mischief and keep me going too.  He is just starting to walk and well, I don't want him to yet. He is my baby and my last baby, and he's just growing up way to fast for my liking.  Along with soccer and running after the 14 month old, I am still tutoring my son on the evenings he isn't playing sports with his writing, reading and fine motor skills.  We are thinking he is finally catching up a bit and hopefully by the beginning of next school year he will be right where he needs to be to start Grade 2 and not be behind.  Its truly hard to deal with all this and not blame yourself on why things happen to your children.  I keep thinking its my fault he has a learning disorder, I must have done something while I was pregnant for this to happen, or I didn't try hard enough to teach him when he was little.  These are all things that have run through my mind the last while on why he has a learning disorder.

Weight loss and exercise life.....

Wow, now this is very time consuming!  But I have been doing good and have lost almost 20 pounds in the last month or so.  Now of course some of this has to do with a change in my medications but still alot has to do with excising my ASS off.  I try to get 2 hours a day in for exercising, and lets say that ain't easy with a family of 4 and myself along with everything else that has to get done in a day.  I try to do a good hour in the morning and a half hour at "quiet time" in the afternoon and another half hour after the kidlets are in bed.  Now, before you go giving my shit again.  I know its better to do it all at once to keep your heart rate up and going, but it just doesn't work for me that way.  I get up at 4:45 am, already I am not getting up any earlier when I don't get to bed till 11 pm or later some nights.  So, I have found breaking it up this way is the only way I can get it all in.  And as for my eating, for the most part I am doing pretty darn good.  I have stopped following Weight Watchers for now and I am counting calories in and calories out, which to me is just as time consuming as WW. 

alot left at the end of a day to do.  But I just remember there is always tomorrow for it!!!! 

Mother Nature... take a hike!

If you can't afford a doctor, go to an airport - you'll get a free x-ray and a pat down, and if you mention Al Queda, you get a free colonoscopy!. 

I received this as an e-mail last week and thought it was kinda cute!

I have noticed that I haven't blogged in a few days.  Wow, life has just been busy, busy, busy here.  With the children being off of school last week I had a house full for Ducky's Arts and Activity Centre and then on top of all that my 3 children were sick through out the past week too.  Now I think I am coming down with a cold AGAIN!  I can't seem to miss these things the last few years.  Any cold or flu that shows up in the community I seem to get it, since my first pregnancy I catch everything.  Before I got pregnant the first time, I was hardly ever sick now it feels like every other week I am.  Oh well live has to move on when you have family and work to do.

I took the weekend off of exercising and I wish I hadn't, when I went back to my boxing I sure noticed it in my arms.  It took a good 15 minutes for my arms to warm up and not hurt so much, but I pushed through that hurdle and kept going.  At one time I know I would have stopped before the pain did, because I just didn't want to work through it, things sure have changed and for a good way!  I just love this cardio workout, now. 

I got a facebook message yesterday from a lady here in town, she is trying to get a Zumba class together and was wondering who all would like to take it.  I jump on the opportunity, with living in a small town of about 215 people or so, there isn't much to offer for classes.  I would love if we could get enough people together to do this and maybe keep it up with a few sessions through out the year.  So I am keeping my fingers crossed all goes well and come April I can get these two left feet of mine moving even more!

As for my weigh in this past Sunday........... lets just say I was more then a little pissed off with it!  I worked out every day except the Saturday and ate pretty darn well and I was still up 1.6 pounds.  Now, I think I might know why, but still it makes me mad.  I have had mother nature visiting me for well over 2 weeks now....... and with her here she has brought havik on my body! The horrible cramping and bloating like you wouldn't believe.  Once again I go back to when I had my children.  After each child my periods got worse and worse, before my first I never had cramps, bloating, cravings, anything.  And then comes baby number one, I thought they were bad then.......hell now baby number 3 is here and they are 3 times worse!  Why is it that us  women have to go through all this crap????????  Once you are done having children, I think you should be done with your period to!

Any who, now that I kinda caught ya all up on my past week or so.  I hope you all have been doing better then I have and keep up with your hard work!

What then hell am I in labour again?!?!

So yesterday I had to head to the city get another colopospy done, lets just say it was not fun at all.  After I had my 3 child and the great old pap test afterwards came back abnormal.  So they did a colopospy at that time and found I had alot of scare tissue build up and some paulups (growths) in my uterus, so they scraped the inside of my uterus back in August and removed everything that should be there.  That procedure wasn't bad, it didn't hurt at all, due to the fact that I had pain drugs for it.  This time was the totally opposite!  I thought that they were just checking to see how things were going in there, if they was anything I was assuming that they would schedule for another appointment and redo everything they did in August.  Well boy I was wrong, the doctor decided that she was going to do everything at once and with no pain medication cause you know she was already in there, why stop and give me something?!?!?!  So the doctor proceeds to tell me that she is going to remove the stop she found and that I will feel a LITTLE cramping while she was doing.  I am sure that the nurse that was helping her had a broken hand by the time she was done, a little cramping bullshit!  I thought I was giving birth again and was at the end of it and had some of the worse contractions ever.  Wow, I was hurting for a while, even once I was going to bed last night, I was still hurting alot.  This morning its not so bad I still feel a little pain but nothing like yesterday.  I am glad that is over and I will be prepared for my next one, just in case it happens again!  Good thing that's not for another 6 months.

So even with my pain last night, I still got a little exercise in.  I didn't want to but I thought I should so I decided to do my step ups while watching some TV.  I went for a good 40 minutes and once I stopped and looked at my pedometer I was amazed I did 6169 steps.  I felt good after that, well a good feeling, still sore in the inside and my legs were just a little tired afterwards.

While in the city yesterday I was also at Walmart, cause lets admit it, I live for Walmart.  I found a great sale on some Wii games, one of which was a Golds Gym one.  I am looking forward to trying it!  I am hoping I might be able to tonight, seem how I was able to sleep in this morning cause the husband started work late today, so none the less I didn't do a work out first thing this morning.

Other then yesterday my week has been pretty good but busy with alot of daycare activities.  We are working on the letter Bb this week.  Lots of fun crafts going on and keeping the kids busy again, seems how the weather is shitty once again outside.  Man I can't wait till Spring so we can go outside more often.

Sunday....

Just a quick blog before I head off to bed.  I have a number of things to write about but that will be for tomorrow!!!!  Today I headed into the city to get groceries.  I was in need of them badly, wasn't much food left in my house and with started my routine tomorrow morning I needed to get prepared.  So off I went with my shopping lists in hand and bought some yummy food and ingredients.  I love grocery shopping now, since I started my weight loss journey and making a healthier life style for my family and I.  Before I would head to the store and buy junk.  Processed this and processed that, a few apples or oranges and um chips, chocolate, etc (you know how it goes!).  Now I am happy with walking up and down the aisles looking for ingredients I need to make meals myself, reading nutrition labels and diving into the fresh produce section of the store and filling my cart full of those yummy things, FRUITS and VEGGIES!  Any who, the highways were shitty today, what should have taken just over an hour to get from home to Regina, it took me just about 2 hours.  I have a lead foot and like to speed a little (I can thank my Granny for that one ;)) and having to drive 60 to 70 KM (Yes, I am from Canada, eh!  So that is kilometers an hour not miles)  was horrible and irritating to me.  But I did it because the roads were like ice and I really did not want to end up in the ditch. 

I got home again and started supper for the family and put away the yummy food I bought.  Later this evening I was organizing tomorrows plan, so I texted my one mom whom brings her little one here to be looked after.  I find out that he wont be coming tomorrow and most of the week.  I am starting to get a little worried and stressed out right now.  I started Ducky's Arts and Activity Centre back in September.  I am a daycare centre which is ran out of my home.  But the last few months I don't really seem to have any full time kids.  Before Christmas all was going well I had 2 full time and one part time, now it seem to be 2 part time and one drop in.  I know, some of the parents work schedules are slow right now, but I can't help but to think "Am I doing something wrong?".  Are my rates to high? Do the kids not like it here?  Or whats going on that I seem to have lost my full time children.  Its really starting to bother me and I am kind wishing I knew what was going on.  Its hard to plan things when you don't know how many you are going to have and money wise isn't always easy either.  I am wondering if I might be smarter looking for an actual job out side of home somewhere?!?!?  At least I would know I have an income coming in.  I love what I am doing but at the same time I just can't help but to worry I am doing something wrong.  OK, I know this last paragraph has nothing to do with weight loss or anything really related to it.  But, I had to get it off my chest.  I tend to let these kind of things build up in me and I then eat instead of trying to figure it out.  So in the long run, it does kinda have something to do with my journey, if I journal it out, may I wont eat cause I have been able to think about it a bit more?!?!?!  Anyone else do this to them self's often?

Homemade Granola Bars

So while in my kick of trying to cut out a lot of processed foods (not all but at least cut down on them), I was looking at the nutrition values of the granola bars I buy for m,y family.  I don't buy the chocolate covered ones any longer, due to 2 reasons.  One I can eat a whole box myself in about 3 days.... and no that's not the small box that's the value size box.  And two is one of my daycare children is lactose intolerant so I have to have as little milk and milk products for him.  So anyways now, I couldn't believe when you stop to read what is in these store bought granola bars there is a lot of unneeded shit in them and a lot has to do with packaging and keeping them fresh.  So I go to my good friend yet again, the wonderful world of the Internet and found some really good recipes for homemade ones.  I printed a few and did some work on the WW website to figure out values and what.  This one was one I mixed up a big and added a few of my own ingredients to help out.  The kids loved them and they are so easy to make and smell great cooking!


HOME MADE GRANOLA BARS

2 cups rolled outs
3/4 cup packed brown sugar (I used 1/4 cup and 1 tablespoon of splenda brown sugar)
1/2 cup of wheat germ (I bought bulk at the Bulk Barn)
3/4 teaspoon of cinnamon
1 cup of flour
3/4 cup of raisins (I used a trail mix that I picked up from Costco, but hell toss in any nuts or dried fruit, it will taste just as good)
3/4 teaspoon of salt
1/2 cups of honey
1 egg, beaten
1/2 cup of oil (to me that was a lot so I used a 1/4 cup of oil and a 1/4 cup of unsweetened apple sauce)
2 teaspoons of vanilla

Directions:
1. Preheat oven to 350 F. Generously grease a 9"X13" pan
2.  In large bowl mix all dry ingredients well.  Once mixed make a well in the centre of the mixture and add all other ingredients and mix again!
3. Place in pan press firmly and evenly.  Bake for 30 to 35 minutes or until golden brown.  Cold slightly and cut.  Don't allow bars to cool completely before cutting, or they will be to hard to cut.

Makes 24 pieces and is 4 points on WW new program.

Hope you enjoy!

Philly Cheese Steak Sandwhich

Well I made an all time favorite for my family tonight.  A meal that everyone will eat, even my picky daughter. 

With a little tweaking of an original recipe and some helpful hints from the Weight Watchers website, this sandwich not only tastes great but has about half the fat and junk as a normal Philly Cheese Steak.

2 cups onions, thinly sliced
1/2 cup water
2 tablespoons Dijon mustard
2 cloves of garlic minced
6 hot dog buns
6 oz of fat-free deli slices roast beef
3 oz of reduced fat Swiss cheese
6 oz of reduced fat cheddar cheese (I sometimes just use the pre-grated cheese by Kraft, and skip the Swiss)
2 cups of fresh mushrooms (optional, but if I can hide veggies in meals I will take it! (gotta love kids))
1 teaspoon pepper

Preheat broiler; in large skillet spray with non-stick cooking spray once heated add garlic and saute for 1 minute.  Add onions and mushrooms cook for another 2 minutes, add water, mustard, and roast beef, cover and cook for 10 minutes.  Open buns and place on cooking sheet spray with butter flavor or olive oil.  Broil each side for 1 to 2 minutes. Add roast beef mixture to half of each bun top with an oz of cheese over the whole bun, broil for another 2 minutes or until cheese is bubbly and melts.  Close sandwiches and eat away!

Makes 6 sandwiches and if using weight waters it would be 7 points (on the new program)

Hope you all enjoy as much as we do!  Sorry I totally forgot to take a picture of what they looked like.  I guess I was just to excited to eat mine.