12of12 | July

[click here to enlarge]

01. I didn't sleep well, instead laid in bed thinking about making a book about my time in Jerusalem (who knows why). So I stopped torturing myself, got up around 4am, and looked through the photo album. For whatever reason it worked, I went back to sleep and was able to get a little bit more rest.
02. I watched my two nieces while my SIL is on vacation. It's so nice that the three of them are close in age and all get along...for the most part.
03. When I got back from my run around 7:15 the sun was just hitting the tips of the mountain. This is the view from my bedroom.
04. I'm on week 8 of P90X. It was a yoga morning.
05. For FHE we all wrote notes to send to my nephew Landon who is at Scout Camp this week. He is so good about always leaving us notes and sending email that we all wanted to show him some love.
06. I've been growing my own basil this summer.
07. We had homemade pizza for dinner. Turns out pineapple is the condiment of choice.
08. Along with my nieces I also had my friend Jenica's 4 littles here as well. My 3 + my 2 nieces + my friends 4 = 9 kids. Did you know that is a whole loaf of bread? Luckily I wasn't alone for long. Jenica came back and we spent a good portion of the afternoon talking.
09. I love globes.
10. Tess had a chance to sneak away from the chaos for a bit and paint.
11. Drew drops from the morning sprinklers. It's amazing how spider webs capture water.
12. Adam ended the night by reading with the girls. I love seeing them this way.

When I woke up and found Bella in the kitchen making her breakfast I went to grab my camera and she said, "Oh, so it must be the 12th." I just looked at her and smiled. I wonder, do your families have you figured out?

Hope it was another enjoyable day. Make sure to share your link so we can all see.


Have a good one.
xoxo

early morning hike

Nothing like starting your day off with a hike in the mountains. Sure I was up at 5:45 am, but the beautiful sights, the sound of rushing water, the smell of the earth, and my friend as company made it all worth it.

[most of these photos were taken while trying to keep up with my friend. I kid you not, she was running up the trail.]


















Have a great weekend!

tuesday randoms

*It's not quite 7pm, but I'm already in my pjs ready to curl up with a good book and say good bye to this day. Not that is hasn't been a good one, quite the contrary, but even a good day can be an exhausting one.
*I think I'm extra giddy that I don't have anything going on tonight. Literally I think this was the first night we ate as a family in like two weeks. Honestly, I can't remember the last dinner I just made for the 5 of us.
*I've been needing to make banana bread for several days now. I keep looking at the pile of withering bananas wondering if they will hold off for another day.
*Don't fall asleep while reading a hard cover book. I found out the hard way last night when the book fell on my face and the dust jacket cut my face. Ya, seriously.
*Week 5 of P90X is underway. It sucks.
*The nest outside my window is empty now. I'm sad they moved on.
*Just asked Megan where Bella was and she said, "she's downstairs watching Nova...about dreams. It's a boring show."
*Went to Sephora for the first time last night while out with Adam's mom and sisters to celebrate my MIL birthday. Never really understood the allure until I went and saw that they carried Fresh products (love their sugar line). Now I'm happy they came to town.
*Speaking of being at the mall...we got lock in the mall last night with a bunch of other people. What? Seems like a serious hazard.


*I had a babysitter today for a few hours which turned into a neighborhood water balloon fight. Good times.

a yoga morning

I just recently borrowed P90X from my mom, more like stole (she knows i have it, but i doubt she'll get it back). I've heard a lot of good things about it, I've been wanting to feel strong again like I did last summer when I was doing boot camp, so I've decided to tackle it for the next 90 days. I am afraid, I admit, but so far so good.

I started yesterday with Day 3 of the program. I know kind of weird, but I didn't want to wait to start next Monday and I want Sunday to be my rest day so I started day 3. Makes sense to me. I figure at some point I will make up the first two and call it even.


[this is my test photo to make sure the lighting was just right. Not only does it crack me up that she is patiently waiting to start, but her outfit. Can't get enough of her.]

Today was yoga day. Megan's been talking about yoga ever since her friend's mom came to school and taught her some yoga moves. I had my mat out the other day and she was throwing around terms like downward dog and child's pose and quite frankly I didn't even know what she was talking about (I've only ever done yoga once, years ago). Imagine her excitement when I pull out my mat and put in the yoga disc. She got herself ready for exercise and joined me. Bella and Tess joined me yesterday for shoulders and arms (w/out weights) so they decided they would play along too.









A lot more moaning than I had anticipated from them, but I get it, it was harder than I thought. Looking at it you'd think yoga is a glorified stretching exercise, I assure you it was not. I enjoyed it though, and enjoyed my company. I'm hoping this will be part of our summer morning routine.

Have you done or are you doing P90X?
Have I made a huge mistake?

Have a great day.

everyday trauma

Bella came home Monday night talking about health and fitness. Apparently in school they had a class about the food pyramid, how to eat right and keep your body healthy through exercise. After telling us all she learned she asked if she could use the treadmill sometimes to exercise. I chuckled at the thought, but told her she could whenever she wanted to.



Surprisingly the next night after dinner she wanted to exercise. It was funny the way the girls made a game of it. They all dressed up in tank tops, shorts, and tennis shoes and wrote out on the dry erase board activities like push-ups, sit-ups, etc. that they had to do. I spied on them and it cracked me up to see them "exercising". They were actually doing it and trying hard too. Bella was running on the treadmill while watching everyday Italian on TV and the other two were on the ground attempting push-ups.

I figured that would be it, but last night they were all excited to do it again. This time I went down with my camera thinking surely this will be my last opportunity and again got a good laugh that they were actually exercising. After I left, right around bed time, I heard the girls screaming as they walked up the stairs. Megan was crying about "not doing it" in a voice that started to alarm me. Turns out Bella was on the treadmill, tried to reach for something that was in her way and fell so that the belt on the treadmill basically rub the skin off her thigh (aka a really bad rug burn). Turns out Megan was crying because of what it looked like and despite the fact that she kept saying "I didn't do it", she was the one who actually turned off the treadmill and freed Bella. She keeps going around saying, "I saved Bella's life".



Lucky for Bella there was no school today so she had a lazy day on the couch. She can get around just fine, but at one point she did say, "Mom, will I need crutches?" I expected to hear nothing less from my sweet Bella...she's pretty dramatic. It wasn't until about 1/2 through the day that I realized her injury could have been much worse and it probably wasn't so smart of me to let her use the treadmill without some safety tips like putting the safety cord around her wrist so if she fell it would shut of automatically. I guess I still need to get use to have a almost 10 year old.

I got to wondered when everything's healed up will the excitement about exercising go away? I don't know, but I do know one thing for sure that Megan said and hope she'll soon forget, "exercise hurts".

she joined me on my morning workout

and then we danced.


I'm going to miss my mornings with her.

an Alma inspired list

That would be the Alma from History of Love. It's no wonder I liked the way she wrote, I seem to write in lists a lot.

1. COMO ESTAS?

Bella and Tess are going to school 45 minutes earlier this morning to start their new Spanish class. I think it's awesome our elementary offers this to the students. I am hoping with the class and with Adam speaking Spanish to them it will actually help them pick up the language, but if not, it certainly doesn't hurt. They are both thrilled about it, but I can't decided if they're excited about the class or that they actually get to take it together.

2. APRON AKA BAKER

The apron was her dad's when he was a little boy and knowing that has her wearing it all the time. "I need my baker" is her constant reminder whenever we're cooking.

3. WHO EVER SAID EXERCISE IS GOOD FOR YOU

So this morning I woke up feeling, I don't know, well rested I guess, and thought I could go out running. I decided to go outside because I just can't stand the treadmill. Since my children were still asleep I ran around my house, I know it sounds lame, but there is a hill and a set of stairs so I thought it would be nice and challenging. Anyway, I was feeling pretty good, loving my music, so I ran down the street and back...boy was that a mistake. Seriously I thought I might die. I did make it up and back fine, but my lungs felt like I had TB, I could taste blood in my mouth, and was dry heaving all the way into my house. It took me at least 30 minutes to recover. The worst part is I still feel like I'm recovering. I have a cough that feels, well, like I have TB, my throat hurts, and I have a head ache. I'm pathetic. Guess I'll stick with Pilates from now on until I have the strength to try it again. Of course some good came out of it. While running back into my house I saw this

You know I love a full moon, but now, right now, I love the subtle I'm_barely_hanging_in_here_moon. It was perfect for how I was feeling at the moment.

4. FOR THOSE WHO WANTED A HOW TO

Etching glass is seriously so simple it's almost embarrassing to call it a craft, except I did come up with my own stencil. All you need is this, masking tape, and a stencil (they sell vinyl stencils, that I think you're suppose to use, but I made up my own with stickers). Just mask off the area you don't want to be etched and then apply the cream all over the negative space for around 5 minutes (check directions on bottle). Then wash it off and viola! Etched glass. One other thing, make sure to wear gloves and do it in a well ventilated room.

5. THE OPERATION CANNOT BE COMPLETED BECAUSE THE DISK IS FULL.

That was the warning I got Monday when I was trying to download pictures off my CF card onto my HD. I couldn't believe it, but I shouldn't be surprised, I have everything on that HD. So all day yesterday I was copying, yet again, all my photos to DVDs (I am just up to 2007 this take forever). Now I will have two copies of everything so I won't be afraid to delete from the HD. I hate to do it, but I just don't want to go drop a couple hundred dollars right now.

6. WHO EVER SAID HALLOWEEN CANDY WAS FOR EATING.

It's been a week now since Halloween and my kids really haven't eaten their candy. I would almost say they've forgotten they even have it. I don't understand this at all, I would have already had mine half gone, but I like it, that they are not ruled by this candy. Sadly, I'm hoping in a few weeks I can just throw it away like last year (I ended up throwing Bella's candy out around Easter).

7. GIVE AND TAKE

I've decided in my 7 + years of being a mother that sometimes I just need to give my girls the reigns and allow them to make the decisions. So when it came time to pick out Bella's new glasses I stood back and allowed her to choose what it was she wanted. I of course gave her options I could live with or that I thought looked good, but I let her do the rest. I could tell it made her feel grown up and more responsible, she sat in front of the mirror and studied her face for quite a long time. I have to say it was hard not being involved, these were not my first choice, but they were hers because of the flowers, she loved the flowers, and I guess that's all I really care about is that she's happy with them so she'll wear them. The best news of all is when the Dr. said her eyes are improving and my not need glasses in the future.

my view

This morning I got up wanting to get back on track with exercise. I have had a love hate relationship with it for some time. I love it for how it makes you feel and hate it for the waste of time it seems to be. Let me clarify...I feel I could be doing so many other things when I have some time to myself, not that it is a waste of time for your health. Do you follow? Anyway for that reason I only want to exercise while my kids are sleeping. I suppose that is why I have been going to a gym because it gives me a break from my kids and they love it as well. But I have not done any exercise outside of the gym. I have wanted to for a long time since I have the equipment and I make it for one week at the gym and then off one due to kids getting sick.
This morning I went for it and since I can't get up before my girls they were there with me all the while...well at least megan who pulled up a chair and hung out with me. It made me laugh. Just thought that I would share with you what it was like for me. Enjoy!