Breakthrough!

I've been in such a funk over the past year...I've felt emotionally shut down, physically bogged down. I'd fallen into a deep depression and didn't see any way out. Finally something in me snapped and I had to get help. I knew I was hurting my family. I wasn't taking care of myself, I was miserable at work, nothing was "right" in my world.

I finally went to the doctor and even he told me that he could see the sadness in my eyes. That was the biggest wake up call for me. He gave me a plan to help me. I also decided at that moment to actually DO something about my weight. it's been a thorn in my side for years now. I've been willing enough to complain about it, but I just couldn't get out of my own mind long enough to fix it. I finally made that breakthrough and realized that I was not only hurting myself, I was hurting my husband and my daughter. All the "reasons" I was giving for not having enough time to work out were just flimsy excuses for not doing it at all.

So, along with the meds, I've started taking care of myself. I'm eating food that's good, healthy fuel for my body. I've started exercising at 5 every morning. Even on my days off. No more excuses. No more self loathing and self pity.

So, this is it. My big breakthrough. I don't feel like working out is a chore, I actually look forward to it. My new meal plan isn't a "diet" but rather a whole new way of looking at food. I feel better. Mentally and physically. I am so excited to get to where I need to be. Where I should have been long ago.

AAAAUUUUGGGHHH!

*Whew* Glad I got that out.

Sorry I've been MIA lately. It's been so hectic around here that I feel like I've barely had time to breathe. In a nutshell, here it is.

*I had another birthday, yay for feeling old.
*We spent a week in NC with my mom and family. Good times! Except for the violent stomach bug. More on that in a minute.
*Came back from vacation and am back to work...and then the laptop died. Like, died permanently died. Hence the main reason I have been "unconnected" recently.
*I've been struggling emotionally with lots of crap, but I'm honestly working to fix it.

Okay, first of all. Another birthday. Ugh. It's not that I don't enjoy my birthdays, because I do! But it's also a reminder of how old I,m getting!!


A giant bouncy birthday cake? Makes my hips hurt just thinking about it.

Seriously. Birthdays always make me feel a bit introspective. Another year gone....where did it go? What the hell did I accomplish this past year? That type of stuff. Soon enough, life takes over again and we're back to the daily grind, forgetting all of the deep thoughts that plague us at times like that. On again on again, jiggety jig.

Vacation! Yes. We took 10 days off of work and drove the 11 hours down to my parents house in NC. Fun fun. Actually, it wasn't too bad. We left home at 1am (I slept for like 5 hours so I could drive first). Leaving that early made the trip go soooo fast! But here's a quick note for anyone thinking about driving through West Virginia. Before you enter the state of WV, make sure the gas tank is full and your bladders are empty...once you are on the "Expressway" (and I use that term loosely) there is nowhere to stop. And I mean NOWHERE. Hardly any exits. And the ones that are there are all dark and seemingly lead directly into the forest. It's truly bizarre. And scary when your GAS LIGHT comes on and there's no exit in sight. But we made it, thankfully. So chalk that one up to a lesson learned.

But the week with my family was really nice. We got there on Saturday. Sunday we had Sami baptized, and it was also my niece's 8th birthday. She had some kind of stomach bug, but she was a trooper. Monday we went to the NC Zoo and had a great time. Until that night. Sami caught the stomach bug...and spent all night throwing up. Mind you, she's only 3, so running to the bathroom is not an option. I had to sit up with her all night and keep a trash can handy. Poor peanut. It's absolutely pitiful to look in your baby's eyes when they are dry-heaving and they want you to make the hurt go away and there's nothing you can do. So I got literally no sleep. At 5:30am I finally woke up my hubby so he could take over while I grabbed a few winks. Tuesday was laid back...Sami was feeling better (thanks to Uncle Scott and the anti-nausea meds he called in for us) and we just chilled for a while.

Wednesday we went to a "paint your own ceramics" shop with my mom and sister. Sami chose a piggy bank, and had soo much fun painting it! Unfortunately, my sister caught the stomach bug next. So she was down for the count Wed and Thurs. On Thurs, Steve and Sami and I drove to Raleigh to go to the Marbles Kid's Museum. It was soo awesome! Except for the fact that I got the stomach bug too. Persistent little thing, it wasn't going to be happy until it systematically took out every member of my family. We had to leave the museum early, which didn't make Sami too happy, but vomiting in the museum wasn't too appealing to me. We got home and I spent the next 8hours in bed, fighting the bug. Fortunately for me, the bug was very violent but short lived, and I was feeling better by Friday afternoon.

We hung low Friday because we were leaving to go home on Saturday. I have such a hard time saying goodbye to my mom. I was a wreck and cried. And cried. It was awful, and I felt bad for Steve. I was a sniffling, snotty mess.

We finally got home and back to work. It was at that point that the laptop died. Corrupt hard drive. Yippee. Thankfully, it was still covered under the warranty. So they fixed it for free. BUT, they were unable to recover any data from it, so eveything I've done over the past year was lost. *sob* But now at least I have the computer back. And I've learned another lesson about backups.

And this is getting too long to go into the last part of my problems. I'll save that for another day. Stay tuned, it's sure to be fun.

Excuse me?

Where did the attitude come from?? My three (soon-to-be-four) year old has been posessed by a teenager. What. The. Hell?



See? Cute three year old. However, I fear that this is in my future.



Sure, you can say I started the ball rolling by teaching her to use black eyeliner so early....but no. I don't think that's it. Cute kitty whiskers do not equal surly, over-makeuped, under-dressed teenagers. I just can't figure out where this attitude is coming from. Just the other day she asked me for some juice. Innocent enough, right? Well, I'll let you be the judge of that.

Sami: Mama, can I please have some more juice?
Me: Sure. Just give me a minute to finish unloading the groceries and I'll get you some.
S: (waits roughly 15 seconds) Hellooo-oooh. I said I wanted more juice.

Uhhh, excuse me?!? If I'd even entertained the notion of talking to my mother like that at ANY age, I'd still be picking my teeth out of the back of her hand. But the thing that kills me is that the girl is respectful to other adults. But to me? All bets are off. And it's making my blood pressure top out. Whoever said that "3 is the new 13" had no idea just how right they were! I have no clue what to do with her now, let alone when she's a hormonal, irrational, snotty, self-important teenager. Gah. Someone hold me please. Or send booze. And chocolate.

and the Award goes to...

Me! Wow! Awesomeness. My mommy friend

Paige has awarded me with the Beautiful Blogger Award! Yay! Paige has a wonderfully informative blog, one of the cutest baybees ever, and has been a great resource in the short time I've known her. She's the one behind our ADM Blog Hop, too! Much love for her!

Ok, so here are the rules for this award meme:
1. Thank the person who gave it to you.
2. Pass this award on to 15 bloggers you've recently discovered and think are fantastic.
3. Contact the bloggers to let them know they've won.
4. State 7 things about yourself.


So I have to list 7 things about myself...here goes.

1. I am the youngest of 5. (And yet, I'm technically an only child. Go figure)
2. My husband and I both had cats named Simon before we met. We named our family cat Simon in honor of this fact, and found out that some things are better left alone. Most notably the cat. lol.
3. I have had 6 cats, 2 puppies, 2 iguanas, 3 ferrets, and numerous fish/frogs/crabs/underwater creatures as pets. Thankfully, not all at the same time.
4. I have 1 tattoo, and plans on at least 2 more.
5. I have a degree in Art. Haven't done crap with it, except cultivate some pretty kickass hobbies.
6. I love the ocean, but hate the sand. And I mean HATE. But not enough to keep me away from the water.
7. I get horribly carsick.

Now that I've done that, I have to give the award to 15 other bloggers. Unfortunately, just about everyone I know who blogs was covered by Paige...

Makeover!

Well, at least my blog gets a lil makeover. Thanks to leelou blogs for this cute new layout!

Maybe I'll use this inspiration and get myself a bit of a new look too!

What *exactly* is in that sippy cup, anyway?!

So the other day it hit me while trying to get my daughter ready for bed. All of a sudden I completely understand why it's so freaking annoying to try and deal with an overtired/wound up toddler. I am going to share this revelation with you, dear friends.

Those of you with toddler age (or older) kids will laugh because you know it's true, and because it makes so much sense once you hear it! Those without kids, or with smaller babies, will laugh because it's funny, but you have yet to really grasp what I'm about to say. ::evil maniacal laugh::

Trying to handle a toddler in Active Sleep-avoidance Mode is not unlike dealing with a severely drunk person while you are still sober.

::waits for realization to take hold::

THINK ABOUT IT...

Seriously! I'm right! Go ahead, admit it! It makes complete sense now, doesn't it?

1. They cannot be reasoned with, and evidently lose their sense of hearing.
2. They think they're funny when they are soooo not.
3. They laugh hysterically and fall all over the place, and invade your personal space in the process.
4. They babble incoherent phrases and words that make no sense whatsoever, usually at very high volume.
5. They have no attention span at all (not like toddlers really do anyway, but whatever.)
6. They say inappropriate things and believe that it's cute.
...

I could go on, but you guys know what it's like, right?

To further prove my theory, tonight we went out to dinner (Sami and I) with some friends from my work. Sami started acting all crazy and all I could do is laugh. It was totally like she was drunk.

Sami: (making crazy babbling sounds like the Tazmanian Devil and jumping around in the booth)
Me: What are you doing?
S: (leans right into my face) MAMA! I have to poop! (kisses me smack on the lips)
Me: (raises eyebrows) Really? We just left the bathroom.
S: (crazy babbling noises) I'm gonna color now. Color!! Color!! Colorcolorcolorcolor.

I, naturally, had to check her chocolate milk to see if they hadn't spiked it with something. She was acting so...um...not normal, even by her standards. All I could do was shake my head. I tried my best not to laugh, but I just couldn't help it. And, true to form, that just served to egg her on even more. Ridiculous.

So, I think the answer to this problem is quite obvious.

Drink heavily. That way, you can act as crazy as they are and it'll be funny!
I'm kidding, I'm kidding. Sort of.

Let it snow!

Welcome to the Weekly ADM Blog Hop. Anyone can join in! Just blog on topic between now and next Monday, include the MckLinky code (below) in your post, and hop on over to your fellow bloggers!

This week's topic:

Here in Cleveland we are snowed in but everywhere has days where cabin fever can creep in. What are your favorite indoor activities to do with your kids?

Ok. So first of all, we're not in Cleveland anymore, we're residing in balmy Erie, PA now. But, for the first time in recorded history (I think), CLEVELAND has more snow than ERIE. It's some sort of alternate universe. Or maybe the beginning of the apocalypse. Not sure. But anywow, there are things that we do to bide our time indoors while the flakes are a-flyin' outside.

I work out of the house, so at preschool they do a lot of art projects and such. This carries over to our home time. She LOOOOOOVES to draw/color/paint/whatever. An art project?? Sign her up. Heh. Just the other day, she asked if she could go outside and color on the sidewalk with her chalk. Nevermind the foot and a half of snow out there. It's time to color!!! She gets that naturally, by the way. When I was her age, I used to say that I was going to be an "ArtistTeacherMother" when I grew up... 2 out of 3 ain't bad ...

Oh yeah, right. Back to the topic at hand. :)

So, art. That's a biggie. She also loves pretend play. She's extremely independent, and veeeerrrry creative. We got her a kitchen 2 Christmases ago (well, actually Santa got it for her, but who's counting?) She plays with it every day. Still. She'll "cook" us food and snacks. I hear her playing in her kitchen, feeding her babies and stuffed animals. Sometimes scolding them and putting them in Time Out. Playing Mommy. She told me the other day that she wanted to me ME when she grows up. ::melts::

Right. I keep getting side tracked. Hehehe.

One thing we used to do to keep her occupied when she was a baby is not unlike playing "fetch", but it was heeelarious. When she started walking and talking, Steve and I would have her "deliver" things from one room to the other. For instance, I'd be in the kitchen (presumably making dinner) and he'd be in the living room. I'd hear him say, "go take this to Mama" and she'd come toddling into the kitchen, giggling the whole way, carrying whatever treasure (i.e. Random Object) he wanted me to have. She'd come in carrying a remote control. I'd send her back out to him, carrying a plastic cup. He'd send her back with a couch pillow. I'd have her take him a bag of rice. So on and so forth. Then, after a few trips, we'd have her deliver the items back to the rooms from which they originated, thus ending the game. Seriously, this would keep her busy for a looong time. And, it also wore her out really well. ::evil grin::

We're pretty laid back. We find fun stuff to do when we can't get outside to play. But the bottom line is, we spend time together. And that's what matters. So let it snow. We can handle it!