The many words of Moses.

I wish I started keeping track months and months ago because when he is 17 I’m so going to pull these blurps out in front of his friends and embarrass the heck out of him. Moses and his words…Moses and his phrases….Moses and his questions…Moses and his theories.

Walking out of his bedroom door: “Goodnight Monster” …closes the door then quickly cracks it back open… “Sweet dreams”. Later when questioned about that conversation he told me they live in his closet...great.

Me: “Moses I am the boss of you”

Moses: “I’m the boss of the motorcycle” (he didn’t care much for being boss of the applesauce)

On the conversation of balls (yeah, those ones): “No Mommy doesn’t have balls….when you get older Mommy you can have balls, ok Mommy?”

Moses: “Where are we going”

Me: “I’m going to work and you’re doing to school”

Moses: “No, I don’t want to go to school; I want to go to Target!”

Noticing my rear end after I get out of the shower: “I’m going to get Mommy’s hiney…(goes for it)...let’s open it”. This stems from his new love to “open” his own hiney and show you for no other reason that he is a boy and loves my disgusted reaction.

 “I want to go to Grammies and Hobby Lobby”

Moses: “What time is it?”

Me: “7:30”

Moses: “OK”

Last one isn’t a phase but an action. On super special days we go to Starbucks before I take him to school. I get an iced Caramel Macchiato (milk on the bottom, espresso on top) and I always stir it to blend it all together. The other day he got his “coffee” (aka Tall iced water) and he pulled his straw to toward the top and started stirring his ice around. When he noticed I was watching he just smiling and kept stirring. A boy after my own heart.

Moses is 2 ½ and has no idea how to tell time, proper anatomy, and all the joys Target can really bring.

Patting myself on the back.

I purposely waited until Sunday was over to throw myself a mini party for our week long accomplishment. For months I’ve been considering a cash budget but I could never force myself to do it…well last week that changed. I stayed persistent, fought through the urges to spontaneously spend and stayed 90% on budget! I say 90% because we did buy gas sooner than expected (both needed some over the weekend) and then spent about $14 on misc items not in the budget. Even though we strayed a tiny bit I am so proud of our self control! And the best part about the week was I carefully planned out meals for every night so it didn’t feel like we were missing anything when we came home from work. I’ve shared before my love for Gina at SkinnyTaste.com and she was my go to for last week’s meals. They taste so good for being “healthy” and each suggested portion fills me up. 

I’ve shared a few times my desire to eat as natural and organic as possible (inspiration from Michael Pollan of Food Inc to our week long organic challenge) and after reading another story last week my feeling about this subject have been renewed. I won’t go into much detail but a typical family of four decided to take a 100 day challenge of eating zero “junk food” and has since sparked a lifestyle change and pledge to rid your family of the junk. Seeing that not everyone in our house has such a passion for this we are not diving in head deep but I will start swapping items out for the more natural/ organic versions like I used to do frequently. Because of this I spent $15 more grocery shopping than my budget allowed for but I would say it’s worth it.

 

(it takes too much time to link all the recipes but if it says Skinny it means I got it from Gina!)

Last week’s menu:

1. Skinny crispy coconut chicken over salad with honey mustard and a side of baked zucchini sticks

2. Creamy beef with onions, peppers, and mushrooms over rice

3. BBQ Pulled chicken sandwiches with a side of corn

4. Skinny Enchiladas with a side of yellow rice

5. Grilled chicken with “Italian salsa” (tomatoes, olive oil, balsamic vinaigrette, fresh mozzarella cheese cubed, salt, pepper, seasoning) with a side salad

This week’s menu:

1. Skinny meatloaf cupcakes with whipped potato frosting and a side salad

2. Herb chicken with goat cheese and lemon butter sauce with a side of sweet potato wedges and broccoli

3. Skinny crock pot taco chili over rice with corn tortilla chips, Mexican cheese, and sour cream

4. Skinny crispy shrimp over salad with eggs and raisins with a side of cauliflower fritters

5. Breakfast for dinner—eggs, chicken sausage, pancakes topped with fresh fruit

I hope by seeing how we finally succeeded after many failed attempts this encourages you to do the same!

Weekend advice.

Having had a husband for a few years now (and that automatically makes me an expert, right?) there are some things I’ve come to learn about men.

 

They don’t understand/like/know why/ rather us not “get” certain items that we may find fashionable:

Rompers

Long rompers

High waisted shorts

High waisted pants

Puffy sleeves

Turtle necks

Trending and a few long term styles such as:

Bright lipstick

Teased poofy hair whether it is the “back poof”, “bang poof”, or “front poof”

Side ponytails

Our obsession with braided hair

Pigtails

Chopped ankle boots

Single ladies, if you want to impress your girlfriends—wear something trendy; if you want to impress a guy –wear something classic. And of course if you want to impress your husband –wear nothing.

Jump on the wagon.

If you’re reading this on Google Reader you may not have noticed my newest addition to the side bar; that little red and white button is my newest addiction. Pinterest.

I’ve been hearing about it for months from Blog Land and friends and sisters but have purposely avoided getting it in fear it will do to me what it’s done to everyone; start an addiction.

If you’re not on it yet, do it. If you’re not following me yet, do it. If I’m not following you yet, tell me so I can do it! You can never follow too many people because I feel like the more people pin the less work I have to do by typing in searches.

Of course searches have become my new best friend when it comes to making my house a priority….oh my gosh people have some good ideas. The DIY sections, the style sections, the food sections, they all get me. I’m not one to tag dream homes and vacations because honestly I don’t have time to sit and lust. I’m looking for things I can make, do, things to inspire a new outfit and new house projects. And yes I will unfollow any board that pins adorable little babies stuffed in adorable little thing because oh my gosh my ovaries cannot handle it the cuteness!

I love that within 1 minuet Pinterest changed my mom’s mind about the entire color scheme she was thinking about doing in her living room. “Oh…” she said, “those colors don’t really look good together”. You can literally pull 1000’s of pictures in an instant and save yourself hours of searching websites and blogs for different ideas.

I’m addicted, everyone else is addicted, and you should be too!

When I tried to sign up it put me on a “waiting list” and I still haven’t got an email telling me I’m invited. However I did just ask my sister, she shot me an email invite, and within seconds I was logged in. SOOO if you want an invite just ask me and I’ll send one your way; no one should have to wait to start Pinning!

You decide where the chain stops.

A few months ago I went out searching on the internets to find a good weight loss/motivational blog to help me refocus my eating and exercise habits. The very first one I came across was Roni’s over at Roni’sWeigh and I have loved it ever since. You can read all about her on her own site but basically she used to be very overweight and through Weight Watchers, food journaling (brilliant), exercise, and an entire emotional journey she is now a completely different person. I love that she has kids, a house, a husband, emotions, but still finds a way to meet her goals by eating right and exercising by a Flexibility Consistent method (if you can’t go run at your ideal time of 6am then do it at 8pm when you have time…that sort of thing).

  

Earlier this week she has this quote and little motivational segment about it:

“You decide where the chain stops”

  

Just because you have one bad meal doesn’t mean your entire day is ruined…one bad day doesn’t have to into one bad week…one bad week doesn’t have to turn into one bad month….ect. You decide when the chain stops….you decide when to make a change. Just because I ate a handful of M&M’s doesn’t mean I have to skip the treadmill waiting for me in the playroom. Just because I was too tired to get up to exercise doesn’t mean I need to eat Chick Fil A tonight. You decide where the chain stops.

  

This method can be true in other aspects of your life (you know, for those of you that have eating perfect and exercising daily down) such as your attitude. Just because you yelled at your husband for eating the last apple doesn’t mean you need to be angry the whole night…just because you had too much to drink last weekend doesn’t mean you need to do it again this weekend (I’m just using broad examples, not real life stuff…I have my hang-ups but this is not my secret way of out-letting all my internal battles). You get the point; you decide where the chain stops.

 

If your needed eating or exercising encouragement I urge you to check out her blog. Some days it may only be a food journal post but each week I feel encouraged after reader her blog and I bet you will too.

Deal Alert! I wanted to let all the locals know about this wonderful Final Sale item I got at the LOFT. I LOVE the LOFT but do they rarely have "cheap" sales. Sunday I was browsing and scored this adorable canva tote; it's cream with thick silver stripes and cost $17 marked down to $3.88! They had gold and silver sequence options as well as a light purple with gold stripes and all around at 13+ inches tall & 14+ inches wide. The purple was beautiful but I wanted something more versitile. It's perfect for a "throw n' go" bag and for under $4 you cant beat it! They had prob 20 total left so hurry over to LOFT if you want one!

First day, yet again.

The first day of school, yet again. Even though Moses is still at the same school this year he does move up each school year just like k-12^th grade does. This year he is moving the second floor at school where all the “big kids” are and oh my gosh my baby is growing up! We had orientation last week and I already really like his new teacher and his new classroom. They do a great job of transitioning the kids to the next classroom by introducing the teacher weeks in advance so this morning he had no problem going to his new room.

We were running around in a hurry but I remembered to pull out the camera last minute to take his First Day picture.

Please note the wild bedtime hair I tried to brush over and the 100 bruises and bumps on his legs; that’s my typical two year old boy! If you were to see him moments earlier he had sticky hands and a peanut butter mustache. Wonder how he is so patiently standing still smiling for the camera? Because he has his eyes on the jar of M&Ms I bribed him with the take this picture! Whatever works, right? 

Rewind 13 months ago to last year’s first day.

And finally the comparison shot of what a year of changes bring. I’m kind of tearing up and kind of have a proud smile on my looking at these side by side. This is just the beginning, I know, but oh my gosh my baby is so grown up! 

Speaking of grown up, check out this text picture I got this morning. My little sister aka Molly Polly Pocket's first day of high school!! I really can't believe the high school era has begun for her...pretty soon she will be driving off to college! A comparison to my first day of high school: I wore the shortest skirt I could find and about a pound of make up. When I asked Molly if she was allowed to wear makeup now she just shrugged and said "uhh I don't know, I'm not going to because I don't need it". Don't need it at age 14....yeah, talk about maturity!