This Is My Year

2010.

A new year.  A new decade.  A new me.

I've never really done New Year's resolutions, mainly for the simple fact that I knew I wouldn't stick with them, so why even bother.  But I've changed my attitude about that this year.  I'm not expecting to be wearing a bikini by summer (although it would be nice, it's not realistic...hello having 3 kids!), instead I have long term goals that can attained by setting short term goals.

I, along with half of the women on the planet, want to loose weight.  But instead of saying I will "X" amount of pounds, I am resolving to eat healthier, make better choices not only for myself but for my family and become smarter about where our food is coming from and how it gets to us.  I will be the first to admit I am a soda-holic.  This is going to be the hardest for me to give up and I will tell you that right now, so I am not putting too much pressure on this goal right now.  I need a glass of soda in the morning (it's my coffee, don't judge) and sometime in the mid afternoon/early evening, so I can go without any caffeine in between those two and just make sure I am having water instead.  What helps is having a large water bottle already in the fridge each night for me, so I can see how many oz. I drank.  Hopefully by starting these baby steps, it will help me get to my larger goal of loosing the jelly belly.

The kids got a Wii from Santa this year and I am looking into getting the Wii Fit.  Between Dre's work schedule and homeschooling the kids, I don't have a lot of time to get to a gym.  Originally I planned on joining a dance class of some sort (a Barre class, strip class or hip hop class), but since we are MOVING (yes....we are moving and I really think that is what is contributing to my highly optimitic mood lately) it will have to wait until we are settled in before I can join anything.  So, until then I am just doing lots of walking/running, squats, just simple basic stuff at home. 

So, that moving thing...yay!!!  We will be moving to the mountains where the summers it very very rarely goes higher then the mid 80's, with a beautiful Lake just 2(ish) miles away.  Living there will be a lifestyle change for us...getting up in the freezing cold winter mornings to shovel our driveway, chopping wood, etc., but we are both up to the challenge and strangely look forward to it (remind me I said this in December...I bet I'll different attitude then).  It is a small town with the small town community feel.  The vast majority of people lead a very active lifestyle and it's a lifestyle both Dre and I are looking to embrace and get the kids involved with. 

Combine the just eating healthier in general (and portion control) and upping my workout regime, I *know* I will be seeing results (I better see some results, lol) soon.

Freezing Bananas....at 2 am

I am experiencing a pretty sucky case of insomnia lately, keeping me up until 3ish in the morning usually, only to get back up around 7am.  Logan is still not sleeping through the night, so operating on only 4 hours of sleep every day is getting to be pretty hard.

My usual tricks of falling asleep aren't working anymore (read a book or watch a little tv) so I find myself cooking, cleaning or working after the kids go to bed.  This last Thursday night was no different...I had a BUNCH of over ripe bananas sitting on my counter waiting to be frozen.  I was planning on doing it the next day, but hey, I was up and full of energy already, might as well do it then, right?

So that is what I was doing last night at 3 am....but it's sooooo easy and goes by pretty quickly...here, I'll show you....

First of all, there are several ways you can freeze your bananas.  The two methods I prefer are these ones:

• Peel and slice then mash the bananas, then pour into sandwich baggies to freeze.
• OR Peel and slice the bananas and lay the pieces on a baking sheet in a single layer.  Put the sheet into the freezer until the slices are frozen.  Transfer to a freezer bag and put back into the freezer. 

I like the second option for making smoothies with!  But last night I went with mashing them.  To make it a little easier on me, I measure out a cup of the mashed bananas and then transferred them to the baggies...so now any time I make my banana bread and it calls for 2 cups of mashed banana, I'll just grab two baggies...easy peasy!  I wound up with a total of ten cups last night...which I then preceded to put 5 of the sandwich baggies into a large freezer bag, labeled and put into my freezer!

Advent Calendar Activities

This will be the first year we've used an Advent Calendar, but we are changing things up a bit. First thing is....we aren't doing any sweets or candy with it, but instead we are doing an activity each night of the week. Second thing is....I don't even have an advent calendar. Hopefully before the end of the week I'll be able to either buy one or make one, so in the mean time I have a list that I wrote up that we are going off of.

Here is a peak at our list of activities this year:

1. Watch a Christmas movie with some hot cocoa

2. Write letters to Santa

3. Go walk around a local town to look at Christmas lights

4. Make Christmas cookies and surprise a neighbor or two with them

5. Write Christmas letters to relatives we will not see for the holidays

6. Visit Santa at the mall

7. Clean out some toys and donate them to Goodwill

8. Make some Christmas candy

9. Watch the movie "A Christmas Story"

10. Sleep under the tree

11. Make a gingerbread house

12. Make some reindeer food

13. Read a Christmas story before bed

14. Set out Santa's cookies and the reindeer food

15. Make paper snow flakes

16. Make a count down chain

17. Make some Christmas sugar cookies

18. Make cinnamon rolls to eat on Christmas morning and take a few trays to a few friends

19. Donate old coats to the needy

20. Watch a Christmas movie

21. Write a round table Christmas story

22. Play board games all day

23. Watch a Christmas movie

24. Go to my sister's house on Christmas Eve to eat, make cookies and watch movies and play games!

*I got several (if not most) of these ideas from The Idea Room*

Obviously, this list is not in any kind of order. Since we are homeschooling and lots of things happen during the day that can throw me off schedule, I want to be able to control what we do each day by picking an activity that morning. That way if plans change, the kids won't be disappointed too much.

Who needs toys when you can climb onto the bathroom sink and use and ice cream scooper to throw water around with?

*please ignore the dirty mirror...that is only 2 days without being cleaned, I promise*