Sarah's Mission Farewell

Yesterday was my step sister's farewell! And guess what? I am blogging about it at a reasonable time haha! I finally got the pictures from Clint's homecoming onto my computer but for some reason it didn't transfer to my blog and I am at work so those will have to wait until later on I guess. But here are the pictures from Sarah's farewell!!

Her farewell yesterday was at my parent's ward, at 11 AM. Love 11 AM church PS. She did an awesome job on her talk! Afterwards, we came back to my parents to eat some food!

Lunch was sandwiches with all the trimmings, a bajillion kinds of chips & a LOT of different kinds of salad {I gotta pretty cute hubby if I do say so myself}

Another view of the food

View of the table and the food over there

Her cake and a picture of Sarah :)

That cake was yummy PS. Love Costco cakes!

Mom & Rick



Few different shots of people getting food...

Richard & Chris

Blake, Jake & Josh eating some food

Jake's making a cute face right? Haha. Eating with Sam & Popper







Jeannene and Matt & Emily's son Keaton. He's our step nephew :)

Isn't he so cute?!

Right before we left, I took a few pictures of Sarah. I was playing around with the lighting on my computer afterwards, since they turned out SUPER dark. I didn't realize that while I was taking them. Good thing to check next time!

And then Jeannene took a quick picture of me & my mom.

It was an awesome day! I'm so glad we got to support Sarah before her big day! I am so excited for her! Spokane, WA get ready for an amazing missionary!!

PS Rick got sustained and set apart yesterday as the 2nd Counselor in the Elders Quorum Presidency. And because Blake & Jake were there, they got to help set him apart! That means it was Jake's first time getting to use the Melchezidek Priesthood!!! I am so proud of him, and Blake, and Rick! Talk about an awesome addition to yesterday's already exciting events!

Fit Friday: Slow & Steady

I can already tell this whole "Fit Friday" post thing is going to do wonders for my motivation! I have been thinking about this blog post all week long!! First things first: weekly weigh in. 171 pounds. So still 7 or 8 higher than my all time low, but it's 5 lower than last week, and 3 lower than the week before! The weight I gained after taking my 4 day weekend off of working out isn't falling off as fast as I thought it would, but its not glued there - it IS coming off!

I bombed last weekend though - I'm telling you weekends are where I struggle. Starting Sunday though, I rocked it! I ate about as perfect and clean as it gets. Stuck to my calories, had a caloric deficit of at least 750 calories every day {for a 1 pound a week loss, you need a 500 calorie daily deficit}. Did all my workouts, minus abs one day, and rocked them ALL! Lifted all 3 times this week, my muscles were FEELIN it this morning - I could barely do the last 3 push ups in my workout haha. And that's why the scale moved - I was super dedicated!

Last Friday, about an hour after I posted my Fit Friday, I bought Insanity & Shakeology again. I'd been thinking I wanted to go back to Shakeology, because it worked before and if it ain't broke don't fix it. So I was about to buy it and thought hey lets get a new workout too, since it's cheaper to buy them together. So I'm looking at the workouts and I talked myself into getting Insanity. I have been very clear, for a very good while, that I would try P90X some day or Les Mills Combat but NEVER Insanity. It was just too much. And that's why I got it. Because it's the one thing I thought I couldn't do. And I'm gonna do it. Because I can do hard things.

And because Insanity delivers Insane results. And I am ready for the last 20 pounds to come off and see more of my muscles. That'd be pretty insane in my book. It is supposed to be in my mailbox when I get home...



So goals for this week are:

1. Stick to my calories all 7 days.
2. Write down everything that goes in my mouth.
3. Do Insanity all 5 days next week {M-F}
4. Work out tomorrow {Saturday}

#1 thing for me to work on - watch what I do in the kitchen!

Jake & I have decided we aren't going to eat out much, if at all, anymore. Well I decided that's what I want, and Jake is coming along for the ride. He agreed though - I'm not demanding it of him. And like I said in my last post, I do bring him home pizza if I want something that he doesn't want to eat. The exception to that rule is ice cream. I talk about ice cream all the time. You know this. I straight up love it. And this lifestyle change I am doing is just that - a LIFESTYLE change. For life. So saying no ice cream is not realistic for me.

So new plan - on Saturdays, if I work out, then we are going to go to Yogurt Bliss for frozen yogurt after dinner. That one day a week, it's ok. That's my cheat meal. Especially since Yogurt Bliss just got Peanut Butter yogurt. I am literally counting the seconds for that tomorrow - I cannot WAIT to go get some!! I LOVE PEANUT BUTTER!!! Oh it's so bad that I am so addicted haha. I might need an intervention. But it's frozen yogurt, so it's healthier than ice cream, and its my cheat meal, and I have to do something to earn it. It isn't just given to me. I can totally do that. It gives me something to look forward to. It's not limiting me and saying "no more of this ever again". And I think that's a huge factor in how I lost 5 pounds this week - all week I knew that I didn't want to mess up and use my cheat meal during the week because I wanted to save it for my PB Yogurt Bliss. Don't worry - it'll be photographed for next weeks blog :)

Found this and loved it. LOVE it!

Love this one even more - this is SO what I tend to do! Great perspective on it!

Slow & steady is gonna win this race - losing a couple pounds at a time. Bite size pieces. One week at a time. And this week, I nailed it!

Lastly, just wanted to post some pics of outfits this week. I have a very real addiction to clothes haha. Not as severe as peanut butter by any means, but real nonetheless. Pinterest isn't helping either... I saw this picture on a blog the other day...

And decided to re create it with clothes I already have...

And I am pretty dang proud of how that turned out! I literally had all the clothes already - don't remember the last time I wore that scarf or that yellow shirt. And I don't keep clothes I don't wear. But I love how bright they are, and then I found a way to wear them together! Gives me hope for spring!!

And I loved this outfit too - got the shirt at Maurice's for free. Yep, free. Because I bought a pair of skinny jeans & an ADORABLE new cardigan, I got 2 shirts for free! And the two things I bought were 40% off. I am quite proud of that. And I NEVER wear this cardigan, and now I got something {once again, for FREE} to wear with it so I can utilize more clothes in my closet! Which means I can start buying less clothes!! Haha yeah we'll see how that goes. And I love my hair straight. It snarles easier and I straightened it WAY too fast so it didn't stay straight all day, but at least it looks good here right?

Can't wait to tell you all about Insanity next week!! And to post losing at least another 2 pounds. I am well on my way baby!!

Ladies Night

Last night, I had the chance to go have a girls night out with the girls from work. Plan was to go to Texas Roadhouse for dinner, which meant I wouldn't be cooking dinner for Jake. Which translated into bring him home dinner. Which turned into this...

Jake's favorite "easy take out" dinner

And then it was off to Texas Roadhouse with the girls! Unfortunately, Rachelle, Angie & Maria weren't able to make it. It was really fun to see Tonya & Lisa again, and I love any excuse to get to see Lindsey outside of work!

All day at work, I was looking at the menu online trying to figure out what to order. They don't have nutritional information available, so it was truly a test of my "Eat Clean" diet principles - based purely off of what ingredients are in them, and if its "clean" or not. I ended up getting 2 skewers of grilled shrimp, with no butter, a side of green beans, a side of steamed vegetables and a side salad with honey mustard dressing on the side. The green beans had something in them that looked suspiciously like bacon {tasted divine} but yeah probably not quite as healthy as I had intended. But I didn't eat any rolls! NOT ONE! And if you know ANYTHING about when I fall off the healthy eating band-wagon, it ALWAYS involves a restaurant. Eating out kills my motivation to eat healthy and I still did awesome! Guessing on my calories, I still had a pretty good deficit for the day! WOOT!!

The 4 of us after dinner - Lindsey, Tonya, Lisa & me

It was so fun getting to see Tonya & Lisa - I have missed both of them a lot since they quit at the beginning of the year to be stay home moms. I miss their stories - they told some good ones last night that had us laughing pretty hard. Can't wait to be a mom and have fun stories to tell :)

In Case You Weren't Aware...

I have the best husband of all time. You may argue that, but I don't care. I have the best husband ever. One of the reasons is because he is spontaneous. Take those Valentines' flowers for example. I told him that we weren't really doing gifts - don't do flowers since they are expensive and die and guess what? He knew me well enough to know I wanted them so he got them anyway. And not only did he do that, he surprised me and brought them to work. He really works hard to put that extra thought in to make things special for me still, even after putting up with my crap for 4 ish years. Seriously he treats me so much better than I deserve.

Yesterday morning, I was running SO late for work. My work out went a little longer than anticipated, and then I took my time in the shower and that turned into me being rushed while trying to get ready for work. So as I am rushing around the kitchen trying to get my snacks and lunch ready, Jake jumped in and helped me make my food. I was so grateful for those extra 2 hands that helped me get ready. And then when I went to take my first snack, I opened my lunch box and found a note from Jake in my lunch box.

My note I got

Ok that might not sound like a big deal to you, but it was a HUGE deal to me. Jake doesn't really do random things like that - and he thought it up, and then acted on it, and then managed to not say anything so it surprised me and sneak it into my lunch box. So I totally started crying when I saw it! Like literally tears fell. I can't believe what an awesome husband I have!!!

And in case you weren't aware, I want a baby. And we didn't get any good news this month either, so here's to hoping for next month. But in the mean time, I have my practice child that I love so much! He has been sleeping with me at night and is quite the cuddly space heater - he makes the bed SO warm!!

After we went to get his shots on Monday

Still loves me even though I made him get a shot. I love my puppy son!!

I'm one lucky girl. Seriously. I know I want a baby, and that I get frustrated that things aren't happening at the speed I want. But it's teaching me patience and helping me realize just how lucky I am to have the things that I have. And we have 2 incomes, so that means we can spoil ourselves more than we normally would. So last weekend, after I got my new dresser, Jake got a new Go-Pro to replace the wrong one I bought at Christmas time. He loves the new one and has already made time lapse videos with the weather changes we have had. I love seeing him happy - makes it totally worth it.

Love that smile. More than anything in the whole world.

And we were able to return the old one, so it all worked out perfectly!

Long time coming...

So a long time ago, I earned a new dresser. And I talked about it here. Jake told me that I could have a new dresser when I weighed less than him. Mission accomplished - a year or so ago haha. I knew exactly which dresser I wanted - as you can see in the link above. We just dragged our feet on getting it. We got our new bed, which added 4 drawers of storage to our bedroom and that helped a TON!!! Like night and day difference having all that extra drawer space for our stuff. But then last week, Jake asked if I still wanted a new dresser. Uh ya!! So he said I could get one. And I just thought it was talk, until we went to get it Friday night after I got off work! I was SO excited that he meant it - that we really could go get a dresser!!!

Friday night I worked late. Like almost 2 hours late. And I work at a bank. You may be asking how that is even possible haha. Our scanner was down so we had to wait for the company to fix it. So I got paid OT to sit and read a book. Score for me!! Jake waited oh so patiently for me to get off. And then when I got off, we really went to Ikea. Even though I thought we would wait until the next day since I got off late - Jake still stuck by his word and wanted to go get it for me. I was pleasantly surprised that he was so willing and almost eager to go to Ikea - building furniture leads to arguments for us normally haha.

We get to Ikea, park the car and follow the maze to get to the dresser area. We {read Jake} loaded the 3 boxes onto the little cart thing and we walked to the checkout in the store to pay for it. We decided to sneak into the clearance area first though and guess what we found? THE EXACT SAME DRESSER! ALREADY BUILT! And the price? $100 CHEAPER?!?!? SCORE!!!!! Seriously we were both freaking out. So he stood there to "puppy guard" it until we got someone to come cut the cord attaching it to the ground. We loaded it onto two carts and moved to the checkout area again. After paying for it, I waited with the dresser while Jake brought the truck around to the pick up area and we tried to load it into the back. Epic fail. I'm not as strong as I thought I was haha. The guy next to us helped Jake move it in while we moved the carts out of the way and then I climbed in the back of the truck to lay it down on its side. And then we went to get dinner at Chili's.

We got a combo to split - yeah bad idea. Those are NOT meant for 2 people to eat. More for like 1 person with a big appetite. The portions were TINY. But we got Queso as an appetizer and just ate all of that and 2 bowls of the chips. Yeah Chili's is a weakness for me, in case I haven't talked about that. Those chips are divine salty goodness. That made me feel sick for 3 days afterwards. I woke up the next day and couldn't get my wedding ring on my fingers were so swollen. My shoes barely fit because my feet were so swollen. Guess it's a taste of pregnancy? But yeah - bad idea to eat that many chips haha. And then on the way home, I wanted frozen yogurt, since I had already screwed up so bad, and went to Yogurt Bliss. And got peanut butter frozen yogurt. Yep, you read that right - Yogurt Bliss now has PEANUT BUTTER frozen yogurt!! OH MY GOSH! Seriously, can't decide if I am excited or sick at the thought of how often I am going to want to go there now haha. The only reason I ever want to go to JCW's is because they have an awesome peanut butter shake. Now, I can just go to Yogurt Bliss! And get smaller portions {cough cough}. And it's high protein yogurt, with probiotics. Yeah, I'll be headed there every weekend for a while haha. One cheat meal a week - that'll be it! Anyway, back to the dresser.

So we had decided to just load it the next day into the house, since it was around 10:30. I come home from getting my yogurt {since the car was at the bank and Jake was driving the truck} and the truck is parked backwards in the garage. Apparently Jake REALLY wanted this new dresser in the house haha. So we brought it right in the house. Jake backed it up so that the tail gate dropped into the house and we just walked from the truck bed into the house. GENIUS husband I have!!

Our old dresser. Jake got it as a baby. It's meant for a baby. Not 2 adults! It'll be great to pass on to our kiddo's though!!

Another view, with the new one visible too. Totally should have taken pictures before we brought it in the house. Whoops!!

The new dresser!!! It was on clearance because of the scratch on the far right top drawer and the bottom piece was put in backwards {there are two "holes"}

View from the side. Seriously, LOVE it!!

It's been nice having so much room on top of the dresser. We like the angle of the TV too. And all those drawers have been AWESOME! 2 of them are empty right now because we don't have enough stuff {yet} to put in them! I guess thats partly because we have the 4 drawers on the bed too. But still - having 12 drawers in our bedroom for stuff has been WONDERFUL! And those drawers on the dresser are deeper and wider than I thought they would be - that bottom drawer can hold a LOT! And those top "smaller" ones can hold a TON - I thought there would only be room for a few pairs of socks. Oh no - they hold TONS!! Huge thanks to whoever built this and then brought it back - we enjoyed not having to put it together and saving $100. And HUGE thanks to my fabulous husband who bought it for me! I love it!! :)

Fit Friday: Frustrated

I just wrote this whole blog post and it deleted itself so I'm annoyed haha. But that's not why this entry is called "Frustated" - I'm frustrated because I didn't lose any weight this week. Then again, I ate pretty bad most of the days. I only stuck to my calories on 2 days. And I had a really hard time getting my butt up to workout 2 of the days. Skipped one workout all together, and then only did a short one 2 other days. So yeah, the scale wouldn't move. But it went up. By 6 pounds. The scale said 176 this morning. FRUSTRATED!!!  But I am learning. I have been really strict - saying things like "never gonna eat that again" so when I slip and eat it, I eat as much as I can since I have told myself that after this, I won't ever do it again. I hate that word never. It leads me to binging in the WORST way. But this week will be better :)

I am going to stick to my calories this week. No going over. And I am writing down everything I eat, no matter what. Those 2 goals right there should help me lose!!

Next Saturday {8 days} is family pictures with my mom & Rick. I look different than I did last time we took them, but I still want to look as good as possible so this is my new screen saver on my phone:

When I eat good though, I feel good - this was on Tuesday, before I binged at dinner and I felt awesome that day - healthy and had a really good hair day!!

Still loving my hair!!



This quote is AWESOME - made me feel lots better this week!

I am really excited to see how this week goes, now that there is no more concept of "never". And I am back on Shakeology. It worked before - I was losing and then I rocked the boat. If it ain't broke, don't fix it. And I fixed it, then it broke. So back to exactly what I was doing before. LOTS of water. Lots of fruit and vegetables. Shakeology. Tracking EVERYTHING I eat. Planning my meals on the weekends. And guess what? This week will be different from last week. The scale is gonna change. You just wait and see.