They are so close to winning!!!

Mandy and Todd are sooo close to winning, they are only 1% behind. Please, please, please vote for them!!! You can vote once per day.

www.sunlitimages.com/blog

Uncle Ryan is coming and I'm going to teach him puzzles!

Keira is very excited that her Uncle Ryan is coming to visit and she would like to teach him how to do puzzles. Keira asks us to do puzzles all the time, but she doesn't actually want you to do puzzles with her, she wants you to watch her do puzzles so she can show off. She really likes it if you clap when she has finished one :)

I am sure I'll have pictures to post of the weekend later!

Vote for my Friends!

Hey all - I need some help.

I've got friends in Indy who have recently gotten enagaged and are on a very very tight budget for their wedding. They recently entered a contest to win FREE wedding photography from a great photographer in Indy. They are currently in 2nd place - they need your vote. Can you vote for them for me? You can vote once ever 24 hours and the contest runs through the end of the week - so if you could vote the rest of the week, that would be great! Just click the link below and scroll way down to the bottom and vote for Todd and Mandy. You remember what it was like to be young and poor right??? They are great people and would be really appreciative of our help!

www.sunlitimages.com/blog

Forgot to mention ...

I have now lost a total of 16 pounds! Yea! Only 6.5 pounds to go to get to my goal! Though I am thinking of upping the goal and adding 10 more pounds - we'll see how it goes!

Possible Papa John's Pizza for $0.25

IF the opening kickoff is returned for a touchdown during the Superbowl, anyone who pre-registers will get a Large Papa John's Pizza for $0.25.

http://www.papajohns.com/countdown/index.html

Birthday Birthday Birthday!

So we celebrated Miss Keira's 3rd birthday several times over the past 2 weeks. Below are a few pictures from some of the parties. It was nice to have family come in and celebrate with us - and since they all couldn't come the same weekend (and we'll have one more visitor next weekend), we just celebrated multiple times! Keira had wonderful time of course, she loves being the center of attention. All the presents we got her seemed to be a hit as we played with ALL of them multiple times yesterday. One of her favorites, but Mom and Dad's least favorite, is a piano that her Gram Gram bought her. Thanks, thank a lot - said very sarcastically.

Keira waiting very patiently for everyone to sing.

Mmm, Yummy!

She did pretty good blowing out the candles, she just wanted to get too close.


See that smile, loves the attention!

She loves icing, the cake she could do without.

She got art supplies for her b-day - this is her saying "TaDa"

The piano, did I mention it also has a microphone that has no volume?!?

I've also got a video or two to post, but I can't find them on the computer at the moment, so I'll try to do that later.

My "baby" is 3 today

I am sure you can all relate ... I am happy and sad all at the same time. I love watching her grow up and see all the new things she can do everyday, but sad that it is all going by so quick. I sit her and think about her birth and can still remember every single minute of that day starting from the moment I went into labor during Wheel of Fortune. I was scheduled to be induced on Thursday, this was Tuesday, and I had planned to spend Wednesday getting my nails done, having a nice lunch out, etc knowing that this child had decided that she was not coming out unless she was forced. Well, you know how the best laid plans go, right? Out the window. I went into labor tuesday night after working all day. This was the only day in the last 2 weeks that Wade had not left work so that he didn't have to come back should I go into labor. He had given up too. So while timing my contractions, he was shooting out e-mails left and right trying to finish up a few things. It was rather comical. Little Miss Keira arrived in this world at 2:48 AM via C-Section (because of fetal distress - she had the cord wrapped around her foot twice, which was causing heart decels with the contractions). 8lbs 13oz, 21 inches long. Brief stay in the NICU because she had swallowed some fluid, but other than that, perfectly healthy. Our life changed forever that day and we would not have any other way. I love you Keira, Happy Birthday!

Gone again

Hey all ... we've got family in town again and a little one turning 3 this weekend, so posts will be rare for a few days ... we've got to party!

6 Free Valentine's Day Photo Cards

Go to the site below and create a Valentine's day card. Order a box of 6 and use the code VALENTINE and the order will be FREE and so will shipping. I didn't have to put a credit card in at all! I just hit submit on the payment page without any info and it says my order was successful and my total was $0!

https://stories.scrapbooksetc.com/shop/cards/valentines/

3 Things

So thus far my day has consisted of about three things. None of which do I find all that much enjoyable, especially in large doses.

1. Dealing with a cranky child.

Keira did not nap at KDO yesterday and we are paying the price. She normally loves to go to the gym, but flipped out this morning when I told her it was time to go crying hysterically. We did not go to the gym. She started asking if it was naptime at 10:00 - I was tempted to let her.

2. Cooking

We made muffins this morning to try to get us all in a good mood. It worked for a little bit. I made Bran Flax Muffins. They are super yummy. I know they don't sound all that great, but they are really good. I have been on a health kick - trying to make sure we all get enough protein, fiber and fruits and veggies. The recipe made 24 muffins, so I froze 18 and kept the rest out for us to eat this week. I made a couple of modifications - used whole wheat flour, substituted oats for oat bran, added an extra TBS of cinnamon, and left out the oil, nuts and raisins (wade doesn't like them). Here's the link to the recipe.

http://allrecipes.com/Recipe/Bran-Flax-Muffins/Detail.aspx?prop31=3

I also made 4 batches of White Chicken Chili for an upcoming meal swap and also for dinner tonight. As always, I am really looking forward to the meal swap.

3. Exercising

Since I didn't make it to the gym, I have been working out at home while Keira naps (and so help me if she does not nap for about 3 hours). I highly recommend this work out by Jillian Michaels. It's only 20 minutes, but it will kick your butt. And bonus, it's on Comcast On Demand right now, so it was free! Also did some Wii fit. Not a replacement for the hour I had planned at the gym, but life doesn't always go the way we plan now does it?!?

How could I forget?

The girl scout cookies are here, the girl scout cookies are here! I know, they are not exactly on the diet, but as long as I plan the calories in my eating plan for the day, I'm all good. I just had 2 of those coconut ones (they used to be samoas, but they changed the name and I don't know what they are called) and they were yummy! We also bought thin mints - excellent out of the freezer. Get out there and support your girl scouts today!

Dinner and what not

So I made Shepherd's Pie for dinner. I'd never had it before, but Wade had and liked it. I found this recipe on the kraft website and decided to give it a shot, we are always up for something different. I feel like we eat the same things over and over and over and over, well you get the idea. And this was super yummy! Click the link below for the recipe. I only made slight modifications. Of course, left off the cheese (for those that don't know, Wade hates all cheese except mozzarella - it makes life difficult), added garlic salt, pepper and onions to the meat while it was cooking. And I only used 1 bag of frozen veggies - 4 cups would have been way too much. We both really liked it.

http://www.kraftfoods.com/kf/recipes/updated-shepherds-pie-69212.aspx

On another food note, Keira has decided that she is going to love vegetables - she has been eating baby carrots and green peppers non-stop. Now, if I could only get her to eat a meal :)

I am going to be making some Flax bran muffins that have carrot and apple in them tomorrow - I'll let you know how those come out.

Funny

This is funny, stupid funny, but funny nonetheless. It's an SNL skit called Mark Wahlberg talks to Animals. Enjoy a dumb laugh.


http://www.hulu.com/watch/37753/saturday-night-live-mark-wahlberg-talks-to-animals

It was 84 degrees here Sunday!

Well, that isn't exactly true. Since my parents were in town, we celebrated Keira's birthday a little early (though we will be celebrating several more times with other family members) and took her to CoCo Key Water Resort. She had a blast and it was nice and warm inside. For those of you not familiar, it is basically an indoor water park - it has a regular pool with basketball hoops to play in, a zero entry pool for the kiddies with 2 slides (Keira LOVED the slide), a big treehouse kinda thing with slides and buckets that dump water, cannons that shoot water, etc. There were three big slides for the bigger kids and adults and a lazy river. Keira spent most of her time going up and down the slides. Here are some pics from the big day!









She lasted for about 3 hours and then was exhausted. She fell asleep on the way home. More pictures soon from cake and ice cream.

Free Quaker Delights

Get a free sample of Quaker delights Dark Chocolate Raspberry Almond Granola Bar, sounds yummy!

https://smartsource.wufoo.com/forms/x7x0k1/

Nothing interesting!

So, I have nothing interesting to post. It's been super cold here, I haven't even been out to get the mail in 2 days! Mom and Mark are coming to visit, flying in tonight, so my posting here will likely be scarce till mid-next week ... I am sure I'll have lots of pics to post after that ... we are headed to CoCo Key Indoor Waterpark on Sunday as an early birthday celebration for Keira!

Have a great weekend!

Free Baskin Robbins

Baskin Robbins has some new menu items called Bright Choices - basically healthier version of their ice cream, plus frozen yogurt and sorbets. TODAY ONLY, if you come in with proof of a gym membership from 11 AM to 10 PM you can get a free scoop. Normally, Keira and I would be all over this, however it is FREEZING here today and I think we are going to have to pass. Seriously, it is -1 with a wind chill of -18. Man thats cold. Hope the weather is warmer in your neck of the woods.

Free Suave

Today Only! Go to the site below and sign up for a coupon to be mailed to you for a FREE bottle of Sauve!


http://www.suave.com/nomics/index.html

Good Quote

I love Scrubs - and have been happy to have it back for the last two weeks. Here's a good quote from this week's episode:

"Who cares what every one else thinks, do whatever the hell makes you happy"

Something to live by.

New Year's Resolutions at work

So my weigh in day is Monday. Drum roll please ..... I lost 2.5 pounds last week. Hurray! Really surprising as I kinda goofed off exercise wise in the beginning of the week and we went out on saturday and I had barbecue chicken pizza, yummy. I joined this sparkpeople website to track my calories and found, if you can believe this, that I wasn't getting enough calories and that may have been hindering my weight loss in the prior 2 weeks. Who'd have thought? So I have lost a total of 12.5 pounds - I am pretty happy with that. The next week or so will be tough as we'll have family in town and probably doing lots of eating out and less working out.


I've already read my books for the month and am working on several more as I got the last two books in the twilight series. So I am sure those will be finished by the end of the month. Or really the end of the week.


Keira's b-day is coming up and she gets to bring snacks in to school for it. My first instinct was to call the local bakery and order something super cute. So I called and what I wanted was going to end up being like $35. Normally, I would have sprung for it - it is her birthday after all - but I'm trying to be a more frugal in all areas, so I am going to make something. I'll post pictures when the time comes. What I'm making is going to cost roughly $5, so way cheaper!


Hope all your resolutions are going as well as mine are so far!

Olay Rebate

Sorry about the short notice on this one ... you must buy the products by 1/14 - that's Wednesday - here are the details ..

Buy any two Olay Regenerist products and submit the rebate form for a $15 rebate. Here is what I did. I bought two cleansers - they were $6.97 each for a total of $13.94 (plus tax). I used a $5 off 2 coupon that was in a recent insert. So my total was $8.94. Then submit the rebate with receipt and get a $15 gift card. It doesn't give details on what kind of gift card this is, but $15 is $15 I suppose. So this is a moneymaker of $6.06. Yeah!

Here is the link to the gift card form - it came directly from the Olay site.

http://www.olay.com/Club_Olay/dec2008/images/OLAY820_giftcard_form.pdf

Chasing Bubbles

I need a new haircut!

So once again, I have gone forever without a haircut and the hair is a mess. So I need a new do - anyone have any suggestions? What do you think about this Reese Witherspoon look (the short, straight one - you can see a bigger pic of it on the bottom tile)?

http://images.search.yahoo.com/images/view?back=http%3A%2F%2Fimages.search.yahoo.com%2Fsearch%2Fimages%3F_adv_prop%3Dimage%26fr%3Dyfp-t-305%26va%3Dreese%2Bwitherspoon%2527s%2Bhair%26sz%3Dall&w=120&h=120&imgurl=cm1.dotspotter.com%2Fmedia%2F0%2F78%2F15%2Freese_witherspoonhair.120.jpg&rurl=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.dotspotter.com%2Fnews%2F949239_Reese_Witherspoon_s_New_Hair...Hot_or_Not&size=5.1kB&name=reese_witherspoonhair.120.jpg&p=reese+witherspoon%27s+hair&type=JPG&oid=03e656e9fd852162&no=9&tt=43&sigr=12f6eupg4&sigi=11u8lnu3t&sigb=13ejfgau0

Renewed Motivation

So I was kinda a slacker this week fitness wise. Not that I didn't work out or anything, I just didn't give it 100%. I still ate well, so hopefully that will be enough to maintain for this week. But now I have renewed motivation. We booked our vacation last night! Yeah! We are headed to Cancun the last week of February. I am so excited. The beach is so calling my name. I found this really cool place in Cancun that in addition to the the nice adult pool, it has this really neat kids water area with a pirate ship and sprays and lots of little slides. Keira is going to love it. When on vaca, Wade and I trade off playing with Keira for at least an hour a day so that each of us gets some down time and some one on one time with Keira. So it's back to kicking butt at the gym as I've got to be in a swimsuit in 6 weeks!

New Homemade Simple Coupon Booklet

Just click the link below - it's a P&G coupon book.

http://www.startsampling.com/sm/100322/quickQuestion.iphtml?item=100322&source=mm50

Surprise

We have this wipe board/calendar thing that I finally got around to updating for January yesterday. It hangs in our pantry and is a pain in the butt to put back up as it has two very small screws that it has to slide onto. So I am in the pantry trying to get this thing hung back up and Keira comes up behind me and we start talking. My back is to her, so I can't see her, but she is just talking away. I finally get the thing hung up and turn around, and she is completely naked, head to toe. I just had to laugh. I thought we were passed this phase, but I guess not. Too cute!

Picture of the day

If only everyday could be like this ... laying on the couch, having a drink and eating turkey bacon!

Preschool

Ugh. So I am on the search for a preschool for Keira for next year. It is not as easy as I thought it would be. I think part of it is harder just because we are so new here, so all the places are completely unfamiliar. I had some of the MOMS club members give some recommendations, so that has been really helpful, not sure where I would have even started if it wasn't for that. I found one I really really liked, but it is $548/month for 3 half days a week. Ha. Are you kidding me? People pay that for preschool? Yikes, that is definetly not in the budget. So we are still looking. Hopefully this task will be completed this month!

Nothing else new to report. No pics to post. Not doing very good on that resolution apparently. :) Hope all is well!

Cell Service bad today

To those of you who have called today ... there is something wrong with the cell service here today as I can't get a call to dial out. The one call I did get dialed out, it just got lost less than a minute in. So, I'll try to return your calls tomorrow - hopefully it was nothing urgent as I can't get a call into voice-mail either.

Comedian

Keira has become quite the comedian lately. Well, at least she things so. Here are two examples:



Yesterday, she was pulling the wicker baskets out from under our coffee tables and throwing all the stuff that was in them out of them onto the floor. I looked at her and said "what are you doing?" She looked at me, got a sly little smile on her face, shrugged her shoulders and said "Making a mess" and then ran off. Toddlers!



Also yesterday, I was making dinner and Keira asked what I was making. I told her Pork Chops, Broccoli Salad and Teriyaki Noodles. She said "That sounds icky, I want grilled cheese" Lovely.



She has also become a huge fan of knock knock jokes. Her favorite goes like this:

Knock Knock
Who's there?
Keira
Keira Who?
Keira Hacker

Then she'll run off and laugh hysterically! Too funny.

New Year's Resolutions!

While I have never been a huge New Year's Resolution person, I do think it's good to have goals. I find you accomplish a lot more if you just put it down on paper. Here are a few of mine for 2009.



1. Read at least 2 books a month. I love to read, but this is often the first thing that goes when I get busy.



2. Lose weight. My goal is to lose 22.5 pounds (don't ask about how I came up with that number, it's very complicated ;). I have sorta cheated on this one though and started the end of November, so as of this morning, I have already lost 10 pounds, so 12.5 pounds to go!



3. Get Peanut in shape. Our poor little doggy is overweight. She loves food and we indulge her way to often. This goal will likely not start being worked on till it's warmer, but in the meantime we are starting her on some diet food that the vet recommended.



4. Be More Frugal. I have accomplished this goal in some areas, but have some work to go in others. I still have a bit of a gymboree habit for Keira, that is one thing I'll work on.



5. Take more pictures and print more pictures. I have done a pretty good job taking pictures, but printing them is another story. Oh, and work on getting them in albums too!

6. Worry less, have more fun! I have a very type A personality. Everything organized, everything in it's place. Everything has a plan and a contingency plan if the first one doesn't work out. Five year plans and 10 year plans exist (at least in my head) Blah blah blah. Try to let it all go and live in the moment. (This is probably the hardest one on the list!)

That is about it. I am sure I'll come up with some as the year goes by. I'll try to keep you updated on the status.

Playing Doctor

Keira's favorite book for as long as I can remember right now has been 'Farley Goes to the Doctor', it's one in the Sesame Street series. She LOVES this book. We have read it at least twice a day for a very long time. So for christmas we got her, her own little doctors kit. I walked into her room tonight and saw that she was giving her doll a check up. It was seriously the cutest thing ever. She did the blood pressure, gave the doll lots of shots, looked in her ears, eyes, and mouth, and listened to the heart. Too cute. She then spent the next hour giving Wade and I check ups. She has quite the imagination. Yesterday she played with all her princess figurines, apparently one of them had lost their Mommy and the others were comforting her and trying to help find her mommy.

Did I wish everyone happy new year? If not, Happy New Year! Tomorrow, I'll post New Year's Resolutions!

bleepingcomputer.com

So the computer is fixed! Hooray. Due in no small part to some very very helpful people at www.bleepingcomputer.com. If your computer ever gets a virus, check out this website. You post your problem on there and then people respond to it. As far as I know, they are just regular people who this is their hobby. The gave me step by step instructions for different things to do. We had to run several different anti-virus software programs (all freeware that they directed me to) and they basically held my hand the whole way. And all for FREE. Can you believe that? I thought for sure we were going to have take it in somewhere and pay a bunch of money for someone to clean it for us. I am so grateful to this site!

Happy New Year!

Ugh, Virus

Just when I get the computer back, it's got some kind of virus. So hopefully more soon, once we get rid of this virus!