It is FINALLY the end of Tyson's school year! Yes, I know tomorrow is June 19th and he is still in school.  To be honest I am sort of glad he went a little late, because I was not prepared with an end of the year gift for his teacher and his teacher aide. After a lot of thought and hours wasted on Pinterst and coming up with NOTHING to give to these amazing women, I thought about what I would have liked from my students if they decided to get me anything (it is a rare occasion when a high school student gives a thank you to their teacher). What I would have wanted was to know what the students enjoyed and my favorite a cup of Starbucks, iced grande soy vanilla latte to be exact. Keeping this in mind I decided to make a mini album with pockets so Ty could write a few things he liked this school year and we could add a few goodies as well. Here are some pictures of how the album came out!

Tyson is super excited to give this gift to his teachers tomorrow! If you are looking for a fun gift to give I would highly recommend this!  Happy Crafting!
Breanne

My Progress

My progress.

So here we are two and two days later and I want to report my progress.  I wanted to be able to type that I have lost tons of weight and I am a whole size smaller, but that is not the case.  When I took a hard look at what was realistic for me, I realized that if I want to make a lifestyle change, then I can’t do anything drastic.  For me it is not realistic to completely cut out carbs, or to eat clean 100% of the time or to get eliminate dairy.  I just don’t have the desire or will power to do this.  Not only do I not have the will power, but I have the constant question of, “what happens if I did eat simple carbs, or if I did eat dairy, or if I has a week of not eating clean.” So my husband (an ex-wrestler) says there are a lot diets you can try, but what it comes down to is calories in vs. calories out.  Now don’t tell him I said this, but he is right.  Knowing this I had to decide how many calories a week I was willing to eliminate.  Using my fitbit I decided that I would cut out 500 calories a day, which is 3,500 calories a week, totaling 1lb a week.  I thought this would be easy, 500 calories a day no problem….WRONG!  I have never been so angry when a handful of almonds has put me over my caloric intake.  Really almonds…come on! At least I am exceeding my calories with something healthy right?

 If I am being honest I do go over my allotted 1,400 calories a day, however with an increase of exercise I get an increase in calories, so my allotment increases.  I have never been so excited to exercise, simply because I get to eat something else. My husband and I are doing the Insanity workouts, they are going well. Yet, the last time I was this physically exhausted was when I was pregnant.  Last night I did a fit test and I improved in all areas! Whoo-hoo. What I was most excited about was I went from doing 6 push-up jacks to 12 push-up jacks (completed in 1 minute) in just 2 weeks.  I am getting stronger!!! J  I am also running two mornings a week with my running partner Cindy.  Thank goodness for Cindy, because I like my sleep, but having her hold me accountable for running has been great. I will say that on the days I both run and do Insanity I am happy that I get to consume a few more calories.

My shortfalls.  I am not going to lie. I have made a few choices that have not been so good.  Now I have not gone over my allotted calories, but I may have used up my calories with some unhealthy choices.  For example on February 17^th my husband and I went out to dinner and a movie. At the movie I wanted popcorn and chocolate.  I ate about 3 cups of popcorn and ½ a box of milk duds.  I stayed within my calories for the day, but I felt a bit guilty.  On Sunday the 24^th I was craving chocolate, really craving chocolate. I needed it, I had to have it.  So I decided I would make brownies, the Costco Ghirardelli brownies, with the chunks. I told my husband I was going to make them and he said, maybe we can find a healthier version.  Feeling guilty I went online to look and I found a recipe.  It had wheat flour, apple sauce, coco-powder, 2 tablespoons of olive oil, and the other usually ingredients.  I added some chocolate chips which ended up making them 103 calories a brownie (2x2). I am not going to lie, they tasted healthy and did not satisfy my need for chocolate. In fact they just made me mad that I ate 103 calories of not so yummy chocolate.  I learned my lesson; next time if I am going to splurge, I am going to splurge. 

So here I am 2 weeks and 2 days after starting to get healthier and I am down 2.5lbs and getting stronger and stronger.  I know 2.5lbs is not much, but my pants are looser and that makes me happy.  I’ll update again soon.  Have a great day!

Week 1

Well, today is the day!  The day I REALLY work to get healthier. I am not going to lie, it is just after lunch and I have been obsessing over food and movement all morning.  I happen to be home from work today, it is Lincoln's birthday and my school district takes the day off. I enjoy having the day off, but being at home all day is testing my will power. I am winning so far.

I knew going into week one of getting healthy, I needed to be prepared, I needed a stocked refrigerator, an eating plan and an exercise plan. So I decided to share with you all what my plan is. 

Breakfast options for the week

Yogurt with homemade granola +fruit
Oatmeal with Fruit
Egg burrito in a multigrain tortilla

Snack ideas

Almonds
Celery and Peanut butter
Fruit
Yogurt and Granola

Lunch Ideas

Minestrone soup (homemade)
Chicken Salad wrap (no mayo)
Quinoa Salad on Avocado

Monday

Dinner- Stuffed Portabella mushrooms (not sure what I am stuffing it with) roasted Broccoli
Exercise-Insanity Day 1- Fit test

Tuesday

Exercise-run 5am 3-4 miles
Dinner-Fried brown Rice (FRIED?!?  1tbls of olive oil for 4 servings)
Exercise Insanity Day 2

Wednesday

Dinner-Stuffed Zucchini and Roasted Cauliflower
Exercise-Insanity Day 3

Thursday Valentine's Day!

Exercise -Run 5am 4 miles
Dinner-Stuffed Pork Chops, Mashed Potatoes, asparagus (I will probably have desert on this night too)
Exercise-Insanity Day 4

Friday-DATE night

Exercise-Insanity Day 5
Dinner-Salad wherever we go out

Saturday

Exercise-Insanity Day 6
Dinner-White Chicken Chili

Sunday-SNOW day with the boys

Exercise-3 mile run (to Starbucks)
Dinner-leftovers

A busy life almost got the best of my preparing for this week.  My oldest son has had a high fever for the last three days and I felt bad leaving the house to grocery shop. But, I was able to sneak out during nap time and stock the fridge.  I almost let having a hectic schedule be my excuse for not changing this week, but it is too important to me to make excuses. I am changing NOW.

I faced the dreaded scale this morning and I knew it was not going to be good. I mean I sort of ate some chocolate,  ice cream and Oreos this weekend. I was just trying to get those foods out of the house and rather toss them I put them to good use ;).  In reality I knew I was starting my getting healthy routine this week so I decided to just eat junk this weekend. Not the best choice, but it is the truth.  Taling about those yummy, not so good for you foods is making me want them...STAY STRONG PHILLIPS STAY STRONG.  It is time to clean up the kids lunch mess so stay tuned for my progress! Have a great week!

 

 

Fruits, Eggs
Maybe a little temtation in the back
(pudding snacks for my son's lunches)
Notice I place the fruit  in front so I can grab them first.

 A drawer full of veggies. Those that know me, know that I do not like bell peppers, but I am willing to try to use them.











Fruit on the counter for easy access.  My boys eat apples like crazy!  Hopefully I will too.

Healthy Change Set-up the Technology

Let me start out by saying that I do not have a technological bone in my body and that I have a fear that if I try to set something up on the computer that I am going to download a virus or change my search engine.  Last night my husband had a meeting and I thought I would spend the evening setting up my fitbit and my aria. I went over the directions and it seemed easy enough.  Yet, of course one thing after another did not work.  This was not because it was difficult, it was due to user error.  No worries though, it only took me 40 minutes to get my fitbit working (should have taken 5).  My advice for new users, take a few minutes to charge the fitbit before trying to set it up (my initial problem). Use a USB port that you do not have to access often (second problem) and follow the directions (they are very clear).  Also maybe don't watch an episode of The Bachelor while you are trying to preform this task, it definitely had the majority of my attention. Yet, I was still able to get the job done.
It was still early in the evening so I thought I would give setting up my aria a try.  I paused The Bachelor, there were two episodes this week :), and started setting it up. My first hurdle was that it stated that I did not have Wi-Fi. WHAT?  Come on, we have Wi-Fi, we have had Wi-Fi forever!  Then I remembered we switched to cable Internet and that our desk-top was hard wired. Now I was stuck so I unpaused my show. As I split my attention between my show and problem solving I saw that you could set the aria up using your phone, so I tried and I failed.  Now I was really stuck.  My husband came home shortly after that and of course it was right during the rose ceremony on The Bachelor so he was hushed as I asked him to try to figure it out.  In the end we grabbed a laptop and finished the aria set-up using that.  I don't know why I didn't think of that in the first place, oh I know I was watching drama unfold on my show and yelling at "You picked her?!?" at the screen.   Both my fitbit and my aria are in working order and in fact I used both today.  My experience will be another post!  Have a great day and get healthy with me!

P.S. I did manage to change the setting on my Internet search engine during my setup, but my dear husband fixed it and didn't even say a thing about it.  I just love him to pieces! :)


I have provided a link to the Fitbit if you are interested in seeing what it is all about. 
Fitbit

A Healthier Life

I debated whether or not I wanted to blog about this, but I thought why not, there has to be other individuals out there who are in the same boat as me. So here I go.

I have decided to begin to blog about getting healthy...well healthier. If you have read my blog before you know that I have run a 1/2 marathon, in fact I have run two. I completed my second run on January 20th of this year. I will say that training for such a race is hard and one might think that you have to be in peak physical shape in order to complete a 13.1 mile race. Let me assure you that is not the case, my legs were in their best running shape, the rest of my body was not. I kept telling myself that I did not want to add an abdominal workout in because I didn't want to be sore for a long run. The same went for changing my diet, I didn't want to change my diet because I was running well with what I was eating. In fact I would (still) use running as an excuse to eat sweets. So after training then running this last 1/2 marathon and not loosing a pound I have come to the conclusion that it is time for a change.

After my half marathon I was trying to decide what I wanted to do to be healthier. I saw an old friend post on Facebook his before and after picture with the lifestyle change he did and I was sold, until I saw the price. I want results, but not at the cost of sacrificing some of our monthly savings. Another friend is doing Paleo and it is working great for her and her family, but after looking into it I didn't feel it was good for me and my family. Truth be told I didn't think I could resist temptation and I didn't want the feelings of guilt that went along with "cheating". Yet another friend was doing weight watchers and is having great success, I too had success doing that program yet the weight came back. So what do I do? I think I can do it on my own, it is simple right? Just eat healthier.

I tried that, two weeks ago I went shopping and I did just that, I ate healthier and I lost a pound! Awesome right? Well then it was super bowl Sunday and we went to Sacramento to see great friends, by the time we got home Sunday night we were exhausted and it was too late to go to the store for the week. I had no dinners planned, I was out of "healthy" food for breakfast, I did have a a few premade salads for lunches and a few healthier snacks. I of course took all of this as excuses and out went healthy eating and in came Starbucks (my biggest weakness). AHHHHH so frustrating. Just eat healthy, and exercise.

I was sitting at a crossroad and I needed to decide either change things or except that I will not have my pre-kid body (or something that closely resembles it). Then I started thinking of a girlfriend who has been working hard to get her rockin pre-baby body back and WOW it is back! She looks FABULOUS. She has done a variety of different things to get her body healthy, including eating clean and P90X. She also has been raving about a gift she received for Christmas called Fitbit. I looked into it and I thought it is just a pedometer, but no it is so much more! It tracks your sleep pattern, you can set weight goals, calorie burning goals, keep track of the foods you are eating and when you are eating, how much water you have consumed, and daily exercise. Needless to say I was sold. I have come to realize that I need accountability and this is what is going to give me this accountability. I am excited to plug it in and start using it.

I did also buy one other item to help with my new healthier lifestyle and that was a Fitbit aria Wi-Fi smart scale. We have been in desperate need of a new scale. Ours has been weighing us a bit light. I am not going to lie, I like weighing myself daily and seeing low number, but when I go to the doctor and get weighed I am blown away at the number (I do blame it on my clothes and jewelry). So I splurged on the scale and I am excited to use it because it will automatically update my Fitbit account with current weight, % body fat and BMI. I may have been impressed with the technology so that is why I bought it. :) I did have a coupon though so that made it okay in my book!

These next few days I am just going to be playing with my new tools and formulating my getting healthy game plan. I am going to try to post weekly about how I am doing, any yummy new foods I have found and even about my failures. In the end I am hoping to be healthier. Follow me on this journey and maybe you too can get healthier with me. :)  Now to plug in my Fitbit and get started!

13.1

Well I did it, I ran a half marathon, I ran 13.1 miles.  This was a goal that I set for myself at the start of 2012 and I did it, I really did it. I wanted to share more about my experience than just my time, so that is why I am blogging this big event.  So grab a drink, settle in and get ready to hear the honest truth about my first 1/2 marathon. 

Before we get into the actual race, let me fill you in on my history. I am currently 32, a mom of two boys Ty who is 4 and Reece who is 17 months.  I have been married for 8 years to my amazing husband Dallen.  Both my husband and I were collegiate athletes, I played water polo and he was a wrestler. In college we were exercising 30+ hours a week, then we became adults...with jobs.  We tried to stay active, we bought road bikes and started riding and even completed a sprint triathlon.  We completed a couple of 10k races together, in fact we ran a 10K when I was 10 weeks pregnant with our second son. Although we would complete in a race here and there we would train for 6 weeks, run and be done with it, we were not consistent.  Going to the gym has also been part of our lives, but I tend to have a bad attitude about going, Our kids have to be in daycare and it is so germy and at one of the gyms the daycare is sub-par and I feel like when we leave Reece he is expected to fend for himself.  As our family has grown our physical health has declined and I decided that we needed to change this and for us we needed a goal, which turned out to be the 1/2 marathon. 

I suppose you can say I started training for the 1/2 back in September of last year.  My neighbor, Nikki, set a goal to run a 1/2 marathon in February of 2012.  So Nikki and I started walking (walking and running).  Back in September of 2011 getting out at night to jog was my outlet, adjusting to two kids was difficult for me and I needed kid free time so at 8pm 3 nights a week I would head out with Nikki, enjoy the fresh air and enjoy not hearing some call for us every 5 minutes.  Nikki and I ran the spooky sprint, which was a 5k, a Veteran's day race which was a 10k.  Then I started to be a little less motivated and she was dedicated to her training.  Nikki worked hard and not only finished her 1/2 marathon but finished it less than 2.5 hours.  In my book she rocked it!  I decided then that I could do this, I could train and run. So this summer I took the boys to the gym, hopped on the treadmill and ran.  I quickly came to the conclusion that treadmill running sucked.  Work started again in August (I work part time as a high school math teacher), and I decided that I would start running in the mornings, get it done and enjoy the rest of the day.  I asked Nikki to join me, because after my first solo morning run in the dark, I realized that there is safety in numbers.  Nikki joined me again and also brought in Cindy.  I am so thankful for the two of them, we have been getting up twice a week (pending everyone was healthy)  and running 3-4 miles.  Cindy is the quick one and she has pushed me to be faster and today I was thankful for her quick pace.  Our short runs have been great and dare I say enjoyable. Dallen and I did our long run together. We had to plan our long runs, because it wasn't just us our boys were along for the ride too.  At first it was okay, Dallen pushed them and I was able to run, but eventually the lengths of our runs became too long for him to push 80+ pounds.  We worked though it and would run to a nearby school set the boys up with snacks, toys, books and we would run the track.  Slowly but surly we increased our mileage up to 10 miles, that was two weeks ago.  We tapered and then it was race day. 

To say I was nervous was an understatement. I was freaking out, I planned my running gear 2 weeks ahead of time, I worked on my playlist for hours.  However this over preparation just made me more nervous, would we leave on time, would we have enough time to stretch, would we be able to find our starting corral.  Dallen was able to calm my nerves by telling me that the race was going to start no matter what, we were going to start, run and no matter what we will finish.  I realized he was right we were going to finish no matter what.  This morning we woke up at 5am got dressed and left 10 minutes late, I was shocked we had no kids with us, yet we were still late.  I became nervous once again.  We pulled into the parking lot with 30 minutes to spare, the of course we had to wait 15 minutes to use the bathroom, nothing like waiting in line to use a port-a-potty.  We found our corral, we put our ear buds in and I tried to calm my nerves.  I reminded myself of these three things...

1. I would be happy if I didn't have to walk
2. I would be happier if we finished in two hours and 30 minutes
3. I would be thrilled if we could do a 10.30 mile pace

Then I reminded myself that no matter what we would finish and the race began.  There I was with thousands of people all there to accomplish this huge task and a sense of calm came over me.   When we finally crossed the starting line we were off and going at a fairly good pace, I didn't look at my watch to check our pace we were just going.  The first two miles we were constantly trying to maneuver around the other runners. I looked down at my watch and we were pacing 9.20 miles.  YIKES! We needed to slow down, was what my brain said, but I felt great we were doing so good. So we kept trucking on at the same pace.  At mile 3 I realized we were going to have to run under a few roads, which meant we were going to have to run down a hill and then back up, in all I think there were 8 of them. In the beginning the were fine, in the end they were horrible. At 4 miles the elite marathon runners were coming back. It was impressive to see just how fast they were. Then at 4.5 miles I saw an elite marathon runner eat a stick of Vaseline, by mistake. I felt really bad for him, did he not know what was at the medical stations.  I only hope it didn't affect his time too much.  Running brought out the competitive nature in me, every time I passed someone who was in my age bracket or younger, I got a little excited.  I also was beyond impressed with the men and women who have stayed active into theirs 60s and 70s and were running a 1/2 marathon some were even running the full marathon.  There was an older woman who ran the entire race pushing a stroller, because she needed the stability. She by far was my favorite runner today.  At mile 6 we stopped passing other racers and fell into our pace group.  We would pull ahead of a couple of runners then fall behind then back ahead. This repeated until the finish line.  At mile 7 my left hip started to hurt, at mile 8 I felt a blister starting to form on my right foot,  mile 9 my right hips started to hurt.  Really mile 9 and I was falling apart. I had to finish, I had to keep going.  Finally the 12 mile marker was in site.  We tried to pick up the pace, everyone around us was running faster, why were my legs not moving faster?  Finally I saw the finish line, my legs started to move and my smile got bigger and bigger.  We were almost there. Then we were done.

 I slowed and then stopped to check my time on my watch and my legs locked up.  Luckily my weight was forward and I managed to step and avoid falling.  So we walked.  We got our medal and sweatshirt and thankfully they had breakfast waiting for the finishers.  We grabbed our eggs and headed out to the tables by the lake.  We ate and enjoyed to sun and then we tried to get up. WOW! Ouch!  After reteaching my legs how to move we went and had a brownie ice cream sundae.  I think the ice cream sundae at the end of the race was the true reason why I chose this race to be my first race. Yes, an ice cream sundae at 9:30am and it was fabulous.  We left to get our boys from their grandparents and that is when we both started to fall apart. Our legs were killing us, joints aching and our tummies were not too happy either.  At home I couldn't wait for nap time. Usually I love nap time because I get to work on crafts, but today I wanted a nap myself.  It was a glorious nap!  When I got up I once again had to reteach my legs to move.  I also thought my tummy would be better, nope not better. Now after both boys have gone to bed, Dallen and I are exhausted, our legs feel horrible and we are both fearful of what tomorrow will bring, but we did it! We really did it! 

Our results...We did not walk at all! That made me happy. We did finish faster than 2.5 hours, that made me even happier.  We even ran faster than 10:30 pace!!!!  WE FINISHED IN 2 hours 7 minutes and 48 seconds!!! Our official pace was 9.46 mile.  I had NO CLUE that I could run that fast a 10 minute mile was the fastest I thought I could run and I ran faster than that!  AMAZING!!!

                                                   Ready to run! Before our race all smiles!

We did it!  Trying to smile through the pain.

                                                         Yep I ate the entire sundae!

Can you see the blister?  Ouch!

I do have another 1/2 marathon coming up in January. To be honest if I wasn't already signed up I may not have followed through with it, but I am sure once my legs are no longer sore and my joints are back to normal I will be ready to go.  Secretly I am already trying to goal set for that race...maybe 2 hours and 5 minutes.  :)   I am officially taking the week off from running.  I will be back at it next week, until then I am going to try to sleep in every morning until 6am!

Welcome Back! My family and I took a mini vacation after the 4th of July and now that we are back and settled in I wanted to share the card I made my hubby for our anniversary. July 3rd marked our 8th year of marriage (together 11.5 years). We agreed that we would not get one another gifts this year since we were leaving for a mini vacation with our kiddos two days later, but that didn't mean I couldn't make him a card and write about just how much I loved him inside. Without any further ado here is the card I LOVE!

I used quite a bit of Stampin' Up materials. The paper I used was Lucky Limeade for the base and the mini banner as well as Basic Grey, Tempting Turquoise and Cherry Cobbler.  I also used Framelits-Apothecary Accents, the mini heart punch, the woodgrain background stamp, and Rhinestones from Stampin' Up. The wood letters are from Studio Calico, the grey twine was recycled from a gift I had received from a dear friend (thanks Carissa), the date stamp was from Dearlizzy and,  glossy accents was the last touch I needed on the heart. I love the layout of the card and in fact I have repeated the layout for a baby card and I love it as well.  I hope that you have found some inspiration in this card to get yourself crafting!  Oh and there is the baby waking from his nap, happy crafting my friends. Until next nap time....-Bre