The Weekend is Coming.....!!!!!

Finally it is Friday and just 7 more hours of work and it will be the weekend! For some reason this week has seemed to drag on forever. Blake is counting down the days until school is out as well as how many days until its time for the Pig Roast. Hard to believe that May is almost over!

I hope this weekend we can finally work on getting our garden ready to plant! It will be added work to a busy schedule this summer but well worth it having fresh veggies.

Twice this week rain has canceled Blake's baseball practice so its rescheduled for Tuesday and Thursday of next week. Oh and Nathans practice is Wednesday... Will be a busy week that's for sure. I also have a board meeting Thursday night so I will be cutting it close getting back From Blake's practice.

Sunday is the start of EMS week and the ambulance district that I work for is hosting a fun event Sunday from 1-6.

I know my boys would love it and have fun but no way for me to work the event and keep an eye on them..

Also been trying to come up with a plan for workouts something that will work for me. I have came to realize I will have to create a plan from scratch as none of the ones I have seen online will work in with my schedule. I don't have any races on the horizon but want to get my fitness level back up to par.

Hope the weather finally decides to warm up and stay having frost on your window in the middle of May is crazy!!!!  Also the colder temps and rain keeping the kids indoors makes them crazy!

A Rant or Two.....

Not often do I post about a rant but this one has been bugging me for a while now.... I signed both boys up for baseball back in March. Nathan to play tball and be his first time ever doing a sport and Blake for Bantam Ball and would be his second time. They were BOTH super excited I was happy but knew full well that between two jobs practices and games it would be crazy!

I looked at when the games would be to ensure it wouldn't interfere with work or monthly meetings, to my surprise they both would play on Friday nights. Yes be a long night but Friday is better since we don't have to always get up early on Saturdays.

I knew they had the coaches meeting in April so figured by first of May we would hear from the coaches know what team they were each on and schedules. And I waited and waited and waited. Asked a few friends who had kids playing and they hadn't heard anything and then last week a few of them finally found out what team their kids were on... By the end of last week Blake's coach finally called to set up a practice for tonight at 5:30 (cue stress on my part I get off at 5, have to drive about 10 miles to pick kids up then another 5-8 miles to the park practice is). I can do it but dang its cutting close...

So still waiting and waiting to hear from Nathan's coach and nothing. Other parents who have kids in tball had heard from their coach. Today on my lunch break I called the Recreation Center that we had to turn fees and forms in to. The guy was SUPER nice and told me who my son's coach would be and that I wasn't the first parent to call and wonder why coaches weren't talking to parents sooner. First game is May 30.

Now my major rant why sign up to be a coach if you aren't going to take the time to communicate with the parents of the kids on your team.. How hard is it to call or heck send a mass text giving the parents information. I know for a fact I am NOT the only working mom who needs to plan practice and games around work.

I can only hope both coaches are better on the field then they are with communication. Needless to say I know both of the coaches somewhat they were both a few years ahead of me in school and well I wasn't ever impressed back then. However I will put that aside and start fresh and hope for the best.

Bottom line its a huge pet peeve of mine when people don't communicate and are just lazy about things.  They knew April 7 who was on their teams and took over a month to make contact...

My other rant is from lunch today. I met a friend for lunch at a Mexican Restaurant got there right at 12. Over half the people in there I am sure were on their lunch breaks but the staff was super SLOW in getting around to drink orders and taking your order. I have ate many places on my lunch break and they are all quick. Lets just say the waiter didn't get much of a tip for me... He gave us our food and never saw him until he gave us our check...

I may be nuts but I am glad school is almost over its getting increasingly harder to get Blake up and moving each morning. He is wore out and ready to be done with school just as much as I am. One more week!

Both boys have taken a notion they don't want to sleep in their rooms but want to camp out in the living room floor nightly. I thought ok one or two days but its been two weeks I may be a bad mom for this but I am letting it slide until school is out. Then it will be back to their rooms to have my sanity back of an evening.

There is more I could rant about but I won't for now. The baseball thing had just been eating at me for far to long...... Maybe it shouldn't have bothered me and maybe it wouldn't have bothered anyone else. But I am a planner and like to know what and when things will happen.

Changes

It's time for some changes and some are long over due as well. This week I am participating in a Facebook Challenge of no sugar for a week. The hardest part of that is no soda... Lets just say the first two day were awful. Along with the fact I worked ambulance Sunday night, regular job on Monday, back to ambulance at 5:30pm to work all night then back to my regular job Tuesday then meeting right after work. But knowing I made it thru that with no soda showed me I could do it the rest of the week.
I am actually thinking about trying to stay away from soda until the end of the month. May make an exception and have one at the pig roast on Memorial Weekend but may not. Not eating anything with sugar in it left me feeling icky and nauseous first part of the week. However I found that many of the foods I eat have no sugar or only 1gram of sugar. I really figured it would be a lot harder to find foods to eat.

Breakfast still continues to be the hardest part of the day easier to just skip it vs trying to fix something healthy that I can bring with me to work.  I did break down Monday morning and buy a tub of mango strawberry Spark by Advocare.  A good friend told me that it would help with the want of soda and give natural energy. That friend works just as many hours usually more than me a week and has kids as well. So far its NOT my fountain Dr. Pepper but it tastes good gives energy and no crash later.

I don't count calories one reason being I get to focused on numbers and want a low number and get stressed out. I have loosely calculated what I have been eating this week and finding its far to low. I know I need to change that this weekend and for next week.

Another change is not letting the number on the scale dictate my mood. It had got to a number I was very ashamed of a number I have never seen in my life. I will still weigh on occasion just to see where I am at. I know I need to weigh some along with loosely counting calories so I don't end up in the spiral of eating issues.

Workouts haven't been consistent and its mainly just getting extra steps at work, more trips up the stairs and parking farther away at stores. Its a process and I know myself well enough to know I can't just up and change food, lifestyle and workouts at the same time. I need to take small steps and master one thing at a time and I know the rest will follow.

We had my Grandma's auction this past Sunday not going to lie it was hard. I kept myself busy helping cook food for the lunch stand and watching some of the stuff sell along with talking to friends. A few close friends that were there knew without asking I was struggling and were amazing to help keep my mind off things. Having that done and over is a big stress relief, my Grandma seems to be glad all the clutter is gone she can now decorate and do as she wishes in the house. That excites me that she is wanting to do and change things to the way she wants.  I know that many times when someone loses their spouse and had been married 60 years the remaining person sometimes gives up and don't want to push on. Glad to see she is just as stubborn and independent as ever!

Another change I haven't talked about is wanting to change jobs. I love love my job as an EMT and that job will stay. But I have came to realize my full time office job is a major stressor and a big factor in to my major breakdown a couple months ago. I took two days off last week and it was great I wasn't stressed frazzled or unhappy. Even with helping my grandma pack and move boxes for the auction spending hours cleaning my house just to have the mini tornados come thru and make a mess I wasn't stressed. So I am keeping my eyes open for a new full time job preferably in the medical field or in an office doing something I will enjoy. Part of the reason I picked up all shifts I could at the Ambulance was for extra money to pay off some unnecessary bills. They are almost gone which means I won't HAVE to make what I do per hour now to make it.

Also been debating on checking in to some schooling in the medical field not sure what avenue or if I will but I want to look at all options, I am young enough to still find a job I enjoy and love to do and make a career out of it.

One huge change is learning to stand up to the negative people in my life, as well as blocking out their comments. Not perfected yet but getting there. Some of the people I can walk away from and not need them and their negativity in my life but others I can't so I have to learn to let it roll off my back.

 

 

Saw this quote on pintrest this morning and its very very true! I am bad about back tracking and going back to what was comfortable even if it didn't work.

 

To many times (more than I care to county or admit) I have wanted to give up throw in the towel and say screw it. But I am not the kind of person to quit or walk away from things I want. Thankfully I had a couple of good friends that saw I wanted to give up and helped me thru. I also had friends walk away during that time. 

Long rambling post and sorry to bore everyone but I need to write my thoughts down get them out of my mind and off my chest so I can follow thru with my changes.



April Recap and May Goals.

May already wow... Blake has 3 more weeks of school then he will be a 4th grader which is crazy for me to think about. Nathan will start preschool in August geez where did my little kids go...


Anyway time to recap April and how the goals went then set some goals for May.

1-Participate in a instagram challenge called #HeatItUp. Never tried one of these challenges before so thought it would be fun. Yep epic fail on that one.

2-Decided to do the April plank a day challenge however I know if I try to aim for the seconds and minutes it states each day I will get overwhelmed and quit. So I am just going to do a plank each day for however long I can hold it. Totally forgot about this goal I had set.

3-Do more family things with the kids and hubby. Blake loves roller blading so I think I am going to make that something me and him do together until Nathan wants to go out there with us. Then find something that Nathan and I can do together. Took both kids staking once last month but we spent lots of time together at home played out side some. So I think it was a success both kids were glad to have me come outside and play.

4-Less soda I don't need to add more water doing good at that. Right now I really only want soda when I eat certain foods or really stressed. So I will just limit it more and more and hopefully one day I won't want it. Doing good with this one. I have been drinking only one a day some days none.

5-More bike rides with the boys. I learned Saturday that I need to figure out what is out of whack in my lower back hip area that has been causing pain and making it hard to ride the bike. No on bike partly due to my back and hip and partly to crazy weather and getting ready for my Grandma's auction. However been seeing the chiropractor and feel so much better.

6-Continue to work on stress management. Well I didn't have any major meltdowns last month so I would say must be a improvement :)


Goals for May:
1-Time with family plain and simple can't let life get busy and not spend quality time with the kids.

2-Exercise more I have no races on my agenda but want to be ready to say hey lets do  a 5k at the last minute.

3-Eat more I find I don't eat enough and also eat better foods. I have a wedding we are attending at the end of May and I want a cute dress that I feel good in. At the moment none of my clothes fit and I am NOT liking it.

4-Make time to do things with some of my close friends. Sure texting and facebook is great to stay in touch but I need face to face time and heart to heart talks with my friends.

5-Work on getting up early to workout on treadmill before waking the kids up. With school getting out soon we won't be as rushed in the morning and I can get workout done get kids up and still out the door by 7:10. (now its up rush rush to get out the door by 6:50 to catch bus on time)


April was a strange month for me had some good times and some crappy ones. I took a few days off work this past week time for me. I have NEVER EVER done this in my life. If I take a day off its for a purpose of dr appt for me or kids or last year to take my grandpa to appts. But I took two and a half days off for me. I stayed home caught up on things there that had been neglected. Got my eye exam done which I had been putting off. And it was so nice not to have the stress of my office job. Of course that all came crashing back yesterday within an hour of being at work. The time I was off I lost 5 pounds I wasn't working out or breaking a sweat so I am thinking this has a lot to do with stress. I don't stress eat stress makes me NOT want food.

Where did April go...... Seems like it was just January.....

Hard to believe that April is almost over and we are almost halfway thru the year already. At times it seems like it was just January and at times it feels like its taken years to get to spring time weather.

I haven't been blogging much lately still reading everyone's blogs though. I just haven't seemed to have anything worthwhile to post about. No amazing workouts not training for any upcoming race just trying to go day by day.

A few weeks ago I did break down and go see a chiropractor. Yes I was very nervous but also walked away knowing that the back pain I had dealt with for years could be fixed. Also had renewed hope on walking and running more pain free. I have been going twice a week for 3 weeks now and can tell a huge difference. Even the dr told me this morning it wasn't taking much to put me back in to place and seemed that I had been staying in place between visits. Not going to lie when they twist and pop your neck I cringe!

Two weeks ago I had my two day fire cause and determination and arson awareness class which was awesome and tons of fun. Well first day was 8 hours of sitting thru seminar and teaching. Second day was getting to be investigators which was cool. Learned a ton in the class!

Easter we didn't do anything stayed home fixed a late breakfast and had my grandma come over for pancakes and bacon. Then we worked in the yard the rest of the day. Did I miss doing a big dinner this year no not really to much going on to want to deal with lots of people in our house.

Friday I turned 31 I wasn't as upset by that number as I was last year with turning 30. I had taken off work to take a RSI class at the ambulance base. The night before class was canceled and I was bummed. I will do a post about my birthday and the weekend later.

Both boys ended up with poison ivy. Now I have NEVER been allergic to the stuff and they had never had it until this year which is odd. None the less its not been fun trying to keep medicine on them and to get it cleared up so far it keeps spreading.

Crazy Busy Tired

Sorry for lack of posts lately. Nothing new or fun to write about on top of being busy with things that wouldn't make for a fun post to read. So I will do a catch up post hitting some of the things that has been going on and they are in no particular order.

* Life went from pretty calm and only working a few ambulance shifts a month to crazy every weekend busy between working both jobs, helping with the fire department for the auctions and taking some classes.

*Weather has still been hit and miss nice one day cold the next which has dampened my mood as well as efforts to get out of the office at lunch and walk.

*Finally sucked up the courage to make an appointment with a chiropractor the thought of someone twisting and popping me makes me cringe. However I can twist pop bend crack all day long and that don't bother me. But it was time to finally get my hips corrected they are out of whack and its affecting me trying to run walk or ride my bike. So vs pushing thru the pain (which I have done for more years than I care to admit) I will be smart and get realigned.

*Last Friday I took vacation day from my office job to attend a class at the ambulance base, was a good class lots of good info and I honestly learned a lot. There is another class I really need to take on the 25th so hope my boss sees I have the work caught up and hours made up so I can take it. Plus it sounds fun RSI rapid sequence intubation I believe is what it stands for. I have yet to see anyone be intubated but I know it will happen and I need to know what I can do to help my partner.

*This Saturday and Sunday is a class at a local fire department that I signed up for months ago. Sounded cool fire cause and determination and arson awareness. Yep two days of classroom but figuring out that there will be a practical live burn that we do..... So I will get to try out my new gloves and new pink nomex hood but not so fond of having to wear SCBA.. or having the massive crash course on relearning to use it since its been YEARS (12) since I have had an airtank and mask on.... To say I am a bit frazzled is understatement.

*Saturday night the kids stayed with my mom so we went to dinner at a local bar and grill. Planned on just having dinner and going home. Well one drink tasted so good I had a few with dinner and ended up closing the place down with another couple we knew there.

*Sleep would be great between working the last two nights and Nathan deciding he don't want to sleep by himself anymore I am wore out. Think its just a phase he is going thru as I remember Blake doing the same thing around the same age. Plus he is getting some molars in, allergies acting up with all the pollen oh and watched a movie that scared him and now don't like zombies. SO between me putting him back to bed a million times telling him leprechauns aren't real and zombies aren't real we usually end up on the couch trying to sleep.

*Hard to believe theres only a month left of school and I will have a 4th grader! He's already asking how many days until the pig roast and how much older does he have to be to shoot the pig.

*Theres lots of other things going on that has created stress and busy times but not things I will post about on here.

If I survive the chiropractor appt next Tuesday I will post about it as well as post about my fire class I am taking this weekend.

April already what happened to March????

Wow hard to believe its already April. Where did March go heck where did the whole first 3 months of the year go????

April needs to be warmer than March was very much over being cold having frost on  my windows each morning. Not that I am ready for thunderstorms and tornadoes but they do sound better than snow and ice. April is also the month for my birthday I will be 31 on the 25.

Last month my goals were:

Goals for March:
1-Get some mileage in on the dreaded treadmill. I have signed myself and hubby up for a 4 mile race March 22, some friends of ours are doing it and talked us in to it. Wish I could say that mileage happened but it didn't. However the race came and went and I survived....

2-Continue spending more time with the kids in evenings and once weather warms up taking them to the park or for long walks or bike rides. Doing good with this one hasn't been warm enough for park fun, but have taken them skating a few times and went on a couple short bike rides (forgot how sore those seats can make your behind).

3-Find ways to manage stress better I would like to say I am better at this but learned its a process can't just happen over night. So I am better with it than I was this time last month.

4-More water less soda (its getting easier but days when stressed I WANT my Dr. Pepper) Tried the Advocare Spark drink and like it and also use Zipfizz some as well. 98% on this only have one soda a day and sometimes none....

5-Learn to open up more to my close friends before getting to the over stressed overwhelmed point. Lets just say I opened up to a "close" friend and didn't go so well. So I have one or two people I know I can talk to about anything and I will have to be ok with that.


Goals for April:
1-Participate in a instagram challenge called #HeatItUp. Never tried one of these challenges before so thought it would be fun.

2-Decided to do the April plank a day challenge however I know if I try to aim for the seconds and minutes it states each day I will get overwhelmed and quit. So I am just going to do a plank each day for however long I can hold it.

3-Do more family things with the kids and hubby. Blake loves roller blading so I think I am going to make that something me and him do together until Nathan wants to go out there with us. Then find something that Nathan and I can do together.

4-Less soda I don't need to add more water doing good at that. Right now I really only want soda when I eat certain foods or really stressed. So I will just limit it more and more and hopefully one day I won't want it.

5-More bike rides with the boys. I learned Saturday that I need to figure out what is out of whack in my lower back hip area that has been causing pain and making it hard to ride the bike.

6-Continue to work on stress management.