Fresh Start

Today is a new day, a fresh start, and things are looking up!  Thank goodness.  The boys woke up happy and I was able to get a good night's sleep as well.  That combo makes for a much better start to the day.  We enjoyed some banana protein pancakes before loading up the stroller to head to the gym.

My banana protein pancakes are made by combing the following in a bowl:

• 2 small bananas
• 2 scoops Vanilla SunWarrior Protein Powder
• 1/2 cup oats
• 1/4 cup oatbran
• 2 T flaxseed
• Enough almond milk to get the consistency of pancake batter
• 1 pinch of cinnamon

I blend it all together using my immersion blender and then cook the cakes up on my griddle just like regular pancakes.  It's super easy and super healthy.  My boys love them too! I enjoyed mine topped with natural peanut butter and a splash of real maple syrup.  Pair with a steaming cup of coffee, it was the perfect start to my day.

Speaking of coffee, I have discovered a non-dairy, non-soy cream substitute for my coffe which is the next best thing to half and half.

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I found it at Whole Foods and I've heard the Fresh Market has it too.  I will be checking that fact out in the near future.

Being able to go the a gym that has child care is the biggest blessing these days.  I love running with the stroller, but it sure is nice to be able to do my own thing in the gym while knowing my kids are having a blast playing with the other kiddos while I work out.  They actually cry when they have to leave now sometimes.  What a huge gift!  Now I can run to the gym, drop of the boys at child care, go lift some weights, and run home.  Sometimes we even combine some errands with our adventure, like swinging by the bank, the library, or Walgreens.  Fresh Market is an easy run from home as well.  I love it!

Today's Best Body Bootcamp workout included Ladder Sets and I LOVED it.  I even added some extra exercises to the list to continue the ladder theme.  It felt great to "pump some iron" after taking the weekend off from weight training.

Ladders looks something like this...

• Perform 5 rep of the given exercise
• Rest a few seconds
• Perform 6 reps of the given exercise
• Rest a few seconds
• Perform 7 reps of the given exercise
• Rest a few seconds
• Perform 8 reps of given exercise
• Rest a few seconds
• Perform 9 reps of the given exercise
• Rest a few seconds
• Perform 10 reps of the given exercise
• Rest a few seconds

These fast-paced workouts keep my interest up as well as my heart rate.  They're the next best things to circuits, in my opinion.  I highly suggest you try them out.  Thanks, Tina, for the great workout!

I finished out my time at the gym with some intervals on the elliptical while finishing up my reading for the next MOPS meeting. The stort if Ruth was a great one.  It was my favorite novela so far.  

The boys are napping so I'm going to embrace the quiet and get some studying done before it's time to tutor.  Happy Monday!

She's Here!!!!!!!

The moment I've been waiting for for the last three weeks is finally here.  My sister arrived yesterday I am in HEAVEN!  I've got a wine drinking buddy and another set of hands for the boys.  Yippee!  I'm already feeling spoiled and she hasn't even been here for 24 hours yet.

Last night we enjoyed a yummy butternut squash and caramelized onion pizza with some yummy red wine and we just finished making a zucchini and spinach lasagna to enjoy for dinner tonight.  YUM!    I hope ours looks this good when we dig into it.

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I'm so happy she loves produce as much as I do!!

I went to a wonderful MOPS meeting this morning while Abigail entertained the boys.  It was so great to be able to chat with other moms and learn some tidbits about their lives before kids.  There were some good stories!  It made me come home and dig through old dating photos...here's some good ones of the goatee I spoke about...

Supporting me at breast cancer fundraiser back in my "3 Day" days.

Posing on his first trip to my favorite city, Chicago.

At his first Cubs came.  LOVE Wrigley field.  

We also got to discuss our book study book as well.  Rahab was one interesting, faithful woman and I'm looking forward to seeing what Ruth has in store for us in the next novela.

I've also been reading Becky Bailey's I Love You Rituals book, thanks to Ginny Luther's recommendation.  It has some wonderful tips for helping parents to maintain a good bond with their children.

I hope my other book club book is a good, quick read;  I've got my work cut out for me this month.

Today kicks off the Best Body Fitness Boot Camp.  Today is supposed to be a rest day from running on my half marathon training plan so I'm just going to stick to the upper body portion and do light weights for my legs.  This 8 week challenge overlaps my half-marathon training by one week so I'll have to make some adaptations for just a bit this week.  Oh well!  I can't believe the race is 6 days away.  I'm actually really ready for it to be over.  Almost there... I am definitely looking forward to changing things up a bit with this new book camp.  

I'll leave you with this verse that really hit home for me this morning as we discussed our book...

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Trust God!  He knows what he's doing and his plan is SOOO much better than ours.  

Loving Me Some Friday

Today is a rest day from running so we started our morning nice and lazily.  The boys munched on some grapes and string cheese, their breakfast preference of the week, while I downed a yummy smoothie alongside my morning coffee.

Into the smoothie went...

• 1 scoop Sunwarrior vanilla protein powder
• 1 frozen banana
• 1/2 cup mixed frozen berries
• 2 giant handfuls of spinach
• 1 T dark cocoa powder 
• Enough almond milk to make it drinkable

This is by far one of my favorite vegan breakfasts.  It stuck with me through a very busy morning, which is a major selling point for my breakfasts as well.

While I was blending up my smoothie, check out what was going on in the guest bedroom...

They couldn't get enough of checking themselves out in the mirror wearing their big boy pants.  Now if we could just get them to pee in the potty instead of in the big boy pants...baby steps!

Once we got dressed, it was time to head to the library for the Family Place.  The boys had a riot this morning.

I could not get enough of Colton's roaring while riding the lion toy.  TOO FUNNY!  Love that kid!  I think Mason has a bright as a daredevil while Colton might dapple in some form of entertainment.  He's such a ham.  It's either that or mail delivery.  He sure does like the toy mailboxes.  Time will tell...

We managed to squeeze in a trip to the gym so I could read on the elliptical while the boys played some more and also had time for a quick run through Publix before heading home for lunch and naps.  I'm trying to finish my R.A. Dickey novel...

...so I can start our new book club selection.

Thank goodness I'm caught up on my reading for the MOPS book study which is on Monday.  Phew!

It's such a scandalous book;  those Bible women were wild!  I don't know who was more intriguing, Tamar or Rahab?!?!  I'm looking forward to chatting about it and continuing on to Ruth's story.  There's lots to learn.

I think it's my turn to bring the snack, so I plan on bringing some of these...

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Tis the season...

It's also butternut squash season and I made a yummy soup with some last night.  It was actually a recipe from the Biggest Loser and it was super yummy.  I'm looking forward to enjoying the leftovers tonight.

It's taper time for my half marathon training so tomorrow just calls for an easy 5 mile run.  It's a nice little break before the big race.  Time to be good to my body so it can show me what it's made of next weekend.

Have a great Friday.  Get outside a move!

Some Book Talk

After a night with no air conditioning, a late start to my morning, and a potty-training boy who pooped on the rug, I did NOT make it out the door for my training run early this morning but I'll squeeze in my sprint work this afternoon on the air conditioned treadmill at the gym.  My plan is to do a half mile warm up, then alternate 6 quarter mile sprints with quarter mile recoveries before cooling down with a half mile jog.  I'm hoping I have time to squeeze in some drop-sets using the upper body machines as well.  I'm looking forward to getting my sweat on!

Despite the crazy morning, there was no way I was going to miss MOPS this morning.  Let me just tell you, I LOVE MOPS!  If you are a mother of little ones and you don't go to MOPS, I suggest you figure out a way to make it a part of your life.  I can guarantee you won't regret the support, love, and friendship the women in these groups can give you.  What a tremendous blessing the women in my groups are to me.  (Yes, I as a matter of fact, I love MOPS so much that I go to two different ones.  I'm a MOPS junkie!)

The group that met today is the one that's doing the book study using Francine Rivers' book, A Lineage of Grace.

I'll be honest with you;  I wasn't excited about having one more thing I had to do, but boy am I glad I decided to give this book a chance.  It gives some amazing insight into some amazing women from the Bible and led to some great discussions today.  The part we discussed today dealt with Tamar.  Talk about DRAMA!  It was like reading a soap opera which made it a real page turner.  

Our table's overall takeaway from our discussion questions was that we really need to TRUST GOD!  He sees the big picture and he knows what he's doing.  He has a plan.  We have such tunnel vision compared to his amazing vision.  If you look back on your past, God's work is obvious, and you have to trust that eh will carry his good work to completion in you.  Will it always be easy?  HECK NO!  But he has a plan, and it's a GOOD ONE!  Trust HIM!  I seem to constantly be reminded of this as I try to take the control away from God and handle things on my own.  Today, it was especially helpful to hear.  

The story also shows that God can and does use EVERYONE for his purpose.  We don't have to be perfect for God to use us, and good thing, because none of us are.  He seems to carry out some of his best work in situations where we'd least expect it.  It's all pretty amazing when you sit back and think about it.  

I'm not only a MOPS junkie, I'm a book club junkie as well I guess. My book club book, The Happiness Project, has been keeping my interest quite well too.  

She has some rules for herself that she continually refers back to throughout the book.  One of the rules that's making a big impression on me is her rule to "Be Gretchen."  In my case, it would be, "Be Rachel."  So often we try to be what we think others want us to be rather than just being true to ourselves.  I find that to be so true, especially in mothering.  We have ideas about how we're "supposed" to be, but we'd be better off if we'd just be the people God made us to be.  It's not an excuse to avoid self-improvement, but it does give us a bit more freedom to be able to say, "I tried that and it just doesn't work for me."  I think we need to remember that the same rule applies to our kids.  We have to let them be themselves, rather than trying to mold them into what we think they "should" be.  I find it especially relevant to my mothering of twin boys.  They may look the same, but they are VERY DIFFERENT children.  It's liberating to give yourself the freedom to be yourself.  Try it!

On a COMPLETELY different note, (I have random in my blog title for a reason...) I impulsively bought Method's Vanilla Chai hand soap yesterday and I am in love.  I will defintitely be stocking up on that one.  What a yummy scent and it comes in a pretty bottle too. See...

Don't worry, it's not too girly for your husbands to use as well.  Even though we're not really having an fall-like temps here in south Florida, I still like to enjoy all things fall when this time of year rolls around which reminds me, I think it's about time to get some pumpkins to put me in the spirit even more.  Check out the ones we carved last year...

I bet you were expecting something really exciting right?  I just wanted an excuse to show you my cuties.  I came across these pictures on our apple TV slide show this afternoon.  It's hard to believe how much my little guys have changed since about this time last year.

Time flies...Enjoy every moment!

My Crazy Version of A Rest Day

It was so nice to wake up and realize there was nothing that I HAD to do on the calendar today.  Other than getting some groceries, dropping off some bank deposits, and making a couple of phone calls, my schedule was wide open.  I did originally plan to get in some yoga as well on my rest day from my half marathon training plan but I switched up my plan a bit as the day progressed.  Let me just tell you I'm a glutton for punishment and it appears I have my priorities a little out of whack.  You'll see why as you read on...

Our day kicked off with a leisurely breakfast of scrambled eggs, Morningstar sausages (my boys and husband love these things and I've learned to like them too), and a waffle topped with strawberry jam...oh, and of course, COFFEE.  Now that the Intelligentsia coffee is gone, we have moved on to the Caribou Mahogany blend.  We already miss those yummy Intelligentsia beans...Hopefully there are more in our house in the near future.  The Caribou blend smelled a bit like cigars...not sure what I think of that.

After we cleaned up breakfast and made ourselves presentable for the day, we headed off to one of our favorite places to visit, Publix.  We can't seem to get enough of that place and go there at least once a week, usually twice.  Lucky for us, Gina was there again this morning to give us balloons.  She's so good to the boys!

I had trouble getting them to look at me.  There were
too many other interesting things going on in the parking lot.

Our next stop was the bank where the boys got some lovely blue suckers.  They thought it was funny when they got home and could see their blue lips in the mirror.

Once again, they're not very smiley today.  So serious!  Maybe they knew what was next up on my plan for the day...haha.

As I unloaded the groceries, I started thinking, "What if I just do my long run today?"  My friend had just invited us over for "world famous margaritas" and I didn't want to have to miss out on enjoying them since I had a long run scheduled for first thing tomorrow morning.  (Last time I drank the night before a run, my run was less than stellar and I didn't want to repeat that event.)  This is what I meant when I told you earlier I have my priorities out of whack--I ran so I could drink!  What's wrong with me???  To my defense I also wanted to have tomorrow to dedicate completely to family.  If I squeezed in my run today, I wouldn't have to worry about it tomorrow.  I could make tomorrow my rest day and I'd much rather have my rest day on a day when we can have our whole family together.

Once the groceries were all put away, I had made up my mind to go for it.  I chugged some caffeine and electrolytes in the form of one of these delicious little babies...

(Thanks to Lindsey for the recommendation.  She described them perfectly, "like heaven and sunshine.")  I don't even like coconut water but I LOVE these.  Check them out!  Once it was polished off, I loaded up the boys in the stroller along with their snacks and water for all of us and we hit the road.  Did I mention it was 11:30 at this point and 87 degrees outside.  This is the part where I'm a glutton for punishment.  What doesn't kill you makes you stronger, right?

I can't claim that this was the best run of my life.  In fact, it might have been one of the most torturous runs of my life, but I figure if I can survive 9+ miles in midday heat pushing 100+ pounds of stroller weight, 13 miles at 6 am on October 28 should feel easy, right?  I'm not gonna lie.  I NEVER take walk breaks and I took at least 5 little breaks to chug water and convince myself to keep going.  On top of it all, MapMyRun wasn't working.  Check out what it was telling me...

 8.36 miles in 33 minutes and 45 seconds.  I wish! I think it was more like 9.5 miles in 1 hr 35 minutes. Only 3 more long runs until the big race.  I won't be doing any of them in the midday heat EVER again.  Lesson learned!  

At least the views were pretty.  I ran over that bridge you see in the distance.  It was probably the coolest part of the run with the breezes off the water.  Thank goodness for that relief!  Somehow the cloud cover that I thought I'd have when I left the house seemed to disappear as I ran.  Not cool!

Once we got back home, I chugged LOTS of water and finally felt like scarfing down a giant salad after my shower.  I love the combination of almonds, craisins, blue cheese, Organic girl super greens, black beans and balsamic.  YUMMY!

I didn't take a photo of my salad but if you haven't tried these salad blends, it's time you did.  I just bought a baby kale mix I can't wait to try as well.

I have a batch of black bean brownies in the oven as we speak.  I used this recipe and changed it up a bit by adding peanut butter to the mix in place of the oil and using a dark chocolate bar in place of the chocolate chips.  I hope they turn out as yummy as the batter tasted.

Now, I think I've got time now to squeeze in some of the yoga I had planned for today and them hopefully I can prop my feet up and read more about Tamar.  Monday's book club discussion is sneaking up on me and I have some work to do on my book.  Thank goodness I'm enjoying it.

It makes me really glad I don't live in Bible times and I got to choose my amazing husband.  I cannot imagine having an arranged marriage.

Only 2 hours or so til I get to enjoy a highly anticipated margarita.  Hope you have something fun planned for your Friday night as well.  Cheers!

Potties, True Friends, and Other Randomness

Last night's Girl's Night Out at Quench Your Palette was a blast even though my fellow painters found my achilles heel.  I am SOO not good with a paintbrush.  Oh well, at least it made for some good laughs.  Thanks to Jenn for helping me so my finished product didn't look like a complete disaster.  I did find out that we have some very artistically talented ladies in our MOPS group.  I am in awe of their paintbrush wielding skills.  My husband, an artist himself, did compliment me on my shading of the sky, but he also thought my enormous shell was a beach towel.  I think I have to hang it up somewhere just so I can laugh every time I see it.  Too funny!

These ladies are awesome.  I'm hoping to paint one of those wineglasses you see in the background the next time I go there.  It seems more up my alley since they use stencils.  Tracing is definitely in my comfort zone.  Free hand conch shells definitely aren't!

While I was out with friends, the boys had a good time being silly with Daddy.

I curled up in bed with The Happiness Project and a cup of tea when I got home. I cannot get enough of that book.  Last night's portion dealt with marriage.  I've got some ideas of things I can work on, like not expecting praise but being more intentional about praising my husband.  It's a good read so far.  I stumbled upon the author's website and found some great resources there as well.  Check it out.

My body is getting used to my early morning wake-ups and I found myself awake without the assistance of my alarm or children at 5:30.  My boys had plans to sleep in a little which gave me time to enjoy a cup of coffee and catch up on my e-mail, etc. before hitting the road with them for my five mile run.  Mickey joined us again for our run this morning.  Lucky me!  For some reason this morning the stroller felt extra heavy and I felt extra tired but we managed to stick to the plan and eek out 5 miles in just under 47 minutes.  Worse things have happened but I'm happy that run is behind me.

I love the MapMyRun App but would love an app that shows me my splits for my miles.  Anyone have any suggestions?  I'm cheap and don't like to pay for my apps...

Check out this beautiful sky that greeted us on the way out the door for our run this morning.  It was even better in person.  

After our run it was go time. We scarfed down breakfast and squeezed in quick showers before Mickey went to work and I headed to MOPS at TC3.  It's always good to see those lovely ladies and get such great support.  We had a speaker discuss friendship and taking the plunge into forming new freindships.  It's like dating all over again trying to find other mom friends.  Thank goodness for MOPS.  It's such a good resource for making friends.  She also asked us to think about what kind of friend we are and whether we're someone we'd want to be friends with.  You really do have to be intentional in your friendships in order for them to work.  It's important to recognize that what you need in a friend may not be the kind of friend you need to be.  She had some good insights!  I want to be a real rather than a simple friend--the one who helps the hostess with the party rather than just showing up with the wine.  What kind of friend do you want to be?

We had to leave MOPS a little early so we could catch our last potty class today.  I feel ready to tackle this potty training monster head on.  Now I just need to decide when to go cold turkey.  I'm convinced that's the only way it's going to work for my boys.  They thrive on consistency.  I started thinking today that maybe the reason that people are waiting longer and longer potty train is because it interrupts our lives and the things we want to do.  I've only played around with it for a couple of days and have seen how time-consuming and taxing it can become, but we all have to do it sooner or later so I'm shooting for sooner.  Pray for me!  Haha

The boys are finally napping and I'm hoping to catch up on some reading that has to be done by Monday for my Hobe Sound MOPS group in between loads of laundry.

I hope it's as much of a page turner as my other book is since I'm feeling a little overcommitted right now. This too shall pass.

Just a couple more hours until we get to go to dinner with the boys' "adopted grandparents" and hopefully I'll still have time to relax on the couch with my husband before calling it a night.

Have a wonderful afternoon!