Complete

I have achieved quite an accomplishment today. It took a long time, but, with a great deal of effort on my part, I finished. Today, I successful finished watching the entire series of The Gilmore Girls. Again.

Thank you so much for all of your praise. Yes, I agree it was very hard and it took months of dedication and perserverence. But, I started this, and I needed to finish it. I needed to tough it out, see it through, and I did. Way to go me, way to go.

A few months ago, I was looking through all of our DVD's and I pulled out the first season of Gilmore Girls. I watched the first disk, and remembered how much I liked this show. I used to watch it every single week when it was on t.v. It made me laugh, it made me cry, and it made me think.

I watched it when I was alone at school, and I always remember wishing I had a best friend like Loreali. She was smart, funny, witty, a risk taker, and had a great sense of style.

Now that I have watched it through grown up eyes, I still wish I had a friend like Loreali. But, more than that, I wish I lived in Stars Hollow, the fictional town where the show was filmed. It is a town full of character, charm, and quirky residents. There were beautiful homes, historic buildings, and you could walk anywhere.

This is the first television series I started watching in my late teens, and into my college years. Certain episodes remind me of exactly where I was when I saw it the first time. I remember laughing my tail off with my mom when we watched the episode where Rory goes to her first boy girl dance. I remember sitting on our old couch, wrapped in blankets enjoying time together. We were able to watch a show that showed characters totally different from us, but made us laugh and gave us something to look forward to each week.


Have you ever seen the Gilmore Girls? Do you like it?

Is there a t.v. show, or series that you watch all the time? What is it?

Friday confessions

1. I ate M &Ms while watching the biggest loser.

2. I only wear granny panties.

3. I sat with my legs apart while in the train, while wearing a dress.

4. I am blogging from work because I forgot to post before the day started.

 

Fess up!

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Clean Eating, week 3

Clean Eating—Week 3

This has been the easiest week by far. I feel like P and I have really gotten into a rhythm with our eating, shopping, and preparing our foods.

One thing that is new is that P and I menu plan together, and rather than simply planning our main course, we have taken the time to plan the entire meal. Before this, I used to simply plan our dinners during the week, and as a result, we were really in a pinch for breakfast and lunch during the week, and ate out most of our meals on the weekend. Yikes! Talk about unhealthy and a budget buster. Now, doing it together is much easier and works so much better for us.

We have found that we really like shopping on Saturday morning’s. Normally we hit up 1 or 2 stores depending upon pricing, and it goes so much faster when the two of us shop together.

I have also found that we are wasting much less food than before. Rather than throwing away a ton of food every week, we have only thrown out one or two items this entire month.

We do have to do a mid- week shop to restock up on fresh fruits (bananas and grapes), but that is usually a quick trip to the store that does not take too much time.

One thing that has really helped me is P has made my breakfast every single morning, and I could not be more thankful. I work out before work, and I am usually flying around the house like a mad woman to leave on time. Every morning P scrambles me eggs with pesto, and puts it in my Tupperware container for me to grab and go on my way out the door. I don’t know that P realizes how much I appreciate this and need this.

Cutting out the refined sugar has been harder than I expected, (hello week 2) but coming out on the other side of detoxing, I can say that I never want to have to go through that again. I never want to feel like I did. I never want to be that tired, that achy, and that grumpy. It was horrible.

We have cut out, grains, refined sugar, legumes, dairy, and gluten. Because we don’t have a scale, we don’t know what our starting weight was, but I can tell that P has lost quite a bit of weight. He seems to be feeling better, and has more energy naturally rather than relying on sugar. P was a big Coke drinker, and when he went to buy a Coke, I always drank some, and requested treats when he went to the store.

We have had a few cheats and treat nights, but nothing compared to what we used to do.

All in all, it has been a great experience so far, and I think we are going to continue to eat like this for a while. We are following the Paleo plan, and have found it to be a good fit for our lifestyle.

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Saying the things that need to be said

Have you told everyone in your life all of the things that need to be said? Have you told them you love them, you miss them, or how wonderful they are to you?

I just hung up the phone with my friend L. It has been a really rough couple of months for her. In November, she lost her job. At the time, we were really worried, and she was really angry, which she had every right to be.

About 3 weeks after she lost her job, her mom went into the hospital. She had a heart attack, and they thought that her mother was going to pass away. She has been in and out of the hospital since then. They have declared that she is in-operable, and they gave her 18 months at the most. The dr. told her to enjoy the time she has left. L has been driving back and forth to Oklahoma where her mother is almost weekly to be with her family.

The holidays came and went, and L was really ready to start working again. She has applied to jobs and nothing has come up yet.

This past week, her sister ended up in the hospital with the flu, phenomena, and the dr. told them yesterday that she needed to be moved to the ICU because she might pass away. Again, L jumped in her car and is on her way to Oklahoma right now to help take care of her family.

L does not believe in anything that I believe in, but as we were talking today, I asked her if she thought that losing her job when she did was a blessing? She has been the strong one in her family, she has been the rock, the constant. She has been there for every doctors appointment, for every family meeting, and for every single important moment.

Through our conversation, I asked her if she has said everything she needs to say to everyone in her life. Has she told them she loves them, has she shared what is important?

After I asked her that, I asked myself, have I said everything that I need to say to everyone I love? Do the people in my life know how I feel about them?

I hope so.

What is something you need to say to someone in your life?

Friday confessions

1. P and I ate an entire large bag of M and M's in less than 20 minutes.

2. I still have my Christmas wreath up

3. I bought a pair of shoes this week, and it's a no spend month for us

Fess up peeps.

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The Money Stash

I have always been a saver. A big one. When I was younger, and my parents gave me an allowance, (something I am trying to convince them they should still do) I would take my money and save it.I found a way to not spend any money. Well, I found a way to not spend my money. 

At some point, I went beyond simply saving, and I started stashing money away in weird places. Remember those stuffed animals with little battery packs it the back to make their eyes light up or make them talk in those creepy voices? Yea, I can't believe they sold so many of them. Looking back, I cannot believe they didn't give me nightmares. 

Did I have a point?

Hi my name is Molly. I am a creeper and I  want to play with your children.  

Right. 

The zipper pouch where the batteries were held. I used to keep cash in there. I also used to hide cash behind picture frames. When I moved out, and my parents suddenly had money because they stopped bank rolling my life style, they had money to slap up some new paint on the walls, and get rid of my hand print pictures, and buy some nice and classy art from galleries, Ross, Marshalls, or TJ Maxx. As they were taking the homemade art off the wall, they found money that I had hidden at some point. 

I continued this as I grew and landed my first jobs. Every time I baby sat, waited tables, worked in the mall, coached soccer camps, and started my first big girl job as a teacher, I continued to pull out a couple of bucks and stash them away.

I never thought this was weird, until I got married. P didn't find out about my stash until one day he was searching for something and stumbled upon my money wad, in my underwear drawer. He was shocked, and thought it was insane. For months, he kept telling me to spend the money. Every time I wanted something, he would say "you have the cash, buy it for yourself." HA! Wrong, I will save and save and save. 

Today, I currently have two money stashes. A larger one, that I keep in my fire box, and a smaller one that I keep with my undies. When I want to shop, or buy something special, I go to my stash and get the money. 

So if you are planning on coming to our house to rob us, don't, because I have my eye on some boots that I just might have to dig into the stash for. 

What about you, do you have a money stash?

Clean Eating, Week 2

Week 2 of our eating cleanse is done. 

If I thought week one was hard, week 2 was rough. I really struggled this week with sugar cravings, and side effects.

I can definitely say that this week, I began to detox from sugar. I have never gone this long without sugar before and my body was fighting back, hard. Saturday through Wednesday was pretty rough for me. I had a low grade headache, I was exhausted, I was getting aches in my joints, and I was freezing all the time. I thought I was getting sick with the flu, but, after some research and consulting with a friend who has been off sugar for years, I discovered that I was in detox.  On Saturday and Sunday I ended up having to lay down for about an hour both days. I came home from work and was in bed by 8:00 each night.  I woke up about 5:00 every morning, and I just laid in bed or on the couch and watched t.v. rather than go to the gym. Finally, I started to feel better about Thursday, but still listened to my body and rested.

My sugar cravings have decreased significantly. I am not jonesing nearly as hard. P and I have cheated twice though. On Friday night we decided to pop some popcorn, and I put a small bag of M&M's in the mix for a hint of sweetness. I was surprised to find they tasted almost sickeningly sweet to me.

I don't want to get too graphic, but things in the restroom have started to change as well. Again, thanks to some research, I found out that I was suffering from something called "leaky gut." Lets just say, things have normalized.

Because we have cut out the heavy foods, and are focusing on quality meats, veggies, and fruit, I am finding that I am getting full much more quickly, and the fullness is not a heavy feeling, more of a satisfied feeling.

There have been other side effects as well. Our meals take much longer to prep, but P and I have been working as a team.  P has made me breakfast every single morning before I go to work. It is so nice to have a hot meal, made by my loving husband before I walk out the door each day.

During this challenge, we have also decided to refrain from eating out. We are spending a lot more money on food this month for several reasons. First, we are buying higher quality foods. Second, we are not eating out an cheap restaurants during the week (Chipolte, Jason's Deli, Freebirds, etc.). 

The last side effect, DISHES. We are cooking all of our meals, so we are going through so many dishes. We are both using Tupperware to take our food to work, and we are cooking all of our meals at home, and as a result, we are running the dishwasher every other day.

So far, this cleanse has been great. I am feeling better, P has lost quite a bit of weight, and I think I have dropped a pound or two as well. I feel my energy returning, and I feel healthier.