Happy Things and Stuff to Look Forward To

Nearly a month since I surfaced here. Many good things and new things going on and coming up:

1. Last year my husband and I were very nose-to-the-grindstone about homeschooling. We partnered up and split the teaching duties and kept at it all year, which was great. In the end, we didn't have as great a sense of accomplishment as we would have liked. In addition, with every available day dedicated to schooling, the kids had no activities, other than Upward basketball season. I had grown increasingly concerned about their lack of friends and social opportunities, and was plotting and planning about how we could take the time and do the driving to whatever activities, co-ops, or whatever that we could scare up for the coming school year.

As it turned out, I came across Classical Conversations. A friend told me about it a couple years ago when I was in no position to have any interest in it. This time, though, I was ready, and it seemed like it could be a good fit. One day a week for all of us to go to a neighboring town to meet with our fellow CC'ers, the boys will get to make friends, teacher training for my husband and me is built right in because we will stay for the entire day and be involved in classes, and the boys get the nudge of being somewhat accountable to their tutors in their classes. Basically, it addresses all of the weak spots I felt we were having, plus it looks like a very challenging program with a measurable goal for each subject, which I think will be good for us and give us that sense of accomplishment that we've been missing. Looks like CC will replace most of what we've been doing for school, and will change a lot around here. We are ready for a change, so I hope this is a good fit.

I've not been interested in the classical approach to education before. All of the books I knew on the subject(The Well-Trained Mind, Teaching the Trivium) sounded so formal and hoity-toity and stuck up, a free spirited gal like me just didn't have even the slightest interest in joining up. This year as I watched the videos and saw a lot of fun, a lot of action, and nothing that looked stodgy to me, I decided it just might work for us.

It is expensive compared to what we've done so far. Thankfully we were able to get the financial end of things all worked out, so it's all systems go for starting in late August. Two of my boys are excited and two don't want to do it. Hopefully it will work out good for all and be a positive year. (otherwise, boy howdy!, we will have spent a lot of money and effort to be miserable for a school year....)

2. My mom is moving to live near me! After 20 years of living approximately 12 hours away from each other, I am more than ready to get to hang out with my mom on a regular basis. We are very excited, and now my kids will have access to even more grandparents, which is really awesome. It was great for me to grow up with grandparents nearby, so I am glad to finally have this chance for my own kids.

3. My husband and I got to travel to IL for the wedding of one of my cousins. I had never gotten to meet any of these family members before, because they are from my mom's birth family that she never got to meet. We've been in touch with some of this new branch of our family tree for about a year now, and I've gotten to be friendly with this one cousin thanks to facebook. It was a very lovely and positive experience to be welcomed into the family and get to spend time with 3 cousins, my aunt and her husband, and the various children and extended family members. Very glad that we went!

4. My husband and I will be celebrating our 20th anniversary soon! Funny how it doesn't seem that long, and also seems like forever that we've been together. Our trip was our opportunity for an anniversary getaway.

5. My daughter is starting high school in a few weeks, and is already busy in marching band. My oldest is done with high school and is now working while he figures out what else he'd like to do. We are looking forward to marching season and all of the contests! Hopefully my mom will be moved here in time to enjoy them along with us.

6. Treadmill: I have wanted a treadmill for a long time, and my husband always pointed out how much space they take up, and how often people get them but don't use them. He would also point out our rebounder and say "You could just bounce!" Yeah, well, I do like to bounce, but not for miles. And as my weight has creeped back on (yeah, creepy!) and my ability to go walking has come to a screeching halt, and as the fitness center in town closed, something had to change. I decided to try out my idea of wanting a treadmill and see if it would work well for me. I put a shout-out on facebook, and don'tcha know, someone offered me a free one! We got it the other day and so far it is providing fun and exercise for all of the kids, one dog, and myself. I used to walk 2 miles most days with my friend Kim. Right now doing a mile feels challenging. So, I've got some work to do. I'm trying to add a tenth of a mile onto my distance each day. With a bazillion pounds to lose, I gotta get crackin'.

Out of time. This concludes today's edition of Happy Things.

Weight Loss Report

I have now lost 26 pounds since December! Just wanted to share my happy news. :)

Random Proof that I Do Not Totally Stink, and some possible proof that I have not completely lost my blogging mojo

Since I vented about some of my shortcomings last night, tonite I will toot my own horn a bit.

Good things I did last week:

Took kids to VBS 3 nights

We got our pool set up and I did lifeguard duty every single day since then

I took my kids to the county fair even though my husband was unable to come with us (We tried to go together on his night off, but it was raining, so I took them the next day solo)

We had a family movie night, and I resisted the temptation to leave the room and go do something else

I played board games and cards with my kids

I stayed up late with my daughter two nights because she seemed like she wanted the company

I created a pretty area in the front of our house with two wicker chairs, a table, and some potted plants (much better than the junkfest that had previously been in that area)

I continued my no-sugar healthy-eating plan last week even though it was very hard to do so

I continued to do my 3 mile workout with my friend Kim

I pressed on to obtain much-desired birthday gifts and made a very happy birthday come together for my 11 year old

I discovered kittens under our deck (neighbor cat that thinks it lives in our yard) and shared the secret with my 13 year old daughter



Today has been better in my brain, and I have made a lot of domestic progress, which I needed. The kids swam. I did a boatload of weeding in the garden and yard that desperately needed to be done. Everything looks so much nicer now, and I am thinking of ways to beautify the place. We were blessed to get a nice new shed last week, which is significant because we have no garage, and previously only had a rickety old 3-sided lean-to barn-type structure way at the top of our hill which was never very good for the kind of storage we needed. For 9 years of living here we have not had proper storage space for tents, bikes, lawn mowers, large tools, garden tools, outdoor toys, our pool, etc. We have had A LOT of stuff stuffed into our house, and a lot of stuff in our yard looking very junky. It was fairly much impossible to improve, even when we downsized how much stuff we had, and tried to get the kids better at parking their bikes in certain areas of the yard. Now it all has a place to be put away, and the yard is so much more pleasant. We are also gaining some space in the house, which is great just for the visual relief of empty space, or at least less crowded space in some areas.

About 3 years ago we created a brick patio out of free bricks that we got. (We still have a bunch, too! What will we make next?!) Up until now this area has largely been relegated to a parking spot for every bike, toy, and deflated soccer ball in our back yard when mowing was needing to get done. Add in a few empty water bottles, soggy paper plates, abandoned socks and winter gloves, broken wooden swords or water guns, stray legos, etc. and a plethora of very strong and tall weeds determined to live in the cement jungle, and you are starting to get the idea of how this has been looking. U-G-L-Y!

Well, now that patio is clear of toys and junk. I spent some time weeding it today. (almost done!) My plan now is to create some sort of living space there to hold the spot and help it not regress into junkville ever again.

I find myself wondering about these people whose blogs I read who drive off to the library and on their way happen upon an estate sale where they find the most adorable wrought iron table and chairs set that will be just perfect for a niche in their back yard, for the bargain price of $7. I want to know where they live, because I never find such treasures at the yard sales and flea markets I come across.

Around these here parts you can find plenty of ugly bank mugs, mostly-used candles, Christmas tins (with rust inside), old tools (but not cool ones), and a whole lotta clothes. (that usually smell like smoke) Apparently we're a little lacking in cast off vintage coolness in central Kentucky.

On Saturday I took a little mental health break, driving somewhat aimlessly to the town south of mine. I decided to pop into the new Goodwill to see if I could find any treasures. Nope. And even the new Goodwill still has that donated clothes weird smell thing going on.

I will give props to the one yard sale that I saw and checked out. I walked away with a Michael Koors belt (50 cents!), and two cute new purses. (I have recently become a purse enthusiast)

Also, I would like to say that since stopping eating sugar back in March I have now lost 10 pounds. (on top of the 5 that I lost between November and March) And the Michael Koors belt fits me. And also I bought fitted tshirts yesterday at Target, and they do not look bad on me, and I did not have to buy them from the plus size department. Which I am pleased about.

As you can see, it is possible for me to become so busy with life that I give nary a cursory blog post, let alone anything interesting or the least bit well-written for ages upon ages, and then all of the sudden in one night I have a whole bunch of random bloggety goodness to spew out at you.

Sorry. I suppose this is one of the risks of being a regular reader (dare I say fan?!) of this blog.

I haven't thought of my life in blogging perspective for quite some time. It feels really nice tonite to be sharing all of this with you. Maybe I'll be back again before the spell breaks....

Exercise

One of the things I've been doing to try to entice myself to exercise is to get various workout DVDs from netflix. After watching an episode of Dance Machine and seeing a guy in his 60s do some pretty sweet hip hop (he said he learned how to do it from his Hip Hop Aerobics classes) I decided to try it myself. I ordered up a dance aerobics DVD, and yesterday was the day to pop it into the player and give it a try. I even invited my husband to join me. He has trouble following the very simple routines in the Leslie Sansone walking workouts, so I figured it would be entertaining to watch him try to do dance aerobics.

I wasn't disappointed.

Not only was my husband having a hard time following the fast pace of the routine, but I felt like a very uncoordinated dork myself. I used to think I had some moves, but the African dance aerobics showed me otherwise.

The good part about this is that not only did we get exercise (I figured that even if we were doing the moves wrong, as long as we kept moving that was good) but we also got the added health benefits from laughing our heads off.

And then I put that stinkin DVD back in it's envelope. Heading back to netflix tomorrow, thank you very much. I now know that I would like to stick with Leslie Sansone instead. She doesn't make me feel like an idiot.

Happily, today's weigh-in showed that I have lost a few pounds in the past several weeks. Hooray for that!

Try, Try Again

So in May I worked on losing weight. I was pretty dedicated to my goal for maybe two whole weeks, not so much for the last two weeks. Still, I did lose weight. Around 7 pounds, I think. Which was a good thing, because all it took was one trip to my mom's house for me to gain every bit of it back. Nice.

Although I know that I could go all kamikaze and make weight loss my huge focus for a few months, and could probably get rid of a lot of my extra baggage, I know that isn't sustainable. I really want to find something that fits into my life in a realistic way, so that I can continue with it. I'm pretty sure that I don't have the time or dedication to get back to looking like I did when I was 19, but I'd like to see where I could get with what I can do.

So now here we are in July. Time to try to rev myself up again. My challenge to myself is to simply do SOMETHING exercise-wise every day. I have Leslie Sansone walking DVDs, Joyce Vedral weight workouts, aerobics videos, a rebounder and a rebounder workout video--all of which I actually enjoy, can do, and have all of the equipment for. I am hoping that if I can just pick one and do it each day, that I will see some good results. (couldn't be worse than doing nothing, right?)

Today I did a 2 mile walk that included some cross training with Leslie Sansone. it was my first time using this video. I didn't really like how it changed from the walking to the weights, so I probably won't do this one again. (netflix has a bazillion Leslie Sansone DVDs, so I just keep sending for new ones)

What works for you?

Pushing the weight down a little more....

My husband and I have decided to try to lose 10 pounds (each) during the month of May. My personal plan to try to make this happen includes:

Doing at least a one mile walk with Leslie Sansone every day (which I think are better as far as calories and muscle use than a walk outside).

Having salad for lunch every day. (I already do this a lot of the time, but will try to make it happen daily)

Avoid obvious junk food and sugary treats.

Avoid drinks that have calories. (I generally only drink water or my healthy lemonade, which has about 25 calories in two quarts, so I don't expect this to change anything, but it's still good to keep in mind.)

No eating after 8pm. (only exception: veggies)

I may throw in some other random good-for-you/low-calorie/extra exercise things as well, but I'm trying to keep my rules fairly simple.

Since we decided this yesterday we did a one mile walk, and this morning I did the two mile walk. Woot!

Warning! Danger!

Warning!! The new Flavor Blasted Goldfish are extremely addicting. They are so good that it is entirely possible that you can suddenly find yourself eating most of an entire bag of them all by yourself....thus undoing the two days of walking that you might have managed to do this week.

They are veeeeeerrrrrryyyyyy yummy...just be careful!

(slinking off to find some carrot sticks.....)

Two Whole Days

Of what? Exercise! That's what.

You see....I got some yoga pants. And they aren't the kind of vanity knit that helps push things back into good places and allow you to continue to pretend like things aren't that bad. No sirree. They are the kind that just lets your bad bulges flop around in all their glory and badness. The kind that say, "Don't you go trying to wear yoga pants when we can all SEE that you have never, ever set foot in a yoga class in your entire life!"

And so, between the yoga pants and the knit tunic shirt, the truth is hard to deny.

And then my husband came home after going to the doctor and found out that he gained 8 pounds.

So, yesterday we hit the road, going for a walk at the cemetery down the street. Just an ordinary, almost-middle-aged-overweight couple out for a walk.

How did I get here??

Today he was at work, but I went to walk on my own. I have a little window of time in the early mornings, if I want to take advantage of it. If the weather, and my resolve, hold, maybe I can stick with it. Because I sure don't have time to go to the fitness center any more. And my kids laugh at me when I do my rebounder routine at home. :)

Weight Loss Can Be So Easy...

Would you believe that I lost 50 pounds over night?!

Yeah, me neither.

The new scale had some accuracy issues. We would step on it and get one weight. Step off and let the thing go back to zero. Step on again and get a weight 4 pounds heavier than 10 seconds before. Get off and let the thing go back to zero. Step on again and get a weight 2 pounds less than the first weight. This morning I stepped on to find myself roughly 50 pounds less than yesterday. My husband also experienced an amazing weight loss of 40 pounds. Some of the kids lost 10 pounds within a day! Whatever we ate yesterday, I guess we need to do more of that.

In short, not exactly a helpful gadget for someone trying to lose just. one. pound. Right?

So back to the store it went. Not sure what I'm going to replace it with yet. I don't have the time or energy to keep buying and returning quirky scales.

In the meantime, I used the refund money to buy cookies. :) NO, not for me. (Well, I will confess to eating one......or two....) We are going to a church chili cookoff tonite, and we are taking cookies. (not chili) I will be a judge for the chili, so that should be fun. I've never gotten to judge a cooking contest before. :)

Today I did something that I always said I would never do.

I bought a bathroom scale.

I've been thinking about this for awhile now. When I was younger I hated getting weighed because even when at a perfectly normal weight and even able to wear a bikini without shame as a 19 year old, being a six foot tall woman comes with weight numbers that are considerably higher than most teeny-weeny teenagers have.

Then for all the years when I was pregnant, I felt like it was just pointless and depressing to know my weight.

And now my baby is almost 5. I've got to lose some weight, and that's hard to keep track of if I have no idea where I'm at.

I really like the idea of just losing one pound at a time. I got this idea from some interview with Cheryl Tiegs quite some time ago. Basically she said that every morning she steps on the scale, and if she has reached her weight limit, she immediately exercises a little more and eats a little less, and keeps doing that until she beats back that one pound. Although I have far more than, ahem, one pound to lose, one pound I can lose. And then I just keep losing one more pound. And another one. And another one.

So that's why I have a scale now. I didn't want to get a depressing one that would remind me of what I weighed yesterday or last week, or one that would calculate my body fat index. I just got a plain Jane, no-reminders scale. It'll get the job done. Hopefully I will too.

Foxy Mamma

I found out about these fun shirts from Couture Moms in a recent magazine review, and decided to buy myself a Mom-to-the-sixth-power shirt for Mother's Day. :)

It arrived the other day and I was so excited! It's very soft and looks great! The bling is very pretty and is a good size and placement.

I had to run some errands so decided to wear my new shirt and head out. The shirt looked so great that I decided to get a little more gussied-up than usual. Just a little mascara and lipstick. And I left my hair funky-curly because my husband loves it that way. (I normally straighten my hair)

Then I got going and called my husband at work to see if he would have time to meet me for lunch. He did.

So I met him there, and the look on his face said it all.... :) But it was nice that he said it in my ear, too. "You look so foxy, I could fall down and die!!"

Ha! Sounds like I better be careful when wearing my new secret weapon, eh? :)

Words from the Wise...

My mom left a comment on the previous post that reminded me of something funny. Here's what she said:

Long past due in my humble opinion! You have run yourself ragged feeding the troops for years! I think the dinner call and time limit is a great idea as well. Eat it or don't, it doesn't matter but there will be NOTHING else until the next meal even if they threaten to faint or die :). You go girl!!

My mom is not one to go around foisting her opinions on her children. In fact, I would say she shows superhuman strength when it comes to not saying things that I imagine she would like to say. :) She's amazing.

I can remember one time, though, when I had just 2 little ones and my mom came to visit. I think it was probably when I was about to deliver my third child. She was observing my crazy efforts to cater to my picky children's whims for meals and snacks, and finally offered this observation (very gently):

"Honey, I think you've taken the concept of Demand Feeding too far."

hahahahahahahahahHAHAHAAHAHAHAAHAHahahahahahaahaha

Too true!

I've laughed and laughed about that daring comment over the years. An understatement, to be sure!

I'm happy to report that meals are going fine. I have not have to send any complainers to bed yet, so that's great. I was serving lasagna last night and some of my kids don't like pasta with sauce on it, so I decided to refresh the concept of Not Complaining in their minds before it got to be dinner time. I said to my littlest one (4 years old), "Now, you don't want to complain about what we're eating, do you? Because what will happen if you complain?"

He sweetly looked up at me with his big brown eyes and said, "If I complain I get to go on the beddy-bye train."

BINGO!

No complainers, and they all ate and even complimented me on the meal. (even the one that hates sauce the most)

I also taught them the fine art of nicely asking for a small portion if the item is not something they enjoy eating, and the difference between asking in a nice way, and asking in a way that is a form of complaint. They did very well.

My daughter, the picky one, is even showing signs of progress. The first night's meal ended up being something she likes, so there was no challenge there. Then last night she was invited to go to a church supper with a friend of hers. I told her that if she went she would have to follow our rule of trying the food that is served before eating bread and butter or whatever. I was pleased to hear that she did actually give the spaghetti a try even without her mother there to make it happen.

The meal helpers jobs are coming along well too. it's kind of a pain to have to make the effort to round up each kid as it becomes time for their job, but overall I think they are fine with doing what they do. My two kindergarteners are enjoying wiping off the table and setting it. it's great for counting (how many forks do we need?) and sorting, etc.

In my enthusiasm about my 16lb weight loss I started thinking about losing more weight, I realized what all of you probably already know: You can lose a pound a week by decreasing your daily caloric intake by 500 calories. Considering that a lot of people consume way more than 500 calories of coffee, soda, and juice, I am thinking this should be fairly easy for a lot of you. (just think! Give up that little bit of beverages, and in a year you'd be down 52 pounds!!) Unfortunately (or not), I don't drink any coffee, soda, and almost no juice, so it's not as simple for me to cut those things out, but I decided to start keeping track of my calories in order to make sure that the eating stays on track for at least a pound weight loss every week. My workouts are extra.

So, today is day three of keeping a food journal. I have been surprised to see that actually I was already doing pretty well on eating even less than my goal. Yesterday I did feel hungry (and cranky!!) through the day because I knew lasagne was coming up for dinner and I wanted to be able to enjoy it. So, I skimped on the eating earlier and had a nice enjoyable dinner and all was well and still ok in the calories dept.

I don't like having to look at calorie info for every thing, and I do find that it makes me feel paranoid about every little thing I put in my mouth. I don't love that, but think this is probably worth doing for at least a few more days or a week. If I could lose 2 pounds a week that would be really groovy, and I'd be 20 pounds lighter before our trip in June.

Blah blah blah weight loss, blah blah blah boring. Ok, enough! Have a good day!

16 pounds is a much more impressive way to say it

I was thinking that by saying, "I lost three more pounds" it kind of lacked the WOW of
"HEY WORLD! I lost 16 pounds so far this year!!!" :)

It's only about a pound a week, but I'm happy with that. If I only lose a pound a week, I'll be mighty close to my target weight by the end of the year. Either way, I'm moving in the right direction and that's a good thing.

Last night's dinner here was so crazy that I don't know if I can explain it well enough. Although my kids know how to behave properly at church dinners, restaurants, or if we have friends visiting, they are fairly monstrous when we relax in our own little society.

First there is the whining. What is this food? What's it made of? Do I like this? I don't think I like this. Can I eat something different?

Then we have one eater whom, to call her picky, would be one of the grandest understatements in the history of the world. This is a child for whom picky eating is both a fine art as well as a prison of her own making.

With 5 boys, ages 14, 8, 7, 5, and 4, there is no end to weird noises, odd body language, getting up and down from their seats, belching, farting, and potty talk.

Last night was particularly bad in most categories. My husband and I started out trying to get one bad behavior under control, only to have 2 more pop up in it's place. It was ridiculous. He finally stomped away from the table to drive the oldest kid to a school activity, and I sat at the table giving the kids a lecture about how Today Is The Last Day You Are Going To Act Like Wild Hooligans At the Table.

After dinner I did some thinking about how I helped our family make changes in other areas that were out of control. (for MANY years our bedtime situation was completely insane, but now I can get 5 kids to bed in 5-7 minutes with very few problems) I remembered that the most successful thing I've done is to obsess about getting the first thing under control first. So, that's what we're doing.

Today I am launching my REVITALIZE DINNER plan.

First, for the wild meal behavior, we now have a reminder poster on out kitchen wall that reads:

You COMPLAIN??
You get a...
ONE WAY
ticket
on the
Bedtime Train!!!

Interestingly, many years ago when our second child (the picky one) started being picky, I wanted to implement a rule that if someone came to the table and complained about the food, that they would immediately head off to bed without the meal. Knowing that it would only have to happen once or twice to convince the kids I was serious, it was a rule I was willing to stick to. but my husband thought it was too harsh.

HA!

He bitterly regrets that decision now that we have 1-5 complainers at each and every meal. So now we are going with my plan. I fully expect that my grocery bill will be lowered for awhile, and that kids are going to be VERY ready for breakfast most days, because it is going to take some serious drill sergeant behavior on my part to keep up with this. But, have no fear--I'm going to win this one.

Once we get them to stop complaining, I'll have to figure out what comes next. What would you think is the next top priority?:

eating your food
not farting at the table (trust me, it's for comedic value, not because he can't help it)
basic table manners and etiquette
staying in your seat

Let me know what you think.

I have also made a Mealtime Helper poster that gives each child a meal-related job to do. Until now I have done all the work before, during, and after the meals, and it is ridiculous. Now I have kids set up to clear and wipe the table, set the table, unload/reload the dishwasher, do the handwash items, and help put away leftovers. This morning when I showed them the chart they were all excited about the jobs they'd been given.

Last, but not least, I have informed Miss Picky Eater that her days of eating her own special meal are coming to an end. For a few weeks or a month (depending on how well I remember, and how well it's going) she is going to have to eat one bite of each thing we have eating. (Then she can eat whatever alternative meal she was going to have.) After we get used to the one bite thing, it'll go up to two bites, etc. I have to believe that she is going to get to like more and more things, or even if she doesn't, that it'll do her body good to have some different forms of nutrition.

I'm also giving her a time limit on getting the bites done (5 minutes) because I am not willing to have everyone's meal ruined with a whole bunch of drama.

And, if she doesn't want to be a good sport about it, I have a nice long list of privileges to take away, starting with talking on the phone to her friends. It's a good long list, so I am pretty sure she'll see things my way.

Diplomacy is one of my strong points. You should have heard the super-positive spin I put on this plan when I told her about it last night before she went to bed. She didn't even look miserable about it. (which only leaves me wondering if she doesn't believe that I'm going to follow through, or that she is plotting some way to try to thwart me)

Of course, my husband won't be a dinner tonite, so I'll be running this mission on my own. Should be exciting, don't you think??

So now we know that when business gets busy, Dollymama readers get ignored. Sorry, folks! I can't do it all.

I've been meaning to put my two cents worth in on a movie our family watched. Like a lot of other families, we were looking forward to the DVD release of Happy Feet. I'm going to be a fuddy duddy and say that I do not consider Happy Feet to be good family-friendly entertainment. Waaaaaay too many references about sex. We will not watch it again.

Last night we watched Al Gore's "An Inconvenient Truth" which explains the problem of global warming. I think that for a lot of people who may have been brought up without much consciousness about environmental issues (like me), this movie is an important one. It is interesting and explains how global warming happens and what the results are in our world today and what can happen to our world in the future if we don't make a change.

I was disappointed that there wasn't any practical information given on what we can do as individuals to make a difference. Fortunately, there is a web site that tells some very simple, basic things we can all do. The information can be found here.

The only thing I thought was kind of ridiculous about the film was it's political jabs. Yes, I'm sure that the current administration could have done more to help curb the problem, but a president doesn't have the luxury of focusing on one pet project all the time like Al Gore does. If he had left politics out of it I would have appreciated it. I think it dilutes his message.

I've been reading soem good books lately:

Unto The Least of These by Nathan Shaw is an excellent book about the need for Christians to care for widows and the fatherless. One of the things I most appreciated about this book was information about Bible times and history that confirmed my belief that divorced people qualify as widows and the fatherless as well. I borrowed this book from a gal at church whose husband abandoned her and their three children, mainly so that I could understand and empathize with them better. Now that I am reading it, though, I see that we are surrounded today by widows and orphans that desperately need healing and God's love (and God's love ministered to them by God's people!). I am also thinking this through from the perspective of someone considering adopting children that are fatherless. Really, our society is full of people who have these wounds, so I think it makes sense for as many compassionate people as possible to become more understanding of how to best help them. Read this book!

I am also enjoying a re-read of Anna Quindlen's Loud and Clear, which is a collection of her essays. I just love the way she makes me think a little (or a lot) harder about subjects I had already made up my mind about.

I have accepted a gig as columnist over at sahm.com in the Moms of Many category. You can go see my name in lights there if it gives you a thrill. :)

Today I went to work out for the first time in about a month. Between spring break, kids and me being sick, and just being too darn lazy to get over there, the weeks had flown by. BY know what? I lost 3 lbs. while I was away, so I guess my eating is helping anyhow. We're going to a family wedding in June so I'd like to drop off a some more weight between now and then. Must. Keep. Working. Out. and. Eating. Less!