March goals reviewed

Happy Easter, my little bunnies!

Today is the last day of March (Thank God! Did this month drag for anyone else?!) so that means it is time to look back on the goals I made for myself at the beginning of the month and see how I fared.

Here are my goals for the month of March:

 -Complete my elimination diet successfully
-Become more efficient with meal planning and grocery shopping for the right amount of food
-Stretch everyday for at least 5-10min
-Run 2-3 times a week and get a workout of some sort in 4-5x a week
-Keep up with my reading plan (I veered off at the end of feb)
-Send KC a final care package

Results:

-My final day of the Elimination Diet is tomorrow, April 1st. I will then start reintroducing foods. Overall I followed the diet correctly with only cheating with wine this weekend :-) 

-I think with each time I go shopping I get better. I feel I don't need to meal plan so much these past few weeks. It could be because my diet has gotten so simple that I can eat the same types of meals and snacks for multiple days. That is something I never thought would happen!

-Stretching. Always been a struggle with me, and continues to be. I definitely didn't stretch everyday. I started having lower back problems and stretching seemed to help, but I stopped once the pain subsided. 

-I have done GREAT with working out this month. The St Pat's Dash really jump started my running again. The last three weeks have had lots of sun so that helps too. I also have been going to a new gym and trying out new classes there. I just love classes, especially in the morning so I get my workout in for the day done early!

-I'm slowly getting back on my reading schedule. I finished a book last week and started a new one this week. I'm about 50% done. I plan on getting a lot of reading done in the next two weeks because of future plans ahead (more on that later) ;-)

-I haven't sent KC a final care package. I probably won't either. I debated for a while whether it would be worth it to send one since he will be coming home shortly after receiving it. I think my thoughts were confirmed when I talked to him yesterday. Things are getting packed up and broken down to ship back soon.

How did your monthly goals turn out? Now go out and enjoy some chocolate bunnies for me :-)

High Fives for Friday!

 

My high fives for this week are as follows (in no particular order):

Suri has NEVER said "Nice weather coming up!" Thursday also turned out to be sunny!

 1. The sun! The heat! Holy molyy, people! It was in the sixties yesterday and the mid to high sixties are on the horizon for Easter weekend. This never happens in March! I'm crossing my fingers and toes that this means we will get summer in June or July instead of August or September. I was able to run outside multiple times this week AND sit on my balcony and enjoy eating my dinner while reading my kindle. Speaking of Kindle..

2. Being back on the reading wagon. I have a goal to read at least two books a month this year and I was doing great until about the middle of Febuary (I say great like keeping on track for a month and a half is some big feat HA!). I started reading BossyPants by Tina Fey and I am constantly laughing. The way she writes her stories are as if the two of you are having a conversation. I've always been more of an Amy Poehler fan, but Tina Fey is hilarious.

3. Seeing my nutritionist while going into my FINAL week of the Elimination Diet/Cleanse. I learned all about starting to re introduce foods into my diet, slowly. I can also start drinking coffee and wine next week, and eat some dark chocolate. I am in heaven. Those are the three things I miss the most.

Maybe I should have told him to smile..or that I was taking a picture of him!

 4. Recieving an email from KC that he fixed the system they use for Skype so we get to have a Skype date this weekend!! I have not talked to this guy in three weeks! The longest we've ever gone. Hopefully he'll also have an update on his return date.

5. Being on my fitness game. This week I have killed it with workouts! As crazy as it sounds I have been really enjoying my 6am spinning class. I think it's been good cross training for running because the past few times I've been out running, it has felt SO good. I may be finally starting to fall in love with running again.

Happy weekend y'all!

MARCH GIVEAWAY GOING ON RIGHT MEOW!

Hey y'all!

This month I'm sponsoring the lovely Melissa @ In her boots! There are 11 fun bloggers giving away gift cards so get your tookus over to her blog and enter the giveaway!

1 // Sarah  // $15 Starbucks Gift Card

2 // Brianne // $20 Etsy Gift Card

3 // Meghan // $25 Victoria Secrets Gift Card

4 // Maia // $10 Target Gift Card

5 // Gia // $10 Starbucks Gift Card + $5 Sponsor Spot

6 // Kristine // $10 Target Gift Card

7 // Rebecca //  $20 Amazon Gift Card + 1 month large Ad Space

8 // Angela // $15 itunes Gift Card

9 // Nikki // Forever 21 Gift Card

10 // Chloe // $10 Barnes & Nobles Gift Card

11 // Melissa // $10 Francesca's Gift Card

a Rafflecopter giveaway

It's (kinda) spring, Seattle!

 I can't even believe it, but I am doing one of my favorite things right now: sitting on my balcony in the sun..at 6:30 in the evening! This sort of occurrence usually doesn't happen until at least late May or June. We have had two weekends of sun in the emerald city, and I feel so lucky. Everyone comes out of their holes and infiltrates the parks, sidewalks, and outdoor dining places in this city. We Seattleites LOVE the sun.

The time change is still messing with my head a bit, but it's making me more motivated to get out and run, which I love. I'm trying to get back into running more/working out more often and I have been highly successful this last week.

This weekend I headed north to attend a surprise 60th birthday party for one of my oldest friend's mother. It was great, she had no idea! She's usually pretty on top of these things so we thought she might have hacked into one of her childrens emails and discovered the plans :-) The party was great, but I seriously struggled with not being able to eat all the yummy food that was offered. Especially the chocolate cake. I was good though, and ate only veggies and almonds. Tomorow I go see my nutritionist so I plan on doing  another post about the elimination diet. I'm on week three which means I start introducing foods back next week.

Other than that, my weekend was pretty low key, as usual. I got laundry done, went running, hung with my mom, went for a walk with my mom and her dog, and scored some awesome dark green skinny Hudsons! I was inspired by Melissa in her cutsy jeans, and then I saw Tara wearing 'em too, and I suddenly fell in love with the color. I swung by the rack and got lucky! Paired with my new combat boots, I think it's a pretty good look!

 

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Nail Files

Yayyy Friday!



This week I'm showing off my Shellac manicure that I got done the day before St Patty's Day. I didn't want to go too green so I think this was a subtle hint at green and the holiday :-)

Seeing how dry my skin looks in this picture is making me apply lotion as I type this sentence. Geez, ready for the winter to go A WAY!



Anyone have any fun plans for the weekend?

One of those days...

Today is just one of those days. A day where I find myself lost in my thoughts. My apartment is silent except for the hum of the refrigerator and the faint sound of the cars passing by on my street. Before I even realize how much time has passed I pull myself from my thoughts, my face in my hands just gazing out the window into the darkness that has fallen across Seattle for the night. My heart aches for KC. I let out a deep breath and realize the last time I felt this way was right before he was injured in November. It's one of those nights where I just wish with all my might that he would call me...That I could hear his voice and tell him how much I miss him.

It's coming up on the 6 month deployed mark, and March just won't leave fast enough.

ELIMINATION (diet)

The title sounds pretty intense, right?

A couple of months ago I started seeing a nutritionist because I found out that my insurance charges me exactly ZERO dollars to see one as often as I'd like. I love when I discover things I can do to better myself that cost me nothing. These days it becomes harder and harder to find, but I digress..

When we first met I discussed the fact that I never really lose/gain weight, portions were fuzzy to me, and some sort of food allergy had to be going on because sometimes I feel SO uncomfortable after eating. We met once a week for a few weeks. She put me on a 5 meals (or mini meals) a day plan. I was told to make sure at every meal/snack to include protein. I was also to cut out any starchy foods after lunch time. At first this was kind of a hassle, but I started to meal plan and pack lunches and snacks with me to take to work. After about a month of following this plan, my nutritionist dropped the new plan on me.

THE ELIMINATION DIET.

Sounds scary, but it wasn't all that bad when I started looking into it. Although I did cry a little on the inside when I was told that I wouldn't be able to drink coffee or alcohol. That's usually how my day begins and ends. With coffee then wine :-) For three weeks you cut out a bunch of foods and then slowly re-introduce them into your diet to see how you react to them. This is supposed to be one of the best ways to determine food allergies. Even more so than allergy tests. I'm not usually a diet kind of person, but I think the fact that this is short term and has helpful results made me willing to give it a try. I really hope to see some results whether it be weight loss or pin pointing food allergies.

Have you ever heard of the elimination diet or tried it yourself?

Weekend Shenanigans

It was a pretty low key weekend. I'm really loving low key weekends these days. Maybe it's a sign of my aging? :-)

I am now a week into my Elimination Diet (post to come tomorrow!) and yesterday I was having a serious drive to eat any sort of junk food I could. When I strolled the aisles at the grocery store I had to restrain myself from grabbing Pringles, donuts, and mini pies. I just wanted to devour anything sweet and bad for me. I strolled over to Fremont and went to The Flying Apron and found a muffin that fits my requirements. I paired it with some wu wei tea and sat down and indulged while reading my kindle.

It was sunny in Seattle on Sunday! I soaked it up. The sunglasses were dug out from deep inside my closet. I don't care that it was still freezing out, because if it's sunny, I'm happy.

My running outfit for the St. Pat's Dash on Sunday. All green-ed out! I was really happy with the race this year. The weather was absolutely PERFECT. A sunny Sunday morning in March..in Seattle? It snowed during last years race, and there was a torrential downpour the year before that! I guess third times the charm. There was over 15,000 people running the race! My body also felt really good. It was a welcome relief considering I've probably ran 4 times in the last month.

Hope everyone had a wonderful weekend!

NAIL FILES!

Happy Friday, Y'all!



Last weekend, my bestest friend Kitty came down to celebrate her birthday. We decided to go get our nails done at a new salon down the street from my house. Saturday also happened to be the day that my little miss Matilda went to her grooming appointment so she too got her nails done. Matilda is a big brat most of the time and loves to scratch my furniture..and me when she gets feisty. I had the soft paws put on. Hers are minty green and glow in the dark. Pretty awesome I think.

 

Mine are the dark Merlot colored ones, my best friend's are the red ones, and as you can tell, Matilda's are the green ones! If you're wondering whats around her neck, the groomers put a coffee filter with a rhinestone (to make it cute, obvs) on each cat so that they don't lick up the product.

Have a great weekend, everyone!

San Francisco Part Two

Once we arrived back to San Fran from wine country we set out like true tourists and hit most all the spots that we had on our agenda. We checked into our cute little hotel, Hotel Mark Twain, dumped our stuff off and made the trek to Chinatown. The three of us were beyond excited to start exploring and then we hit the hills. THE HILLS!!!

Seattle has some hills, believe me, but San Fran has hills that are so steep you feel like you might fall backwards when you walk up them. The San Franciscans are smart though and walk on their toes when climbing one of the many monster mini mountains. I took notes. None the less we still walked 99% of our adventures and only cabbed it when absolutely necessary.

 

Before returning our sweet convertible we stopped at a look out spot (1,5.) on the other side of the water from the city. When we finished with our food in Chinatown the three of us walked all the way to the worlds crookedest (their term, not mine :-) street: Lombard street (2,3). I don't know why anyone would want to actually drive down it. You're barely moving the entire time on a street jam packed with other cars and pedestrians. No thanks. We continued our walk because it was all down hill once we got to Lombard street. Might as well go down when you just hoofed it up a huge hill! I couldn't believe how much there was to look at. Including the gorgeous trees and flowers (4).

 Our hours long walk (1) led us to our next stop: Fisherman's Wharf. It was such a gorgeous sunny day, but wayy too cold for my liking on the water (4). We stopped at Ghiradelli (2,3) and had a delicious coffee with free chocolates. That place was PACKED, and I hate being in a place that is almost to capacity so we got the heck outta there and kept moving down the wharf. We did some trinket shopping and went into an empty looking wine bistro and drank and ate shrimp cocktails and bread :-)

 

Recognize the house in picture 5? I hope you do or else maybe we shouldn't be friends..This was absolutely a HUGE  highlight of my trip! Who didn't watch Full House growing up?! I can remember being a kid and my mom telling me that I better take my bath at that exact moment or I was going to miss watching Full House. Needless to say, I was in that bathtub before she could finish her sentence! Is it ridiculous that I still watch it when it comes on Nick at Nite?  Fun fact: we ran into a guy when we were taking pictures and he told us that the owners just put that gate up at the bottom of the stairs the week prior. One look at #Fullhousehouse on instagram and I knew why. People are all up on those stairs and standing at the front door taking pictures. Get serious people, let's have some respect. I think people forget that it's actually someones house. Which by the way, the house would NEVER fit the Full house layout in it. This place looks wayy tiny compared to how it looks in the show. I would love to know what the actual inside looks like. You can also see that the street (3) doesn't really seem fitting either. 

We also managed to make it over to the Mission District after we visited the Tanner's. We stopped in to La Cumbre (2) for burritos and beer. If you're a Man Vs. Food fan, then you'll remember that this was one of Adam's stops. It was really well priced and delicious. The burrito also came with chips that you could dip into all sorts of salsas that were at the salsa bar.

Overall it was a great trip. We got some nasty cold and rainy weather the last two days we were there so that deterred us from making it out to Alcatraz, but other than that we pretty much accomplished all we set out to do. We did so much walking, but I noticed after the fact that I was so occupied with all the sights around us that I didn't realize that we had walked two hours straight. The architecture is so different than Seattle, and the hills and city skyline also provided a welcome distraction. I think from the whole trip though, wine country was my favorite part. I'm in a city all the time so heading out to Mendocino county and slowing down was a great break from the norm.

Goals for the month

I've come to the realization that I love lists. Whether it be To-Do lists or a list with goals written down. There is something so fulfilling about writing something down and then being able to cross it off the list when it is completed.

Since this deployment has began, I've observed things in my life that have been affected since KC left for Afghanistan. It's funny to see that in 5 months I've experienced so many different feelings. To see all the positive things that have occurred is what is really great. Reflecting on these months I've been able to focus on me. I've started to make my eating habits better by meeting with a nutritionalist and figuring out what is fitting and nutritious for my body. I'm reading more books than I have ever before and I look forward to crawling into bed early just so I can pull out the kindle and read a few chapters. Having the same early bed time during the week makes me well rested, and I think has been one of the contributing factors to why I haven't gotten sick (while being surrounded by sickies) in over 6 months (flu shots are overrated, and I'm glad I have still yet to get one!) maybe the red wine and the nightly chamomile tea helped too ;-)

Becoming even more comfortable with having more "me" time has got me thinking that I only have a couple more months before KC comes back, and I'm sure once he returns it will throw a bit of a wrench in my all about me schedule. I'm an independent lady, but I know with the return of my soldier, some things will for sure be different. I'll probably start eating later in the evening, I'll most likely stay up later, and eat out more often. Obviously I'm more than excited that he's coming home, but changes will occur and I want to be able to balance the before and after and mesh the two together as much as possible. Until then though, I plan on documenting some goals for the next few months starting this month.

March Goals
-Complete my elimination diet successfully
-Become more efficient with meal planning and grocery shopping for the right amount of food
-Stretch everyday for at least 5-10min
-Run 2-3 times a week and get a workout of some sort in 4-5x a week
-Keep up with my reading plan (I veered off at the end of feb)
-Send KC a final care package

Have you experienced similar feelings of personal growth while your soldier was deployed?

Here's to a great March! I think it will be a good month..I mean daylight savings picks up again next weekend, and that always means longer days and sun ahead..AWESOME :-)