Addicted

The greeting card aisle is a dangerous zone for me,

I could live there for hours joyously laughing inside.

My desire is to usually buy the lucky card receiver four or five cards but - that's weird - plus expensive and what do you really do with a card after you've opened it and read the love?

You toss it. 

(Ha! Unless your me and then it gets placed in a very special cardboard box, stored away, probably never to be read again.)

Oh, it's so hard to choose just one.

I ran into this problem recently and decided to take pictures of the cards that were sadly being placed back into their "bday humor" section.

Seriously, I could not leave these bizarre, so strange they're funny, scripted words behind.

I'm addicted.

An Adventure with Cousin A.

A few months ago when my sister Shanny was incredibly ill (Boo to that! She's thankfully so much better.) her daughter came and stayed with us for a week and it was an adventure for sure! 

A lovely adventure.

Here are some of my favorite moments.

She was still made a crown and dubbed Queen of the table by her cousins even after throwing Ruckus down the stairs. :)

Moo and Cousin A - best buds Forever!

Opting to eat Minnie Mouse for Dinner.

She liked it.

She was all sorts of cute for church!

The Beloved with the girls.

We had a toe nail painting party while she was here.

The baby's first time painting nails.

Cousin A's and Moo's toes.

We love this sweet ball of energy! Adore her actually.

Even though she kept us on our toes she definitely knew how to work her way into our hearts.

Random Photos that Need to be in the Blog Book.

24 Hour Pharrell Music Video Party.

They were pretty pooped the next day.

Little C's friend Zach

But not too tired to dump their heads in water filled buckets.

Because that sounds fun? :)

Ruckus

Moo

The Lap-a-Thon

Little C and his friend Ethan

Do you see Moo going strong, running ahead of Little C?

Ruckus with a buddy from his class.

Go Lou!

Handing out high fives left and right.

Marks of all the laps ran.

Luigi and Mario

Mustaches sent from Grandma.

The Aquarium -

Where Sea animals really exist but you can't tell because we were hanging out in the tropical bird section.

Our neighbor had a bird land on her head.

Ruckus was FREAKED.

Lou embraced it.

Moo thought - Party On Wayne!

Party on Garth.

The Zoo.

My Sexy Model.

My Beautiful Baby.

And the...

I Don't Know Who Wants it More

Photo. :)

I'm Finally Learning at age 32-

That I can't have Hostess Ding Dongs for Breakfast.

Well I guess I can but I shouldn't.

Lame.

And it's hard because sugar used to be the only thing helping me jump out of bed in the mornings-

A piece of chocolate cake and Pepsi for breakfast! Yes Please. Totally on board. 

In my past (before 5th child) life I could eat whatever I wanted and still maintain a healthy "looking" weight as long as I worked out at least three times a week.

But, three months after my sweet baby girl was born I still weighed as much as I did before I gave birth.  I was twenty pounds over my initial before prego weight and eating whatever I wanted wasn't working so well. Heart-breaker for sure. 

It turns out another one of my mother's pieces of advice that I should have listened to a Loooonnngg time ago was signing up for Weight Watchers.

Around February last year I became a member and after participating for approximately 6 months I shed all of the baby weight, losing over 20 lbs. 

Now, I'm not one to push healthy eating. In fact I'm the mom who tried to make Little C take a 24 pack of Dr. Pepper to his school party because I get so sick of hearing about "healthy snacks". Who wants a healthy snack at a freaking party? Isn't that just called a regular-not-at-a-celebration-everyday-snack?

P.S. My good, mature kid wouldn't take in the pop. Boo. :)

Anyway, the great thing I learned from Weight Watchers was paying attention to what I am putting into my body. Tis all. I eat more fruits and veggies now and I am conscious about how many cookies I eat. I promise I'll always say yes to a cookie - but just one. Not seven.

Oh and the pop.  We were close. Still are. But I only try to have one a day instead of 57. I haven't been strong enough to say farewell forever yet. One day.

I think the major change was my water intake. I drink a ton of water and it makes this body feel so great.

I also walk.

Who knew this could make such a difference? Well I'm sure many people knew - but I always assumed I had to do some huge magnificent work out to get meaningful exercise and see results. 

This body responds to walking. 

So... there you have it. Success in being healthy is not a secret diet or some new pill or extreme work out. It's eating healthy and regular exercise - exactly what most people have been telling me all along.

 It's kind of disappointing . :)

Here's the KitKat  M&M cake.that about threw me over the edge. It was beautiful. I almost ate if for breakfast many times. :)

A couple times a month we exercise as a family.

We call it Family Size.

A few nights ago we embarked on the extreme (I know - I just said extreme is not necessary. This was for fun) Insanity workout.

Warming Up.

Shirts comin' off. :)

Good times.

And to end, 

I'll share a weird, funny thing we do.

Anytime a screen is paused in our house everyone in the room has to make the same face as the one showing on the TV. Then we look around at each, holding the expression, and laugh.

Here are our impressions of Shaun T.

I couldn't hold the face long enough for a picture without laughing.