i'm still here...

...just been reading more than posting!  But...it's November now and time to wind down the year and start thinking about goals for the New Year.  I've been busy with "busy work" and haven't been making a priority of  more important things.  I've spent the last several weeks clearing out the clutter and cobwebs and am ready (after 4 months...) to get back on track and taking care of more important things!  Stay tuned!

home sweet home

Home from vacation!!!

We had back to back vacations this year.  One week in Punta Cana without the kiddos and then one week on North Captiva Island WITH the kids.  Needless to say, we had a GREAT time and came back with some brown skin.  It's been 4 years since we've had a long vacation with the kids (where it was JUST the 4 of us) and we had the best time.  Lots of fishing, shelling and island hopping.  And...a little bit of relaxing.

Now we've been back for a solid week and the laundry is caught up and we've made it through the long 4th of July weekend.

One thing that I wanted to do this summer and that we just started working on last week is eating FRESH and LOCAL food.  We're lucky in the fact that we're kinda in the country so finding roadside farm stands is pretty easy.  We're on the search for the best farm stand this summer.  We stopped at 6 last week alone...we had a "tomato tasting" between 3 of the stands!  Anyway, it was a great week back and we had fun shopping on the "outer aisles" and farm stands and getting some really good, local fruits and vegetables. I'll post some of our menus and recipes another day.

Another thing that we're focusing on this summer is driving less.  We live in a golf cart community and are able to get anywhere within the city limits on a golf cart.  Since Memorial Day, we've had 20 days where we've only driven the golf cart.  I'm hoping that we can get the number to 40 by Labor Day!

Anyway  -  this is a short post.  We're on our way to the swimming pool (in the golf cart...) and the kiddos are waiting.  Just wanted to check in and say that I'm still here (or that I'm back from vacationing...) and am looking forward to sitting down and catching up on all of my favorite bloggers posts!

suntanned toes...

...tickling the sand. 

Cold drink chilling in my right hand...

We're headed to the Dominican Republic this week for our "work vacation".  I call it a "work vacation" because it's an awards trip paid for by my husband's company.  Be back in 5 days! And did I mention we're kidless this week?  Woo Hoo!!

Nothing to do but breath all day until the big moon rises and it's time to play...

a letter from mr. president

For my Grandmother's 92nd birthday I requested and received a Happy Birthday note from President Obama.  I didn't know that you could request a congratulatory note from the President for special occasions until 2001 when I was pregnant with my youngest son.  I requested a note after his birth and received one from President and Mrs. Bush.  My second request for a special note was this spring when I requested the letter above for my grandmother.  I sent my request in February for her April 12th birthday.  The note didn't arrive on time, BUT it did arrive during her birthday month.  I was very excited!!!  Two requests...two notes!  Not a bad record.

So, how do you get a VIP note for special occasions?

Here's the info...

The White House will send greetings to U.S. citizens only for special occasions, as outlined below.

• 
  
  Advance notice required.  Your request must be received four weeks in advance of the event date.  Every effort is made to honor every request, but there is no guarantee of a greeting if this guideline is not met.  (Greetings generally are not send after the event date, except for wedding congratulations and newborn acknowledgments.)
• 
  
  Anniversary greetings are extended only to those couples who are celebrating their 50th (and subsequent) wedding anniversary.
• 
  
  Birthday greeting cards will be sent only to individuals 80 years of age or older.  A special card is sent for those who reach 100 years of age.
• 
  
  Other greetings: A limited number of special occasions other than birthdays and anniversaries exist for which the Greetings Office will send appropriate recognition to U.S. citizens.  These include:

1. 
   
   Wedding (send your request after the event; include couple's married names)
2. 
   
   Baby's birth.  Send request only after baby's birth, include baby's date of birth, and full names and address of baby and parents
3. 
   
   Eagle Scout Award
4. 
   
   Girl Scout Gold Award
5. 
   
   Bar/Bat Mitzvah or equivalent occasion

The following information much be included in your request:

1. Name and home address of honoree(s)
2. Form of address (Mr., Ms., Mrs., Dr., etc.)
3. Exact date of occasion (month/day/year)
4. Age (birthdays) or number of years of marriage
5. Your (requestor's) name and daytime phone number
6. Any specific mailing instructions if other than to honoree's address

Send your request to:

The White House Greetings Office

Room 39, Eisenhower Executive Office Building

Washington, DC 20502

When should you expect your greeting?  "In most cases, greetings will be mailed from the White House approximately 10 days prior to the event.  If you have made a special delivery request, every effort is made to honor that request."  (Note...It took 4 1/2 months to receive my note after my son was born, and then I received my grandmother's note the month of her birthday)

So - next time you need to send a unique gift to someone consider requesting a letter from the President.  I think it makes a great memento (regardless of your political affiliations)!  The notes are free and if you wanted, you could frame for the honoree to hang on his/her wall! 

grocery game update

$447 worth of groceries!

...and I paid $210!

I've posted before about the Grocery Game and how much I love it!  This past week there were some great sales that I fully took advantage of.  Take a look!  Probably the one thing that will stand out most is how much processed food I bought.  Yes...there is a lot.  I stocked up on crackers, Fiber One bars and cookies for our vacation.  We're spending a week at a beach house and are taking almost all the food that we'll need.  At least half of what was purchased is for the beach.  Some of the snacks are for my kids for when they fly to see Grandma at the end of this week.  They're flying by themselves and I want them to have a few snacks for the airplane ride.   

And, I guess the post wouldn't be complete without a picture of how I'm able to save the money.  Coupons!  I always wait and get the Sunday paper on Sunday night or Monday when the store has combined 2 papers for a lesser price.  I'm able to get 2 papers for $3 instead of 1 paper for $2.  When the coupons are exceptionally good, I'll purchase 4 papers for $6.

$237 saved.

an intentional summer

Yesterday I mentioned a blogger who wrote about having an Intentional Summer.  Here is a link to the posts by Rebecca at Turned Loose.  If you haven't already, take a look at it when you get time!

We're on Day 11 of our summer.  Here's what we've done so far intentionally...

Day 1 - Family Night.  Grilled hamburgers & hot dogs.  Played board games with the kids.
Day 2 - Watched Ferris Bueller's Day Off as a family. 
Day 3 - Drove into "the city" to get fishing stuff for our vacation.  Ate lunch at the kid's favorite drive-in.  My oldest son had a friend sleep over.
Day 4 - Went to a Memorial Day party/cookout at a friend's house.
Day 5 - Went on a Night Hike in our woods and caught lightening bugs.
Day 6 - Went swimming with friends
Day 7 - Went to a country Farm Stand and planned dinner based on what looked good at the stand.
Day 8 - Went to pool until it started raining.  Kids got to have pizza for dinner--hubby & I got to have sushi...everyone was happy! 
Day 9 - Went to see Cheap Trick in concert at our town's amphitheater.  So much fun!!!
Day 10 - Took boys fishing at the lake.
Day 11 - Football camp.  My oldest son rec'd his airsoft gun that he'd ordered (using his own money) & spent the day in the woods having target practice.
Day 12 - Repeat of Day 11 only adding some tennis in there for me!

We live in a golf cart community so we've been trying to have days where we're "golf cart only" and don't drive our car.  So far this summer we have 7 days of only driving the golf cart! 

So that's it so far! We're in prep-mode right now getting ready for our vacations. The kids leave Thursday for Grandmas. Hubby & I leave Monday for the DR. Then we all get back next Friday/Saturday and leave Sunday for our family vacation.  So the next couple of days our intent will be getting ready to go (for the most part -- I bet we can throw some fun in there too)!!!! 

m.i.a. --- school's out --- summer's here ---

Missing in action...that's been me!  I can't believe I haven't posted anything in almost 2 weeks!  We've been busy wrapping up the school year and beginning our summer.  School got out for us the Friday before Memorial Day.  So...that last week of school was jammed packed with fun things happening at the school.  It also was the start of football season in our neck of the woods!  Yes...football season!  Lucky for us our family LOVES football, so passing out pads and helmets and having football tryouts the last week of May sounded like a great idea to us!  :)  This week the boys are in football camp each morning!

We're into our second week of summer now and we've been having a great time.  Somewhere I read about a blogger who is having an Intentional Summer.  I'll have to go back and find the posts that I read, so that I can link it.  When I read the bloggers posts I thought it sounded like a great idea.  How many summers (or ANY breaks from school...) do we have a mental list of all the fun things that we want to do, only to the week before school starts to realize we've accomplished nothing on our mental list.  This is what I want and plan to avoid!

I asked my boys some of the things that they really wanted to do this summer.  The requests ranged from having a lemonade stand to going hiking up in the mountains.  All were fairly inexpensive outings that will make some wonderful memories.

So...we're having an Intentional Summer this year.  I'll find the blog/post so that I can link it, and I'll share with you what we've been doing so far!

tainted muffins

In order to get my kids to eat healthy, I sometimes have to be sneaky about it.  In fact, sometimes I flat out lie to them about what ingredients are in their food and why their food sometimes might look different.  And, you know what?  I have no problems lying about this. 

After reading over at Premeditated Leftovers about how ground flax seed could easily be substituted for eggs and/or vegetable oil, I decided to try it and see if I could sneak it into my kids diet.   I first tried Blueberry Muffins.  Well...these weren't a hit with my kids.  Not because they didn't like the way that they taste, BUT...because they didn't like the way that they taste.  Turns out that they just don't like Blueberry Muffins.  Well, my husband and I love Blueberry Muffins so we were happy to eat them.

I remembered that my kids LOVE Chocolate Chip Muffins. I made these next.  I turned these into a healthier version by substituting the 3 Tablespoons of oil with 6 Tablespoons of ground flax seeds.  My oldest son asked why they were darker than normal and I said that they are made with some whole grains.  (The flax will make the batter a little bit darker making it look wheat instead of white.) They LOVED these muffins!

So - In the future, I will continue to taint our muffins and will be branching out to cupcakes and cookies and anything else I think I might be able to sneak a spoonful of flax into!  Try it for yourself if you haven't already...you're in for a treat!

Food Waste Friday

In an conscious attempt to keep food waste to a minimum, I join The Frugal Girl and many other bloggers each week and participate in Food Waste Friday. I clean out my refrigerator, line up any waste on the counter, (usually) take a picture and post it on my blog. After doing this for a while, I can honestly say that I work throughout the week to eat (or feed my children) what's in the fridge so that I don't have it to post on Fridays!

When my in laws came to visit last week they packed a cooler with sandwiches and drinks for their 11 hour car ride to get here.  I think this is a great idea!  When they got here they had sandwiches left over and put them in the fridge.  Six days later they left to head back home, taking with them the same bag of (leftover) sandwiches to eat on the way home.


What do you think?  Would you eat six day old sandwiches to avoid wasting them?

things to do

Today is a boring post...I know.  I've got lots to do today, so I'm posting my list to motivate and encourage me to get it all done by 2:20 when I get the boys from school.

Take tent to friends house
Go to Home Depot to order screen door for my pantry (another story for another post!)
Check out Weight Watcher times/meetings
Call for kennel/trainer for our dog during June
Get 3 poster boards to paint sample wall colors on
Log spending
Send card to my grandmother
Write cards for kids Sunday School teachers (Sunday is teacher appreciation day)
Laundry - wash son's baseball uniform for tonight
Clean/Clorox boys bathroom
Vacuum upstairs
make fruit tray for...
son's class play at 9:30
baseball camp info - send $ to MIL
sign up for youngest Adventure Camp
sign both up for football camp

Operation Jiggly Bits - FINAL summary

Today is my final summary for Operation Jiggly Bits (a bit of a repeat from last week...sorry!).  Thank you Carla for creating this challenge and keeping us motivated and holding us accountable.  I think accountability counts for so much when working towards meeting my goals!  I must say that I didn't rise to the challenge as much as I thought I would when OJB began, but here are several changes that I've made that I plan to continue even though the challenge is over.


Drinking more water.
Before OJB there would be days that I would go without drinking water. Drinking Diet Cokes has always been a bad habit with me and I would tend to only drink my water when I was playing tennis. However, there were many days when I'd show up to the tennis court with a Diet Coke in my hand. Not good...I know. Now I'm trying to only drink my Diet Cokes first thing in the morning and switch to water for lunch, afternoons and with dinner. When I'm really craving a soda in the afternoons, I've found a natural diet soda...Zevia that I will drink instead. Zevias are sweetened with Stevia instead of artificial sweeteners AND they are caffeine free. My goal is to eventually stop drinking Diet Cokes and switch to Zevias when I want a soft drink.

Drinking less wine.
Instead of sharing an entire bottle of wine each week night with my DH, we are drinking only ONE glass of wine after we put the kids to bed.

Veggies & Fruit.
Unless I could count my wine as a fruit, before OJB I was definitely not getting in my fruits and veggies most days of the week. I think out what I'm going to eat throughout the day and if I don't have enough fruits/veggies incorporated in my meals, I'll make myself a Green Monster. With the Green Monsters I can load all my F&V's into one drink.

Exercise.
I am working on this still. I play a lot of tennis...about 8 hours a week. And while it's great cardio and I know it's good for my body, I need something more than this to lose weight. I really need to be running and lifting weights as well. I'm still working on incorporating this in my daily/weekly routines!

Clean Eating.
Before OJB I hadn't heard too much about eating "clean". In the past 6 weeks though I've done my research and realize just how easy it is to eat clean. This is definitely an area that I've opened my eyes to and am slowing weeding out processed and man-made foods and adding more and more clean foods. I look forward to getting to where we're eating the majority of our meals and snacks as clean foods.

The bottom line.
More than anything else, over the last 6 weeks I've developed a new attitude. One where I realize when I'm making healthy choices, and one where I realize when I'm making choices that if I made even the slightest change, I would greatly benefit from it.

Here are my final, final numbers...

Weight: 142....141
Chest: 37.5....37
Waist: 31.5....30.5
@belly button: 34.5....32
Hips: 39....38.5
Thighs: 22.3....21
Biceps: 12.25....11.5

I haven't said goodbye to all of my jiggly bits, but at least to 6+ inches of them!  Thanks again Carla...it was a FUN challenge!

planning for guests

One my list of 210 Things to Do I challenged myself to plan ahead for guests and to not only know what I was going to feed to them each and every meal, but to also have all the ingredients on hand beforehand.   Failing to have a plan before guests arrived set us up to spend more time and money deciding what we wanted to eat and by eating out meals that we could have had at home.

My in-laws arrived last night for a 5 night stay.  I'm pleased to tell you that I have each meal planned and almost all of the ingredients on hand before they got here.  The only thing I'll need to purchase is fresh bread and fresh veggies for a couple of weekend meals.  While I like having a plan, we're always flexible to go out to eat if that's what everyone wants to do.  My in-laws aren't big eaters and normally only eat 2 meals per day (max...), so something light for breakfast and lunch is all they want.  If I make too much food it'll just go to waste.

Here's what we've got planned:

Last night:  They got in late, so we had soup, salad, bread

Today
Breakfast: fruit, muffins
Lunch: turkey sandwiches (smoked the turkey yesterday), chips, fruit
Dinner: crock-pot spaghetti, salad, bread

Friday
Breakfast: Grandparents Day Breakfast at the school
Lunch: turkey sandwiches for my FIL.  I'm planning on taking my MIL to lunch at a tea room
Dinner:  Lasagna, mushrooms, salad, bread

Saturday
Breakfast:  fruit, cinnamon rolls
Lunch: Leftovers or Sandwiches
Dinner:  Steaks, sweet potatoes, asparagus

Sunday
Breakfast: fruit, breakfast bread
Lunch: at the golf club for Mother's Day
Dinner: Hamburgers & Hotdogs, potato salad, beans, chips, fruit

Monday:
Breakfast: I'm not sure if they'll want to eat before they leave, but I'll have same type of light morning food ready for them.

mother's day gifts

I'm curious to know what kinds of gifts you give your mother's and MIL's for Mother's Day?

I always try to find things and give things that I would enjoy receiving as a gift, and things that are fairly inexpensive because we don't budget a whole lot for gifts.  Our gifts for our moms this year are Janie's Cakes.  And they are delicious!  But I kind of feel guilty that I'm not buying something expensive because I know many people who give their moms very nice and very expensive gifts.  It makes me wonder if I'm in the minority on what people spend on their mothers.

I'd love your input.  What do you give your mom for Mother's Day?