Summer Recap

I know I've been neglecting my blog... I've been busy making memories with the family. Here's a picture recap of our summer...

Cheaus had a party and dinner at Red Robin for his birthday

Josh's work sponsored a family night at the Bellingham Bells game. Boundary Bay BBQ and playing with the mascots! So fun!

We moved! Hallelujah no more apartments! We are now Lyndenites! Whoop! Whoop!

Elli had a Little Mermaid Birthday party at the new house. 

Elli got a new to her bike

We enjoyed the Lynden Fair... was so nice being able to walk there from the new house.

This is Joshua's first rodeo!

We are not against child labor in the Price household, kids are getting the car all sparkley for Josh.

And to bring our summer to an end, we joined our friends (and old neighbors) at Wild Waves in Federal Way for a special birthday celebration for their girls. 

My Journey to Better Health, Part 5

"VIGINTI, VEINTE, VENTI!!!"

I did not mean to abandon this series for so long! Some of you may have been wondering if I'm still keeping up with my health journey. Sorry to leave you all in the dark! We've been staying busy here finishing up the school year, having Gabriel's birthday party, took our first real family vacation, had all the kids sick with colds/sinus infection for a week and had Josh away for a week for fire training in Texas. So, not a lot of blogging time for me.
I've been doing really well at keeping up with my exercise routine of working out on my elliptical machine for 20 minutes every morning except Sundays and have only missed 1 or 2 days since getting the machine! I've also been trying to stay active throughout the rest of the day and going on walks or playing outside with the kids later in the day. Eating well is also going well, even while we were on vacation! Juicing has fallen by the wayside for a bit, but I'm hoping to get back into that soon.
I've had days where I felt like nothing was improving, no weight was being lost and just plain discouragement, but I pushed through it and kept working and am now starting to see the affects. I feel like I'm slimming down, but thanks to being a taller person haven't gone down in my clothing size yet. Finally yesterday, curiosity got to me and Elli and I walked over to the fitness center here and used their scale to check my weight... I lost TWENTY pounds! I can't believe it! I was expecting maybe 10, but not 20!

I have lost the equivalent of 2- 10 lb bags of potatoes!!!

I'm so thankful to all of you who encourage me and all of you are on similar health journeys, it's such a blessing to think of you all while I'm working towards my goals. Let's keep working hard!

Surprise!!!

This past Tuesday (May 29th) we all loaded up in the Durango and headed off for a drive. I had already packed for everyone and had it loaded up. The kids had no idea where we were going. They came to consensus that we must be going to Auntie Trish's and Uncle Ben's because we never go anywhere else. After we past the Auburn area, they decided we must be going to visit my sister Shandi.
Shandi lives right down the road from our destination, so I let them keep on thinking that until we surprised them with the real destination in the video below!

I love how Gabe is pretending to not be excited... LOL!

Here are some pictures of our fun time!

Joshua... He's getting all grown up & stuff... He needs to stop that!

Zaccheaus warming up in the kiddy pool

Elli getting sprayed at the Fort McKenzie part of the waterpark

She loved spraying everyone at the jet skis

Having fun at the kiddy slides

Shandi, Seaira, Sariah and Shanel(pictured above) came to play (a little fuzzy I know, but it was the best I got of her)

We watched the clocktower show each night we were there... The rhythm of nature song is now emblazoned into my memory and that's not a good thing. the show was filled with "lovely" lines like "trust the great wolfs howl" and "there's nothing to be scared of here, trust in Mother Nature"... Um, ya given the chance that great wolf would eat you and last time I checked nature cannot be trusted! ;-)

The story time afterwards was good though and the younger two enjoyed meeting the animal characters. On the first night Zaccheaus got all dressed up in his outfit just like the character Oliver, only to find out they just bring out one character each night and that night was Wiley's turn to be out for story time. The story reader lady noticed him all decked out in his Oliver garb, so she brought Oliver out for story time the second night we were there.

Zaccheaus and Oliver

Now Oliver being the mischievous raccoon that he is, sometimes is known to steal things... Like the story teller's book or a kids hat. Well, this evening Oliver was so excited that Zaccheaus dressed up just like him, he tried stealing Zaccheaus! He started walking off with him & Zaccheaus went right along with him... Of course they didn't go far and Oliver quickly returned my boy to me. 

Gabe joined us for story time on the second night and Oliver gave him nooggies to get him to smile for the camera. 

We all had a great time and the kids are all already ready to go back again!

To all the mom's out there....

Life's a beach

Last Sunday evening we were sitting here in our apartment, bellies full from a big Sunday lunch, trying to figure out what to do with the rest of our evening. The sun was out we could take the kids to play at Boulevard Park (or any other park) and walk the boardwalk... Which we do quite often. Go out to eat, but we weren't hungry. Go to a store and look around.... What to do? Then Josh suggests, why don't we drive out to Lummi, buy some fireworks and build a fire on the beach. Um, ya, lets do that! The kids will love it!

I walked around gathering beach glass, I ended up with about twice as much =)

Gabe is having fun... This is his happy face. ;-)

 Hello little ferry boat, I think it's about time I go ride you again and check out that little island you go to.

Beautiful sunset over Gooseberry Point. 

Walk/Run for Life

Hi All! The family and I are participating int the Walk for Life again this year.  The WFL takes place on May 19 at Abundant Life Church here in Bellingham. The Walk is the primary fundraiser for the Whatcom County Pregnancy Clinic, a non profit crisis pregnancy clinic downtown. If you would be interested in donating to our fundraising efforts please visit our fundraising page where you can donate or even sign up to walk with us.

My Journey to Better Health, Pt. 4

"My new Toy"

I have wanted an elliptical machine for a really long time. I've watched craigslist and thrift stores, but never came across one. One day while Josh was at Sears looking at tools, I popped over to the exercise equipment and fell in love with this elliptical. They had a used one at a great price & I was hoping to get it. Josh's only worry was where would we put it. There's not exactly an abundance of space with 6 people living in this apartment. We decided to give away our oldest computer and clear out what was my old desk area and I could fit it there. This process ended up taking longer than I planned and I missed out on the used one. Bummer! The next week's Sears add came in the Sunday paper and the same one was going to be on sale $400 off! Plus if I used my Sears card I would save 5% more! And I had a $5 off coupon (every penny counts!), so I got a screaming deal on a NEW one, cheaper than the used one I originally looked at!

My first few times on it, it was evident how out of shape I was. I could hardly do more than 5 minutes of a jogging speed without needing to stop. But I was determined not to be discouraged. I've kept at it exercising every morning, except Sundays and I've gotten up to being able to do 20 minutes! I'm doing just over a half a mile and increasing the resistance each week. This thing will be whipping my butt into shape in no time!

A bump in the night

One morning about two weeks ago, I went to grab something out of the truck and stumbled upon this scene....

Hmm... are those tail-light pieces under my bumper? Oh wait the bumper is cracked and hanging a little weird and the license is all mangled up.... Yep, I think someone really did hit the truck! No note left, so I called the police and reported it as a hit and run.
Later that day I went out for a bit and then returned home and found this guy in our parking lot...

HaHa! I found you! I had no clue which neighbor this was, so I had to search them out... Turned out to be the guy who lives right next door to me! I spent most the next day stressed about having to confront him and on more than one instance decided to let Josh just deal with it, but I knew it was my responsibility. I prayed for God to ease my nerves, give me the right words to say and to protect me from any danger. Then when I saw his car back in our lot, I took Elli with me (no one can be angry with her cuteness around) and  I headed over to his apartment. At first he played dumb but agreed to give me his insurance information. Then I explained to him that a police officer might contact him, because technically this was a hit and run (his girlfriend wasn't too happy with him about that one). But, if we could just get the truck repaired I wouldn't press charges and this could be done with. The last thing I want to do is create strife between my neighbors and I. They were both thankful for my attitude and were very cooperative with me.
After getting their info and talking with their insurance, I took the truck into Olsen's and had an estimate done, $1000 worth of damage was done and it would take almost a week to get it fixed. So, a rental car would be available for me. This is what I ended up getting...

2012 Chrysler Town & Country... Now note; I am one of those people that HATES mini vans. But, man! This thing is fancy! The keys have buttons to open and close the back doors and the trunk, satellite radio, leather seats, dvd system and more than enough room for my family and all our accoutrements.  Since we had such a plush ride this week Josh decided to go check out the new Cabela's over the weekend and visit his brother in Auburn. The kids and I have been looking forward to our daily errand runs and enjoyed a trip down to Skagit County to check out the tulips. 

Look at all that space they have! I'm definitely going to miss it! I'm not going to miss the V-6 engine and an average of 18 mpg! My Jetta TDI has ruined me, if it doesn't get close to 45 mpg, I don't want it! Yes, I know I can't get 45 mpg and fit a family of 6 in the vehicle, but a girl can dream right? Maybe Josh can design one and make us millions! LOL

My Journey to Better Health, Pt 3

"Getting my juices flowing"


I have had numerous friends suggest that I watch the documentary "Fat, Sick and Nearly Dead" and give juicing a try... They were all on juicing diets, seeing great results and loving it. I've never been one to jump on bandwagons or follow the fads, so it takes me a while to finally give something a try.
One night while searching for something to watch on Hulu we came across the documentary and decided it was time to listen to my friends and see what it was all about. What was different in this movie that I hadn't already heard from all those infomercials in the 80's and 90's? My brother had a mini juicer back when I was in high school and it ended up being too much of a hassle cutting the fruit and cleaning the machine that no one ever really used it. More recently Josh's mom gave us an old full size juicer, but it had the same fate as the previous one... Never being used. (Actually we ended up selling it on Craigslist in our failed attempt to move off to Texas.)
Anyhoo... back to the documentary. Josh and I were very skeptical at first, but the movie won us over. They went over how a healthy diet needs to be more micro-nutrient (or was it macro-nutrient?) based, as in the pyramid below;

note; I have no idea who Dr Fuhrman is, he just had the right pyramid on his site =)

While Josh and I weren't too keen on cutting down our meat/protein consumption to once a week and the idea of Josh "rarely" eating a steak is almost laughable. We did glean a few good points from the movie and decided to give juicing a try. The day after watching the movie I found a Jack LaLanne juicer at Costco and brought it home. The following weekend we went to Cash and Carry and bought a pallet cart full of fruits and veggies to try. We quickly learned what combos we liked and those we didn't.
Now we are about a month out from that and I've been making (mostly orange based) juices every morning and often make either a juice mix or a salad for lunch and have a regular dinner. I've also cut down my caffeine consumption from 1-3 servings a day to about 3 servings per week and have been working on drinking more water to stay hydrated. What a huge difference it has made! Between the juicing and the vitamins I started taking, I really feel the difference in my health... I haven't even had a single migraine since I started juicing! 

I encourage you all to watch the movie and see if juicing can benefit you! 

And here's a little video for you to watch and laugh at the juicing craze from back in the day... If you are not familiar with In Living Color or Jim Carrey's early work, this may not be funny to you. To me it's hilarious! ;-)

Bham Herald Cute Kid Contest

I entered a picture of Elizabeth into the the Bellingham Herald's Cutest Kid Contest in hopes of winning a gift certificate to our favorite consignment shop. Hop on over to their page and vote for her, please. =)

Read more here: http://bellinghamherald.upickem.net/engine/SubmissionWidgetView.aspx?PageType=VOTING&ContestID=56530&SubmissionID=19155769&IncrementNumber=1#storylink=cpy

Angel Food Loaf Cake

I know it's a little ridiculous to post a dessert recipe during a series on better health and loosing weight, but I don't care! LOL! Actually this recipe does play into that a little bit, as I found it on my search for smaller desserts. I wanted to make something special that would have little left overs and less temptations to eat more than I should. So here is my recipe for an Angel Food Loaf Cake that I altered a bit from this cookbook.

Ingredients:

1/2 cup sifted cake flour

1/4 cup sugar

2/3 cup (5) egg whites

1/2 tsp cream of tartar

dash of salt

1/2 tsp vanilla

1/4 tsp lemon extract

1/2 cup sugar

Preheat oven to 375 Degrees.

Sift Flour with 1/4 cup sugar 4 times.

Beat egg whites, cream of tartar, salt, vanilla, and lemon extract until egg whites are stiff enough to hold up in soft peaks but are still moist and glossy.

Add remaining 1/2 cup of sugar to egg whites,  2 tablespoons at a time, beating after each addition to blend. 

Sift about 1/4 of the flour mixture over egg white mixture and fold in lightly. Fold in remaining flour by fourths. 

Bake in un-greased 10x5x3 inch loaf pan in moderate over (375 degrees) for 25 minutes or until done. Remove from oven, invert pan, and let stand for 1 hour or until cool.

Yummy! But it needs a little something more......

PERFECT!!!

Great Wolf Lodge "Oliver" look a like contest

I rarely ever do any of the online contests, since the odds are so low of winning. But I had to enter this one from the Great Wolf Lodge. Great Wolf is looking for pictures of kids who look like their newest character Oliver the raccoon.

photo from greatwolf.com


And I just so happen to have this picture of cute little Zaccheaus in his explorer outfit...

I can enter up to 10 times with different pictures, but I think this one is pretty good. What do you think? They even both have glasses!

We've been wanting to go to GWL for years, this would be a great chance to go check them out!

My Journey To Better Health, Pt. 2

"Check yourself before you wreck yourself"

My first step on my new weight loss journey was to learn what condition I was really in. As I was saying in my last post as the fall turned into winter I was becoming more and more tired and lacked the energy to just do normal day to day things. I was like Eeyore from the Winnie the Pooh stories, LOL. Of course my over active imagination went into high gear thinking of all the things that could be wrong with me. Did I have Diabetes? Or maybe my iron levels were just low? So as soon as my medical insurance became active I scheduled an appointment with my Dr.
He ordered a whole panel of lab work to check for diabetes, my cholesterol levels, my kidney function, my thyroid function and all my vitamin levels. Everything came back perfectly normal, with one exception. My vitamin D levels were really low. "Vitamin D, really?" I thought "I take a vitamin D supplement almost every day". The Dr, suggested that I up my supplements to 2,000 IU's a day and make sure I take it every day. I did and after the first week I was feeling really good, but would still start feeling tired mid day. So, I decided to up my supplement to 3,000 IUs, plus the 800 in my daily vitamins. This made the hugest difference! Right away I started being more active. Seriously, the second day of taking the 3,800 IUs I was running around the backyard playing soccer with the boys. Something I hadn't done in over a year. I'm sure it didn't hurt that by this time the sun had finally started coming out and the weather was perfect for playing outdoors.
I learned online that vitamin d deficiency is a very serious problem that can lead to the bone disease Rickets, because without vitamin d your body can not absorb all the calcium it needs. Because we live in an area with low sun exposure (Did you know Alaska gets more sun than Western Washington?), I don't drink milk and was spending most of my time indoors through the fall and winter I wasn't getting all the natural vitamin d that my body needed. Thankfully it didn't effect me in a way that would have lasting consequences, like bone damage.
Hearing that I was perfectly healthy was such a relief! Now I just needed to make positive changes to my diet and lifestyle to keep everything that way!

My Journey To Better Health, Pt. 1

"Failure to Plan is Planning to Fail"

I hope you don't mind or get bored by these posts, but I have decided to chronicle my weight loss/ health improvement journey here.

I have always had the idea that as long as I felt healthy, could keep up with the kids and still fit into my clothes; it didn't matter what my weight was. That was until after going up a size with each pregnancy and then I discovered I had put on 20 lbs after having one my last child and never changed a clothing size. Slowly I wasn't able to keep up with the kids as much as I used to and began to feel sick more often than not. I knew I needed to change something... to eat healthier and exercise more, but felt trapped because of our past limitations, when we were without a regular income. Eating healthier usually means spending more on fresh healthy food and how does one exercise regularly in the rainiest state of the US without some sort of indoor equipment or membership at a gym? I was bound and determined to make a change as soon as I was able to.

I thought that opportunity had come when I friend put together a weight loss accountability group back in the fall. Josh was working again and I had the support of a small group of friends, I was going to succeed this time, right? Wrong! As fall turned into winter and the holidays came around I found it harder and harder to put forth the effort needed (more on this in a later post) to succeed at my goal I had set of losing 30lbs by spring. I would lose 5lbs, gain it back, lose 3 and just yo-yo back and forth. Very discouraging. Looking back I realized my problem was that I had no plan of attack and made no drastic changes to my daily habits that would produce lasting results.

Which brings us to now. I have made some changes and am seeing some results (mostly health wise, not so much weight wise yet) and would love the support of my friends and family who read this blog to cheer me on. I have a lofty goal of losing 50 lbs by the end of the summer, which would bring down to my pre-3rd pregnancy weight. The next installment of this series should be up in the next couple of days. Then there will probably be weekly or bi-weekly follow ups. If you'd like to join me in this journey, we can talk more about the changes I'm making one on one sometime.

Pray for me friends this is going to take some major strength and determination.

He Finally Lost It

Zaccheaus has this tooth that's been growing in behind all his others. He calls it his shark tooth. Even though this adult tooth had been coming through for almost a month, his baby teeth were not coming loose. We think it might be because he grinds his teeth so bad at night all his teeth are tightly pushed into his gums. He's almost 7 and hasn't lost a single tooth! Josh and I have been working at loosening his baby tooth all week long and finally last night Josh was able to pull it out. 

He's happy to have it out, as it was starting to cause some pain.
Now to start this whole process over again, since the next adult tooth is starting to break through. ;-)

Valentines Dinner

Valentine's Day usually isn't that big of a deal in the price household, but this year I thought we were in need of a little something special. So I put together this little dinner for our family;

The table was set

Dinner was made, simple yet delicious! The place mats are pieces of card stock that I wrote "I love you" on with a metallic sharpie.

Extra special items as a centerpiece, the cross has the Corinthians love verses on it. The willow tree figures represent our kids.

 

Close up of our table cloth. It's a plastic one from Fred Meyer. I don't really like the traditional Vday colors, but this one fit my style perfectly!

The best part (IMO). A simple yet special dessert, boxed brownie mix, whipped cream & chocolate sauce.

I have a real problem with over planning things and not being able to execute all the great ideas I have thought of. Which leads to the end result of me being frustrated and no one enjoying the evening, because mommy is grumpy. So this year I was purposeful to plan a simple menu and simple decorations that 1. didn't cost a ton of money and 2. were easy to execute even with being gone most the afternoon at my book study class. Josh commented that it was probably his best Valentine's Day ever. This comment did come after he took a nap (while the kids were outside and I was making dinner) and after he had a few glasses of wine with his steak dinner. But, I'm taking it as a complement regardless and think I was successful in my simple attempt! =)

Did you do anything for Valentine's Day?

January 2012

Not a lot of time for blogging lately. Seems when we've been staying home we've had one sickness or another and I don't really feel like blogging at those times. Other times we're constantly going-going-going and I'm exhausted at the end of the day and don't feel like even thinking, let alone blogging. LOL

Below is a picture recap of the month of January...

Josh and I went shooting with some of the guys from Conoco Phillips (his new job). I shot his Glock and his AR and was getting pretty good with the Glock, but at one point I had my hand in the wrong spot and the slide part came back and took a small chunk out of my knuckle on my thumb. Josh got to shoot the other guys' guns like the dessert eagle pictured above.

I signed up online to get a unit study from Panda Express about the Chinese New Year and it came with a DVD, craft papers (making lanterns above), worksheets and 32 coupons for free kids meals! Seriously we still have like 15 of those coupons left, I've been giving them out to anyone I know. If you would like some, let me know and I'll give you some. (It does require the purchase of an adult meal for each free kids meal.) 

On the 14th  Joshua turned 11! Seriously, I have an 11 year old people! I can't believe it! He's showing of his new winter coat we got him in the picture above.
Some stats on Joshua...
Height: 5'1"
Weight: 115 lbs
Shoe Size: Men's 10
What he want to be when he's grown: Chef

I find it hard to plan birthday parties for Joshua. Being just after the holidays and the cold unpredictable weather at that time of year, seems to ruin any plans I make. So this year we just took him down to Burlington to Chuck E Cheese (where the pic of Eli and my dad was taken), played a ton of games and ate pizza (salad and knitting for me!), then we headed back to Bellingham and took him out for a game of bowling. While Josh and the boys were bowling I went to Dairy Queen and picked up an ice cream cake, per his request and took it back home to thaw. We came home, had cake and if I remember correctly played more video games. 

 The day of Joshua's birthday was the start of our big snow storm of the year. Some places closed during the storm and schools were cancelled, so we stayed home and played outside with the neighbor kids. 

The boys built a snow fort wall for snow ball fights and Eli kept filling her bucket and adding to their wall. 

After the cold winds came in we decided it was too cold and stayed inside and admired the snow from the warmth of the apartment.

We finished off the month with the snow melting away just in time for my sister to fly in from Texas. We had just over a week to visit with her and my nephew Tristan. I didn't take a single pic while they were up. We were having too much fun playing with Tristan and catching up. =)

Stay tuned if I find a few more minutes this week, I'll get some posts up here of what has been happening this month.