Whole30 Challenge: Half-Way There!

Yesterday was day 15 of my Whole30 Challenge. I was feeling pretty good about it all until around 10 or 11am. Then I got a terrible headache that lasted all day and most of the night. I have no idea what set it off (I don't think it was anything I ate). But I was pretty much miserable all day. Other than that though, I think things have been going pretty well.

Chris and I did make "dessert" the other night which consisted of a banana and one tablespoon of unsweetened cocoa powder mixed up in the food processor then chilled. It was delicious. Technically on the Whole30 you're not supposed to have "dessert" but I'm PMS-ing and wanted chocolate (really the first very strong craving that I've had so far). 

Again, I haven't noticed any drastic changes, but I'm optimistic (maybe that's the drastic change!). I have noticed that I'm starting to sleep better and I seem to have more energy in the mornings and throughout the day. Still not quite enough when combined with cooking at night but I think I will get there eventually. 

I haven't noticed a significant change in my asthma or allergies. I'm still taking my allergy medicine almost daily. That's kind of disappointing, but I'm still holding out hope that it will get better toward the end. 

Aside from all that, I really do feel pretty good overall. I've enjoyed almost all the foods/meals I've been eating (some weren't great, but could probably be improved with some more seasoning). If this continues to go well (or if I feel like the extra time might help improve my allergies and asthma) I might stretch it out to the end of Lent. Maybe even beyond that. 

I know I definitely don't want to go back to eating all the fast food and junk I was eating before. And I do want to experiment with certain foods when this is over to find out what I'm truly sensitive to so I know what I should avoid on a daily basis and what might be ok for me to have daily or just occasionally. (I'm really hoping I can have cheese and Greek yogurt again!)

We made beef stew the other night with carrots and sweet potatoes. I've never been a big fan of stew, but this one was pretty good!

I am starting to get slightly bored with what we've been eating lately, even though we've only repeated a couple meals so far. I'm getting extremely bored with my standard breakfast of a hard-boiled egg and a banana. I found a recipe for an egg, sausage and sweet potato casserole that sounds amazing, so I think I'll try making that soon so I can have the leftovers for breakfast. 

Chris will be out of town most of next week for work (lucky duck gets to go to California). And while I'm slightly upset that he gets to go enjoy nice weather and I'm stuck here taking care of the pets and whatnot (and of course, I'll miss him), I'm trying to look on the bright side of things: I get to make whatever I want and buy whatever groceries I want because he won't be here! :p I'll probably be eating a lot of variations on eggs...those are the easiest things for me to make when it's just me. 

In other news, Chris and I went to our first Blues game together Monday night for St. Patrick's Day! 

The first two periods were pretty slow, but the third period was awesome. It turned out to be a really great game and we had a good time! :)

It's almost the weekend! Who's excited?! My sister is celebrating her birthday this weekend--complete with lots of food and alcohol that I can't have! It should be fun though. 

Have a great one! 

Preparing for the Whole30 Challenge

I spent the weekend preparing for my Whole30 challenge which will officially begin Wednesday (for Lent). But most of my meals prior to that will be Whole30 just because I didn't want to buy a couple days worth of regular food plus all the food for the Whole30.

My preparation started on Saturday with a long day of grocery shopping. I already hate shopping, so having an extra long list of lots of specialty items I needed to find was frustrating. On top of that, everywhere was packed because of the "Big Storm" that was coming Saturday night/Sunday. I hated every second of that shopping trip. But after going to two separate stores, I managed to get all but two or three items on my list, so I decided that was a win.

I decided if I'm really going to commit to this, I need to keep track of everything so I can measure my results. (Whole30 rules dictate that you cannot weigh yourself during the challenge.) So I weighed myself, and although it's definitely not where I want to be, it's not as bad as I thought it would be either. And I'm going to show you a picture of it, just to make sure I'm really, super committed. I'm not making a weight loss goal, but I would like to lose weight. I know that it's not all about the number on the scale, and I want to focus more on how I feel throughout this process and see improvements in my overall health, but I'd like to see the number on the scale go down too. So, here it is:

151.5. Yikes. 

Again, I'm doing my best not to focus on the number and I want to focus on other things like if my allergies and asthma improve during this challenge and what my energy levels are like. I also took measurements so I can see how many inches I lose. And, I took some "before" photos, which I absolutely hate and I don't think I'm quite ready to share them. I'm hoping I'll see some good changes after this challenge is over and I can share my before and after photos at the same time (and I'll feel good enough about my after pics that I won't mind sharing the before pics).

Since I'm doing this Whole30 Challenge for Lent, it will be more like a Whole40. If it is extremely difficult and I don't think I can stick with it beyond the 30 days, I'm not going to push myself too much. I just want to make sure I hit the 30 day mark. I'd like to do it for the full 40 days of Lent though (and obviously carry some of these new healthy-eating habits on beyond that). 

I'm hoping I'll be able to start working out/running more regularly, but so far the weather is not cooperating (I don't mind running when it's cold, but when it's 3 degrees? No thanks). Plus, I started that temp job last week and I'm working 8am-4:30pm there, so I'm trying to figure out a balance between that, fitting in exercise, being home for Copper, cooking every night (yeah, this Whole 30 Challenge pretty much requires cooking every.single.night), and writing for the Community News. I'm sure once the weather warms up I'll be more inclined to find ways to fit exercise in my schedule. 

After I finished all my shopping on Saturday, I cleaned out our pantry and fridge and got rid of all the foods I can't have during this challenge.

Almost two full boxes worth! Our pantry is so much more
organized now though ;)

I probably should have taken a pic of all the food I bought too, but I was so happy to be done with my shopping that I put it all away and forgot about it for a while :)

On Sunday I did a little food prep. And by that, I mean I cut up some veggies. I didn't actually cook anything ahead of time. I might give that a try next week after seeing how the cooking for this week goes. A few of the things we're having this week are: 

Roasted chicken thighs with roasted sweet potatoes and a veggie

Chili

Italian Pork Roast

Zucchini Ginger Soup

I'm most excited about the chicken and the chili. 

I plan on keeping a daily journal throughout this challenge so I can keep track of what I'm eating, how I'm feeling, sleeping, how bad my allergies and asthma are, etc. I've never been great at keeping a daily journal, so that will be a challenge as well, but I'm going to do my best! 

Day 1 is tomorrow!

V-Day Recap

How was everyone's Valentine's Day/weekend?

Mine was pretty great :)

I've never been all that into Valentine's Day, but when Chris and I were first dating, he really wanted to celebrate. So we compromised--we got each other gifts, but instead of going out, we stayed home, ordered a pizza, and watched a funny movie. And it's been our tradition ever since.

So this year, I got him some new pants from AE that he's been bugging me about since Christmas and he got me a gift certificate to get a manicure and pedicure. Then we ordered Domino's, pigged out on that, and watched Sex Drive. After that we met my cousins at a local bar for a few beers.

Saturday my sister went with me to get our nails done. It's been so, so long since I had my nails done. The guy who did them asked if this was my first time--yikes! But they turned out fabulous and it was so relaxing :)

I think the color goes nicely with my ring ;)

We did some shopping and then I went to church. We went out to Fast Eddie's that night and that was probably a mistake. It was so crowded! But we were able to share a table with some friendly strangers just before we got our food, and the food was delicious as always!

Sunday morning we had breakfast with my family, did our grocery shopping and then had dinner with Chris's parents. 

It was a pretty great weekend. 

Today hasn't been too bad either. I've had two healthy meals so far today and I feel great. Tomorrow I plan on going for a run (which will probably be more of a walk, but I'm gonna try) since it's going to be so warm! 

I've been reading It Starts With Food:Discover the Whole 30 and Change Your Life in Unexpected Ways. I'm not finished with it (I'm not even half-way through with it), but it's already changing how I look at food. And while I'm not sure I'm ready to do a Whole 30 Challenge, I may be by the time I finish reading the book. My current issue with it is the cost. They want you to buy organic foods (mostly) and definitely organic meats, and that stuff is expensive. I'm just not sure I can spend that kind of money right now since I'm unemployed. Plus, if Chris isn't willing to do it with me, then we're buying food to make us each our own separate meals every night of the week and that will drive up the cost too. 

Either way, I'm really enjoying the book, and what it says makes a lot of sense. So even if I choose not to do the Whole 30 Challenge in the near future (or at all), the book has made me much more aware of what I'm eating and I'm really starting to pay attention to how the foods I eat make me feel.

Have any of you heard of/thought about doing/or done a Whole 30 Challenge? If so, let me know what you think about it! I definitely recommend reading the book if you're ready to change your relationship with food!

December 14, 2013: I said "Really?"

Then I said "Yes!" And cried.

Here's the story:

Chris and I had plans for Saturday night to go see all the Christmas lights at the Zoo. Unfortunately for me, the night before I was up the entire night. No matter what I did, I couldn't sleep. So I spent most of the night looking for jobs and saving several to apply for the next day.

On top of that, it snowed all night. So I spent most of Saturday applying for jobs and then shoveling the driveway. And I finally took a nap around 3:30. I was exhausted and starving.

Chris came home and asked if I was almost ready (I had only gotten out of the shower about 15 minutes before that!). I was, but still deciding what to wear. He suggested we get dressed up and I told him I was probably just going to wear jeans and a hoodie--we were going to be outside in the cold! For one, I wanted to be warm, and two, we'd be wearing coats anyway so you wouldn't be able to see what was underneath.

He said okay and then asked where I wanted to eat dinner. Because I was exhausted from not sleeping and hadn't eaten very much earlier that day, I said I just wanted to go get McDonald's or something because I didn't want to wait too long to eat. I probably would have gotten very cranky otherwise.

So we ate at McDonald's and then headed off to the Zoo. Everything was really pretty, but very cold! Here's a couple pics:

Penguins at the Zoo! 

Swans

Not engaged yet :p

After the Zoo we headed home. And managed to get lost. So we took a little detour through downtown. Oh well. By the time we got home I was ready to put on my pjs and curl up in bed. Plus, I must have pulled a muscle or something when I was shoveling the driveway earlier that day because my foot, ankle, and calf were all really sore. While Chris was letting the dog outside and then back in I was busy getting my boots off.

When he came back in he had turned on the Christmas tree lights and told me to come out in the living room because Copper wanted to play with me. So I finally went out there and started to pet her when I realized there was something shoved in her collar. I honestly wasn't sure what it was at first. It felt like a jewelry box, but that didn't mean that's what it was, or that that's what was inside. 

I said "What's this?" and Chris told me to open it up and see. 

As I opened it, I realized it definitely was a ring box, but it was empty. As I was doing that, Chris had gotten down on one knee and pulled the ring out. 

He asked me to marry him and I was in so much shock I actually asked "Really?" first before I said "Yes!"

And then I cried a whole bunch. Then we turned on the lights so I could see the ring. It's beautiful, and he had it sized before hand, so it fits perfectly! He did a great job picking it out!

Engaged!

After I calmed down a little, he told me to put my shoes back on so we could go meet my parents. They were at Hendel's having dinner with people from church. I cried some more when we walked in and I hugged my mom and dad. People couldn't believe that I had no clue, that I didn't even suspect that he was going to propose. I honestly didn't. Obviously I knew we would get engaged and married some day, but I just assumed it wouldn't happen until sometime next year. 

Apparently he planned to propose in a more secluded area of the Zoo (which is my favorite place there), but it was closed off. And I had made it clear I didn't want to be proposed to in front of a bunch of people. So he waited until we got home. 

He also fessed up to all the little lies he'd been telling me about the money he was spending and stuff. Apparently he planned to wait until Christmas to propose, but I kept asking too many questions and getting too upset about all the money issues (can you blame me?! I'm about to be unemployed!). 

It turned out to be a perfect night though. We had a couple drinks with my parents to celebrate and then headed home.

On Sunday I went to my grandparents house to show them the ring and I also called my BFF to tell her. She literally screamed. It was awesome. 

Later on Sunday I met Chris at his work to go out to lunch with him and a couple who will be opening a Massage Luxe in Chicago. They gave me/us some beautiful flowers and treated us to lunch at a pizza place in Maplewood (can't remember the name right now).

They smell amazing :)

It turned out to be an incredible weekend. And I'm already freaking out about planning and stuff. But the first thing on my to-do list is to get a job! So hopefully something will come up soon and then everything will be perfect! And by "something" I mean something in an office-setting at least, even if it's not related to my degree. I'm hoping to avoid having to resort to retail. 

So that's our engagement story!

Thanksgiving Recap

How was everyone's Thanksgiving?

Mine was pretty good. Not nearly as 

relaxing as I hoped it would be, but it was still good. 

Wednesday was probably the best day even though it started with me and Chris driving to Farmington to get my personal property tax waiver, which we had to pay a freaking dollar for. 

Once we got that over with though, we drove back to St. Louis and headed over to The Hill to buy some soap from Herbaria. That store smells amazing! 

After that we happened to drive by Steve's Hot Dogs so we stopped to have some hot dogs for lunch. They were delicious and it's such a cool place. Definitely recommend it!

Later that day we went to see Catching Fire at the theater. It was a really good movie and I can't wait for the next one! 

That night we met my family at church for the Thanksgiving service and then we went out for some pizza and beer :)

It was probably one of the best days I've had in a while. 

We spent Thanksgiving at my aunt and uncle's and then at Chris's parents'. It was a long day with a lot of food, but it was fun seeing everyone. We went home after that, had more dessert, and watched a movie. 

On Friday I had planned on going to get my license plates renewed but discovered that I couldn't find my current insurance cards. It took most of the day before I could get them printed out. So I decided I would go Saturday. 

I baked some chocolate chip banana bread for Chris (partly because I didn't have time to make it Thanksgiving morning and partly because Chris didn't want to share lol). 

I got up bright and early Saturday morning to go to the DMV to get my plates renewed. Turned out the DMV was closed Friday so it wasn't all bad that I couldn't find my insurance cards. 

I was third in line and could have been done quickly except for one little problem: the renewal notice they sent me said I didn't need an inspection, but since I've moved back to St. Louis, I do need one. And no one could get me in Saturday to do an inspection. I seriously can't catch a break. 

My first attempt at a pumpkin pie. 

So I went home and spent a few hours being mopey and pissed off that I'd have to take Monday off to deal with all this. 

Once I was done moping though, I baked my first ever pumpkin pie. I tried it after Chris got home, and the verdict? I still don't like pumpkin pie. But Chris said it was really good. I also made chili for the first time. It turned out pretty good as well :) 

They actually took a nap together! It was freaking adorable--while it lasted.

Later that night I went over to my mom and dad's house to watch Christmas Vacation. 

On Sunday we spent most of the day getting out our Christmas decorations. Chris got the lights up on the house. We got the tree up and lights put on but we didn't get the ornaments on. We went out and bought a tree skirt (those things are stupid-expensive), stockings, and a tree-topper. I guess we'll get the tree decorated eventually. 

If you look closely, you can see Copper in the window. Creep. lol

All our stockings, hung from my fancy new bookcase because we didn't have anywhere else to put them. 

I was pretty grumpy most of the day because I hate doing this stuff. It probably doesn't help that I'm so exhausted lately. 

My Thanksgiving weekend was good, but it was busy and not very relaxing. I don't feel like I got nearly enough rest. And I didn't get much else done either. Very little exercise, no violin-playing, and no reading or writing. And as of January 2, I'll still be unemployed. I've applied for a lot of jobs now, and I haven't heard a single thing--good or bad--from any of them. 

Here I am on Monday morning (thankful I have so many sick days) waiting for my car to get inspected and then I get to go to the DMV to hopefully finally get my license plates renewed. Yay Mondays. 

I hope you all had a great Thanksgiving!

Recipes

This weekend was pretty relaxing. I didn't get a lot of the stuff I needed to do done, but I did get some rest at least.

Copper wouldn't let me sleep in on Saturday though, so I was up before 8am. I made myself some tea and had some apple slices with peanut butter for breakfast. After that I read The Hangman's Daughter for a while. I'm a little over half-way finished with it (I started it a couple months ago...), but it has been pretty good.

Later that day I walked over to the library (I love having a library so close to my house!) to pick up my new library card and check out a couple music books. When I got home I took Copper for a short run. Neither one of us did too well. She either wouldn't keep up with me or kept trying to run ahead of me. We didn't get very far. My asthma was terrible thanks to it being so freaking cold.

Despite my horrible asthma in the winter and the cold weather in general, there are some plus-sides to running in the cold. Mainly, I usually wear a jacket that has pockets, so I can carry more stuff with me, like my inhaler, which I definitely need in the winter. Plus, I'm just wearing more clothes in general. Pants means no thigh-chafing!

Copper and I took a mini-nap when we got home from our run, and after that I actually got out my violin and played for a bit! Later that day I got our dinner ready for that night. Chris and I have decided to try a new recipe every week (this doesn't always happen, but we're working on it) because we've been getting really bored with our meals lately. One of the new meals we tried was homemade sesame chicken.

I found the recipe on Pinterest, which led me to the blog Table for Two (that link will take you to her original recipe). I changed a few things, so here's what I did:

I forgot to buy garlic, so I used garlic powder instead. I don't think it really made a difference either way. I'll probably try to use real garlic next time though. And I used boneless, skinless chicken tenderloins rather than chicken thighs (in the comments she said you could use breasts, so I figured tenderloins would work fine too).

I put the chicken tenders on the bottom of the crockpot then mixed all the other ingredients together and poured that over the chicken. I cooked mine on low for about 4 hours. Her instructions say to take the chicken out and cut it up, but I found that mine were practically falling apart when I tried to cut them, so it was like half-cut and half-shredded chicken.

She also said to add some cornstarch to thicken up the sauce a bit, but she doesn't say about how much. I've never used cornstarch for anything before so I just mixed some with a little water and added it, but I don't think it made much difference. I might just skip the cornstarch altogether next time.

Chris made rice to go with it (I really wish I liked rice) and I made broccoli and then poured the chicken over the broccoli. I didn't bother buying sesame seeds because that just seemed like a waste of money to me. I wanted the flavor, not the "look." All in all, it was delicious and I can't wait to make it again!

The second recipe I tried was on Sunday while Chris was at work and I was at home pigging out on leftovers and such. I decided I needed a healthy snack to break up all the other junk. This is another recipe I found through Pinterest. Here's the link to the original recipe: http://www.somethingswanky.com/peanut-butter-apple-dip-protein-packed-but-tastes-like-dessert/

I love dipping my apples in peanut butter, so when I found this recipe I was pretty sure I would love it. It's honey, greek yogurt, and peanut butter. I think she used vanilla greek yogurt in her recipe, but all I had was plain. I still think it tasted amazing though! And it's healthy too!

I'm always looking for some simple crockpot recipes for us to try, so if you have any good ones, send them my way!

Weekend Recap

New glasses! :)

I went to pick up my new glasses and contacts last Friday. It's so nice to be able to wear contacts again (and sunglasses!) and glasses that are nice and light. 

We had a couple events in St. Louis on Friday for our newest book: 

We had a great turnout for both events. I love getting the opportunity to meet the authors and hear them tell their stories. Unfortunately we didn't sell quite as much as we had hoped due to time constraints at the second event, but we sold a decent amount of books. While everyone else went out to a fancy dinner that night after the second event (which was at the STL Public Library and that building is so cool!), I went home to eat pizza with Chris and then sleep.

I've been so exhausted lately. And that's making me cranky. It's really bumming me out that I just don't have the energy to go out and do stuff. I got my oil changed Saturday, we took Copper, our horribly behaved dog, for a walk on Sunday, and had dinner with my parents later that night. And that's really about all I did. I didn't clean or do any of the other things I should have.

Probably the best thing to happen all weekend was that I was asked to send in my resume for a possible job! I really hope something works out with that one because it would be an amazing organization to work for. Fingers crossed!!

Who's ready for Thanksgiving? On the one hand I'm totally excited to only have to drive in to work 2 days next week, but on the other hand, it means Christmas is too close for comfort. I have gifts to buy (with money I don't have) and places to go, etc, etc. I'm looking forward to the family time and stuff, but I'm also really hoping for some time to just rest next week. I need it. Badly.

I'm starting to feel sick, even though I've been taking Vitamin-C regularly, drinking a lot of water, eating fruits and veggies, etc. I'm hoping it's just allergies and nothing worse. I don't think I can handle getting sick and needing more medicine.

I hope you all had a fantastic weekend!

Falling Off the Wagon

Last week I fell off the "30-Day Squat Challenge" wagon. Hard. Tuesday was my first day of classes and it went pretty well. I had a decent day over all even though I had gotten little sleep the night before: class was good, and I was looking forward to going home, doing my squats and then relaxing.

Instead, I came home to a house that smelled of poop. I had no clue which animal had done it or where, but I knew what it was the second I walked in. I wanted to cry. Of course, it was Copper. She had diarrhea. And she had managed to get it all over her kennel and herself. So I had to clear all of the cat's stuff out of the bathroom so I could give the dog a bath (still in my nice work clothes--didn't want to risk her getting her poop-covered self on any of the furniture). She was not happy about the bath, which she made quite clear when she got out and shook off, soaking everything in the bathroom.

I made a few attempts to dry her off then set out to clean her kennel. I wanted to puke. It smelled so, so bad. Meanwhile, she went and took a little nap on the couch. While she was still soaking wet. On top of all that, I couldn't even shower until later that night because Chris was working late.

Needless to say I did not get any sort of workout accomplished that night. The next day was my other class, Advanced Publishing, which is my night class. I had coffee twice that day because I was so exhausted. The class was good though. We watched Helvetica (if you're into typography and that sort of thing, you should watch it) which was pretty good. I'm pretty sure it's on Netflix, so once we move and have better internet, I might watch the whole thing. Since I work all day on Wednesdays and then have night class (not to mention the fact that I was exhausted), I didn't work out that day either.

By my afternoon class on Thursday I was completely off the wagon. I had given up hope of working out at all that week, or on catching back up on the squat challenge.

I spent the weekend doing homework, laundry, and napping. Copper's diarrhea slowly went away (thank God!!) and she's doing much better now.

Labor Day marked Year Two for me and Chris. We stopped at the Boat House in Forest Park for a beer and then went to the Zoo (mainly to see the sea lions!). After that we went to Pi for a late lunch and then headed home. Aside from burning my fingers with hot grease from our breakfast (much better now but hurt like hell at the time!), it was a really great day :)

Despite all the obnoxious kids that kept getting
in the way, I was able to get a couple good pics.

The Sea Lions/Underwater Tunnel is definitely
my new favorite place at the Zoo :)

Cute little elephant :)

View from one of our favorite spots.

Grizzly bear!

And last, but not least, the penguins!

I hope you all had a fun, safe Labor Day! Sorry that I also seem to have fallen off the "blogging wagon" as well. I promise I'll try to write more regularly ("try" being the key word there!). 

Grad School: Year 2 Starts Today!

My "last weekend of summer" was pretty good. Spent time with my family, went to the Cards game Sunday (which they lost...), and went to see our new house (which isn't quite ready yet). 

Before I show you pictures of the house, here's a couple of the coffee table Chris made:

Copper wouldn't get out of the picture. 

We also got a brown slip cover for our futon, since we can't
buy a new couch just yet thanks to the dog! 

And now for the house! It's being inspected this week (I think), so hopefully we'll be able to move in a couple weeks. 

Front of the house. Adorable :)

Itty-bitty, teeny-tiny kitchen--with no dishwasher! But it's
so cute :)

Front door/living room

Bathroom (yes, those walls are purple, lol)

Dining room

Copper's big back yard :)

Back of the house: on the right side is the garage, and the
doorway in the middle is the breezeway/mudroom. 

I can't wait to move!! Hopefully we find out this week a set date so we can start planning and packing! 

In other news, I'm on day 8 or 9 of my 30-day squat challenge. It's going pretty well so far. We'll see how I do once school is in full-gear. 

Speaking of which, I have my first class of the semester today. I'm so glad it's not my night class because I didn't get much sleep last night. I woke up around 2am sneezing and coughing. Finally I just got up around 4:30am. Not fun :( So my Tuesday/Thursday afternoon class is Contemporary American Poetry and my Wednesday night class is Advanced Literary Publishing. I'm excited for both classes. I think this is going to be a pretty great (although probably exhausting) semester! 

And just for fun, here are a couple pics of Copper and Cocoa :)

Left this laundry basket out for her all weekend
while we were gone. Both of her toy mice were
in it when we got back lol

Copper had to sit at my feet on our way back
on Sunday. Luckily, she behaved most of the way.
She did not behave herself most of the weekend though :(

30-Day Squat Challenge

I saw this on Pinterest and decided to give it a shot. I actually like doing squats, and I definitely need to strengthen and tone my legs, so this sounded like a good idea to me. I started on Sunday, so today is day 3 for me. Here's the link to the 30-Day Squat Challenge if you want to do it too: http://www.fitsugar.com/30-Day-Squat-Challenge-30806625

The first couple days haven't been too difficult so far. The biggest obstacle for me is keeping Copper out of the way! Basically by the end of it, you're doing about 200 squats. And I think that's a pretty awesome thing to be able to say you can do.

Speaking of Copper, she's been super hyper lately. So Sunday I decided to try taking her for a little jog instead of just a walk. I think she had fun and she was tired/well-behaved the rest of the day!

After I did my squats yesterday I decided to try taking her for another jog. Again, she did pretty well, seemed to have fun, and appeared to be really tired once we got back. Granted these were both pretty short jogs as there isn't really a safe place for us to really run anywhere near our house, but after she drank some water and sat around for about 15 minutes or so, she was back to being hyper and obnoxious and chewing on everything in sight! So while I was plenty tired, she was not :( 

And, as far as the chewing goes, well, like I said, she's chewing on everything. She has a couple bones she likes and a ball and a rope...and that's all the toys she has. Every toy we buy her lately gets destroyed within ten minutes--even the Kong toys, which are supposed to last a long time and be "indestructible." I got a few suggestions from people on Facebook and it seemed like the best option was to get her a Nyla bone. Unfortunately for her, she has to wait until the next time we need something from the pet store. Pet toys are so expensive! If you have any other suggestions for toys that she won't immediately destroy, I'd love to hear them! 

Between chewing on our remotes and terrorizing the cat, she's driving me nuts! 

Poor kitty. 

Chris is going out today to get us some pallets to make us a coffee table! I can't wait to see how it turns out! I'm hoping he doesn't get much started today so I can take some before and after pics for you guys :) 

And school starts next week. Yikes. I'm almost ready for it. Almost ready for all the interns and grad students. Almost. I have a few things left to do. I am ready for my classes. Except I still have a book to get. And it'd be really nice if I could order my Kindle now, but I have to wait for my loan money to go through first. It'd be nice if I could use that money to pay for my books too, but that money doesn't go through until like the second week of school. It's a tad irritating. 

We'll be spending our last weekend of summer in St. Louis. No big plans for Saturday, but we're going to the Cardinals game on Sunday. And we're probably going to stop by our house to see how everything's going (I'll take some pics this time!) and measure some things so we have an idea of where to put furniture and what we'll need to buy. I can't wait to move!! 

And don't forget about the 30-Day Squat Challenge!

It's not quite as bad as it looks...yet ;)

I'm still looking for jobs and applying for some here and there. I'm not finding a whole lot right now though. If you guys know of anyone hiring in St. Louis, let me know!

News!!

This past Saturday we had my dad's 50th birthday party. It was a lot of fun! Here's a couple pics from the day:

My sister, my dad, and me :)

Just me and dad :)
He got about 8 or 9 bottles of crown!
Definitely enough for another party! ;)

This is my Aunt Rose. She's the best.
But she lives in NC, so I don't get to see
her much :( 

So while we were drinking and eating and having a good time, Chris and I were talking to my cousins about this house they're fixing up. It's a 2-bedroom, 1-bath in Florissant and they said they'd rent it to us. We kind of laughed about it and let it go since we had never even considered living in Florissant. 

Well come Sunday we were driving back to Farmington and thinking, depending on what the house is like and how much they'd charge us for rent, it could be worth looking into at the very least. So we drove all the way back to Florissant just to go look at the house. And we loved it. The back yard is huge and has a nice patio. It has a one-car garage, a breezeway/mudroom type thing, and a good-sized basement. The only downside is that there's no dishwasher (but we generally eat off of paper plates most of the time anyway...) and there isn't a ton of storage in the bathroom. The closets are also a little small, but we figure with the basement and garage, that should give us plenty of extra storage for all the stuff we don't use on a regular basis. 

I called them on Tuesday to tell them that we officially want to rent it so it should be ready for us sometime in September. For those of you who are wondering, yes, this adds another half hour or so to my drive. Which will suck. But I have a couple options. 

I can always stay in Cape a couple nights if I really have to. And I'm hoping I'll be able to keep working from home at least one day a week. But I've also decided to start looking for jobs in St. Louis, even if they're just part time. I've got a few reasons for this. 

First, I'm already exhausted and I'm not even in school right now. So adding more time to my drive, plus classes is gonna make that worse. Second, because I'm doing so much driving, I'm spending a ton on gas and car maintenance. Yes, working for the university means I only pay 30% of my tuition, but it also means that I get almost none of the loan money I get approved for (I don't understand why this is but I guess they figure if most of my tuition is covered I don't need the extra money). So this semester--before we even decided to move to Florissant--I decided I wasn't going to take the tuition discount, because I get all of my loan money that way, which I need. So whether I continue working for the university or not, I'm not using that discount anymore, so I figured I might as well start looking in St. Louis. I'll just have to find a place that's willing to work around my class schedule. 

There's too much math involved to really get into the details. But basically if Chris and I are living and working in St. Louis and I'm only driving to school a couple days a week (instead of 5), we'll save a ton on gas and all that. 

And we get to switch our internet to AT&T! Unfortunately that means paying HughesNet's outrageous cancellation fees. But once that's done, we'll be paying about the same amount for cable and internet as what we're paying for internet alone now. So we'll be saving a lot of money as far as stuff like that goes once we move. 

We're super excited about the house and can't wait to move. The fact that we're so close to moving makes our current house seem that much more unbearable. 

Things will definitely suck for a while with all the driving and possible staying in Cape that I will have to do. But when we talked about it and whether we thought it was a good idea or not, we had to think long-term. I'll be starting my last semester of school this time next year. And we had plans of moving back to St. Louis after I finished school anyway regardless of where we were living at the time. Plus, my cousin said if we want to buy the house from him in a couple years, he'd sell it to us for pretty dang cheap. And we already know we like the city and the area and want to stay there, so if we end up loving the house too, why not buy it? So, thinking long-term, we just couldn't pass this up. 

Plus Copper is going to love that back yard! 

Updates

Sorry I've been M.I.A. for over a week now. I've got three weeks of school left (yay!) and a lot to get done in that short amount of time (boo!). So you may not hear from me again until after finals.

Aside from school (which isn't going too badly, just lots and lots of work), things are going pretty well lately. We had a good weekend.

Oh and last Tuesday was day 30 of being gluten-free, and also the last. Chris talked me into going to Buffalo Wild Wings that night, so I got the pepperjack steak wrap and had a beer. I didn't eat most of it--we had an appetizer too so I got full pretty quick (and I wanted to finish my beer since you can't take those to-go lol).

I've been eating foods with gluten in them since then and I haven't noticed a big difference, except that I'm definitely not eating as healthy (which makes Chris happy). I talked to my mom over the weekend and she agreed with what I had said previously--that most people who have a gluten allergy and go gluten-free notice major differences almost immediately. And it made me feel better that she's heard that too and I didn't just imagine it!

My next step is to try fiber pills I think. Apparently fiber just kinda works in whatever way your body needs it to. So I'm gonna give those a shot for a while and see how that goes. I really can't afford to go to the doctor right now anyway, so I'll just keep experimenting and see what happens.

Chris and I are house-hunting again. We probably won't be moving until after our lease is up in October, but we're starting to look anyway, just in case we find something really great. We're looking to rent a house (or townhouse) in the Arnold area mainly so Copper has a fenced-in yard. Arnold will only add five or ten more minutes to my drive depending on how far away from the highway we are and I can stay on one main highway the entire way. Highway 32 sucks, especially at night when the weather is bad (like it was last week).

Copper got some new toys this weekend and she destroyed a couple others including her tennis ball :(

We got her a tire/rope and she really likes it :)

You can see the tire/rope better, but she has
crazy eyes in this one lol. RIP tennis ball.

And this is a random picture of the cat that's
always outside my office--I like to text Chris
pictures of it and tell him I'm going to bring it
home because Copper needs a friend hehe :)

Most of my free time over the next couple weeks will be spent on homework, so you may not hear from me again until May! I'll try to post again soon though :)

Easter Weekend Recap

While everyone was leaving Thursday to start off their Easter holiday early, I was stuck in class. Lame. My teacher brought in (what looked like) some delicious brie though (I obviously couldn't have any), so I guess that makes up for it. Sort of.

I got home and we had jalapeno turkey burgers for dinner. I thought they were really good, Chris thought they were okay. Maybe it just tasted better to me because I was so hungry. :(

I had a nice wake up call on Friday (my day off) as I heard a lot of racket coming from next door. Apparently they were installing carpet and new appliances and whatnot. At 7:30am. So much for sleeping in.

I managed to get some homework done and get started on my thesis (better late than never I suppose). I also did some laundry. And I really don't remember what else. It was kind of a long and boring day off. Eventually I gave up and started watching SVU. I have problems.

Saturday I got to sleep in a little bit later. I did some more work on my thesis and then did some shopping at JC Penney since I still had a gift card for there from Christmas. I bought a really cute white sweater...which I managed to get grape juice on when I wore it on Sunday. Fail.

When Chris got home, we went to Applebee's for dinner. I swear we somehow always have terrible food and service in some way or another at every restaurant we go to in Farmington. Every time. And we generally order the same few things from Applebee's. And they taste different every single time. Chris got the quesadilla burger, which he said was terrible. I ordered the oriental salad with grilled chicken and it was really good. I ordered it without the noodles on it, but I really couldn't tell if there were any there or not. The way my stomach felt when I got home tells me there were :(

We watched the last Saw movie (finally!) and then went to bed. I drove up to St. Louis the next day. Hung out at my parents' house in the morning and my sister did my hair for me and gave me my new Paul Mitchell flat iron! I'm so excited about it :)

You can't really see my hair in this, but it's a tad shorter
and I've got bangs now. Not pictured: grape juice stain
on my new sweater. :/

After that we headed over to my aunt and uncle's for a late lunch/early dinner thingy. I ate a lot of fruits and veggies and then had one chicken breast (which was surprisingly good since chicken isn't my favorite). My mom made me a gluten-free chocolate cake and that was delicious. Unfortunately, almost immediately after that, my stomach was in knots. Not fun. So I left after that.

Chris texted me right before I left to say that Copper chipped her tooth and her mouth was bleeding :(
Turns out, her whole tooth came out. I asked my cousin if we needed to take her to the vet or anything and she said just to watch her and make sure it doesn't get infected. She was hyper all night last night though, so I think she's fine :p And she got some new toys (which I'm sure will be ripped to pieces by the end of the week).

I hope you all had a lovely Easter weekend and got to enjoy some of the nice weather!

Weekend Recap

This weekend was kind of...lame. I got a little bit of homework done. Not much though. I did thoroughly clean my house though and got all the laundry done. Go me! 

Friday night I went to bed pretty early after watching SVU for a few hours. My life is so exciting. Saturday I did homework, cleaned, and got gas/did the grocery shopping, and I'm super glad I did. 

By Saturday night, it was raining at my house. I woke up early Sunday morning because it was my little sister's 21st birthday and I was going to take her to breakfast for mimosas and then we were all gonna go to Fast Eddie's. Well, Mother Nature shit all over those plans. I called my parents at a little before 7 and they told me to stay home because the weather was starting to get bad up there (it was doing nothing at my house at this point). 

So, I put my pj's back on, threw the sheets in the washer, had some cereal for breakfast, put in a Disney movie and drank some chocolate wine. 

Yes, I did drink half the bottle. On a Sunday. Don't judge me. 

My power flickered on and off a few times, but never went out for more than a few seconds, thank god! We got mostly freezing rain/ice throughout the morning and then it turned into snow a little later. I'd say we got 2 or 3 inches, but it was so windy, most of it just blew around rather than sticking to the roads or anything. It was enough to make the roads nice and crappy this morning though.

Meanwhile at my parents' house in St. Louis:

Not sure what they finally ended up with,
but my mom said they had about 10 inches
around 8:30 last night when I talked to her.
A lot of other people had closer to a foot. Yuck. 

Pretty glad I ended up staying home yesterday, although I was bummed I couldn't celebrate with my sister. That's okay though. We'll just get drunk on Easter or something ;)

I got up early this morning because I knew I would have to clean my car off. It took me about 45 minutes to get my car cleaned/scraped off/defrosted and get the driveway shoveled. A barking puppy is very little help with these things. 

The roads in Farmington sucked (although they suck even when they're dry...), but once I got on 55, they were just wet mostly. The snow decreased gradually--Cape got nothing. On the one hand that's nice that I didn't have to drive in snow/ice the whole time. On the other hand, we have school today and everyone in St. Louis is off. Lame. Oh well, we're off on Friday, so I guess I can't complain too much. I'm going to get my hair cut and then go to the eye doctor and hopefully get some new glasses and contacts. 

I hope you all had a good weekend! 

PS Still doing this gluten-free thing. It still sucks. :(

Long One

Brace yourselves, this is gonna be a long one. 

The short version is I got sick. 

The long version:

I skipped my workout Wednesday to meet a deadline. I knew if I worked out at my usual time, I wouldn't get the project done in time, so I decided I'd go once I got the project finished. Well, by the time I got it finished, I was exhausted and my throat was hurting. So I decided to just give it a rest and I'd get back in the gym on Thursday. 

I got through my class that night okay. My throat still hurt, but nothing terrible. I got home, had dinner with Chris (eggs, asparagus, and sausage) and then went to bed. 

By the time I woke up Thursday morning I felt terrible. If it weren't for my class that night, I probably would have stayed home that day. But I went to work and progressively got worse. I did however make time to stop by My Daddy's Cheesecake to get some cookies to bring to class. 

I'm assuming they were good since there were only
a couple left by the end of class. 

By the time my class started that night I was miserable. Sneezing, sore throat, body aches, chills, etc. And of course, not only did the class go the full time, but it went over. My friend Angi let me borrow her sweatshirt to use as a blanket, and everyone just kept giving me these pitiful looks all night. Not fun. 

I finally got home and went straight to bed. And felt terrible for not eating the dinner Chris had cooked for us. Unfortunately, I didn't have the option of staying home all day on Friday. I did get to leave around 1:30 though. I stopped at Walgreens to buy some Nyquil and then I went home and straight to bed. Chris came home later and brought me a Sprite and a York Peppermint Patty to make me feel better :)

Saturday morning we got up early to get ready for my friend's wedding. I would have taken some pictures, but I felt like crap. It was a small wedding and the reception was almost immediately after (pretty early in the afternoon). We stopped at the Schnuck's next door and found a nice little Gluten-free corner. So I bought myself some bread to try. Probably should have bought more, but oh well. 

I was only able to eat the salad at the reception, but it was pretty darn good. And everyone else's food looked good lol. After the reception we went back to my parents' house to pick up the puppy and head home. 

We ended up staying for dinner (I had another salad while everyone else had pizza--luckily I don't really like the pizza they got, so it wasn't torture or anything to watch them eat it). And we stayed until the end of the Blues game (which of course went to overtime). I'm glad we stayed though. Even though I felt like crap, I had a good time--and we got a free dinner out of it ;)

And Copper tried really hard to make friends with my kitty Cocoa: 

You can't really see her, but Cocoa is under the chair.
They stared each other down for a good ten minutes.
It was hilarious. 

I woke up Sunday morning from my Nyquil-coma to the smell of bacon. We had bacon and gluten-free bread/toast for breakfast. Super healthy :)

After that we headed out in the stupid rain to go do our grocery shopping. Thanks to Chris, we actually found some gluten-free stuff, like the Quaker rice cakes/snacks and stuff. (I swear those did not exist last week when I was there!) It was a pretty successful shopping trip. I got some new gluten-free snacks to try, and we bought corn flour tortillas for our tacos that night. 

The corn flour tortillas were interesting. They don't taste too bad, but they fell apart pretty easily. That could also be because we were trying to stuff too much into them ;) 

I went to bed Sunday night feeling a little bit better. We had done some laundry and watched a couple movies and I took a nap. At some point in the middle of the night that all changed. I woke up the next morning feeling terrible. I got up, fed the dog, and then texted my boss to tell her I wouldn't be in. 

Once Chris got up around 7, I took some more Nyquil and went back to bed...and didn't wake up until almost 5. After I got up though, I felt significantly better. I showered, watched some tv, and then made dinner. I made spaghetti squash with ground beef and tomato/alfredo sauce, and a side of asparagus baked in the oven with a little olive oil and parmesan cheese. It all turned out really good. 

After dinner we caught up on some shows and watched Bates Motel--not bad so far although kind of confusing since it's the prequel to Psycho, but it's set in modern-day. And then we went to bed. 

I woke up feeling quite a bit better this morning. Not great, but a pretty big improvement over the past few days. I spent most of today catching up at work and I'll spend the rest of my week at work and then at home doing homework. Lame way to spend Spring Break.