My Life as of Recently

Lots has been going on recently and summer break is finally here. I'll start with the weight loss stuff first and then get into what has been going on in my life. I started using Lose It! to track my food and exercise. I don't have a smart phone, so I use it on my computer. I like the program and I have a couple of family members using it, so it is nice to have some support. I spent two weeks maintaining and trying to get back on track. This past week I know that I have been eating too much and don't even want to step on the scale. Now that I am not working, I'm going to come up with a plan for the summer for weight loss and exercise. In fact, that is one of the things on my to-do list today.

Like I said, lots has been going on recently. We (my St. Joe friends) had a going away party for two of my friends that are moving to Detroit. It wasn't all that long ago that we had a going away party for one of my friends in this group that moved to Knoxville. Even though I didn't live close enough to Lafayette to be there all the time to do stuff, it was nice knowing that in an hour and a half I could be there and see everyone. One got a master's degree and the other a PhD, so I am proud of them for their achievements and first jobs with those degrees.

This is most of our group my freshman year at St. Joe.
 

Here is a pic of us from our group that graduated the same year. Notice how I'm the only BA in the group with the white tassel.

Another exciting thing (at least in the life of a homeowner) is that we got our 70's brown gutters and soffits replaces with some nice white new ones. It is the first thing that we dropped a pretty penny on for the house, but it makes such a difference. I still would like to paint the shutters and sides of the house that are still 70's brown (maybe a nice gray to tie in with the color of the roof), but to be honest, the brown shutters aren't bothering me so much since the white gutters/soffit are up.

The house when we got it.

The house now (please ignore the fact that I need to edge the yard and do some weeding - I'm injured and have bad allergies).

I had a great school year at work and it came to a whirlwind end like usual. This year is the first year that I had students from kindergarten all the way through fourth grade. After five years, you do have an attachment to the students. I was emotional on the last day of school due to that and some of the other changes that will be happening at work. Heck, even seeing my classroom emptied out felt kind of sad. I know that this is no excuse, but it did play a role in why I haven't done as well this past week in the weight loss department.

On last Thursday, my last day at work (teacher work day), we were able to leave early. On the way home, I found some garage sales to check out. I love a good garage sale, because you never know what kind of goodies you can find for a good price. I only ended up buying stuff at one of them, but it was a great find for me. I found a bunch of jeans, shorts, and capris in my current size and most of them were 25 or 50 cents. I also got two t-shirts and a nice pair of size 12 jeans (for that someday in the future when I'm a 12). I spent around $5.75 for all of this stuff:

After that fun, I loaded up all my stuff that I was taking to the garage sale that my mom, sister, and I were having at my mom's house. My mom and sister had furniture and appliances to sell along with their smaller stuff. All I had was smaller household items and a few odd and end items. I helped my sister set up and price this stuff, so it was ready to go on Friday morning. I hope that next year I have lost so much weight that I have a mini clothing store at the garage sale.

This weekend I have done a few things around the house and started my homework for next week. I'm taking two summer classes- Intro to Mental Health Counseling and Counseling Diverse and Multicultural clients. I'm liking the multicultural book so far (two chapters in), but I've always liked learning about culture. Music is an aspect of culture and that is what I teach. I always though it would be cool to be an enthnomusicologist or get a master's in music history.

I know that you are all jealous of my summer reading!

As for around the house, I mowed the front lawn (really regret- my allergies are still killing me two days later), did some dishes, did some laundry, and started grooming the dogs. I also got most of my sickly plants into the ground now. They have been sitting outside in their containers for two weeks now. I'm lucky that they didn't die, but I'm hoping that they turn around now that I have them in the ground.

 

My husband has done a much better job with his garden. This is a whopper strawberry.

 

I'll close this really long post with some total randomness. The doxies like to lie on this sunken in spot in the futon. Lilly is small enough her whole body fits into this spot that we call "the groove." I just caught her napping there and she looks so cute.

My First Veggies from the Garden

Sunday was a day of a lot of running around and trying to get something done. I began my morning with stopping at grocery store to stock up on Mt. Dew for the hubs. They have it on sale for $5.99 for a 24 pack. The deal gets even better- if you buy five of them, you get another $1 off per pack which brings it down to $4.99 for a 24 pack. I know this isn't the most exciting news, but I love me a good deal!

I also found some of my first veggies in my garden this morning.

And yes I know I need to weed my garden!

The FIL came over and helped us destroy the bathroom a little more. We tore out the wood panel and part of the linen closet to take a closer look at the plumbing situation for the tub/shower fixtures. We are going to try to find a two handle set up that is similar to what is in there now. If not, then we will have to switch over to the one handle.

The shower went from this...

to this!

I went out with the hubs and FIL to Red Lobster for lunch and got my usual meal. They often times go to Red Lobster for lunch on Sundays, and I should probably be tagging along more often. The meal is healthy, I get a portion of fish for the week, and I don't have to cook.

Tilapia meal which also came with a salad.

After lunch we stopped at the Home Depot to figure some things out for our tub/shower fixtures for the bathroom reno. We ended up not finding anything in the two handle that was nickel (which is the finish I'm trying to get all the fixtures and accessories throughout the house to be someday). We did find a one handle nickel finish set that everyone seemed to like, so we talked about it on the way home. I decided I would go look at Lowe's and Menard's first before buying that one just in case I found something I liked better.

I decided to go back out and return the stuff that won't work that I bought with a gift card. Between that and the leftover money I had on another gift card, I had almost enough money to buy that new set. I ended up having to pay for some tax. I also found a nickel finish toilet handle to put on the toilet in downstairs bathroom for a few bucks.

My attitude with eating today has been whatever I feel like I eat today, because I'm gonna get it together tomorrow. You have no idea how many times I've told myself this! I'm telling the truth this time, because I'm setting up a little challenge for myself next week. The next post will explain it all.