Wordless Wednesday

Healthier Weight Loss

Recently someone commented to me that they had read my blog about my weight loss. You know at times I completely forgot about the HCG diet. I knew once George was born I wouldn't be able to the HCG diet and nurse. I was concerned how I would get all the weight off.

Well the first 25 pounds came off early fast. I think within a month it was gone. That was great because I only put on 19 pounds while I was pregnant. After the holidays I decided it was time to get the extra weight I had gained prior to getting pregnant. I wanted all my clothes to fit again.

I joined a Facebook group. I had to eat 1/2 cup of fruit, 3 cups of veggies, exercise 30-45 minutes per day 5 days a week, no sugar, and a weekly challenge. I lost 20 pounds within 6 months. I have now lost an additional 10 pounds. I am now down 50 pounds in a year...having a baby helped get rid of some of that lol. I did it a lot safer and healthier this time around.

I also learned that my body can't handle sugar on a daily basis. When I have sugar on a daily basis I get really run down and weak. I noticed this change after I had my thyroid out. It was so strange. If I give up sugar I feel human again. I am glad I figured this out! Sugar is so addictive and harmful to our bodies on a regular basis.

I do allow myself 1 cheat day a week. It is usually on Sunday. I will go out to eat, have ice cream, M&M's or whatever else I am craving. This really helps me eat clean too. I don't feel deprived or that I can't ever eat things again. I just remind myself when Sunday comes I can have a treat.

My goal is to lose another 25 pounds. I would like to have 15 of it off before vacation, but we will see if my body cooperates. I have struggled with losing weight because of nursing. There were times I just had to eat food to keep my supply up. Now that I have cut back on nursing I have been exercising a lot more.

I also don't think of this as a diet. This is a lifestyle change. Yeah, I know what you are thinking....oh people talk about these life style changes all the time...blah blah. Seriously though for me it is because of my health. It is very important to me to be the healthiest I can possibly be for my family. I also want George to eat healthy and see us eat healthy. Hopefully he will make wise food choices.

Happy Birthday George!

One year ago this little boy came into the world after 52 hours of labor. It was the longest 3 days of my life. Once he was born it was totally worth the past 3 days. The past year has been amazing! I would happily trade the prior 33 years of my life to relive the past year over again.

I LOVE watching George grow! I remember the first time he rolled over. It was sooooo exciting! Then he learned to scoot around, then crawl, pull himself up, sit, walk around furniture, eat, talk etc. It has all been so exciting!

Last night I put my 11 month old to bed for the last time. He will now be so many years for this point forward. I wanted it to be a cuddly all emotional bedtime....he had other plans. He was over tired, didn't want to sing our songs, and just wanted in his bed. lol Story of my life. He is so my child! He has a mind of his own, determined and stubborn.

I know George won't remember this time of his life, but I will cherish it forever! I remember being about 5 years old playing in my room with my dolls. I was sitting there thinking how I couldn't wait to have my own baby one day. That desire to be a mom was so strong in such a little girl. As I grew up the desire to be a mom only grew more and more.

Holding him in the hospital for the first day was a little strange. I couldn't believe he was mine. It didn't seem real. Then they told us he had to stay because of jaundice. I laid on the hospital bed with him next to me just crying. I was so worried I wouldn't be able to stay right beside him or something might happen to him. The whole jaundice thing is a distant memory now.

 

A couple hours old

George only wore 4 pairs of pants for the pictures. The first pair was a teeny tiny premie pair that he could wear until about 2 months old. Then he wore some pretend jeans that came with another outfit. Once he was able to fit into his Lucky or Gap jeans he wore those until the end. In the 11th month picture you can tell his pants got too short. Around 11 months he had a growth spurt and almost all his pants became too short. His Gap skinny jeans made it through from month 5-12. Gap clothes might seem a little pricey...shop their sales and look how long they last!

I have spent the past 4-5 months planning out G birthday. Looking at Pinterest for ideas and working on making things. We are one week away from the big party! I can't wait to share all the details.

Happy Birthday to my amazing son! I am so lucky to be your mom!

Almost a year old!

It's hard to believe one year ago today we went to the hospital to be induced. What a rookie I was that night!  I thought George would be here by the 4th.

I remember we were so excited!  Anxious most of the day. We got to the hospital to check in and they didn't have a room. WHAT!  We had this day scheduled for 3 weeks and had called ahead 4 hours before arriving. Well we were about to find out why there wasn't a room. 

Labor & delivery at my hospital was a revolving door. I sat there for 3 days or in labor for about 52 hours. Arrived Wednesday at 7pm and left Saturday around 5:30am to go to a regular room lol. I might have set a record there.

Inductions are no joke. Something I didn't want and something I hope doesn't happen again. 

I remember looking at that little bed thinking OMG that's for us!  My dreams are about to become a reality. This is still a favorite picture. The anticipation of waiting for my little miracle! 

I didn't give up faith that we would have a baby. I knew one day it would happen. Being determined can be a good thing. 

In a couple days we will celebrate George first birthday!  I can't believe he is one, but on the other hand I can. It's been an amazing year. Lots of laughter!  I love the little personality coming out. Last night I was laying on my bed and he was crawling around the room. He got to the door, turned around, smiles super big and waved. Then he proceeded to open the hall closet to just look inside. 

Motherhood is one of best things in the entire world!!!  I just love being a mom!  There are moment it's hard, but to me totally worth it! 

Life Changing

Last year I read this article. I knew my life was about to change in just a few short weeks as my due date approached. There are some parts that I had no idea would be changing so much. 

In the article it mentions how you feel you need space, but then you don't need space. There are days I feel I just want to go to the store alone. I would like just 30 minutes to an hour alone. Then another part of me doesn't want to leave G. I honestly love being a mom more than anything in the world. I have realized though in order to be a good mom I need some time for myself every so often. 

One of my friends asked me recently how I liked motherhood. My answer was I felt lost in some ways before motherhood. I just felt there was more to life, but I didn't know what it was. Then I had G.....life was complete. I knew what my purpose in life was all about now....to me a mom. 

The only thing I struggle with is the sleep. I now can function on 5 hours of interrupted sleep each night. If I am able to get 6 hours of sleep in a night I feel AMAZING! I worried how I would function without sleep before G was born. People would say you eventually just function. I couldn't wrap my head around how you function on such little sleep. Well they were right. You just learn to function with little sleep. That doesn't mean you aren't cranky or a zombie some days. Life goes on. 

I am different person. I look at things differently now. It's crazy to me how much of a mama bear I am. I am a helicopter mom when it comes to who my child is around and who takes care of him. I am not a helicopter mom when it comes to letting my child roam the house. He needs to explore, learn what happens when things open and shut, play alone, and eat a little dirt. 

I can look back on my life and 2 dates pop out in my mind that changed me. The first was January 18, 2013 when I found out I have a cancer with no cure. That was a life changing event that rocked my world. The next date is September 6, 2014 when I had G. My world was rocked again, but mostly with emotions of protecting and loving this amazing little boy. I think the order in which things happened were fitting. I have soaked up every day of motherhood. I want to cherish every moment with him. 

I look back on the past year and I see how much we have all changed. Art and I have both changed a lot. Life is a lot different now, but it is different in a good way. I can't wait to share the world with G. I want him to know just how much I love him every single day. 

Possible Peanut Allergy

We had quite the scare last week. I have been giving G peanut butter for a couple weeks. He has been eating peanut butter crackers, smoothies with peanut butter and peanut butter on bread. No reaction at all. Last week I gave him peanut butter bread for lunch. He had a reaction within 5 minutes. He broke out in a rash all over his face. 

The rash went completely away within an hour. He didn't have any swelling around his face or in his mouth. I kept checking on him. He was running around the house, screaming and playing with no problem. When he laid down for his nap I checked on him numerous times. It was just scary! The peditrician is going to do some allergy testing at this 1 year appointment. I am really this was a fluke or he outgrows it. In the mean time we will be keeping him away from peanut butter. 

There is always something to keep you on your toes with motherhood! Have any of you experienced a peanut allergy that later went away?

Wordless Wednesday

Bargain Shopping

Last year I bought got these pjs at Kohl's for free. I had a $10 off $10 purchase coupon. The pjs were on sale for $10, so I got them for FREE! I was so excited about them. I bought them in a 18 month size thinking G would wear them around December 2015. Ha! My child is a long boy. Footie pjs he always needs at least 1 size bigger than his current clothes. 

Pregnancy Highs & Lows

It is hard to believe it has been almost a year since I was pregnant. Last year at this time I was anxiously waiting for little G to come. I remember last year people saying I would forget about most of the pregnancy issues after the baby came. I thought yeah right I won't ever forget this craziness. 

A friend mentioned heartburn recently on Facebook. I forgot all about the heartburn. The only way I could keep it under control was to take apple cider vinegar each day. When I took a tablespoon of that daily the heartburn stayed away. 

I struggled with trying to work out while I was pregnant. The round ligament pain was terrible. Prior to getting pregnant I would walk on my lunch breaks at work. I had a route I did daily and it took 30-35 minutes. When I was pregnant I could do about half that. I would have to stop along the way due to the round ligament pain. 

Oh and the wonderful morning sickness that stay around for 17 weeks. I kept reading how for most women it went away after 12 weeks. I was so so excited to get to the 12 week mark for numerous reasons. When the morning sickness stayed I was not happy. It wasn't morning sickness. It was all day sickness. It only went away when I ate. So when I was eating something it was gone. As soon as I was done eating back it came. It was hard to eat healthy foods when all that sounded good was french fries. 

I was really careful with any type of medications doctors suggested. They all will offer up drugs for morning sickness. I didn't want to take any chances. I had read women taking Zofran to help with their morning sickness. To me I needed to just suffer through it and not take a chance with my child. I am so glad I felt that while I was pregnant because now there are all type of warning commercials out about the side effects of Zofran. 

Now let's talk about some of the perks of being pregnant. This one still is strange to me. The head on my hair grew like crazy, was full, and never got dirty. The hair on my legs stopped growing. I only had to wash my hair about once a week and shave my legs every other week. Talk about major perks!

There was the perks with sleeping early on. I could sleep all the time and so deep. Then the sleeping got rough towards the end. I love sleeping on my stomach. 

I LOVED feeling the baby kicks! It was the BEST feeling and my favorite thing of being pregnant. G would kick like crazy after steak. If he had been quiet I would eat steak and he would play a soccer game inside me. Friends would tell me I would miss the kicks. I miss them just a little bit. Now I get hugs and kisses from the sweetest little boy!

We will be celebrating G's 1st birthday in about 3 weeks. Hard to believe it has been a year already. 

G approves of smoothies!

Last week G had another fever. No idea what caused it. He wanted to be held most of the day, didn't want much food and took lots of naps on me. I love it when he will cuddle. He rarely cuddles these days. Normally he wants to be on the floor swiffering away. lol He just is on the go non-stop. 

I tried to feed him numerous things when he was sick. He would take a bite of this and that, but his appetite just wasn't there. Normally the kid eats a ton. I pulled my smoothie out of the fridge to drink while I held him on the couch. He grabbed that thing and started gulping it down. He drank over 1/3 of it. I figured I would let him drink as much as he wanted. It was healthy and he needed food. 

He also learned to drink out of a straw last week. That is life changing when you don't need to carry a sippy cup every where. 

Happy Boy!

It is hard to believe this little guy is already 9.5 months old! The past 3 months have flown by. The first 6 months seemed about right. He is growing so much! The other night he started pulling up and standing beside things. Honestly I am ready for him to walk. He is like a human swiffer when he crawls around the floor. He can't wear anything white. I swiffer and mop the floors all the time....he still looks like a dirt ball. lol

Back to the Grind

Back to work we go....G sums up exactly how I feel noooooo. 

He is all about climbing in things these days. This picture was taken right before nap time, so he was upset. Getting into things is fun, but climbing out is another story. He would much rather play under his exersaucer than on top of it with the toys. 

Wordless Wednesday

The Struggle is Real!

My new motto lately is "The Struggle is Real". I love every moment of being a mom. I can think of 3 exact times when I felt motherhood was a little too tough for the moment. I think that is pretty good for 8 months into motherhood. HOWEVER....It is a struggle daily to stay on top of things. There are days I just can't. I have been trying to give myself compassion and realize I just can't do every single thing. 

I look around my house and there are toys, clutter, dirt in the corners, dust on the furniture, dishes to put away, laundry to do etc. My most important thing I feel I need to stay on top of is clean floors...even that is a huge challenge. I can mop my floor and the next day G has dirt on his shirt from crawling cross it. Tile floors are just frustrating me at the moment. I have tried everything to keep those floors spic n span. 

I have one child....but the toys look like I have 2-3. I find toys under the couch, chair, in the kitchen, bedroom, and even my purse. Each night we pick up toys and put them in the baskets. Some how we just can't contain all these little toys. I am starting to think those toys are alive at night like Toy Story and move themselves all over the house. 

As I was running errands I realized just how much pressure women have on a daily basis. Just as a wife, mother and employee the numerous jobs that go along with those titles are out of control. We need to look like a million bucks on a fifty thousand dollar budge. That fifty thousand dollars needs to pay all the bills, buy groceries, save for retirement, save for college, new cars, and maintaining the million dollar womanly look. It's completely impossible to manage all that nonsense. 

I can't maintain a blog while working full time, carrying for an infant, trying to be a good wife and running a household. When I have time I blog. Most of the time it is a picture I am able to post from my phone. I don't even have time to read blogs anymore. I will catch a blog once in awhile if I see the blogger made a comment on FB or IG about their latest blog post. 

It was important to me that G was breastfed and boy oh boy was that a real struggle the first eight weeks. I had to work soooo hard to make it successful. I still have to work on staying on top of having enough milk. It also is important to me what he eats. I have made 98% of his food. There are times I have just had to buy jarred food. Guess what he has been fine too. I know I get a little crazy about what foods he eats because of my whole cancer ruckus. I just want him to be healthy and grow up to be as healthy as possible. 

You know what matters the most? The fact my son is thriving and super happy. That kid loves a good selfie or to talk to Nonna on Facetime. He sees himself and starts smiling away. Or when I pick him up from the nanny. I walk into the room and he lights up. In that moment who cares about the stressful conference call I just had. That smile fixes everything. Those dishes can stay in the sink, laundry can stay piled up in the basket and greasy hair will probably be covered up with dry shampoo yet another day. The struggle is real folks!

Wordless Wednesday

Happy Mother's Day

Motherhood is better than I ever dreamed it would be. It is a struggle at times.....some days you find yourself wresting an 18 pound baby alligator with poop all over his butt flipping over all while trying not to get poop on anything to cause more laundry. Or the day you turn around to grab meat in the grocery store to see him chewing on the sales ad and you have to pull pieces out of his mouth h...oping your not giving him bacteria....the struggle is real...Where he got the sales ad I have no idea. 

Then there are times he sneezes while eating avocado and there is green stuff everywhere....everyone cracks up laughing. How about his first bite of yogurt with the most sour expression lol 

Hearing him laughing hysterically chasing the dog around the house or not letting the dog off the couch. The mornings you walk in his room greeted by the biggest smile, grabs your neck and plants a big kiss on your cheek. These are the moment you wait a lifetime for and remember for a lifetime. 

Happy Mother's Day!