Weekend Shenanigans

Happy almost Thanksgiving.  Can you believe it the holidays are here, I swear it was just summer wait I live in Southern California it was just 85 degrees last week.  Any way the holidays marks the beginning of all the crazy weekend shenanigans, and this was the start for me.

Saturday was my friends Kerry & Dan's wedding.  It was held in a beautiful winery in San Juan Capistrano.  

We clean up pretty good.

the hubs and his best impression of the thug life lol.

and then of course the best photo bomb award goes to this guy who offered to take our picture.

The wedding was so much fun we drank, danced, and did a little more drinking.  

Sunday was my first official photo shoot of the season and it was with one of my favorite families.  Gary is actually my running buddy Barb's brother.  I just love them and their boys are so stinking cute! I want to marry DQ off to little Gary :) 

Then of course I used the rest of my free time making bows and such.  I'm seriously thinking of reopening my easy shop. I just need to build up my stock first.

How was your weekend?

Linking up with Healthy Diva Eats and Life of Meg.

WiW...I May Have Found the Secret.

Happy WiW everyone.  I have been working.  Not necessarily  working out  but working at figuring out why my weight loss has seemed to have stalled this last year.  I know some of it has been because I've bounced around and tried different things (you can read about that here). Then one day I started going through old blog posts and thinking about what I was doing not just on the blog but in my life

then it came to me...

  I was doing a lot of crafting.  I love to craft, I love trying new crafts, I even turned TaTa's old room into my crafting/office when she moved out.

  I sew, do paper crafting, some jewelry making, and bows.  I used to LOVE to make hair bows.

 I would sell them at my school and even had an etsy shop for a bit.  Then for some reason I just fell out of it. 

When I was reflecting I really thought about it and tried to figure out why I was doing better with my weight during that time. DUH... I was busy, busy making or sewing.  Planning or taking pictures.  My hands were always busy. 

EUREKA!! 

My hands and mind were busy.  So there was no mindless snacking.  I would stop long enough to make and eat meals, and I wouldn't go back for seconds because I needed to get back and finish what I was working on. I wasn't mindlessly eating.   HOLY CRAP! I think I may have found the answer.

Also I love to watch TV and lately I've been sitting with DQ or at the kitchen table with my iPad and watch but then I would get bored and start looking for things to snack on. So I just brought my iPad in to my craft room/office and watched it while I was working on things.

and this is the result of finding the secret to hopefully my success  …

down 3.4 pounds

Now, any guesses to what I'm doing next? lol

Linking up with Fitness Blondie, and Weigh in Wednesday.

Vacation Recap Warning (tons a pictures)

So I have finally gone through my vacation photos and there were just so many (as you'll see).  It was a great time and we had a blast.  Not gonna lie the resort Be Live Canoa was just ok.  Don't get me wrong it was beautiful, but the service was just so-so.  But really I'm not going to complain because

The hardest decision was whether to go here.

or here

We also did some awesome excursions, like a catamaran.

snorkeling

we swam with sharks (a tad scary)

and rays

a sunset boat ride.

We also found time to hit the gym and get in a few good workouts (even though there was no air conditioning and we were sweating balls)

and some fun workouts like kayaking.

to counter act all the liquid calories

so...

many…

liquid calories...

So that's it in a nut shell.

Have you taken or are you getting ready for any vacations?

Oh Hey Friday's Five

Like what I did there in the title lol so let's get straight to it 

 

{one}

 



I have been detoxing from my vacation and this has been my breakfast of choice lately a green Protien smoothie and a slice of cinnamon raisin Ezekiel toast.  So good! 

 

{two}

 

Staying strong in my detox mode I have fought these urges.  Not that it's horrible but I had already eaten my lunch, so I popped some gum in my mouth and just said no. 

 

{three}

 

It is finally sweater weather here, if you can call 65-70 degrees cold...sorry my mid west and northern friends. 

{four}

In keeping with the name of my blog I need to stay on track and get to losing because I must borrow this outfit from TaTa... So cute and I am digging her new pixie cut.  Sorry for the shitty pic.

 

{five}

 

And lastly this first week back has been the longest week ever!! So I had a at home happy hour.  It was so yummy and I kept the portions under control to minimize any damage. 

Have a great weekend!! 

 

 

 

 

WiW... Back on Track

So this is the damage from vacation. It's not pretty. 6 pounds up,  I knew there would be some gain but I was hoping for less. But it is, what it is and I can only go forward from here. 

And even though I'm back from vacation I haven't really been home.  Yesterday was our staff development day and they put us up at the beautiful Shorebreak Hotel in Huntington Beach. 

And even though I just wanted to sit on the balcony with this beautiful view and a glass of wine telling myself "just one more day" I grabbed my kicks and headed to the beach path for a run. 

Then I had that glass of wine with these awesome girls. 

And since we weren't fully ready to be back Carrie and I decided to pretend we were still on island time.

I am still a little messed up with my time so I was up at the crack of dawn.  I chanced it and text Barb to see if she was wake...she was so I told her to get moving and meet me in lobby for a morning run.  We did a quick 5k then spent the rest of the day at our staff development.  

I am so glad that I made myself get up and get back on track instead of falling into old habits.  Yes I gained (a bit much) over vacation and I'm not happy but I don't regret it and I'm back full force ready to get working again.

This may not be the Caribbean but really how awesome is Southern California in November. 

Linking up with Fitness Blondie, and WiW.

Back to Reality

Reality has come crashing down hard today. So this  gonna be some what short a sweet or quick and dirty depending on how you like it ;) maybe both?

 After waking up to this every morning

and doing this pretty much everyday...

This plane ride was hard. We are smiling cause we got seats with extra leg room for the last flight home! Score...See sometimes it pays to not here your name called at the gate.

 

The hubs is sitting across the aisle from me don't worry I dragged his ass home with me, if I had to leave so did he.

Actually the whole day was exhausting, the van picked us up from the resort at 10am eastern time and I finally crawled into my bed at 2am Pacific time...that's like 20 hours of travel/waiting around in airports time. (I am NOT a mathematician so it may be give or take a few hours lol) 

Then cause I'm still off a bit time wise, my happy butt was up at 5am so I started to unpack, and start the vacation laundry.  I swear everything in my suit case was  slightly damp.  Nothing ever seemed to dry out there with all the humidity.

So 3 loads later it was off to the grocery store.  We seriously had nothing in the house, except coffee THANK YOU JESUS!  and yes I made sure of it before we left. Failing to plan is planning to fail, am I right? 

Look at all the loveliness.  It is time to get back on track so it was all the healthy stuff ok yes there are chips in there too, a request from DQ but come on I needed the extra mom points I did just go on vacation without her..lol

And then I had to pack again because we are having our teacher in service tomorrow night into Tuesday  and they booked us a room at the hotel.  It's right on the beach so really I guess my vacay isn't quite over.  

Linking up with Katie, and  Leeann.

Crazy Chicken Lady

I don't have a WIW for you guys this week as I am on vacation but
a few of of you have emailed or left a comment asking about my girls...not my human girls but my feathered ones. So here it is everything I have learned about being a crazy chicken lady…so far.

 It was never my intention to trun it the crazy chicken lady and really it happened so fast and painlessly that I didn't even  noticed until I was looking for something on amazon and this came up. 

Ya I also google stuff  I never thought I would either, like "what does normal chicken poop look like",  hey I was worried I thought Xena was getting sick...nope there is a wide range of normal in that area. 

So to answer some question...

How many chicken do I have? 

 I have 3 which technically is a small flock, and the pecking order thing is true.  They all have their  place in even this little flock and they all have very different personalities.  Yes they really do...

 Xena the Warrior Chicken is an Easter Egger 

She is the Big Boss Lady, and also the mama hen she watches out for the other girls but keeps them in line. 

She is also the most friendly and will actually come a cuddle up with DQ when she's out there.

 Princess Shit Head is a Barred Rock,

I added the shit head part cause she is the spoiled teenager of the bunch, and only likes to listen and come to us if we have something for her. She also chases Dobby (the dog) for sport.

 Noodle is an Australorp and the baby of the bunch.

I worried bout her when I first put them out in the coop, she didn't quite have all her feathers and looked so scraggly for the longest time.

Now she is actually the biggest in the bunch.  She is also the one that likes to sneak into the house if I leave the screen open.

 Are chickens noisy?
Not really or at least not that I have heard.  The coop is right outside my bedroom window and I have never heard them.  They do make the normal clucking sounds and Xena will often coo when I'm holding her (I like to think she is talking to me…see crazy chicken lady party of one).  But we also do not have a rooster, they are the noisy ones and are actually not allowed by the city.  Our city only allows up to 5 hens and NO roosters.

Don't you need a rooster for eggs?
Nope this is the question I get most, and no you do not need a rooster for your girls to have eggs.  Chickens will lay eggs no matter what roosters are only needed if you want those eggs to become chicks.

Are you going to eat the chickens?
Ummm NO!  I kinda have a rule that I don't eat anything I name (hey maybe I should start naming my cupcakes lol).  And truthfully I don't think I could do all the stuff that needs to be done before you eat them… Don't get me wrong I still love me some chicken nuggets but I'll just go to the supermarket and pick up some nameless, beak less relatives.

Why?
Well cause I'm a little crazy, I love all animals and DQ is just like me.  Also what other "pet" can give you breakfast!! it's really a win/win.

Are they easy to take care of?
Yes they are actually very easy to take care of. We have a coop that we bought pre made and just had to put it together.  The hubs is pretty talented so he made me a watering system that stays clean and I only need to fill up once a week, and a food one that I need to refill twice a week.

They are in the coop most of the day but I let them out to roam for a few hours when I get home if possible

and then most of the day on the weekends.  Really the only bad part is the poop. I'm talking A LOT of poop and my backyard is mostly concrete, so what I do is before I let them out I sweep all the poop from the day before (so it's dry) into the patches of garden I have (great fertilizer) then let them out so it docent really build up to bad, and I only have to clean out the coop once a week.
I have this big popper scooper thing I made it's kinda like cleaning a giant cat box. but it only takes about 20 minutes once a week.

So, that my friends is some answers to your chicken questions.  I am no expert and am learning new things about my girls everyday  but it a fun little thing we enjoy.