First South Beach Sunday

Ok, so no one wants to South Beach with me, I am still going to try to post on Sunday's for accountability.

This week I lost 3 lbs and to make a total of 12 lbs lost. (I forgot I gained one last week, so I was at 9 lost goining into this week.

Tip for the week: I am loving the sugar free pudding and a tbs of peanut butter mixed in. It is a nice sweet for very few carbs.

TT

South Beach Sundays

Anybody want to South Beach with me?

I stated the south beach diet about 4 weeks ago and I am enjoying it very much. Besides feeling better and not always being hungry, I have lost 10 lbs. I was wondering if any one wanted to join me on this journey.

I am trying to get healthy and fit so that I can enjoy life and have the energy to do all I need for my family, job, and church. I don’t like having that draggy feeling all the time. I have noticed when I replace the bad carbs with protein it has changed the way I feel.

However, feeling better does not seem to be enough motivation for me. If I am accountable to you in cyber space, maybe I will find the stamina to stick with this and accomplish my goals.

What I was hoping to implement with South Beach Sundays as a place to state how much you lost the pervious week and how much you have lost total. Might be a nice way to stay accountable. I also would love it if people would post tips, recipes, and secrets to their success.

For example:

Tip – I found if you use sugar free chocolate pudding mix instead of the coca powder in the ricotta cream cheese desert, it tastes great and still has few carbs.

Recipe - One of our favorite meals is Spaghetti squash with marinara sauce loaded with veggies. We also sauté veal patties, that you can get in the meat department of the grocery store, and add that on top of the “pasta”. Delicious and you can make it in less than 15 minutes!

I would also love any weight watcher recipes or anything that is healthy and low carb.

So whatcha’ think??????

Cucumber Baby

A nice lady that works in my office (one of those people you pass in the hall, but don’t really know) asked me if I wanted a cucumber she had grown in her garden. I said no thanks, but she insisted I take the cucumber. When she pulled it out of the Wall Mart sack, it was the biggest cucumber I have ever seen. This is weird, but ok I thought.

Well I went to pick up Liv. When I was putting her in the car, she saw the cucumber (how could she not, it took up the entire backseat) and wanted to hold it. It was a bit heavy for her, so I helped her place it in her lap for the ride home. She jabbered on to the cucumber and we had a nice ride home.

That evening we went to her aunt and uncle’s home to play with her cousins. When we got out of the car, she insisted that the cucumber go inside with us. I thought this was a reasonable request, because no one wants a cucumber in their sweltering car when it is 90+ degrees outside. So, the cucumber went inside. Everywhere Liv played, the cucumber had to go too. The Eppling family now thinks we are weird, but I think we just confirmed what they already suspected.

When we got home that night, I placed the cucumber on the counter and did not think much about it. Liv started to wail. I could not determine what the spontaneous outburst pertained to. Then it hit me that she wanted the cucumber back. I gave it to her and she took it into the den (only after she dropped it about 10 times getting it to the den; I meant it, this is a seriously large cucumber.)

Once she and the cucumber were in the den, she began to wrap the cucumber up in a blanket. After the cucumber was properly bundled, she placed it in her baby doll stroller. She then got it one of her pretend bottles and began to give it a drink. At this moment Cucumber Baby was born.

That night, I was almost asleep when Matt got home. He crept into the bedroom and kissed me on the cheek and asked, “Why is there a ridiculously large cucumber in our daughters “princess” stroller?” I responded, “it is not a cucumber, it is a baby,” then I drifted off to sleep.

Later that week, the above-mentioned Epplings came over to swim. Her uncle, Erin, noticed the cucumber in the stroller wrapped in the blanket. He went over and picked it up and commented he could not believe we still had the cucumber. Then he pitched the cucumber back into the stroller. Matt and I both yelled at the same time, “you put the baby in upside down!” At that moment we both new, the cucumber had to go.

It took us a few days to get up the nerve, but one night the cucumber disappeared. I am not sure Liv will ever be able to play with, I mean eat cucumbers again……..

Liv's Favorite Things

Things Liv Loves that makes her so LIVEY
-Singing one-word songs that she makes up. The songs consist of one word that is repeated over in over in varying lengths, tones, and volumes. Below are her favorites:
-Grandparent Songs consists of the name of a grandparent over and
over
-Food songs list her favorite foods, cheese, ha-heart (Pop-Tart), and
juice are the three songs in this category
-Classmate Songs: This song consists of a classmate’s name. The
options for this song are as follows: Rio (by far the most popular), Hanna, Aric, Gabriella (Gabby is the name in the song), and another girl in her class that rarely makes the songs is Alivia. We think Alivia is not making the song rotation because Liv is confused as to why someone else has a name that sounds like hers.
-Puppy Song. This song breaks the rules; at times actual names of puppies she likes are thrown in instead of puppy. I am assuming Jeffy, Marnie, and Sadie are the verses and Puppy is the chorus in this song.
-The University Child Development Center
- Liv is really enjoying her school. Above you see her classmate’s names. Ms. Jackie is her teacher. When she says Ms. Jackie is really sounds like Ms. Daddy.
-She loves school and is doing well with counting, animals, and animal sounds. She starts Abeka curriculum in September. I think it is weird that she will actually be working in a curriculum before she is 2.
-Dancing
-Indian dancing around a tent in our den. We dance to the Phoenix Master’s Frontline CD. She loves it. We mainly dance to the first 3 or 4 songs on the CD before we collapse. After the dancing fun, Liv’s wants to worship to her favorite song “Come Walk With Me”
-Doing dances / hand motions on the hearth of the fire place (this weeks favorite is “Head, Shoulders, Knees and Toes”
-Dancing in her car seat to any and all types of music
-Getting down to fast praise music at church
-Dancing to the music in her head. I mean it, she will just start dancing and there is no music on, she just hears the beat in her head.
-Cooking eggs with Mommy
-Wearing Mommy’s shoes
-Fireworks, anything with a firework on it, and pretending to be a firework
- Harassing Marnie
-Harassing Daddy
-Riding on Mommy’s back like a horsey
-Hopping like a kangaroo or frog
-Sitting on the front porch and waiving to the cars that go by
-Eating Lucky Charms cereal
-She eats the marshmallow pieces and gives the cereal pieces to our
dog Marnie

Update

Ok, don’t everyone fall out because I have actually posted something on my blog. It has only been 8 months since my last post. That is not unreasonable is it?

Anyway, since my last posting a lot has happened.
I quit my job at BellSouth
Matt quit his job
We moved from Atlanta to Huntsville
Matt stated working for ESPN radio. You can catch his show at www.espn1450.com
I started working for ITC^DeltaCom. I would tell you what I do, but no one would understand it, and by the time I finished explaining it, you would all be asleep
Liv has started daycare at the University of Alabama Huntsville – yes, she is that smart, already in college. Well, she thinks she is

So as you can see, it has been a bit busy. And all of the above really only happened since the middle part of May.

We miss the youth group and all of our friends in Atlanta like crazy. The youth group there is amazing and the leaders are amazing too. I miss seeing them on Sundays and working with the youth band during the week. I also miss my work friends like crazy. I am enjoying my new job, but BellSouth people are a different breed. The people at ITCD look at me like I am from Mars. At least at Bell I did not stand out that much. Those of us in Sales op / Marketing were all pretty weird. Miss you guys.

Even though I do miss my ATL friends, it is so nice to be back in Alabama. It is wonderful that my parents are only 2 hours (and no ATL traffic) away. I have been able to see them a lot since we moved here. Matt’s family is all here in the Huntsville area. Having my support system so close to me has been wonderful. I don’t know who I did it before. Liv loves seeing all of the family more often.

Matt is doing well. The radio show is really taking off. His co-host is Gary Darby and the producer is his long time (20 years) best friend Matt Castleman. The three of them make a great team. I love listening to the show, and I am the one that can not stand to listen to talk radio.

Liv is doing well. She will be 2 in October. She is such a girl. She will not leave the house without her purse stiffed full of hair bows, and dress up jewelry. She is a hoot. This weekend we took her to the Huntsville bicentennial celebration. She loved the parade and has marched around like she is in the marching band. We them went to the children’s discovery museum (can’t remember the name of it). She and her cousins played all over the place. It is such a wonderful thing to step back and watch you child play and learn. My Mom was in town and we had the best time watching her interact with the other children and activities. That night we took her to the fireworks. We have been preparing he for this by asking her what the firework says. The answer is of course, BOOM Sparkle, sparkle, sparkle. Once the fireworks started she was so excited and kept yelling BOOM Sparkle, sparkle, sparkle. She thought they were great. It is a moment I will never forget. Matt, Liv, and I were all curled up on a blanket watching the display and at that moment, nothing else mattered except being together. I looked over at the two loves of my life and saw them smiling and enjoying the moment as their faces were lit by the different arrays of color from the fireworks overhead. I’ll never forget it. I am so blessed with an amazing husband and child.

On Sunday, I had to explain to people why my child was yelling BOOM Sparkle, sparkle, sparkle as she walked though the church. She of course was pretending to be a firework.

I will try to be better about posting. After working on a PC all day, I really do try to avoid our office. I will ask Matt to post some recent pictures of Liv.

Traci