low body love"osis" : the trouble with weight gain

Hello all, I will skip voicing my self deprecating remarks today and move to improvement.

This weekend i signed up for a gym membership. I know that most people do that in January and then fail to actually go 10 times by march, then they feel guilt for spending a lot of money on their membership around now and try to at least go one more time. I would like to believe that by buying my membership now i have skipped the procrastination and started really thinking about being more fit. We shall see.
 There are a lot of little goblins that want to takeover your positive attitude and day. Some of my goblins being low in body love and dishes. I have a very active toddler and outside actives are what he loves to do the best. When i was young, i also did a lot of playing outside and always felt sad that my own mother was not fit enough to play outside with me. Whether it was in the dirt, playing catch or even getting on the floor and playing barbies. I have often been terrified of becoming so unfit that i would miss parts of my kids life because i was not able to participate. As a young mother you rarely have opportunities to exercise and lose the baby fat. I have two kids under 4 and often between my toddler climbing all over me (which he is doing right now) or the baby teething and needing to be held, i rarely feel like i can step away enough to loose weight. Before baby two i could call myself a daily runner. my little toddler would ride in the stroller and we would go about 3 miles before he got fussy. Now, that same toddler would like to walk with me, which i would like to encourage, yet it slows me down and walking, even slowly will allow the weight to come off...but very slowly and, depending on your diet, not at all.  We have since put child #1 in preschool 3x a week and so that frees up my time. I have been doing P90x, but it has been ineffective because the days i do workout with my father and p90x, they usually are doing yoga or stretch. Which has made me very flexible, put alas, not healthier.

Next step is taking a look at what I'm eating. As head chef of Lund a la Cuisine, i am responsible for what my family eats. i really have very little excuse for my menu including high caloric food with very little nutrition. Before baby 1 i had 6 months of being a vegetarian. I loved it. I know many of you are probably meat eaters. And believe me, I grew up as a connoisseur of the perfectly made hamburger. When I saw a physician about my weight problems about 2 years ago now, She had decided to become a vegan. She shared her experience of weight loss and feeling like she had more energy, she suggested that maybe i should try going vegan for a week and see how i felt. I was very reluctant and made fun of the idea. after hitting a point in my frustration over not running very fast on my last race, i decided what would one week hurt. So I did...and then i...lost 3 lbs. I felt freer. So i kept up with in and around 1 month i didn't crave meat anymore. In fact, if it was put in front of me, i felt like it was a piece of cardboard. no interest whatsoever.  6 months after that i became pregnant and decided to eat meat again because i am not cool enough to figure out how much of everything i need to eat in order to keep a healthy pregnancy.(my first pregnancy was awful and ended in a very horrible early birthing experience.) So i fell off the vegetarian/vegan wagon, now i am struggling to get back on it. i don't really want to eat meat, but my husband and kids do, so it makes life a little interesting. they are not against eating vegetarian, but their mental health issues do better on high protein and being vegetarian is not high protein, though I'm sure some extremest could do it.  For those who would like to try it and are scared, just try it. You will notice that a lot of things can be so very good without meat. In fact, eating out isn't as complicated as it looks. Red Robin( my favorite burger joint) serves any burger with a vegi patty or a boca patty. You honestly can not taste the difference. (or maybe you can, but its still delicious.)

Okay, next topic. I have come across a wonderful blog/website that i must share. http://thestressedmom.com/2012/03/10-habits-for-a-well-run-home/

This stressed mom has wonderful ideas to help organize a home.

Ok peeps, Happy Easter and Happy Spring.

I first of all would like to give a shout out to LegacyKnits. I have left this blog alone and you have inspired me to continue on my battle. Thank you.
Now for  my focus this month....CLEANING and ORGANIZING...Don't run away, i have taken some advice that has actually made this scary combination fun.

This month in cleaning
I have decided to organize and clean the whole house. for those of you who are unaware, my family currently resides in what used to be my mothers paint studio. We have partially converted it into home a couple years ago with a pretty good sized kitchen and a bath. yet, the kitchen and bath are very rough.

I have decided to divide my home into zones. I am taking the advice of my sister in law and taking one part of my home at a time and cleaning it. I started with the Bathroom and Bedroom and they look so much better. I love Costco and Amazon for helping me organize. I have to admit that i am too impatient to go garage selling(I live in Washington state and garage sells are only in good weather...which happens for like a week a year) and i can usually find better deals online or through Costco than i can in store for the quality.

The Bath
We have a large water heater in our bathroom. I hid it by buying a cloth shower curtain and hung in on existing pipe. Thus, hiding the water heater. I have also matched the colors in the room so that it looks nice. We have a light blue, very cushiony mat and i have a step stool for my toddler. I also have a shower curtain for our tub, its blue tile inspired. I removed our old bin for shampoo and toys and replaced it with a tool organizer.

The bedroom
I have bought 3 shelving units from Costco. We are using them for clothing and also one is being used for my husbands robotic and mechanical gadgets. I bought sheets and a large king yellow quilt. I am working on acquiring artwork to fit what i need. my husband recently installed 5 point surround sound in our bedroom with our giant TV. we are currently looking for a large tapestry to hang over the TV when not in use.

This week is the Kitchen and Zone 1(which is behind the kitchen)
So far all i have done is a partial cleaning on the kitchen.

Kitchen
I have purchased a wire shelf organizer at Bed Bath and Beyond. we have encased our coffee maker in the shelf unit and placed mugs next to it.  The shelf has really helped organize the many gadgets we leave on the counter. also instead of a drawer for our cooking utensils i have put them in a metal container and have magnetic measuring spoons attached. I hug our measuring cups near the stove. To handle making dinner clean up easier i bought a vinyl table cloth. it is so much easier to clean off messes.

wow, this all sounds very boring. When i have worked by rooms or zones cleaning seems so much more manageable. i have taken pictures of artwork to put into my home.( in fact there is a pintrest art project where you taking pictures of your kids in the tub and frame them for the bathroom) I am feeling very creative and alive with making each room or zone a focus. Jump on the wagon and lets clean together. I would be happy to hear any ideas that would help organize and clean.  Happy Spring cleaning!