LOVE this guy!!

'The Nutcracker'

My mom and I enjoyed a night out together and saw the ballet 'The Nutcracker' together. I had a lovely time with my mom and re-living my memories of 10 (or so) consecutive years of performing in 'The Nutcracker.' The ballet is a holiday tradition that many dance companies perform on a yearly basis, children dream of dancing up on the stage as the Sugar Plum Fairy, Clara, a snow fairy or the Waltz of the Flowers princess.

I could not help but smile throughout the entire show; smiling because I thoroughly enjoyed watching all the children dance and smiling remembering Crystal, Ashley, and I all dancing various parts throughout our dancing careers. I never knew I would miss dancing in point shoes, the ladies just look so pretty doing so.
I might just have to sign Jaden up some year to be a Party Boy!!!

Thanksgiving dinner

We spent dinner at my (Andrea) parent's house with both of my sisters, their lovely families, and my parent's friends, Leah and Tom. With 4 children present it was far from a quiet meal, mostly due to our son. I don't think anyone minded, the extra noise definitely gave lots of energy to the day/meal!!

Congratulations to Crystal and Jeff on their engagement!

Now the Christmas decorating has begun:

Playing......

In my diaper! I would not stand still for mom to take a picture so these are "action" shots:

What's been going on

This past weekend we put up new curtains on three windows in our main living area. After replacing the windows we had not put any type of blind up but with winter approaching it definitely was time. These picture are from our dining room.

While mom and dad were installing the curtains Jaden and Tucker kept each other entertained:


Jaden enjoys vacuuming with his very own vacuum, we would have very clean floors if it actually worked:


I know Halloween was a few weeks ago but I just got to downloading the pictures to my computer. Jaden went as a cowboy:

Body after Baby - week 7 (missed a few)

Here we are at week 7, only 2 more weeks to go. I have not posted in a couple weeks due to being on vacation and then a busy last week transitioning from full time work to part time!! I am back now and ready to update.

I have gone running 2 days in a row and have had no issues with my asthma, hip hip hooray!! Now that I am working less I hope to make running a big part of my weekly routine and intern that will help me lose weight. I am still working on not weighing myself daily and trusting that if I eat healthy/appropriately and exercise I will lose weight the healthy way.

Week 7 diet goal: eat more vegetables
Week 7 exercise goal: run - increase to 3 miles

I have been keeping track of my points else where so I will be updating that section as well.

FINALLY

I went running and had no issues with my Asthma!! What a relief.

Here is too many more days of running!!!!!!!

Halloween - a year ago

Just for fun:

Illinois and Washington DC

We are home now from our 12 day trip to Illinois and Washington DC. We had a wonderful time but are also glad to be home. Our first stop was Illinois to visit the Fifhause family, including meeting our nieces, Addison and Chloe, for the first time. Unfortunately Chloe had to have more surgery right before we visited so our time with her, Mike, and Lyndzie was short but we were able to watch Addison for them and spent great quality time with her. On the day we were to leave Illinois Chloe was released from the hospital, we got to see and hold her at home for a few minutes before we took off for the second adventure of our trip.


The second adventure of our trip was to Washington DC area, both to sight see and to attend Jacob's cousins (Kelly) ceremony to renew her wedding vows with her husband Jason. Leanna, Al, and Anna also joined us for this part of the trip, Jaden thoroughly enjoyed seeing his grandparents and Aunt Anna. I had never been to Washington DC so had a wonderful time taking in all of the monuments, significant buildings, National Zoo, and museums, lots of history surrounds the area. I know these pictures are pretty small and only a few, if you wish to see more head over to Jacob's photo gallery (link is on my blog list, click on his name not the Washington DC part, this will take you to the home page) pictures are located under the Fall 2009 heading and the Washington DC heading.

Body after Baby - week 4

I made it through the week of not weighing myself and at the end all was good. Lost a little bit of weight even. I am currently on vacation and do not have my scale with me so can not report on how much I have lost so far. I will definitely weigh myself next Friday and give a report. I feel my diet so far while on vacation is doing pretty well, eating salads and fruits when I can, also letting myself splurge a little bit because lets face it everyone deserves a little down time.

I kept pretty good tack of my healthy meals from last week and ended with a total of 15 points, that is an ok amount. I am up to 59 points total for that portion of the challenge. This week we are counting the number of sit-ups we can do (hopefully reaching 50 per day for 50 points).

Diet goal: eat healthy while on vacation, keeping portion size in mind

Exercise goal: 50 sit-ups per day.

Here is to another week!

Body after Baby - week 3

Week 3 is underway. I have not weighed myself recently but am snacking healthier which has been my main goal for the past couple of weeks. I use to obsess over my weight and weigh myself daily, I hear this is not healthy for me. Is that true? I have even gone so far as say I might have had a slight weight disorder with how obsessed I was (am still fighting against). Not that I ever was super thin, my sister and I always referred to ourselves as "healthy," now how ever I am above healthy. To help me battle my obsession I have asked my husband to hide the scale except for on Fridays, so this Friday I will weigh myself after not doing so for a week. I will let you all know how it goes.

I walked/ran for a total of 14 points last week. I am also happy to report my asthma seems to be better which should allow me to run more frequently. I volunteered for a run event this past weekend and it sort of inspired me to run more so I again can race (at least participate in fun runs).

Week 3 diet goal: still working on eating fewer sweets.
Week 3 exercise goal: RUN!!!!!

Mama notes is encouraging us to eat healthier this week, for each meal that contains at least two different types of food groups I earn 1 point. I am off to a great start (and am not too worried about accumulating points, we typically eat healthy meals) as we had chicken, salad, and fruit for dinner. Point 1 earned :)

Weekend happenings

It was a busy weekend for the Fifhause's. Saturday brought ballet class, house painting, OSU football against Standford (OSU won!!!!!!!!!!!!), and a visit from our dear friends Christine and Kevin. Christine celebrated her birthday a few weeks ago and as her gift we took both out to dinner. Jacob and I left the OSU game early so we could go out to eat before the game crowd. Jaden does not always enjoy restaurants and usually lets us know by yelling, but this time he was a perfect gentleman!!! We got SOOOOO lucky, it was wonderful, thanks little J.

Sunday all 3 of us volunteered for the Great Pumpkin Run hosted by Home Life, Inc., the non-profit organization I work for. This was my 3rd year volunteering for the event and we had more runners than previous years!! I work on the committee by creating the registration form and setting up the online registration, besides our day of volunteering. Maybe next year I will run in the 10 k event, we shall see.

I had to leave in the middle of the run to go teach Sunday School, I am teaching a 3rd-5th grade Sunday School class at the First United Methodist Church. I have volunteered for older grades in the past at my church growing up so this is different for me but I am enjoying the kids. Unfortunately none showed up this week :( We are learning about God creating the world, this past Sunday we were going to talk about the Sabbath (day of rest) so I guess everyone took the day of rest :) When finding out that no one was going to show up I headed back to the run to help clean up.

After our early morning we headed to Albany to celebrate Uncle Paul's birthday, Happy Birthday Paul. We met up with Ashley, Paul (of course he is the birthday boy), Mom, and then Christine and Kevin joined us as well for a nice lunch.

We have now started our week anticipating our trip to Illinois and Washington DC towards the end of this week. Can't wait to see all of our family in those parts of the country!!!

Ms. Newell

Jaden wanted to send a little shout out to his friend Christine. He is VERY excited to see you this coming weekend!!

Body after Baby - week 2

My goals from last week were to snack healthier and to run twice, I am happy to report I was able to accomplish eating mostly health snacks (apple with peanut butter is my new favorite food item). However I had a set back with running, I have sports induced asthma and unfortunately it is getting worse as I age rather than better. Last Wednesday I attempted to run 2 miles on my lunch break, made it less than 1 mile and had an attack. Luckily I was able to get into my doctor promptly and am on a new regimen of medication. I have not attempted to run sense the last incident (I am a little fearful) but think I will make the attempt tomorrow!!

Diet goal: cut out sweets (ice cream, cake, candy, pop, etc.) unless for a special occasion (birthday parties, etc.). I don't eat a ton of sweets but definitely could eat less.

Exercise goal: run 2 days, plus biking to work and ballet class. I am repeating week 1's exercise goal due to my set back.

I am also tracking how many minutes I run/walk during this week, this is the Body after Baby weekly challenge. For every 15 minutes I walk or run I earn 1 point!

Blog question

I am new to this blog thing and have a question for those who are more experienced. If you become a follower of a blog do you receive email updates when a new post is written? Do I have to change a setting so those that follow get an email? If that is not possible what is the specific point of following a blog, other than to let the author know who is reading it?

Thanks much for your help!

Over the Bridge

Body after Baby - week 1

The challenge is underway. I have waited a couple of days to write this post because of stats I want to post but am self conscious about. I do hope that by making these numbers public I will stick with my goal(s) for the next 8 weeks. I trust all of you to not judge me but to encourage me, so please don't judge, thanks!! :)


weight: 147 lbs (yikes!!)
Overall weight loss goal: 10 lbs

Week 1 diet goal: substitute unhealthy snacks with fruit and vegetables. I have accomplished this goal for Monday and Tuesday, go me, now lets hope I can keep it up for the remainder of the week and then the remainder of the month and then for life! (or something like that)

Week 1 exercise goal: Run 2 days during this week. I use to run a lot, even ran a marathon, but have not returned to the sport consistently after little J was born. I like to blame it on Oregon's dark/dreary winters and working FT but really people run who have way busier schedules than I so really I have nothing to blame but myself. I keep hoping I will be able to wake up in the morning to run, has not happened yet. My preferable time to run is mid afternoon but that clearly is not possible with my work schedule. I am down to trying to run at night in the dark (thankfully I do have a dog to go with me) or forcing myself to get up in the morning to run. I am still hopeful for the morning running cause the idea of running at 8p is not sounding that appealing. Either way I will run 2 days this week (plus I have 2 ballet classes equaling at least 4 days of exercise, I hope).

This weeks points are earned by drinking water, I get a point for every glass of water I drink (typically 4 a day I think). I will keep my tally running on the left side, as with all my other points earned through out this journey.

I will post either Monday or Tuesday of every week with what I accomplished during the week before, including my weight loss amount.

Here we go!! WOOT!!

B.E.A.V.E.R.S!

Look at that excitement (before the game, we were a little less excited afterward)
Jaden thought it would be fun to wear mommy's OSU shirt and run around the house in it.

1 car family :)

We FINALLY did it, we sold the Jetta!!! It had become very apparent over the last year that our family did not "need" 2 vehicles, yes it is convenient but the need was not there. Jacob works from home and I only work 2 miles away from the house. Corvallis is a great biking town with lots of bike lanes and biking paths and we also have a fantastic public transportation system.

Once Jaden hit 1 year of age (the recommended age for being able to support a bike helmet) we bought a bike trailer, bought me a sweet road bike, and put the Jetta up for sale. Little did we know it would take us about 5 months to sell, I knew the market was not the best for selling a car but never imagined it would take this long. After lowering the price a couple of times we finally got an offer and took it!!

We are very relieved to be done with this process and excited for the adventure of having 1 car!

So You Think You Can Dance

Maybe I will be a contestant for Season 6? Probably not but I (Andrea) did have my first ballet class yesterday, first class after not dancing at all for probably 4 years and definitely not dancing consistently for 7 years.

To increase my aerobic activity I have decided to enroll in 2 adult ballet classes per week at the studio I attended during my younger years. It has been great to see all the same teachers and some what comforting as well. I was very nervous for the first class; fearful of my lack of flexibility, fearful to wear pink tights and a leotard, fearful of falling on my face, pretty much fearful of everything because it was very unknown to me how my body would react.

I am happy to report that my first class went better than I had expected. My favorite teacher was the one who taught and a young lady I know from volunteering with the high school youth group was also a participant in the class. Now don't get me wrong my body is definitely not the same and muscles that I have not used in 4 plus years will require great strengthening but overall I am not as out of condition as I had anticipated.

I am also happy to report that I CAN walk today, LOL. My caffs are slightly sore but I can walk without limping too noticeably.

Here is a picture of me after my first class: (no I will not just wear tights and a leotard, I will be wearing the shorts for a long time as there is much to cover up)



And a picture of Jaden eating his lunch (just cause he is too cute):

Here we go

This Blog has been created to document A's weight loss journey in conjunction with Mama Notes. It may include other cool information but no promises. A is still figuring this whole blogger thing out!! Any suggestions/advice is greatly appreciated!! Pictures will follow as I know posts are much more interesting when pictures are included.