Getting a New Family Member!

I'm still working out and attempting to loose weight. Just keep reciting my mantra of "slow and steady wins the race". Still building muscle so that's a good thing and my clothes are bigger on me. Looking forward to finding out what my weight is at my next weigh in.

We are getting a new dog tonight. The kids and I are so excited! I've been wanting a dog for such a long time and saw that a family near us needed to find a new home for their Cavalier King Charles Spaniel. They have a 4 year old who apparently can't keep his hands off Lightening. I'm guessing that their 9 year old named him. He was named after Lightening McQueen in Cars. Hehe This family has had him since he was a puppy and he is now 5 years old. We are so looking forward to spoiling him!

This past week was quite a busy one for us. The kids went for their yearly homeschool testing. I knew that math was going to be an issue for them and it was. This is precisely why we are continuing to work on math through the summer. I'm seriously considering giving the 2 month trial for Aleks a spin. They have an artificial intelligence which is able to target a student's problem areas so that they are able to get special focused attention on those. I'm thinking this may be just what we need to get our math levels back up around here.

Now that we have our testing done and the results mailed off to the appropriate authority, I just need to make sure that our homeschool portfolios are in order. This shouldn't be a terribly difficult task since our chosen curriculum, Time4Learning keeps records for me.

Trying to Break Out of This Plateau

I have been sitting at the same weight for 2-3 weeks now. The only thing that is keeping me from being TOTALLY discouraged about this, is that my clothes are still feeling loose. In fact, I went shopping with my Mother-in-law yesterday. She pointed out a dress on a rack in Walmart and said, "That would look really cute on you!" I took a look at it and saw that it was marked down to $5 from $20. I decided to go try it on. While trying it on, I realized that it was a size 10 and if FIT!!! I can't remember the last time I could wear a size 10! A month or two ago, I would not have been able to get into that same dress! I kind of feel like this is God's special little gift to me as a reward for working so hard. And an encouragement to continue. God knew that I would never even consider buying the dress unless it was priced that low.

I'm continuing to work to get lesson plans ready before our new school year starts. One of my goals is to set up spelling lists for ManBoy in our homeschool spelling curriculum. My plan is to use vocabulary words from his science course. That way he will be getting practice learning how to spell these words as well as hopefully making it easier for him to learn his science.

A Little Wisdom, (very little!)

Yesterday during my workout I was telling myself that it was a good thing that I wanted to quit. The thought occurred to me that if you don't want to quit during a workout then you aren't challenging yourself. Then, as I tend to do, I related this to my spiritual life. I ended up coming up with a phrase that probably isn't all that deep or original, "The Christian life is like a workout. If you aren't feeling the burn, then something needs adjusted!"

My kids are feeling the burn! Even though it's summer break, I've been making them workout and do math. I just started a new math curriculum with them, Teaching Textbooks. Today is the first day with it. ManBoy has already voiced his approval of it. Praise God! Of all the pros and cons of homeschooling, one of my favorite pros is getting to choose the curriculum that best fits our family! We have struggled for so long in the area of math, it will be refreshing to finally find something that will work for us!

Still losing!

I'm down another pound this week! Yippee! A big part of me really wants this to happen faster, but I keep reminding myself, "Slow and steady wins the race!" This refers to my weight loss, not my movement!

I also was able to break past a MAJOR (for me) fitness barrier this past week! Warning:  Any guys reading this, you may want to tune out for the next paragraph or two.  

I tend to have very painful periods due to having Endometriosis. Because of that, I've always taken my period as an excuse to lay off working out. Previously, this has caused often long disruptions to my workout routine with me taking weeks or months to get back to working out. Doesn't make for very consistent weight loss!

Last month, I was thrilled that I was able to get right back into my routine after taking 10 days off for my period. This month, I'm elated that I've not taken ANY days off!! I managed to continue my workouts right through the cramps! I felt better during this period than I have in forever! My hope is that I'll never have to skip another workout due to my period again!

Ok, guys, you can tune back in here! I'm adding in a new thing to my "rest days". I want to start doing yoga on my non-workout days. A friend told me about this DVD that offers a Christian Alternative to yoga and I ordered it. It's called PraiseMoves Flow and incorporates scripture into the workout. They have other workout videos on their site as well. There's even one called, PraiseMoves Alphabetics DVD!

It's all yoga postures that mirror the letters of the Hebrew alphabet! Now that's what I call a unique way to put words in ABC order!