Friday Perrrrtys

Love them, want them, cannot afford them at $300!!!

I love victorian tea cups
Lust

yes please
Julia would look FABULOUS in this!

Freelancer, love her style love her blog

Enamel bracelet love

Looooooove Damask, and these are super kewl

Pretty rockin!

Love the color, love the outfit love the girl, check her out at Galadarling.com

Unexpected tastyness-Kale

Wanna try a new veggie? Try Kale!!

Since I have been eating healthier, I make it a point to really dive into the produce section at the store and try stuff I never tried before. I have always had an interest in exotic veggies, ever since I dated a vegan chef back in 2003.

I had heard in one of my Natural health magazines, that Kale was known as a super food, it's anti inflammatory property and cancer fighting super nutrients are world renowned for helping to achieve better health. I have kind of always turned my nose up at Kale without ever really trying it, I am not a huge spinach fan, but I have been known to eat it now and then, kale was always spinach's ugly stepbrother in my mind. But given the great health benefits, i decided to look it up online to see just how exactly you cook kale. What i found surprised me, hundreds of people tried kale and loved it. There were recipes galore, from baked to sauteed. I had to give it a try.

Kale has a taste like a cross between raw broccoli, cabbage and spinach. It has a very earthy flavor, bitter but with a touch of sweetness.

The first time that I made it I sauteed it with mushrooms, onions garlic and olive oil, and it was delicious!! Then last night , I cut it into bite size pieces, brushed it with olive oil and sprinkled it with season salt, and baked them until crispy, THEY TASTED LIKE POTATO CHIPS!!!! I shit you not! I don't know how its possible, but they were really good, and addicting! I mean kids would probably even eat them!! So next time your in the grocery store, try some kale! You just might like it!!

What did I do this weekend?

Visited my sister and my beautiful niece Kiera!

Made Squash Apple Soup
Finished sewing my Ipod cover with embroidery
Turned this....
Into this ,Pot Holder Embroidery floss organizer
Finished these stuffed felt softies for Hudson
Spent time with the little angel.

Fabulous Fall Fashion Goodness

So I HAD to make a fall fashion post about the things I am loving right now, Most of these things are yearly fall favorites.

Chunky and fine knit hats in all sorts of colors . hat by Pixiebell on etsy
Every kind of patterned tights imaginable, I cannot get enough of them!

Photo from this cute gals site. I would love to display my stockings like this, brilliant.

sweater dresses in all shapes and colors! They are so easy to wear

with a pair of cute tights and warm boots or booties
Ridiculous oversized glasses
I am so very in love with enamel jewelry, and these bamboo bracelets are do DIE for!
These rugged boots from Wanted

And these would be super cute with a grey sweater dress and black tights!

Happy dressing!

Well crap, there goes that idea.....

Soooo about that 30 day no spend challenge.... yeeeaaah riiight. I bought this yesterday.

But WAIT I can EXPLAIN!!

On Tuesday my phone finally bit it. Just completely went to hell, i had been wanting this phone for along long time, but never could justify the cost, but since Tmobile has screwed me twice now with bad phones, I decided I was going to get a killer deal on this thing if it killed me. lets just say I came out of that store with exactly what I wanted, and cheap Internet access, seriously i love this thing, for reals! There is nothing that this thing doesn't do, it is comparable to the iphone, but waaaay smarter. I can't keep my hands off of it!! Anyway I obviously blew my challenge. Even though it was a necessity, I decided to put off the no spend challenge until Jan. Anyways.

But on the diet challenge front, I lost 4 pounds!!! I know I shouldn't get too excited it's probably water weight, but it's something people!!!! let me have my moment lol. I have successfully avoided refined sugar for two days, even though I got a blazing headache yesterday I still managed. I Rock!!!

This and that sunday

This weekend was rather nice, we went to a coworkers packing party on Saturday. And then on Sunday I spent some time with the hubby and the lil man. Julia came over and we went to Clementine’s to sit in the sun ,

drink pumpkin coffee and just vent. And then walk around the nearby shops. I came home and made a killer batch of chicken stock, which I plan to make into chicken and dumplings soup tonight.
The weekend was also a little scary, after I got home from going out with Julia, I was changing the lil man when he starting making this wheezing sound and looked like he couldn’t breathe. Now mind you, he had actually had this issue since he was 3 weeks old or so, after he is done eating or when he is scrunched up he makes this wheezing sound. Our old pediatrician said that the problem isn’t in his lungs (those are fine thank god) but in his voice box, and that because babies has “floppy windpipes” sometimes they make that sound, sounded reasonable to me, but over the past few months the noise has gotten worse, still I suspect he may have acid reflux and just attributed it to that. Until yesterday when I was changing him, he looked all of the sudden like he couldn’t breathe, started shaking his hands and let out a cough, then was fine, but scared the shit out of me. So I finally called he new doctors answering service and had her ring me back, she said that they don’t call it wheezing, it’s called “stridor” and that wheezing refers to a whistling sound made when the lungs exhale, Stridor is a sound like gasping when the baby inhales, she said it’s a voice box condition that has to do with underdevelopment in that area, in other words “a floppy windpipe………still”. But she said it’s nothing to be concerned with unless he has trouble eating (no problem there!) and if he starts turning colors a baby shouldn’t turn. Still she is going to check him out on the 20th when he goes in for his 4 month shots.

Still it’s scary.
Today I also started the beginning of my two 30 day challenges.

The eating healthier challenge and the no spend challenge.

On the diet front, I am starting out at 175 pounds, phew! My long term goal is 145 my reasonable goal is 155, just because that’s what I was when before I got pregnant,

I haven’t been 145 in YEARS,….but wouldn’t it be nice?

I had my one and only cup of Joe this morning and am working on my first water of the day. For lunch I have a salad with lots of veggies and chicken, green apples with cinnamon and celery with peanut butter for snax some crackers and some yogurt. I really hope I don’t kill people today not eating any chocolate….specially around the 3pm hour…….god help me.

I made the last of my frivolous spending last night, I bought, a rolling pantry system for the kitchen, although I debated whether or not to call this “frivolous” we have hardly any space inour tiny kitchen and with the jars of baby food I am getting from friends, ever increasing, not to mention OUR food and the dogs food, we have no I mean NO space. So it really was a need. Still I didn’t want to put it on my already heavy credit card,

but what are you gonna do ya know?

And then true to freaking form, my damn cell phone started breaking this weekend, but I am sticking to my rule, NO FRIVILOUS SPENDING until the end of the month, mainly because the phone still works, for the most part, the handset is just ready to give way, and it routinely shuts itself off for no reason. Still I am going to try to use it until it totally craps out, in the mean time I am doing a bunch of research on a new one.

Well that’s really all for today, I can’t wait until lunch when I plan to just sit in my car and work on my embroidery, no borders or Target or craft store, I have to stay away from temptation. I can do this!!!!!!.....I think lol

Double 30 day challenge

I love to challenge myself every now and then, it makes life more interesting. Lately I have been inspired to try not one but two 30 day challenges. "inspired" for a few reasons.

The first challenge, and perhaps the most important, is the 30 day clean eating challenge.
for thirty days starting nov. 1st. i am cutting out the junk, after the baby, my body just doesn't seem to have as much of a taste for junk as it used to, my sweet tooth died down, and greasy food doesn't sit well. Instead, I will focus on eating fruits, veggies, whole grains, legumes and meats. Nothing fried, or with added sugar. Liquids will consist of water, coffee (which I really can't stand to give up) or low sugar juices.

This is not only to see if I will lose weight, but to make me FEEL better, I have been feeling really sluggish lately, a product of constantly tending to the baby, work, housework and everything else on gods green earth.

I am also doing this to get in better physical shape to work out, in two weeks I am going to renew my gym membership, in the mean time i really need to make sure I am feeding my body properly. I feel good about this and hopefully it will also be a little fun.

I go grocery shopping tonight, so I have to make sure that I get plenty of fruits and veggies,lean meats and breads. They always say to shop on the outsides of the grocery stores , not in the middle isle were all the junk is. And that what I intend to do! i have to grab a battery for my scale tonight so I can see were i am starting from. ( haven't weighed myself in ages!)

Challenge #2

In an effort to save money in these tough times, I will take the 30 day no spend challenge. This....will be a tough one, I will not let myself buy anything but necessities, not necessities like (omg I NEED that purse) but more like OMG my baby NEEDS his formula.

I can only spend money on:
Baby food or care items
weekly groceries
bills (of course)
gas
medications

I cannot spend on:

clothes for me

anymore shoes (this is why I have strategically planned it out to start on sunday, because I have a 50% off coupon for boots i really want this weekend lol)

Makeup (yup i have to scrape out every last bit of what I have until the month is over)

unnecessary baby items (like more clothes)

Sweets or things from the vending machine

Coffee stop in the morning ( I am going to have to deal with free office coffee :( )

The purpose of this is to save a little bit of money and learn to keep record like a fox. Marking down every little penny I spend.

There is one small loophole here, since I am making Christmas gifts, I do need to make one trip to the craft store to get everything that I need in one fell swoop. Then that's it. No new crafts or projects until later in the year.

Maybe I am being a little bit tough on myself but these are two things in my life that need order. And I am kind of excited about giving it a go!
Wish me luck!