I've been doing a lousy job posting here or anywhere! I was offline for about 3 weeks (except for the occasional checking email) here is a bunch of pictures from our trip!


favorite picture of the day!


my mom with the boys :) I can't believe they are all smiling at the camera and everything!


Landon and my dad before they went fishing (they caught nothing but seaweed!)


the boys and their grandpa STEVE FIRES

First we went to AR to visit my dad. the boys and I drove alone and Mike flew into Memphis 10 days later. we spent the weekend there and then drove to MI, then Toledo and then home. in no particular order here are some highlights.

We went to the Memphis Zoo

Here is Oliver in the Boba




don't they look alike :)


Landon in the Boba


The Memphis Zoo has a little water thing the kids can play in and they had so much fun! it was SO HOT it was nice to get wet and finish the zoo a bit cooler...


Dad and Dianne! I think they will be pleased with this picture!


Landon on the 4th (well really the 3rd) we went to Caraway to a little festival and fireworks. the scratch on Landon's face is from some bratty kid at the splash park in Jonesboro! he clawed him in the face!


Landon wanted to go on this, and I thought "oh boy, this is going to be terrible!" but he had so much fun he wanted to go again! each of the little red things spins!


my dad is so funny. he was singing this to our friend's husband... something about how he should be jealous that my dad can play Guitar Hero just as well as he can ;)




Dad took Landon fishing 2x and they never caught anything


the mosquitoes were way too terrible or I think we wouldve been able to stay long enough to have him catch SOMETHING. but we were getting eaten alive.


Landon had his haircut halfway through the trip and it's pretty short now! I really like it like this but when he was swimming he'd complain it was getting in his eyes. These are his Transformers watches, the little robots come off and you can play with them!


Lepanto is a very small town and Dad knew one of the firemen, and he gave him a ride in the firetruck! we all got to ride, and Landon got to honk the horn! Eric forgot he turned the lights on so when Landon honked people started pulling over haha! Oliver was so thrilled... he fell asleep in my dad's lap :-p


Landon and fireman Eric


my dad is surrounded by farms and the crop dusters would come really close to his house and the kids would go nuts for them!


it was so hot we would go to a park in Jonesboro a lot to play at the free splash pad. Landon and Oliver both enjoyed this park and we went 3 or 4 times.



the boys had a lot of fun in the water! dad was throwing them in their tubes and they didn't mind getting wet







Grandpa Tom reading to Oliver

my mom and Tom have a boat that we took out one day. Landon and Oliver both fell asleep on it. I can't believe they did because a little speed boat on Lake Michigan is very bouncy. Landon was attaching the camera screaming "WHAT!" and we were cracking up



Oliver also got to help drive the boat and at one point shut it off! haha!


me!


family portrait???


the first day we went to the beach Oliver didn't like the water because it was too wavy. he stood in the water for about 5 minutes just watching it and then turned around and sat in the sand.


dardevil pants on the other hand thought it was wicked awesome.



the second day was way calm and everyone enjoyed the water :)

We drove to Detroit on Friday to visit Mike's parents before heading down to Mike's sister's in Toledo. my goddaughter/niece turns three tomorrow and they threw her a party Saturday and we got to go! she puts anything I do to shame! the party was a cooking themed party and they all made some deliciously healthy recipes together.


Landon on their slip n slide. the younger kids couldn't get down it themselves so you have to push them!


Oliver thought the water was cold. below is his new face when he is unhappy or someone yells at him or he's not getting what he wants.




Izzy the birthday girl!


Alex - he's so funny, he really liked me and it was because I like Star Wars. he thought I was cool, which is nice :)


Danny!


the boys can put their toes on their noses LOL

Tried to get a pic of all the grandkids in one sitting but it didn't work, they are too busy!





Izzy needed to have some girl time alone, so the boys just rough housed and played on the couch :)








Izzy's grandpas! on the left is Mr. Koory and on the right is Mike's dad


Izzy's grandmas! on the left is Mrs. Koory and on the right is Mike's mom


Landon and Isabella "cooking"


this picture would be so much better if Landon wasn't scowling/eating a cookie. don't I look like my mom?



Mike and his sister -- don't they look alike?

blah. I woke up full of hope and excited to look at the scale yesterday after a week of really hard work (and no exercise because of the broken toe situation) and all that hard work really paid off! 164.6 lbs! that's a 3.2 lb loss for last week!

but maybe it was because I was sick, because today the scale reads 167.

so as a rule I don't let this stuff bother me, but today it really bothered me. i feel like I'm never going to get out of the 160s.

and since I'm dying of the flu I can't even get a workout in at all. i'm eating to satisfy my hunger (and soothe my raw raw raw throat) and I definitely am not going out of my low calorie range.

I just don't understand why I didn't lose weight last week.

I'm ready to be weaning Oliver purely so that I can lose weight and that's not fair to him! I can do this I know I can, but I feel like right now I can't. this is where I plateaued last time and then I got pregnant. I won't get pregnant now but I don't know how to break this.

maybe as soon as I'm not dying I will work on busting my ass at exercise. I was hoping to be 10 lbs down by end of June :(

oh man. I think I'm doing a bit better with calorie counting and getting back into the swing of it, but I noticed I've definitely decreased the amount of weight I've lost and I'm back to more of maintaining. I went and re-evaluated my weight goals and determined that I should probably cut back a bit more, since Oliver isn't breastfeeding all night long and I've been busy without the gym I'm not burning as much as I could be. so decreasing calories is really going to suck, because I have been getting the max pretty much every day. clearly it's too much. now I'm decreasing and keeping at about 1550 as the max rather than 1700. I need to lose a bit more than 1.5lbs a week to reach my goal by October 1. I will be pleased if I hit it then, but I'll just be pleased to be a few pounds short.

I'll be honest, I'm scared that I'll fail. I'm scared that I will be like I have been and complacent with my weight loss instead of battling it. I have just over 30 lbs more to lose! I can do this! but if I hadn't just sat here for six weeks being "eh" I need something drastic.

I'm excited and extremely nervous! let's see what happens. I'm skeptical because I've been so lax, but also we are doing a lot of traveling and I need to put the kibosh on food splurges.

haha also, I am requesting Katy Perry, Lady Gaga, Pink and others from the library. my friends will think I lost my shit, but LOL I'm not so into running with Dashboard Confessional :)

I want us to be a family of health and doing.

oof. I haven't been here in a few weeks. I'm really just in this slump and not sure how to go back into everything. I'm 172lbs now. This is terrible. I was much closer to 135 at the beginning of April. it's amazing how easy it is to get out of habit.

I'm fortunate to have friends who are going through the same thing and it's nice to commiserate. I'm heading back to the gym tonight and hopefully that will make me feel a little better.

motivation-wise I'm desperate for the Nike+ but all the hints in the world isn't going to get it for me! I'm going to suck it up and buy it on Amazon since I have a gift card there I've been clinging to.

I'm trying to get the house in order so we can set the dining room table up in the spare bedroom. it would be nice to have dinner in there, but mostly I look forward to it being a craft room. I really want to paint that room a limier green too.

this post is all over the place!

i just need someone to restrict my eating! i've been eating far too many carbs and far too many calories as of late. I might have to resort back to eating some pre-packaged meals to cut back on portions and stuff.