Ringing in the New Year...Mommy Style

Well, here it is, 4 hours and 45 minutes from 2011, and I am sitting in my living room in my sweats with C-Money, waiting on the hubster/dad to bring us dinner. It's a big night at the Holt house.

I hope you are all having a wonderful New Year's Eve, whether you're at an awesome party or you're chilling at home with your family like I am.

Here's to 2011! Cheers and Happy New Year!

Nothing to say but Epic Fail

As all 10 of you know, I started out on a quest to radically change my life for the better and started with eating clean. I knew it was foolish to start such a venture right before the holidays, but I wanted to be hardcore and decided that the holidays were not an excuse to live in gluttony and wallow in laziness. I did wonderfully through Thanksgiving and even through the first several Christmas parties. Since Christmas Eve Eve, however, I have fallen off of the clean wagon. Hard. Straight onto my fat ass.

I have nothing to say for myself except that I intend to pick right back up where I left off. I am positive that I have reversed quite a bit of the progress I made on the scale, but that is a part of the process, I suppose. Lesson learned. Again. Cannot eat like a fat ass without becoming, well, a fat ass. Shocking revelations being made here, people. Groundbreaking, really.

I don't want to say that my New Year's Resolution is to eat clean, because I made that resolution before New Year's, and that, to me, makes it more serious and permanent. No one sticks to her New Year's Resolutions, anyway. That never stops me from making them, though, so here goes:

-cook more at home
-be a better wife
-and mother
-and sister
-and daughter
-and friend
-hang out with my friends more (before I become a full blown recluse)
-go to church regularly
-work out on a regular basis
-take my lunch to work regularly
-stop complaining about my job so much (although I feel that this is an impossible goal. So far this week, I have received a letter from a client asking me to reduce the charges on her past due account, and a $10 payment on an account well into the thousands. TEN dollars. That is not a joke. I feel my hands are tied in the complaining about work department, but, nevertheless, I will try my best).

I'm pretty sure I did a written list of New Year's Resolutions last year. If I can find it, I will post it with a report card on my progress. I doubt much progress was made.

Happy New Year, everyone. Here's hoping that 2011 is going to be a good one, since I am pretty sure that the consensus for 2010 was pretty much all around bad for everyone (except for the one ray of sunshine...my sweet Carter).

I hope you all have more fun plans than I do. I plan to stay at home and ring in the new year in my pajamas with my sweet baby (who will be asleep) and my husband. I am pretty excited about not having to figure out what to wear and where to go. See what I mean about being a recluse?

Yo Mother...Nature

I can't believe that Christmas is a mere 4 days away! That is insane! Where has this year gone? I thought it would drag on, since I spent the bulk of it pregnant with my little man, but 2010 has absolutely flown by! I would greatly appreciate it if 2011 would slow it down a little so I can enjoy my baby while he is still a baby.

On the topic of Christmas, it is possible that the reason I cannot believe Christmas is this week is because it is about 60 degrees outside. What the heck, mother nature? Get it together! I saw the forecast for Christmas Eve and Day and Channel 5 News says that whatever precipitation we are getting this weekend might turn to snow that evening, but I know they are just trying to get us all excited...it is going to be far too warm for a white Christmas. Boo.

I hope you are all getting in the Christmas spirit and have a wonderful holiday season!

quickie

Upon the suggestion (insistence) of my co-worker, I am watching the season finale of Sing-Off. I have not watched any prior episodes but she knows how much I love Glee and listening to anyone who is talented at singing. You know who isn't talented? The hosts of Sing-Off. I was totally unimpressed with Ben Folds' a capella skills. Also, with each passing moment in the show, I hate Nicole Sherzinger (sp?) a little bit more. She is a silly girl. She says stupid things and she was a note hog when she sang with that Talk of the Town band. She covered runs like Mariah Carey or something. Gross. I hate when people do that. If you can sing well, you don't need to do all of that mess.

Nothing new to note on the clean eating front except that I am totally obsessed with guacamole and it is delicious on a sandwich. Subway is on board and I appreciate that. Yum. Also, Wholly Guacamole has some 100 calorie packs of guacamole and they are delicious and give a pretty good serving size of the yummy green stuff! Try them out. You are welcome.

Cheater Cheater

That's me. Cheater, cheater, junk food eater. This weekend, I deviated from the clean thing for the first time. Friday night, I went to a wedding and by the time we got to the reception, it was already 8:00. I was starving so I made the executive decision that I would punt the diet for the evening. I ate wedding food (chicken fingers, little sandwich, spinach dip, etc) and didn't even eat cake, but still, the next day, I felt like CRAP. I had the worst food hangover ever. It was worse than a hangover. My stomach was queasy all day and I didn't even drink at the wedding. I was so nervous I wouldn't be able to have fun at the Tacky Christmas Sweater party last night. (Don't worry. I had plenty of fun...too much fun, I think).

Last night was the annual Tacky Christmas Sweater Party so I obviously drank lots and lots of whiskey and some keg beer during the flip cup Olympics that occurred in my garage. It was super fun this year! Much more fun than last year, when I was pregnant and hated everyone. I did try to control myself food-wise, though, so I would not have a 10 pound gain when I weighed myself again. I had Subway before the party so I was able to skip all of the tasty party snacks, made mostly of butter. I was pretty successful. I only had a few spinach balls (that I remember). Miraculously, I was able to function today and we even had our friends Jared and Kelly and Mabel over today to play with Berry. It was nice to chill in our pjs with some friends since we were all pretty tired. It gets harder each year to recover from drinking nights. We still play the same games and have the same friends, but we're all a little older, fatter and balder and it takes a little longer to bounce back. It was fun, though!

I hope everyone had a wonderful weekend. I can't believe this week is Christmas! Merry Christmas everyone!

It's beginning to look a lot like Christmas

Is it me, or is this holiday season screaming by at the speed of light? I feel like I haven't even had time to sit back and enjoy the holiday season. Tonight, in hopes of getting in the holiday mood, my sister and I took C and her two girls to Bass Pro Shop to have their pictures made with Santa. It was FREE and there was no line! I was shocked. I expected the line to be hours long since I had heard the rumor that pictures with Santa were free. It is the best kept secret in Memphis, apparently.

Haley's girls were NOT excited about meeting Santa. Gracie bravely gave her gift request from about three feet away. Haha.

C$ did not care about ole SC one way or the other. I wanted to scan in his picture and upload it, but our upstairs computer where the scanner is has the blue screen of death or whatever that stinking virus is that basically kills your otherwise perfectly operating computer. SO annoying. Here are a few self portraits of me with little man after he had his picture made with St. Nick.

Ignore my face in the last picture. I am not trying to eat my child, despite the look of terror on his face. A nice lady there saw me taking self portraits and offered to take our picture. While I was telling C to "smile," she snapped the shot, hence the maniacal open-mouthed look I am sporting.

I am so excited about Christmas this year! I know that C won't know what is going on or remember this holiday, but it will be so much more fun with a baby. Plus, my sister's kids are perfect ages for a fun Christmas morning! I can't wait! Christmas is my favorite time of year. I just need to slow down and enjoy this one!

It's been a while

I know it's been a while since I posted a blog, but for those of you who were worried that I had fallen off the clean wagon, I am still sticking to it. This week, the LFC (Lawyers' Fat Club) started at work and we all weighed in. As I have said multiple times in earlier blogs, my scale has been broken pretty much since I started this whole process. I was anxious to get on the scale and see that I had dropped 15 pounds or so. Not. So. Much. I was quite disappointed to find that I had only dropped about 7.5 lbs since I started. That was a disappointment, but I am not going to let it slow me down. I think that although the author of my Eat Clean books says you do not have to count calories as long as you are eating clean, I may need to pay a little more attention to what, exactly, I am eating. What I mean by that is, I know that I am eating "clean" foods and I definitely feel better about myself, but I need to pay better attention to the carb/protein/fat ratio than I consume. I also need to step it up with my workout. I have been doing Jillian's Shred, but I have only been doing it about 4 times a week. I think I at least need to kick that up to 5 times if not 6 times a week, especially since it's only 20 minutes! There's no excuse for not doing it! I'd also like to incorporate a little walking (and eventually jogging) into the mix but since it's about 10 degrees outside, I guess that will wait since I'll have no choice but to take my little man with me!

Speaking of little man, I'm going to have to cut this blog a little short because he is ready to eat. That, and I want to fully concentrate on the biggest loser finale! Go Ada!

I stink at this

I have vowed that I would get to work at a decent time this week to show everyone how manageable this lifestyle is. I am an utter failure to you all. The bottom line is, though, it is manageable and everyone can do it. I just need to get my a$$ out of bed sometime before 7:30 to start my morning workout, cook breakfast, pack my lunch and C's diaper bag, shower, dress myself and C, drop C off at the babysitter's and get to work, approximately 20 miles away from my house.

Yesterday, my time of arrival was a somewhat improved 10:00. Today, an abysmal 10:40. In my defense, the business really slows down this time of year. Turns out, not a lot of people want to get divorced right before Christmas. Go figure. Also, not a lot of people want to pay their bills right before the holidays either. Or ever. In fact, the other day, a client (read: now ex-client) informed me that she would pay me $50 towards her $2500 and growing bill, and that she would make another payment after the holidays, if she could. IF SHE COULD!! I asked her if she expected me to work for free. She said no. I asked her if she expected me not to touch her case, call anyone, set anything, send any correspondence or call or talk to her in any way between now and then, and she said "of course not." Funny. She doesn't expect me to work for free and yet she does not intend to pay me. I do not see how these two truths can exist at the same time, but again, I am not sure that this person understands the concept of "truth." That is a blog for another day, though. Suffice it to say, she is no saint and her moral compass is a bit off, in my opinion.

Anyway, I have been following another fun blog and I wanted to share it with you all. I am still relatively new to this blogging world and I love reading new blogs! This one is called "The Front Burner." www.thefrontburnerblog.com

One negative aspect of my newfound love of everyone else's blogs: I am now painfully aware of how embarrasingly subpar my blog is. I will try and work on this, but honestly, I don't know how to make it all fancy and highlight words that link to other blogs and whatnot. I need a blog tutorial.

Not Today

My mission today: to get up earlier and get to work at a reasonable time. Status: Fail. Time of Arrival at work: 10:37. I know I can do better than that.

Meanwhile, in my adventures in clean eating, I cooked Paradise Island Bean Burgers for dinner. (recipe featured in The Eat Clean Diet Recharged). I was pretty pumped about them and really wanted them to they turn out well. Billy came into the kitchen demanding to know where the meat for tonight's meal was. When I told him there wasn't one, he acted as if I had told him we were eating a meal made of cow dung. Well guess what? Our vegetarian, meatless Paradise Island Bean Burgers were delicious! Even grumpy Billy liked them and asked for another one when he finished his first one. (he didn't get one because I have planned our meal out for the week and his second helping would've thrown everything off).

Some People

I realize that I may be the last remaining considerate driver, however, other drivers beware: I am not afraid to honk, scream at you like a madman and/or give you a hand gesture to accompany my screaming and honking. I was driving home from work today and I made the mistake of driving through Shelby Farms and up Kirby Whitten. I totally forgot about Starry Nights traffic. For those of you who are not familiar with the Memphis area, a portion of this drive is two lane and normally, there isn't a lot of traffic, but there is a Christmas light display nearby and it creates logistical mayhem. Anyway, I was headed away from Shelby Farms on Kirby Whitten and was literally sitting in standstill traffic when I came upon a sidestreet and someone trying desperately to turn from said sidestreet, left onto Kirby Whitten. I kindly waited to allow this person to turn in front of me. The other driver had to wait for the traffic heading the other way to stop, since obviously, none of the jerks headed towards Starry Nights had the Christmas spirit enough to stop and let him pass through. The traffic ahead of me moved up approximately 20 feet and I stayed back to wait and let driver turn. Let me remind you, traffic was not moving 20 feet ahead of me and we were not even close to the stoplight. The &*^*^%%$^& people behind me flipped out and honked and yelled as if I could not see that the traffic had moved a little bit in front of me. The a-hole behind them even floored it and zoomed around me, cutting off the poor left hand turn guy. I was so mad I literally had to convince myself NOT to get out of the car and go tell the people behind me exactly what I thought about them. Note: once the left hand driver finally was able to turn in front of me, we waited another 15 minutes to get to the light, so there was literally NO difference in the traffic for me stopping to let this poor guy turn out of his neighborhood. Some people. Another note: after all of my efforts, I do not believe Left Turn Larry bothered to wave in gratitude. That pissed me off even more than the jackassery that was taking place in the car behind me. UGH.

In an unrelated note, I was able to return to my shredding today, and I am optimistic I will even be able to walk tomorrow. Tomorrow, however, my goal is to get out of bed and get going early, because part of the reason I post about this stuff is to show myself and anyone who cares that it IS possible to hold down a full time job, have a child, eat healthy, clean foods and work out regularly. Today, I did not want to get out of bed and I did not want to do my workout but eventually, I did. I didn't make it into work, however, until about 10:30. I realize most people do not have that luxury, so I am going to try and make it a point to get to work at a respectable time to further show myself and everyone else that this life is possible and sustainable.

Tonight, we had split pea soup. It looked disgusting but it tasted pretty good. Stay tuned for my further adventures in clean eating!

S.O.R.E.

As you all know, I stared Jillian Michaels' 30 day Shred on Wednesday morning. I woke up Thursday and was sore, but decided to push through and work out again. That may have been a mistake. Throughout the day on Thursday, I grew increasingly sore, to the point I was literally having to use my hands to lower myself onto chairs/toilets/anything you sit on. It was pretty pitiful. Jillian loves lunges and squats, hence the ridiculous soreness. Friday morning, I decided that walking was necessary because I needed to go to court and Christmas and grocery shopping, and also because it was just me and the little man this weekend as B was out of town. I am not sure that one would call what I was doing "walking." I seriously looked like I was trying to learn how to walk with prosthetic legs or something. My quads were so weak I feared my legs might just give out from under me. Pathetic. I was able to walk again today like a normal person, however, I cleaned the house, decorated, put up garland and Christmas lights outside, cooked dinner and started on dinner for tomorrow night, and am just now sitting down for the first time, so I have not done the workout since Thursday morning. Never fear, though. I plan on picking right back up tomorrow where I left off. I only hope that this week, my legs are at least a little bit stronger so that I can walk and use the restroom like normal.

I made some turkey burgers tonight with a crazy recipe from my Eat Clean book. The recipe included ground turkey, skim milk, high protein cereal flakes, egg whites and some other ingredients. When I formed the patties, I have to admit, I was pretty sure it was going to be a disaster. You know what, I was WRONG! They were delicious! I put the burger on a whole grain bun and added romaine lettuce and a teeny bit of guacamole. YUMMO.

Now, I am cooking split pea soup. I have had it once before and it was delicious. I keep going in to check on it, though, and it looks nothing like the picture in the cookbook or the kind I had before. I hope it doesn't turn out to be a huge waste. Maybe it will surprise me, like my turkey burgers. Stay tuned and I will let you know exactly how the soup turns out.

Would You Like Jello With Your Workout?

I purposely waited until many hours after my first Shred workout to post this blog so that I would be able to avoid calling Jillian Michaels an evil succubus. For a 20 minute workout, I definitely felt it! It really isn't Jillian, though. It is me. I am SO out of shape it is disgusting. I literally had to picture the 400 lb Biggest Loser competitors working out to this exact workout for 9 hours a day to force myself through the workout. My fitness is a sad state of affairs. Jillian said that people on their 5th day would find the workout much easier than the first day folks, which I hope is true since I spent much of the workout grabbing my socks, panting and heaving like a madman. I hope that is true. I can already tell that I am going to be sore tomorrow and my legs were jello-esque all morning after the workout. To make matters worse, I grabbed a pair of maternity workout pants this morning and they kept falling down around my ankles. While I am glad they don't still fit, it was super annoying having to pull them up every 3 to 5 jumping jacks. Savor that mental image. It was every bit as funny as you are picturing. One of my goals is to get fit and thin enough to have super cute workout clothes.

I am going to try to stick with the morning workout plan in addition to my clean eating plan. Every diet book/website/magazine article/television show out there says you have to stop making excuses about not having enough time in your day to work out and to make time for yourself. It worked fine this morning, although I did not waltz into work until about 10. I will have to plan better if there is ever a time I need to be at work at a decent hour. That is another thing about this whole health kick I am on, it literally FORCES you to get your shiz together and get organized. I have to plan out meals, get C's clothes, bottles, food, etc. ready the night before, have a rough idea of my clothes for the next day the night before, and the list goes on. It is a lot to take on. Consider this my fair warning to you should you choose to take on something like this.