Gotta Get Healthy!



The awesome bridesmaid dress,
imagine it in thistle.

So, I need to get healthy.  I have some unhealthy habits, a few extra baby pounds, and a cute strapless J.Crew bridesmaid dress to wear in May.  What I don't have is self-discipline, a desire to eat vegetables, and an attraction to exercise.  So I've decided to get healthier by gradually adding small, easy, healthy practices to my life.  I want to share a few of those small steps with you.  I had to find things to add to my life that actually seem doable and not overwhelming.  I have a full-time job that often takes more than 40 hours week, a one-year old who is more than a full-time job, and I also like to maintain some semblance of a social life.  An intensive exercise regime or a major diet just don't fit into my hectic lifestyle.  But here are a few things that do fit into my lifestyle:

1. I bought a pedometer (and eventually figured out how to program it!).  For just $5 (from Wal-Mart), this handy little gadget, in an attractive periwinkle hue, records how many steps I take.  Following my friend Mo's advice, I'm wearing it today to get a sense of how many steps I take in an average day.  Then, I'll try to increase my daily steps by 1,000 to start.  This will probably mean I take a walk around my building (the quad is gorgeous in the spring) or use the bathroom on the second floor of my building!  Pretty easy changes to get some more exercise in.
2. I'm drinking more H20.  I have refillable 20 oz. water bottle.  I'm trying to drink one full bottle every morning before I have my first cup of coffee, and at least 2 more bottles throughout the day.  We have a water cooler in my office, so I have all-day access to cold, tasty water!
3. I signed up for a daily healthy challenge at http://www.meyouhealth.com/.  I stumbled upon this website through an advertisement on my facebook profile.  Essentially, you register with your e-mail address, and every morning at 7:00, they send you a health challenge for the day.  The challenges focus on physical, emotional, and mental health.  Once you complete the task, you check "done", and have an opportunity to share a reflection about completing the challenge.  You can also invite your facebook friends to be in your circle, and offer each other encouragement.  There's also some sort of points/reward system that I haven't quite figured out yet.  The daily challenges aren't particularly difficult or exciting, but they're a great reminder at the start of the day to think about your health. The website has some iPhone apps as well (for you apple nerds). 

So those are my easy healthy steps this week.  I plan to keep up as best I can, and hopefully add more healthy lifestyle changes regularly.  With Lent beginning next week, I imagine I'll be adding/or giving up in a way that contributes to my health.  I'll keep you posted, and hope you might leave a comment sharing simple, healthy living tips that have worked for you!  For now, I'm signing off - at 758 steps!



If Michelle Obama thinks I should get healthy, I'm inclined
to get on board. 



The First Ear Infection has "Arriven"

Feeling good a few weeks ago at his 1-year doctor's visit!

So our little guy has his first ear infection.  I'm pretty proud.  Not that he has an ear infection, but that he made it through (and beyond) his first year without one.  I'd like to think that his overall good health has been a result of something we did as parents, but you never really know about these sorts of things - what's nature, what's nurture, and what's plain luck.  He's been breastfed, although not exclusively, for more than a year now and Tony and I don't mind too much if he gets dirty, is around germs, etc.  He's been at daycare since he was just 8 weeks old, so I guess he's been exposed to lots of nasty little bugs.  Lucky for us, all of that exposure seems to have helped strengthen his immune system.  Anyway, I"m bummed that he's a little under the weather, but so happy that we've been blessed with a healthy son.  I see lots of TV specials and articles about young children with terrible diseases or severe illnesses.  When I stop to consider how fortunate we are to have such a happy, healthy Henry, I am reminded that his presence in our lives is truly a miracle.

Extreme Couponing

So while the boys were napping today, I caught the TLC special, Extreme Couponing.  Now, some of the folks featured seemed a little looney, creating stockpiles that would put any nuclear fallout shelter to shame.  One of the shoppers featured, however, (a man, incidentally), had an impressive personal stockpile, but also wielded his couponing power to acquire tons (literally) of first quality cereal, toiletries, etc. for his local food bank.  Granted, he spends hours pouring over store ads and online coupon sites and planning mega-shopping strategies, but - this got me thinking.  These couponers would walk out of a grocery store with carts filled with name-brand items, paying just a few dollars.  What if there were volunteers at food banks who strategically clipped coupons and helped these food banks stock their shelves for pennies on the dollar?  Or what if more of us were a little more conscious about how we pay for groceries - we could end up saving lots of $$$ for our own household, but also passing those benefits along to others in our community for whom affordable food is a real problem.  I don't anticipate I'll ever reach "extreme couponing" status, but it probably wouldn't hurt for me to a little more intentional about how I spend my family's money.  I mean, I get a huge thrill when the bottom of the Kroger's receipt tells me how much money I've saved.  I can't imagine if that number got exponentially bigger.
Curious if any of my throngs of readers are couponers - any tips or helpful strategies?

Let's try this again...

So, I think I'm a decent writer.  And sometimes, I even think I'm funny.  Almost two years ago, when I found out I was pregnant, I decided to start a blog to document my pregnancy experience.  That lasted for about six minutes.  Then I had the baby, and decided to use the blog to document life as a new mama.  That lasted about three minutes (who knew having a newborn would be so exhausting and time consuming?!?).  So...here we go again, now that the kiddo is a year old, and slightly more self-sufficient.  I have high hopes.  I think this one's gonna last at least an hour, and that's a conservative estimation.  Maybe no one will even read this, and that's okay.  You'll just be missing out :-)