3 of My Faves: Dates, Lady Vols, and Shoes

This past weekend we had a great date night. We haven't been on one in a while. Don't get me wrong, we've gone out to eat without Reagan and spend almost every Friday night with her at my mom's. But we haven't just gone out and had fun together like that in a while. We went to eat at our favorite sushi place, Sakura. I LOVE that place. It's one of the best things about moving back to west TN. We tried a new roll this time, the Picaso roll. It had cream cheese, some type of seafood, and jalapeños and the whole thing is dipped in tempura and deep fried. MMMMMMMMM. My mouth is watering just thinking about it. Justin poked the jalapeños out of his...sissy. ;) Then we did a little shopping to pick up some things I had been wanting to get the next time we were in Jackson. After that we went to play putt putt at the same place we went on our first official date. I beat Justin! Let this go down in history because I NEVER beat him at putt putt. He got me back in the arcade though. Ski ball and air hockey go to him. :) It was great to just spend time doing something fun and spending time together.

I'm a big Lady Vols fan. I haven't kept up much this year with the move and all, but I've been watching since the NCAA tournament started. Yesterday Reagan sported her Vols overalls Grammy made her to show her support. :)

Would you like to guess how much I paid for these shoes? $1 for each pair! Whoo hoo! I was headed to check out at Wal Mart when I saw a shelf that said "All Shoes This Shelf $1.00" Of course I was drawn in. :) The zebra print shoes need a little cleaning up, but who can complain when they were a dollar?! Yay for super cheap shoes!!!

Bonus: We found out yesterday that Justin and I are going opening day to watch the Cardinals play in St. Louis!!! Yay! We will have to leave the lectureship one day early, but we are going to opening day!!!!!! Justin is, of course, super excited to go see his team play. A sweet, sweet couple at church bought us the tickets and even got us a hotel room for that night. They are so kind and it will be so much fun! I can't wait! I can't wait for lectureship either so we can see lots of friends we haven't seen in a while. I'ts always a great week with lots of wonderful speakers and fellowship.

My Little Impressionist

Reagan LOVES to ca-ca. That's color for all of you non-Reaganese speaking folk.

Once she discovered real markers she's not into the color wonder so much anymore.

She's very picky about the colors she wants. You must give her choices and if you don't have anything she wants she'll say, "Noooo," and wait for you to bring her more.

I think she is an art prodigy. Just check out this picture she drew for me!

Doesn't it look like a flower?! It reminds me of the Impressionist paintings.

I think she's going to be in museums one day. ;)

Weight Watching

I mentioned in my last post that I have started Weight Watchers. I'm the type of person who needs to have something or someone to be accountable to. I'm not good at making myself do it. I need a coach. But not my husband as my coach or I get mad at him. :) I started the program on January 9. I took advantage of the free sign up when you pay for 3 months in advance. I think this offer goes for another week if you're thinking about doing it, by the way. It's around $19 a month. Paying for it makes me feel like I have to stay on it or I'm just wasting money. That's a good motivator for me. Who likes to waste money? It's a good program. You don't have to completely deprive yourself. In fact, they actually give you extra points in addition to your daily points to use over the week however you want. There are some days, though, when I wish I could drink a whole 2 liter of Dr. Pepper, eat a whole chocolate cake,

and not have it count. The points are based on fat, carbs, protein, and fiber. I've also been working out. I've done some toning/light weights, some walking (when it's been warm enough), and some Zumba. I ordered the videos with b-day money and it is definitely a workout!

So I guess you'd like to know how it's all going. In the first two weeks I lost 6 pounds, then another pound the third week. The next three weeks I didn't loose any, but I was definitely getting smaller and could feel a lot more muscle than before. It was pretty discouraging to do all this work and not see the scale move. This week I finally lost more weight, a little over 3 pounds. So far I've lost a little over 10 pounds and several inches. I've got 17 pounds more to meet my goal. If I can keep up my motivation I know I'll get there, eventually.

I didn't take an official before picture but here's one from Halloween. You can't see all of me but you can see from this one and the next that my middle is definitely getting smaller.

This was taken the other night. I couldn't wear this shirt before because it stuck to my "back fat." :)

This is from the summer of 08. I want to look like this again!

Weight Watchers and working out is definitely working. I wish I could just make it work faster! :)

Doctor, DMV, and a question for Mommies

Yesterday we took Reagan for her 18 month check up. There was a little drama with them having us scheduled for today instead of yesterday, but they worked us in. She absolutely hated being stripped down to her diaper but finally got over it. I wish I'd had a video camera with me in the exam room because she was hilarious. There was a mural on the wall behind the table. She kept standing up and moving her hands all over it and talking like she was critiquing it or something. She is soooo silly. She is now 21.4 pounds and 31 3/4 inches. She's still a little thing but her length has caught up to the 50th percentile. Her weight is still between the 5th and10th and she still has a big head in the 70's. Hahaha. At her 12 month and 15 month appointments she had low iron and has been taking a supplement so we had to get that checked out. They drew blood so they could check for anemia and get iron studies done. Needless to say, she did not appreciate that. Thankfully though she only needed one shot to be caught up. Everything is fine with her iron. She doesn't have anemia and her iron levels were fine so we can stop the supplement. Yay! Here she is with her little bandage. She hated it and kept trying to pull it off.

She also appears to have banana face in this picture. lol

We also went to the DMV and finally got our TN drivers licenses. By the time we waited at the Dr.'s office, ate lunch, then went to the DMV she was ready for her nap so that was an exercise in patience and trying not to drive the whole place crazy with her whining. But overall it was a productive day because we checked a couple of things off our to do list.

Now for the question. Reagan still gets her paci at nap and bed times and occasionally during church when I can't get her to be quiet. I know it's time to start weening her from it. For you ladies with experience, what is your opinion on the best way to do this. I tried just not giving it to her at nap time today. When I left the room she kept saying, "Oh no," and then cried for a good 15 minutes before I went in and gave it to her. What strategies have worked for y'all?

A Day at the Park

Ok, so I know I haven't posted since October and some of you aren't too happy about that. :) I get stressed pretty easily and kept feeling like I HAD to post all the time and it got me all worked up so I dropped it for a while. I think things have finally normalized enough after the move that I'm ready to get back to it. We are good and settled here in Ripley and are in a routine and everything now. Lots of things have been happening. I'm on Weight Watchers, Reagan just turned 18 months, we had lots of holidays, we moved...but you've probably still kept up with us on Facebook.

Friday we took Reagan on her first trip to the park. She had so much fun. We took lunch with us. She would barely eat because she was so excited looking at everything around her.

They have the cutest Cinderella carriage there!

She loved climbing on everything.

Taking a ride on a frog. :)

She loves her dada!

They both enjoyed the park. :)

"Weeeee."

And this is how she thinks you are meant to get to the top of the slide.

Riding on the merry-go-round.

She didn't want to leave. When I told her it was time to go she said, "No. Peeeee (please). Nooooo." We'll be visiting the park a lot this spring and summer. Apparently it wore her out. She stayed with Grammy Friday night and didn't get up until 9:30 Saturday morning. Hmmm...maybe we should go every day! :)

Ch-Ch-Changes!

So...we are moving back to Tennessee! Justin made the (tearful) announcement to the congregation here this morning. December 19th will be our last Sunday here and we will be moving on the 20th. He has accepted a position at the Ripley church of Christ. We are so excited for this new opportunity to work with a great congregation and get closer to family. We will only be 20 minutes to an hour from all of our parents! Needless to say all of Reagan's grandparents are VERY excited to get to see her more often.

We are also sad though, because this means we will have to leave the WONDERFUL people here in Demopolis. We are going to miss them terribly. Justin says if we could just pick Demopolis up and move it to west TN we would. We've grown close to many people here and hate to move away from them. We have definitely made some lifelong friendships.

Now we have 8 weeks...8 WEEKS!...to pack everything, buy a house, and get everything set up in Ripley. I will probably start the packing stuff we won't be needing tomorrow. lol I just need to get going so I don't stress too much. Plus now I probably have carpal tunnel syndrome so I'll have to take lots of brakes for my wrists. (I go Tuesday to find out for sure). We are going to look at houses Friday so we can go ahead and find what we want and make an offer. I know the whole house buying process can stretch out for a while so we want to jump on it quickly. Also, this means no decorating for Christmas this year. :( But I think it's worth the trade off. :)

This is something we prayed, thought, and talked a lot about. We definitely feel it's the right move for our family. And for some reason I feel the need to break out in Tennessee by Arrested Development. "Past Dyersburg, into Ripley..." :)

Something I Needed to Share

If you know someone who gets Christian Woman magazine (put out by Gospel Advocate) I highly suggest borrowing the September/October issue and reading the article A Journey for Truth: Rethinking the Pill by Lacy Crowell. She talks about one of the back up methods the pill uses. The pill causes changes in the lining of your uterus so that, should you ovulate, the chances of implantation of a fertilized egg are reduced. This means that it would be flushed out of your body. What she calls "in essence, a chemical abortion."

While Justin was at the Memphis School of Preaching we were told this. There was debate, though, if it was true. We looked into it for ourselves and couldn't find any information on it. I looked at the pill I was on's website and couldn't find anything. We talked to a member of the church who is a pharmacist and we were assured that's not a method the pill used. (I guess it's just not widely known.) Some time after we moved to Demopolis I was having a lot of trouble with frequent migraines, depression, fatigue, mood swings, etc. I was trying to figure out the problem and looked in to the side effects of the pill I was on. It seemed that it was the cause of those things. I also found a section on how my pill worked and there it was. A section on the back up method that could cause a perfectly good fertilized egg to not be able to attach to the wall of the uterus. As someone who believes that life starts at fertilization (Psalm 139:13-14), I was devastated. Had I unknowingly caused a chemical abortion? How many had I caused? Needless to say, I stopped taking the pill.

After Reagan was born I asked my doctor about it as well. I told her I had read that a fertilized egg could be flushed out because it couldn't implant and that I believe life starts at fertilization. She said if I was uncomfortable with that then condoms were the best choice.

I wish I had known this sooner. I wish I had shared this sooner. I don't know why I haven't shared this before.

I encourage you to check this out for yourself. Here is a link to the page for Ortho Tri-Cylen Lo. Click on Secondary Methods and it plainly tells you it impedes implantation.

I just want you to be informed.