I almost couldn't make it!

So, I know that I am not in a good physically fit state of being right now.  It's not a secret.  I would love to lose the "baby" weight now that my "baby" is three.  I am a year longer of losing the weight than I was with Paden, only took me two years then!  Sheesh.  That third kid really did me in.  But, he's the cutest darn thing and of course I have absolutely NO regrets.  I would just really like to get rid of some lbs.  My cousins post on FB about their Omnitrion drops and wraps that shrink their fat down blah, blah and it sounds tempting, but what happened to go ol' fashioned exercise and good eating.  Well, I have never really exercised for real in my life, only through sports which was easy back in the day.  Not so easy now.  I was also recently tempted by a late night infomercial on the Tummy Tuck Belt.  Rub some cream on belly fat, wear a girdle-like belt for 10 minutes or all day and melt the fat away.  Sounded good to me, but I am kind of not sure I want to spend the money.  They were, of course, a "get a second one for free if you call in the next 10 minutes" kind of deal, so it wouldn't have been too expensive. But, alas, I feel I would be ridiculed for trying a gimmick.

So, last night we went in a monsoon of a rain storm into Hermiston to pick up a free elliptical from my co-worker.  She's not using it for now, I told her we'd give it back if we didn't use it or she wanted it back.  I guess it wakes her daughter up and she gets mad, so she stopped using it.  Anyway, works for us.  We wanted to buy one on the cheap in case we didn't end up using it.

So, I just did FIVE minutes and I almost couldn't make it up the stairs afterwards!  So, yeah, I think it's working.  It's definitely going to get the heart rate going and the muscles working.  Both Neil and I plan on using it.  We just plan to build up slowly.  I'll do five minutes for a few days, then work up minute by minute each day or two.  

On another good note, I leaned the craft room again.  It's gets to be looking like a tornado hit every couple of months it seems.  It's actually really annoying.  Maybe I'll try harder to NOT do that this time.  It's really the boys mess too . . . not just me.  I cleaned my bedroom about two or three weeks ago and it took like FOREVER.  It's been pretty clean since.  I've tried to keep up on laundry and not have millions of loads to fold and put away all at once.  One a day works better.  I am behind this week on the boys' clothes.  They are fresh out of clean pants.  Good thing school is OUT (as of yesterday).  Too bad the weather isn't really shorts weather yet though.

In other news, Fischer is now officially potty trained.  He actually did really well.  I started about a week before he turned three.  The other two boys were three before they decided to cooperate, so I really felt no rush or pressure to try with him sooner.  I think his babysitter tried a little bit here and there, but we didn't really hit it hard until right before his birthday.  So, I started on a Friday that I stayed home from work with the boys and worked with him Friday, Saturday and Sunday.  He did progressively better each day - less accidents.  Monday, he had to spend the day with my friend Marilyn instead of his regular baby sitter and he wasn't happy about that.  He stayed dry all day until I got home from work and then wet his pants.  He held it ALL day.  He doesn't seem to handle change real well (taking after Paden) and will hold it if he's not at his normal comfy locations (home or Sarah's).  He went to the children's museum with his little friend Malia one day and he did the same thing then, except he went in the toilet when he got home this time.  So, really day four only one accident. At the end of the second week, I let him wear underwear to bed, as he'd gone the entire two weeks w/out wetting at night.  So, I thought that went really well actually.  I gave away left over diapers.  I now have pull-ups to get rid of, which are kind of expensive and we didn't use hardly any of them.  He had had a couple of accidents during the day this week.  One at the sitter's and one here.  He told me he had to go, then we got distracted and then he all of a sudden was saying, "agh, not again . . .I told you mama I had to go . . ."  So, let's blame that one on me. :-)

The bad news is we have a leaky, rusty valve to the sprinkler system.  The good news is that it rained the normal summer rainfall amount in the last two days, so the grass got watered.  My orange lillies in the back also got some water they deserved and started to bloom.  They are the ONLY good thing left in our back yard.  It's a train wreck back there.  We are very, very close to just paying someone to help get it cleaned up and paying a kid to come once a week to maintain.  Neither of us like yard work, I guess and I usually get an allergy attack after being in the jungle-like weeds that we are sporting, so I have a hard time.

The boys finished school.  Paden scored very high on his placement tests.  Gunnar is where he needs to be for his grade level.  He did an awesome job at his speech with his catapults.  Paden and Gunnar both got in a bad habit of not turning in their homework, so that's an area of improvement for all of us.  Paden used to be good, but then got sloppy.  Gunnar got progressively worse as well.  Luckily in 1st and 3rd grade, it doesn't really count against you.  Gunnar is excited to go to a new school next year for 4th grade.  He and Paden won't be at the same school which makes Gunnar SUPER happy.  They have a hard time getting along right now.  When Gunnar is in 6th, Paden will be in 4th grade and they will be at the same school again, but hopefully in completely different wings.  It was hard for Gunnar this year because his 1st grade brother should have been in the K-1 wing of the school, but he was in a 1-2 blend class and in the 2-3 wing of the school.  I hope they will be friends again some day.  Paden was emotional the last day of school because his teacher is retiring.  We need to do something for her - she did an awesome job with Gunnar (for two years) and Paden both.  Gunnar's teacher did well with him, Gunanr can be a tough cookie sometimes - he is getting better with his attitude.  But, he definitely has a similar amount of patience as his mother - so we're all doomed.

I hope to get some housework done tomorrow, get some crafting done before soaking my feet at a Mary Kay Spa Party tomorrow night!!!