Good Monday morning Sunshines!

It is a crisp and beautiful winter morning, here in little ole Tilburg. My friend Chuanita came for the walk with me this morning and so we had a nice little visit too. Cup of tea and some mango. This weekend was oki, saturday i did absolutely NOTHING. And Sunday I wanted to torch, and found the children's stuff stacked a mile high behind my chair, so I started throwing out. I've decided I want my house back, not a garbage dump! So I am going through things, tossing things that are messes up, missing pieces, cut, coloured all up, out they went. Next project my clothes, I know there are clothes in my closet I will NEVER wear and why I keep them I do not know. I have clothes from before I came to the Netherlands, thats 10 years ago and they still have their tags on them. I never wore them. But I hold onto them in hopes that I will be able to fit into them once again. I highly doubt it, but I can dream right? Well no more, if I haven't worn it in 1 year... it is gone! I don't have the space or the energy to wash 50million things anymore.
Now that all the christmas stuff is down and gone, my house is looking kinda empty. I think I need to get a drill and hang up some pictures. But for now I will try and get the house clean. One step at a time as with my diet. One step at a time...

A poem

It kept me occupied all day trying to get it just right and now it is completed.


Gentle hands slowly brush
Agonizingly soft temptations
Caressing tender bare flesh
Coaxing and gently coercing
Knowing hands inspire and caress
Satin flesh heats with fervor
Innocent hands tentatively explore
Stroking heated velvety softness
Fevered crescendo of needs
Softly soothed with butterfly kisses
Whispered words of passion
Limbs entwining tempestuously
Adept fingers stoke passion's fires
Trembling bodies harmonize
Hearts and souls, seductively ensnared
Frantic caresses inflame and incite
Heated bodies tussle in the night
Souls merge and dreams explode
Exquisite pleasure shattering sanity
Slowly, spent bodies collapse trembling
Racing hearts subside
Glowing warmth eminates and surrounds
Tender words whispered intimately
Passion's fire banked and smoldering
Bodies entwine in replenishing sleep
First light will stoke passion's fire once more

Five days - Done myself proud....

I am VERY proud of myself. I have walked 30 minutes each day this week so far. I am planning on doing it also in the weekend, but will not bash myself if I don't make it. Heck I might just take the girls to the Wandelbos and walk around there instead. I'm thinking of doing that next week anyways. Mon/Wed/Fri walk around the neighbourhood with Beau and Tues/Thurs walk in the woods. It will be a nice change of scenery and I bet its really peaceful there early in the mornings. I remember when I went looking for pine greenery to make gifts for the teachers, there wasn't hardly anyone in the woods. So I'm thinking it will be a nice walk, and who knows, I may change the route to 3 days the woods and 2 days the neighbourhood.

Tonight I am SOOOOO going to be on the torch. Man it feels like FOREVER and a day since I actually sat down and played. I do have some back orders I need to get done. But I haven't heard from my costumer since I took a 'sabbatical'.

Thursday... nearly weekend

I so wanted to play on the torch last night and was mad at myself for breaking my nail. Oh well, it gets fixed today. I've got the broken piece still bandaided on.

This morning my walking partner Beau, was very reluctant to leave the house. Wonder why... but I got her out the door and then she took forever sniffing around the doggie area and finally we could get our walk started. I forgot to time myself today, but I am back about normal time, so I figured it took just about the same amount of time.

Since I started taking my vitamins and doing this walking stuff, I've felt a whole lot better. I'm not as tired during the day, and actually can get myself out of bed when the alarm goes off for the third time and still have enough time to get ready nice and easy instead of rush rush rush like it used to be. I am enjoying this taking care of myself for once thing. It makes life nice and makes me want to look forward to tomorrow instead of dreading it.

In fact yesterday when my project leader at work was upset because my other co-workers hadn't helped her on tuesday when I was off, I couldn't even get upset. So I thought about it for a while, and I told her, to let it roll off her. They have I think something like 1.5 months left before they stop. Why would she want to risk being upset and stressed out for that long, when they won't matter anymore once they are gone. She agreed with me, that it wasn't worth the energy to stress about it.

But now it is time for a bit of mango and banana, I think I will have an apple too. Then its into the shower I go, and then I am going to my mom-in-law, to have her help me get the patterns ready for my outfit and Kees' for carnaval. The girls I will use a halloween pattern that my mom gave to me years ago.

WAH!

I broke a nail!
My purty acrylic nails that I got done for new years!







I was opening a box, and it fell out of my hands. The corner of it caught my thumbnail just 'right' and broke it from just down to my nail and up to the corner. So I ended up with a piece and a dagger point. So I figured I'd get smart. I bandaided the whole thing back on. Called my manicurist and she will fix me up tomorrow afternoon. I feel SOOOO stupid!

But I do know that next week I will need to make an appointment to get new ones done, and I will go for something natural and plain and then the time after that I'm going for black sparkles with flames!

Damn Mango...

Well here I was sitting, enjoying my fruit after my 30min walk with Beau this morning and eat my mandarine and my apple, and get out the mango. Supposedly its REALLY good for you to eat mangos, something about glycemic index and glycemic load.... Which has to do with how fast the body responds to whatever you are eating to make the blood sugar level rise. So a mango has a GI of 51 (which is low and good) and GL of 8, which is really good too. And for 120 grams of mango you fill up pretty fast, so I sit here slicing it in half thinking, peach like effect, you know? Slice in half pull the one half off the pit, well seems that mangos don't like doing that so I got squirted in the face and down my shirt (its a good thing it was just my shirt from walking and not clean new clothes). So I figured I'd peel half of it and eat it by slicing off bits, well it seems the dang thing has gone all yicky. Oh well... I have to go shopping in a bit anyways so I will get some new ones, they were on sale too. Which is a good thing. I need more bananas too, the kids take fruit daily to school too. I wondder what I will eat for lunch today, prolly a sandwich with cheese and mustard (which is supposedly really good too cause it ups the metabolism or something for several hours after just a small amount)> According to the negativecaloriesfood diet, mustard is an after meal metabolism booster. It can raise your metabolism by as much as 20-25% for several hours. Thats a GOOD thing, especially seen as I LOVE mustard and my metabolism can most definitely use all the boosting it can get.

My neice had her birthday yesterday and is celebrating the party today, so the kids will get out of school and we will have to hurry home for lunch because Oma will be here around 2pm to pick us up for the party. I can't forget to get something easy for dinner, I'm thinking lasagna from the cooler section of the store, just this once, I do still have the salad stuff that I had planned for dinner yesterday, but with soup, meatballs and carrots yesterday, no one was in the mood for salad. So I think that solves my problem for dinner this evening. Lasagna and salad it shall be tonight.

But anyways... now shower time and shopping time... sometimes I really hate doing the grocery shopping. I think next week wednesday I need to make a trip to the market and get fabric for the carnival clothes. I need red for hubby, and black for me and and white for the kids...

Hubby and I will be devils, him in red outfit and me in black with bits of this really awesomely cool flame fabric to accent it. The children will be my 'Devils in angel disguises' They will have little white dresses and red horns and red tails and a halo. I am gonna have to get some white spraypaint, because for some odd reason I don't think angels, even devils in disguises, don't have purple wings... ;)

Day 2 of Lose Weight Plan - Still going strong

Yesterday I actually felt really good all day.
For my breakfast throughout the morning I ate a banana, 2 mandarines, and a kiwi and had two half liter bottles of water. Lunch consisted of two pieces of dark multi-grain bread toasted with a thin smearing of hummus and a half liter bottle of water. Dinner had to have been the best, it is from a diet my husband and I have done off and on over the years. Its called 'Fit for Life' and this particular recipe consists of grilled mustard, garlic, lemon juice marinaded chicken breasts, lemon butter mushrooms and a mustard, basil, olive oil, lemon juice marinaded courgettes and paprikas. Yum Yum! Oh and a glass of water. I was then at work and had three more glasses of water and came home and had one more half liter of water. But man, the chippies in the cupboard were calling to me. Hubby had bought them while I was away this past weekend at a friend's house.

Today has consisted of my vitamin, a banana and a bottle of water so far, but the day is still new. So I have kiwis and apples and mandarines that I can munch on, some pineapple juice I think I will enjoy a small glass of that this morning. For lunch I have a nice salad with pinenuts and a pesto dressing. Dinner tonight will be meatballs with carrots and a nice big salad with feta cheese and green olives (at least that way I know I can force the kids to eat a little bit of it, they are absolutely crazy about feta cheese and olives).

I still didn't get my christmas tree down, so I will do that either today during the day or this evening. I have the evening off, because I was supposed to be going to Rotterdam, but I've not heard from the woman I was gonna meet there, so I'm not gonna go hop on a train for an hour ride to just have to turn around and come home. Not to mention, I have no one who can watch the kiddos after school.

Another annoying bit of information, for Christmas hubby bought me (read US) an MP3 player, well within the first week the one of the earphones stopped working. And now... the stupid thing won't turn on even with brand new batteries. *boggle* So off to downtown I have to go again. But I can have a good excuse to stop off by my glass suppliers and see how things are going with my borrowed torch.

Here is a picture of my walking buddy, her name is Beau:

Happy New Year!

First off, Happy New Year.
Secondly, I am going to use this as a sort of exercise/diet journal for myself.

Today, the kids went back to school after Christmas break. So I decided, I will take advantage of the time they are gone and start myself on a walking schedule. Get up, take the kids to school, come home, get dog and go for a 30 min walk. I said I would do it, asked a friend to join me, she backed out today, but I went on anyways.

I am proud of myself for taking the first steps for myself to get some of this excess weight off. I have a Large goal of 50 kilos, but will work with smaller goals along the way. For each 5 kilos I lose I will put 50 euros into a pot. So when I lose all 50 kilos that will be 500 euros in the pot that I will use for something special. Maybe new clothes, or new shoes, or keep saving for a trip to the states, who knows. But I have set this up for myself, for no one else, no one has told me this time i have to do it. I am doing it, because I am tired of feeling like I am 60+ years old and I am just almost 32. I have my two lovely daughters who I want to see grow up into the beautiful women I am sure they will be, and be able to play with grandbabies when and if they decide to have children of their own.

I am also reading up on the www.negativecaloriesfood.com and it seems to be a good 'diet' cause its not really diet food, just making myself more aware of which foods are better for me to eat than others.

Now it is time to get this christmas tree out of my house and to get my house back in order and prepare it for Imbolc.