Motivational Monday - 7/30/12

So another week has gone by. Me and Mike went to the gym on Thursday and Friday of last week, and I haven't been back since. But I'm GOING tomorrow!!!

It's so hard!!! Getting up at 5am to go to the gym, when I have to leave my house by 7am, work from 8-6, then get back home at 7pm. When I get home, I have to eat dinner, shower, and wind down, and hope to be in the bed by 9pm in order to wake up at 5am. But you know what?

Movtivational Monday - 7/23/12

Alright, Ali....it's Motivational MONDAY! C'mon! LOL, I can't keep doing it on Tuesday, that defeats the purpose, haha.

*Sigh*...Oh well...

This has been so "me" lately. Yes, I'm talking about in regards to fitness, and weight loss, and eating right...but there's a lot of things that go into that. I hate it when my house gets "cluttered". First, it makes me not want to clean bc I don't know where to start. And second, it makes simple things (as easy as packing lunch) more difficult bc nothing's in the right spot.

So this weekend I decided to do something about it. These pics are NOT good quality, bc they were just for me to see the difference, but then I thought, I could put them on the blog because....well, just because! It's my blog after all, it's the one place I can do what I want - haha!

It's the hallway and pantry that have been bugging the CRAP out of me lately, so I decided to do something about it!

So here are some pics... in the first one, you'll notice on the shelf above the washer & dryer: a heating pad, laundry detergent, crumbled up reusable publix bags, random water bottles, the red string is the wire stuff that goes to the weed-eater (that we haven't used in at least a year, lol), and dog food, collars, & leashes (on the far left side where you can't see), and random other stuff...

On top of the washer and dryer is a crockpot that we don't use anymore (we upgraded), a box that needed to go to the street for trash day, pizza (Busted!), my lunchbox, more laundry detergent, some Febreeze, and a 2 liter. Can't even reach the buttons on the dryer, ugh! I'm ashamed I let it get like that, lol.

It's BEAUTIFUL now! On the shelf: a rarely-used dog crate that was in the hallway, a box for "yard stuff", dryer sheets, laundry detergent, and misc cleaning supplies.

On the washer/dryer: NOTHING! :^) I put a box labeled "dog food/collars/leashes" on the back of the dryer. We keep their bowls in there also, since they're only fed once a day.

And here's the pantry....it's such as eyesore! It's pretty organized, but because it's in the middle of the hallway, it's so UGLY!

Fyi, the baby gate is there to keep the pups out of the hallway. It allows us to be able to get out the door without them getting out of it first. That one you see looking at me in the pic? (The one that is a total mama's boy and was wondering what I was doing?) Yeah...he could race a greyhound....it's damn near impossible to catch him once he's loose. :^)

Solution: tension rod and a fabric shower curtain. $15 and I LOVE it!

Oh, and because we were talking about the pups, here are a couple of pictures to show them off, haha.

See? 60 lbs of total Mama's boy. I love that dog.

I love her too...she's just a tad more stand-off-ish, lol.

Ok, back to the mess...This was the right side of the hall. First, there's the tension rod, but that was just to put the shower curtain up with. Then there's a dry erase board that we use to tell each other if we've fed the dogs (to avoid double feedings), but Mike hung it up originally with blue sticky stuff, and it fell down (leaving the blue stuff on the wall with the dry erase markers). Then there's just random stuff...a grill pan, some board games, a  bag of dog food, a dog crate we never use, several trash bags that were going to the street the next day...

So pretty much EVERYTHING is gone from the hall now, and those trash bags are gone now too, and it's fabulous! Feels like there's SO much room in there now!

So anyway, that's part of what I did this weekend. Isn't it funny how we can just spend a little chunk of our time cleaning an area, and it just transforms it? Awesome.

Motivational Monday - 7/16/12

Yes. No one will believe it until YOU do.

xoxo,
Ali

Motivational Monday - 7/9/12

Well, ladies and gentleman, today is the Eve of my 30th birthday. And you know what? I'm lovin' it.

I feel more loved right now than I ever have in my WHOLE life. On Saturday, my friends threw me a birthday party with a bunch of my friends from GA & FL all together. It was more amazing than I could even begin to describe here. Here are a couple of photos...well, several photos. I couldn't narrow it down, lol.

me and Adrian

Wendy and Dailyn

me and Luc

me and Mike <3

me and my twinnie Amy!

all the kids

me and Christi

me, Kayla, and Amy

Mike and Andrew

EVERYBODY! I love this pic...

Ok, ok....enough of that. Motivational Monday - getting to it!

So, with my back still not being completely healed, I'm not able to work out. Although I'm hoping to be cleared to at least WALK by Thursday... But that doesn't mean that I can't eat right, and drink the water I need to, and get enough sleep, etc.

And as soon as I'm cleared - I will be taking it easy - but it's ON!!!

Seriously, body?! Get it together!!!

Well................
My back isn't any better. My 30th birthday is next Tuesday and my body is NOT cooperating! It's hard to say "Well, I don't FEEEEEEL 30!" when I currently have to shuffle instead of walk, lol. However, I'm going to the chiropractor today, so I'm hoping that by the time I actually TURN 30, I'll be better! :^)

On another note, I got paired up with my Foodie Penpal today, so that'll be like an extra birthday present, lol. I CAN'T WAIT! I contacted the girl I'm sending a package to, within 15 mins of getting her email address, haha. SO. MUCH. FUN!

I'm off for now, headed to the doc! Have a fabulous Thursday everyone!!!

xoxo
Ali

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Update as of 12:58pm:

Diagnosis from chiropractor: I have dislocated/sprained my left sacroiliac joint. It's the joint that connects the hip bone to the backbone (runs across the top of your buttcheek pretty much, lol, tmi...).

Anyway, she put these little electronic pulse patches on me, with a big ice pack, then she put an exercise ball on the table and had me lean over it, while she worked the CRAP out of the muscles around both ends of the joint (hurt SOOOO bad).

Then she put me back on the electronic thingys and the ice pad. Then she put bio-freeze on it, and gave me lots of samples to last the weekend.

She said my car trip to GA this weekend for my BIRTHDAY PARTY (YAYYYYYYY!) would be fine as long as I kept icing it on and off, and I have a follow-up appt on Monday at 5. But I'll tell ya, I've got some relief now. It still hurts, but I didn't expect a miracle! It was DEFINITELY worth the trip. :^)       

Motivational Monday - 7/2/12

Ok, so shoot me. My "Motivational Monday" is actually a "Too-Late Tuesday", lol. But see...I threw my back out Sunday morning. I tried telling my body "No, you will not be defined by this! You're stronger than a hurt back!"

Turns out.............. I was wrong. VERY wrong.

Never realized how true this was...

Thrown-out backs are nothing to mess with. I've been on muscle relaxers and hydrocodone for two days and the heating pad has become my best friend. Yesterday I had to call out from work bc I couldn't even get out of bed by myself. And honestly, I shouldn't even be here today. It's just, I have TONS of work to do, and we've already got tomorrow off since it's July 4th (which I could not be happier about right now!)

I can barely walk today, and sitting in this chair is excrutiating, and I just want to go home, but I'm trying not to complain. It's funny; this whole thing has really made me want to work out, and it's made me realize that we can't take for granted that we CAN work out. So get out there and DO it!!!