Inspiration!

I have been inspired. I am in love and super excited to start sharing with you. What is this new found inspiration you ask? DIY Projects. I.am.in.love. I think this blog might start shifting in such direction so I hope you enjoy the ride!

My first project? Well... we just moved into a new house. A larger house, which is quite lovely in that I'm not running into walls constantly anymore but not so lovely in that we're a a little short on furniture. Although I've been drooling over the Ethan Allen catalog lately... I'm thinking the New Country Media Center would look b.e.a..utiful in my loft... I just can't quite bring myself to pay $5,000+ for an entertainment center. On to the new inspiration... ReStore by Habitat for Humanity and the GoodWill Store. I.love.them. They are my newest bestties.

Listen to me get carried away... entertainment centers. Something nice and pretty, dark wood with silver knobs. Yes, yes... this is what I'm dreaming of! Price... well... how about... $15. Um yeah.. I think that sounds fantastic. Not possible you say... let's see about that...

Here's what I bought:





Oh yes. I bought this lovely little dresser for $15. Wait, wait you say... I thought we were talking about entertainment centers. We are! Keep watching...





First we took all the drawers out. Then I decided it would work a little better and look more like it was intended to be an entertainment center if we took the middle shelf out, so we did just that!. We broke the lower drawers apart and used the wood to fill in the shelves. Some stripping, some sanding, some more stripping, some more sanding... yeah, yeah, you get the point: we put in some elbow grease time! Then for the stain...





Oh my, oh my... I.am.in.love. LOVE!!! Here's what it looks like with the pretty little silver knobs and sitting pretty in my new family room:





Like I said... love. The hubs and I were looking at a similar one at a local discount furniture store. They only wanted $600 for it. HA! I say, ha! I got mine for $60. Oh yes... you know you can picture my huge grin right about now.

Stay tuned... I have a whole house to play with and SO many ideas drifting around that I can't wait to get started! Next up? I believe a tour of the downstairs is in order!

~Andrea

A Story about the Munchkin...

It's time for a story about the munchkin in my life. Let me preface the story with this, I'm so proud of her.

Last week was parent teacher conference time at the school she attends. I went expecting the usual report and wasn't disappointed. Here is one part of where my pride in her is coming from...

Her teacher and I discussed her reading, writing and spelling skills. Finally we arrived at the subject of her math skills. She started the conversation by stating that my munchkin is being pulled out of half of the class's math time to go to a special class. She then asked me if I had gotten a chance to see the charts on the walls outside the 1st grade classroom. Having been a little on the verge of being late to my 7pm conference with her, I totally failed to even notice them, much less look at them. She told me that she needed to explain something that was going on in the computer lab for me to be able to understand the Munch's current math skills. She explained to me that the kids have been playing a math game during computer lab since the beginning of the year. Each level of the game consists of 30 to 40 math problems. The kids have to answer a certain number of them correctly in a set amount of time to pass each level. There are 10 levels of addition, 10 of subtraction and so on. She tells me that half of her class is still working on passing level one. The other half, minus two boys and my munchkin, are working on level two. The two boys are working on level four. She pauses a bit, I'm guessing for effect... which works 'cause I was totally holding my breath at that point. She looks me in the eyes and proceeds to say, "And your daughter... is currently working on level 14."

I'm a beaming Mommy... enough said.

P.S. The munchkin just caught me writing this, and as the reading skills are also advanced, read the end of the story and protested. Apparently she's on level sixteen now... my bad.

Love...

... "keeps no record of wrong" (I Corinthians 13:5)

Part of a beautiful and well known passage, words have never posed such a challenge. How many times have I read this passage and skipped these words?. Have I ever dared to take the words at face value? Could you? All I hear are an awful lot of "buts!" rattling around in my head...

There's been some drama afoot in my world. Through a series of events it has come to light that my beloved husband has been telling some whoppers for awhile. Without going into much detail, let's just say that I found out that my in-laws, whom I had never met and was led to believe hated me and were monsterous, are actually wonderful people and they in turn found out about my existence along with the fact that their son is married. Yep, you read it right... married.... for almost two years.

*Sigh* Anyone feel like curling up with me and ignoring everyone for awhile? *Sigh* Well since that isn't going to work, how about some yelling, crying, etc. Unfortunately, that's not working for me either. My heart keeps screaming out for me to look to Someone above myself. But I've been protesting. Why? I'm not sure.

Well, ok. Maybe I kinda have an idea. It's this verse above. 'Cause dang it! I want to be mad, and stomp my feet, and throw a fit, and pout, and, and, and... that verse just isn't playing along with my pity party. Here's how my recent conversation with God went:

"I'm mad"
"Ok"
"I want to throw a big fit."
"Do you love him?"
"Well yes, but I deserve to get back at him!"
"Really? Why's that?"
"Because he hurt me."
"But you said you love him."
"And?" (Yes, there was some attitude from me during this conversation. I think He just ignored it.)
"Love is patient, love is kind."
"I know, I know... but I just want to be upset right now."
"Why?"
"Because he deserves to have me be mad at him."
"It keeps no record of wrong. You said you love him, do you really?" (Maybe He didn't really ignore my attitude, but rather knew it would bite me later.)
Ouch... where the heck do I go from there?

*Sigh* So now I fight this battle within me, 'cause let's face it... I'm a woman and I'm really good at remembering those wrongs and keeping a record of them. My close friends and family that know about the drama mentioned above keep talking about how I've "handled it so well" and such and such. Um... not so much.

Do I love him? Yes. Do I love him enough to prove it by taking those words above at face value? Ugh... Do I have the ability to die to self and cherish true love between us? Why is this so stinkin' hard?

"But the greatest of these is love."

And in pursuit of the greatest... all I can do is try so let the internal chants begin... "Let it go, let it go. Let love be the greatest."

~Andrea

Whew!!!

Whew! It's been a crazy couple of weeks!Let's see if I can remember what's been going on...

First, the diet. Don't worry, I didn't give up! I made it to thirty days. Final results of the first round?!?! 27 pounds and 21 inches GONE! Whoo hoo!!! You have to wait six weeks in between rounds so your body doesn't become immune to the HcG. I'm pretty stoked to start round two at the end of May. On the other hand though, I am pretty excited to eat some different foods for awhile too. I'd kinda had enough of chicken, fish, fruits and vegetables.

Second, we had a minor catastrophe at our house two weeks ago. My darling husband forgot to pay attention when he was backing his Tahoe out of our garage and took out the front of my car. Grrr!!! I was a little more than upset. It caused about $1800 worth of damages and my poor little car had to get towed to the body shop because it was undrivable. Yes... it was really that bad. I am so grateful that we have insurance though! We only have to cough up $500 for the deductible. It's a decent amount of money, but easy for us to pull out of savings. The insurance company is paying the rest of the damages, paid for the tow truck and also paid for a rental car for the entire time my car is in the shop.

Perhaps this is silly, but the little accident really affected me and for totally selfish reasons. My little car, a 2006 shiny red Volvo S40, is one of my babies. I have always, always wanted to drive a Volvo. Kinda weird for a little kid, huh? So,its a dream fulfillment. It also symbolized a significant time in my life. I've talked a little bit about my ex-husband and divorce in some past posts. One of the hardest parts of the divorce was the financial world. When everything happened, the financial world of the marriage fell on my shoulders alone, with only half the income. As you can imagine, it killed, like super-killed, my credit. I worked at those bills and situation for two years. I had to put every extra penny towards bills and had to work with a company that fixes credit scores before I finally pulled myself out of the hole. The Volvo was the first major purchase, that relied on my credit score, that I was able to make after the divorce. I still remember that day... I was shocked beyond belief when they said I was approved for financing and without them having to pull any strings. All that said... that car means a lot to me and it, this feels silly but..., emotionally wounded me to have him run into it. Oh silly me... the things I worry about and care about. I don't really have a conclusion for this section yet, I guess I haven't quite figured it out yet!

Well... there were some other things that happened in the past few weeks but it's getting late and I've been trying to get up at 4:30 am to work out before going to work. Time for bed!

~Andrea

Updates and Ponderings

So... today is day 15 of me being on the HcG diet. It is fabulous! My mild hunger I had the first week has mostly subsided which is making it easier to be on the diet. I weighed in and took inches today. In two short weeks I have lost 20.6 pounds and 15.5 overall inches! Whoo hoo! And that about sums up how excited I am about all of this! In addition to all of this, I think my hormones are starting to get under control. I have a lovely little thing called PCOS. I have had a terrible time with acne for the past 10+ years. I have tried absolutely everything out there to help with it to no avail. It has been soooo frustrating. Guess what? My face and back have TOTALLY cleared up for perhaps the first time since I was a teenager. Not only am I super stoked about that but it is also giving me hope that my body may heal enough that we can get pregnant. That would be the ultimate accomplishment in my book.

My heart is pondering what to do with my little one and her education. She is in kindergarten in the local public school. It's not working out so well to say the least. She went into kindergarten knowing how to read, write, ABC's, count to 100+, and basic addition and subtraction. She doesn't want to go anymore because she's so bored. She came home a couple weeks ago and asked if I could do 1st grade with her over the summer so they would let her go to 2nd grade in the fall. *Sigh* What to do, what to do. We can't afford to send her to a private school. There is a charter school in town and she's been on the waiting list for two years now. Too bad there's 100+ kids on EACH grade's waiting list. I'm having a hard time with the unknown too. It's going to be a $200 investment in materials if I teach her over the summer and I have no idea whether or not they will actually let her move on. *Sigh* I want the absolute best for my daughter but I'm not too sure what direction leads to that right now.

~Andrea

One Week!

Today will be the completion of week number one on the HcG diet! I am so impressed with myself for having the will power to follow the diet perfectly. This is SO unlike me! So keeping in mind that I gained 5 lbs on the load days, I have lost an additional 10 pounds! Whoo hoo! That means my body has kicked out 15 pounds of icky fat in 5 days of VLCD! I checked my inches for the first time this morning too. I was skeptical but... 8 inches! Gone! Amazing!

Although I'm super stoked about all this weight loss, I do have something else on my heart. My little sister. She is in a really bad relationship, again. My whole family wants to go get her and bring her home but, it doesn't feel like the right thing to do. I'm having a hard time with it because some of things that are going on are like deja vu for me from my ex-husband. *Sigh* I guess it's just the waiting game and prayin' time.

~Andrea

It's getting exciting!

Are you ready for an update?!?! Well, I am ready to give you one!

Today is day number six on the Pounds and Inches protocol. It is my fourth day on the Very Low Calorie Diet. I have to say... I'm addicted to food! My poor family has had to deal with a grumpy momma the past few days. I promise I'm trying to be happy but well... there isn't enough chocolate on this diet! (Hee hee) I haven't cheated yet which I'm pretty impressed with. I also haven't exercised at all yet, just followed the diet.

So.... did I make you wait long enough for some numbers? Keep in mind that I gained five pounds on the two load days. However, I have since lost that five pounds along with an additional six pounds. Yes, that's right. My body has shed itself of eleven pounds in four days! Can you believe that?!?! I am so stoked about it! This is my miracle diet and I am so glad I found it!

~Andrea