back to the daily grind

Wednesday was Lauren's first day back to school after the holiday break. She was beaming with excitement and had a huge smile when the teacher came to get her out of the car in the morning. She had an even bigger smile when the teacher brought her back to the car in the afternoon pick-up line. Once she was in the car she was talking a mile a minute about her day. Normally, she tells me that "yes, I had fun and everything was my favorite." But today she was a total chatter-box. "Mommy, did you know that it is Winter now?!" "Did you know it is a new month and YEAR?!" "We have new homework and it's the letter "L"." and finally "We're going to be penguins tomorrow."

It was pretty cool to watch.

While she was apparently having a Blast at school Tyler and I went to his playgroup at his friend Becca's house. He stayed pretty close to me most of the time but about 15 min. before it was time to go he warmed up a little and found some cars to play with. Although I had Tyler on my lap, I was still able to kick some butt on Tetris Party on the Wii.

Here's a shot of an exhausted Lauren re-grouping after her fun day at school.

Shortly after lunch the kiddos took a nap/had some quiet time. While they were doing their thing I broke out my Denise Austin: Hit the Spot Pilates. Part of the "30 Days to a New You" program calls for some physical activity each day. I'm alternating mine between cardio and strength training.

I must say that I feel Great. It's just been a few days of this continuous exercise and it's already made a world of difference in my attitude and energy level.

The hardest part for me is counting calories. Yesterday I ate a pretty high caloric lunch and basically used up almost all of my daily calories. So I sacrificed my family's happiness and found a low calorie Minestrone Soup recipe. To the recipe I added a bag of chopped "Asian Style Veggies" I had in the freezer. To go along with the soup I made a loaf of "Quick Italian Bread." By the time I decided I needed to make some bread I didn't have much time left before dinner. This bread took about one hour total...it was a yeast bread and even needed to rise. Everyone agreed that this loaf of bread was delish.

ready to go into the oven

out of the oven and sliced

topped with mozzarella & pepperoni, broiled for a few and served along side my delicious Minestrone Soup.

Lauren's favorite part of the meal were the random lemon slices.

even Tyler got into the Lemon Licking excitement

After the kids went to bed Matt and I went downstairs and watched WALL-E on our new Blu-Ray machine. Honestly, I was ready to go to bed half-way through. Do kids these days really get interested in this movie? Did you?! Seriously...I want to know.

This morning was another school day for Lauren. She picked out her school outfit which was a sundress from Cozumel, Mexico given to her from Grandma Jan and Grandpa Michael. The dress; paired with a turtleneck and tights worked just fine. She told me she recieved lots of compliments on her outfit from her teachers.

While Lauren was at school I resumed my usual Thursday volunteering at our church. Despite the fact that on the drive there Tyler kept repeating that he just wanted to "go stay at home instead," he actually had a good time. He played with play-dough, had a snack (lots of snack they told me) and also colored on a huge coloring page.

Back at home and after lunch I put the kids down to nap/quiet time and took my new i-pod to the basement to do my workout. Matt, bless his heart, downloaded some music onto it before he wrapped it up for my Christmas present. Since I haven't taken the time to figure out how to download MY music onto it I had to rock out to Phil Collins. (...which I must admit wasn't that bad...just don't tell anyone I said that.)

Here's my new i-pod touch and the new arm band I just recieved today from ebay.

Also given to us today was some authentic French chocolates from our neighbors. All Matt had to do was drive Frederich, Maria and daughter Lea to the airport to catch their plane to France. The chocolate is SUPERB and if you're ever in the area Check Them Out.

For dinner tonight I made a Penne Pasta Casserole. I've made this before but since this was a "use what we have week" I had to make it again. It was still good though and I used the leftover Italian bread and turned it into garlic bread for this meal. Yummers but still controllable...calorie wise.

Earlier today I made some more hummus. This time with Black Olives, Chickpeas, olive oil, lemon juice, cumin and some cayenne pepper. It was delish. I also made some more pita bread to go along with it but since this post has become unbelievably long I'll save that for tomorrow.

In the mean time enjoy this picture of Lauren with her dirty finger-nails thanks to some left over black olives I didn't use in the hummus.