Memorial Day and Sunshine

So Memorial Day almost across the nation is synonymous with sunshine right? Well, this Memorial I almost thought we would not get any. Here is the Pacific Northwest we have had a VERY cold and VERY wet spring. So cold and wet in fact that it still feels like winter a lot.....You can imagine my joy when the glorious sun came out to play for the early evening and into the night. Yes, it stays light here until about 8:30pm. But I digress. I know that it is the end of the day and I am WAY behind the power curve but I would be remiss if I did not stop a take a moment to thank all of those that have made the ultimate sacrifice for my freedom. I take my freedom very personally, freedom to me is a matter of life or death, it is not something to be taken lightly.

I Served for 6 years, I deployed to Iraq for my country I know what it takes to serve. I love all those that I served with because I had to trust them with my life. I know what it takes for a family to support a loved one who serves because my husband is still Active Duty. This life is hard, but we do it to defend our freedom and for the love of country. If you do not value your freedom and value those that sacrifice everyday so you can remain free then you are just purely un-American.

Happy Memorial Day. Thank a Veteran, visit a cemetery, hug your children.

Home Made Deliciousness

So today in church there was a lesson on food storage and making things at home more often and buying processed foods less. The gal who taught the lesson brought in some awesome home made bread, soap and marshmallows. Wait, did I just say that? Home made marshmallows? Oh yes, and they are so delicious and so worth it. So I did some looking around and found some great websites that feature marshmallows. I figure I will post some links tonight and let you look at them. Later this week we are going to try and make them at home. Oh, and some home made graham crackers. They look pretty easy and VERY delicious. Go, drool like it did and then go cook!

Smitten Kitchen Home Made Marshmallows
This Week for Dinner Home Made Marshmallows
Smitten Kitchen  Home Made Graham Crakers

Oh, by the way, can you just imagine how wonderful S'mores would be with these great home made ingredients? I am so stinkin' excited!

Thing 1 and Thing 2

I just wanted to share some pictures of my beautiful girls. I have been trying to log on all day to Blogger, but it has been having some issues. I made shepherd's pie for dinner tonight, they both loved it and it was super easy to put together. I guess you could call tonight a pantry dinner night, ha ha ha. It is late, I have peanut butter cookies to eat and some X-Files to watch, yes I know I am a huge loser!

This is Thing 1. She is beautiful. She is my gal.

I adore her eyes.

This is when she told me to leave her alone and let her play.

This is Rocket Dog, we love her.......alot.

This is Thing 2. She is the Tasmanian devil. She is a diva. We love her........alot.

I am going to print this one, die and then hang it on my wall. I am so in love with this one.

She is slowly learning that Mommy likes to take pictures.........alot.

Until next time.

Do you know how much you are eating?

I did the Fort Lewis Down and Dirty Mud Run 5K on Saturday. I ran with team "ZipFizz". Here is the picture. Take a look and then I will tell you my epiphany.

You see the three healthy looking women on the the left? They are active, healthy and maintain a good weight for their heights. Then look at me, but not to closely please? I am larger then they are, thankfully that shirt was covering my mid-section that was threatening to dunlop over the waistband of my shorts! I saw this picture shortly after the run on Saturday, and my first thought was "wow, I look so much bigger than they do" my second thought was "why is that?" I have been thinking about this a lot, all weekend in fact. I am an active individual, I love to run, swim, chase after my girls and go for walks, why am I over weight? So I decided to do a little observation of myself, and I painfully realized that I eat WAY to much food! My problem is that I have no idea what portions I should be eating. If I am controlling my portion size I can then control my calories, equaling weight-loss. Which is what I want.

I have done some research and found some pretty good information that I thought I would share. I know that I am surely not the only one struggling with this! I want to figure it out now, so I can teach my girls healthy portions and healthy eating habits. I went to Freedieting.com and found their calorie calculator. I put in my information and found out that if I want to maintain my 181 lbs (wow I just said that on the internet, help me!) I should be consuming 2,165cal. If I want weight-loss, I should be consuming 1732cal and if I want extreme weight-loss, 1448cal. Granted, going from 2,165 to 1,448 would most likely send my body into shock and probably not a good idea, I will stick with aiming for 1,732cal. With that in mind I then went to the Mayo Clinic's website and found an awesome slideshow all about portion control and gave me some great visual clues to help me with portion control. Here are some pictures to give you an idea.

This is a medium orange, the size of a tennis ball.

Chicken, Pork, Steak any meat really should be about the size of a deck of cards.

Dairy should be about the size of four to five dice. This one is hard, how do you tell that amount when the cheese is melted all over some wonderful pizza? Please tell me!

Pasta and rice should be about the size of a hockey puck, I guess this means I need to buy a hockey puck so I know what size that actually is!

Here are a few tips that will also help if you are trying to watch your portions and ultimatly your calories.

• When at a restaurant ask the Waiter for a to-go box and put half of your entree in the box, because typically restaurants serve about double what you should eat.
• If you are going to eat fast-food take it home and put it on a plate, you would be surpised and how full your plate will be!
• Then order smaller portions, I mean do we really the king size or the super king size? Come on now.
• If your super yummy evilly tempting treats are easily accessible you will eat them more often. So, out of sight out of mind right? Put the ice cream in the back of the freezer, I mean like behind soemthing. 
• When drinking that must have glass of OJ in the morning, drink it out of a tall skinny glass because you will feel like you have had more. 
• Did you know that dried fruit is 3/4 smaller that their original size? Meaning a cup of grapes equates to 1/4 cup of raisins. 

Now that I have enlightened myself on portion control I am really going to try and use it! That way I am eating better and my family is eating better. I mean, really isn't that what it is all about?

Now that you know a bit more go and test your smarts here......Pop Quiz!

Oh, this is a good one too! WebMD's Portion Control Plate

It's been awhile.....

I have been away from my blog for awhile and well, I have been busy. I cook, I clean, I do laundry, I play with Thing 1 and Thing 2, I go to church, I take pictures, I run, I clean, I cook (wait I said those already!). Anyway, you get the idea.

So, now I feel that I have something to say, so I am going to throw somethings your way. When it comes to photography I am a novice, a newbie, a baby, a beginner. I really want to improve my skill and make photography what I do, you know, my skill, my profession, my craft. I know that I may not make great wealth, I know that it can be hard work, I know many people want to become photographers and just can't seem to make it happen. I have been doing a great deal of studying online to brush up on Photoshop, which is still over my head, brushing up on lighting, exposure, composition and many other things. I have talked with other photograpehrs and I have even had the opportunity to assist a photographer on a shoot. I plan to assist on many more if she lets me!

I have taken this all in and decided to continue practicing. I have been doing landscape photography for awhile now, but breaking into portrait photography is intimidating. I have done two official shoots now, and I would like to share some of the images from those shoots. If you are a photographer and would like to critique my work I welcome that! Otherwise, please enjoy!

The first shoot I did was of four sisters. They had so much energy that all I could do was try and catch up. I had a fabulous time running around after them, I think I was able to capture some really good images of them.

The next shoot I was able to do was of a beautiful friend of mine who is pregnant. I am really thankful I was able to capture some of her pregnancy for her. I know personally how momentous pregnancy can be, I also know that I am glad I was able to capture some images from my two pregnancies.

I do just want to add that this is totally my fav.

If you have liked what you see you can visit my A-N-E Photography page on facebook. If you want some pictures, let me know!

Got some running shoes and insomnia

     Yes, it is almost mid-night and my head has not yet hit the pillow, but I am not tired! So, this is me and Thing 1 right after I finished my most recent 10K. It was the St. Patty's Day 10K held on Fort Lewis. It rained the entire time I ran, it was fun a miserable all at the same time. Running in the rain is something I still have not fully adjusted to while living here in the Pacific Northwest.
    Thought I would share this fantastic article from Active.com. For all you runners that want to build some endurance. I have taken quite a break from running myself and will need to get back in the swing of things if I am going to run a half marathon sometime this year. Once the doc gives the ok to start running I think I might ease my way back in with this great little plan. It has you running three days a week, which I am used to thanks to my days in the Army, it helps me keep a schedule. I also love how it reminds you to take it easy and not kill yourself on your long runs. It is a six week program that has you running at the most 7 miles, so who's with me, you wanna go for a run?

How to Double Your Endurance in 6 Weeks | Active.com

What I see....

I have found that today I don't have much to say, that may change as my day goes on, but for the moment I don't. So Here are some pretty things to look at, I hope you enjoy them. I went walking around the beautiful little town of Stielacoom, which is relatively close to Fort Lewis. I instantly fell in love with the historic downtown area. However, these images all came from the beach there (that I also fell in love with), I will share more images of the downtown later. Seriously, I would live there if I could afford it!

This last set of images are what I titled Broken Pier, I wonder what they used the pier for? All that is left now are the support legs.

I hope that you enjoyed viewing life through my lens. I am truely a novice photographer, and still pursuing an education to be one. If you like what you see and you want me to capture some images for you let me know.