Tea!

I will start by saying that I have always loved tea. my mother got my sister and me into drinking it when we were younger. Our tea selection consisted of only the Rose tea that you buy at the grocery store and it came with a free little ceramic animal in the box. :) We always had sugar and milk in our tea. When I got older I stopped putting the milk in my tea and only added sugar or honey to it. I preferred the taste of it this way. My tea pallet has become a little more sophisticated since I was 10. I love exotic teas as well as simple ones like a white peach. The brand of tea is HUGE when choosing a good tea. You can go to the grocery store and get a cheap tea and what you will taste is cheap tea. It is what it is. I do love Tazo. One of my faves!! Of course, I do love Starbucks. I discovered recently a company called Teavana. I have yet to go to the store (We have one about an hour away) or order online but the raves are crazy good!. I found the website today and discovered a tea maker on the site. Temperature and steeping time for different varieties is crucial to a good cup of tea. Green tea should be steeped and the water heated differently than a black tea, for instance. Well, this tea maker does all that!! With the push of a button you can tell the machine what kind of tea you have and it heats the water perfectly and steeps it just right. I am wanting this so bad!!! Here isThe LINK to the tea maker by Breville made just for Teavana. It is not cheap for sure but so worth it if you have the birthday money to spend on anything you want. :) I do drink tea that I have made in my Keurig but it is not the same as when you heat it right and steep it perfectly. Tea is an art. Truly. It is beautiful to look at and it is such a warm satisfying hug to drink if made the right way. Some day I will have this Tea maker. It will sit next to my Keurig on the counter. I like my coffee in the morning but my tea all day and night long. :)

Beach Body!

As I type the title of this post I hear the voice form the beach Body videos saying it. Hahaha. it makes me smile because my nearly 4 year old says it all the time imitating the man in the Videos. I am thinking of becoming a Beach Body coach. I am stoked about it and I am a little nervous. I have an awesome coach right now and if you sign up with Beach Body you need to look her up. nationwidenicci. Type that into search for coaches and you should find her. She is fabulous!! She is motivating me to be healthier and work out more consistently. I have spoken of the car accident before and I am finally feeling like I am recovering from it. I started the Beach Body Insanity DVD's by Shaun T. and I was loving it. but, just as I was about to start the 2nd month I broke my foot and sprained my ankle. I had to stop all of those workouts for two months. then when my foot healed I got bronchitis and then vacation happened. I feel like I am starting all over again from day one. I am going to do this again and be consistent and accountable. :) I did Hip Hop Abs today and I liked how fast the routine was. I felt like I had just started when the DVD was finished. But, the intensity was not what I was used to with Insanity. I will stay with it all week but I was actually wishing I had put in the Insanity DVD. Crazy! I know!! My Coach suggested that I try the T25. It is a Shaun T. DVD and supposed to be great and only 25 minutes! I need fast with 3 kids and a busy life. I got a nutribullet recently. I am loving it!! I have tried a few combos of greens and fruits and I am feeling good too! I may do a blog post on that soon. I drink my Chocolate Shakeology every morning and now I have the nutribullet juice for lunch too! If I become a BB coach I want to be sure my commitment level is high and I want to be in shape so that I can teach others to do what I do. I love being healthy and I know God gave me this body and it is my job to take care of it. :) I would love to help others take care of theirs. Take care of your body today and ttyl!

With Love, Natasha

I just ordered a gorgeous barrette (it can be ordered as a headband too if that is what you prefer) from With Love, Natasha, a nice small business run out of her home so that she can be a stay-at-home-mommy. Natasha Combs owns it and makes the prettiest hair clips and headbands. She has other things as well. You must check out her facebook page. I do believe she also has an Instagram account as well. You can see a lot of her things on the facebook page. Just send her a message as to what you would like and she will give you pricing and stuff. She accepts PayPal too!! I personally love that!! These would make perfect last minute Christmas gifts from anyone from age 0-100!Check out her page today!! https//www.facebook.com/WithLoveNatasha Sorry about not putting a cute little link here but I am still trying to get used to my laptop and this windows 8 thing. Haha. :) This photo is of one her items, in fact, the one I ordered for my daughter for Christmas. When you do stop by her page, let me know here what it was you loved. I would love to know!!

Christmas in Florida

I am not sure I will ever get used to this warm weather for Christmas. Tonight we went to Sarasota to watch a Christmas light show and it was 75 degrees in the dark! We wore sweatshirts just in case it got chilly but ended up sweating. We moved here 6.5years ago and I am still homesick for the snow. I was thinking the other day about all of this. I sometimes get sad that we live in FL at Christmas time. I was trying to see the positives of it, and there are some, but, I think the biggest thing is that I realized that I can't share my nostalgia with my kids. they will not be able to have the same kinds of memories growing up that I did. No snowball fights, snowmen, snow forts. They won't be able to experience the fun and competition with the neighborhood kids of running from house to house shoveling driveways for $5 a drive. (we made a lot of money during those snowstorms). They won't be able to sit in anticipation in the wee hours of the morning with the radio on waiting for the announcement that there will be no school because of snow. Sledding, tubing, ice skating, snow covered pine trees... Awe... I have some precious memories. I guess I will have to make new traditions and memories that my children will cherish and reminisce on when they are older. I wanted to take a moment to remember all the families and people that were affected by the tragedy in Connecticut yesterday. I cried as I watched the news. It was an unthinkable thing.

I got a laptop for my birthday!

I think it will be much easier now to update my blog more often! I now have my own laptop and I love it!! It is basic but it has all that I need. I love my hubby and he knows me so well!!

I did it!

I can't believe it but in 4 weeks i was able to get back down to the weight I was before I started to gain!! I lost about 12.5 pounds in the last 4 weeks and 4.8 of those were this week alone!! Now, I can start losing again and feel like every pound counts because I don't feel like I am starting all over again. It's a good feeling to be back on track. Unfortunately it is a crazy time of year to be dieting. Halloween candy, Thanksgiving, making Christmas goodies and going to Christmas parties... oh my. this is gonna be hard, but I started Weight Watcher's last year in October right before Halloween. I did well too. I lost consistently for about 3.5 months straight without one gain. So, if I could do it then, I can do it now. I will be strong. I fit better in my clothes again and that feels great! I have 12 pounds until I get to my Weight Watcher's lifetime goal! Yay, then it's FREE! I will continue on to lose another 10-20 after that but I will be happy with even 10 more after my lifetime goal. I was that weight when I got married and I was thin. I am 5' 11" and I think a size 6 is good for my height. I do want to get lower but if my body won't go that low I will be ok with it. I can't wait until I can start walking again. My stroller got a flat tire and we are having a terrible time finding an inner tube to fit. I would love to start running again but my neck and back still ache when I try. .(car accident again...grrr.) I will have to walk on my treadmill or do some Fios exercise programs or my Wii. I have some dvd's but I still have to be careful of my injuries from the accident. anyway, I am so excited to share about my weight loss and I hope to have inspired someone out there to not quit! I wanted to. I saw my weight creeping back up and I just couldn't track my food every week. I kept giving in to the candy and the cookies. (my weaknesses!) I made excuses, but when I saw the scale one day and a number popped up that I had not seen in just under a year, I panicked and knew I needed to get back on track NOW, not next week, NOW. before it was too late and I was back where I first started. That would have been discouraging to me and I know my husband who pays for my meetings every week, would have been mad. Well, it is late and I need to get to sleep. Sleep is important in weight loss too. So goodnight everyone. :)

Saving money and losing weight again!

I will start off by saying that I Bought $7.86 worth of nail polish and lip balm and got it all (tax included ) for $2.64 BUT, I got $2 back in Walgreens RR. Yay! I paid $.64 for all of it!!Not bad at all. I was struggling on Weight Watcher's for a few months now. I had a major stressor come about and I just about lost it completely. I wasn't able to eat right at all. I got so out of control on eating (or not eating) that I found it super hard to get back on track with Weight Watcher's. Well... for the last 2.5 weeks i have been counting and measuring and losing!! Lost 4.5 of the 15 I had gained. I am so happy. It feels good to be in control again. I am hoping to loose again this week. that will be 3 weeks in a row, this Tuesday. I have not exercised at all because my neck and back injury form the car accident a year and a half ago are really bothering me. But, I know that once I can start moving again it will be even greater!! Here is a photo of what I got tonight at Walgreen's for $.64!! Have a great night. xxoo.

From Drop Box