Something for my Health

Earlier this week I did something that I've been meaning to do for the past 3 months....I got a gym membership. I am now a card-carrying member of our local community center that has only been open for 7 or 8 months. Brand new! I've never been excited to work out, but I'm excited about this. The first time I went in and toured the place it just felt comfortable. I mean, there's a bunch of overweight suburbanites just like me, whew! No size 0 skinny girls on the treadmills, no bulging bicep mr universe type guys lifting weights. Just regular people. It was nice.

So I've gone the last 3 days and am very proud of myself thus far. My aim was to get in the pool and swim some laps. Okay...so when I'm on the tour of the facility the guy tells me that without the local school district (the one I went through all my life) there would be no pool. Therefore, they have priority in the competitive pool and the lap lanes. Their high school swim teams practice from 3p-8p every day Monday thru Friday. The next day I went back to start swimming and had to face my fears. I had to 1) wear a bathing suit without a cover-up (per community center policy), 2) walk through the natatorium (where the pools are) past a bunch of pimply teenage boys in their speedos (ugh), and 3) take off my towel and get in the pool in front of those teenagers. Yeah, when it comes to body image and self esteem....I am very insecure. I can't even remember the last time I went swimming without a cover-up over my suit. So for me to overcome insecurities so I can get a nice workout in the pool is a HUGE thing for me...so yay me!!

Now I'm trying to decide when the best days to go would be. The swim meets are held on Wednesdays I found out, so that day is no good. I mean, pimply teenagers AND their parents and friends watching? No, not yet. Anyway, I feel like I really need to go at least 3 days a week, maybe more if I don't get too busy. So if you feel like it, please pray that I'll keep this up and it will help me get into shape and get healthy and shed a few pounds along the way.

In other news, I have somewhat of a milestone birthday coming up. Still unsure how I feel about it. What I do know is that I had a hell of a lot of fun this last decade. Learned more about myself in the last 5 years than ever before, made a few good friends, found the one I'm spending the rest of my life with, became an aunt, watched a lot of my friends get married and have babies. My only hope for the next decade is that I can start teaching the next generation how to live life and be a good person and eat their vegetables. :) Yep, things change, people grow up, and new life sprouts. It's the circle of life. :)

And if you know anything about Tim McGraw's music, you know he has a song about 'my next thirty years' which first tells you how old I'll be, but also tells you what direction I want my life to go. ;)

What's Goin On

So I decided to change things up a bit and get a new background (duh)! I think it portrays more of who I am than the standard greens and blues I had before. :)

What else....Oh...yeah....so follow me on this one--my mom's best friend's son's girlfriend (in short, a friend's girlfriend) told the best friend that she just 'knows' that I'm pregnant. Interesting. I don't know that it could really be possible at this point, like today, but still interesting. It kinda makes me feel good to know that people are thinking about me, even though I hate being center of attention. Like, my wedding day was the only day I was really looking forward to everyone looking at ME. But after that I'm back to wanting to be in the background. Although my birthday is coming up soon and it's a big one so...

Anyway, speaking of birthdays, my uncle turned 40 last week so tonight his wife is throwing him a little party down at the place where she works and we've been singing karaoke for the past few months. That, to me, equals FUN! Oh I'm dead serious. Anytime there's a gathering of family, a chance to sing karaoke, and to poke fun of someone for being over the hill makes for a great time. :) We've had many a fun birthday in my family celebrating people becoming over-the-hill. Wonder if that'll happen to me...

Umm what else. Oh they changed the dress code at my job so we can wear jeans every day now. That's always good. Heh.

I finally got off my butt and finished another test in my computer literacy course of my online schooling. Got a 93. :)

Also finally ordered a mouthpiece for DH so maybe, just maybe he can stop snoring. Here's hoping!!

Well gotta run...time to go buy said uncle some embarrassing gag gifts for turning 40. :) Ah but I love him, it's all good. ;)

Things I've Come to Realize About Myself

....I'm not a white-collar worker. I belong with the blue-collars, the ones in the filing room with whom I got to spend my afternoon. I was much more comfortable.

....I'm a really bad procrastinator. Like, really bad.

....I'd do most anything to help out family and be there for them, but am very obstinate about helping myself. I need to help myself more.

....One of the reasons I can't seem to lose weight very well (besides the obvious-not exercising enough) is because I don't sleep very well. At least, I haven't in the last 4 years...

....Some days I like to snuggle with my dog more than my DH, because the dog likes me all the time and never gets mad at me. And always greets me very excitedly when I come home from anywhere, even if I've just been gone for 10 minutes.

....When I'm not around them all day at work, I get kinda lax at keeping up with my friendships. And I'm very sorry about that. :(

....I want to have a baby, like yesterday, and am conflicted about when it should happen. One one hand, I need to lose some weight and let my cycles regulate on their own. On the other hand, it crushes me that I'm almost 30 and I don't have children. It's my life's calling to be a mother.

Mother Nature's back

After 40 days of waiting. Yes, 40. And again it only lasted 2 days. If I'd known it would be like this I would have gone off the pill a long time ago! After spending every period for the first 5 years of my 'womanhood' doubled over in pain, throwing up and lasting 7 days this is like a vacation! Even when I was on the pill it would last 4 days. Geez, I wasted a lot of time on birth control.

I hope this doesn't mean they'll just farther apart and then gone. I'd like to think that my body is capable of ovulating and all that. I mean it is only my life's ambition to be a mother. For as long as I can remember it's the thing I've wanted to be most.

Anyway, I just keep praying and try not to let it stress me out too much. Although when I was at the grocery store the other day I checked my blood pressure in one of those sit-down-put-your-arm-in-a-cuff things. The top number was a little high, but the bottom one was below normal. Totally weird. I'm guessing it was stress. Stress can do strange things to your body.

In other news, I attended a baby shower last Friday for a friend whom I've known since we were in elementary school. So cute to see her and her little pregnant belly. Of course I won't look like that whenever I get pregnant...no I'll be one of those girls who just blows up like a balloon. Yep I can see it now. I can only hope that, like a balloon, I would deflate easily after the baby is born. :) Haha!

There are just so many signs of new life around me lately that it's just amazing to me. In a few weeks I'm going to a cousin's wedding in Nebraska. A cousin who I can remember as a toddler, standing in our living room at Christmas, hugging a big teddy bear about as big as she was. Getting married. Like my little cousin I last blogged about having a baby...this friend of mine having a baby, another friend had hers in May. Another girl I went to high school with getting married. And me celebrating a somewhat-of-a-milestone birthday in about a month. Wow...we're all so grown up. Where did the time go?

Time to head to bed now. Dream of Mother Nature coming back next month. Or not....

I'm a SuperHero

I just wanna say...this would be totally sweet!

Your Superpower Should Be Invisibility

You are stealth, complex, and creative. You never face problems head on. Instead, you rely on your craftiness to get your way. A mystery to others, you thrive on being a little misunderstood. You happily work behind the scenes... because there's nothing better than a sneak attack! Why you would be a good superhero: You're so sly, no one would notice... not even your best friends Your biggest problem as a superhero: Missing out on all of the glory that visible superheroes get

What Should Your Superpower Be?

Babies....

Yes, it is safe to say that babies are on the brain. Which is kinda weird, considering they were never much on my brain when I was taking care of them every day. Hm. Anyway, I went to my little cousin's baby shower yesterday and got to see how cute she is pregnant, and all the cool things she got for her little girl, and to hear her tell me how excited she is for me to be pregnant. What? In a complete shower of attention, she is thinking about me? I was truly flattered. :) All I wanted to tell her was how excited I was for her and I came away thinking how grown up she is all the sudden. Kinda makes me teary-eyed to think how the little cousins are all growing up.

I say little cousins because there was a time when me, my sister and our cousin M(boy) were the only ones our age for awhile. There were the oldest cousins...D, M(girl), and B. Then there was me, my sister and M(boy). And then when I was 12 it seems like my mom's younger siblings started exploding with kids. The youngest tier of cousins (the little cousins) consists of AK, KK, NR, AR, JK, CK(boy), BK, ARK, and CK(girl). We won't even get into the next generation, that is growing by the minute it seems like. Back to the point....I was a tweener when they all came along so I started babysitting them. Probably where my love of kids started.

And now the oldest little cousin is having one before I am. In a selfish way, yes I am a little sad that a cousin who is several years younger than me is starting her family before I get to start mine, but I'm also very happy for her. I think she'll be a wonderful mom. :)

I can't wait to meet you baby girl PM. :)

My karaoke side

As some of you may know, I love to sing karaoke. I was introduced to it about 4 years ago and in fact, it is how I met my husband. For some reason, around family and close friends who don't really know I can sing I get a little shy about it. But a good friend of mine, JR, showed me the awesomeness that is Myspace Karaoke. And I love it! I can sing karaoke in my own home, with no one around, as loud as I want. So I've recorded a few songs from their list and saved them in my library, afraid to let others hear me. Tonight I have decided to let the world listen. I can't figure out how to put the player on here, but here is a link to my Myspace karaoke page....


ksolo.myspace.com/actions/myWebpage.do


Hopefully this works. If you'd like, please visit my page and tell me if I'm any good, or not. Whatever. I sing because it makes me happy and it's a good way to release emotion and stress. I don't really care if I'm good enough to be the next American Idol (which I'm not, by any means), I just like singing for fun. So, please be kind. :)