1.24.2011

Monday, Monday...

Monday Monday...it was so good to me, it was all I hoped it would be...Monday Monday....

Back to life, Back to reality, why can't I get that song out of my head?? haha.....

Happy Monday kiddos. we survived. Considering we have not been in school (For those readers who don't know, I work in an elementary school with children with autism) for what seems to be a long time, we had a two day work week last week thanks to MLK Jr.'s birthday, an hour delay and two snow days, I'd say it was a pretty lovely Monday. My kiddo was in a good mood, all things considered especially since he had been up since 3am. Those poor kiddos, how come they can't sleep?

So I was called skinny today, well told that I looked skinny... from my co-worker, who went out of her way this morning, to walk a few extra steps down the hall when she saw me in the doorway of the classroom I work in, to say
"I saw you from down the hall, this isn't work related, but I had to tell you that you look skinny."
"Really?? because I thought I've been on a plateau, not really working out since I can't breathe so good right now"
"Really, you look good"
"Thanks! Thanks? (still in disbelief but loving her for it) Thanks for cheering me up on this Monday, not that I was in a bad mood but its good to hear on a Monday!"


Simple words. Big impact.

To end the day, I came home and made the most delicious mushroom and spinach lasagna with a tossed salad. I used my no boil oven ready lasagna noodles...sooo easy, and multitasked everything else, cleaning up while getting at it too!! I made the sauce again from a great recipe I found on For the love of Cooking's blog, it came out even better than the first time I made it. I sauteed the mushrooms, onions and garlic, while the sauce was simmering, and soon enough added everything together!! mmm sooo gooood.

Even though I haven't been exercising to the best of my ability, the most consistent, I have been continuing to eat well. I haven't had cheezits in for everrrr. haha, I eat more fruits and veggies on a daily basis than I can remember. I look forward to cutting up an apple for morning snack at work with the kiddos, and eating salads with my lean cuisines...I look forward to grocery shopping and cooking meals.





one day at a time, one healthy choice after another. healthy mind, healthy body...I'm starting to understand it all finally.
The healthier the body, the happier the heart...It's the little things in life that make me happy these days, like going to the grocery store, blogging, writing in journals...but the little things will be the most rewarding in the long run.

What are you doing to keep your mind and body a bit healthier these days?

1.23.2011

spin me right 'round, baby right 'round...



spin spin spin, round and round...thanks to this little older lady who suggested I use the extra 50 cents, it's worth it! The time saver spin machine, she stuffed my comforter right in there and for a few minutes and a few quarters, it rung out a good amount of water from the washer, before being entered into the dryer. So those 2 extra quarters saved me the rest of my time Saturday afternoon! ha. Nothing like a little Saturday morning stroll in the laundromat. Interesting people? you bet.



I only brought my comforter. I couldn't imagine having to go to a laundromat weekly to do my laundry or once a month, with 2 decent size gray bins, and a trash bag full of clothes and sheets. There goes your whole Saturday! But maybe I spend that much time doing my laundry weekly or biweekly, with multiple loads in the convenience of my own home. Convenience, there you have it kids, the missing word when talking about the mighty inviting laundromat. I mean what's more inviting than the sweet smells of laundry detergent and common folk, and the scratchy, skidding sounds of the uneven laundry carts shared by all. College kids, dating couples, single mothers, married couples, elder ladies and men.

Laundry, just another thing we take for granted, the ability to do our laundry in the comfort of our own home without the planning of our day wrapped around it. I walked right in there, having only been to a laundromat (a different one) one other time, thinking I knew what I was doing, only to realize me and my Saturday morning benefited greatly from the kind assistance of others. I tried to hide my coach purse and it helped that I wasn't all dolled up from Friday's snow day, in fact I hadn't even showered since Thursday morning, so I felt a little better about that believe it or not. Funny how I didn't know these people, and probably won't be there again for awhile, well at least until the comforter needs another washin'...but only now when I am writing this, am I thinking consciously about the fact that yeah, I did seem to be hiding my purse, and I wasn't embarrassed about my attire or presentation. To think I had any idea I knew what I was doing, when this place was second nature to her. So thank you for not thinking I was better than you or that I may for a split second thought I was better than you, because I'm not.

We all have a story, a past, a background, that helps shape and mold us into the person we become later in life, they're not for me or you to judge, but to embrace and help each other. Does anyone ever really make it on their own in this life?

1.15.2011

somersault. a falling or tumbling.

And then one day you find, ten years have gotten behind you...

"Maybe you can afford to wait. Maybe for you there’s a tomorrow. Maybe for you there’s one thousand tomorrows, or three thousand, or ten, so much time you can bathe in it, roll around it, let it slide like coins through you fingers. So much time you can waste it. But for some of us there’s only today. And the truth is, you never really know.-L.Oliver"

"Have you ever lost someone you love and wanted one more conversation, one more chance to make up for the time when you thought they would be here forever? If so, then you know you can go your whole life collecting days, and none will outweigh the one you wish you had back.-M.Albom"


Last night, I attempted a somersault on the couch, it was short lived and followed by an abrupt bang of my right arm on the glass coffee table. Luckily the coffee table is still intact and as far as I can tell there are no bruises. However, my head hurts, since the attempts didn't end there. I tried and I tried to do a somersault on the floor, but I was afraid! Afraid of the unknown, the fear was larger than my will? or maybe it was just the size of my ass, that I couldn't push myself over....so, after almost peeing my pants from all the laughter, a light went off inside my head, as I passed by the bedroom and said hmm, lets try the bed!! After all it's a soft and springy cushion for my head. 1st attempt on the bed, failed by the side landing, 2nd attempt call me a somersaulter! I did it as I was laughing and yelling not knowing I was falling off the bed. Feet landed and no one got hurt! All in a nights work, after my first visit to the Dragon 88 restaurant, a hole in the wall, where apparently I was the only one who didn't know you would get yelled at by the infamous David running the show behind the bar, haha. The guy next to me said don't worry his bark is bigger than his bite! good times with coworkers, 2 long island iced teas, a mich ultra, some food, some fun and light conversation as well as some fun f'ed up family conversations, and about 4 hours later...home sweet home. Let the somersaults begin.



I surprise myself sometimes, doing somersaults in my living room, on my couch, with gum in my mouth and a few drinks in me, just laughing uncontrollably, without a care in the world. or so it seemed. sometimes you just need to laugh, because if we don't laugh at ourselves or the world around us, we'd all be walking around miserable and crying, or at least I would. If you've followed this blog at all, you know by now I'm forward with my emotions, open like a book so the saying goes...it's harder for me to hide them than to not. It's harder for me to pretend I don't care than not. I often wonder if it would take less effort if I didn't care as much, or not so emotional. It can be tiresome. How do you not care as much? If someone has the answers please let me know. How do you just let your loved ones crumble before you? How do you separate yourself from them, just enough to still enjoy visiting your parents and other family members? How do you care a little less, because you know you can't help someone when they don't want to help themselves? I'm missing my friends a bit more it seems. I'm missing the closeness of someone other than whom I'm dating or related to, a person who knows me just as well, someone I can visit close by, somewhere I can just get up and go to, go visit. I don't want to be a burden. I don't want to be so heavy all the time, it's not fair to you, or you, or you. It's hard to vent to those in your family when they are going through the same, and sometimes worse depending on their relationship with the deceased loved one or the loved one so far gone but maybe not gone enough to want to help themselves.

I wrote the date the other day, putting January 13, 200 and I stopped myself. Was I just going to write 2001? Weird. For that moment in time, I was no longer standing in the classroom, instead imagining myself where I was on that day. The day Auntie Terry lost her four year courageous battle to breast cancer. The year my family (to me anyways) was no longer whole. My Sittoo lost her first born, my mom lost her sister, my cousins lost their mother, my Uncle lost his wife, my little brother lost his godmother. Why do we remember pain in such greater detail than that of happier times? Why can I recite almost verbatim what my mother said to me as we stood in the cemetery 10 years ago tomorrow, why can I still hear the loud cry from my youngest brother the morning of her passing, but not remember her voice.

I don't want your sympathy, I don't want your "I'm sorry's," I don't want to bring you down. As sad as I get sometimes, I have to believe and you have to remember my happiness far exceeds my sadness, because if it didn't the psychiatrist I saw some odd months ago would have suggested medication and more appointments with him rather than a psychologist. Ha!

Ten years later, and I now know what they meant by life is a journey, it's a process....etc. Ten years later, and I still don't know why I cry so hard when I do, laugh so hard it turns into tears...life is like a somersault. a falling or tumbling, one snowball after another, but if we don't have people to push us over when we can no longer push ourselves, or to catch us when we land sideways, oh wait, or to laugh with us when we fall sideways into the coffee table...then what are we left with, just a sore head from trying. "head up young person"

til we all meet again...<3

1.09.2011

Oh Christmas Tree...until next year!

eat drink and be merry. we celebrated christmas with our parents on the 20th of december. our parents first meeting. success.



"Here's to the corkscrew - a useful key to unlock the storehouse of wit, the treasury of laughter, the front door of fellowship, and the gate of pleasant folly." -W.E.P. French




"If more of us valued food and cheer and song above hoarded gold, it would be a merrier world."




“One cannot think well, love well, sleep well, if one has not dined well.”- Virginia Woolf




"It's the company, not the cooking, that makes a meal."

1.01.2011

hello 2011.

thank you 2010 for a new kind of healing, a new kind of beginning, and a new kind of love for myself. its been a long time coming...

Today is a new day. just like tomorrow and the day after that. a new morning, a new chance to do right, to do me, to love more, to listen more, fight less. so there will be no new years resolutions, there never are, people don't keep those anyways. instead, there will be more exercising, more eating right, more loving those who deserve my love, and more loving myself. continuing what I have started in 2010.

Today, January 1, 2011, a new day? just another day. another day to do right by you, to make you happy, to make myself happy. to love more, to eat less, to exercise more, to fight less, to smile more, to cry less...



so cheers to this journey called life, which doesn't start today, it already started! Life waits for no one, and it keeps going, its moving so fast around you whether you are ready or not. embrace it. live it out loud. 2010, it's been freeing and loving. It hasn't been the easiest, nor the hardest. Rewarding. growing, loving and living out loud.

*say sorry when I really mean it, not all the time.
*count to ten before yelling. take a breath. close your eyes.
*smile. laugh. love.
*walk and cuddle with russy.
*take care of me. love me.