30 Days Of *Mostly* Vegan.

I say mostly, because We have family coming next week, and I'm not going to make them embark on my experiment. And today I made myself a pina colada smoothie for breakfast to finish off the Greek yogurt I'm completely obsessed with.

I recently watched Forks Over Knives, and was intrigued. If you haven't heard of it, it is on Netflix! It's about how a plant based diet can solve medical problems, and the benefits of establishing a plant based diet in general. I was curious and have thought about it for a while. I've decided to do an experiment and take on the plant based diet for 30 days. I'm hoping it will not only help with getting in shape, but will also give me more energy, help with the post partum depression, and help me sleep better.


The problem: when I think about plant based diets, I think of salad. Salad, salad, and more salad. While salad is delicious, I don't want to eat salad for every meal over the next month. Yesterday I got a vegan cookbook from the library. I want to put a couple more on hold, too. I was shocked at all the recipes, especially the dessert ones. My first challenge is to find vegan chocolate chips. I just got done calling just about every grocery store in this great state of Utah with no success. However, after a little research, it turns out Ghirardelli semi sweet chocolate chips ARE vegan!

I'm curious to see how this goes! I'm excited and hope I can stick with it, and hopefully see results after the 30 days! Not even in school, and doing an experiment.

-Ross is NOT going vegan. He will NOT be taking part in this experiment.

Here We Go!!

Last night for Family Home Evening we took Claire to Target to pick out her own potty and big girl underpants. We spent a really, I mean REALLY, long time in the potty aisle letting Claire look and play with the different potties. Her favorite turned out to be a pink princess one. Needless to say, I was thrilled. Then we ventured over to the toddler underwear. We held out seven different packages of panties to her and she loved looking at all of them. Finally she decided on the Disney Princess panties. (YAY!)

When we got home, we set up her potty and let her explore. When it was bedtime and we took the potty away she hard a mini freak out and kept yelling, "MORE!". I'm glad she likes it. We're leaving it set up for a few days so she gets used to it, though the actual potty training adventure won't begin until Friday.


I did some reading yesterday and decided to go with the 3 day naked weekend approach. This could be the longest weekend of my life, so Thursday I will be stocking my fridge with some Diet coke to keep the calm when accidents happen. Unfortunately our whole apartment is carpeted, so I'm counting on renting a carpet cleaner come Monday. (Carpets could use it anyway, I'm sure.)

Wish us luck!! It'd be nice to have only one kid in diapers!

First order of business: Teaching her to NOT do this AFTER we go potty.

Claire's Favorite Songs.

A Little Bit Of Everything.

A little over a week ago my mother in law, (let's face it, she's really MOM) texted me -she's fabulously young and even more tech savvy than me- anyway, she asked if I'd run a marathon with her next June.

Ummmm YEAH!!

So we chatted about different training programs and half marathons around in the fall. So I signed up for this one. And I'm really excited about it. I've written out my training program for each day on my monthly calendar. I like that I not only know exactly what I'm doing that day without having to look it up, but that I can see how it progresses and I know that I'll improve and and do better each day. (Except for my rest days. But it's nice to see those, too and know a break is on its way!)

So I've been running in the evenings, about 8:00. At first I thought it'd be hard. I thought I'd be completely drained and wiped out from the day, but it's turned out to be quite the contrary. I LOVE it. I look forward to it. And I get excited about it. It's become my me-time. I love and adore my little girls, but I get to be a real person outside of just a mom for a few minutes. And it is wonderful.

Plus all that weight I packed on last month is disappearing again, despite my sneaking and indulging on Ross' Father's Day candy. Thank goodness.

Obviously I dropped P90X. Which I'm ok with. I had a great 1st week running last week. This week I'm planning on adding a rotation of the Ab program from P90X and a 20 min yoga disk that I love. If this week goes well, next week I'd like to add in weight training on my run rest days. Just adds in more me time away from the kiddos, right?

I guess I can and should provide a family update since this is our FAMILY blog.

Aoife has been sleeping consistently from between 9 and 10 until 5:00, sometimes not eating until 7. When she wakes , some time's we'll give her a binki instead of a bottle and she'll sleep a couple more hours. Maybe she'll be ready to move into her room soon!

Miss Claire had pink eye in both eyes all last week. I think it's clearing up so she'll be good to go for the 4th of July. It's interesting, whenever she goes to the bathroom now she grabs at her diaper and says, "Ewww." and wishes to be changer IMMEDIATELY. I'll be spending the day learning about potty training, but any advice, tips, or information from you experienced moms would be appreciated! It feels a little daunting to me, but then I think, well I'm potty trained and a whole lot of other people are so it CAN be done!

Ross finished his internship at RPM last month. Unfortunately they aren't able to offer positions as this time, so he is currently working on campus for the summer and starting to apply for jobs. He'll be walking next month, though graduating in December. The end is in sight!! His goals right now are to apply to three places a day, eat around 3500 calories a day, and this week he's starting a program he likes to call, "Batman Abs".

I kind of feel like I'm writing a holiday card, so we'll leave it at that. Things are well with the Lovelands and we're looking forward to 4th of July festivities in Utah county!


-Oh, and let's just talk about pinterest for a minute. I've had an account for the longest time, but never pinned anything. It was just fun to look at. And then Aoife was born. And now I can't stop!!!! Is there a Pinterest Addicts Anon group somewhere?

No-Sew Play Tent, Though Really More Like a Hide and Seek Tent.

There's an adorable DIY play tent going around on Pinterest. I'm cheap. And the cords to my sewing machine are MIA. So during some "me time" on my throne I was staring at the shower curtain and had a brilliant idea! But we don't have any real curtains. So I came up with an even better idea. I used a wire hanger, some ribbon, and a flat sheet.



I untwisted the hanger and then took the edge of the sheet with the big pretty seam and I cut a corner off on both sides so I could slide the hanger all the way through. I then reshaped the hanger into a circle and twisted it back together.


Then I cut 4 slits in the sheet. One on each side, and just small enough to tie a ribbon. I used a pretty long ribbon, cut it in two and attached the ends to the side opposite so they crossed over each other. I took the bunch and tied a knot so I had a handle. (I know I'm explaining this poorly so hopefully the pictures help.)



I then realized I didn't have a way of attaching it to the ceiling to form the tent without making a good sized hole. Because we rent, I decided that wouldn't be such a good idea. Luckily the people living here before attached a hook thing to the ceiling so I could just slip the handle over that. Unfortunately It's right along the wall next to the door so there isn't much room and it looks more like a decorative fabric. Which I guess could be great for a reception if you did them all over with tulle and lights instead of an ugly bed sheet.


Claire didn't mind and had a blast hiding and jumping out yelling, "Boo!" So I guess it served its purpose. There isn't a ton of extra space in the double nursery, but I'll have to get more creative and think of a way to move it to the center so we can see if my makeshift tent actually works. It's definitely not as cute as the one on pinterest, but it was no-sew, free, and Claire loves it anyway.

Perfect Play Doh.

Maybe I should start up my own mom blog. Thoughts? Yay or Nay? I've been really into the active, creative Mom thing lately.

Anyway, I've had this play dough recipe probably since before I was 10. I used it all the time when I'd go babysitting or when I did my summer day camp for the neighborhood kids. It is the BEST. Really.

Here goes:

1 C. flour
1/4 C. salt
2T Cream of Tartar
1 T Veg Oil
1 C Water
2 t food coloring. (Claire wanted purple so I used red and blue.)

Mix flour, salt, and cream of tartar in a medium size saucepan. Add water, oil, and food coloring. (It's important you mix this all up BEFORE you heat the mixture)



Stir over medium heat for 5 minutes. It'll look like this when it's ready.



Let cool. Knead over floured surface. (I actually like to do it while it's still a little hot. There's something relaxing about squishing hot dough. Next time I'll use my feet! Kidding.) Don't worry about the flour ruining the color, it'll come through.



It wasn't until after I had set the dough in front of Claire that I realized she's never played with play dough before! She wasn't too certain at first but we ended up having a great time. We made a mini croquet course, rolled balls back and forth and Claire even tasted some! Ross and Aoife wanted to play, too!

Toddler Jar.

Claire is an extremely busy girl. She is always looking for something else to do and is always going. I made a jar of quotes about fitness. Each day I let Claire pick one out. We read it together and then I tape it to the fridge. She has so much fun pulling one out that I decided to make a jar of simple and inexpensive things we can do together. Here's a few of the things in the jar:

Paint each other's faces

Go to an ice cream or yogurt shop and share an ice cream

Bath tub paints

Treasure hunt at the dollar store. We can each have a dollar to find something fun.

Make and play with water balloons.

Make paper plate masks.

Play dough

Library visit. Maybe find a new book or movie.

Make hand print plasters. There are lots of easy recipes online.

Paint nails together.

Explore some place new around town.

Make fridge magnets. (Cut pictures out of magazines or use your own pictures and glue to clear stones. Then glue to a magnet.

Make a pile of pillows and blankets to jump on.

Star gazing with glow in the dark stars.

Brown paper bag puppets.

Share a Hawaiian Shave Ice at a park.

Make an obstacle course. You can use string, chairs, balls or balloons, drape sheets from the ceiling, there are so many options!

Visit a toy store.

Build a tower out of cardboard boxes.

Color in a coloring book together

Write a letter or draw pictures to send to Grandparents.

Dance.

Blow bubbles

Make a fort

Play dress up

Pots and Pans band

Watch a movie with popcorn

Finger paint

Bake Cookies

Play with water in a big tub with cups and other toys.

Visit a pet store.

Go to the fountains (We have an outdoor mall with fountains for kids to play in.)

Feed ducks

Play at a Park

Have a Picnic outside.

Make S'mores.

Have a tea party

Sidewalk chalk

Build a ramp and race toy cars down it.

Make silly hats

Ride the train at the mall.

Blanket rides up the hallway

Walk around the temple

Ride the train at the mall.

Take pictures at Chuck E. Cheese. (My sister and I used to go there to take silly pictures together in their little photo booth. It was SUPER cheap and fun!)

Eat ice cream with a topping bar! If Claire decides to make hers a bowl of sprinkles with ice cream to go with it, who cares?!

Anyway, so I cut all of these up, folded them and filled a jar so Claire can pick something fun for us to do together each day that won't break the bank. I thought I'd take a picture of the things we do together and I could save the scrap of paper with the activity on it. I could make a mini scrapbook with the picture and scrap of paper for Claire.

Jar says, "Let's Play!"