Am I Ready??

I had a baby....got all motivated and lost a bunch of weight...made it through the holidays...started (another) a blog about it....

...and then quit. Again.

Luckily I've just fluctuated within a 5 pound range of my weight loss. I haven't gained it all back. But I have completely lost motivation. Almost every day for the last few weeks I've woken up and said to myself, "Today we're getting back on track!" And by that afternoon I've given up.

I have about a million excuses. And some of them are really good. Especially the one when I haven't had a good night's sleep in MONTHS. I'm sooooo tired!

But I'm getting tired of my own excuses. I'm getting tired of eating way too much pizza while watching the Biggest Loser and thinking about how great they are. I'm getting tired of waking up motivated just to disappoint myself the same day. And I'm really getting tired of the way I feel. Gross. Fat. Tired. Sluggish. Lazy. Ugly. Worthless. Hopeless.

So I took a small step today. A really small step, but a step still. I downloaded a book to my kindle and started reading.

Are You Ready!: To Take Charge, Lose Weight, Get in Shape, and Change Your Life Forever by Bob Harper. THE Bob Harper. He's going to be my personal trainer now. :)

All kidding aside, I looked through the descriptions of a lot of weight loss books this morning. I knew I needed something to get me off my butt, but I didn't know what. This particular book stood out to me not because it was from the tv show I love, but because the entire first 1/3 of the book focuses on your heart and mind.

That's what I'm missing. My heart and mind aren't in it right now. I know the stuff. I know I need to eat right and exercise. I even know a lot of great recipes and workouts. I know lots of tips and tricks and rules. But my heart and mind haven't been in it lately. And that needs to change.

Right now, the only thing holding me back is ME. I am too busy telling myself that I'm fat, ugly, lazy, unmotivated, etc. I'm too busy telling myself that I've failed at this a hundred times before and I'm just going to fail again. I'm too busy telling myself that maybe I'll be able to do it when Lucas is sleeping through the night, or I'm not nursing anymore, or the kids are out of the house a million years from now and I can focus on myself.

But I know that when those things happen I'll have a new set of excuses holding me back. So today I'm going to focus on reading this book and working through the emotional part of this process. And when I'm ready I'll take another step and clean out my fridge and pantry. I'll make a meal plan with healthy foods. I'll go to the grocery store. I'll force myself to go to sleep at a decent hour. I'll workout. When I'm really, really ready.

As for today, I'm going to keep reading. I'm going to focus on my heart and mind. I'm going to work on being ready. Really ready.

Funnies

Life has got me laughing a lot lately, so I thought I'd share a few funnies.

The other day I overheard Jack talking on his toy cell phone. It sounded like a pretty serious conversation. "I'm sorry. We're just not debt free yet, Dave!" So I asked Jack who he was talking to. Looking at me like I was brain dead, he says, "Dave Ramsey, Mom!" Duh!

Then yesterday my little sister Mare got her wisdom teeth removed. We went over in the afternoon to take her juice and ice cream and other mushed food she could eat and to just hang out and keep her company. My parents were given strict instructions to video Maren, just in case she was funny, after her surgery. Although it's said that girls are generally less funny and more emotional than boys. And they tend to come out how they went in. Maren was anxious and weepy, so they weren't expecting much funny.

Turns out, Maren was a crack up! We watched the video and we were all laughing pretty hard. There's a good 45 minutes of goodness. Oh man. And Jack has been quoting her all morning. :) It's hilarious!

Maren made awesome facial expressions, sang like a pro, and fought ninjas. At one point she even pressed imaginary buttons on her arms while making "button noises", and then said into her imaginary intercom, "Buzz Lightyear, to the rescue!" Ha ha ha ha ha!!

My mom tells Maren in the car that she's very "glassy-eyed". Maren asks, "What does that even mean?!" Mom tells her it's just because of the drugs and Maren starts to cry. "Did I smoke?! Did I drink beer?!" It's hysterical!!! And Jack has been reminding us of all the good parts all morning long. :)

You Need A Budget.....SERIOUSLY!!!! (aka YNAB)

I definitely need a budget. Why didn't I think I did before? I mean, I think I sort of knew that I should have one. But I never realized how much of a difference it could make. And it's made a HUGE difference already!

Remember this post? And the post I linked to in that post? So we started with NeoBudget. And we really loved it. But we weren't making the dent we wanted to be making in our debt. I recently discovered YNAB. YNAB and I got off to a rocky start. I loved NeoBudget. I was comfortable with NeoBudget. I understood it and knew where everything was and how it all worked.

YNAB was a little more complicated and I didn't want complicated. I wanted comfortable. But I kept hearing about all these things. So I gave in and signed up for the free trial. I took the live web classes. And then I was in love. As in smitten kitten.

See, with NeoBudget we were budgeting for our major bills and then the rest of our income would sit in our "Unallocated Envelope" and we would spend it on whatever we wanted. We were paying off some debt. We were saving some. But we were blowing a lot. And we were still living paycheck to paycheck.

I'm not even through our 34 day trial with YNAB yet. It's still the beginning-ish of February. And already, since January I have paid off $1,621.65 in debt. On top of that we have saved $2,445.58! That's right! In 41 DAYS!!!! And here's the kicker: We haven't even received our tax refund yet!!

And that's while paying ALL of our bills and still having fun! We've gone out to eat (much less than we used to, but still enjoyed eating out on occasion), rented movies, done things together as a family, and gone out for dates, etc. We're still living! We're just doing it on a smaller scale, while saving and paying down debt on a much, much LARGER scale!

I think my favorite thing about YNAB right now is their "Rule #4: Stop Living Paycheck to Paycheck". YNAB has 4 basic rules/principles for budgeting. #1, Give every dollar a job. #2, Save for a rainy day. #3, Roll with the punches. And #4, Stop living paycheck to paycheck. With the last rule, YNAB helps you to create a "buffer" in your budget so that you're living off of last month's income this month and this month's income will just be hanging out and ready to use next month.

We haven't quite reached that point yet. But we're working on it and will be there this month. Lucky timing has allowed us to use our tax refund to establish our buffer. That means no more seeing super tiny numbers in the checking account at the end of the month and hoping that I can make them stretch until the next paycheck comes. What a huge relief that will be?!

Anyway, I'm sold. Between YNAB and Dave Ramsey, we're really learning a lot about money. It has completely changed my attitude. I don't think about our accounts or finances and grimace anymore. I'm excited to check the bank balance and see what's cleared, and then check it all in my budget. I'm not anxiously waiting for payday so that I can go grocery shopping or pay bills; I'm waiting for payday so I can play with my budget and see how far I can stretch our dollars!

You can bet I'll be purchasing YNAB when my trial expires. Sure NeoBudget was good to us while it lasted. Like an old relationship, we learned a lot about ourselves from it. And it set us up for an even better relationship now. So we're grateful. But we're also super happy to have found YNAB!!

Sorry about my crazy cheesiness. I'm just that excited about this stuff. Also, no I haven't been compensated in any way by any of these companies. I'm just that excited about this stuff. Have to share! Although, saving that much and paying that much in debt is compensation enough for me!!

Things I Haven't Blogged About

(and probably won't ever get caught up on, but we'll see)

Thanksgiving in Park City

Christmas

New Year's

Payson's Birthday Party

Lucas is 6 Month's Old

Lucas's First Food

Making Homemade Baby Food

Payson Losing a Mouthful of Teeth :)

Weight Loss Progress...or Lack Thereof

My Birthday/Jason's Birthday

...and probably a handful of other things. Maybe one of these days I'll find some time and get all caught up. Or partly caught up. But I sort of doubt it.

Happy Grandparent's Day??

Yesterday we were running some errands and I had the following conversation with Payson:

P: Mom, when is Granparent's Day?

M: I have no idea. Why?

P: (she says this very seriously and excitedly) Because if the Grandpa sees his shadow, then there are 4 more days of winter!

M: (laughing HARD) I think you mean Groundhog's Day. :) If he comes out and sees his shadow there are 6 more weeks of winter. And it's tomorrow.

Luckily, Payson has a good sense of humor and laughed at herself. And then we called my mom to share. I got a text from my mom this morning:

"Grandpa saw his shadow!"

We all laughed pretty hard. :) I love my sweet Payson.