Health wrap up

As I am wrapping up January (January-where have you gone?), I am doing my best to reflect on my goal of health for the month. I am pretty proud of myself. I have managed to go to the gym every single week, 3-4 times. I have lost 7 pounds, which isn't that great, but I'm still ok with it :) Beyond that I have been on weight watchers and I have been trying to make very wise and healthy food choices and make new and fun recipes for Rick and to eat. That has been the hardest because I am in school three nights a week during dinner and have to eat on campus. All in all, I am just trying to make these health choices part of my life and routine so they aren't "hard". I think I knew I was on board when last night Rick brought home some of those sugar cookies from the grocery store with the crazy frosting...I allowed myself one and I didn't even really enjoy it!

I just want to say that part of health is having some sort of idea where our food comes from. About two years ago I decided to stop buying beef. I really love steak and hamburgers, so I wasn't going to stop eating them, but I decided if I could buy ground turkey instead of ground beef, that i would do that because cows have a horrible environmental impact. (Their nasty gas is terrible for the environment!) I have stuck with that, except buying a very, very occasional steak, or buying hamburger patties when we have a bbq. Yesterday on Oprah she talked about where our food comes from. She was talking about the documentary "Food, Inc." (which I need to see). They showed a clip from the film where the chickens were so big and fat from all the antibiotics that they could barely walk. They grow them big and fast for only 39 days from hatching to butchering them. And in that short time they're fed a bunch of crap and shot up with antibiotics, they live in crowded areas and can barely walk. The scene made me cry. I am a total bleeding heart emotional person. If something has to be raised to feed us, at least it should have a happy short life in my opinion. So I did a little research and most chicken farms are like this. Foster Farms doesn't do this, and anyone that lives here in the NW knows who they are. I am making a new commitment to only buy turkey and chicken from Foster Farms. I am willing to pay a little more to know those poor little chickens get to walk around in their short little lives AND knowing that I'm not eating meat chalk full of weird antibiotics.

Anyways, that's my little soap box about health. February is all about love. I am hoping to show those I love how much I love them in little ways all month.

We are headed to the beach this weekend with some friends and I am looking forward to it. Hope you all are well too!

Lauren

Grade school

There has been a barrage of photos floating around on Facebook lately from grade, middle and high school, so I apologize if you've seen these on FB already, but I wanted to put them up anyways :) I love my scanner!
My kindergarten class picture with Mrs. Boylen
I'm on the bottom row in the pink with the fro. My Mom took me in to get a perm right before school started, and they gave me this awesome little orphan Annie look. There are many of these kids that I went from kindergarten through high school with, and some of which I'm still friends with today!
1st grade. I'm on the top row with the flipped out mullet. I'm wearing an awesome sweatshirt with a lamb jumping rope :)

2nd grade with Mrs. Jensen, who was really mean. I'm in the 4th row.

3rd grade with Mrs. Chisholm-one of my favorite teachers. Sadly I gave my friends "lipstick", including myself. I'm in the 4th row in the plaid dress. I remember that dress was super itchy and I hated it!

4th grade with Mrs. Dexter. This was a fun class! I'm in the 2nd row with the white t-shirt and headband. I had an awesome dress on, I wish you could see it. It had a big black elastic waist band, a red straight skirt with a ruffle and a big red button on the waist! Classic!

I thought these were really fun, hope you enjoy!

Emily in town

My friend (and at one time roommate) Emily was in town from Utah with her hubby and daughter. She was here for a long time, so I got to see her twice, which was really fun. Once with Travis and Elise-we went to lunch-which I didn't get any pictures of, then once to dinner with some of our other girl friends.
But first, a quick pic of Rocco playing in my new sweater organizer! That cat is seriously into everything :)
Here are the girls at the Montage-one of my favorite Portland restaurants-and one that we used to frequent a lot in our early 20's.
Sharon, Emily, Hannah, Makelle & I

Cute Makelle and I. Makelle is pregnant with her 3rd daughter. I'm so excited to meet her new one, sometime in May. She makes the cutest girls :)

Em, it was so great seeing you guys, and getting to spend more time than usual together. I so appreciate you, and I'm so glad we're friends!
And to you other girls-dinner was wonderful. I love catching up with you. I'm so impressed by all of you. You're such smart, beautiful women and are great, inspirational Moms! Love you!

Happiness

Over Christmas break I saw the author Gretchen Rubin on the Today show. She wrote a book called "The Happiness Project", which I have not yet read, but hope to. She was only on for a few minutes but her story got me thinking, and inspired. Her book is about researching and finding ways to be happier every single day. I believe what she did was pick a theme for every month and then she spent the whole month focused on that topic and trying to be happier. So, I started a list of possible topics for myself and themes for each month that I can think about and try to make my life happier! I'm not exactly sure how I'll execute it-I am a busy lady and I don't have time to revolutionize my life by any means, but I thought if I could pick a monthly topic, then at least I would be thinking about said topic all month and maybe I can squeeze some time in to act on it as well. So here goes, my themes for the year.
January-Health
February-Love
March-Organization
April-Environment
May-Creativity
June-Family
July-Patriotism
August-Outdoors
September-ME
October-Friendship
November-Gratitude
December-Community/Making a Difference

Of course if I see fit to switch any of these because it is more appropriate, I reserve the right to do so :)
I hope to spend some time blogging about some of the things I decide to do, and how they impact my life and my happiness.
I know January is already half over (what the heck?!), but I have been concentrating on my health since the beginning of the month already. I started back on weight watchers, and I resolved to take advantage of our brand new Rec Center on campus. I have been sticking to the plan and went to the gym three times last week, and four this week. I am so proud of myself. I am a total foodie, and even though eating right is really difficult for me and I really don't like to work out, I feel so much better after I do both of them. The goal of course is to lose weight, but even more than that, I want to establish eating right and going to the gym as part of my routine. At some point Rick and I will want to start a family and I don't want to be over weight and out of shape before doing that. It will only make it harder to lose the weight afterward. So I would definitely say that doing these two things-working out and eating better has made me feel better about myself, which always makes me happier. I hope to spend the next two weeks (and beyond) keeping up this routine, but also looking into other ways to get healthier (and happier too)!
That is it for now. I need to go make dinner. On the docket: Bbq chicken and black bean home made pizza. Yum!

New Years Eve

This year for New year's Eve we went up to Brightwood and stayed in a cabin with some friends. The house was beautiful, and we had a really great time hanging out and eating some good food!
Of course DJ Rick made an appearance and kept the tunes going all night for us!
All the girls that were there, minus Hayli

Liz & I

Morgan, putting money in Rick's fake tip jar

Dance party

Kelly really excited about balancing a noisemaker on my hat!

Morgan photo bombing a pic of Liz, Tina and Kelly

Tina & I hanging out in the kitchen

Our whole gang!

Outside on the deck at Midnight! Pretty cool-we were right on the Sandy River, with a full moon over head. A great way to usher in a new year and a new decade!

The all-important New year's kiss!

Rick & Ronn excited about 2010 :)

Jenn & I towards the end of the night

I hope you all have an amazing 2010. Cheers!

Becky's visit

One of the best things about Christmas is that it brought Becky home for a few days! Most of you know Becky and I have been best friends since we were 8-going on 22 years now! She moved to Boise in October of '08 to go back to school. It is hard having her so far away, but she is doing great there. Becky and I have a truly unique and special friendship, one that I think many people don't get to experience. Having someone who knows you as well as yourself, someone who has seen you grow up and has been with you through thick and thin who you aren't related to is rare! We know how lucky we are to have each other, and her cute Grandma put it best when she said we are soul mates! I love you Besty and I'm so glad we got to spend some QT together while you were here!
Our night out-beginning the evening at Nichole's

Dinner at Casa del Matador, that's our friend Ryan next to Becky. (PS If you've never eaten at Casa del Matador, I hightly recommend it!)

Becky and I are not so good at getting good pictures together, but this one won for the evening

Later that night we met up with more friends-Becky and I with Jen, Faith & Jessica (also in town from school in Indiana!)

Nichole, looking beautiful!

Rick, butting in on our photo op :)

Driving to another location (don't worry we were stopped at a red light!)

Becky, me and Jen-we've all been friends since we were in grade school. Love my old friends!

And that's it for pictures of Becky's visit. Right now we are trying to work out a trip somewhere fun for her 30th birthday in May. I hope it works out!
Oh, and Happy New Year! I can't believe its 2010! A new year and a new decade is always a great time to do some reflection and think where you want the next 10 years to go. It scares the crap out of me to think I turn 40 in this decade. Wow. But for now, plans include working hard on this semester (my 2nd to last!), eating healthy, working out, spending less, trying to get to Utah and New York City in the next couple months, spending more time with the important people in my life and taking more time on myself.
PS My best guy friend Preston is engaged, if you didn't know! I am thrilled for he and his fiance Rochelle. She is a great girl and they are so cute together. I love Preston to death and I'm very excited for their wedding! Love you both!