Thankful

Since my family is leaving for a month-long missions trip to Thailand shortly, in all likelihood, this will be my last blog post of 2012. While I’m super excited for visiting our friends in Thailand (not to mention Mr. Donut), I’m positive the stress-levels in our home will be elevated as we have to begin packing and are attempting to send out our New Year’s greeting cards prior to leaving, so I thought it’d be a good time to reflect on what I’m thankful for this past year (in no particular order):

– For funny kids: particularly D1. Sure being a parent can be challenging often at times, but it’s also incredibly hilarious. In Sunday school, D1’s teacher has been teaching them about the armor of God:  belt of truth, breastplate of righteousness, feet fitted with the preparation of the gospel of peace, , shield of faith, the helmet of salvation, and the sword of the spirit. So each week, they learn about the piece of armor and make it. The teacher then collected the item and held on to it until they completed the unit.

A few weeks ago, D1 told a lie to my wife. When she confesses to my wife that she did in fact tell a lie, my wife asks, “D1, why did you lie?” Her response? “Because mom, my teacher has my belt of truth.”

– For that first bite of rice not causing me to go all Nutty Professor:  My goal weight was 175 and I met that in early October, mostly due to a low-carb diet and lifting weights. Once I met the goal weight, I figured it was time to eat some rice. I’m not gonna lie – I thought I’d go all Nutty Professor and all the fat would suddenly come back after that first bite. Thankfully, I’ve been keeping steady at 175 and I hope to do so for the foreseeable future.

– For my parents: we’ve been living with them for more than a year now, and somehow, we haven’t had any major blow ups. I’m grateful that they’d give up their freedom and comfort to house us. It’s easy to let myself become ungrateful and only think of the inconveniences living with them may cause – choosing to be grateful has been both challenging and a source of personal growth for me.

– For juicy baby fat: D2’s thighs were mighty juicy, but S1’s are even more amazing. For his last checkup, he was off the charts for weight and 90th percentile for height. The little guy’s 6 months old and weighs around 20lbs; D2 weighs about 25.

– For my wife: nearly 8 years of marriage and I’m falling more in love with her every day. This year marked a lot of change and challenges for her: quitting her job and becoming a homeschooler, caring for the kids while I nursed my sprained ankle and stomach issues, birthing and nursing S1, and encouraging me as I spent more time at the gym.

– For this blog and my readers: while I don’t update nearly as much as I used to (those who blog regularly with 3 or more kids, I salute you!), I’m thankful that this blog has been an outlet for my musings and helping me to become better at organizing my thoughts. The people I’ve had a chance to meet and converse with have been an invaluable resource & encouragement in my life.

As we look toward the end of another year, what are you thankful for?

30: 2 Week Check-In

I’m a guy that likes concrete numbers. For example, when my wife says, “Let’s go shopping!” is FAR more daunting than, “Let’s go shopping for x because I really need it.” Granted, I know the second is probably a lie anyway, but at least mentally, it allows me to prepare by thinking of how many potential stores/malls we’d need to go to find the perfect x. So when it comes to following through on my goals for my 30th year, concrete numbers help me. Every week, I’ll be posting some metrics I’ll be tracking as well as some thoughts on the past week. This week, I’ll be covering 2 weeks since I didn’t get a chance to do a check-in last week.

Previous Week’s Weight: 210 (at the start)
This Week’s Weight: 207 (lost 2lbs the 1st week; 1lb the 2nd)
# of Times Exercising: 1 the first week, 2 the second

I lost 3lbs by merely adjusting my diet, specifically, I ate more vegetables and ate in more. We set a goal that we wouldn’t go out to eat unless friends asked us to go out. Note: dear Reader, will you be that friend when I need you in a few months? Pretty please?! And who knew that I’d have a much harder time eating chocolate if I don’t buy chocolate or keep it in the house?

Another thing I’ve found helpful is not to obsess over my weight by weighing myself every day and agonizing over every single food-related decision. Taking it week-by-week is allowing me to focus on bigger goals and not being too discouraged when I do cave in – like when our office had TONS of free catered food. What can I say? I’m a sucker for free food.

I’ve also been taking weekly photos – I won’t post those here b/c I’d rather not be responsible for making you nauseous. I may post them at the end of the year though, we’ll see.

I’d still rather nap than go out and exercise. “I’ll nap in the room next to the kids just in case they wake up,” I say, even though my wife will tell you that I don’t respond when they do wake up. ^_^ So I’m making it a point to try and meet my goal of exercising at least 3 times this week.

And being the dork I am, it’s nice to know that I am 3.846% done with this experiment. My goal is that by the end of it I’ll have more energy, which will help me be the best husband and dad I can be, and that I would have developed healthy habits for life. After all, I hear kids stop napping around 4 or 5, so I can’t use that as an excuse.

What about you? How are your resolutions going? Do you miss the days your kids would take naps?

30

I recently turned 30. My wife and friends surprised me (those sneaky hobbitses) the day before with a birthday bash. Maybe it was their friendship or maybe it was the freaky clown on the cake

I apologize if you are afraid of clowns

but when I looked in the mirror on my birthday, I told mysellf, “enough is enough.”

You see, I entered 2012 in a pretty sorry state.

For those who’ve been following this blog, you know we’ve been trying to sell our home. Well, we  sold it a few days after Christmas. After having our home on the market for nearly 8 months, you’d think I’d be excited but those 8 months were arduous, as we had to mull through low-ball after low-ball offer. After all that waiting, we still ended up selling our home for much lower than we anticipated and had to wipe out our savings and borrow from my sister in order to complete the sale.

I kept saying positive things to my wife like, “You know, some people had it much worse and lost a lot more money on their homes,” “Sure, if we rented after we got married we would’ve been in a better state but 7 years ago, NO ONE was renting because home values were skyrocketing,” “Sure they took all our money, but at least they didn’t take away our kids or vital organs or anything.” But who am I kidding? I wasn’t trying to alleviate any of my wife’s concerns; I was attempting to reassure myself that I wasn’t a complete failure.

I say I don’t subscribe to traditional gender roles but when it comes down to it, I still consider it my duty to provide for my family. After having been married for 7 years, all I had to show for it was $13.54 in my savings account and I’m now living with my parents as a 30 year old.

When I’m feeling down, I usually turn to food. If you couldn’t tell, I kind of like food. A lot. So the entire holiday season, I felt like Fat Bastard from Austin Powers, “I eat because I’m unhappy, and I’m unhappy because I eat. It’s a vicious cycle.”‘

To top it off, I had zero motivation for anything and often felt lethargic. I didn’t workout. I didn’t update my blog. I told my kids I’d read them books later. I passed my time with simple pleasures: memes on Reddit and games on my iPhone. I got the point where much of the content on Reddit were reposts and I unlocked all the achievements in Plants vs. Zombies (this was 1000 times less exciting than I thought it would be).

WAH! WAH! WAH! Will you get to the point already?!?!?!

Right. So, now we’re back to me looking at my jiggly, unmotivated self in the mirror on my birthday.

I sat down and made goals for my 30th year.

1) Eating whole food – I read In Defense of Food, watched Food, Inc., a few years back but processed and fast foods were so much more convenient for us as parents. D1 is now able to point out McDonald’s, Panda Express, and other fast food places in the car. Yeah, it’s time to change.

I’m going to try and follow “Eat food. Not too much. Mostly plants.” So that means minimally processed food (no more than 5 ingredients). But don’t worry, I’m still going to enjoy a juicy, sizzling steak every now and then.

I like it rare

2) Consume more Scripture and less media

3) Exercise regularly – 3x/week

Aside from having to pee every morning around 6am, 30 doesn’t physically feel any different than 29. But I’m resolved to make it my best year yet.

Go, Pop, go!!!

What about you? Have you made any goals for 2012? What changes did you go through when you hit a milestone birthday?