A real blog

Okay, now that I got the last blog out of the way, let me talk about our weekend. On Friday, I had a dentist appointment. I had my permanent crown put on and also had two fillings. I have one more appointment scheduled for November 6th. I need two more fillings, and then the dentist is going to fix a broken tooth that I have in the back. He can do that all in one appointment. He said after that, I’ll be all set! Thank God! On Thursday, I had an eye appointment. I walked in thinking I had 20/20 vision, then walked out with a new pair of specs. I’m farsighted in my right eye. I forgot my glasses today. It sucks because I’ve been spoiled being able to see clear. Ignorance is bliss. I didn’t realize how bad it was before I had the glasses.  I’m sure by the end of the day I’ll be feeling this.

On Saturday, we took the kids up to Kerber’s dairy for a hayride, pumpkins, and ice cream. We had a good time. Em freaked out when he saw the goats and lambs. Freaked out in a good way. He just kept yelling “Dog!” I guess he thinks anything on four legs is a dog. LOL It cracked me up. He freaked in a bad way on the hayride though. We didn’t realize it was a 30 minute deal. Try asking a toddler to sit for 30 minutes. Ha! Fat chance. Anyway, we decorated pumpkins on Sunday. Em had a good time until he started to eat the stickers. LOL  I also rearranged the living room on Sunday. I’m trying to make a more functional space with the toys. Now, Em can actually see the toys he has. I think he likes it better. He played for hours by himself. It was nice. I was able to clean the entire house, and fold all of the laundry. It was a nice weekend. We need more of those. It was nice being home so much. Next week…wow…

Saturday is going to be absolutely insane. We have a Halloween parade on Saturday morning, then a birthday party in the afternoon, then a Halloween party that night. I hope Em is ready for all of this! I’m hoping he naps after the parade before we go to the Halloween party.  On Friday night, we’re having some friends come over for a fire and smores. My sister and nephew are sleeping over because they are attending all of the same things as we are on Saturday. Sunday, it’ll be a chill day for us. We’ll probably swing past my parent’s house for a little bit in the morning, but other than that, we are staying home. I know I’ll be exhausted after all of that!

Today was picture day. I hope Em smiled nicely. I dressed him up so adorably though. He wore a red plaid button down shirt, jeans, and nice shoes. Perfect for fall pictures. I hope they come back before Thanksgiving. I swear they always take forever. Other than that, I hope it’s a pretty chill week. I hope you guys have a good one too!

Why are people assholes??

I am very ticked off about something that happened this weekend. Beyond furious. Let me back up a little bit. This weekend, my family and I had planned to go to a pumpkin patch. We were going to go on Sunday. My older sister was actually going to come too. We were all excited, but the weather wasn’t looking real great. It was supposed to be really cold with a small threat of snow. We still kept the plans anyway though. On Saturday, my sister and I took Emerson and my nephew to Kerber’s Dairy. It’s a creamery that makes amazing homemade ice cream, but they also had a hayride and a pumpkin patch too. The kids had a great time, but it was freezing. Emerson ended up with windburn on his face from the hayride. The wind was whipping pretty badly when we were on it. I didn’t realize how bad it was until we got to my parent’s house. His poor cheeks were so red.  We all decided at that point to just cancel going to Trax and to do pumpkin decorating and dinner instead. My parents told me to make sure I texted my older sister to tell her. Below is the full conversation we had. (verbatim)

Ash: We’re just going to do some pumpkin decorating at mum’s tomorrow since its going to be so cold. The kids went to Kerber’s today and it was snowing and so cold on the hayride! We are having dinner there too so come over!!!!!!!!

Nik: Okay

Ash: Yay!! We are getting stuff to decorate them J (Them meaning the pumpkins)

Nik: That sucks we aren’t going and plans changed to evening because I have plans to go to a haunted house tomorrow night. That’s why I was glad we were going in the day so I could go to the haunted house.

Ash: A haunted house on a Sunday? You probably won’t go until dark time tho. We’re going around like 3 J You’ll have time to do both

Nik: Yeah I was going at 530. It takes an hour to get there

Ash: It’s just too cold to have Emerson out for long spans like that. None of us care what we do as long as we do it together. You hardly see us, or the kids and you haven’t seen Isaiah in eons. You do see your friends a lot. It would be nice for you to come. If not, then  you probably won’t come around until Thanksgiving if you don’t already have other plans. (One year, she didn’t even come for Thanksgiving!!!!!!!!)  We make the effort and visit your home. Maybe you could start visiting us to see Em a little more than a handful of times a year.  It would be nice if he actually had a relationship with you. He doesn’t now at all.

Nik: Well we had plans to go in the day time, so I made all my plans surrounding doing everything in the daytime. So since you guys changed the plans, now I’m expected to cancel all my other plans and I’m not doing that. I get that it’s going to be cold out. I understand that, but that shouldn’t mean that I can’t go to the haunted house now that I’ve been waiting to go for 2 weeks because you guys changed the plans.

Ash: Well maybe you’ll have time sometime soon to come and visit.

That’s it. Usually, I let it go, but it is bologna. I wasn’t expecting her to change her plans, but she really is with her friends pretty much daily. They sleep at her house. She sleeps at their house. She works with her best friend too. We even invited her friend to come with us. Anyway, it does tick me off because we’ve made the effort and have gone to her house on several occasions. She didn’t even have the audacity to show up for Emerson’s birthday party. She blew us off in the craziest way!

When I went to my parent’s house the next day, my mom asked me to fix her phone. She had a huge bubble underneath the screen in her ottor box. After I fixed it, I pulled up her text just to get the phone lit, so I could see if it was gone. Low and behold, there was a slew of rotten text messages from my older sister. She was bashing the hell out of me. I guess my mom said she was upset that my sister wasn’t coming. I never told my mom. I texted my dad and said “I got stuff to decorate. Nik can’t come because she has other plans” That was it. I never told him about our exchange. Nik starts bashing me saying I manipulate them into thinking she is being flakey and just didn’t want to come. It’s not her fault that we changed the plans. She said I constantly make myself the middle man. She also said that she felt it was rude that I didn’t invite my parent’s to Kerber’s with us. (I actually did. They declined ) My mom actually had my back on that one and said that I did, but that they had other things to do. Nik said she would have liked to be invited, but she said it after she told my mom she doesn’t want to be around me and is only nice when I’m around because she isn’t a rude person. She then asked my mom to verify that her, myself, and our younger sister aren’t exchanging Christmas gifts because apparently I must make stuff up all the time.

Throughout all of this, my mom NEVER had my back. My mom could have stopped the entire thing by saying that I NEVER even said anything. I never talked about it at all with them because I don’t need to. Just because I had a conversation with her doesn’t mean my parents needed to know about it. I never said anything to them about her not wanting to come either. I also didn’t make myself the middle man. They were my plans to begin with and I organized the entire thing. I was told to let her know that the plans changed. It’s such crap. I didn’t manipulate crap. She makes herself look like a real idiot when she doesn’t show up regardless if plans changed, or not. I don’t make her look that way. She does it to herself. She loves to pull the victim card and make it look like other people are in the wrong for her absence in the family. It’s beyond annoying. Here, I thought we were starting to have a better relationship, but she validated yesterday that she’s just being fake towards me because she isn’t a rude person. News flash, bitch. That is rude!

My mom keeps it going though. By not squashing it initially, she eludes to the fact that I did say something when I really didn’t. It gets even better too. My mom starts talking MAD SMACK on Nikki to me and Britt! She was saying she’s done with her and she isn’t making the effort with her anymore. Then, she says Nik was kissing her butt via text, then asked her to go Christmas shopping. My mom said she told Nikki she doesn’t know if she wants to. LIAR! Her texts said Yes, and that she was excited about it! Why is she being so two-faced?!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! It’s like she likes it, or something. She is playing ALL of us! I’m not even telling Nikki either. She wouldn’t listen anyway. They are both made for each other. They both have serious mental problems. If you guys even knew how my sister lived her life you’d be absolutely baffled. It isn’t my story to tell though. One day, she will have to answer to it though.

Let’s fast forward to a few hours later when my sister was creeping on my Instagram AGAIN and accidentally LIKED one of my photos.  She does it ALL of the time. For someone who hates me and thinks they are so much better than me, she is constantly on my Instagram stalking. I’ll give her some stuff to read if she wants to use me to pass the time, but she isn’t going to like what I put up there! It isn’t slander if it’s the truth!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!  The bottom line is she’s an ahole. She’s been an ahole since 2010 when she started to live a different kind of life. She can continue to be an ahole. I am completely done with that bitch!

Unknown territory

Before I get into the more juicier stuff that you guys probably want to read, I wanted to talk about my workout today. 45 minutes blasting my glutes! Dumbbell step ups, weighed squats, donkey kicks, lunges, dead lifts, then walking lunges. I did 25 reps with 10lb weights, then repeated three times. I crushed it. I can tell I’m going to feel this tomorrow. I need to use heavier weights, so I can do less reps.  That way, it doesn’t take me as long when I’m on my lunch break. I’ll get there, but today was awesome. Tomorrow is my cardio day, then I finally get to rest on Friday. Here is what my weekly workout looked like. We’re starting from Saturday when I officially decided to shift from the 21 day fix to lifting.

Saturday: Legs

Sunday: Chest and Back

Monday: Tris/Bis

Tuesday: Shoulders and abs

Wednesday: Glutes

Thursday: Cardio

Friday: Rest

Not too bad! It’s nice breaking everything  down to this level. The 21 day fix extreme did a nice job of doing that, but this is driving even more into a specific area at one time. Grow, baby, grow!

Okay, so last night, after Emerson went to bed, I invited my friend over. We’ve been friends for about 12 years. Years and years ago we started to hang out a little bit, but the timing was never right…meaning I always had a boyfriend, or an ex-boyfriend in the mix, or I was just an ahole looking for something else outside of what was in my face. Anyway, we’ve maintained our friendship all of these years. We pretty much talk daily even if it’s just a quick chat. We know each other fairly well, so there isn’t really any bologna to muddle through. I wasn’t inviting him over as a romantic hangout, date, or whatever the kids are calling it these days. It’s just nice to be in adult company sometimes. I don’t have a lot of freedom to go out, so inviting friends over after Em is in bed is what I am limited to. It’s not a bad deal either. It isn’t interrupting my time with Emerson and I also don’t have to get dressed up. Score!

I’m not sure what he viewed it as. I wasn’t having him come over to hook up, or something weird like that. I thought we could just talk, play with the dog, and watch t.v. Pretty basic. We did just that. We talked for a long time, we played with the dog, and we watched t.v. He did bust a move on me, which I didn’t ward off, or hate. We have been friends for so long that it’s sometimes hard to see people in a new light. Sometimes it’s hard to look past a friendship onto other feelings, but it didn’t feel strange at all. I get pretty freaked out these days because I’m very mindful of Emerson, and I like my independence. I am very picky when it comes to who I am spending my time with. It was really nice. Nothing CRAZY happened, guys. We kept our pants on. LOL Someone is going to have to work pretty hard for that to happen, but it was nice to not have any pressure either. I don’t really know what will happen from here, but I am oddly not worried about it. It was nice to be in good company last night and to not have to sit on the couch all by my lonesome. I’ll obviously keep you guys updated. We have emailed back and forth today. He sent me an email and apologized for keeping me up so late. I guess it’s a good sign that he even said anything. I guess I didn’t scare him off too badly yet! Just kidding.

A little background though about Mr. X (I refuse to name drop and I also hope he doesn’t have access to this blog. How embarrassing) He is a couple of years older than me, but not by much. He lives fairly close to me. He’s in the IT and graphic design business. He has no children, and lives on his own. He has 3 turtles as pets though. 2 of them are pretty old. I believe both are over 20 years old. He has a sister who is married, but has no children. She does have 2 dogs though that he loves, and visits several times throughout the week. He actually met Kodie (my dog) when she was a puppy. She warmed right up to him when he came over last night, which was nice. I’m not sure how he feels about children though. Throughout all of our conversations when I was pregnant through now, he strikes me as the type that wants to date someone with freedom. Someone who can come and go whenever they please, go on vacation, and not be tied down too much. Obviously, I don’t have that kind of freedom. He doesn’t drink really at all, and he never parties either. He was never a bar kind of person either. He’s into cars and car shows, he does workout at the gym though he isn’t nearly as crazy about it as me, which is probably a good balance. He is a very nice, respectful person, which is really important. He has some old-fashioned tendencies, which I think are nearly extinct in this day and age, so that’s refreshing. The fact that he wasn’t pawing at me ridiculously last night says A LOT. Some people don’t know how to just go slow, work your way up to those kinds of things, and just enjoy the moments leading up to THAT. Everything is RUSH, RUSH, RUSH. Okay, that’s about all I have for now. Again, I don’t know what will happen and I’m not even sure what I would like to happen, but not having expectations is so nice.

Let’s switch gears. Emerson got to take his teddy bear to school today. He was so darn excited about it too. He cracks me up. While I was driving him to school, I kept hearing him kiss the bear in the back seat. He is so silly. Alright, guys. I have so much to do, so I am going to cut this now. Have a fabulous hump day!

My ramblings

The last time I wrote was 5 days ago, which was Thursday. It’s now Tuesday. I’ll just break it down by day. It’s easier that way.

Friday- I drove into work because we woke up late. That sucked. I hate driving into work, but I had missed two buses. If I waited for the third, I would have been crazy late. I ended up getting to work on time by driving. You probably wonder why I don’t just do that daily. Well, parking is more expensive than taking the bus, plus putting wear and tear on my car, and using gas. It adds up fast. I’d rather take a 65 minute bus trip than have to drive myself for 45 minutes. Either way, it’s sucky to have to commute that far, but I like taking the bus. Anyway, since I drove in, I decided to just get my run in early. It was dark out, which was kind of scary, but no one bothered me. I always have this fear that a homeless person is going to attack me, while I’m running under a bridge, or overpass. My run kind of sucked though. I had a cramp in my side the entire time. I couldn’t get rid of it. I only ran 2.3 miles. A total flop in my mind, but any exercise is better than no exercise. I went back to the gym, showered, got ready for work, then headed to my desk. Not a bad start to the morning. I had several meetings set up, so I handled my biz, then left work at 3pm to beat traffic. On the way home, I stopped at the store. We needed wipes, toilet paper, and some food to get through the weekend. I picked Em up from daycare, then we went home for our usual routine. My sister gave me some teeth whitening trays to try out. She didn’t like them, so I decided to give them a whirl after Em went to bed. Wow, my gums were SCREAMING. I couldn’t even make it through the entire 30 minutes. They cause sensitivity, but on an already sensitive mouth, it was overload. Luckily, the sensitivity didn’t last very long.

Saturday, we had big plans. We had a play date with my friend and her son.  After chocolate chip pancakes, Em and I headed to the mall. We found they took out the kid’s play place. I guess they’re remodeling it. I had no idea. Luckily, we had a back-up plan. We headed to giggles and smiles. Em had a blast. It was nice meeting up with another mom and her son too. The kids had a great time. We stayed there for about an hour and a half. Em was so tuckered out that he fell asleep in the car on the way to my parent’s house. We hung out there for a while, then went to the grocery store to grab a couple mini pumpkins, then home for Em to nap. Em took a long nap. While he slept, I cut out some pumpkins, so that he could finger paint when he woke up. I also did an amazing leg/glute workout. After Em got up, I sat him at the table to do his crafts. He wasn’t as interested in finger painting as he was playing with the paint bottles. He occupied himself for at least 2 hours! I was able to make dinner, and to clean up uninterrupted, which was nice. We had dinner, played, then did our usual night-time routine. After Em went to bed, I rented Magic Mike XXL. Wow. It was an awesome movie and left me wanting more by the end of it.

We slept in until after 8am on Sunday morning! Wow! What a treat! I woke up so confused when I saw my clock read 8:06am! That’s just not normal in our house. I guess giggles and smiles really wore Em out. We played at home for most of the day, then went to visit my parents. We stayed there for a while and did our laundry. When we got home, Em played in the yard until dinner time.  After bed, I watched all of my shows (Kardashians included), then went to bed.

Monday, I took the day off because daycare was closed. They follow the school closures. Our district was off for Columbus Day. Em and I played at home most of the day. After nap, we headed to the store to get our weekly groceries. Afterwards, we played in the yard, had dinner, played some more, then Em had a bath, then went to bed. I stayed up until a little after 10.  I ended up over sleeping today though, which sucked. I didn’t drive in though. I wasn’t paying more money to park after I had already loaded my bus card.

I got my flu shot this morning. My arm is sore, but nothing major. I’m hitting the gym shortly for shoulders, then abs. I’m sore from the bis and tris workout I did yesterday, and from the chest/back workout from Sunday. I meal prepped for the week last night too, so I’m all set. I’m trying to find a good balance between wanting to be lean, but wanting muscles. It’s hard. You can’t really get muscles unless you gain some weight and cut some cardio, but you can’t stay lean by doing that. I haven’t figured out what direction I want to go in yet. I know I want to grow a little. Nothing insane, but to do that I do need to pack on some pounds. I’m not fully ready to commit to gaining yet. Most people gain, stop all cardio, power lift, then cut like crazy to bulk up. I’m just not comfortable getting fluffy in the process. I’m slowly adding in calories every week and decreasing some of my cardio, so that it isn’t a BIG shock. Instead of running 3 times a week, I’m reducing it down to one time outside, and a job on my treadmill. I’m also upping my weights, so that I can actually grow when I lift. I’ve derailed from my 21 day fix program and have navigated towards the hammer and chisel programs that are available through my beachbody on demand mixed in with just some dumbbell workouts that I have. So far, I’ve been sore every single day, so I know that signifies change in some aspect. I just need to keep with it, keep upping my weights, and add in some healthy calories. More protein, healthy fats, complex carbs.

I was figuring out my macros the other night and had a hell of a time. I was overshooting the protein, but coming well under with my calories, and carbs. How is that even possible? I think I try to eat TOO healthy at times. I’ve rearranged my meal plan a bit, so I can support my goals, but I am still finding it very difficult to meet my required calories of 1750, but keeping at 112g of protein! Protein has so many calories in it. You’d think if I’m overshooting that total, I’d be hitting my calorie mark. I’m not though. I’m having a hard time consuming 1200 calories. I need to add 100-125 calories a week too. This is going to pose a challenge for me, especially to my wallet. I don’t want to have to buy more food. I’m giving it a fair shot though. I know I need to eat if I want to see any progress. The good thing is the more I weigh the more protein I can eat. It’s 1g per pound that you weigh. That excites me! I know a lot of people follow a flexible diet that are into powerlifting. I like that, but it also leaves the door open to interpretation of how you view the flex dieting. IIFYM (if it fits your macos) basically means you can eat whatever you want. Poptarts, cake, cookies, etc. As long as you’re eating within your fat, carb, and protein range it doesn’t matter what you eat. I don’t condone this though. I think sometimes it’s okay to do this (moderation), but not every day. It’s crazy though because a lot of bodybuilders do this and they are absolutely shredded! I don’t want to gain burgers and fries though. I’d rather gain healthy weight. It’s tempting though. Bad food is cheaper than eating clean, but I don’t want to live that way. I made this change four months ago and I’ve thoroughly enjoyed eating healthy. I don’t want to go backward. I guess we’ll see what happens over the next month. I need to take some before pics to measure against my first bench mark of November 13th. I’m not sure what I want to achieve by then. Maybe gain 3-5lbs, but to put on some good muscle on my back, legs, and arms.  Okay, I’ve gotten completely off track here.

Sorry! I hope you guys all have a good week!