The Author

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I am a high school English teacher, and mother of two charming little ones of my own. I teach in a high poverty urban charter school, while I live in a typical American suburb that has frequently been rated one of the safest cities in the country. It is a paradox I struggle with constantly, but it is my life.

Thursday, June 30, 2011

Productive day... yet not finished.

One would think that I would use summer vacation to be very productive, and that things would just get done, but they really have not. I have been having a lot of fun and doing a lot of relaxing and much needed catching up on working out at the gym.

I have been trying really, really hard to at least keep up with laundry, but other stuff needed to get done. I have somewhat designated Thursdays for this, since I can't really do anything big on a Thursday because Vinny has acting class in the middle of the day. But Thursdays are not enough. I am going to have to really try to get a bunch done tomorrow morning. No more sipping coffee and cuddling on the couch all morning.  Stuff has to get done.

I did really enjoy the gym this morning. I wanted to cry looking at pictures of myself in a bathing suit, so I decided to start trying to go to the ab-focused classes. I went to a "core" class this morning and it kicked my ass. Or should I say, it kicked my abs?  Seriously though. There is something that people don't understand unless they have been through it themselves about pregnancy. Suddenly, there are all these muscles in your core that you are not using because there is a baby in the way. So, in addition to the weight, you have these muscles that get completely untoned. I don't think there is any way to fix that without some work. I mean, I weight about what I weighed before the baby, but my tummy does NOT look the same, that's for sure, and my legs are just... chunkiness beyond belief. I feel like I had just barely gotten back before Tiana, and then it was all out the window. I didn't even gain much with her, but I just look like crap. And I know a bunch of you are going to say I am being too critical, so I am actually going to post it...

See?  Not being too critical. Marc has done SO well at his diet. He needed to lose 20 pounds... and he did it. I, on the other hand, am stuck. If I keep up this hour-a-day workout routine all summer, hopefully I will get there. 

In order to help us keep up, I decided to make a meal plan for the next few weeks today. I went through all the stuff we have in the freezer from our co-op and planned healthy meals for all of it. I consulted websites for kid-friendly meals and healthy meals and assessed the calories and tried to get creative.  The plan includes turkey burgers and grilled corn on the cob, crock pot rotisserrie chicken and baked potatoes with grilled summer squash, potato skin pizzas (which are ingenious since the crust is the worst part of the pizza and potato skins are high in potassium, which is apparently lacking in my diet), stuffed bell peppers, crock pot jambalaya, stuffed bell peppers with brown rice and ground chicken, grilled pork chops, and grilled tostadas (instead of frying- genius- they get crispy as if they were fried).  Yum. 

Bleh, so much cleaning the house to do. Bleh......

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