You Wish You Had a Camera When . . .

When it comes to being a mom and capturing those magic moments on camera – I’m the worst.  I tend to get wrapped up in the moment and simply forget.  Then 2 minutes after it’s over I say “why didn’t I get a shot of that”?

I have captured a few of those crazy moments

Belle ready to go play soccer
Mattie?  No, that’s not my beautiful daughter
CT, are you grilling nakie?
 I can’t stay.  I really mustache.

 Sponge Bob?

Yesterday, during a 6 mile trail run, I made a right turn and straight in front of me was a wild turkey.  Did he fly away?  No!  He tried to outrun me.  His butt was swinging left and right as he frantically continued down the path.  It was the funniest thing I have ever seen (except maybe when I saw an owl running after a bunny and thought it was a 3 legged cat).  I wish I had my camera so that I could share it with you all.
What I like about photographs is that they capture a moment that’s gone forever, impossible to reproduce.” 
Karl Lagerfeld

What’s the funniest moment you have caught on film?

Miles run so far this week – – -18
Days until race day – – – 136

Indoor Dinner Beach Party

“One must maintain a little bit of summer, even in the middle of winter.” ~Henry David Thoreau

This has been a long – no – the longest – coldest winter I can remember.  Looking forward to spring break and ready for the weather to turn we decided to bring our beach party inside for our family dinner night.

The menu:
Turkey burgers 2 ways
Baked Beans
Potato Chips
Kale Chips

For a beach party you can’t forget the décor: beach decorations, paper plates, beach boys music, and of course, a beach ball.  We made up fun beach ball games around the dinner table. Here are several variations of our silly games.

Clear the area of any breakables.  We knocked over a few drinks.  You just have to relax and laugh it off.  No Type A behavior allowed.

Pass the ball around the table and each time you get the ball you must say:

  • a food in alphabetical order (apple, banana, cheesecake)
  • change it up when the first and last letter are the same reverse the direction of the ball pass
  • counting by 1’s, then 2’s, then 3’s and so on (make this more difficult by not starting on evenly divisible numbers.  Start counting by 2’s on an odd number, by 5’s on 34, etc.)

If you drop the ball or mess up you are OUT!

Olive Turkey Burgers

Printable Version

 
Ingredients
  • 20 oz. ground turkey
  • 1/2 c mayo
  • 1/2 large white onion, chopped
  • 1/2 cup jumbo green olives, chopped
  • salt
  • pepper

Instructions

  • Mix the above ingredients.
  • Form into 6 burgers.
  • Line a pan or your grill with tin foil. Make small slits in the tin foil for juice to run through. (If broiling use a drip pan). Spray the foil with cooking spray.
  • Broil or grill until desired doneness (medium or medium well is recommended).
Awesome Turkey Burgers
Printable Version

Ingredients
  • 20 oz. ground turkey
  • 1/2 large white onion, chopped
  • 2 Tbs. olive oil
  • 2 Tbs. fresh mint, minced
  • 1 Tsp. ground cumin
  • salt
  • pepper
Instructions
  • Mix the above ingredients.
  • Form into 6 burgers.
  • Grill or broil until desired doneness (medium or medium well is recommended)

I Can’t Stop Eating; Attack of Berta

Our regularly scheduled program, losing 6 pounds in 2 weeks, has been interrupted.  Berta strikes again.  Call it the snowed in with my refrigerator effect, or these kids are home too much now so I need to eat, or nothing is as warm and cozy as a ham sandwich.  I feel like Zac Efron in 17 Again

 
Ever have those days?


Day 1 – Losing 6 Pounds in 2 Weeks

They say to new moms that “it took you 9 months to put on the weight, give yourself at least that much time to take it off”.  Not many women whom I know bought into that.  Most of us thinking of a much nearer birthday, or formal event that would require a slinky black dress and setting our sights on that date as the target.

I am going to use that rule to take off weight gained during business travel and log measurements that I feel are important to achieving this goal, The 4 Keys of Successful Weight Management.  2 weeks to put on the weight, 2 weeks to take it off.

Measurement is the first step that leads to control and eventually to improvement. If you can’t measure something, you can’t understand it. If you can’t understand it, you can’t control it. If you can’t control it, you can’t improve it.”  ~  H. James Harrington

DAY 1

Sustenance – fuel

Breakfast     -1 granola bar
                    -1 large green apple
Snack          -1 oz almonds
Lunch          -salad (3 cups mixed veggies no dressing)

Snack          -1 clementine
Dinner         –mujadara (2 cup serving)
                    -1/2 pita

Sweat – exercise

30 minutes elliptical machine

Sip – hydration

32 ounces water
16 ounces coffee (bad)

Slumber – sleep

8 hours, restless (darn those hot flashes)

Clear Communication?

Parents, leaders, spouses, friends, coworkers; any relationship is made stronger or weaker by how clearly we communicate.  Our word choice, tone, punctuation, and even the timing of our message can affect how it is perceived.

We all know that there are words that we just simply shouldn’t use.  Their meaning is just, well, mean.  “Don’t call your sister stupid”. “Don’t say I hate you”.  Suck.  This sucks, that sucks, you suck.  I was just at a classroom Christmas party and suck seems to be the current 4th grade favorite for boys and girls.

Then, there’s the way we say things.  Tone, inflection, and body language all express
the meaning behind our words. “What’s going on?” vs. (arms crossed) “WHAT’S GOING ON”!  The same words are used, but our intent is different.

The written word is much more prevalent today.  We text, email, instant message as our most common use of communication.  Besides the ability to read the wrong intent into some one’s words by reading in emotion that isn’t there, punctuation misplaced also changes the message.  We have all seen these and laughed.

“Woman, without her man, is nothing” vs. “Woman: without her, man is nothing”

 

“Eats shoots and leaves” vs. “Eats, shoots and leaves”

 

“King Charles walked and talked; half an hour after, his head was cut off” vs.”King Charles walked and talked half an hour after his head was cut off”

And, how about those spellcheck mishaps?  I once received an email from an executive that was supposed to say “customer inconvenience”.  Instead it read “customer incontinence”.  That was a great LOL moment.

Also confusing the meaning behind our message is the fact that there is more than one party involved.  There is the delivery person and the receiver.  Sometimes we do everything right in the delivery of the message, but the breakdown occurs in how it is received.  Seth Godin wrote earlier this week, that there’s the hard work of understanding.  He posted in his blog :

“Sometimes, we’re so eager to have an opinion that we skip the step of working to understand. Why is it the way it is? Why do they believe what they believe?
We skip reading the whole thing, because it’s easier to jump to what we assume the writer meant.”

If you are looking to build better relationships in 2014, clear communication is a good place to start.

Enjoy this video and a couple of fun links about language

Absurdities in spelling
Why English is hard to learn

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