December 21, 2020 Grinch Play Day

 Heather had sent Kev a Grinch costume for fun. Around here he’s known as the Grinch because Christmas pretty much drives him crazy between putting up lights, putting up the tree and all of that. He’s always saying bah humbug so we call him the Grinch. He even has a few grinch ornaments hanging on the tree, so she thought the Grinch costume was perfect for him.

We picked up Hunter’s kids for the day again and wanted to bring them back to the house. We thought we would decorate some cookies, go to the park, celebrate some birthdays and just spend the day with them. Avah, Baby K, and Annaliese all have birthdays in December, So that’s where the birthday celebrations come in. Santana’s is the only one that doesn’t have a December birthday, hers is in August.

They got a chance to go to the playground here at Encanterra as well as ride their bikes and just play outside, they really enjoy that. Plus they got to have pictures with the Grinch.

On the way home we went to look at some lights. We went to Comstock Street in Gilbert which is really neat because the whole street is all lit up with lights as well as music going to the lights. And then around the corner all the sidewalks are lit up with archways of lights.

We also stopped at At Rock Point Church in Queen Creek because they have lights all around the church campus, plus they had a big pile of snow. The girls wanted to go play in the snow so we stopped there for a few minutes while they ran around and threw snow at each other and we checked out the lights that were around the grounds.  

December 15, 2020 75Hard Complete

  I can’t believe it, but I have finished the 75Hard challenge.  When I first started , I thought it sounded so far away and here it is Day 75. Actually I’m writing this on day 76 because I wanted an end of challenge weigh in, measurements and photos.  

These are the three sets of pictures which are all from Day 1 and Day 75.  I feel like you can see the difference in all of them.  

And not only do the pictures show the difference but I lost inches too.  Overall, 19 1/2 inches.  I feel really good, I’m really happy with the weight loss and my clothes fit so much better.  In fact,  I am wearing some workout tops I haven’t worn in years.  It’s such a good feeling.  Last week when I weighed I was actually in the 160’s.  It was 169.4, but that’s still the 160’s.  Not sure why I was up at weigh in today, could be any number of random reasons but I’m not real worried about it.  It could also be that I weighed on a Tuesday and not the full week to Thursday like I had been.  I’m going to weigh again Thursday and see what happens.   I’m still going to work to get to 160 so just cause the 75 days is over I’m not done yet.  

Here’s the before and after of my measurements. 

One of the other parts of the challenge was to read 10 pages of a non fiction book every day.  I have been loving reading again.  I do so many audiobooks that I haven’t really been reading a whole lot but this got me to read every night and every morning.  Through the course of the challenge I read 9 books.  I enjoyed them all and did like some better then others but I decided that this is something I will continue to do, the reading every day.  

These are all the books I read.  

Meredith asked me a couple times what was I going to do when the challenge was over and I really couldn’t answer.  She meant as far as my eating and exercising plans.  I do feel good when I eat Whole30 so I feel like I want to keep that up but maybe make some little tweaks.  Possibly add in some Greek yogurt, some steel cut oats, maybe some popcorn, I’m not sure.  I know there’s no tweaking Whole30 but I guess I mean I would keep eating mainly like I have been with a few add ins.  I know it’s the time where there’s all kinds of yummy food around with the holidays and stuff and I almost feel like I want to stay strict Whole30 so that I don’t get derailed so I’ll have to see.  Still not sure.  And as far as my exercise, I’ll keep that up too.  Between my walking, hiking and Pickleball I’m pretty active and want to stay that way.  I feel like my walking got me started on my weight going down.  

So again, I did it!!! I completed the 75Hard Challenge and I have to say I’m super proud of myself for sticking to it and making it to the end.  

 

November 28, 2020 Santa Pics

 Alicia had an appointment at Bass Pro Shop to get pictures with Santa.  With Covid everything is different this year and that includes getting pictures taken with Santa. She had to make an appointment, and when she got there they took temperatures of everyone that was going to be in the picture. Santa was sitting behind a piece of plexiglass as well as wearing a face shield. But it was a great set up and the main thing was is that they got some family pictures with Santa. Normally they come to Encanterra and get pictures with Santa, but here at Encanterra, we didn’t have Santa come because of Covid so there was no going to be the opportunity for them to get them done.  I met them at Bass Pro Shop so that I could take some pictures with my phone so that they would have more options to choose from other than the two that they were going to get for free.

Vincent thought it was so cool when Santa put his hand up to the plexiglass and Vincent put his hand up against it, it lit up and he knew it was magic.

November 21, 2020 100 Miles

On November 1st I started the 100 miles in 100 days hiking challenge. It’s something I did last year that I explained about it in a previous post, but today I reached my first 100 miles. After doing the challenge last year I had said that I wanted to do 200 miles this year so I am off to a great start by reaching 100 miles already.

After each hike I make a collage like the one below.  One of the requirements for the challenge is that you take a picture of the map that is from a tracking app as well as a picture of yourself on the trails that you hiked.  This collage also includes the picture of the fact that I hit 100 miles.

November 20, 2020 Feeding the Animals at the Farm

All Alicia’s kids had spent the night so on the way to taking them home we stopped at the animal farm in Gilbert to let the kids fed the animals.  It’s such a great little set up and the kids love feeding the different animals and being able to get so close.  

November 14, 2020 Play Day at Alicia’s

We had not seen Hunter and Jess’s kids since March.  With the whole Covid thing it was just hard to feel relaxed about getting together.  But we finally just bit the bullet and arranged to pick all four of them up to spend some time together.  They live out in Ahwatukee now so we decided to pick them up and take them to Alicia’s house so all the kids could play together.  She has all the toys any kid would want to play with anyway, a trampoline, a jungle gym, swings and a bounce house.  Who wouldn’t want to go there and play? Plus Vincent was there so there were more kids for him to hangout with too. 

Baby K loved this truck. He played with it for a long time.  We decided he was getting one for Christmas. 

 

                                  This was Annaliese’s awesome hiding place for hide and seek. 

                                    After all the outside playing the kids had pizza for dinner.

You try getting 8 kids all together and looking the same way and hopefully smiling to get a picture.  This is the best I could do.  

All the kids had a great time.  It was so fun to have the cousins spending time together.  We’ll definitely go back to the Padilla playground for everyone to enjoy again.