Project Status: Bathroom Medicine Cabinet

Project Status:  In Progress

Well, with the kids sick most of this week and last, progress is slowing to a crawl here on this little ol' blog of mine!  I am really slacking on all of the blogs, and this weekend has been brutal. So, to get a little "me" time in, when the kids were napping today, I took apart the medicine cabinet.  So relaxing!  ;)

I am not finished, but I got a really good start today.  Here's a picture of the current state of things:

I threw so much stuff out it was ridiculous - things that expired in 2004, one that expired in 1998.  Wow.  I took out all of my hair care stuff and lotions because it really is a medicine cabinet!  I will find a place for those elsewhere.  And I tried to group things according to use and how often they are used.  

The pain relievers are all together in one container, as are the cough remedies, etc... I placed the containers and then a row of bottles to keep the space in between standardized so that things just don't start to get jumbled again.  Creating a space for everything does that!  Or at least helps minimize the putting back where it doesn't belong.  Hopefully it will work!  Plus, I know we need a few things that I am saving spaces for.  

I am looking for a way to use the height of the bottom shelf...I know there are shelves they sell that hang from the shelf above it, but I need to make something since I don't want to spend the money.  Cheap Cheap! I'd like to label things as well.  Once I got into it, I realized that would help in keeping things where they belong and in finding stuff quickly.  

So, that's the status!

All the Motivation I Need.

I ask myself why I am trying to lose weight.

And this is what myself tells me:

Obvious reasons:

• Being healthy, feeling good, not getting Diabetes.
  
• Keeping up with the kids, having the energy to attain all the goals I want for all of us in this next year.
  
• Not feel embarrased in a bathing suit
• Not have to wear maternity clothes for the rest of my life (duh!)
• I want my strength back.

And with eyes as big as saucers, these are today, just realized reasons:

• My 15 year High School reunion is this summer. Whoa.  I do not want to be the one that when I walk away, everyone shakes their head and discusses how I "let myself go."
  
• Family Vacation this August, in the water constantly, I don't want to be mistaken for a water buffalo at the water's edge and be eaten by a freshwater crocodile.
• 10th anniversary trip this summer to somewhere hot, I don't want to feel frumpy and self-conscious, I want to feel hot!

Those last three are ridiculously powerful motivators, if only for extremely vain reasons.  But, I can handle that.  

I am signing up on the private weight loss blog I follow, called "Adios, Fatty", as a motivated-guest blogger/poster this week.  I am looking forward to the accountability from all her readers. If you are interested in her journey, she has lost almost 30 pounds so far and super fast, predictably 2 pounds a week like clockwork because she has done the math!  She's an animal!  I am sure she will let you in on the blog if you are interested.  Shoot me an email at ertelbear@gmail.com if you want to sign up for hers and I will let her know she has more readers!  She already has two other weight loss posters and I think about 15-20 readers, so I will be the third to sign up and post every week. The more motivation the better!

Project Status: Bathroom Medicine Cabinet

Status:  Take the Before Picture!

I haven't officially started this yet, but here's a before picture, and all the reasons it needs to change.

Here's the full cabinet, it's pretty shallow.  

This is one of the major annoyances of a shallow cabinet and an addiction to super-strength Motrin.  Yes, I blurred it out so that none of you junkies out there could fill our prescriptions and run away to Mexico.  It's for your own protection. 

After the c-section of the triplets, I got a bucket load of the stuff - it's great to have around for super-migraines!  The week after, Mike landed in the ER with a slipped disc - and he received his very own stash.  Not that I am bitter, but I got Ibuprofin 600s for my surgery - pulling 3 kids out of a slit in my belly... he gets 800s for his.  Hmm.  Is this a man's world?  I digress...

And this is our other collection.  Apparently we need 2500 band-aids.  In every size imaginable.  

And do you see the pills stashed everywhere?  We have problems.... ;)

Tomorrow I attack this shallow denizen of pain relievers and ouch-pads.  The bonus, if I get hurt in the process, I can finally use something in there.  Wish me luck.

Project Start: Bathroom Medicine Cabinet

I'm not sure when this got out of hand, but it is a.total.mess.

It's my job now to sort through and toss all the expired meds, vitamins, lotions, band-aids (do they expire? lol) and then reorganize in some fashion all the contents of this tiny cabinet.  We must honestly have about 600 Motrin pills in various strengths.  I guess we like the Motrin!  I will post a before photo tomorrow, when it's not the middle of the night and taking a picture would probably awaken Mikey.  Talk about a Last-Minute-Lucy!  

Hopefully, this will be a quickie and I can devote more time to the other projects that need attention this week!  It will be nice to have done, though, since every time one of us opens it, a pill bottle jumps out at us, like it can't stand to be squeezed in there one second longer.  We then stuff it back in and close the door real quick like.  :)

So, the goals on this one:

• Sort cabinet contents
• Toss the expired or the bad
• Give away the extra to the most accident prone person we know
• Consolidate as much as possible (i.e., the 10 bottles of same strength prescription Ibuprofin into 1)
• Organize shelves by category
• Label?  Do we go that far? 

Favorite Things Friday

Yep, I missed it.  I got back to my computer this evening and realized I missed Favorite Things Friday! *gasp* So, I decided to post-date it, just to keep the continuity.  I'm anal like that.  

This week is a product I have used a lot, this week.  Unfortunately.  The cats have been throwing up like mad for some reason, and in the past, this chore took a while to get the stains out.  

Not anymore!

This baby - the Woolite "Oxy Deep" P.O.D. Cleaner - cleans the spots in literally seconds.  And that is why I heart it.  

If you have pets, this is a must.  Just sayin'.

Snag!

Monday was good!  It was my first day of exercising and eating well.  I was on track.

And Monday night, I started feeling a little under the weather.  Super bad headache and just plain bushwhacked.  So, I took a few Motrin and called it an early night.  Tuesday morning I woke up sick.  Really sick... And SORE......!  What timing! Curse you, Jillian Michaels!!

30 Day Shred Users have all commented that the next day after the first workout is unbearable pain.  Soreness, achy, can't sit down or do a flight of stairs without the ever-present agony kind of sore.  

So, I woke up sick AND that kind of sore.  It was a brutal day and an awful blow to my momentum and motivation.  Today is the first day the soreness has mostly abated and I can just deal with being sick.  And today is the first day I realized just what kind of sick I am.  Chest cold, at it's finest.  Can you beleive that I was that sore that I couldn't tell what was hurting from the sickness?  It's kinda funny, really.  

I haven't fallen off the healthy eating bandwagon though, just the exercising.  We actually had a good meal last night that I will be posting this week - the basic chicken, veggies and whole grain cappelini kind of meal... It was very tasty.  So, hopefully tomorrow, I will feel well enough to get up early again and exercise my patootie off...again.  

Check out some of the new healthy living blogs I have added to the sidebar.  There are some really great recipes, tips and motivation butt kickers on there.  I will be adding more as I start different kinds of projects, and then sorting them as they are all different kinds of helpful.  

Recipe Madness

Ok, so these will not be recipes that would be fit to file under "Recipe Madness", but the title made me chuckle, so there it is.  I'd like to share a few recipes I find or make up along the way on this blog.  You can choose whether or not they are fit for man or beast... if they make it here, at least I liked them...and since it's my blog, I can cry if I want to!  ;)

This is my only caveat:  I like a lot of "weird" stuff.  And sometimes I make combinations just to try them.  Sometimes I like them and others, well, those times I know why I never became a professional chef.  By the way, "weird" in our house is defined as something Mike doesn't like. 

Since I want to try and reduce the amount of calories I ingest daily, and also a few carbs along the way, I decided to go a little South Beach on myself and try a lettuce wrap sandwich.  I have had a few in the past (like a rosemary chicken goat cheese wrap!  Yum!) and they never fail to amaze me in the fact that I really don't miss the bread at all.  In fact, I like the refreshing crunch of the lettuce leaf instead.  Not all the time, of course, but if I skip the bread now and then, that's almost 200 calories I can either use somewhere else or skip altogether - a worthy sacrifice!

Today was the start of this new endeavor, so I came up with this lunch quickly after getting the kids settled in their own highchairs, munching on their own good stuff.  Can you believe my kids like prunes?  That amazes me every day...but, that's another story.   ;)  

What should I call this one?   Hmm.....

Avocado and Egg Lettuce Wrap

(that's pretty straightforward, huh?)

2 red leaf lettuce leaves

2 eggs

4-5 thin slices of avocado (hass)

1 tbsp hummus (any kind, I used the classic)

Dijon mustard (to taste)

dash of Cumin (optional)

Using the smallest amount of butter possible, fry up the two eggs, breaking the yolk so the whites and yolks all cook together.  While they are cooking, mix the dijon mustard and the hummus together in a small bowl.  When at desired flavor, place the lettuce leaves on your plate and spread half of the hummus/mustard mixture around on each leaf. When eggs are cooked, place 1 egg on each leaf, on top of the mixture.  Spread the other half of the hummus on the eggs. Cut the avocado into chunks and add on top.  Sprinkle with cumin and wrap.  

Warning, they take a lot of practice and skill to eat without getting messy.  I haven't mastered that quite yet.  Also, I made this without mixing the hummus and mustard first, and this is why I modified the recipe.  The picture shows a big dollop of the mustard on top...and since I am a softie and Dijon can be quite like horseradish in the strength, I figured it would be better spread around a bit.  

I ate this with 1/2 cup of sliced strawberries and a big glass of water.  The dijon mustard and the cumin added a nice kick.  I liked this one quite a bit and will make it often for a quick lunch.  

Approx calories for the whole meal:  325

I walked this morning for 35 minutes, only burning 235 calories.  Boo!  Then, in the afternoon, I did 30 Day Shred, and doing some research, first timers to the levels might burn around 225-250 cals.  All that work for the same as a 40-minute run.  This is going to take some time to get used to!