Updates

So, I haven't written in a while. Sorry about that. First things first. I got all my final grades in for the spring semester and the verdict is..... 4.0 GPA. That's right! All A's. For two of the classes, I wasn't shocked. But the other two, well, let's just say that I think my teachers might have liked me... :) Just kidding. I worked my butt off this semester and I deserve the grades I got! (I'm trying this new thing where I don't minimize my achievements. It is a bad habit that I need to break.)

Speaking of achievements, my scale has this neat feature where it calculates your metabolic age and tells you how many calories you need to consume to maintain your weight. Well, I haven't used that feature in a long time. In fact, the last time I used it, it told me that my metabolic age was 38 years old and that I needed to eat 1400 calories to maintain my weight. Boy was I in denial! I thought the scale didn't have any idea what it was talking about, and besides, I wasn't eating much more than 1400 calories, so I was doing just fine. Ha! I was just kidding myself. In reality, I was eating much closer to 2200-2500 calories every day. Well, do you want to know what the scale told me Monday night? It is kind of exciting! The scale told me that my metabolic age is 19! And that I need to consume 2100 calories a day to maintain my weight! Can you believe it? I almost can't. I lost almost 20 years! Or, actually, I gained 20 years. I can definitely feel a difference in my health level. I feel more healthy, like I'm able to do anything. It is an amazing feeling. Especially since I haven't lost too much more weight during Round 2 of P90X. I'm pretty much at my starting weight. But that is OK. I feel great, I look forward to working out, I derive pleasure from watching what I eat and eating delicious food. I just can't believe how much I've changed this year. What a difference 4 and a half months makes, huh?

Ok, well, what else have I been doing lately? Well, my first class of the summer started up. Once a week, every week of the summer. It is all about research and assessment, and I think if I keep a positive attitude about it, most of the information will come in handy.

Anything else? Well, I've been hanging out with Kate and the boys a lot this summer. It has been really nice. I usually watch Parker and Preston on Mondays while Kate does her Health Challenge. We always have so much fun. Also, last week (maybe 2 weeks ago) Kate and I went to the Botanical Garden. We were going to go to the zoo, but we decided that there were too many people there. So we went to the NGB, and boy was it amazing! The boys had so much fun, as evidenced by the video :)


{Ok, I guess I should give some background for the video. In the beginning, Parker is looking at family of geese, and singing "Follow the Prophet". *shrug* I guess he thought the babies were following their parents, and it reminded him of the song. Also, the Botanical Garden is right by the airport, and Parker and Preston got so excited every time they heard a plane get ready to take off. On a side note, Parker is actually VERY far from the water's edge, so he was never in danger of falling in :)}

The boys had fun smelling all the roses. There were so many different kinds!


We went to the World of Wonders, and surprise, surprise, Parker wanted to rake the "grass". I think he had helped Ben with the yard the night before :)

Preston had to find a rake, too!


Parker was sneaky and captured some pictures of me and Preston while I was watching them one day!






What else? Oh, well, Matt and I decided last Sunday that we were going to go camping. Not your ordinary camping, mind you. Nope, we decided to load up our bicycles with everything we would need for the night and ride off into the sunset...well, ride over to First Landing State Park, anyways. We were able to get a camping spot back in the woods, and we just had a great time! It is awesome, knowing that we COULD do it. Carry everything we need to survive on our bikes. We had a great time camping, it wasn't TOO cold, in fact, Sunday was perfect. It was set to rain Monday, and we left the campsite early enough to make it back home before it rained. Thank goodness! Although, if we're going to ride across country, I suppose we are going to need to get used to riding in the rain. But I think we'll save that for another day!

Here we are, together. Boy, my glasses are reflective! Oops!


Matt, with our bikes, fixing some dinner. What else? Pasta, of course!


Stirring the pot!


We walked down to the beach and watched the sun set. It isn't very often that you can live in a place and watch the sun rise over the ocean and set over the water, too! Sunsets over the Bay are very nice!


So, that's pretty much what I've been up to. Workouts in the morning, watch the boys or run errands, clean up the house, fix dinner, go for a bike ride, you know, the usual. What a fun summer so far! (We haven't actually gone to the beach yet, but maybe this weekend... )

~Pam