31 things challenge: Meal Planning

I find when I make my meals ahead of time, i'm much more mindful of what I eat. I make an effort to use food that we have in the house. This is how it always happens...I resist cooking or preparing food. I look in the freezer to see if I have any Amy's burritos hanging around.


Then when I find out that I've used my backup meals, I go to the pantry...what can I make. So this week, I'll be using the following:

JBSW Spring to Summer Salad:
1 tbps Trader Joe's Hummus

all of this is 5 servings:
cooked Trader Joe's Israeli Couscous
1 Roma tomato
1/2 cup chopped onion
1 tbsp green onion
garlic salt
lemon juice
salad greens
SIDE of: baked tofu (LOVE baking tofu, baking the tofu gives the tofu the consistency of it being fried, but it's much healthier.)

I imagine that I'll be using this combination this week. YUM! I just put the salad ingredients in a tupperware, bring it to work and bring it out in servings for lunch. It's light and easy. You could easily substitute another grain for the couscous...and use a different protein instead of the tofu.

31 day challenge: I chopped my hair off

I've written about my hair and desire to go natural. I could go into all of the reasons that I wanted to go natural...but I've written about it a lot. I'll give you a brief summary/overview. I would refer to my hair as not as good as Kenley's. I loved getting relaxers. And then there was a point where I realized that when we have children, I want them to be comfortable in their own skin and even their hair. I wanted to be able to work with natural hair and be comfortable with my own. I went through figuring out what it meant for me to continue getting relaxers...for me, I was done putting the chemicals in my hair. I'm trying to work on eating whole/clean food...food that is somewhat connected to its natural form...I don't get it right every day or even every meal. But I want to be good to this body and my hair and love it in its natural state.

I realized that cutting my hair was a very visible way of saying that I choose not to use chemicals in my hair...well, not some of the bad chemicals that straighten hair. My goal now is to welcome my new hair. I love love love it. It has this cute little curl. I want to learn how to really do my hair and be good to it. And to be good to my body. The way that I want to love my hair, I want to love my body. It's what I have right now and every step of the way is a beautiful part of my journey.

I'm enjoying the 31 day challenge. I realized that my body loves getting 7 hours of sleep. I hit a point where I was trying to get less than 7 hours of sleep and when I would do that, I would hit snooze. :) Now doesn't that make you laugh. So I'm going to go to bed earlier, probably incorporate less tv into my life, and do lots of other things. I'm tracking my food and working on my pushups...those are hard!

My hair!!

Tomorrow is my hair day...I'm doing the BC aka the big chop. I thought I could do a long transition, but I realized that it's been three months since I'd had a relaxer and i'm not putting the time into my hair styling right now...and I want to take care of my hair.

I have had really great friends who have asked how I'm feeling...they want pictures, etc. This morning I was driving to work and thought that today is the last day that I'll have my hair how it is....for who knows how long. Tomorrow at this time i'll be counting down the hours until I get my hair cut...and when I get it, imma rock it cause it's gonna be fierce. :)

gym therapy

I had a day that was full of sorts. I feel like I experienced a lot of emotions in one day and I'm pretty tired. One of my dear friends texted me this morning and wrote that I was an inspiration. It was really surprising and humbling. Then later, my friend expanded and told me that when they met with their life coach, they had homework...write down people in your life who you admire and my name was one of 'em.

In the midst of that I was sorting through a lot of other peripheral things in life. And I was tired. I told Crocker that I wanted to go home and skip the gym. She encouraged me to go to the gym. I almost didn't make the turn...but I'm glad I did. I had a lot of fun working out with friends and screaming about Body Attack. Now, I need to go to bed soon...that whole 7 hours of sleep is hard...and not hitting snooze. This morning I thought I had the not hitting snooze thing...I ended up turning my alarms off and kept sleeping, but fortunately Dolly won't let me sleep in that much. :)

home alone

i've been humming that one song from home alone...

donnne don donnnne don dooooon donn.

i've been home alone with thursday. liz was my roommate last night....and now i'm chilling from the weekend...and tired and realized that dang. i miss kenley. he needs to get back.

thank you mother earth

So today when I was gardening I was struck by the fact that I was massaging the ground. I was working through the soil and incorporating soil and dirt...and digging and planting. It was the weirdest feeling to work with the earth...I felt really connected to the earth in my own journey. We have to put work into our lives, we have to kill weeds, we have to plant, we have to water, we have to care for it...I also understood my friends who love love their gardens, they plan their vacations around the garden. I wanted to spend all of my time with my little plants and see how much they will have grown...

I feel like I'm able to catch the slightest glimpse of how God must adore creation. There's no way to completely understand it of course...but I was just so happy outside and really wanted to be happy with the journey that I'm on...our journey is ongoing and we have to be fully present....what have you done today to be fully present to yourself?

PS I'm getting my haircut on Thursday :)

Health lessons from my dog...

Meet our dog, Dolly. She's between 4-9 years old. Has a heart of gold and is as sweet as can be. We've had her about 7 months!

Since K is out of town and he's the normal dog walker, I've taken on the responsibilities of walking our sweet girl. Sometimes I notice that she is so distracted by every noise and every smell. I've heard that dogs have a sense of smell that is 1000 x stronger than humans. I don't know where I heard that and if it's true. I do know that they do have a stronger sense of smell than I do. On one of our recent walks I noticed that she would literally stop and smell everything possible. She has this beautiful sense of wonder that has me enamored with her. I think we have a lot to learn from most of creation, but for this post...i'll focus on Dolly.

Things that she does that I find are good habits:
- She drinks a lot of water
- She tries to be patient when she eats and she sometimes eats slowly
- She is happy when she's outside and exercising
- She receives what the day has for her
- She explores her surroundings
- She embraces her curiosity
- She loves
- She gets a lot of sleep

I could've just looked at her habits and picked 31 things. :)