Date Weekend

What a fantastic weekend! Friday afternoon/evening we spent some quality time hanging out at the hotel, swimming, hot-tubbing, dining out. Hit DSW and Dick's. We found out the the cost of in-room movies has gone up....$10.99.

On Saturday we shopped. Since shopping with 3 kids is next to impossible, we took advantage. We had a bunch of gift cards from Christmas and birthdays so we had the funds available to get school shopping done. I needed some jeans (woohoo!) and so did Jeff. We hit Macy's, Kohls, and Target in the morning. Off to Albertville for the afternoon. We did some damage in Ann Taylor, Puma, Carters and Oshkosh. Almost walked away with some clothes from Calvin Klein, but we needed to pace ourselves financially (aka didn't have a gift card from there). I don't think I've ever spent an entire day shopping. I didn't realize how exhausting it is! We were sore and tired. We couldn't think anymore. Making a good decision on what the kids might or might not wear was next to impossible after a while.

Thank you to Hilton Garden Inn, Maple Grove, for a nice stay. The rooms are clean, the pool area is nice, the exercise room was great, and breakfast! Can you say "made to order"? Of course I couldn't partake in that, but the fruit was excellent! Great location for anyone wanting to do lots of shopping. Arbor Lakes shops are close as well as a few malls and Albertville. Plenty of dining options.

The kids were happy to see us on Sunday. Ty went through a myriad of emotions on the ride home from Grandma and Grandpa Hemingson. Larson and Ali were relieved to see mom and dad came back. :-) Larson went through his inventory of school clothes, and we only have one item to take back. Success!! Now to talk Ali into wearing clothes other than the 4 dresses she owns. Girls! She's been banned from buy clothes until she wears the ones she has in her closet.

Back to reality today. Swimming lessons and a really nice lunch with a good friend (minus kids). I pretty nervous to weigh myself. I think I'll hold off until tomorrow morning. It might be ugly, but it might not. I'll keep you posted. Next week we will be off to the lake for our annual family vacation. I'm so excited to see sister and spend some quality time with the family. Hopefully we'll get a run in, and some water skiing should be good for core strength training. A hike up Inspiration Point will be good cardio. Three more weigh-ins for Biggest Looser. It would be fun to be down 10 more pounds. Keep your fingers crossed for me.

Exercise and vacations

On such a hot day, the kids are doing as well as can be expected. The little guy is sleeping and the big kids are playing Chutes and Ladders. We're taking them to the pool later today. It's way to hot for me to take Ty to the pool this afternoon. In reality, I'd like to participate in the kettlebells class at the gym, but some family time is needed too. Jeff gave me a kettlebell for my birthday, so I could exercise at home later this evening.

Jeff and I ran a 5K relay for the first time on Saturday. Ya, it didn't go so great, but we did it. I'm not a fast runner. The experience leads me to question again if I even want to run. I've never really liked it, do I want to pursue it?

I've lost a little over 15 pounds since starting Biggest Looser (20 since starting my weightloss journey). I'm super excited about that! Instead of running distance, I've started running intervals. This seems to work out better for me, and I don't spend as much time on the treadmill. I spend 30 minutes running intervals and then 15 minutes doing something else like the bike or elliptical. Then of course a quick round on the weights. Tracking my food on Weight Watchers has been very beneficial. WW has worked better for me than counting calories.

Looking forward to seeing Jessica and Dave on our family vacation in August. I'm very excited that they agreed to rent a cabin with us. The kids are SO looking forward to seeing auntie.

We scheduled Jeff's birthday trip! I'm not going to tell you how old, but it's a big one...therefore an entire trip dedicated to the big day. We'll be staying at Mountian Villas in Duluth close to Spirit Mountain. We're going at the end of October, so we recognize that the weather will be hit-n-miss. In any weather event, we'll have a blast!

Lots of fun things to think about.