Mel's Box of Chocolates

At our house we don't just carve pumpkins we CARVE pumpkins...What do you think?

This is my fourth year teaching and every year it seems there is something new to learn and apply in my classroom. My second year of teaching I was moved to the elementary school where I am now and was stricken with fear at the thought of being transferred from my safe place where I had student taught and then taught for a year to go to a school where I knew nobody. In order to get my foot in, at the end of the year before I moved I went over for the day to just say hi to the principal (whom I had never met). The principal met with me for about 5 minutes and then put me with a teacher and told her to show me around. This teacher is now one of my closest friends, Lyndie ! Lyndie has been a teacher for 7 years and is awesome at what she does. She has a way with kids and really goes out of her way to make learning fun. I have stolen many of her fabulous ideas over the past three years and am very proud of it. She is such an inspiration to me!! I am always telling her how when I grow up I...

It's another weigh in day and another half pound gone! I know I am always the one telling others that they should celebrate the loss no matter what, but I have to admit that I am getting a bit tired of only losing a half pound at a time. I only have 14 pounds to go until I reach my goal, but at a half pound a week that is going to take me 28 weeks or roughly 7 more months! I knew that the closer I got to reaching my goal the harder it would probably become to lose the pounds, but I'm starting to frustrate myself. My other problem is that I am somewhat content with where I am weight wise and clothing size wise so I find myself slipping on counting my points. While in the back of my mind I am still counting and keeping track I have not consistently recorded them in my Points Tracker. So I have decided that in order for me to get these last pounds off, I must step it up so I can get them off at a quicker rate than 7 months! So what am I gonna do, you ask? I'm going track ever...

Last Sunday, after church, we headed to Mr. Pepper's Pumpkin Patch for some fall fun. Of course we were sweating the whole time since it was 80-some degrees...not cool (no pun intended!) I am so ready for fall. We kept putting off going hoping for some cool weather, but since it didn't seem like it would be here before Halloween, we decided we were just going to have to get it done. Dylan and Zoe took turns being the leader as we made our way through the corn maze. You can't go picking pumpkins without catching a hayride! Of course, finding just the right pumpkin was our mission. I think we completed the mission with flying colors! There is just nothing better than spending a day with the family making new memories!

Zoe's 3rd birthday was on the 11th and I just realized that I never posted any pictures...bad mommy that I am. She was lucky on her actual birthDAY because she got to spend the entire day with her Grampy and Gramma. They spent the day having fun, eating at McDonald's, and baking her birthday cake. Gramma was nice enough to do birthday dinner too so we had a juicy steak (which is exactly the words that Zoe used when she was asked what she wanted for her dinner), brocolli, green beans, mac n cheese, and rolls. Yumm!! The cake was so cute in the heart shape with strawberry pink icing and topped with a strawberry. Of course every birthday comes with presents and she was tickled pink with her Barbie ballerina and pink Barbie mustang. She also got a pretty white leotard for ballet from Grampy and Gramma and mommy gave her a Barbie book with music player so we had our own ballet performance after dinner. I think the winning present was from daddy...Zoe got her very own digital camera....

The night before Zoe's birthday we went to Toys R Us to get some things for the party on Sunday and Zoe thought she hit the jackpot. An employee there asked if we were signed up for the birthday club and when Zoe told them her b-day was the next day, well they had a few surprises for her. They gave her this paper crown that you would have thought was the Queen of England's crown the way she beamed when they put it on her head. Then she also got a balloon, and well do you know any 3 year old who isn't thrilled with a balloon. She also got some stickers and whistle. Here is a pix of her in all her glory on the way home... And the birthday celebration begins...

Today is weigh in at Tales from the Scales , so how did I do this week?? I MADE MY 40 POUND GOAL!! I lost 1 lb this week taking my total weight loss to 40 pounds since January. I am so proud of myself for sticking with it and aboslutely love seeing the results of my hard work. Everyday it seems somebody is commenting on how great I look which is a huge motivator and of course buying smaller sizes in clothing goes a long way for motivation too. When signing up for Weight Watchers , I orginially set 125 as my goal weight which would mean I have 20 more pounds to go. Now that I am comfortably wearing 8 and some 6's I am thinking maybe my goal weight is too low. I want to at least make 130 though and keep a 5 pound flex range so I guess I'll just see what happens as I lose a few more pounds. What do you all think? I am about 5'3"...what would you think is a healthy weight range? So although I am celebrating I realize I still have many pounds in front of me. I n...

Our weekend was packed full and I am thoroughly exhausted, which is not good on a Monday with a full school week ahead! Last week was hectic enough and it just continued on right through the weekend. Starting with Friday when I headed home from school to work on picking up the house since my parents, two brothers, and sis in law were coming in for the weekend and would be staying at the Tuttle B&B. When Dave got home from work, I was then off to the outlets in search of coordinating clothes for a family picture that we had scheduled on Saturday. I got home around 9:30 to finish picking up a bit more and then crashed on the couch while waiting for my parents to get here. Saturday things just kept rolling! We had soccer, of course, then a trip to Mickey D's, and a run through Giant for dinner and b-day party food. Once we got home we started prepping for a big fondue night we had planned that included crab fondue, with steak and chicken too. Then we had to get nine people showere...

HAPPY 3rd BIRTHDAY ZOE!! Today is Zoe's 3rd birthday! As a kid I remember how the days would drag by taking a day more than forever for your birthday to come around, but I swear my own kids birthdays seem to occur every other month. It is hard to believe that 3 years ago today I was in the hospital waiting impatiently and painfully to see my baby girl. I was curious to see what it was like to have a daughter after being stuck in the male world with my hubby and son for the past 3 years and couldn't wait to even up the numbers. Without too much trouble Zoe made her arrival and I was in love once again. She was perfect, passing her birth test with flying colors, and latching on right away to nurse. Dylan was a very lazy eater so it was nice, or so I thought at the time, that she was so quick to latch on and start munching. Then my darling daughter started showing her true colors...screaming at the top of her lungs for the entire night! She literally nursed about every 30 minutes...

Since I started Weight Watchers people have been asking me what my goal is. I have always told them that it wasn't a number that I wanted, but rather a certain size in clothes. My goal is a size 6, mainly because my closest friends are around that size and I figured I could multiply all my clothes!! Well tonight I had a selfish night beginning with a haircut and brow wax and ending with a bit of shopping. I headed to Ann Taylor first because I really like their work outfits. I grabbed all 8's to try on except for one skirt that I picked up in a 6 since they didn't have an 8 and guess what...IT FIT!! True it was a bit snug, at least to me although others may not think the same, but I could breathe, sit down, and squat!! This was such a pick me up because it has been a really rough week in which I have eaten all of my weekly allowance points by Wednesday and have consumed every last one, and a few more, of my daily points too. So after being able to fit into 8's comfortab...

Crazy Hip Blog Mama's are looking for pictures of clouds and sky. Dave took this picture in Michigan as we were driving to my grandparents house during our visit in August. We were stuck in construction, but there were such cool clouds that our family kept busy by looking for objects in the puffy clouds. It made me think of a background picture on a computer!

..and no she is NOT me!! I just found out over the weekend that my brother and his wife are expecting. Yes, this is the brother that just got married in August. They both really wanted kids and had joked about having a honeymoon baby and I guess God provided. Lizann is going to be a great mom and Dan...well...Lizann is going to be a great mom. Honestly, my kids love their Uncle Dan and he will be a great dad!! I am so happy that they have been blessed to be parents. I cannot wait to be an aunt and finally have a little baby that I can love on and then send back home. So fun!! Congrats you two!!

Today is week two weigh in for the new challenge at Tales from the Scales and thank goodness I use Saturday as my weigh in day considering yesterday was a 36 point day!! Between that wonderful time of the month and having one of my killer migraines I managed to eat a snickers bar, an Arby's regular roast beef sandwich, a small order of onion petals, a bag of mini chocolate chip cookies, and of course breakfast and lunch. Now I have 12 weekly allowance points left for the week. Thank goodness I have until this Saturday to work it all off. As of this past Saturday though I was down 1 1/2 pounds! I had a pretty good week with my points although I did use all of my weekly allowance points. I am a bit disappointed in myself for not exercising more though. It was a really long week with lots of after school meetings and activities so I was just too tired to get my butt on the treadmill. Over the weekend I did walk though and that felt great. It seems like every week I have more exerci...

Over the weekend my dad turned the big 5-0...I know he is really young, huh? I always had (and I guess still have) the young parents compared to all my friends. On Sunday Dave, the kids, and I headed over to Baltimore to spend the day with my dad and take him down to the Inner Harbor to enjoy some sushi. My brother, Dan, and his wife, plus my little brother, Andrew joined us. Here are some pix of the day... The Inner Harbor is a great place to just walk around and people watch. There is also a big water display with many waterfalls and pools that you can walk through which the kids loved. We went to Edo for some fresh sushi that we delicious (and I must say very low in points!!) Afterwards we picked up some cheesecake from the Cheesecake Factory (I must say NOT so low in points) and some ice cream from good ol ' Ben and Jerry's . We all sat on the curb by the harbor enjoying the view. Uncle Dan couldn't just sit on the curb, but had to dangle his feet in the harbor....