A weekend worthy of a wrist brace

This weekend was so fantastic I have to start wearing my wrist brace again so my tendonitis doesn't make me feel like I'm dying.

I was super spoiled for mother's day, Stephen drawing the whole thing out into a great weekend, just the way he knew I'd love! Friday night he made me the ultimate Atkin's meal - grilled mushroom swiss cheeseburger, asparagus and sweet red pepper things stuffed with proscuitto and more cheese. Uhm, nom! I redressed the spare bathroom, as planned and I think it turned out nice! See (before is last photo):

Saturday morning I woke up and did some HITT running in my new kicks. LOVE these shoes; they're NB 890s in black and fuschia; I scored them on JoesNewBalanceOutlet.com for $40!! After a little exercise I called and made a hair appt at Tresses Salon in Mt. P & then hopped in the shower to rinse off before my hot stone massage I had scheduled at 10 at I'On Health, of which I scored on Groupon for nearly half price! What!What!

Cathy, my massage therapist and the self-proclaimed - and I can confirm such - "Pain Whisperer" - was wonderful! She worked out some serious knots in my upper back/shoulder blade area via some deep tissue massage and then a hot stone treatment. My body was raging with toxins and hormones afterwards, apparently (I know because she said so, not because I was a raving lunatic). Massage by Cathy. Do it. I called Stephen afterwards and we decided to meet up for lunch at Uno Mas, a regular spot for us. He and Josh had been running errands since I left, of which I'll mention in a moment :) Lunch was great, as usual - simple, atkins diet friendly chicken fajitas (no shells, duh!) Stephen and Josh had their regular - serrano shrimp enchiladas and chicken fingers, respectively...

After lunch we headed to Lowe's - because I had that lovely dresser project to work on and Stephen wanted to get materials for his pull-up bar he's been talking about. I needed to try another shade of blue to match my dresser daydreams; turns out I was looking more for a midnight blue, not navy. I worked on the dresser while Stephen added the new toy to the yard fort. 

My hair appointment at Tresses was with Mara at 3. I'd been to this salon before, a few years before as the photographer for a fashion/hair type fun show they put on for their clients; I really liked the staff but have had a regular hair therapist for many years and didn't need their services. Unfortunately, but fortunately, an oversight by my regular "therapist" (who also happens to be the BFF) I had to go somewhere new/different and Tresses was the first place I thought of, especially since I was closer to them than usual (with my being in Mt. P instead of N. Chas.).

I was nervous. I've never had anyone take care of my hair the way Sarah does. Ever. But Mara. Well, Mara might be seeing me again; she was a great stand-in for my usual and I'm over the moon happy with my cut!! And was even more satisfied with my experience when, upon trying to check-out, the sweetheart at the front informed me that my services had been "taken care of" by my boyfriend. I argued with her, yes I did. "How? When? Whaaa? Mine? Are you sure?" And then she showed me a card and said "is this his phone number?" it was, and it was also written in his handwriting.

By golly.

What a freakin amazing man I have to love me! He and Josh stopped by the salon while I was getting de-tensioned and gave me yet another wonderful memory for this mother's day :) :) :)

The dresser and I mingled over paint and an orbital sander for a few hours; it was intense. Josh's grandmother offered to watch Josh for a few so Stephen took me to Wasabi's on Daniel Island for dinner. MMM! Sushiiiii! Stephen found a drink that he will never, ever ask for again - a jalapeno mojito! I licked a bit off the straw and it was some fresh hotness! The drink consisted of jalapeno simple syrup... + typical mojito ingredients, lol "it tastes like burrrning!"

shit, I'm really keeping you with all this blabbing (bragging?). Lucky you, I'm almost done...

The fun didn't stop there - I was awoken Sunday morning with breakfast (at the table, cause who really eats breakfast IN bed? not us.) Josh and Stephen had some fun greeting cards waiting for me alongside a plate of scrambled eggs, turkey sausage and a fresh, hot biscuit and perfectly prepared coffee.


the drawer closest is the winning shade of blue

I worked on the boys' dresser basically the remainder of the day and nearly finished it! I only need to sand one more time (i hope) and then add the varnish, or whatever to protect the paint job from boys.

Josh got to enjoy dinner at Queen Ann's Revenge with his Grandma (Pam) and Nana (Rae) and the other mothers and cousins on that side of his bloodline.

...That's basically it.

Sleepy Jessica Ruined My Title.

When I went to bed last night I had some witty title for this post; Blogger Jessica was all "write it down!" but Sleepy Jessica was all like "no way! that's too awesome to forget. go to sleep instead!" Sleepy me won and for now I remain titleless.

This past weekend in Litchfield (just outside of Myrtle Beach, SC) was dynamite! We beached, pooled, drank, ate like we wouldn't gain that 5lbs that inevitably DID show up on the scale, and enjoyed some quality time with our Anderson family. Also, I learned something about my future; as an official member of the Mommarazzi - it can be summed up in four pictures:





Jack Stephen Russ Josh

 

this is probably as good as it's gonna get.

I'm going to have to learn how to splice pictures together. A big shout out to Stephen however, he managed to maintain the same amused smile for each shot and then humored me with this:

I do adore him :)

I stepped on the scale yesterday morning out of sheer curiosity and with the solid notion that it would NOT ruin my day. It didn't. What it did do, however, is kick this ass back into overdrive and real-life diet mode. A little more than a year ago I went from 203 to 160 in about 6 months by sticking to a no / low carb diet. So no more of this "but i don't understaaaand" as I admit only to myself the crap I ate that day. The new guy at work brought in donuts last Friday; what, like we can control ourselves around here?! No. So, to show him, I took a small bite of four different donuts and threw the remainder of each away. God they were good. I'm wasteful, I know. shut up. I did it for everyone else.

...Anyways, Atkins and I are BFF's again after I doled out booku dollars at Sam's Club for "friendship supplies". As of this a.m. I weigh about 2lbs less than I did yesterday. I was feeling so psyched about it I did some yoga this morning to get the day started. I'm loving the 10minute series for beginners. I usually just do two of the sets but on days I'm feeling extra amazing I do all 5 of them. Yay me.

Only one month out until I haul my crap across the bridge to invade the Land o' Stephen. While I'm not worried anymore about getting my house ready to rent, now we've got to figure out bedroom / furniture situations for the boys and (fingers crossies) the dining room and living room; the last two being of the least importance but I am NOT in love with his dining room table and chairs (glass top, iron base, and some modern patterned parsons chairs). First world problems.


Annd a few (ok, a lot) more pics from our weekend on da beeeeach:

Jack (7) Josh (8) Russ (so-close-to 4)

 

Rainy Weekend

Stephen and I took what would have been a crappy rainy weekend inside and made it less crappy by incorporating porch-side margaritas and going to the pool when it wasn't raining that badly. We only included the boys in one of those activities; don't guess which and show your opinion of me ;) While we took the easy road for Saturday night dinner ("hello, Papa John's - yeah, it's us. again.") we did whip up a fantastic version of last weekend's Thai coconut curry shrimp dish.

The original link: http://www.myrecipes.com/recipe/thai-coconut-curry-shrimp-10000001835298/

The flavor was admirable but the shrimp was giant in comparison to its roommates in the pan. This time we boiled chicken, shredded it, added new veggies - based on a dish Stephen had a few days prior - snow peas, red bell pepper, and asparagus. I also tossed in some mushrooms and we omitted the fish sauce. The shredded chicken was on-point in regards to not dwarfing the other ingredients. Next time we're tossing in pineapple and red pepper flakes.

I managed to sneak in 30 minutes of cycling on Sunday. Nothing strenuous, just 4 miles. I was pretty indifferent about the ride altogether - my ass hurt but I felt better about myself for actually going. Also, I picked up the new issue of Self magazine - new love! - and it mentioned HIIT training, or running or something like that. It's High Interval something Training where basically you sprint for a minute, then walk for a minute. Repeat until you feel like you're about to die. or 8x. or until your shoe rubs the skin off your Achilles tendon. whichever comes first. Mine were the first and 3rd options combined. But I felt great and was a little sad that it was wiser to stop than to continue to punish my lungs (and feet) for merely existing.

Only the boys went to the pool on Sunday, I went grocery shopping for the aforementioned curry dish for dinner. 

Russ in his new shark bike helmet.

Josh