Happy Father's Day

Happy Father's Day to all you wonderful Dad's out there, you are doing an amazing job and while I try to remember to tell you this on a regular basis it's nice to have a day devoted to it too.

Chris, the most amazing husband and father to my children. The three of us are so lucky to have you...you're supportive of our dreams, endlessly patient, not afraid to roll up your sleeves to help with anything (from changing diapers to building blanket forts) and maybe the handiest guy I know. You make me laugh everyday and I know I can count on you 100% in all things. Thank you for going on this parenting journey with me.

And my Dad, pictured here holding a sleeping Ella on her very first Christmas.....the strong, silent type with a sense of honour that runs deeper than the Pacific Ocean, he is definitely the type who you can trust on a handshake, he will always do the right thing. This seriousness is well balanced with a goofy sense of humour, and excellent story telling abilities (a gift he has passed on to my sister Amanda).

I love both these men in my life so much, so here's to you on your special day....Happy Father's Day. :)

Chickens!

I've gone a whole week without a blog post! I can't believe it, but we had a great family getaway and things have been crazy busy since I got home.

 One of the most fun things has been the addition of these little guys...

There are blue laced red wyandottes and they will look like this:

Image found here

Silver Sussex and they will look like this:

Image found here

And one little Araucana cross chick because it was cute and I'm hoping it turns out to be a girl and will lay green eggs for me. 

My chicks came from my good friend Amanda at 

She has so many lovely heritage breeds and is very serious about her birds. You can check out her website here.

Can't believe it's Friday already, what are your plans for the weekend?

Thursday randoms from around the net....

Another gorgeous day here and I am loving the sunshine and heat so much that I think I might need to move where it's hot like this all year round.....

But since that's not happening anytime soon I'm just going to enjoy the summer here. Really looking forward to getting away to the beach this weekend. The weather is supposed to stay warm and sunny so it should be just what the doctor ordered.

Now for some randoms...

Have you seen this guy's slick way to get out of an awkward wave? He's got some moves...lol

Smooth recovery

Here's a picture of MGM filming their opening credits in 1928. From my online research this lion's name was Jackie and he was the first one to roar, the previous lion (Slats) just looked around.

Wondering how best to put a cheese plate together?

(courtesy of Martha Stewart)

My current favourite song....the perfect summer tune....

Float by Pacific Air

Speaking of summer, dry shampoo is my best friend in the summer and I just started using this one from  Bastiste and I'm loving it. Works wonderfully for soaking up the oil and giving your hair great texture and has a nice light coconut scent. I found mine at Shoppers Drug Mart.

Have you seen this slideshow of celebrity lookalikes? Some of them are pretty close:

Celebrity Lookalikes

This is such a good (and easy!) idea:

(found it on Pinterest but the link was broken so can't credit)

And one more song 'cause you know I loves me a good tune:

Gotye - Hearts a Mess

Apparently it's an old song but I didn't hear it until I picked up The Great Gatsby soundtrack, which by the way is AWESOME and you should buy it right away. 

Have a great Thursday!

Wardrobe Wednesday and the winner of the GIVEAWAY!

This week started out miserable and raining and now the last couple of days have been glorious and sunny...and really warm, so warm in fact I got a sunburn yesterday!

The Plan diet has been going really well now that I figured out the whole butternut squash thing. I feel amazing, no cravings and the weight continues to fall off. I'm now down 10.8lbs in 12 days, that's almost a pound a day and I think it would be if it hadn't been for the squash shenanigans. We are getting away this weekend as a family which we never do so there will be some indulging but that's part of life and we will be back at it once we are home.

I have been searching around trying to find a second hand and reasonably priced Bowflex for Chris and I to use and finally had success. We picked up the Bowflex Sport last night and I can't wait to show off my big guns this summer. ;)

On to the clothes...

Scarf: Old Navy

Denim Jacket: Old Navy (on sale right now)

Shirt: DKNY

Jeans: Old Navy skinnies in the Flirt style

Shoes: Liz Claiborne

Top: Old Navy

Tank: Bootlegger

Jeans: Warehouse One

Shoes: Converse

Chambray shirt: Winners

Jeans: Old Navy rockstar style

Shoes: G21 from Wal Mart, love these leopard print heels and they were on clearance for $15!

Bracelet: Hello Berry

Top: Winners

Shorts: DJ Jeans

Flip Flops: Old Navy

Necklace: cameo was a gift and the feather is from The Naked Squirrel

And speaking of The Naked Squirrel......

This weeks giveaway winner is:

Amber Desilets!

Congratulations Amber! Please message me with your mailing address and I'll get the necklace and earrings out to you asap!

For those of you who want your own anchor necklace (or one of many other beautiful pieces), today is your last chance to get a huge 25% off your order using the code Discount25 so be quick!

Don't forget to stop by The Naked Squirrel Facebook page and "like" it to keep up to date on new pieces and sales!

Have a great Wednesday!!

Motivation Monday

Wow, yesterday was a tough one...seriously fighting the butternut squash I think. I know, I heard it...that sounds so ridiculous. That butternut squash is so tough..grrr..haha. Apparently for me it is though. I felt so impatient and angry yesterday, today it's like a cloud has lifted. When I feel grumpy like that it is so hard to stay the course...I just want to say forget it, it's not working and eat what I want. It takes all my strength of will not to give in.

 When my emotions are normalized again it's much easier. I was down .6 of a pound at this mornings weigh in putting me at 8.2lbs in 10 days, not too shabby considering the last few days have been all over the place. Chris is doing fantastic too, he's down 11.2 in the same span of time.

I have been loving this song lately and wanted to share it with you, it motivates me and makes me feel good. Hope you enjoy!

Gorgeous and sunny here today and I'm heading out the door to walk with my friend...the rain has put a real "damper" on our walking..haha.

What do you think of The Plan diet? Have you or are you going to start it?

Sunday deals and steals and another Plan update

The saga continues. If you read yesterday's post you know I've been having some troubles and I'm trying to deduce just what I ate that hasn't been agreeing with me. The only other thing I ate on the steak day that was new was roasted butternut squash, which I ate again the following day as leftovers on my lunch salad.  It was on last nights menus too and look what cutting it up did to my hands (you can click on the pictures for a close up view):

You can see it here on the tip of every finger/thumb and at the base of my pointer finger (this is the hand that was touching the squash, not the knife hand):

I didn't cut the squash up the last time we had it, Chris was the one to do it. I didn't even realize anything was going on with my hand until I had put the squash in the oven and it felt like my thumb was starting to go numb. I had already washed my hands twice too!

Yes, I did eat it for dinner, perhaps an unwise choice but I really wanted to know if it was going to affect my digestion. Today I was only down .2 of a pound so yes, it did. Other than the squash yesterday nothing new was introduced (in fact the squash wasn't new either but it was new on the day we had steak for the first time), so by the power of elimination that should be the culprit right? Or maybe it was both the steak and the squash? At any rate, I'm not having the leftovers for lunch today.

 Moving on to shopping! :)

I love this beach bag from Forever 21 and it's only $15.80. It's canvas which is hardly and easy clean and the colours are so pretty and summery.

Geo Beach Bag

This shirt isn't on sale but I love it and the colours so much I'm including it anyway. From Anthropologie it's $58.

Split Image Top

This graphic tee from Old Navy is so soft (love the vintage finish) and pretty and on sale for $15.

The Endless Summer Tee

I own this denim jacket from Old Navy and quite like it. Now it's on sale (of course) for $30.

 Denim Jacket

This pretty top from Anthropologie is on sale for half the original price at $59.95

Jukka Silk Blouse

Don't forget about the amazing giveaway going on right now on this blog for this necklace (more info here). Or you can buy this necklace (and so many others that I am loving....the feather necklace is my personal favourite) for an amazing 25% off by going to The Naked Squirrel and entering the code Discount25 at checkout. This special sale is only for Random Thoughts readers and is only on for one week (ends June 5th) so don't wait!

It is gloriously sunny here today (finally) and I hope it is where you are too, enjoy the rest of your weekend!

A speed bump....

So I hit a little speed bump with The Plan diet and in the interest of being completely honest I'm sharing it with you here. If you remember in my last post I said that I thought I was having a reaction to rye (and then thought maybe it was the wine), but now I don't think that's what it was, I actually think it was steak which I'm more sad about than the rye. The reaction to it however makes it not worth eating for me. Here's how it went:
I was quite irritable with the kids the evening of eating it, they were kind of driving me crazy and seemed very loud. I mean, who am I kidding, kids are usually pretty loud but it differs on how I feel about it, it rolls off my back much better on the days that I have more patience.
 The next day I was up .8 of a pound, which is exactly what the book says will happen if you have an inflammatory response to a food, and as the day progressed I started to feel really blue. I thought maybe I was feeling blah because of all the rain we've been having and I have struggled with feeling this way in the past. By yesterday I was full on sad, barely keeping it together..I just wanted to spend all day in bed reading books with Marshall, and really struggled with keeping the tears from falling. It was rough (being sad like that is absolutely debilitating) and I couldn't wait for the day to end (I had lost the .8 of a pound from the previous day when I weighed in that morning).
 This morning I woke up feeling much better and was down .4 of a pound, which isn't a lot but I'm still coming down off a bad inflammatory reaction. The book says it can take up to 72 hours to go away and that's where I am today. If I had realized that I was reacting so badly than I wouldn't have tested another food yesterday (bread), but thankfully it doesn't seem to have affected me. Normally you don't test another food for a couple of days after a reaction.
 I am very curious to see what my weigh in will be tomorrow morning now that I'm back on track. Another thing I found quite interesting was that while I was feeling gloomy and reacting like that I really had to fight the urge not to eat junk food, whereas I haven't had any cravings for anything up until now.
Now, I know how important food is and that it can really affect you, just look at the the sugar addictions people fight (I'm one of them!), but there is nothing like keeping a journal and watching it play out in front of you like that. What a wake up call. This diet is amazing and I think everyone should try it, it will change your life.

I found a great video interview with Lyn-Genet Recitas who is the author of the The Plan book and it explains how and why The Plan works so well, check it out here. People with thyroid, depression, and fertility issues are seeing amazing progress (they had six woman get pregnant in one month, all of whom had been trying to get pregnant for years), arthritis and eczema issues are clearing up...the list goes on and on. What a difference it makes when you feed your body correctly.

Hope you're having a great weekend!