4-F Upgrade 2.0

The 4-F's 

Family, Finances, Fitness and Food 

Every year life changes...with change comes a new outlook and goals.  This year the goals include the 4 F's (fitness, food, finances and family).  Why choose these?  It's time to get a grip!  I've been giving advice on all these areas but haven't put my "money where my mouth is" up to this point.  So now it's time to put it all out there...well at least in writing at this point.  

The joys of living overseas is that the advice that is given (when looking at US websites) are for those that live in the US and are able to obtain those resources.  Well, not all of us are able to do that for one reason or another.  My case is that I live in the Middle East and no I'm not talking about the Middle of the East Coast in the US, I mean outside of Abu Dhabi/Dubai in the United Arab Emirates.  This makes my lifestyle a little different but still in need of an upgrade.  So upgrade it shall...once I get off of holiday and back home (the joys of living overseas is that I spend 5-6 weeks on holiday in the US every year so right now I'm enjoying my holiday time).  

But what is the first step?  Each of these areas are HUGE and can and will overwhelm any one person...much less an entire family.  So I'm using the rest of my holiday to break each area down into manageable goals.  Will it be easy?  No.  Will it be fun?  Not necessarily.  Will it be worth it?  Yes, yes it will.  When my daughter goes through life without debt.  When I finish my first marathon and triathlon.  When I am able to completely vacation without credit cards.  When food isn't a constant struggle.  This next year will set it all up so that I can accomplish this and change my future as well as my daughter's. 

So the next few posts will describe how each of these areas will be accomplished but lets look at what the goals are before we figure out how to get there.

1.   Family - this year we'll just plan on having 2 meals a week without electronics.  Sounds easy right?  Well there are just two of us so it's a bit harder than it looks.  And of course I'll add to this especially in the area of chores and consistency of expectations and schedules (yep - I may be a teacher but I truly fail at this in my own house.)

2.  Finances - get out of debt and start savings to accomplish my long term goals.  (So much to say here but I'll leave that to another post but please know I firmly believe in this and want my daughter to have a different financial future than what I currently live).

3.  Fitness - to drop my 5k to under 30 minutes, my 10k under 60 minutes and my Half Marathon (13.1 miles) to 2 hours again.  (I was close if not at these goals two years ago but now need a lot of work to get it back.)

4.  Food - get off sugar and on to clean eating.  (This may sound lofty but I firmly believe I can accomplish this but will need support throughout this - and yes that's part of the plan.)

That's it - that's the whole goals.  My goal is to put together an action plan for all of these and document it.  It CAN happen and it WILL happen but there are going to be problems and reality says that'll happen and it's ok.

“The voice inside your head that says you can’t do this is a liar.”

— Unknown

Read more at http://womensrunning.competitor.com/2015/08/nyc-running-mama/16-running-quotes-to-motivate-you-for-your-next-run_44620#gF34jeI67QoDVtgC.99

Growing family...

Since B has been asking for a pet as well as a new baby, I took the plunge.  We are now the owners of 2 cats - Chip and Yogi.  Chip is 2 and from a friend while Yogi is a rescue who was bottle fed from the time he was about 2 weeks, he's now about 4 months.  The transition has been good for both of us - it's nice to have critters again but at the the same time it has been challenging as they are DEFINITELY night animals!  B has become a good cat "mom" and is learning to feed them and change the litter box!  All good things to add to her commission list to help her earn money and get what she really wants.  Plus it helps that Yogi is totally fine with B dragging him around and playing with him while Chip prefers me ;-)  He's much more relaxed and mellow and not really into B chasing him!

 Life is settling in here in the UAE.  School is in full session and we're finally getting into the rhythm of enjoying weekends, hanging with friends and going to school ;-)  As B starts her commission life (A Dave Ramsey process for teaching kids about money).  In the process I have started FPU (Financial Peace University) with a friend.  It's tough and I'm working through it but I'm not really sure how I'm going to do.  It's a scary process - much scarier than learning to eat better or even training for a half marathon.  In this case it is our life that is key.  It's time to step up and take advantage of this wonderful job I have and the ability to provide for my daughter as well as do what we need to do in order to help myself.  As much as I do hope there's a prince charming in my future I need to do what I can to help B and make sure she has all the opportunities available to her!

Taking on food, finances and work all at the same time ;-)

There are some weeks that are better than others...for the first week back to work after the summer holidays.  So far this week I've started work, began buying more organic produce, made meals that were more than pizza and macaroni and cheese and starting going through Dave Ramsey's Total Money MakeOver.  Overall a successful week I would say!

B has become more and more independent and interested in asking questions that are not only thought provoking but scary.  Tonight's questions began with "what is a question" to "what is information".  She has begun to question all aspects of life but sadly enough still worries consistently about all types of issues.  Her biggest worry is death - how to work through that with a 4 year old?  So we have gotten to the point of just not bringing it up at this point.  I will always answer her questions but for being 4 she has questions that are well above her chronological age.

We finished going through the "I Quit Sugar" recipe book today so next week we will begin our process of quitting sugar.  I wish I could say it would be easy but we all know that's a lie ;-)  Yet she is super excited to be involved in the process.  And that's a huge goal this year - in order to help her make good food choices when I'm not around she needs to be involved!

When it comes to money she is not being paid on "commission" - a Dave Ramsey Financial Peace Junior concept.  Another project we did today was to go through and make a commission chart - things she can get paid to do around the house.  If she doesn't do the work she doesn't get paid.  We shall see how it goes!

New Year - New Goals

Today was the first day of the academic year in the UAE.  Teachers reported and many walked into new buildings.  We arrived Wednesday evening and are still adjusting after a summer of fun in the USA.  As I start the new school year I have a variety of goals to reach and am hoping by working through this blog that I'll be able to keep my goals within reach as well as become the parent I wish to be.  So here I am listing my goals for the world to see and hoping someone helps keep me accountable for these ;-)

1.  Finances - I came to the UAE to help my finances and haven't done a great job as of yet.  This year I'll be working through Dave Ramsey's Financial Peace University and B will be starting the Junior version in hopes she will do better with finances when she is older!

2.  Running - I like to run but my consistency hasn't been there over the last year. So I'm planning on running the Abu Dhabi Striders Half Marathon on November 14th but that means I need to get motivated and do the work.  So here's me saying that I need to do it and I will be finishing it feeling good.  Do the work and it should be able to be accomplished.

3.  Nutrition - This summer I was really struggling with keeping the positive nutrition habits we had started and that really got shot to heck this summer.  So we're starting over and this time we're going to carry it through to the best of our abilities.

I firmly believe that small changes are the best way to go.  So each time there is an error then we reset and keep going.  It's time to stop quitting and instead move towards the path that makes us better people overall.

How to be grateful...

Gratitude unlocks the fullness of life. It turns what we have into enough, and more. It turns denial into acceptance, chaos to order, confusion to clarity. It can turn a meal into a feast, a house into a home, a stranger into a friend. - Melody Beattie - Gratitude is something that I'm working on not only with myself but with my daughter.  We have both become a little too used to getting what we want and not being grateful for what we have.  Since winter we have been making an extra focus on thanking God for every day.  And in that aspect we have been working on what we need versus what we want - we're still not very good at it but as always it's a work in progress. As gratitude becomes a greater part of our life so do friends and family.  As the academic year winds to a close, I am grateful for the ability to spend a majority of the day with my daughter and get to see her grow up without hearing about it through daycare or a sitter.  She is an amazing child who I am most grateful for and without her life would be incredibly different! As we both work on our gratitude I find that we spend more time stopping to smell the roses along the way and TRUELY enjoy each aspect of the time we spend together.  The positive affirmations continue to increase as does the ability to stop and do what we need to do and want to do.  We WANT to spend time together - we WANT to pray together - we WANT to learn new things - we WANT to have new experiences - and most importantly - we WANT to do all of these things together. That is the most amazing aspect of it all.

Learning to NOT hate my body...

This is the current theme of my life - I am at the lightest I've been since years before my daughter was born.  Yet I've never been more critical of myself as I am currently.  I love that I have been able to drop 17 pounds since January and have kept it off!

 In addition I am finding that I LOVE working out every day and have not missed a day since starting 21 Day Fix on April 7th.  As of today I have also started LesMills Combat and I'm loving every part of it!  Tonight I was also able to start MyYogaPro - a Kickstarter site that I came across through DoYouYoga.com - TOTALLY amazing!  Plus I've started a more clean eating type of diet for me and my daughter - all things to be proud of right?

 I wish, it seems that I'm more upset and critical of myself then before and I'm not sure why.  It would seem that the more inches I lose, the more weight I lose, the more I critique myself.  It doesn't make sense - I'm enjoying all aspects of working out and have even become a BeachBody Coach - I FIRMLY believe in the program and all aspects of support that they provide.

So new goal - coming up on a long weekend here in Al Ain - is to work on being happy with what I have - that is what we're taught and I'm trying to teach my daughter - to be happy with what we have been given.  I have abused and used my body for the last 30-something years (nope, not telling) I can't expect to undo that damage in the span of a few months.  Instead I need to take time and enjoy the process -

Mr. Magorium was a very very intelligent man and should be recognized as such - Life IS an occasion - our job is to rise to the occasion and enjoy the journey that gets us to that point.  That is what this weight loss/health journey is about.  My goal is to take the long weekend coming up, enjoy my workouts, my daughter and become more comfortable with myself and loving all parts of me again.

Mother's Day Yoga

Ok I'll admit it - I'm a HUGE Bad Yogi Fan ( http://erinmotz.com/ ).  I love her yoga routines and yes I helped on Kickstarter to support MyYogaPro - what can I say I'm a big believer in having the ability to do yoga at my fingertips!  For Mother's Day Erin Motz sent out an e-mail with a special Mother's Day Yoga Class.  I will say I feel better after completing it!  But I always feel better after yoga - it's just one of those things ;-)

Today marks Week 3 Round 2 of the 21 Day Fix and I'll say I am trying to complete double workouts every day - either with running, yoga or one of the Team BeachBody DVDs that I have.  This may be extremely difficult but if one doesn't have goals in life what does one have, right?  The key is sticking to the food on the fix - it's how I lost 5 pounds the first week - but I'm not so good at that so I'm working on the ability to snack on vegetables instead of crackers, chips or any of the stuff I'm used to.  IN fact I have even had salads for dinner the last 2 nights - some may think this isn't a big deal but I'm VERY much a carb based eater and this whole challenge has helped me to look at food differently.  I'm hoping to one day see food as fuel instead of therapy.

Part of the key to this is to continually look at my daughter and see the example I'm setting for her.  At first she was against the "real food" but she is slowly starting to enjoy the variety of food and want to see what else she "likes".  She's tried snap peas, snow peas and asks for cauliflower ;-)  All things that makes this Mom happy.  We're not perfect but life is a journey and our journey is still going strong!