Additional Info

The MyPyramid.gov website has some great insights to helping us get healthier. At this link you can put in your information and it will give you specific pyramid for your needs. If you're not at a healthy weight it will give you suggestions for progressively getting to a healthy weight. It also has some great tips for adding these good things into our diets. So if you're concerned about getting all your fruit and veggie servings in, check out the tips on your pyramid. It's pretty cool, they even have a link for those of us who are pregnant or breastfeeding. And if you'd like to get the kiddos involved they have a pyramid for them too.

Dave was asking me how much of something is considered a serving of fruit. Inside the Pyramid lists several different common fruit and how much is considered a serving. There is a chart for each pyramid option as well. I didn't realize that beans were considered vegetables, but according to the vegetable link from the same page linked above, they can be protein or vegetable. That's awesome, I use beans in a lot of my cooking!

Dave also asked me to define "treat" for purposes of the challenge. I don't want to do that, I think that it needs to be a personal decision for each person. The basic idea is to exclude high sugar/fat/calorie foods. Some ideas you might try to exclude: candy, cake, cookies, soda... you know treats. :) Whatever you deem as OK for you will go since you'll be awarding your points each day. Just keep in mind we're trying to get healthy. :)

So, I was thinking about 30 minutes of exercise and sometimes its really hard to get it all in one shot. If you get 30 minutes in increments (three 10 minutes workouts, for example) you can award yourself 1 point rather than 2.

I will post weekly points on the blog as well as total points for everyone involved. At the end of the challenge the person with the most points wins.

OK, any other questions or concerns. Now is the time to figure it all out.

Healthy Family Challenge Info

Hello all you healthy challengers!

I am so excited that we are going to do this! I decided that this week will be a practice week to get us all used to keeping track of our points and making these healthy choices... or like Ethan said "you have a week to get rid of your treats!" So the official tally will begin starting next Monday. I'd like to do the prize money thing for incentive, let me know if you want to or not. If we're going to do it, I'd like to know who all will be contributing and how much the prize money will be by next week. So get back to me asap.

We will run the challenge through the end of February, I think it is 12 weeks exactly. This way its not such a far off goal that there is no end in sight, but its long enough that we can (hopefully!) see some benefits.

The daily points will be awarded for the following:

• 2 points for 30 minutes exercise
• 1 point for strength or flexibility training (at least 10 minutes)
• 1 point for 7-8 hours of sleep
• 1 point for 5 fruits and vegetables
• 1 point for at least 48 oz. water
• 1 point for no food after 8:00 pm
• 1 point for no treats
• 1 point for personal prayer
• 1 point for reading the Book of Mormon

As you can see, a total of 10 points is possible for each day. Remember Sundays are free days! No points will be awarded for Sundays. That means a weekly total of 60 possible points. As you can also see, we are totally going to be on the honor system. Adrienne suggested she might create a spreadsheet to keep tally of her points on, if you're interested in her system ask her for a copy, I'm sure she'd love to help. That's what this is all about, encouraging each other and doing it together!

Points will be reported to me each Sunday. I will try to send an email out each Saturday night or Sunday morning to remind you to get me your points. I will post the points on the family blog so we can all keep track of our progress. Feel free to post on the blog how you've been feeling, what things you're finding have a big impact on you, what you're struggling with, etc. That way we can use it as a support system of sorts. I will post on the blog each Sunday night... that means I really need your weekly points that day. A point will be deducted from your weekly score each day after Sunday that I don't have your points (I'm so mean, I know!).

So far, I have the participants as:

1. Mom
2. Dennis
3. Heather
4. Richy
5. Kari
6. Adrienne
7. Kim
8. Ethan

Dad doesn't want to participate. I haven't heard anything from Sean or Dave. There is still time for you two to join us! Just let me know one way or the other, please.

OK, if anyone has any questions or concerns about anything, let's get them sorted out before next week when the official tally starts. Thanks again everyone for doing this with me! I'm so excited!

Last one!

Finally, hats of to Coach Kreis. What a stud! He so much awesomer than Mr. Smuggy-pants. What an amazing job he has done for RSL. He's so little in real life! He's cute too!

Oh my gosh it's WILL JOHNSON!!! AHHHHHH!

So, you'll want to scroll down for the the first part of the story. Obviously, blogging is not a strong point. So after I got a quick pic of Russell and the cup, I continued on my way out past the baggage claim, when Oh my gosh! there's Andy Williams! I just happened to have a blue sharpie in my purse (seriously, I had been carrying it around for no reason in my purse and was going to take it out the other day, but I had the thought "you never know when you'll need a sharpie - boy, was I right!). So, Ethan and Spencer got their hats signed by Andy.
I'm on my way out again, moving along, I just happen to look to my left and standing RIGHT BY ME is.....WILLL JOOOHHHNSOOON! Now, as you all know, picking a favorite RSL player for me would be like choosing among my own children- impossible! But, IF I had a favorite, it would be Will......I LOVE YOU WILL!!!! Isn't he so CUTE! (He's smiling at me). The other pic is kinda blury cause I couldn't get the dang camera to work fast enough.
Wingert is down at the bottom there, he rocks!

RSL Homecoming Part 1

Some may consider me a bad mom for this (nuts to them!!), but I pulled my kids from school so we could go so we could go to the SLC airport and welcome home our favorite team. RSL ROCKS!!!! There were tons of people there (which was awesome), but we couldn't see a thing (not awesome). After much chanting, cheering and screaming (my throat still hurts), I decided it was time to go. Also, Skye and Gavin aren't quite fans yet, and they very much were not in the spirit of things :P













So, as we started walking out, I turned to my left and...Holy cow! There's Robbie Russell
with the MLS cup. Neato!

Ok, there is more but the pictures are gone. More to come as soon as I figure out how to blog...again!!! Blast.

A Holiday Proposal

So, I've been thinking. I really like to eat. I really like to eat junk. I'm really tired and don't feel like working out much. These are things I struggle with all the time. I'd really like to overcome my dread for these things, but I'd really like some support from each of you. Maybe we can all sort of cheer each other on?

So here's my proposal: we have a family fitness challenge.

The challenge isn't competing against each other per se. It would be more like each of us pushing ourselves to make better choices for our health. Each day we'd have the opportunity to earn 10 points. Points are awarded for things like exercising for 30 minutes, eating 5 fruits and vegetables, drinking enough water, getting enough sleep, reading the Book of Mormon (don't forget spiritual fitness!). You can lose a point for eating a treat. Sundays are a free day, no points awarded, no points taken away. A friend of mine has been doing this with their family and it has gone really well. They each donated some money to a pool and the person with the most points wins the money.

The nice thing about it is that everyone can do their own kind of exercise. So Kari can get totally ripped with P90X and I can just walk or do water aerobics or something. It doesn't matter if we lose weight (which I obviously won't), its about getting healthier as a family.

I'd like to hear what you guys think. If we all contributed as little as $10 (each person that's participating) the pool would be over $100. That would be a great prize! I know the holidays are upon us and money is tight, but we don't even have to do the money thing. We can just do for bragging rights or some other prize. I think the holidays being upon us is a great reason to do this now to help us make good choices during this time. If we do it we can all decide on what we get points for or we can just go with what my friend's family has done. Whatever.

I propose that if we do this we do it for 3 or 4 months and report weekly. I'll gladly be the go to gal with the points and post on this here blog about everyone's progress. Or someone else can do it if you'd rather. We can even start after Thanksgiving so everyone can have 1 more week of indulgence. :)

Let me know who's in. You can leave a comment or email me your thoughts. Thanks everyone. Love ya!

Playing catch up

Woa. Its been a while since I've posted on this blog. Here's a cute video of Jonas that I think you'll enjoy!