Dream On!

"Dream On" is the color of the nail polish I have on right now.  The brand is "Sinful Colors." It's hard to capture the awesomeness on camera, but it's a really bright magenta pink/purple.  One of my students got it for me for Xmas, since they know I love brightly colored nail polish. :)

It inspires me to be more creative and fun!

Ha! Showed You!

To all those nay-sayers out there who have made fun of me for wearing a pedometer to track my steps on a daily basis...

I just had $125 deposited into my bank account for getting up to the next level for Virgin Health Miles.

HA!  I just got PAID for walking! Booooooyaahh! (do people say that anymore? If not, I just brought it back!)

I have a pretty little necklace over at Tiffany's that I've had my eye on, and I'm pretty sure that my walking money will be what pays for it!

Ooooohhhhh yeaaaaahhh

New Favs



Urban Decy All Nighter

Some of my new favorite products that I have been using all the time: 

















This spray is awesome!  I can spray it on after my makeup is on, and it helps make it last longer throughout the day!  I usually get the smaller bottle, which is $11 and it lasts for a while.



Urban Decay Eye Shadow Primer



















I have been using this primer for a year or two now.  I tried the too faced primer but didn't like it as much.  This one honestly makes it so my eye shadow doesn't crease AT ALL all day long.  The only thing I can't figure out yet, is how to prevent my eye liner from creasing, but that's another story.



Bare Escentuals Maximum Coverage Concealer Brush

 

















I used to just put concealer on with my fingers, but after switching to a brush, I'll never go back! It's SO much better, and there's just better coverage this way.  It's funny, when it comes to Bare Escentuals, I actually like their tools better than their actual makeup.

Skin-Renew Anti-Dark Circle Eye Roller

























I love this eye-roller! Concealer and brightener all in one!  I love that it feels a bit cold, because it wakes my eyes up.  And it's not greasy at all!  It actually feels really good when you put it on.  The roller ball is cool too because it helps smooth it over.

Do you have any new favs you want to share?

Workout Crazy

So I worked out on Thursday, twice on Friday, Saturday, Sunday, and then twice today.  So technically, I've worked out seven times in a row! Yikes! I know it's best to have a day of rest, but it's hard to stop once I'm on a roll!

AND I'm in some more step challenges with my co-workers, so that's extra motivation!  I feel like I just have this non-stop burst of energy and motivation and I should use it while I have it!

Tomorrow I'm going to a Step and Sculpt class with a co-worker and then I might go back to the gym with Dan later on again.  That's how I went twice tonight...I went to a half and half class where you do half cardio/dance and then half muscle conditioning with weights and the yoga ball.  It was awesome, but I didn't feel as exhausted/sweaty as I wanted to.  I came home, had dinner with Dan, and then I went to the gym again with him and just ran/walked on the treadmill for a while.

So the suggested amount of steps a regular person should take is about 10,000 steps a day (typically with "normal" size steps, 2,000 steps = 1 mile so that would mean walking about 5 miles a day is good).  Well, I have been averaging way more than that.  When my school day is over, I usually already have about 10,000 steps.  Then I have my workout, and of course today with 2 workouts I got a TON of steps.

So how many did I get today? ...Are you ready?  28,082 steps!!

I know, crazy, right?! And awesome! Now all I need to see is the scale move some more (downwards please!) and then I'll be even happier!

Let's hope! I'll keep you updated :)

Have a great night!

Hoping my work will pay off

This week I worked out on Monday, Tuesday, Thursday, and twice on Friday.  After I write this post, I'm going to go to the gym, and may even possibly go again later tonight.  I am trying SO hard to lose some weight, and I haven't seen the scale move much at all yet, except for a pound or so.  I know it takes a while, but seeing a difference (even a little) would be even more motivation for me.

I hope I see some serious movement soon-ish!

~~~~~~

Yesterday was a productive day.  I went to the dentist and had a cleaning.  I was so happy that I got a great report! All my flossing has paid off! Woo!  I also went to my bladder doctor and that went well too.  I took the day off to go to those appointments, and also to relax a bit.  It was really nice waking up at 9am, instead of 6am.  Sometimes you just need that!

I'm looking forward to the holidays, but I still can't believe it's so close! It just doesn't even feel like December right now!

I finished all of my holiday shopping on Black Friday (ohhh yeah!) so all I really have to do to finish is start my wrapping.  Thankfully I have a lot of bags and tissue, which is my favorite kind of "wrapping."

Anyways, I'm off to the gym. 

Happy Weekend!

Yummy Sweet Potatoes

I made this on Thanksgiving and it was super yummy!  I also made some tonight without nutmeg (because I don't have any here) and with regular sugar instead of brown sugar.  Still tasty, but I would have rather had the brown sugar. I also put a lot of more butter in than just a tablespoon, because it kept them nice and juicy while they baked.

Sweet Potatoes

• 3 Sweet potatoes, peeled and cut into bite size cubes
• 2 tsp olive oil
• 1 tbsp butter
• 1 tbsp of brown sugar (more if you want it sweeter)
• 1 tsp of ground cinnamon
• 1/4 tsp of ground nutmeg
• Pinch of ground ginger
• Sea salt, to taste

Preheat the oven to 350 degrees. Coat a small baking dish with cooking spray. Peel and dice the sweet potatoes into bite size cubes and place in the baking dish. Melt butter in the microwave and pour over the potatoes along with the olive oil, brown sugar, cinnamon, nutmeg, ginger and salt. Add more sugar or cinnamon if desired. Toss to coat evenly.

Bake in the oven for 60 minutes. Stir the sweet potatoes once or twice during roasting. Enjoy.

Made My Day

So the car situation turned out way better than I thought it would.  Because of a wet driver's seat and pet hair all over, the rental place ended up not only paying for one of my days like they told me they would, but actually ended up paying for all 11 days! Woo!  I went from going to have to pay $154 to nothing! Yesss!

...and it gets better!

The body shop was able to take my deductible from the insurance checks, so I didn't owe them anything either! AND on top of that, when he did his math, he found out he actually OWED ME 10 bucks! Wait a sec, I get paid 10 bucks to get my car fixed from two accidents! Um, OK!

So needless to say I was in a fantastic mood the rest of that day.  My bank account is still in a great mood too :)

I did some mad Black Friday shopping (from midnight-8am and then again from 3-7pm) and got just about all of my Xmas shopping done.  So I used the money I was going to use for the rental/deductible and paid off my Xmas credit card debt.  Woo! 

Tomorrow I go back to school after a 5 day break.  I'm not even totally dreading it, because it was so nice to have a couple days to recharge that I'm ok with going back.

Now I'm off to a brunch with my best friends, and then we're going to make cookies all afternoon!  Best week ever! :)