My favorite circuit training exercises & a rockin' playlist!

I love making up workouts( duh, that's what my job is!! )but I love doing them even more. I know lots of people hate working out and it's so hard for them to get motivated. Not this girl! I LOVE working out and my self motivation has always been part of me. Working out makes me feel great, clears my head, is refreshing, and of course is good for me. I can't imagine not being able to go for a run or get in the gym and work up a good sweat by lifting weights. 

Here is a circuit I have been doing the past week. It's high intensity and I'm sure it's burning quite a bit of calories. You should give it a try!

And to get these exercises done with a smile on my face, I have to listen to music that pumps me up and makes me want to keep going! So here is what's currently playing on my shuffle...

Birthday party @ Build A Bear

A few Sunday's ago Rowen got invited to a birthday party at Build A Bear. I had never been inside of one and was so excited for him to get to make a bear! His friend Michael was turning 3 and had invited quite a little crew to his party. We got there and mingled for a little bit with the other parents and kids and then it was time for the kiddos to pick out their bear. They got to choose between a tan one and a white one...

Rowen chose the white one. After they chose their bear, they sat in a circle and played a game to see who would get to stuff their bear first, second, third...etc...puh-lease. 2 and 3 year olds do not want to play a game when they are excitedly waiting to fill their bear with stuffing and pick out it's clothes. Not to mention, they didn't really understand the game! Well the kids kind of overruled what the leader was doing and just made a line beside the stuffing machine. Way to go kids! 

{waiting to get his bear stuffed}

After they stuffed their bear,  they got to place a little heart inside of it. Once it was stitched up,  they got to take it over to the bath tub and wash it. That was quite hilarious to watch and pretty cute. Rowen gave his a good scrub! 

{placing the little heart inside his bear}

The final step was picking out an outfit for the bear. Rowen picked a dinosaur hoodie. He kept saying "rawr" "rawr" when I was putting it on his bear! haha. 

{giving his bear a bath and showing us his bear}

He named his bear "Ed". I have no clue why! They ended the party with cake and treats...and balloons. 

It was a fun little party and Rowen loves his new bear!

weight loss weigh in-week 2

I will really really try to post these updates on Sunday at some point( probably the evenings ) since that's the day that I am weighing in! Yesterday all I wanted to do was sleep during any free moment that I got. These 3-4am feedings are really getting to me. Last night Isla slept through the night though so hopefully we are headed in the right direction to making that happen regularly!

I didn't get to do as much cardio as I would have liked last week. Since it was so bitter cold last week, I had to head to the gym every time that I wanted to work out. I can't wait till it gets warmer and I can just take off for a run from home. I worked out last Sunday, Tuesday, and Friday. Sunday and Friday I ran on the treadmill for 10 minutes then did arm exercises( seated rows, tricep pulldowns, straight arm pulldowns, front punches, and woodchops ). I also did squats with 10lb free weights and deadlifts also with 10lb free weights. After weights, I headed back to the treadmill to run another 10 minutes and then cooled down with a 5 minute walk. I'm currently running at 5.0-5.5mph and varying the incline each time. 

Tuesday I ended up getting to do some leg exercises before my clients arrived at the gym. I squeezed in seated leg curls, lunges( w/overhead press ), and leg press. 3 sets of 10 reps of each exercise. I also did each crunch exercise I put my clients through with them! My core is still weak and each opportunity to do some sort of ab work will be taken! Once my core is built back up, everything else will quickly get back to where it should be. 

( please excuse my desperate need for a pedicure! )

I lost 1 lb last week. I'll take it. A pound is a pound! I'm hoping to lose 2-3 lbs this week. Hopefully I will get to do a little more cardio that last week. 

** if you missed week one, go here **

As far as my diet, I'm not on a diet! My eating is the same as what it was before I got pregnant. I'm not cutting anything out just eating smaller portions here and there. We eat healthy already so that's not a problem. I don't believe in cutting out things. I think you should eat what you want...well balanced meals. I have never dieted and never will. Eating healthy( for the most part )foods and exercising frequently have always kept me in great shape. That doesn't work for everyone but that's what works for me...that's what keeps my body heathy and in great shape. 

Super easy Valentine fringe garland tutorial!

This garland was super simple to make and took no time at all so I wanted to share how to make it with y'all!

What you will need:

festive tissue paper

scissors

something to hang your garland on( twine, string, ribbon, etc...)

Pay attention this is going to be tricky!....that's super sarcastic!

Grab a few pieces of your tissue paper.

 I cut 2 at a time. Fold them in half and cut strips. They can vary in width or you can keep them all the same. I pretty much tried to keep mine all the same width.

That's it!!

Do this with the remaining tissue paper sheets. For my garland, I cut 2 red sheets, 2 pink sheets, one white, and one heart sheet.

Next hang up your string/twine where you want your garland to be. Unfold one sheet of tissue paper at a time and hang over the twine. Drape half the sheet over the back of the twine and half over the front.

I hung a sheet of red tissue paper on the far right side and the far left side. Then hung my one white sheet in the middle.

Then I took my 2 pieces of pink and laid them over part of the red on both sides.

Then I hung my heart sheet right over the white sheet in the middle. To make them look a little messy, I scrunched them up a bit with my hands. 

There you have it! A quick and easy Valentine fringe garland.

weight loss weigh in-week one

I started my baby weight weight loss journey last Sunday and decided to document it here on the blog. I will be taking weekly pics( every Sunday )of my weight on the scale and share what exercises I did that week. I'll also be taking pictures of myself every now and then to document the weight loss and muscle building/toning that will be happening. I got down to my pre-pregnancy weight in about 6 months after I had Rowen so hopefully it will happen just as quickly this time around! I know it will take time and lots of patience.

I went into the hospital the day Isla was born weighing 170...eek! I gained 50 lbs with her. So I would like to get back down to 120( my pre-pregnancy weight )in the next few months.

 I stepped on the scale on January 12th in the afternoon to find I was already down to 145 lbs and I hadn't begun to workout yet! Down 25 with 20 to go. 

Since it's freezing cold outside, Brent and I joined a gym about 90 seconds away from our house. Yes, I do train at a gym and workout when I'm there but for days when I don't go to my gym, the gym down the street is super convenient! So I headed to the gym the evening of the 12th and worked out for about 45 minutes. I hadn't run in months so running on the treadmill felt weird plus my core is weak so it was for sure challenging. I have been a runner for years. It's something I just love to do.  But doing cardio at this point is not fun in the least bit but I know what I have to do to get back to my normal strong girl self! I can't wait till I get back to running with ease. So I did a little circuit of cardio and weights. Ran for 5 minutes then went and did 2 to 3 weight exercises( I did total body ). Then went back to the treadmill for another 5 minutes of running and back to weights. I repeated this till I had 30 minutes of running under my belt. It felt great to get going and work up a sweat for sure! 

I did another workout on Tuesday and then again on Friday. Tuesday I just did upper body and Friday I duplicated the workout that I did the previous Sunday( cardio/weights ). So I weighed in Sunday morning on the 19th...

I lost 3 lbs in my first week of postpartum work outs

Next weigh in: Sunday, January 26.

Isla and Family

Here are a few more pictures of Isla before we left the hospital( 6 weeks ago! ). I can't believe she is already 6 weeks old. I am a little behind on the blogging. When I have a free moment, I would rather be sleeping than doing anything else...usually.

I love this picture! This was during her hearing test( given to all newborns )on the second day in the hospital. It like he was telling us to be quiet so she could listen! She passed the hearing test with flying colors. The lady giving the test actually told us to come and look at her when she was doing this.

We had lots of friends and family come to visit( some aren't pictured)! 

This is a picture of Brent's brothers, sister, spouses, kids, and the 2 of us! 11 big kids and 4 littles....and we aren't done growing! Brent and I are but the rest of them aren't!! 

{ big brother and little sister }

Her coming home dress.

Our sweet angel!

Isla Wren Easley{ Her Birth Story }

For starters, this labor was completely different than Rowen's! It was wonderful and easy like his but I had no clue I was contracting and that I was in labor! I'll back up a bit. Rowen came 4 days early so I had it in my mind that Isla would be at least that early if not more. She was due on Friday, December 6th. On the night on December 1st I remember going to bed and thinking "ok, I just know that I will wake up sometime during the night with contractions so I better fall asleep". Well, when I woke up and I was still in my bed at home, I was a bit disappointed! I also walked a couple miles on December 1st hoping that would push me into labor. {Side note: I have realized that no matter what you do to try to get that baby out of you, he/she is not going to come out until they are ready!! Those 100's of lunges and miles and miles that I walked days before her birthday did nothing but make me sore! } 

Well, 4 days early came and went, 3 days early came and went...and then there was 2 days before her due date. I posted this picture on Instagram around 2pm on December 4th:

I was over being ready and was a little annoyed that I was feeling nothing...nothing at all.

Around 5pm I decided to take Rowen on a walk around the neighborhood just to get some fresh air. Oh and on December 4th here in Nashville it was in the 70's! I ended up working up a sweat on our short little walk. While we were heading back, Brent called and said he was on his way home and I told him that he needed to come on home and not make any stops because I was feeling a little weird. No contractions( I thought no contractions anyways )but just pretty tight in my stomach area. Since I was so close to my due date and I was feeling a bit weird, we decided to call my parents and have my mom come on over to the house and pick up Rowen. We said good bye to him and that we would see him soon and to have fun at Nana and Pops's house. He always does! 

Brent got that same exact nervous look on his face when I told him my stomach was just really tight that he got when I told him it was "go time" with Rowen 2 years before! His face screamed "I'm nervous and excited all in one"! After walking around a bit, my stomach was still in a tight ball but wasn't relaxing. I was going back and forth about calling the dr and Brent said to just go ahead and call. So I called. I told the operator what was going on and she said the on call dr would give me a call shortly. I was in no pain so I didn't think it was real labor. With Rowen, I was woken up with definite contractions. They were strong but bearable and I knew I was in labor. My nurse was actually still in the office so she was the one that called me. I told her that I thought I might be in labor but wasn't sure and that my stomach was super tight but didn't seem to be letting up. Since I was already at 4 cm, she said to go on in and she would let me dr know. 

We got to the hospital around 6:15/6:30pm. We pre-registered so it didn't take long to fill out the rest of the papers that needed to be signed. This whole time I felt one maybe little contraction and thought to myself " ugh, they are going to send us home I just know it!" We got to a room and the nurse came in and hooked all the monitors up and asked me some questions and several times during the questions she would stop and say " how are you feeling, did you feel that"? And I was like feel what? Did I have a contraction?? And I was having contractions about 5 minutes apart. I had no clue! I was baffled. Fast forward a little to I was definitely in labor and I was at 5cm. My dr obviously wanted me admitted and she was the dr on call for the evening! Yay! I was so so glad that she would be delivering Isla. 

Once in the L&D room, I decided to go ahead and get the epidural ordered. I had been on fluids since I had gotten there so I was good to go for getting the epidural. Once we knew we were staying, we called our family and let them know to come on to the hospital! 

My sister in law took these pics of some of our family members in the waiting room...everyone on their phone/computer! Haha!

Meanwhile Brent and I hung out in our room watching Christmas Vacation. The perk of being in the hospital around Christmas time: Christmas movies! I got my epidural around 8/8:15pm. I was still barley feeling my contractions and the anesthesiologist joked with me about just having a natural birth then...ummmm, no! Brent noticed the  anesthesiologists ast name and found out that we had gone to college with his son. Crazy! AND the sweet nurse that I had for the night was friends with one of my sister in laws who was at the hospital with us...again, crazy! Speaking of nurses, Baptist hands down has THE BEST nurses in the world! I mean they are all so sweet, attentive, reassuring, make you feel like you are their number one priority, etc etc...I couldn't imagine delivering at any other hospital! So back to the epidural...I remember being so nervous when I got one with Rowen b/c I didn't know what to expect but it was pretty painless. Just a little tingling/burning feeling but nothing painful. So this time around I was thinking no big deal it's just a little burning for a few seconds....WRONG-O! I don't know what it was this time but it HURT so bad. It was painful and felt like 100 bees stinging me all at once and that feeling felt like it lasted for forever. The nurse gave me her hand and squeezed it so hard! Brent was sitting in a chair looking away...hospital stuff isn't his thing! But he did look over at me at one point and mouth "are you ok?". And I was fine but it did not feel good. The effects of the epidural however felt great. I quickly became numb from the waist down. A little later Dr Kyzer came in and checked on me just to see how I was feeling and to say Hi. I think when I hit 7cm she came back and broke my water. She said she was heading back to her office to get some rest and that she would be back when it was time to deliver.

I was progressing steadily and 6 cm came, 7 cm came, 8 cm came and around 8 cm( 11:30ish ), the nurse and I talked a little about the lowest drip of pitocin b/c my contractions were still about 4-5 minutes apart and they really needed to get down to 2-3 minutes apart. I asked some questions and decided to get the lowest drip. It did the trick and didn't slow down my labor at all. My contractions quickly started to get closer and closer. Fast forward a little bit to 1am and I hit 10cm and it was go time. The nurse had me push twice and told me to stop so that she could go let me dr to come on over to deliver. She got there, suited up and had me push a few more times and Isla arrived. It was so fast and pretty effortless to be honest. I pushed for litterly 5 minutes! Not joking. Isla Wren was here! She arrived at 1:37am on December 5th. She was( and is still )so pretty :) She weighed 8lbs 6oz and was 18"long. She was a bit swollen for the first few hours and had some little bruises on her cheeks for the first day or two. Here was her announcement to the world:

She was so snuggly and cute. My mother in law, father in law, my mom, and one of my sister in laws stayed until she was born and came in to see her around 2am! Everyone else came by the next day!! 

We got up to our room on the recovery floor around 3am. Isla got her bath, I fed her( she did great! ), we sent her to the nursery, and we got some sleep. I actually got 2 hours of sleep before they brought her back in to feed again. We kept her in our room most of the day and would send her to the nursery when we had chances to get sleep. Here are some of her first pics( well, the right after delivery pics are on Brent's phone so I will show those later...these are pics a few hours after she was born ):

Rowen meeting her for the first time

I'll wrap up her birth story by saying I was so blessed with a healthy and easy labor and delivery and even more blessed with the arrival of a healthy baby girl. She is such a blessing in our lives and she's such a great baby.

{More pics to come of the second and third day on the next post!!}

Isla's Nursery

When we found out that we were having a girl, I knew that I wanted her room to be super girly but simple at the same time. I loved the idea of a rag tie banner over her crib so I decided to make one. It was a fun project and turned out great. I used Rowen's crib in her room but decided to paint it white. I wanted everything in her room to be light and crisp looking so I went with white and light pink everywhere. 

I also wanted to incorporate some shabby chic flowers so I used a few different shabby chic fabrics in her rag tie banner and I found a shabby chic blanket for her crib. I received a shabby chic diaper holder as well. 

{Standing outside of her nursery looking in. I also made the rag tie mobile.}

{The rocking corner}

{Changing table/dresser and mirror. I painted the changing table and mirror light pink...Ballerina Gown was the exact color.}

{White ruffle curtains}

My friend Kate had this made for Isla and I love it. I'm planning on hanging it above the lamp when I get a chance later tonight.

Her nursery turned out just like I had imagined. It's pretty, simple, & very cozy!