Pick me!

So I have been secretly following this photography blog called "Clickin Moms."
They have really great information and I love being inspired by the photographers who also call themselves mom.  I would love to be at their level one day...
BUT for now I am just wanting to win a spot in one of their upcoming seminars.
Lisa Harrison and Natural lighting 101 please pick me!!
http://www.clickinmoms.com/blog/lighting-101-a-cmu-natural-light-workshop-giveaway/?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=feed&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+ClickinMomsBlog+%28ClickinMoms+Blog%29

Mental Vacation

I am having a really hard time getting back to everyday life after my 3 week vacation. 

I spent 3 weeks out of town, hitting 13 different states (if only on the road traveling through!) putting LOTS of miles on my car and creating lots of memories. 

I was with my kids, my parents, and their dog. Well...for 5 days I was with my husband but then met up with my parents and my husband returned home. Then we were with some other family for another one of those weeks.

It was nice to not have to worry about my "home" responsibilities.  So nice that I am having a hard time getting back in the swing of things.

I have heard of needing a vacation after a vacation, but I need an overhaul! 

Maybe tomorrow, since it is my normal lazy and relaxing day, will have to be a mental adjustment that will get me back on track.

No Bake Garlic Bread

Tonight we had spaghetti for dinner and I had purchased a loaf of wheat french bread yesterday with intent to make garlic bread.

However, the idea of turning on the oven when it was over 100 degrees today was not something I wanted.

So I decided to be creative and see if just putting it outside in the sun would do the trick. (Thanks PBS and Curious George for the idea of using solar energy)

I made my garlic butter, cut the loaf in half, smeared on the butter, put the two halves back together, then wrapped it in tinfoil, placed it on the hood of the car (which was in the sun) and...

20 minutes later we had warm, buttery garlic bread. 

It was not quite crisp on the outside like the oven would have done, but it was warm and the butter had melted into the bread quite nicely.

So if you have a hankering for garlic bread but don't want to turn on the oven, use the SUN!

A Treadmill workout

 

 

My motivation to workout has been hit and miss. 

Some days I am highly motivated but then when I get going I loose it and don't last very long.  Other days I struggle and battle to get going, and if I manage to (which I don't always) then I get going and I get in a really good workout. 

Who knows why and what the solution is. 

I know what your thinking...okay maybe I don't, but a solution IS needed because I LOVE the way I feel when the workout is done and I also don't self deprecate myself for what I eat or for being lazy when I have worked out...even if it is only 10 minutes.
Also is is 5K season around where I live and I like to sign me and my husband up...to keep us motivated to run/stay active.

Well thanks to pinterest and the "www" I have found a couple good treadmill workouts, which made me think that maybe I should share the workouts I create/created.  Not to brag or to show off but maybe because it will help someone else with their humdrum days with working out. Also maybe this way I will write them down and can reuse them and save myself the stress of "creating" a workout.

Most of my treadmill workouts will take/last around 30 minutes...they just kind of tend to work out that way. 

Here is the workout I did today.

Time	Speed	Incline
0-1	7.5	2
1-2	4.0	2
2-4	7.5	2
4-5	4.0	2
5-8	7.7	2
8-9	4.0	2
9-13	7.5	2
13-14	4.0	2
14-19	7.7	1
19-20	4.0	1
20-26	7.5	1
26-27	4.0	1
27-30	8.0	1
Cool Down

Now let me tell you that the treadmill speed can be varied according to what you would normally jog at.  Also you can easily make any workout harder or easier by adjusting the incline.  My personal recommendation is that you always have a 1.0 incline because -it makes up for natural resistance you would have if you ran outside.
This particular workout is supposed to be right around your normal jog pace (i.e. 7.5 is mine)
I like to slowly increase speed so that my jog pace will get faster...someday...at least it is at the end of one day
I did not write in a warm-up, probably because I don't.  Or I seldom do.  I will just use the 1 minute walk period to stretch something if it feels tight. 
I do however (almost always) stretch at the end of my workouts.

If you try it and like it/hate it, leave a comment and let me know.
I will try and post more workouts when I create one or use an old one and think it is worthy of passing along.

Oh and P.S. I have little ones at home and so I tend to use the treadmill to train because it is really hard to get outside that often but when I do I usually just run without much thought or script.

Can't get enough

Lately I can't get enough of photography related learning and practice. It is like a virus that I can't shake. Not that it is bad to learn how to be a better photographer, but when I sit down to look at something photography related (like a tutorial or a photography website), I am finding myself looking for way longer then I my allotted time..."Oh it's dinner time already!"

This past weekend we had a family get together and I was able to pretty much have my camera attached to my hand...it was great! Since being home I feel like I am having withdrawals from taking pictures. My kids are getting tired of the camera and I am lacking other subjects. I guess I will just have to be patient for the clients and strict with my allotted photography browsing time!

Maybe turning some of my old pictures into "Styrofoam canvas prints" or DIY "canvas prints" will help take my mind off taking new pictures!?!

Motivation

Lately my motivation for certain things has been minimal.  I seem to get them done, but kind of last minute.  At the end of the day I am finding myself wondering how or why I didn't get more accomplished.  I know that some days it is because I spent time doing things with my kids (which can never be wrong) like taking them to the park, playing outside, etc., but other times I feel like I spent it reading/browsing things relating to my hobby.  Maybe this is the hard part with 3, learning to balance things. Or maybe it is because I had 2 months where there were big projects that I had to do and getting them done made me feel accomplished, so now I'm back to the everyday things and so even when I get them done, it's just not anything special.
I guess it is time to try find new motivation for the same old things!  Especially because I know that as my kids get older there will be many more outside activities that they will be involved in and that means even less time spent at home.

The Kirby

So the Kirby door to door salesman finally got to my house.  I think they stopped once before but I didn't really even give them a chance because it was not a good time.  Probably had toys all over and my kids running around still in their PJ's (hopefully and not just their diapers :)

The way it was approached was that I would get the carpet in one room cleaned for free and all I had to do was share my experience with a friend. 

Well it was a bit more then that...it was a 2 hour demonstration about the Kirby vacuum and how amazing it is.

I had about and hour to pick up the house from the time the salesman first came and when he returned for the "scheduled appointment" in which they asked that I vacuum before they came back.  I of course vacuumed and knowing that when he started the whole sales pitch, right off the bat he had me thinking how dirty my floors still were.

Now don't judge me by the dirt in my floors!

This picture is a view of how they show you the dirt in your carpet.  They have this filter thing that they put on the vacuum and then after only 10 seconds or less (sometimes more) of vacuuming an area they pop it off an put on a new filter, kindly laying them back on the floor in a display sort of way.

In the mean time they are also showing and telling you all the reasons you need to have a vacuum this great.  Such as reducing allergies, carpet and furniture lasting longer, etc.

They even have you get out your vacuum so they can do the '50 passes' test. 

They dump baking soda on the floor then vacuum 50 times over the small area with my vacuum, then they pull out a black filter for the Kirby and vacuum up the rest of the baking soda. 

and of course they just set them back on the floor in the same manner so that you can continue to see all the DIRTY filters piling up.

They then pull out the accessories and show you how you can basically clean everything in your house.  It can even unclog the kitchen sink!

They even vacuumed a small portion of the bed (again with black filters) claiming that what was on the filter was bed mites and their feces (majorly gross if I didn't think that there was also some of the white sheet fibers in it)

Of course by this point they have already introduced the price of the machine and then dropped it once or twice or even three times.

Finally they get to the shampooing part. 

So I did get my floors cleaned after two hours of sitting and listening to the sales pitch.

Luckily I had the excuse that my husband was out of town at a work seminar and that I wouldn't be able to talk to him until that evening.

So despite the great appeal to have my floors really clean and a vacuum that can clean everything, I kept telling them I couldn't make a purchase till I talked to mu husband.

I will admit that I WAS SOLD. 

And, had I been someone to make large purchases without consulting my husband or taking time to look up reviews, I would have probably bought.

They (I say they because a "manager" would come by and see how the salesman was doing and then a managers discount onto the already reduced price.  Or there was the person on the other end of the phone calls, but I am not sure who that was...the person who was okaying then next step or the next price adjustment.) 

So despite the fact the Kirby seems amazing, I don't like that the attachments require a whole setup change to the vacuum.

I am also not a fan of the smell that existed after the shampoo and it took more then the claimed 20 minutes to dry.

I will also say that I didn't expect much of my vacuum.  I think I paid $40 dollars for it and that was 3 years ago. 

But it does the surface like I expect. 

Anyway the next time I went to use it I decided to change the bag.  I should have taken a picture because I have never seen a bag so full. 

I thought they had a "shut off" mechanism that stopped them before they got so full. 

Literally the bag was firm to the touch the entire bag, top and all.  The only area not filled with stuff was the part that was attached to the vacuum. 

I will say that it did a much better job at vacuuming with a new bag.  Probably why the see able filter thing the Kirby does allows full suction for the demo's.

The salesman left probably thinking that he wouldn't hear from me, but once I talked with my husband and he looked online at some prices and also talked to his dad (who bought a used one last year), I called him to tell him we would pass at this time.

Maybe if they come back in a year or two I will have more money in the savings account and a few items paid off and will spend the $$ for the "once in a lifetime" vacuum.  Maybe.

Until then I will remember to change the bag in my vacuum a little more often!

Oh, and if you were wondering where my kids were during all this...part of the time they were downstairs playing, part of the time sitting on the couch with me, and part of the time playing outside.