Myriad of Salads

I've been pushing my luck too long.


I admit, I've never had the healthiest eating habits. My weakness (surprise surprise) is a burger and fries. Of course, I also love fresh veggies, and fruit. But that sort of stuff, I have to be in the mood for it. Well, now is the time where LoLo must condition herself to not eat junk, and start eating the way she should've always been eating.


I also have a problem recognizing correct portions. My big thing is learning portion control. One reason I eat so fast and so much is because I would not eat until I was STARVING and then eat and eat and eat. Apparently, that's not the way to do it.


When I had my doctor's appointment the other day, she mentioned that I had a blood test coming up from my PCP for glucose levels suring fasting since I've been diagnosed as pre-diabetic. With that said, she also mentioned that if I were to test as full blown diabetic, I can't take the medication she prescribed...oh hell no!!! This is when the alarm goes off and someone pops up and does the V8 commercial "BONK" on my forehead.


So, I decided to do something about my conditions. It seems that losing weight will not only make for a healthier life, but also easier to get pregnant, and carry the child. Also, the PCOS and pre-diabetes will go down or away completely and also the Sciatica will go away too. So instead of being one of those pregnant women who can hardly move, I elect the alternative. I've been eating WAY more veggies, drinking a lot of water, and walking to work two days a week (hey with the Sciatica, I'm taking it slowly). Even in the few days I've been doing this, along with taking a daily vitamin, I feel great! Just the walking to work gets me out in the fresh air and I love this time when it's the end of Summer and almost transitioning into Fall. The sun is giving it's last hot days and the evenings are warm...it's the best.


I've also been checking out different salads as I've never really paid attention before. I've discovered good ones all around! During these hot days, the last thing I need is to be weighed down by "bad" food. A nice, fresh, cool salad seems to be hitting the spot. Of course I know there will be times when I'm going to have to give in a little to keep my will power going, but I don't mind that. Here are a few I'd like to try to make:

Strawberry and Almond Spinach Salad

Cranberry-Pear Tossed Salad

Can you tell I like salads with fruit....and cheese?

F/U: Doctor's appointment yesterday

Yesterday I was a wreck...a nervous wreck. Counting down the hours until Jake and I could leave was pure torture. I wanted to hear what the doctor had to say, I wanted to know our chances of having a child. The butterflies in my stomach were so strong, my legs were twitching and my hands were shaking. Did I mention I was nervous?

So the time came and Jake drove (thank you Honey) because all I could do was try to take deep breaths to calm myself down. I had my BBT charts in my hand as well as the lab results the hospital sent to me in case the doctor needed to see them. Jake tried to make small talk with me in the waiting room to calm me down, but I was still a little shaky. FINALLY the nurse calls my name and Jake and I follow her through what feels like a Labirynth of hallway to the doctor's actual office. Not an exam room, her actual office. I instantly felt calm and sort of happy to be there. The shaking stopped, and I introduced the doctor to Jake and we sat down.

She asked questions and I answered, and I asked her questions and she answered. She took us through the lab results and what they meant and basically told us they were what she was expecting given my history with PCOS. She asked about any previous medications I'd taken and I asked her about ones I'm taking now and would they effect the pregnancy? She included Jake a lot in our conversation and talked to the both of us, and not just to me. She looked us square in the eyes and never talked down to us. She acted like we've been her patients forever and Jake really likes her. She gave us instructions on what to do from here regarding blood tests and our new medicine and said she hopes to see us with a little one cooking soon. She also made it blatantly clear that if I ever have any questions to call her or email her at any time and she'll get back to me within 24 hours. What's funny is she put me on Clomid, which has a 5% chance of twins...oh Lord...

On the way home, I felt so relieved. My questions had been answered and we were shown a path to make this process easier on us. Suddenly, a lot of the stress and worry was gone and Jake and I just enjoyed ourselves when we got home. We watched a movie, talked...and just enjoyed each other's company. Oh, and last night I had the best sleep I've had in a while.

This is it...what we've been waiting for...

Tomorrow is our big day! Well, maybe not big day...but it's certainly up there in size...

Tomorrow at 3pm, Jake and I are meeting with my doctor to discuss treatment and possible medication to help me ovulate regularly to help the "process" along. I know this might sound a bit...stupid, but I'm scared.

I know being scared is normal. Who wouldn't be scared after all the tests and charting? You want a good outlook on the possibilities right? And at any moment, that cloud might be missing the silver lining. You could find out like Charlotte did on Sex and the City..she had a 15% shot at having a baby. Yeah...way to burst the bubble.

I have every confidence in my doctor. She's wonderful and so professional and knowledgeable. I have no problem being frank about my fears with her, as she is a specialist in dealing with PCOS and pregnancies. I know having PCOS doesn't mean I'm incapable of conceiving...it just makes it that much harder. I'm trying my best to see this not as an obstacle course, but as an added adventure so that when we do have our little one, we've hit the X on the treasure map.

OK...I think I'm ready...I just hope to God I don't forget any paperwork I need...

2 days to go...THANK GOD!!!

Life sucks sometimes...and I mean IT SUCKS...

About a month before Jake and I moved to Point Richmond, I started going to therapy again. I wasn't feeling comfortable in my own skin, I was irritable, down on myself...the works. I started going and told my therapist if she were to put me on medication, I needed some that wouldn't interfere with having children. Of course, the doctor didn't listen and I was put on Celexa for PTSD, anti-anxiety (not as bad as my siblings, but it's there), depression and I was also notified I had mild anger problems..no kidding! I know where all these diagnoses come from, and I know what caused me to have depression, PTSD, and have anger problems...but we won't go into that.

I was feeling better...I was smiling more, I was mellow. Call me mellow-yellow, because that's how good I was doing. Then I noticed something...my medication was running out. So I called Kaiser, and set up an appointment with their Psychiatry department. The closest appointment they had? 5 weeks...yeah...5 weeks...ridiculous. Anyways, my medication ran out and I felt it again. The anxiety, the mood swings, the sudden urge to cry at the MOST random times. I start crying and immediately Jake is there asking me what happened. I sit any say mid-sob "nothing...i'm seriously fine...but I'm crying"...

When I called my former doctor to discuss my medication and the affects it might have had on Jake and I trying to get pregnant, she immediately told me to stop the medicine cold-turkey. Of course, I didn't like that idea so I at least tried to slowly wean (sp?) off. Well, the day after tomorrow is my first appointment with my new doctor and I couldn't be happier. I feel psychotic. Who seriously starts blubbering in the middle of folding laundry??? who??? ME that's who!

Don't worry, no tears were shed during the making of this blog...

Yard Sale Yelp

I remember my first experience with a garage sale. I was about 7 or 8 years old and thought myself a complete genius for thinking of a lemonade stand. I had a little TV tray table set up with my Kool-Aid type lemonade and neon green sign that I decorated for it. I think I made a total of about $10, but to a 7 year old...it might as well been $1000...

I did the same when I was about 10...my grandma was moving from Redwood City to Morgan Hill and thus had to "unload" some 50 years of "stuff". I again had my lemonade stand, this time not so successful. I did, however, managed to sell some of my old toys and stuff I had grown out of. I think that time I made about $25. I was moving up!

Well...fast forward about a dozen or more years, and here I am. I'm going through our storage unit in our house and all our closets to weed out items we don't need or use anymore (and all items are chosen by the both of us, not one picking on the other)..we've got it all: furniture, electronics, baby items (from Summer and Skyler), HUNDREDS of DVDs, housewares, gifts, etc...and boy did wierdos come out of the woodwork.

Day 1: Saturday the 16th...
Jake and I are up at 5am to go put yard sale signs around the neighborhood. We've already put a couple of ads on craigslist. We start putting things out on our front grass "patch" at about 6am...our first (and only) early bird comes at 8:40. The yard sale officially opens at 9am. We've got it all...from older men asking for p-o-r-n, to old ladies wanting 10 things for $1, to little kids rifling through the knick-knacky toy bin...but we didn't mind. I never got sad to see the items go, and I never regretted a sale...well maybe one...but it's alright. Jake's mom pays us a visit and helps herself to a 10 cent plastic collander, and our neighbor down the street is all-to-enthusiastic about my mom's eBay trinket box "order from hell"...even our housemate is buying stuff from candles and picture frames to my old light-up disco ball and tornado lamp I had as a teenager. By the end of the day, Jake and I are both severely sunburned and exhausted. We've made good headway and got rid of a lot of stuff, but we still have about 150 DVDs to sell...

Day 2: August 17th...
Considerably slower day than the previous. We don't get our first "customer" till about 10:30. We've chalked it up to people being in church and decide to wait it out. I think we got a handful of people, and every time we decide to maybe call it a day, someone drives/walks up. Jake was selling his Playstation 2 with 4 controllers and 2 memory cards for $30 total..not a bad deal. Our last group drives up and it's two ladies and about five kids. Jake and I had started packing up the books and stuff for the Salvation Army truck coming next week. Of course, everything stops as we try to make sure these kids don't take anything. One kid sees the PS2 and asks "How much for just the memory card?" Jake says "$2/piece"...obviously it wasn't good enough for the kid. Shortly after the brood leaves, weassess the damage and discover that not only had the kid taken one memory card...he had actually snatched them both from under our noses. I felt mostly at fault because I had been standing right next to him in plain view, but was trying to watch them all, that I missed one. You can really tell the characters in life.

One man came on day #1 and saw that Jake had a box of old shirts that don't fit anymore. Well you would have sworn this guy thought he had won the lottery. He was talking all sorts of nonsense like he bought an old Bayonet knife that looked like something Crocodile Dundee would carry. This guy said "WHY ARE YOU SELLING THAT? THAT'S A PIECE OF HISTORY RIGHT THERE!!!" well, he bought the knife straight off. He came back to the house at 8:30pm that night to try to buy the shirts, but luckily our housemate caught him and told him to not bother us (yes we were sleeping we were so tired by then) and to come back the next day. Well, he did and he bought more stuff. He bought Jake's old Gameboy Color because he swore he could hook it up to be a type of Caller ID screen..whatever...scary man...

All in all, we were pretty successful...was it worth it? Worth the experience, not worth the sunburn. Would we do it again? Not for another 5-10 years. Just for the sake of not feeling like I have to do this again, I think our US economic contributions will go on a long term sabatical. No unecessary shopping...ugh...

Happy Birthday to Jake!

Last Friday was Jake's 29th birthday. Of course, being the procrastinator he can be, Jake decided to wait till the day before to tell me what he wanted. So I ran around like a crazy mad woman getting him what I could. So, he got two PS3 games from me: Civilization Revolution and I reserved Madden '09 for him, and the cats got him the Iron Man game. The cats and I decided it is our personal mission to get Jake every Marvel game we can for his PS3.

Friday night was also the Summer concert series in town, so we stayed until the end and left for Jake's grandparents' cabin near Tahoe. Traffic was horrible, but that's alright. We got there safely. The cabin is really nice and we gave Grandma Shirley her belated birthday gifts and they gave Jake his. The next morning, Grandma Shirley, Aunt Edna, Jake and I went to the clubhouse where the cabin is to have a community breakfast they have from time to time. We had biscuits and gravy, which was my first time having it, and it was pretty good. When we got back to the cabin, I baked Jake Red Velvet cupcakes for his birthday and then we went into South Lake Tahoe for the day. Lynn, Grandma Shirley, Grandpa Del and Aunt Edna went for a picnic at Wrights Lake.

While Jake and I were in Tahoe and there was a Sammy Hagar concert at Harvey's. Jake and I walked around Heavenly Village and did some shopping, and I gambled a little at Harvey's. I won $55 on $5 playing Deuces Wild...it's all beginners luck. We then went to dinner at the Hard Rock Cafe' and that was pretty good...loud but good. Then we went back to the cabin and had cupcakes and played Life for a while...

The next morning we slept in and left around 4pm and stopped at Wrights Lake to scope out some potential camping spots. Then we stopped in Placerville at Mel's Drive In for dinner...

So this weekend was great and the weather was amazing! It was warm, but breezy and nothing beat the smell of mountain air...

Annie Leibovitz - Disney Photographs

Despite the Miley Cyrus upset, I LOVE Annie Leibovitz photography. I've been noticing random Disney photos of hers with celebrities as the characters. Some of the are simply breathtaking. So I checked everything out on the internet, and these are the ones I found.

Scarlett Johansson as Cinderella

Rachel Weisz as Snow White

Jessica Biel as Pocahontas

Gisele Bundchen as Wendy, Tina Fey as Tinkerbell and Mikhail Barishnikov as Peter Pan

Julianne Moore as Ariel in The Little Mermaid

Roger Federer as Arthur in The Sword and the Stone

David Beckham as Prince Charming in Sleeping Beauty

Jennifer Lopez as Jasmine and Marc Anthony as Aladdin

Beyonce as Alice, Lyle Lovett as the March Hare and Oliver Platt as the Mad Hatter in Alice in Wonderland