Lessons Motherhood has Taught Me

In case you are interested in getting a sneak peak into some of the lessons I have had to learn as a single mother, I wanted to share this with you.  Of course there are millions of tiny little lessons and this just touches upon the very tip of it, I thought it might be nice to hear some of your lessons as well.

Within the first month of me going from full-time military to a civilian contractor in support of the military, I surprisingly discovered that I was pregnant.  From that moment on, I knew that to go through with this meant that I would be doing it completely on my own.  At the time I wasn’t sure how this was going to work with my job and with being in the middle of gearing up for a house move.  I admittedly knew very little about being a mother and the costs entailed and decided that I needed to make some life altering choices to make this work for me.  I decided to go with a much lesser house to have a lower rent payment and I was doing what I could to prove myself at work so that I wasn’t in a position to lose my only source of income now that I was going to have another mouth to feed.  I was actually gearing up to go back to school full time at this time as well and I had to put that on hold.  It took several years for to find any sort of confidence in my “mommy” skills and to find the best routine and security in my job.  I did end up changing companies for a better family benefits package and more job security.  Now that I have established more security and stability, I no longer need to put school off, I am ready to go back.  I have already been setting aside time in advance to ensure that I can succeed in this venture.

Before I get ahead of myself, I guess I better get back around to describing what I have learned from being a mother.  I have learned more than can ever be put into words.  I learned what the true meaning of time management is.  You don’t realize how much free time you are wasting in life when you are younger until you forget what sleep is and pray for an extra 5-10 minutes in the morning to make it to work on time.  I have learned what it truly means to be selfless and sacrifice for another human being.  Previously I had thought that I was being selfless in life, but until I was a mother I never knew how easy it would be to put someone else needs, future and wants before my own.  I learned what true unconditional love is.  I have always had love for animals, but never had the love I felt for a person been unequivocally unconditional.  I experienced the highest levels of stress and I learned the definition of “mommy guilt.”  I have fought so many internal battles as I have grown as a person and entered into the process of learning what it is like to care for another person’s every need; to wish any pain and any hurt could be taken into me so that my son would never feel a second of discomfort.  As my son has entered into toddler stage I have felt stress at the constant pushing of limits to constantly re-evaluate the way that I teach him in the best way possible for him.  The search for the best way is new and different every hour; some days every minute.  I have learned that in times of high stress I can reach anger much too quickly and that to yell can make me feel like the scum of the Earth.  I have learned that I need to be easier on myself, that some days are good, and some are bad.  Other lessons I have learned include learning how to take that deep breath and walk away until I am more level-headed.  I have learned that I am not alone and that as our family of two, we are a team and must move forward together.  Time management has become my best friend and has made me more efficient than I ever knew I could be at the most menial of tasks.  I was always good at multitasking, but I have become a machine now.

Most importantly when it comes to incorporating these lessons into being a prospective student, I now know my limits, I know what I can and can’t handle and I know that pursuing education further is the best plan for me to achieve long-term security for my small family.  The heightened confidence that I have achieved as a mother will be incorporated into bolstering my passion, drive and motivation to successfully accomplish this goal.  I have the ability to do this at this time in my life, as routine has become second nature.  I know that the longer I wait to get started, the more that I would enter into regret for lost time.  As I have learned so many lessons thus far as a single mother, I relish the idea of all of the new lessons I will learn in the future.

Insanity Cardio Abs Review & Cookie Failure

First I will start with the Abs Review.

Having taken a break from Insanity for awhile after it kicked my butt a few times (Insanity Plyometrics Review), I wanted to start back in to things a little slower, so I chose a 20 minute workout.  This happened to the be the Cardio Abs workout.  Having done a couple of the Insanity workouts before I was mentally prepared.

I'm not going to say that it was a bad workout, because it definitely did work my abs.  I felt that it was a little weak in comparison to the other things that I have come to expect from Insanity.  My Belly Pilates totally kicked that workouts butt!  See Belly Pilates Review

The workout starts with a warmup as they all do with Shaun T.  The most intense part would be the jump leg curl ins, which is very high impact on the body if you have back or knee issues, but you can definitely feel it.  About 3/4s of the exercise is spent on the mat.  I am not saying that this is a bad way to work your core, because I think you can reach your core splendidly this way.  I am not really sure how you can call it cardio given the slow pace and a lot of movements involving planking.  Once the mat came out I didn't feel like my heart rate really stayed up.

Overall I call this a nice, slower paced workout in terms of insanity.  It is definitely a core workout, but I would hesitate to classify it as full cardio.  There is some cardio in it, especially in the beginning.  If you haev never tried Insanity before, I would suggest it as a nice "easing into it" exercise, as the fit test can make you feel like you suck and shouldn't even start, and the Plyometrics leaves you in so much pain you never want to go back. 

*As I could not find any actual Shaun T previews, here is an exercise class a workout facility doing the workout, if you want to get a feel for what the workout is. 

COOKIE FAILURE
Now back to the failed cookies.  If you read my blog last night about Liam's being fully potty trained, he still does want his cookie now and again after he goes potty and washes hands.  not always, but when he does there better be a cookie, needless to say we ran out of cookies this morning and he was LESS than impressed.  So I figured we could just makes some (did I mention that we need to go grocery shopping).  My recipe ended up with so much improvisation that it was a big mess.  However after tweaking with ingredients and adding some more stuff (mostly flour) I was able to make the second batch that came out of the oven more than a big mess, and actually suitable for the cookie container on the window sill.  I can show you the photos, but I won't give you the actual recipe because it did NOT work for me.  here are the 3 main reasons why it did NOT work. 

1. When making cookies you should ALWAYS use unsalted butter.  I only had 3 TBsp left and substituted margarine the rest of the way and this made the cookies not stick together as well and greasy
2. I know when I move I will find a thousand containers of baking soda as I see it all the time.  However some magical entity steals my baking soda when I go to make cookies which left me instead with 2 separate containers of baking powder.  this usually makes your cookies not rise as well and they stay flat and spread out.
3. I was trying to half a recipe that I was only half following anyway...  So it was a mess I can admit I had a cooking failure today haha

Needless to say I did get a GOOD dozen chocolate chip heath cookies that are a little flatter than they should be and also a big spread out cookie sheet of cookie mess, all tasted amazing, and I am saving and eating off of the scraped off flat spread out greasy cookie mess because I suck at presentation anyway and taste is definitely high for this mess :)

*Even though i am the improvisation queen, some things CANNOT be improvised, and when you improvise TOO much you end up with something else ENTIRELY :)  Have a great Saturday night.

Cookie Dough

Failed batch

Better Batch :)

Dumb Criminals Part 2: Robbers at their "Best"

Let's start by talking about people that actually commit crimes.  You would think that if you are going to commit yourself to something that could potentially lead to jail time or possibly even death if things go really bad that you would want to do at least a little bit of research before you go in. 


With that being said let's talk about our first dumb criminal of the evening.  A 28 year old man named Christopher Allen Koch decided that he was going to rob a bank.  I am sure it started out with a desperate times call for desperate measures type of ordeal and then a "plan" was hatched.  The bank that he was attempting to rob was in Liberty, PA.  What he didn't think to check before choosing the Bank was the operating hours.  Reportedly he sat in his car for about 20 minutes, probably psyching himself up for it and then decided to go through with it.  This particular bank closed at 12:00 and by the time he got out of the car to go up to the door, it was 12:01.  Oh wait, did I mention that he came up to the door wearing a ski mask and gloves and had a gun on him.  So he is out in broad daylight for everyone to see.  The employees saw him and reported his license plate number to police who were able to arrest him for attempted robbery.  If only he had looked at the door to see the operating hours, or had the sense of mind to wait until he was inside to put on the mask, or even to have gone inside when he first got there instead of waiting 20 minutes....  But if he was that smart he probably wouldn't be robbing a bank in the first place....

Dumb Bank Robber Turns Up Too Late

Since we are already on the topic of robbery, let's take a look at the burglar who wrote his own name at the crime scene.  In the UK, an 18 year old names Peter Addison and a friend vandalized a children's campsite building and set off fire extinguishers.  He actually wrote "Peter Addison Was
Here" on a wall.  If that wasn't enough to ensure that everyone knew who had done the handiwork, he also wrote his associated gang's name on the wall.  Police were able to locate him after looking him up online. 

Daft Burglar Writes Own Name on Wall




Looks Like Burglary is the hot topic of the evening.  Our next criminals robbed a bank in Vail, Colorado.  Two Australian bank robbers have been dubbed Dumb & Dumber after jokingly taking pictures of themselves with the stolen cash in a McDonald's bathroom.  Their celebration didn't last long as they were captured the next day.  They left behind a plethora of clues which easily lead the police straight to them.  The men, Anthony Prince and Luke Carrol made it "laughably easy" for the
police to capture them.  Here's why: First off they wore ski masks but robbed their own bank that they frequented and were well known by their Australian accents in a Colorado bank.  The tellers were easily able to identify them on this alone.  If that wasn't enough, they were also visibly wearing their name tags from the sports store where they were employed.  That same day they attempted to buy airline tickets to Mexico with the stolen money.  Wow, these guys REALLY didn't plan well at all.

Dumb & Dumber Take Their Own Mugshots




Let's talk about another dumb attempted robber.  Have you ever heard the adage "You don't take a knife to a gun fight?"  Well, in Beaverton, OR a man named Derek Mosley decided to do one better.  He thought it would be a great plan to rob a gun store with a baseball bat.  Most likely he was under the impression that the guns being sold aren't loaded.  The only part of this that was possibly a good plan was that there was the possibility of a lot of money being in a gun store.  However he forgot about concealed carry laws.  Mr. Mosley decides to walk into a discount gun store and walks up to a display case and smashes it to steal a gun inside.  I have no idea why he thought that everyone would just sit around and be ok about this because he had a baseball bat....  The employee working behind
the counter took out his personal firearm and directed Mosley to drop the baseball bat and the gun that he had grabbed.  Wait, it gets better, apparently Mosley also had a knife on him that he dropped, so he really DID try to bring a knife to a gun fight....  By the time the cops showed up he was already on the floor at gunpoint ready for the handcuffs.  Wow... just wow....

Guy fails miserably at robbing a gun store with a baseball bat

Last but not least I leave you with a candidate for one of the worst robbers ever.  55 year old Harry Williams from Tempe, AZ decided for whatever reason that he was going to rob an Ace Hardware Store.  He walks into the store put his hand under his shirt and tells the employee at the cash register that he has a gun under his shirt and wants all of the money in the register.  The cashier told Mr. Williams that he didn't have any money in the register and wouldn't give it to him even if he did.  Williams asks the cashier to prove that there is no money in the register by opening it and letting him see.  The cashier tells him no and Williams walks out of the store.  Apparently the cashier was not convinced about William's "gun".  Not to be deterred, Williams decided to go across the street to the
Safeway.   He again tried to convince the cashier of his possession of a gun and again failed miserably.  Williams was escorted out of the building.  Williams waited a few minutes before sneaking back into the store and stuffing a sausage into his pants....  the dirty jokes are endless here...  Shortly after stealing the sausage he was discovered by police and they discovered that he actually did have a knife on him that he never used.  Apparently the judge felt bad enough for him that his sentence was greatly reduced. 

Candidate for Worst Robber Ever