Hangry.

(both images found on pinterest)

 



Happy almost Friday everyone :)
If you follow me on Instagram (arichardson79) then you are probably pretty annoyed by all of my posts lately. Lol. It's all pinterest's fault. Really, it is!

While browsing on pinterest, I saw a pin called "Lose 5 pounds in 3 days - 3 day military diet" and was intrigued. Let me start from the beginning. I made a new year's resolution to get fit and healthy. Starting January 2nd, I started eating MUCH healthier and working out every Monday, Wednesday, Friday EVERY WEEK for an hour each day. This was all new to me, I have never been very into fitness. I have been doing it now for over 6 weeks and have not shed one stinkin' pound. Not one. See, I have about 10-15 pounds that I have been wanting to lose for a long while and I thought these positive changes would do the trick. I know 6 weeks isn't that long, but I thought I should have at least seen a small improvement. Nope. So, this diet got me wondering IF I could do it, and IF it would work.

My husband is a firefighter and every couple of weeks gets 4 days off in a row. I decided that if I was going to try this diet, I would need him to be off work so he could tend to the kids, feed them, and just leave me alone if I needed to nap or cry or whatever. Why? I tend to get hangry when I haven't eaten much. This diet....not very much food. To make a long story short, I planned to start the diet this past Monday, did all my shopping, then found out that my hubby would be working for 2 out of the 3 days. I was already pumped up, so I decided to go for it anyway and just hoped for the best.

I'll spare you the pics of all of my meals. You can see them on Instagram if you want (arichardson79) And you can check out the details of the diet HERE.

It was HARD.
day 2 and 3 had NO caffeine at all. No coffee. No tea. Nothin'.

HARD.

The kids and I watched lots of tv. I read half my book. I was hangry for a lot of the three days. lol. I even sat on my couch long enough to make these cuties for my shop:

Cute, yes!? (pardon my shameless plug).

Anyway. The diet was HARD. Did I mention that? Haha. It was doable though, and I did it!! The hardest part was having to prepare food for others while eating barely anything myself. I didn't cheat once and I stuck strictly to the meal plan. I don't actually own a scale so I weighed myself at the gym at the start (Monday morning) and after I was done (first thing Thursday morning).

My Results: I lost 5.6 pounds in 3 days :)

Proud of myself?? YES!! I wasn't sure if I could stick with it but I really gave myself no choice. Hopefully this is the jump start I need to keep losing little by little. Overall, I am in support of a healthy lifestyle. To me, this means a well balanced diet and regular exercise. But, this little "fad" diet really gave me some confidence and has helped me realize that I don't need to snack as much as I do. I also discovered that my portion sizes could really be smaller and I would still be satisfied. A great learning experience and eye opener for this food loving girl.

I recommend trying this diet. I will definitely do it again down the road if I feel like I need another boost. I recommend doing it with a buddy too, that would have really helped me through my hangry moments. Instagramming my meals really helped me stay accountable and it was nice to have support from my friends following me along.

Hopefully I'll be able to keep the pounds off and continue on this path  :)

Let me know if you try it out or if you already have :) Misery really does love company, haha!

Have a great weekend everyone!!!

Snow FUN

Thanks for all of the input on my last post everyone. Definitely helped get my wheels spinning and hopefully I can come up with some minor changes to make them sell sell sell.

If you follow me on instagram (arichardson79) then you saw an abundance of happy snowy pics on there over the weekend. We had the BEST time in our local mountains and I wanted to share some more pics with you :)

We picked up Noah from school on Fri at 2pm and got right on the road. Typically, in good weather, the drive to Big Bear takes approximately 2.5 hours. It had been raining all day and the temp was low so we knew it would take a tad longer. BUT - we had no idea that it would take us close to 8 HOURS to get there. Yep. Brutal.

Before it got too snowy, this happened.....

It took a while to get them on just right, but luckily the kiddos and I were warm in the car while the hubby did all the hard work (did I mention how much I love that guy)......

(that's him in the side mirror. Brrrr.)

 

The drive basically looked like this the entire time. Brake lights. Ugh. As it got more snowy, the kids in the car ahead of us kept getting out and having snowball fights int he middle of the road. We would be stopped for 20-30 minutes at a time at some points due to cars sliding in the road, people who had their chains on wrong, collisions, etc. Noah was so restless in the car, he almost had a breakdown. lol.

All in all, we knew we would eventually get there so we just had to relax and make the best of it. Most of you saw on the news about that crazy ex-cop shooting up Big Bear. We knew of this going in to it and although it wasn't ideal, based on what we knew of the situation, we felt we would still be safe and didn't want to cancel our happy weekend.

When we woke up in the morning on Saturday, we had a fresh coat of white fluffy snow on everything. It was truly magical for this SoCal girl. So white and quiet and sparkly. Just beautiful.

 

Our first stop was "Magic Mountain" Snow play area. Time for some tubin'!

 

There was a cool "magic carpet" that would take you back up to the top. Sort of a lazy-tubers dream. Lol.

 

The kids had a blast!!

 

weeeeeeeeeeeee!!!

Selfie (I am always the one behind the camera)

We had a GREAT time zooming down the hill and ended our day out with yummy pizza from a local pizza joint. YUM.
After we got back to the cabin, we found a cool sledding hill about 50 feet down the road. It was awesome!!!

Josh took some time to dig out a nice smooth path for the sleds while the kids and I hung out in the fresh powder.

There were even traces of Christmas around the forest...

Hayden was our sledding champ. She would bomb the hill with no fear and a HUGE smile on her face. SO cute to watch!

Occasionally she would end up like this.....

But she usually recovered quickly and got right back to sledding. Lol.

Papa of the year :)

My brother after a not so smooth landing. Lol.

I even bombed the hill a few times (pardon the butt shot)

After a loooong day of sledding and playing, it was time to soak in the hot tub :)

Noah and Hayden both said this was their favorite part of the trip :)
After a yummy homemade dinner, we finished up the night with some smores. Yum.

The next day, we did some more playing in the snow, sledding, and having FUN!

The crew:

siblings...

After a final soak in the hot tub, we packed our things and headed home. The ride home was a lot less eventful and we made it home in about 3 hours (including a stop for dinner and donuts). It was a truly magical weekend and we will definitely be going back next year!!!!

Happy hump day everyone :)

Market research....

Hello people! It is almost Friday, woohoo! The fam and I are headed up to our local mountains for some fun in the snow this weekend and I can't wait! I popped in quickly to get some feedback from my lovely, smart, and honest readers.

In my Etsy shop, I have these felt cupcake/dessert flags....take a look.

I package them up cute too....

I have not sold one set.

I take that back actually. I sold a set of 50 flags in a custom color story for somebody's wedding cupcakes (which I think is an adorable idea - btw). But I haven't sold any in the colors that I have listed in my shop. Ever.

My question to you all is.....why do you think they sit in my shop and don't sell?

Originally I was charging $12 per dozen. Then I thought that might be a bit too high for a throw-away item (I totally rinse my sticks off and reuse them, but typically they would get thrown away). I lowered them down to $10 per dozen. Nothin'. Now, I have come down to my "lowest I will go" price of $8 per dozen hoping they will start to sell.

I'm just a bit perplexed. I guess mainly because I love them so much and use them for every occasion that is even semi-cupcake/dessert/cake appropriate.

Does $8 per dozen sound reasonable to you? Can you think of anything I need to do to tweak them? Do you like them as is? Do people typically just make their own cupcake toppers or buy the basic ones at craft stores? Any feedback you give me will be greatly appreciated.

Thanks friends!!
Happy {almost} weekend to you all :)

Etsy SALE

SALE SALE SALE!
Use the coupon code: Vday13 in my Etsy shop through Sunday and receive 20% off your purchase.

Truth: I am saving up to attend the Country Living Fair in September with my sister and some amazing friends so.......... c'mon and SHOP! K!!?? $$$$$$$ Lol.

Thanks people!