So much happening!

Life just seems to go by so fast - and if I miss even a few days of blogging, it seems I've missed so much!

So I'll start from today and work backwards a bit. Today was a Mommy-Daughter bonding day with Brooke. After my bike ride this morning (and yes, it felt so good to be back on my bike - 12 miles!!!!), Brooke and I did Jillian Michael's 30-day shred workout. And boy is it a good one! Then we set out to destroy all of our hard work...

We decided to go to Chili's for lunch since Telle was working - I talked him into helping me bartend at Brooke's going away luau next weekend :-) After Chili's, we went to Staples to pick up the latest order of course materials for my class next week - they look so good. My husband is amazing! I'm really looking forward to using them in my class next week, especially after Friday, but I'll get to that in a minute.

Then it was off to the movies - gotta love a matinee! We saw My Life in Ruins, with the lady from My Big Fat Greek Wedding and it was really cute. The best part was that we got there early, so no rushing around, and the theatre was filled with older folks, so there was no cell phones going off, annoying talking/laughing/smirking/etc, etc. It was great... and the movie made us both want to take a girls' trip to Greece! We topped our day off with a stop at Baskin Robbins for a little treat. (calorie-free, of course).

So working in reverse, that leads me to Friday. Really wasn't that great..... actually, it kind of sucked. But it made me really appreciate everything coming up in the future. I was delivering The 7 Habits of Highly Effective People for an IT group at a health science university. If you know anything about the 7 Habits, it's very much a personal development program. Yet, the intention of the day long seminar was to teach them to be more effective from a professional perspective. Well, when the extent of the drive of 1/3 of the class was bouncing the stress balls off of each other's heads (and sending them across the room throughout the lecture), neither personal nor professional development entered their thought processes. They were so rude!

I gave 110% throughout the day, trying to relate the 7 Habits back to their jobs whenever I could. I do have an IT background so it's not like I didn't have an understanding of their work, but when you have people who could care less what you're talking about, you're not going to be effective. Which is kind of funny as I write that - here I was teaching them to be Highly Effective and yet I was less than effective. After the very long day, I had a very long drive home... but it was all good. I enjoyed the drive, the views, the music (cranked up Melissa and sang at the top of my lungs). At a few points, I did try to pretend that I was driving a new Jeep - LOL.

And I got the best gift.... the dark clouds that had gathered as I left LA, were transformed into the most amazing sunset as the sun went down in my rear view mirror. The beautiful colors were reflected on the mountains as I drove the desert - shrouded in shades of pink and rose. It was simply breathtaking. And I took that time to drive in silence (yes, Melissa was turned off) and thank God for all of the amazing gifts that he has blessed me with. I thought of my family, my precious daughters, my incredible husband. I thanked him for revealing to me my gifts and talents and allowing me to create an income with those gifts. It was so awesome. How can someone witness a sight like that without knowing there's a God?

On another really cool note, I found, or rather was found, by my long-lost sister-in-law thanks to Facebook. Kristen is the sister of the girls' biological father - the last time I saw or talked to her was 18 years ago. But we picked up like it was yesterday (a big bonus is that she's a Republican and is just as dismayed at what's happening in this country as I am!). It was good for the girls to be able to reconnect to a part of their past, despite the fact that there is no blood (both Kristen and Kirk were adopted). Which just goes to prove that family is not created by genetics, but by the heart and by love.

On a different note, I decided that I want to move to Belize - buy a little beachfront house, snorkel every day, enjoy the island/coast lifestyle. You know, fly back to the states every other month for a few weeks to deliver a class, write my books, treasure every moment with my husband. And property is so reasonable down there - even for beachfront. Make it so!

On the diet/exercise front.... still doing my shakes everyday... still no weight/inch loss. I've tried upping my calories, reducing my calories, increasing my exercise, decreasing my exercise... I know there's plenty of fat that could be melted off.... I just need to figure out the magic formula.