The Saturday 7

1. I had such an amazing time last weekend with my girlfriends. We went up to Traverse City for 2 nights and enjoyed the perfect balance of downtime at the hotel and going out and about. We shopped, wine tasted, ate and ate and ate, sat in the hot tub, watched HGTV and TLC, giggled and talked and cried. I'm so blessed to have these ladies in my life:

2. So did you all notice that I got my smartphone this week? ;-) I'm going to drive you crazy with my Instagramming. Hopefully the novelty will wear off, but for now I'm loving it. I was worried I'd hate the touchscreen on my phone, but I've gotten used to it quickly. Thanks again, Rachel, for hooking me up with Republic Wireless! It's awesome! Some instagram faves from this week:

This is my new go to when Lena is grumpy: youtube cat videos.

3. May 1st marked one month of trying to eat healthier/exercise. I lost 3 pounds (mostly in my boobs - had to go buy a stinkin' smaller bra). I still have 10 pounds to go to get to my goal weight, but I really don't want to keep dieting. Haha. My goal for May is to workout 3 times a week. Hopefully it will warm up so I can walk outside. Blerg. I go back and forth every day between accepting my body the way it is and hating myself for having a muffin top. Haha. 

4. This week, I put Lena to bed at 8:00 (instead of 7:30) every night in hopes that consistency would result in her finally starting to sleep later than 5:45 a.m. The first few days she slept til 6:30, but has been up before 6 every day since then. Grrr. I probably need to drop her morning nap. I'm so conflicted, though, because she lays down without a peep every morning and sleeps for 2 hours like clockwork. I feel like that means she still needs the nap, but she probably just needs it because she's not sleeping as much as she should be at night. I'm gonna need to power through a few days of crankiness and see if it makes any difference with the nighttime sleep. 

5. Justin and I had date night last night. We're supposed to be having one once a month, but I think we skipped April. Guess that means we'll have to do 2 in May! Anyway, last night we went down to 28th St. to get Justin fitted for a tux for his brother's wedding.  We got Red Robin for dinner:

I'm so glad I have a smartphone now so I can take pictures of my food like the rest of the world.

Then we headed to Old Navy. Justin snuck an Old Navy gift card in my suitcase when I went to Traverse City, but their Old Navy recently closed so I wasn't able to use it! I really wanted a pair of dark skinny jeans, so I tried on about 13 pairs and finally ended up with one I liked. Woot! We ended the evening with a stop at Coldstone because of this:

We even got a brownie with ice cream, whipped cream, caramel, and pecans like the picture. :-) 

6. For the first time ever, we had a non-family member babysit our girls. Although she's practically family. Luke's girlfriend Esther was sweet enough to come over on short notice and watch the hoodlums. Lucy adores her, so I knew she'd be thrilled. Lena, however, was not as excited. Poor Esther. Apparently Lena cried pretty much the whole time. At least she went to bed easily! Poor, attached Mama's girl. I've given up hope of actually sitting in the service during church. This too shall pass, right? Enjoy it while it lasts, right?

7. I got nothing for number 7. Please enjoy this joke brought to you by my brother:

Q: "What's the difference between a piano, tuna, and a bottle of glue?"
A: You can tuna piano but you can't piano a tuna. Ha ha ha.