Rum and Coke Night

Okay...

My partner in crime at my North Region Hospitals that we support is Cindy girl. I am so lucky to have Cindy because she keeps things sailing smoothly in the North Region while I am at Flower...the biggest of the 3 hospitals that we support. I am usually at my North Hospitals 1-2 times a week....most of the time only once a week. So the load falls on Cindy to keep things running smoothly with the electronic clinical documentation. 

Out of all my fab crew, Cindy is the most "straight laced" of us all. She is as prim and proper as she looks and she is just a gem to work with. But I can corrupt even the straight laced nurses with my craziness....hahaha. 

 

Training

None today

Nutrition......uuuummmmm

Well.....

Chicken salad sandwich

Salad

Cake- one piece

Sesame seed snacks

Pumpkin fudge...a kinda big piece

Chicken drumstick...1 leg broiled

And a much needed RUM AND COKE!!!!

I decided to have a stiff drink when I got home following an anxiety provoking work related meeting. AGH!!!!

I wore a blue smokey eye shadow look to work today...not the same old neutral dud look. Haha...it was pretty...using shadows from my new vice2 palette. The look was more a night time out on the town look....but I brought the look to work. Bold eyes, boring hair, no lipstick. That is soooo me.

I came home looking for a package that I hoped my hubby would not find before I got home. I parked the car, ran to the side porch and then to the front porch. Sigh of relief, the package had not arrived. Then I walked up the back porch...and was greeted by my husband with "are you looking for this?" He had the package in his hands.  I mumbled, ummm.....yeah. That is the last package that I should be getting. He looked at me in disgust and he said...yeah you said that 5 packages ago.

I humbly took the package walked in the house, took the package to the bedroom and ripped it open. 

By the time hubby came in, all the contents of the package were out of the box and put away and I made it a point to smile and strike up a conversation unrelated to my packages.

Recognition Matters.....

"There are two things people want more than sex and money--recognition and praise." Mary Kay

I remember sitting in my bosses office spouting off from my mouth that I did not need praise. What a bunch of bull shit...right? I will admit it....I am a recognition junkie! I like recognition and you like recognition too. 

If I could re do one thing in my career as a boss, I would recognize my people more. I think God moved me into the thankless world of IT to learn the importance of recognizing people. This position has made me a better leader, and a true leader is a person that recognizes the efforts of others on his/her team. I was not good at that a few years back. I held my staff at a very high level and did not recognize their amazing work often enough. I used to think it was enough to praise them in their yearly evaluations....that's good enough. I was wrong.

Well, today at work my team, along with the project manager at one of the hospitals I support received a service excellence award. We each received a certificate....that we will frame a place proudly in our office...and a sincere thank you from the Leadership team at Flower Hospital. 

That made my day!!!!!

 

You know me, after the presentation I pulled the team together to take our OWN special picture. (They took a formal picture at the meeting).

From left to right... Chris (Project Manager for the hospital), Jenn and Laurie...my partners in crime, Tammie, my super supervisor, and then me.

Work should be fun and for the most part my job is fun. We work hard and we play when we can. 

As you can see...I had a good day at work!!!

Training,

I have upper body training tonite. I have not gone to the gym, but I will let you know tomorrow what I trained.

So, my diet consisted of a high fat sandwich that I bought at the coffee shop....

Cal 490

Fat 20 g

Carbs  56g

Pro 23g

Not the cleanest sandwich...haha (had pepperoni and 2 thick slices of mozzarella cheese) then I had 1 large sugar cookie...about 200 calories and lots of carbs and fat

I will eat a ton of veggies for dinner and some chicken breast and probably an apple or 2 tonite.

So, not the cleanest diet...but oh well, I am happy!!!!!

I am loving an eyeshadow palette I bought from Urban Decay called the Vice 2 Palette. (I have the Vice 1 palette too...limited edition 2012). This palette rocks. I can use this palette as a stand alone...which is rare for many palettes. I have used this palette exclusively for the last 5 days...I am in love.

Dare to be different....

'Tell me I can't do something, I will do it. Tell me I can't have something, I will have it, some way, some how. Yesterday I went to one of my favorite stores and fell in love with some flared plaid patterned pants. I just had to have them. I was kinda hoping that the store would NOT have my size so that I could walk away without looking back....BUT they had my size. Well maybe they won't fit, right? So I snatched them up and headed to the dressing room and rushed out of my pants, threw them in the corner and then donned the amazing plaids. And then I heard the heavenly angels singing aaaahhhh in unison in my head. They fit GREAT! Off to the cash register, cha....ching for the store and I strolled out of the store happy as a clam. 

Hmmmm.......how do I get past my hubby. I committed to a NO BUY. I will not break my word again.....Promise.

So I took the bag in the house, dropped it in the foyer until the coast was clear and then I got the pants and hung them up with the many other pants hanging in my closet getting no love. 

So, these pants are a tad bit....just a tad bit over the top for my conservative work environment...so...what should I do??? WEAR the pants. And since I am being a bit bold, why not take it to the next level and wear polka dots with the plaid pants. I LOVE IT!! 

Disclaimer....I am not trying to show a picture of my tush, I am trying to show the coolness of the polka dots and plaid....haha.

So, this is what I wore to work. I LOVE THE PANTS.....as well as my polka dot cami. Haha

Then at exactly 3:36pm today this beauty popped into my inbox at a 65% discounted price...

OMG....LOVE IT and I just could not help but to push that place in shopping cart button. Then something forced me to click the checkout button and then it was done....in one click. 

I will take a pic of me wearing it when I receive it in the mail. I love the FedEx and UPS trucks.

Now...promise, I am on the No Buy Track for 4 weeks. Starting now....for real. 

I need an intervention....

Training

Lower Body Day

I did 3 sets of the following 

Leg presses 

Stiff Legged Dead Lifts

Standing Calf Raises

Step ups on High Bench

Around the world ab exercise

I was in and out in 40 minutes

What did I eat today....

Chicken Breast Caesar Wrap 

1 large Ghost SugAr Cookie

1 Apple

2 eggs with peppers and onions from our garden...hubby made it for me

That's all for the food

I need to lose 8-10 pounds of this. I am holding a pound of fat in my hands. This is a model of fat that I keep on my desk at work....quite the conversation piece. This model is special to me. First, it helps me keep things in perspective when I want to get down on myself for not losing a pound of fat a week. A true pound of FAT is ALOT and so is half a pound. Second, when I want to stuff my face with 3 big sugar cookies, I look at my fat model.

Starting Tomorrow......

 

Back to the grind....yay. I am in a good way now...work has slowed down and my gym hours are extended, so I have no excuses for slacking on my training. 

Perhaps I can get my mind in sync with my goal to lose the 10 pounds that my body wants to hold on to for dear life. I am past the desire to work like a crazy woman to get the weight off fast. A couple of years ago I would be at the gym twice a day doing cardio in the morning and strength training in the evening. My diet would consist of chicken breast and green beans and protein shakes.

Forget that crap. While I am not a super duper lean bodybuilding machine, I look okay. At 20% bodyfat I look fine. But, I would love to lose 10 more pounds which would put me at 18% bodyfat...which would be perfect for me.

So, perhaps I can do it in the next couple of months.

Training is going well, the diet is just okay...but not crisp enough to lose the final 10 pounds so starting tomorrow I am going to tighten up my diet.

So here we go....again :)

Today...

No training....just work. But after work, hubby and I went out and I had too many Margaritas. Yes, I am inebriated I will admit that,

Life is grand.

That is my blog for tonite.  God help me tomorrow morning..

Where have I been?

Oh, it has been a long time since I have blogged....about 2 months!!! Well, know this, I have been crazy busy the past few months at work and at home. So let me update you all on my adventures!

Home Life

First thing, I moved from one house to another! UGH!!! For those of us that have moved, you know how crazy it is to move. I still have boxes and stuff everywhere, doing bits and pieces here and there. It has been crazy!! 

All is well with the husband, kids, and grandkids. My mom, sister and brother and their families are doing well too. 

Work

Just went live with a huge upgrade at work. I have worked hard with my team of great folks to ensure as smooth of un upgrade to our electronic health record system as possible. People who work in IT can surely appreciate what it means to undergo a huge upgrade that ultimately changes the end users world a bit. The upgrade went well....of course we had some hiccups and continue to do so, but for the most part the hospitals that I lead (along with the other system hospitals) the upgrade went pretty great...really. We had to take the doctors, nurses, and ancillary clinicians off line for about 12 hours....that is it. We were prepared to be down between 16-24 hours. 

Long hours, endless phone calls and end user support filled my waking hours...lol. I was away from home from Sunday through Wednesday...about 4 days from October 6-10. Then I got to go home on Thursday and then I watched the grandkids at my daughters house Friday night.

In the midst of the craziness, I was contacted by the manager of Bare Minerals Informercials (a cosmetic and skin care line) to submit before and after photos for consideration to be used for their 2013 Informercial. How cool is that? I love Bare Minerals and I have hundreds of dollars worth of their products that I use daily and to be considered for an Informercial is really neat...and an honor. I will let you all know if I get selected or not. 

What is awesome about Bare Minerals is that they use normal every day people like myself in their ads and infomercials. I LOVE that. 

So I had to quickly do a before and after picture using all their products. 

So let me share the Good, Bad, and Ugly....me bare faced and then me all glammed up with their products...

 

Well, although the Bare Minerals made a world of difference the night I put it on, I was not really happy with the end results...I did the photos last Thursday around 9pm after a long day of work and several days working second shift. I submitted the above photos Thursday night just in case I did not have time to do a better photo on Saturday (that depended on how busy I would be with the grands). 

Well I had a strategy. I kept my cutie pie 2 year old and 1 year old grand children up Friday night til midnight...lol. They both were out like a light come Saturday morning. That gave me time to do my makeup right, and plus my eye bags were MUCH better after 7 hours of sleep. So I took my time doing my makeup and hair....and took several pictures that I was happy with and I re-submitted my after photos for the Bare Minerals Team to consider.

I was much happier with this photo.

So....we will see what happens. Wish me luck!!!!!

Training

You know me, when life gets busy...what suffers? My training...so my gym days were hap hazard the past few months, but I kept my eating at bay and I maintained my weight and started back to training a few weeks ago. So it is all good. I will post some pictures next month prior to Thanksgiving. Maybe sooner. 

Today, I took some pictures with my girls at work...we call ourselves the Flower Divas....lol. They are part of my Hospital Support Informatics Team at Flower Hospital. I have to take a picture of my girl Cindy at my North Hospitals. You will see that next week.

Let me share some pictures of the grands!!!!!

Ha...check out one of the supplement shirts I got at the Olympia Bodybuilding thingy. I love this shirt.

Sporting it in my half done kitchen....new top cabinets, the old cabinets are white at the bottom. My kitchen is tore up....just the sub flooring. A huge work in progress.....for my hubby. He does a little each weekend. 

Well, that is all for now. I am back for about a month and then I am busy again with yet another Golive at one of my Michigan Hospitals in December.....during the holidays of course.......