Laughter is the Best Medicine

Ben working late hours during tax season does have one benefit, and that's that I get to spend more time with my girlfriends without the nagging, guilty feeling I usually have when I go out on a ladies' night and leave Ben at home to be tied up and gagged by our children. That being said, last night I had another opportunity to revive my sanity by seeing Parenting 101: The Musical at the Kimmel Center... the first musical I've ever seen there. What a gorgeous building! I remember being inside of it when I worked at Ecolab, because they used to be one of my accounts, but it was first time being inside for pleasure. If you have children, you would find this musical to be absolutely hysterical. Now I'm a person that tends to laugh at everything, but honestly, I haven't laughed like that in a while. (ladies' nights excluded because I laugh a ton at those) Basically the show was about parenthood starting with labor pains and ending with empty nesters. Of course, we missed the first 25 minutes because it took me forever to get the kids ready to get ready for bed, but that was like the perfect introduction into what the whole show was about.... the trials and tribulations of parenthood. Each skit used a well known pop song or show tune to perfectly compliment different situations parents go through on a daily basis, like the loss of a family pet, siblings fighting, older siblings ruining Santa Claus for their younger siblings, sex (and the lack there of), moms being supermoms, dads overreacting at their kids' sporting games, the list goes on and on. Now, we were the youngest people in the audience, but I would definitely recommend for parents of all ages... I know Ben would have liked it had he been able to go. I might even go again with him, that's how good it was! If you have a chance to check it out, I would go for it.... you will laugh your ass off, the cast (only 4 people) is truly gifted and I guarantee you will have a great time. The theater it's in is small, so it's very intimate and there's not a bad seat in the house.

If I had to pick one of my favorite skits (and this is really hard because a lot of them are so funny) I would have to say it's a tie between "My children are kung fu fighting" (a brother and sister going at it) and the skit where the dad is having so much difficulty putting his kids' toys together... I can't remember the song it went to, though. It just reminded me of when I took 2 hours to put together Nathan's Kinex roller-coaster for Christmas, only to have it torn down within 2 days. Hahahaha.

Save a Horse

Me & my seasoned line dancing girlfriends

It is with great excitement to announce that I tried line dancing for the first time last night. I was a little skeptical being that I really am not a fan of country music, but I have to say I had a great time! I didn't even need as much booze as I thought I would. =] A few observations:

1. I have never in my life seen old people move the way I saw them move last night. These people danced circles around me (literally). One old guy even used his cane as his partner.

2. Line dancing must produce sensations of self confidence because I have never witnessed so many men prancing around like they were on 'Dancing With the Stars'. That, coupled with the cowboy boot stomping and cowboy hats, and I was in sheer people watching heaven.

3. Line dancing also causes women of all shapes, sizes, ages and abilities to bust out in sporadic outbursts of choreography at any given time.... how do they ALL know the dances to EVERY song? It was slightly creepy and intriguing at the same time.

3. People named Vicki are super cool. The woman teaching the lessons was named Vicki and she was a little spit fire and funny as hell. Obviously takes after her namesake counterpart. Thankfully she broke things down for us newbies and had them play the songs at a snail's pace so that I could keep up without rolling an ankle. I knew I wore ankle boots for a reason.

Well, I did get the frequent flyer line dancer card, so I guess I will be attending again. I need to practice beforehand, so the old folks don't show me up! It sure beat sitting on my tukus watching the boob tube while my hubby was at work!

Cristin & Johanna, and the old peeps breakin it down in the background.

Back in Action ... Finally

I finally feel compelled to write a new blog entry after all these months of running around and not being able to collect my thoughts long enough to write anything that would be remotely interesting. Not much has changed in the sense that I still can not collect my thoughts, but I will try to focus on this as long as my kids give me a good half an hour of me time... Ollie is asleep and Nathan is semi interested in TV at the moment, so, here goes nothing...

Last year I went on a huge running kick, starting with training for the Broad Street Run (10 miles), my first 5K in April and ending in August with the LiveStrong run, which was very emotional for me. After that run, I wanted to take some time off to enjoy myself and that subsequently turned into enjoying myself for 4 months! We all know how much we love "enjoying" ourselves during the month of December... I think I consumed 4 dozen cookies alone in the weekend following my Holiday Cookie exchange! All that time off left me feeling blah, blah, and more blah, and disappointed in myself that all my hard work was down the drain.

Well, I finally motivated myself to get off of my tukus and shelp the boys and I back over the ever so lovely LA Fitness, that was exactly one month ago on January 4th. Looking back at my training for the past 4 weeks, I can't believe how much a difference even a month makes! I have so much more energy and feel much better about myself, which is so important when you're a mom! Only mothers know about the unconditional selflessness that goes into raising children and we can all admit that at one point or another in our post children lives, we are feeling bad about "letting ourselves go" or just not feeling as beautiful as we did prior to having kids. Well, I have the answer, ladies... get your rear in gear! It works wonders for the self esteem, mood, sleep... I could go on and on. I hope I can stay this motivated till May 2nd for my 2nd Broad Street Run!!

In addition to me loving on the endorphin producing side effects of exercise, I have been eating a lot better, too. I still don't find the time to actually sit down and eat a meal in peace, but at least I am not reaching for the chips and cookies. Which brings me to my latest random adventure... Shakeology. This stuff is supposedly so good, it makes you feel super energized after one shake and is HEALTHY, like eating a huge salad, but in a shake. I know, I know, it seems like a gimmick, and of course, I would fall for it, but let me give it a try first before I start catching any slack... it does come with a 30 day money back guarantee, even if the bag is empty and I say I don't like it... hmmm... sounds like a plan.

OK, I am off my exercise high horse. I have a few moms that I know that are looking for something to help jump start them to get back in shape. The Broad Street Run is my motivation. Unfortunately for a lot of people, they were shut out because it sold out in 5 days! Hell, there are so many people doing the race, you could seriously still run it, unofficially. ;) If you need a pep talk, come see me. I won't charge ya, I swear. :)