Do it yourself picture wall shelves

I have been speaking, preaching, nagging, dreaming . .(what ever you want to call it) about a picture wall to Javy for about 2 years. I had the perfect spot for it in my living room. There was only 1 problem.

1. I have slowly gotten rid of all of Javy's "bachelor" decorations. In the 8 years we have been together he only had a lonely surf board left hanging on our walls. 

I wanted this surf board down, and I wanted this wall. After a few years of brainwashing him into a picture wall, he gave in. Only under 1 condition.

1. I have to do the whole thing myself. 

The thought of hanging a picture and making it straight terrified me. I was up for the challenge. I did lots of research on the kind of shelf I wanted here is what I came up with and how for a total price for shelves $30!!!

1. Floating shelves are EXPENSIVE. Especially when you want a 6  and 3 foot long one. Make your own shelves. Start with going to your local Home Depot and buy some GOOD wood. Don't get the cheapest stuff (although tempting) spend the extra bucks and get some quality (Javy found my wood)
2. Find the least noticeable shelving anchors. You don't want something big and bulky.
3. Find your stain of choice. I wanted dark. (Javy did this)
4. Bring your wood home and use a table saw to cut a small crease down the middle of the wood (to hold your frames up right on the shelf)  (Javy did this)
5. Start the staining. Javy told me this would takes days. I didn't believe him. it takes days. You really want to get a good color going on your wood. You need to let it dry and stain again, let it dry and stain again. Blah. (Javy did this)
6. Arrange your pictures on the floor prior to hanging. This way you can get an idea of shelving spaces prior to screwing everything up once your shelves are up.
7. Hang up those shelves. I pouted a little, threw a small temper tantrum about hanging the shelves myself and before I knew it Javy was helping. Actually, who am I kidding, he did it all. I sat on the couch and made sure everything was straight.

        8.  Once your nice little homemade shelves are up on the wall. Arrange your pics accordingly. There you go, your very own picture wall. I love it

Please note: I ended up putting down one coat of stain myself, putting pictures in the frames, and organizing the frames myself. THANK GOD FOR AN AMZING HUSBAND WHO GIVES INTO MY POUTY FACES AND SAD EYES.

The easiest chicken pot pie on earth!

There is a few things I look for when cooking a new meal

1. budget friendly
2. easy
3. quick
4. delish
5. easy
6. easy
7. easy

I LOVE Marie Calendars Chicken pot pie. One day I thought I would be healthy and go out and buy one. Not so much. Have you ever checked how much fat is in those things. Don't do it, you will never truly enjoy one of her chicken pot pies again. 

Below is my healthier, EASY and budget friendly version of chicken pot pie. My husband really liked this dish. This says a lot. Javy claims he is not picky. This is not true, he is the pickiest eater I know. If he liked it, you will too.

Ingrediants:

• 2 chicken breast- cooked- shredded
• 1 (10.5 oz) can condensed cream of chicken soup
• 2 cans of mixed veggies (drained)
• 1 box ready to bake pie crusts

Pre heat over to 375 degrees. Once chicken is shredded, mix with soup, and mixed veggies

Place 1/2 of pie crust at bottom of pie plate and press down

fill pie with chicken mixture

Place other 1/2 of pie crust on top of mixture, press around bottom of crust into place. When done slice 3 lines into top of raw crust

Cook pie for 45 mins or until crust is light brown

Wait 5 minutes to cool down, cut and enjoy!

Meal ideas for the working mom

So lets chat about a few things:

1.  it's not easy being a mom
2. it's not easy being a mom, while working full time
3. it's not easy being a mom, while working full time while trying to loose baby weight

I'm here to make it easy. I want to introduce to you some daytime snacks/meals that helped me loose the weight without feeling completely starving out of my mind. 

Breakfast. I make a huge breakfast every weekend for everyone in my family  . . .but me. I cook up the eggs, stuffed french toast (recipe to come), home fries, toast, bacon and sausage. If I am feeling CRAZY I may cut up some fruit too.  Everyone says breakfast is the most important meal, it is, eat it . .it will fill you up and prevent snacking. Below is my a few of my breakfasts of choice:

1. 2 scrambled egg whites with a table spoon of cheddar cheese, 1 slice of deli ham and a tad of salt and pepper
2. 1 cup Kellogs fruit and yogurt cereal with a half cup milk (I use to be able to eat at least 5 cups of cereal, I could eat it non stop. Give yourself 30 days of eating just 1 cup, your body will get use to it.)
3.  Brown sugar and maple oatmeal with water

Lunch. I work like a maniac, and hardly take a full deserved, sit down lunch. Normally I am eating at my desk while approving files, crunching numbers or making the next big decision. Here are a few options on what I shove down my throat real quick.

1. Lean cuisine. Frozen meat freaks me out.I only eat them with no meat. I went on a Lean Cuisine only diet one time and lost 15 lbs. These bad boys are good. (These run about 7 points- when I am not breast feeding, I definitely won't have enough points for this)
2. Half of a turkey, provolone sandwich on wheat (my least fav. lunch, super boring)
3. Stuffed grape leaves from Costco. My service manager introduced me to these. They are $9.99 for a million of them and they are only 2 points per stuffed delight. This is my new addiction.

Snacks. I eat one snack a few hours after breakfast and 1 snack a few hours after lunch. I think about 20 snacks during the day. The key is to ONLY eat 2 :-)

1. Fage greek yogurt. (Strawberry is my fave) Plain greek yogurt freaks me out too, is it the texture? I don't know, but Fage is the BEST ONE EVER
2. Fiber one bar (90 Calories)- I eat this as a morning snack and it holds me up for hours at only 2 points
3. Pepperidge Farm cracker chips- you can eat a ton of these for about 2 points. Yes please.
4. Fruit. Zero points. Hell yes. Give me a vine of grapes, an apple orchard, and a pear tree. Done.

Dinner:

I don't make anything weight water friendly.  I cook for my family and what they crave. I simply only eat 1 portion size and make sure I have eaten good all day if I know my dinner may be a little on the higher fat side.

Bring snacks with you to work. Don't take temptation. Plan your eating for the day ahead of time. It's that easy. 

Go get em tigers.

Fish! It's what for dinner

In efforts to get healthy and loose the L-Bs I am committed to eating fish at least once per week. Living in Colorado it's not exactly exciting going to the grocery store to pick out the freshest catch of the day. It's more like going to see what frozen fish is the cheapest this week.

My fish of choice is normally tilapia. It's not fishy tasting or smelling, reasonably priced and easy to cook with. Tonight Javy asked what kind of Tilapia I was making. I was planning on throwing some lemon pepper on the fillet o fish and calling it a day. Crap, this wasn't going to be fly with him, he was expecting gourmet style. I had to think fast, I had to make something a tad bit tastier. Below is a recipe I made up and it was D to the LIGHT! (sorry, I forgot to take pics, but trust me it's good. You will love it, you will make it again, you will thank me later)




3 Cheese Encrusted Tilapia

Ingredients

• 2/3 cup plain bread crumbs
• 1 TBL  dijon mustard (don't ask where this ingredient came from when creating this)
• 1/2 TSP dried parsley
• 2 TSP lemon pepper
• 1/2 cup Parm cheese
• 1/2 cup mozzarella cheese
• 1/2 cup cheddar cheese
• 4 Tilapia fillets

Pre heat oven to 350 degrees and spray bottom of baking dish. Mix together first 7 ingredients. Once mixed well, press mixture onto the top of each tilapia fillet. Place tilapia fillets into baking dish and cook uncovered in pre heated oven for 10-15 minutes or until fish is cooked through. YUM!


I served with steamed broccoli and the rice you can always guarantee I have in my house, Knorr Cheddar Broccoli Rice. This stuff is cheap, and a little treat on your taste buds.

Go Indulge in a fishy treat folks!

Dummy's guide to keeping a house clean

I work full time, 40 hours a week, and have 2 small children and a husband. How do you think my house looks? A filthy pig sty? Toys everywhere? A sink full of dirty dishes? 

Wrong. The key to my heart is a clean house, and cheez its, and pizza. But mostly a clean house. I want Xavier to be a great husband someday starting by picking up after himself. I have instilled in him from the beginning how to pick up after himself. At 4 years old he folds his own laundry, makes his bed, cleans his room. Before I know it he will be cleaning my whole house. I kid, I Kid . .that would be wrong. Kind of. 

Since the key to my heart is a clean house. I do have a hard time spending my 2 days off from work doing a deep clean on my house. I want to be with my babies :-) I can totally justify having a housekeeper once a month- THIS IS WORTH EVERY PENNY. IF YOU CAN DO IT, THEN DO IT. YOU WILL NOT REGRET SPENDING A DIME OF THIS MONEY.

Below are some tips on how to keep your house neat, tidy and looking nice all while managing through dirty diapers and super hero melt downs.

1. After each meal clean the table and sweep the floors. This takes 3 minutes and makes a kitchen so much cleaner if simply the table and floors are looking shiny.
2. This step is EASY and will make a world of difference at the end of the day! Pick up what you took out! Don't let things build up, if you put it away when directly after your done with it you will avoid a TON of clutter
3.  Clean up the kitchen right when you are done cooking. The longer you wait, the harder it is to get motivation to get it clean. 
4. Before I go to bed each night I tidy the pillows on the couch, line up the shoes by the door, make sure all toys are put away, towels are nice and neat in the bathroom etc. A little OCD? Maybe, but who likes waking up to a messy house!
5. Seriously . .just teach everyone to pick up after themselves. I am nobody's slave, everyone knows how to put a dirty dish in the sink. Consistently make them do it. 
6. Make your kids eat at the table and not walk around with sippy cups and snacks. If I see a cracker crumb on my couch I might flip my lid.
7. Make your kids/husband put their clothes in a designated dirty clothes hamper/pile/whatever you choose it to be. Lets be honest dirty kids clothes can build up and make a mess quick. Xavier puts his clothes away each night, therefore I NEVER have to see his clothes piled around the house.
8. Keep antibacterial wipes in each bathroom. This can clean up a bathroom mess nice and quick.
9. Fold your clean clothes and put them away immediately. This goes back to step #3, the longer you wait, the quicker your clean clothes will just pile up and look like more of a mess than anything.

I could probably go on forever. But the moral of the story is- Take the extra 2 minutes to do things right the first time, and put crap away. There. That simple. Do it. 

The dummy's guide to loosing weight

Here is my weight lost journey. I am about to release information about myself that not many people know . .my weight. This is a big step for me, so congratulate me later.

 As a teenager and young adult I always stayed very petite at a itty bitty 5 feet 2 inches tall and 115-120lbs but noticed as I got older my metabolism slowly slowed down. Even before I had kids I was yoyo dieting, loosing weight but gaining double the weight back. At one point I just gave up. After my first child I lost the baby weight after 1 year but never fully felt like I was myself. I gradually gained back all the weight I had lost and reached 165 lbs. I NEVER thought it was even possible to weigh this much. I felt horrible about myself however, I wanted 2 things so badly. 

1. to loose weight
2. to have another baby

After weighing my options (no pun intended) I decided it was time to pack on even more weight and pop out another baby. I got pregnant at a weight I felt awful in, and promised myself to eat healthy and gain little weight during my pregnancy. Lets be honest folks . .this is near IMPOSSIBLE! I ate horrible, swelled up the size of a small hippo and was truly a HOT MESS. and I mean HOT MESS.

A few weeks after the birth of my little girl I was actually feeling good about myself at my ultimate highest, 190 lbs. I put on some clothes I wore post pregnancy and took this pic.

Man ..I thought I looked GREAT! Once the picture was taken, I plugged my camera into my computer to see how cute I looked- BAM I was knocked out by how bad I looked. This was my reality check. It was time for a MAJOR change. I knew I had to do something quick before I lost all motivation.

I turned to a bowl of ice cream and contemplated what to do. I had questions:

• Do I try eating healthy on my own no diet gimmicks?
• Is my husband going to divorce because I am 70 lbs heavier than when he met me?
• Do I start execising with Charlotte in my front carrier every morning?If so, how?
• Do I do Jenny Craig? Weight Watchers? South Beach diet? Body by Vi?
• What the heck do I do to loose this weight?

After lots of research, I turned to something that worked for me in the past, Weight Watchers Online. I had once lost 25 lbs on it, so what the heck, it was worth another try right? I signed up that night and never looked back. I have since lost almost 70 lbs and have almost reached my "hay day" weight of 120. 

Quick before and after

Do I have stretch marks? YES! Are my hips permanently wider than ever? Heck yeah! Do I still have a "baby" pooch? You bet! But I feel amazing! I have the body of a mom and received 2 beautiful kids for the price of a ruined once tight body :-) 

Here are some tips on what to do and not to do to loose weight on weight watchers:

• Start when you say you're going to start. Don't give yourself a day, a week or a month to start. Waiting will only make it harder to actually do it! If you're thinking about it than get online and sign up now!
• Don't eat all of your unhealthy food prior to starting a diet. Having that food around will only build your will power and give you even more confidence when you don't touch it. Give the food to your husband, make him gain some weight . .
• You must track EVERY SINGLE thing you eat on weight watchers. You have a packet of sugar in your coffee? Track it! A bite of toast? track it. Yes it's a pain for the first 30 days, after that you become ammune to it. This really teaches you to see how much you really eat and how bad you need to just put the crappy food down!!
• Plan what your eating for the day ahead of time. If you know your going out to dinner that night, look at a menu prior so you can calculate points of the dinner you want to be sure you don't go over your points for the day. Having a big lunch? This means you need to have a smaller dinner. Get it? good.
• Want a piece of cake? Have it. BUT don't have the beer, the chips, the beer, the wine, the beer, the vodka cranberry, or the beer. Indulge, but know you limits. 
• Track your weight weekly and see your progress. When you gain a pound don't get discouraged, you will loose 2 pounds the following week. Feel free to get off the scale when you gain those 2 pounds, get back on, go pee, get back on it, take off your sock, get back on. You will notice that you have still gained 2 pounds, but it's fun to see if you can get your weight down in a matter of 45 seconds. 
• Brag to your husband/boyfriend/lover/friend/girlfriend when you loose weight. Force them to tell you how great you look. At least that's what I do. 
• Learn how to eat in smaller portions. The first 30-45 days of the weight watchers diet is tough. You will be hungry, you will want to give up. Don't!! This phase will past, and eating 8 slices of pizza in one sitting will be far lost memory. Or was the only one who would eat 8 slices of pizza at once?
• Don't eat until your full. Just stop. Put down the 2nd piece of lasagna. Let go of 3rd pancake. Your body will do just fine with 1 portion size. Your stomach will eventually adjust and you will start to feel full after MUCH smaller portions.
• You will hit a plateau, you will stop loosing weight. Figure out what you can switch around in your diet. I was able to cut out my nightly ice cream and start loosing again. 
• I was just reminded that I want ice cream right now. Guess what? I'm not having it. It's past 7pm . .don't eat past this time. You don't need. It is just your mind/body being a horrible horrible influence on you.

I religiously tracked my points for 6 months. I no longer track them for a few reasons; I eat pretty much the same thing daily and I know what points are for almost everything. I keep an ongoing mental calculator in my head at all times.

I hope I have inspired, influenced or helped at least one person who has read this! Stay tuned for even more weight loss tips and meal ideas!!

A buck!

Lets talk about my husband, Mr. Javier Velazquez Garcia Jr. This guy is is quite the man. When I met Javy he was a Caifornian surfer dude from San Diego, not a care in the world except when his next big wave was coming.

Now fast forward 8 years. My surfer dude has transformed into a wonderful father, supportive husband and . . .natural born killer. He has somehow became this redneck mountain man with a 5 o'clock shadow, occasional beard or handle bars, with a camouflage hurley hat. Turn off the Sublime and throw on that Alan Jackson.

I find us getting more and more redneck by the minute. Last night Javy and our neighbor hosed down a deer carcus in the front driveway, and skinned it right here in a garage in the suburbs of Westminster. I have never seen Javy more excited about anything but this beast. Rumor has it he screamed like a school girl when he shot it. I have heard the story on how he got this deer 4 times now, and I can't wait to hear him tell it again.

Now I can't give you any tips on how to skin a deer, I was too intrigued by the amount of ticks crawling on this thing to pay any attention. .IT WAS NUTS! PS. did anyone know a deers ears were this big? I sure didn't. Now we need to decide where this deer head is going in my picture perfect cozy home.