A Six Week Secret: July 2013

Okay,

Way to go me, for not posting ANYTHING since February? That's pretty terrible.

For those of you who follow me on FB, you know that I've been SUPER busy getting back to life, as well as adding a new job, as a MOM. CRAZY.

It has been a wild ride, but I wouldn't trade any of it for the world!

Husband and I have both been back to work, Scott is now working for Blendtec, ("Can you Blend it?" Check it out on YouTube.), and I have gone back to teaching Group Fitness at 24 Hour Fitness, PG Community Center, and BYU, and I'm adding UVU again in the fall.

I won't lie. Going back to work hasn't been easy. It was super hard physically to get back to teaching. Who would have thought of like 6 weeks of zero physical activity, that jumping right back into teaching as crazy classes as I used to would be hard... oh wait- everyone thought that.. except me.

Nevertheless, it's been so great to be back and be dancing with my sweet students! It's the biggest self esteem booster to walk into my class every week and have huge smiles greeting me and "YAY it's Andrea"'s.

It's absolutely amazing.

Since having a baby, I've gone on and accomplished a TON that I've just never had the guts to do. I competed in my first Ragnar, I completed my Les Mills CX Worx certification and did the training for LM Body Pump, and my Aqua Zumba certification. I've run another 5k (temple to temple 5K) and competed in a singing competition for Pleasant Grove, in which I took first place.

There's something about having a baby that makes you want to better yourself. I always thought I was doing okay, but now, I've had the urge to go do and try everything. I think because when baby Ashton grows up, I want him to look at all I've accomplished, and use that to inspire him and his future siblings to try hard things. To try things they've always wanted to try, and know you're never too old to follow a dream. It's NEVER too late to be who you want to be.

I also have had the drive to do all this, because I want my children to be like "wow, my mom's kind of cool.". Haha! I want my kids to grow up and see me as someone to look up to.

Next step that's in progress is to go back, and FINISH school. I CAN do it. I MUST do it.

My baby boy is the sweetest little guy, and I just hope that I can grow up to be the mom he deserves, and that once again, he can some day look to as a role model. I mean - his dad's already got it in the bag. Scott will be loved no matter what cause he's always doing projects and has the fun toys and stuff to do with Ashton when he grows up. I'm the one that has to work like a crazy guy to get his attention.

Okay so let me tell you about this little boy of mine-

Ashton Scott Veenker.
Born March 27, 2013 11:19A
8lb 11oz

He's 4 months old as of yesterday, and he's brilliant.
He's totally healthy, strong and he's so fun! I love having someone that smiles at me when I sing, or that will laugh at all my jokes. I'm totally going to enjoy that while it lasts!

We're happy he's here and all I do all day is watch him grow, and learn and it's amazing.

Now to tie that into health, bloggish stuff-
I lost about 27 lbs the week he was born, which was GREAT on my self esteem, and since he was born I've lost about 38 lbs. I gained A LOT with him. But I've been working hard and will post pictures for you all to see my progress as I figure out how to get my body back.

I've lost weight before, and I'm excited as I learn for myself how to lose baby weight and figure out life post pregnancy. It's CRAZY - the things that pregnancy does to a body! INCREDIBLE, but crazy. I look back at pictures when I was like "ooh i feel so faaaat" and I think "What was I thinking? I LOOVE GREAT in those photos!"
I guess you never know what you have till it's gone right?

But anyway- I think so far my biggest struggle when it comes to my current weight loss, is finding time to eat. I've been trying on eating every 2-3 hours like I tell my PT clients, but finding time to eat is so hard! You never know if baby is going to cooperate that day or what kind of mood he'll be in, or if he'll even sleep the night before.

When I'm so tired, I of course choose SLEEP over food any day. I'm still working on it though, and have been really good at having healthy snacks stashed everywhere to try to eat while baby eats. So that's been my biggest goal.

That, and I'm planning on going back to lifting this month at LEAST twice a week at 6 AM. Baby wakes up around 5, so I can feed him, hit the gym, and come home to shower and sleep before he wakes up again. I'll keep you posted on my progress.

Thanks for being so patient with me as I've been away from blogging! My goal here is to at least update once a week.

Feel free to follow me on instagram if you're not already- andimaree

I love you all! Here are some pics for you to enjoy of this crazy year.