1. My mid year mileage that I have ran is at 283.41 miles. In June I ran 41.25 miles.
2. I read two books this month: Dead and Gone (Sookie Stackhouse #9) and London Escape (Cacey, one of my Wine friends wrote this novel, check it out along with my review here.)
3. In June, Brian and I spent a lot of time planning our agenda for our Paris trip. It was a lot of fun, and I think we will get everything in that we really want to see. We did have a little bit of trouble while planning a couple of restaurants because everyone is on HOLIDAY in August in France, so a lot of the restaurant owners shut down for 2 weeks or so. But, there are about 8,000 restaurants in France (and only about 1,000 in St. Louis), so we still had a lot of restaurants to pick from. I must say after all of this planning I have found out that the French eat a lot of duck, goose, beef cheeks, lamb, sea bass, etc.! I have never tried ANY of these! And, I am a little afraid to…Ok, I’ve tried lamb and I do not like it. Also, some of the restaurants that DO offer steak, offer it only blue or medium rare. I like mine well done! Sooo, my plan is if they don’t have anything I am familiar with I will order duck. I think I could like duck. We’ll see. 🙂 I can’t starve. 😉 I do know I will have no trouble enjoying the French wine, desserts or crepes. I am trying to create a cheat sheet too of their language. Also, as our trip approaches I am getting more nervous about flying to Paris! I am such a baby when it comes to flying, I have flown 2.5 hours tops one way, so flying 2.5 hours to Philadelphia I am ok with… but, 7.5 hours from there to Paris, and its 8.5 hours on the way back… eek! I am hoping I can SLEEP or read and just chill out on the plane, cool as a cucumber. 🙂
I hope to post our itinerary sometime soon, it would be fun to share it. I need to go dress shopping, soon too. I want to get a black dress for the Eiffel Tower dinner and a Maxi type dress for the River Seine dinner cruise.
OH, and… Everyone keeps telling me how H-O-T it is in Paris in August. I kept thinking, H-O-T as in St. Louis hot. So, I go on Weather.com and the temps are in the mid-70’s! That is not HOT in my opinion!! Its 105 here! That’s hot! So, I think it’ll be VERY nice to be in Paris in August. At least, better then it’ll be here in St. Louis! ha!
4. No motions or hearings this month, its been calm. My case is still not closed, though, apparently another motion MAY be coming down the pipe. It is regarding some fees that J doesn’t want to pay, yet thinks I should pay them even though our decree doesn’t say I should pay them. If he files it, my attorney has no doubt it will be thrown out. Fun stuff. Hoping after this, it’ll be OVER.
5. Had a STAYCATION at home with the kids. It was SO much fun, they were so upset when I had to go back to work… as was I! I think the highlight of the ENTIRE week was taking them to Six Flags. They are STILL talking about it. I am seriously considering getting family season passes next year. Nathan rode his first roller coaster (Mine Train) and Autumn got to go on the Log Flume and Thunder River for the first time. We were there 9 hours at least! Nathan also caught his first fish and Autumn got to visit the American Girl store for the first time. We did other misc. things such as Sandy Creek Covered Bridge, Wabash Train ride, Chuckie Cheese, etc.
6. Started Summer Library Reading Program AND finished ALL 3 levels of the program as well!
7. Hired a MAID (more on this below)
8. Vacation Bible School (Autumn’s first!)
9. I finally got to meet Brian’s Dad’s side of the family. So, now I have met almost ALL of his family. He gets to meet two of my really good friends this Friday, can’t wait!
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And, how I am doing on my resolutions:
(1) Grow in my faith – I am caught up in my Once a Day Bible, and I am almost to the New Testament. I am starting to think about what I want to do next year, a bible study would be nice or something that will help me learn even more about the scripture.
(2) Friendships – Not much to report here.
(3) Risks – Not much to report here.
(4) Quality time with my kids – June was good for this, later bed times (I think this just naturally happens in the summer), doing spur of the moment activities such as mini golf after work… we also spend a lot of time outside on our new patio and HUGE porch swing, sitting together reading books or Nathan will hit balls and Autumn loves to take the sprayer and water my flowers.
(5) Time to myself each week that isn’t BUSY time. Recharge time. One word for this one- MAID. I have two cleaning ladies out to my house every other week and they have only been out twice so far but I LOVE it. With two young kids, I was spending SO much of my time (especially when they’ve been at their Dads) CLEANING. Now, I can spend more time for ME. Focusing on the kids, organizing stuff in the house, relaxing (what’s that, oh! Now I know!), etc.
(6) Pursuing my interests: I will give myself a PAT on the back for these: planning trip to France, keeping up with 2 books a month, getting two upper body workouts in every week INCLUDING at least 15 miles of running, etc. I still need to get a Zumba class in! I want to try to find a 5K in September… but, otherwise Warrior Dash is next. I also want to start working on redesigning my BLOG, which takes a lot of quiet time so I can focus. I have some ideas of how I want it to look, but I want to go back to 2 column so my photos can be larger. What else? I want to try to take another Superhero photo class in the FALL, because I LOVE the Fall. I also want to try ALL of the chocolate chip cookie recipes I’ve pinned on Pinterest because I LOVE chocolate chip cookies and each recipe is SO different.
(7) Meals – I really want to hold off on the meal plans until the summer schedule ends. Then, I’ll have the kids most nights for dinner again. However, I should start planning for this ahead of time! I did get a little cooking in this month, made some old recipes I love and some new ones!
(8) Mornings. I hate mornings. Try to be better about getting up on time. – I seem to get to work TOO early on the week J has the kids, and 4-10 minutes TOO late on the weeks I have them. I have a flex schedule, so I am starting to wonder if maybe 8:10am is an OK start time and not beat myself up for it… I must say, the mornings haven’t been as chaotic lately, but Autumn does throw at least 1 tantrum before we’re out the door each morning. Its just how it flows… got to love 3 year olds. I do want to try to get out of the door 10 minutes sooner.
(9) Finish my accumulating to-do list (its another blog!). – Making a LITTLE progress on this, but not nearly as much as I thought I would. My excuse? Enjoying a nice laid back summer! But, at least I’ve made a tiny bit of progress.
