You're Just What I Needed!

In my head, the title of this post is sung... like that Cars song... "You're just what I needed!"  (This Song)  I have been feeling pretty sorry for myself lately.  Not like, "Oh, poor me" but more like, "Oh man, I have all this stuff I have to deal with in my life."  I guess that's pretty much "poor me," isn't it?  I'll admit I have been feeling pretty overwhelmed with life lately, but really it's just LIFE STUFF.  Everybody has something to shoulder, and the things I'm "saddled with" aren't really that big of a deal.  Anyway, today was a day that turned things around for me.

Today's post is kind of a two-parter.  I got super pissed last night because I tried to post and it lost all my shit, so I gave up and went to bed. So I will do an abbreviated post on what I was GOING to post yesterday.  What it boiled down to was that one of the things that keeps me going in this whole paleo gig is planning.  It DOES require a bit of planning and I do have to be aware of what I'm doing for food throughout the week.  My love affair with planning and organization started WAY before I got on the paleo train.  For example, when I was a kid I used to INSIST on organizing the pantry in our family's kitchen and my Mom's medicine/toiletries cabinet.  It used to make me totally unsettled when I would see canned goods mixed with peanut butter, mixed with sugar, mixed with rice.  There needs to be an order to things, for goodness sake.  My Mom's medicine cabinet was my FAVORITE because I used to use shoe boxes to put like items together and sort them and get rid of the stuff that looked funky.  I LOVED it. My Dad used to tease me because I seriously asked for Rubbermaid containers once for a birthday.  I know, kind of a weirdo, but I love order, I love routine, and I love to know what to expect... whether it be when I open a cupboard or when I get ready to make dinner.  Planning on paleo ensures that you have SOMETHING ready to be prepped or eaten every day so you're not having to sacrifice and default to something crappy.  I have always been a meal planer, and I have ALWAYS loved to make grocery lists.  I make my list according to the order of the store.  In fact, I make an initial list and then re-make the list crossing off things as I re-write them on the NEW list in the order of the store.  I'm freaking myself out saying this.  Wow, I'm nuts.  But seriously, it's unbelievably fulfilling.  If you've never tried it do it... you just might love it and it SERIOUSLY cuts down on impulse buys.  It's kind of like clothes shopping and you end up with all shirts and no pants or skirts.  It'll never happen with adequate planning.  It's no accident that on my team of teachers at school I'm in charge of scheduling out the year and planning for lessons so we teach all the topics we need to teach by certain deadlines.  Love it.  It's a sickness but it's wonderful. I also am realizing, as I watched my 3-year-old make it so her glasses were perfectly squared off to the table and totally even with her sister's... that POSSIBLY... that apple didn't fall far from the tree.  Sooooo... in an effort to keep myself and our family organized, this calendar is magic.  
 It makes me happy.  I scoured Barnes & Noble for the perfect calendar for our family to use to stay on top of things.  It's posted in our kitchen and this particular calendar fits EVERY bill I needed.  It actually has a SLOT built in for meals.  I love this thing and God help us all if they ever stop making it.  This is year four in the making of this bad boy.  I've sought it out over and over and it's never let me down.  So yesterday was meal planning, grocery shopping, and re-stocking the fridge.  I love when we have practically NOTHING in our fridge because we've used up EVERYTHING we bought and we've followed the meal plan to the point where we're not wasting bags and bags of produce.

On to part two.  I'm not going to say much here, but when you have a day like today... I look at what I have in my life and I feel so incredibly lucky and fulfilled.  I woke up and went for a crispy fall morning run, worked out doing some pull-ups (no, I can't do a real one... jumping ones), push-ups (but I CAN do a mean "real" push-up), and squats, and then came home to a DELICIOUS breakfast cooked up by my amazing hubby.  He keeps my belly happy.  He takes very good care of us and he makes me happy.  Things aren't always perfect and no-doubt will never be... but for now, things are good and he is a hell of a guy.

THEN... we frenzied and packed up our stuff to hit the pumpkin patch with our group of friends (read: family) that we built up here.  My family is all over the place, and there's no family like it.  I'm a crazy lucky person.  I have an incredible "real" family, and I have this one... this is a family that's grown and evolved and is ever-changing.  But right now, it's a family that I've chosen and had a privilege to be a part of for quite a few years now.  We all have kids (see the newest little wee babe... SO SWEET), we all love hanging out, and we all make it a point to laugh with and at each other as much as possible.  We pumpkin patched and then went one of the couple's houses and had soup and sammies and hung out.  We held babies, ate good food (I made a paleo soup to take just to be sure I didn't gorge on paninis. That's not to say I didn't sneak a few bites from one or two of other people's sammies.  But soup is about the EASIEST thing to make paleo and VERY satisfying, so I did manage to stay away from the beer, the no-bake cookies, and the potato chips.), and laughed... a lot.  Moments like today are unfortunately few and far between, but oh-so-necessary for the goodness of my life.  I am happy right now.  At  this moment I can say that all the "life shit" that I was feeling overwhelmed by is still there.  My car's heater is still jacked, we still have bills to pay, I still have to find a way to move forward and today... it seems like somehow it'll all work out... just like things have a way of doing.  I love days like today... full and happy.  I'm sitting here at the end of this wonderful fall day with a fire in the fireplace, watching some cheesey Live Well Network TV show, and I'll start the next week of my life happy and I'll try to ride this wave as long as I can.

I nourished this belly today with:
Breakfast:  Sweet potato, onion, pepper, and spinach hash with two poached eggs.
Snack:  2 apples from the pumpkin patch (they grow 'em there).
Lunch:  Super paleo soup with tomatoes, avocado, and basil.  (And a few nibbles of assorted sandwich crusts... not gonna' lie.)  Also took a grapefruit with me and had two clementines poppers.  These things were TINY!
Dinner:  Leftover soup and some cashews.