2019 Goals: October Goals

Is it just me or is 2019 flying by?! I know it was a busy year for me, but still! October flew by just like every other month has. I kept an eye on most of my goals as the month went on and also kept looking at my 19 in 2019 list. I still have quite a few items to check off but I'm hopeful that November will be a good month to do so! Today I am sharing my progress with my 2019 goals.

Goal 1: Maintain a Healthy Lifestyle

I've been making it a point each week to prep a healthy breakfast and lunch. When it is already ready for me each day, I don't have many reasons to deviate from what I should be eating. Our dinners can tend to be a little more comfort foods so I feel good if at least 2 of my 3 meals are healthy! I ran the Hershey Half towards the end of October and I maintained a great training schedule for that. Strength is making its way back into my schedule at full force!

Goal 2: Reduce, Reuse, and Recycle

I'm pretty excited to say that so far this school year, I have not brought any plastic baggies in my lunches. I've been sticking with using reusable shopping bags at the store and recycle everything I can!

Goal 3: Reduce Phone Usage

Work keeps me busy enough during the day that most days I don't end up playing on my phone until bedtime. 

Goal 4: Try New Recipes

This goal seems to be getting a lot of attention lately. We tried some different meals this month to try and switch up our weekly routines. I have also been finding some yummy baked good recipes that I've been trying out just for fun.

Goal 5: Give Back

This goal has started to take a back burner but I am sure I will be doing a lot in November to give back such as make donations.

Can’t stop, won’t stop buying pumpkin iced coffee :)

Goal 6: Save Money

This was our first month following the Dave Ramsey way of budgeting and I am already feeling good about saving money! It almost feels like a game trying to get what we need with only a certain amount of money. We've been budgeting money for groceries since we moved out so that wasn't too hard. The newest thing was only giving ourselves a small sum of money for "fun" money throughout the month. Both John and I learned it all goes towards buying lunch at work and iced coffee, haha.

Question of the Day: How are your 2019 goals coming along? Have you completed anything on your 19 in 2019 list, if you made one?

My Week in Pictures XXXV

Hi everybody! I can't believe Monday is actually here. I could've totally used another day to relax. Luckily, after this week I have a full week off for NJEA Convention week so I just have to survive this week and then I'm free :) Last week was equally busy and relaxing. Today I'm sharing what I was up to all week!


Monday was the day after the Hershey Half so I treated myself to a chai latte on my way to work!

On Tuesday I drank strawberry wine while making pierogies for dinner. We had both been craving them for awhile.

The boys are really starting to like each other :)

Ashley, Tommy, and Joey joined our Wednesday night Chick-Fil-A date.

I started Friday off with a Dunkin' pumpkin iced coffee. I can't get enough of them!

Friday night called for relaxing and watching TV with some kitty snuggles :)

We also baked some cookies as treat.

We started our Saturday off with a workout class and grabbed protein shakes on the way out.

When we got home, I baked some pumpkin chip cookies that my friend Maureen shared with me!

I went for a nice run later on.

We made pancakes as usual on Sunday and I went with a Halloween theme!

Question of Day: What was a highlight of your weekend?

Friday Favorites

Happy Friday! This was another week where I kept thinking it was Friday and it wasn't so needless to say, it was a long week. We have a bit of a more chill weekend ahead of us. Tomorrow we have a birthday party for John's cousin's baby and then we are just hoping to relax the rest of the weekend. I'm sure something will come up, though :) Today I'm sharing a few things I've been loving this week!

Ziploc One Press Seal Containers

These have been in my cabinet for a couple months now, still in their package. I pulled them out last week because I needed just a small container to portion my wheat thins into. They ended up holding a whole serving perfectly and they truly do close with one press. They stack up easily in my cabinet since I pre-package some of my snacks and keep them in there. I use the extra small size, which holds a half cup.

O'Keefe's Rough and Red Relief

My mom gave this to me a couple weeks ago after I was complaining yet again about my dry skin. We are all huge fans of O'Keefe's products so I knew I was going to love this and I was right. It's not too thick but it's thick enough that I only use this at night, right before bed. 

Soup

Kind of a broad item but I have just been loving eating soup for lunch all week. Now that it is getting chilly, I crave something warm and comforting for lunch. This past week I packed cans of Progresso soup along with crackers or tortilla chips as a little crunchy topping. I'm hoping to find some time this weekend to cook up some homemade soup to have for next week!

Question of the Day: What is something you're loving this week?

Race Recap: Hershey Half Marathon


On Sunday I ran my 6th half marathon, the Hershey Half Marathon! The Hershey Half was my first half back in 2014 so it was exciting to return. My sister, who had her second baby 4 months ago, decided she wanted to train for and run this race, so I decided I'd join her. I knew running the Philly Marathon was out of the question for me this year considering I missed a big chunk of training time with my wedding. I knew a half was completely doable for me so once I knew I'd be good, I signed up. I am so glad I did because I had really missed running half marathons! Before I share too many details, I'm going to jump right into my race recap! In my head, I split the race up by the first 5 miles, the next 5 miles, and the final 3.1 so that is how I'll arrange my recap. I'll also throw in the pre-race details because why not?

Packet Pick Up/Pre-Race

John and I drove up to Hershey early on Saturday to meet up with my sister, her husband, and kids and also my parents. As part of your registration, each runner receives 2 complimentary Hershey Park tickets which we decided to use that day. Once we arrived, we quickly went through packet pick up which was easy-peasy. I resisted looking at too much because I knew I didn't need to buy anything. We headed straight to the park and spent most of the evening there going on rides and hanging out.

Pre-race rainbow :)

The race started at 7:30 am on Sunday morning and roads would be closing by 7, so Ashley and I planned to leave our hotel by 6 am to be safe. Thank goodness we did because traffic was even crazy that early! I woke up around 5:30 after a surprisingly super restful sleep, got ready, and grabbed a bagel from the continental breakfast area before leaving for the start. The forecast showed rain for most of the morning but luckily it wasn't raining when we arrived at the start, which was right outside the Hershey Stadium. I made the decision to not wear my running rain jacket for the race. I thought it would be too hot over top of my tank top and long sleeve top, which would've probably been true. We jumped right in the port-a-potty lines when we got to the start area but still managed to wait awhile. We literally left the port-o-potties and got right in the big mob of people that was moving towards the starting line since they already had started. For once I was thankful the start was slow because otherwise we might've missed it or crossed it by ourselves.

Miles 1-5

The race start is right outside the Hershey Stadium. As luck would have it, the rain did not really start until the middle of the first mile but it was steady from there on out. The first few miles wrap around the whole parking lot for both the park, Hershey Stadium, and Giant Stadium. John cheered us on right before we crossed the starting line and again when we were in part of the parking lot because it was easy to walk to that area. Once we left the parking lot and went up a main road, we circled back in to go through the park! For those of you familiar with Hershey Park, we come in around the area of the park that is near the Boardwalk, run by a bunch of rides such as Fahrenheit, Lightning Racer, the ferris wheel, a big portion of the Boardwalk. Somehow it loops us back out near Storm Runner and then brings out an exit near there.

We started out at a decent pace. {I should probably add it in now that we were NOT running this half for time. My sister just had her second child 4 months ago and my training was broken up a lot with my busy schedule. We knew we wanted to just run it for fun and to spend time together.} The parking lot portion didn't have too many hills so we just cruised along. My ankle was a little sore for the first few miles, as per usual, but settled down after awhile. Once we exited Hershey Park, we ran around a residential area and also back near the factory. I love seeing the Hershey smokestacks up close! That area was pretty hilly, which slowed us both down.The rain wasn't too heavy at this point so we were able to actually enjoy the views which included the Hershey Country Club. It was still pretty even in the dreary weather!

I love this "temptation station" a spectator had set up with beach chairs and snacks!

Miles 6-10

This is where the rain started to pick up. I distinctly remember it being heavy around the halfway point because that is where we passed the relay start/finish area. Those who ran the first portion of the relay were finishing and getting the medals and recovery bags. I was cold and had soaking wet socks by this point so I was jealous of those who were finished and heading off to their warm cars. We kept pushing, though! 

Our favorite part of the race was during this portion: The Milton Hershey School! A good chunk of the race goes through the Milton Hershey School campus and it's always the best because of the spectator support. A lot of the students come out and cheer on the runners which is the cutest thing. We were nervous the crowd would be small this year but there were actually a good amount of kids out! This portion also has the worst hills so the signs and spectators were a great distraction.

Miles 11-13.1

Around mile 11ish we were running up Chocolate Avenue with the cute little Hershey kiss street lights. I love that part! It is also where they hand out mini Hershey bars, which I stuck mine in my pocket for later!

Then this was where we started to lose steam. The rain was picking up, my shoes and socks were soaked, and it seemed like we were running uphill the whole time. The final portion of the race cuts back through the Hershey Park parking lots and then makes its way towards the stadium. Add the way we felt with this boring part of the course and you can just imagine how this part was. Luckily, we were close to the finish so we attempted to use whatever steam we had left in us to push to the end. We actually hit 13.1 on our watches outside of the stadium so pushing that last bit into the stadium seemed to drag. Once we were in the stadium, we saw our family cheering us on which gave us that last power boost to send us over the finish line! It felt so good to get that medal and pick up our recovery bag full of goodies... but it felt even better to change out of my wet socks once we got in the car!

Well that pretty much wraps up my Hershey Half recap :) I’m sure I left out some details. Writing about it a day or so later is tough. I tried so hard to remember details during it but 13.1 miles is a lot to remember!

Friday Favorites

Happy Friday! This felt like a long week but now that Friday is finally here, it doesn’t feel as long anymore. We’ll be in Hershey for the weekend with my family! My sister and I are running the Hershey Half Marathon on Sunday and we get free park tickets so we’re going to go there on Saturday. I’m so excited!  Before I check out for the weekend, I’m sharing some things I’ve been loving lately :)

Walmart Joggers

I've been on the hunt for a nice pair of jogger sweatpants and after a long search, I've finally found a great pair.. at Walmart! I like to peruse the workout clothes section every time I'm there because I have found some of my favorite running clothes there. When I saw these joggers I was super excited because they were cheap. I was even more excited when they fit super comfortably AND had pockets! These have been my go-to pants for relaxing and running errands lately. Of course I can’t find them online now to share the link...

EveryDollar Budget App

John and I are currently going through the Financial Peace University classes to help us pay back our debt and so far we are loving it. As part of the class, we are making monthly budgets {real talk: we've always made a budget, but now we are a bit more smart about it}. The app that we are using is called EveryDollar and it focuses on a zero-based budget. A zero-based budget means we allocate every single dollar of our monthly income towards something. It's a lot easier than it sounds. Pretty much anything left after we've budgeted everything {mortgage, utilities, food, fun money, etc.} goes towards our loans. Easy-peasy! I highly recommend looking into it if you are looking for a budgeting app.

Honeycrisp Apples

My mom gifted me with a couple honeycrisp apples the other day and man have they been a good treat! Honeycrisp have always been my favorite apple. They are also so huge though! I usually have to cut them up and eat them as slices instead of biting into the whole thing. These have been a good taste-of-fall treat lately :)

Question of the Day: What is something you're loving this week?

My Week in Pictures XXXIV

Hello and happy Monday! We had a slightly busy weekend so an extra day would've been appreciated. But here we are, on Monday morning so I suppose I have no choice but to start the week haha. I hope everyone has a great day! Keep reading to see what I was up to all week!


My Monday started off with another lovely drawing of me by a student.

I finally mailed a letter to my brother on Tuesday morning!

It was fire prevention week so the kids had a presentation by the local fire department.

That afternoon I stopped by my parent's to see Tommy and Joey. Tommy loves auntie snuggles!

That night John and I went to the gym as per usual. I've been doing a lot of my runs their lately.

That night I was surprised to see Jax in the cat tree and Dexter okay with it.

On Thursday I had wanted an iced coffee but decided against it. Then my coworker came in with a pumpkin iced latte for me anyway :)

I met up with my sister at the park to play with the boys. Both enjoyed it!

Saturday morning started out with our last long run of half marathon training. Tommy joined!

We headed off to Lancaster later that day for pumpkin picking with my friends from college.

We took advantage of being in the area and stopped by El Serrano for dinner. It was our favorite place to go while I was in school.

Jax had the right idea on Sunday morning. It was great to relax!

We spent the afternoon at Top Golf with John's family for his one cousin's 30th birthday. It was so fun!

Question of the Day: What is one thing you did that was fun this past week/weekend?

Friday Favorites

Hi everyone! I am welcoming Friday with open arms today! It has been another long week and the weekend is going to be much appreciated. We have a busy schedule this weekend which includes pumpkin picking with friends up in Lancaster Saturday and going to Top Golf with family on Sunday. Maybe I'll squeeze in some relaxation time somewhere in there ;) Before I check out for the weekend, here are some things I've been loving this week!

Scotch Thermal Laminator

As a teacher, I love laminating! A few years ago, John surprised me with my own mini laminator. The biggest size paper it can laminate is 8.5 x 11 which is perfect! I buy the Scotch brand laminating sheets for it because they are the perfect thickness when laminating regular paper. It is perfect for laminating anything my students will be manipulating because it holds up well. It's also nice to be able to laminate something quickly without waiting for the person who laminates at our school to get your materials back to you.

Quinoa with Taco Meat & Veggies

I've been in a lunch rut lately so when my mom gave me some veggies over the weekend, I knew I needed to come up with something creative. I decided to chop up the veggies {zucchini, squash, and mushrooms} and sautee them in garlic oil. While that cooked, I boiled some quinoa. This was going to be it until I saw leftover taco meat in the fridge. So then I ended up with a mix of quinoa, sauteed veggies, and taco meat. Surprisingly it was a delicious lunch all week! I recommend it!

Nivea In-Shower Body Lotion

I'm positive I've mentioned this before on here but oh well. It has been my life saver this week! In- shower body lotion is exactly as you would think: lotion you use in the shower! I put it on right after I wash my body, but before I get out. It goes on just like lotion and then you rinse it before you get out. I love it because it keeps my skin moisturized now that it's getting a bit chilly out!

Question of the Day: What is something you're loving this week?

My Week in Pictures XXXIII

Happy Monday! It's been awhile since I shared a week in pictures so here I am, getting back to my regular routine. I hope everyone had a great weekend and has a good week ahead of them!

I started my week off by making more pumpkin chocolate chip oatmeal cups. I switched up the recipe a bit and added pumpkin pie spice for a more pumpkin flavor.

Tuesday was a long day but I still managed to squeeze in my run just as the sun was setting.

Later on, John and I both agreed it was already a long week and went for ice cream sundaes!

On Wednesday Jax started to get more comfortable with us and let me take pictures!

I spent a lot of time this week admiring my wedding band. Those details are just to die for!

I felt guilty leaving for work Thursday morning because Jax watched me from the window upstairs.

A student drew a very accurate drawing of me during writing time... haha.

Our parents came over Thursday night to look at our wedding pictures and the boys behaved super well for them.

I used a new platter to display the taco fixings.

After a long week, Friday called for a pumpkin spice iced coffee on the way to work!

I was impressed by a student's goose drawing during writing.

I got up super early on Saturday to run 12 miles with my sister. My friend Erika had been over the night before and we stayed up late so I had been tired. Afterwards, I drank hot chocolate in bed and watched This Is Us.

After a nap, I woke up and made grilled cheese for lunch. John was away all weekend so I just did my own thing.

Saturday night I went with my family to a BBQ at our friends house and then we walked to a fall parade from there. I had so much fun with my nephews :) It felt like fall!

Later that night we went back to the party and made s'mores and hung out with everyone.

I got up early on Sunday to lunch prep for the week.

Tommy convinced me to come over for the afternoon.

My sister and I made cookies with him!

 
And then we ended our visit with snuggles before we had to head out to our Financial Peace University class.

Question of the Day: Did you do anything fall related this weekend?