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It's probably just because I'm really nosey, but I love finding out what people do everyday and what people have on the menu. I'm always asking my sister what she's making for dinner! The day-in-the-life posts are some of my favorites to read. A lot of it is curiosity, but it's also good for inspiration. 

It was really fun to document what I ate on this day, which was not actually a Wednesday - but I'm sharing it on a Wednesday. Typically, I'm really flexible on my calorie intake. Ideally I'll have a deficit. I do eat more on days I'm exercising more. I also have Hypoglycemia, so I have to really be in tune to my body and not hesitate to eat when I'm feeling low. I know the symptoms by now, and I can gauge how long I have to get something in my stomach. 

Breakfast
I literally eat this breakfast every day. I've learned that peanut butter with my breakfast is excellent for keeping my blood sugar regulated and feeling full until lunch. I have whole wheat toast (usually Dave's Killer Bread or Ezekiel Bread) topped with homemade peanut butter and a fruit. Most days I eat a banana on the toast, but this day I had an apple. 490 Calories

Not my plates or my counters! My mom and I exercised before work and I got ready at her house. I got her making her own peanut butter too, so I was happy to see she had some and I could eat my typical breakfast. 


Snack 
I was so thirsty on my way to a work appointment! I saw there wasn't a line at Chick-Fil-A and grabbed a half sweet/half unsweet tea (my fav) and one of their fruit cups. I love their fruit cups! It's kind of pricey, but the fruit is so cold and crunchy. Fruit isn't usually a go-to snack for me because it burns off so quickly. I either have to eat a lot of it or in conjunction with hummus or peanut butter. But I wasn't worried about that too much today because I was feeling balanced. 165 Calories


Lunch
My client consultation took much longer than I anticipated so I was really glad I got that fruit cup. Typically I take my lunch to work, but out of convenience I made it a Chipotle day. My co-worker was super jealous and I felt bad I didn't offer to bring him anything. 

I get the same thing every time! A bowl, with brown rice (1 scoop though!), black beans, chicken, mild salsa, guac and lettuce. I really don't understand why guacamole costs extra. Chipotle only has like 5 toppings, so they should take the money they save from that and give you the guac. Whatever, I order it anyway. 670 Calories

Dinner
For Dinner we made these delicious Greek Pita Pizzas from the Skinnytaste cookbook! They tasted great and they were super colorful. They were kind of physically heavy to hold when you loaded them up with the veggies. We try to do meatless meals throughout the week, and this one is a new favorite. It's totally up my alley - I love greek salads and hummus..and pita! Plus these are only 195 Calories. You could easily make two, but I was actually really full after one.


I rounded out the day with 1520 calories, which is basically my target to consume if I'm not going to exercise that day. It was kinda fun to document my food for you. I'm fairly pleased with this day's diet! I'm working on eating more plant based foods and drinking water. It can be so hard to eat thoughtfully when you're on the go! 

Leave a comment below if you like to read about other people's days and meals! Are you nosey like me? And do you tend to eat and order the same foods all the time?

What I Ate Wednesday

Wednesday, April 26, 2017

Before Blake and I got married in 2010, my parents helped me move all of my furniture to what was going to be my new house. I didn't have a lot of furniture, but I did have a great bedroom suite that I loved. And since Blake was still using his childhood set...it was a good thing I did. 

We loaded it up on my Pop's trailer and moved it in. It made it all in one piece! I picked the wall I wanted the bed on and happily made it with the sheet set we had just gotten at our wedding shower. My friends had helped us paint the room the week before, and as soon as I got the furniture in there, it was the first room I 'finished' in the house.



Aside from a new comforter set a little down the line, that room hasn't changed at all! But, after 7 years we thought it was time for a change! That's not unusual for me. I'm always thinking about what I want to update and what I want move around. While I would have liked to change this room up, there were other areas of the house I felt needed more immediate attention. It wasn't until Blake said something about moving our furniture around that I actually entertained the idea.

We talked about how we could rearrange the furniture, but there was really only one way we could actually see it working. After thinking about it I knew that would mean a lot more work than I felt like doing. If we were going to rearrange, we would need to move the tv, and that would require patching some holes, which would mean painting...

It just seemed like a lot of work and we both agreed just to leave it as it was. Then, I made a huge mistake! I complained about the TV in our bedroom. It's really small, and I was actually having a really hard time reading any of the titles on Netflix without my glasses. I know I'm going to fall asleep 10 minutes into the movie anyway so I did not want to wear my glasses in bed! First world problems!

Anytime I complain about our technology Blake takes it as permission to upgrade! He found a great deal on a 4K TV, but it was going to be too big for the spot the old tv was in. All of this is the long story leading up to why we finally decided to change our room up! 

Before we bought the TV we made sure the configuration of the room was actually going to work. We loved it! The room was more functional and we both felt like the change was good for us mentally. It did feel weird the first night because we actually ended up switching sides of the bed. 


After moving things around it was clear that it was the perfect time to paint. The problem was I had NO idea what color to pick. I usually have such vision for this type of thing, but I was drawing a blank. I knew I wanted to go more neutral, but whether that was gray or beige, I didn't know. The linen curtains and bench are beige, so, beige walls might make everything fade away. But do beige and gray actually go together? 

Obviously I overthink everything. I ended up asking some friends for advice and Chabeli sent me this color palette which exactly represented what I wanted. Both beige and gray were in there, and navy is the color I gravitate toward for bedding. Now choosing between the light gray and the one to the right of it was the next challenge, so thank you to Laura and Chabeli for helping me with that! 


It took almost a whole day to get everything painted. Everytime we take on a painting project, I swear I'm going to hire someone next time! I hate cutting in, and with paneled walls there is a lot of that. But I could not be happier with this color! I kept saying how much I love it. I'm glad I had this palette to go off of, because the color is actually called Retro Colonial Blue, and I was going for a gray-so I don't think I would have picked it myself. 










One of my favorite additions to this room is this leaner mirror from Target. I had to drive an hour and a half to a store that still had one in stock, but I'm so happy I did! It fits perfectly on the wall between our walk in closet and our bathroom. We had a little mirror on the wall there before, but this is such an upgrade! 

The TV will go on the wall opposite the bed. I had a few wedding pictures blown up on that wall, but I decided not to relocate them when we took them down. Less is more! We also need to cover the cord hanging off the wall by the bathroom. It wasn't a problem before because that's where our tall dresser and TV were. 

I'm not usually a fan of covering a window with a bed, but sometimes that's just how the room works best. It's actually been really nice not to close the blinds every day. No one can see in, and we get natural light in the mornings. 

Our master bathroom can also use a paint job. It's was redone before I was in the picture and still looks really nice. I would just prefer a more airy color in there since there isn't a window and it can get quite dark. I would SO rather hire someone to do it for me, but it's such a small space I actually think it wouldn't be that bad. 


Leave a comment below with how long you could go before changing up a room! Do you often hesitate to take on a project imagining how much work it will be? And do you also struggle with picking out paint colors?

Time For A Change: Master Bedroom Make-Over

Monday, April 24, 2017

Blogging definitely falls to the bottom of my to-do list when things get busy! I need to get better at scheduling content so I don't fall off the face of the earth like that. I thought I'd share Just 5 Things that we've been up to.

Amelia Island
I have a friend that vacations at Amelia Island every year, and she always talks about how great it is. I had NO idea how much I'd love it. Blake's aunt and uncle have a house there now and they invited us to stay there when we were picking up a friend at the Jacksonville airport. *sigh* I did not want to leave. It's the Florida I love. We spent the evening watching the sunset on the deck, and explored a bit of Fernandina Beach - which is the cutest place I've ever seen.

We can't wait to go back, and are already hoping to spend our anniversary there next year. It's still too cold to swim in the ocean, but we loved walking on the beach and getting a little sun on our faces. We were talking about how the beach is such a healing place, and I found this scripture: "Light is sweet, and it is good for the eyes to see the sun." - Ecclesiastes 11:7




Winston is getting fixed this week. 
Little guy isn't so little anymore! He is such a great dog, and being able to train him from early on made a huge difference. Winston is coming up on 9 months old! He is definitely ready to get fixed. We are looking forward to it calming him down a bit. It'll be interesting because they will have to make 2 incisions, because one of his testicles never made it out of his belly. Kinda weird and I've learned a lot more about that stuff than I ever thought I would. He is going to be so mad at us! 


Disney Pins
Yet another ploy by Disney to take all of my money. But, I still fell for it. You see people all the time trading and collecting pins at the parks, but I was never tempted by it. We were walking around Epcot last time we visited and I saw some really neat pins! I have a little Vera Bradley backpack for the parks and I thought a pin or two would look cute on it. I picked up a Star Wars pin and one with Carl and Ellie on it. I thought I was done...but then! I found the whole world Disney pins on Ebay! There is a pin for every occasion. It's crazy. I did a little hunting and found the cutest Pug pin ever to go with my teeny collection. It's Percy from Pocahontas sitting on a pillow. It's so cute!! And that ends my buying of pins. I'm good with 3. 


I finally saw Beauty and the Beast.
I have been wanting to see Beauty and the Beast! I loved the animated version as a kid, and Belle was my favorite princess for awhile. Blake was not interested in taking me at all, and I wasn't sure if I was going to get to see it in the theater or wait till it comes out to rent. I ended up needing to stay at my mom's house over night last week, so I bought us tickets. We went to the nice AMC with the recliners, bought popcorn and put M&Ms in it, and loved every second of the movie. It was so good! I will say I absolutely hated the part at the end when the Beast growled as a human. Duh-umb. 

I liked all the the new bits they added, and the new songs. I can't get the songs out of my head!



I unsubscribed from junk mail. 
We I did my big declutter a few months ago I made sure to think of every area of our lives and what I could get rid of. A big help was unsubscribing to email junk mail and newsletters. I love that empty inbox! So it really bugged me when our actual mailbox was filled with junk every day. We might get 3 envelopes a week that actually mean something. I was listening to The Minimalist podcast and they mentioned this website. There are tips on how to unsubscribe from junk mail and even how to opt out of receiving phone books! It may take a few weeks to kick in, but I'm really interested to see how this cuts down on the mail we get every day. 

That's a super good podcast by the way, if you are interested in intentional living. They've got good suggestions! I like listening to podcasts that are motivational and that teach me something. It makes my commute a little more productive. 

After a very busy 2 weeks, we were so happy to spend our Sunday afternoon like this: 

Just 5 Things

Monday, April 17, 2017


Chabeli is someone I can always count on to get my creative juices flowing! I'm not just saying that because we share a last name. You've seen her amazing photography on my blog for months, so I'm thrilled to be guest posting on her blog today! 

Head on over to read the 5 things I'd do differently at my wedding if I were to do it all over again. Then get nosy and go through all of the gorgeous weddings they've shot recently! 

5 Things I'd Do Differently At My Wedding - Guest Posting!

Thursday, April 6, 2017

I have a sneaking suspicion that when I started cleaning houses for extra money, I started developing a chemical sensitivity. It can't be all that good for you to breathe in harsh fumes on such a regular basis. Bath & Body Works candles and Febreeze plug-ins that I used to love, now give me a terrible head-ache. Have you noticed even Swiffer Sweeper pads are scented? 

The problem is that I LOVE to have a candle burning and for my laundry to smell great! (and with 3 pugs, I really need febreeze!) I started diffusing essential oils as a compromise. Everybody seems like they are on the essential oil train right now and I was super skeptical about the whole thing. I'm definitely not one to do something just because everyone is doing it. 

Admittedly, I am a total believer now. I ended up buying 2 diffusers and have one in my Amazon cart for the car. The scents are so nice and it's awesome that it's a natural scent, free of chemicals. No headaches! 

It's honestly so overwhelming to read about essential oils. There are so many different oils and they can be used for so many different things! I was really hesitant to try anything other than diffusing, just because I wasn't even sure where to start. 

When I ran out of Windex I thought it was a good opportunity to test out a homemade glass cleaner recipe I pinned a while back. To say I'm obsessed with it sounds so dramatic, but I kind of am. I'll put it this way: I tested out the cleaner on the front mirror in our living room, and it worked so well I went on to clean every mirror and glass surface in our house. Including all of the windows and picture frames in the house. I was actually looking for things to clean! 

That gave me the confidence to make a mock Febreeze spray too. I've been so impressed, so I thought I'd share the recipes with you to try out. You'll feel like such a chemist in your laboratory mixing these concoctions up! 


Glass Cleaner
1/4 cup white vinegar 
1/4 cup rubbing alcohol
2 cups water
1 tbs cornstarch 
10 drops essential oil (scent of your choice)
You'll need a glass spray bottle, funnel and a way to label your bottle. 
(I used this spray bottle and this label)
You must shake the bottle before each use. I've used mirror cloths and paper towels and it's always streak free. 

Room Spray
1/4 cheap vodka
20 drops essential oil (scent of your choice)
Fill the rest with water. 
Shake before use. 

I made a citrus room spray, but lavender would be really nice for your linens. I'm going to use these bottles and make smaller lavender sprays for our bedroom and guest room. 

Next up is making a furniture polish, bathroom cleaner and playing around with floor cleaners. Now that I know it's this easy and cheap, I'm ready to start experimenting more! I'm confident in the glass cleaner to start taking it with me to clean other people's houses - in fact, I wish I could go back to the house I did last week and redo their mirrors...

Leave a comment below if you've ever made your own cleaners! I'd love to hear your variations of these recipes, or if you have a tried and true formula for other cleaners. Are you into essential oils too, or skeptical like I was?
Affiliate links used at no cost to you!

Homemade Glass Cleaner & Room Refresher Recipes

Tuesday, April 4, 2017


Hello!

Hi friends! I'm Kristen, and this is the Life and Style of an early 30's Floridian living the Best Life Ever, with her husband and three pugs. Runner | Avid Reader | Small Shop Owner

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