cleansing.

we spent the weekend with joe's older brother and his family in sioux falls, south dakota. we had a great time, even though we had really crappy weather and couldn't play outside. bennett has four cousins who just love him, which is really fun to watch. i think ben was slightly overwhelmed by all the action and noise, but he loved the constant entertainment and all the room to crawl at their house. our little nieces and nephews are growing up so fast! it's hard that they live far away, but it's always fun to spend a whole weekend with them and get a small glimpse into their everyday lives that way. [side note to self: i need to be better about bringing the camera and taking pictures!] also we have a great time once the kids go to bed, just chatting and laughing with jeff and robin. we watched pitch perfect on saturday night and laughed hysterically at all the ridiculousness. bennett did not sleep well all weekend (he never does great when he's not in his crib at home), which means we didn't sleep well and are pretty exhausted. it's worth it though. and fortunately, ben does really well in the car so at least the 4 hour drive there and home wasn't bad.

today is day one of my cleanse. [bonus- the scale showed a nice low number for my starting weight!] last night i prepped a bunch of food and packed my lunch for work. i, of course, finished off the night with some ice cream as a last hurrah (helpful, i know). this morning i literally gagged on the weird citrus-y fiber advocare drink. it was nasty. i'm really looking forward to several more mornings started like that! but honestly i feel really good about starting this and having to be disciplined. i know it will be hard when we go out to eat tomorrow night, and when i go to supper club on thursday. but it's only ten days, and i can handle that. it's amazing how much i've already been made aware of things i hadn't noticed, like how i put some sort of cheese on or in so much of what i eat. or how so often what i cook is built around bread or pasta. here's what i'm eating today:

breakfast:
advocare fiber drink
old-fashioned oats made with unsweetened almond milk
2 T. almond butter
2 t. honey
banana

lunch:
quinoa salad with lemon-basil dressing
pineapple

snack:
red bell pepper strips with hummus

not sure yet what i'll make for dinner. joe has a business dinner, so it'll just be me and bennett. it's supposed to be 70 degrees today, so hopefully we'll take a nice, long walk tonight and then we'll figure out something easy for supper.

bennett is ten months old today! i'll do the ten month update post later, but didn't want to forget to mention that today! what a big boy he is :)