BIG NEWS

SOOOOOOOOOOOO....I got a job!!!! I wasn't even looking for one. My parents' neighbor is being promoted and the position she had needed to be filled so she told my mom about it and my mom of course encouraged me to do it. My guess is she sees the stressed out mess I have become and thinks maybe getting out of the house and making extra fun money would calm my neurosis down. Either way, I'm appreciative of the opportunity. I think it is going to make the deployment flyyyyy by and not only that, but my kids will have some with my family before we make our big move to Hawaii at the end of next summer!

Also, this is going to help me reach our financial goals for 2014 even faster which is exciting! So, what is the job you ask?? Actually it's totally for me....I'm going to be working for a stage lighting company as a customer service and shipping/receiving employee. The work is mostly clerical and the work atmosphere is super laid back...the schedule is synced with my county's school system so when my oldest is out of school, I can work from home rather than at the office location. The pay is well above minimum wage with possibilities of raises and my first day is tomorrow!! I'll be training tomorrow and thursday and then im off until Jan 1st, which is when christmas break is.

I'm so excited and nervous. It has been a while since I've had a job outside the home and the thought of being away from the kids makes me sad, but I know it isn't for forever and it will be great for me and the kids!

I've been scouring the internet for tips on going back to working after having little ones.....It's gonna be A OK....but WISH ME LUCK and SEND ME GOOD VIBES =)

Murphy's Law

Ok you military wives, husbands, gfs, bfs, blah blah you get it....we have all heard it...."anything that can go wrong will during deployment." This is my 2nd and right before my first deployment with my husband I would roll my eyes every time I would hear that. The I went through a deployment and I was like aaaaaahhhhhh...YEP...IT'S TRUE!

Last deployment we got rear ended in a brand new car and then had a trip to the ER with my then 6 month old all within the first month he was gone! This deployment....I got into an accident, had to fix a garage door, and had someone steal my identity and steal my money!! grrrrrrrrrrrrrr....all of that on top of cranky children who miss their daddy...HUMPH



But we get through it!! There are so many ways to cope and Mama Meagan has a great blog post and accompanying video all about how to cope!

http://mama-meagan.blogspot.com/2013/12/deployment-tips-for-coping_6.html?showComment=1386334033291#c1567913954110656665

^there is the link for her blog!


Def check it out!

What I did and What I ate on Wednesday

WARNING: not the healthiest day.....but definitely a FUN day

Breakfast:

 I almost always start my morning with a spark and some catalyst and thermoplus. Spark is a mental focus drink packed with vitamins and amino acids.

Catalyst is a supplement that supports muscle tone and enhances strength and energy. Thermoplus is a supplement that helps stimulate the metabolism. All 3 of these items can be purchased at www.advocareteamcatalyst.com

Typically I take those items first thing in the morning and then get ready, but on this particular day I got ready before hand

 30 minutes after I take my supplements, I have my breakfast. On this wednesday I tried the vega choc-o-lat smoothie powder with some ice and some frozen bananas with a little bit of berry flavored sparkling water. MMMMMMM I will be buying a tub of that vega smoothie mix...DELISH!! I picked my packet up at whole foods.

 At this point in the day, I usually fill up my big JUST DRANK gallon container with ice and water. I try to finish this before dinner time every day. My lovely friend, Jena, who you'll see later in this post, purchased this one for me but you can get your own at justdrank.com

It's a great cause!

Lunch:

 For lunch, Jena and I went out to one of our favorite little Thai places here in the Jacksonville/Orange Park, FL area.

  We started with some tea (hot tea for me) and spring rolls, which are fabulous there!! We also had some of the bean sprout soup.

 I had the day's special. Salmon in a very delicious ginger sauce with thai style veggies.

 Jena had a yummy (I know because we are those friends that eat off of each others plates) garlic and ginger chicken  with vegetables and the cutest scoop of rice you ever did see.

 We both treated ourselves to a thai iced coffee =)

After lunch, Jena and I felt like it was a good day for walking around our local hippy friendly stores in the five points area. Midnight sun was our first stop. Here are some of our pics from our adventure.

 There is Jena =) told you that you'd meet her in this blog update. To the left of Jena, you'll see sparkles our unicorn friend.

 We picked up some candles and incense for a friend of ours and then headed over to Jena's place to RELAX before dinner. My Mamma (grandmother) was in town and I took full advantage of her babysitting the kids all day! No way I was going back home before the end of the night lol

Dinner:

Most of my friends and myself love to eat local. Brick is a great restaurant in the riverside area. Great cocktails, great atmosphere, and great food!

 We met up with our friend Tiff for drinks and dinner! We started with champagne to toast to good friends and good times during this deployment (All of us are husbandless to the same command at the moment so we are going through deployment together). Along with our champagne we had a baked brie. Not just any baked brie, but a baked brie topped with a caramel sauce and pecans served with toasted bread, grapes, and strawberries. It was my favorite thing I had there.

 Such a great place to enjoy with friends!!

 We all picked off of each others plate so I can tell you, they were all AMAZING! Jena ordered this Mediterranean salad. Greens, olives, pasta, tomatoes, and fried calamari...OH MY!

 Tiff ordered this big ole stack of yumminess. Layers of beefsteak tomato, mozzarella cheese, and caramelized onions all topped with sea salt, a basil leaf, balsamic vinegar, and olive oil. 

 I ordered the ahi poke salad. OH MAN! Seaweed, horseradish, cabbage, lima beans, mango, ahi tuna, and crisped up wantons. SO GOOD!

We all finished up with a cocktail. Mine was a lemon drop Martini! mmmmmm

After dinner we went over to our friend Nikki's to spend time with her, Julie, and a friend of Nikki's. The the fun at Nikki's was captured on another friend's camera, but I assure you we had a great time ;-}

Hope you had a great week! Stay tuned for my thanksgiving vlog =]

WELP......im living the "single mom" life

Hello everyone!! Deployment has started for us. It was a tough 4 goodbyes...yes 4....between changing takeoff times and broken P3s...we said goodbye to my husband more than once. I think having 4 goodbyes is harder than having just the 1.

I surprisingly held it together ok until the actual hug....my husband is one of those people that just gives a really good hug. For a tall skinny man his hugs are surprisingly bear like. I broke down once more in the car on the way to target (yes of course that was the first place I went after saying goodbye). My oldest son, Larry who is almost 5 cried and that BROKE ME. It was tough!!

Our first night without my hubby went ok. My boys snuggled in my bed and kept me warm and cozy and i went to bed early and got 10 hours of sleep to start the next day with! I did hear from my husband late that next night and have heard from him daily. SO THANKFUL FOR THAT!

On an even happier note...my grandmother..who I call Mamma...not pronounced like momma or mama...and her "wayne"  (My papa passed away in 2008 and for years my grandmother was sad and alone but found someone to spend her time with and while they arent married....it's weird to say boyfriend so he is just a family member named wayne) arrived the day after my husband left and my aunt uncle and 2 of my closest cousins that I grew up with will be here late tomorrow night...woohoo! In addition to that, I've also had a bonfire with my good friend and neighbor, brandi, and have spent time with my bestie, Jena, along with my lovely mommy, daddy, sister, and brother who thankfully this deployment live almost directly behind my house.....YAY! I wont lie...I have spent a large amount of time in target over the past few days too in order to help pass time...lol

Tomorrow is thanksgiving eve and we have a lot of prep to do!!! What are your thanksgiving prep plans and meal plans? And furthermore what is your black friday opinion?

I have gone back and forth on whether or not to go...today it's a no but yesterday I said I was going lol

Part of me wants to snag a sweet deal on a tv and some toys but another part of me wants to stay up late with family and friends drinking and playing games and then sleeping in the next day!!! It skeeves me that stores open on thanksgiving around the time everyone should be with family, but whatever...I guess thats why im not the marketing director of any big store or the ceo of any big company.

Anyways, I WILL BE FILMING ON THANKSGIVING.....eeeeeekk I am so excited to let you in on the excitement that is my family! =) so keep a look out for that...I will be starting a whole new fresh channel...one that's a little more grown up than the one I started 5 years ago..sound good? great!

My new channel/youtube name is TwinklesandTeas

I'll be working on setting it up for the next couple days =)

Talk to you again soon!!

I have been very neglectful!!

I know I know.....the 10 people that even look at this blog are probably soooooooooooooo sad I haven't updated in a while....(SARCASM)

But I get happiness out of it and I have missed it so much....so I am back at it and ready to update the blogger world!

So what has Meighan been up to???....well A LOT.....I have been decorating, working out, cooking, cleaning, taking my oldest son to school every weekday, camping, traveling, trying to perfect our budget, working, shopping and preparing for another deployment...bleeehhhh

My husband leaves soon for deployment *****cue in the "awwwww im sorry"**** no really though its fine...I really dont find deployments to be that bad...we dont fight, we communicate as much as possible, and we still pick up a pencil and actually WRITE each other (I know GASP) and I'm trying to get a routine going BEFORE he leaves so that the adjustment isn't as tough. I am like a machine...I just get through it and get it done...it's our two little boys that I worry about, but hey it is what it is and WE LOVE BEING A MILITARY FAMILY so it's all good in the hoooooood!!! I mean hey what other job moves you to places like sunny florida and hawaii?????? On that note, guess what? We are moving to Hawaii!!!! Not until August 2014 but I AM STOKED!!!!

In other crazy exciting...well not really....news, I am going to be back into doing my youtube channel!!! www.youtube.com/meighantosten

I have so much to talk to you guys about! =] Stay Tuned!

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What I ate Wednesday

It's time for what I ate Wednesday! As I explained a couple posts back, I've lost quite a bit of weight since have my second son and I've just decided to document and talk about it. So the last time I made an entry was before christmas and before my family went on a vacation, a cruise, and a weekend trip to miami. Let me tell you something about key west....key west cupcakes and mattheessens are the devil....so delicious but so bad for you lol...anyways I gave in big time to those two treats and went out and drank with friends that had a mini vacation there with us...alcohol is terrible for ya but sometimes it's a hard thing to stay away from lol. Let me also tell you something about cruises....there is food available 24/7 and 85% of it is too amazing to stay away from! I did use the beautiful gym on board 3 out of the 7 days we were on the ship and I ran 3.1 miles everyone of those days I went in addition I also swam and did loads of activities everyday. Even still, I managed to gain 6 pounds! My husband ate more than I did and never exercised and lost a pound! Miami was full of good food too! UGH! So now it is Jan 23....3 weeks later and I am back to 141 lbs...womp womp...I believe I was at 137 the last time I wrote, but anyways not too too bad. I have been exercising a bit and I have been trying to stay under my calorie intake for the day. Last week was bad...I exercised everyday but also went over my calories everyday and this week I have stayed under but havent exercised much...at least not enough to even bother entering it into myfitnesspal (my username is meighantosten btw!) My husband is on night duty this week and it has thrown my schedule out of wack...Im also insanely busy with miscellaneous errands and appointments all week so it's been a bad workout week for me. Anyways...here's what I ate today!


Breakfast:

Diet Mountain Dew (I have been on an odd diet soda kick lately...and I know it's terrible!)

0 calories

Snack:

water

0 calories

hershey cookies and cream (1/4 of a king size bar)

93 calories

Lunch:

(quesadilla)

1 flour tortilla

210 calories

chicken breast (1oz.)

30 calories

shredded sharp cheddar (1/8 cup)

55 calories

Salsa  (2TBSP)

10 calories

Applewood Bacon (1/2 slice)

23 calories

green onion (.1 cup)

5 calories

Snack:

Extra noodle condensed chicken soup (1/2 cup)

90 calories

Dinner:

(Homemade spaghetti and my famous meatballs)

Pasta sauce (1/2 cup)

80 calories

Ground beef (3oz)

230 calories

White bread (1/2 slice)

30 calories

Shredded Mozzarella (1/8 cup)

40 calories

Spaghetti noodles (1.2 cups)

250 calories

Snack:

Hershey kiss

22 calories

Diet Coke

0 Calories

NET calorie intake 1168 calories

weight today 141

Okay ya'll, I know it has been way too long! I am sorry for the hiatus! As some of you know that subscribe to my youtube channel (youtube.com/meighantosten) or follow my twitter (@meighantosten), my husband came home from a 6 month deployment in december! 2 weeks after he came home we headed down to key west and had some fun with friends and family. After Key West we went on a 7 day cruise that was amazing!! Much needed vacation with all of my close immediate family. =] We spent new years in Miami, and are just now slowing down. So as you can see, The Tosten Family was busy!

We are now adjusting to life with my husband home and trying to get back on a normal schedule all while attempting to stick to our resolutions! Which, by the way, involve saving money. I never realized how hard it would be to save money when you love having friends around and staying busy! We are surrounded by bad influences and we absolutely love to have people over, and we spend a lot of money doing those things. We have decided that we'd like to go on another cruise, make a trip to Pennsylvania, go to disney again this year, and stay at the wilderness lodge for a few days before my husband deploys again. All of those things are quite pricey so the savings begins now if we are going to get to do any of those things!

What were some of your resolutions? Have you stuck to them? What are some things that make sticking to them challenging?

Over the next month I am going to put the time and effort into my youtube and blog. I will be doing a video on my eating habits and workout habits, a monthly favorites video at the end of this month, and my husband and I will be getting back into our fam vlogs and cooking vids!

Thanks for sticking around while I was MIA! See you/talk to you soon!

Meighan ^_^

I APOLOGIZE!

UH I know it has been waaaaaaay too long!!! I promise I will get back on track this week!!!!! So sorry!! I will take the time to explain the hiatus in my next post =]