All Aboard! It's Divine Friday!

Salutations!! 

Congratulations on making it through another work week! Its Divine Friday so let's have some fun. How does Divine Friday work, Sparkle? Everyday, I try to find The Divine in my everyday life and take a picture. I choose which one I think is the best and I share it here with you guys! I post it on my Instagram and Pinterest using the hashtag #DivineFriday. You should join in the fun too! Just snap a shot of whatever made you smile this week and share it on your Instagram or whatever social media of your choosing. Sounds easy, right? :)

So last week I was on my way home from work and everyday I have to cross over the train tracks to get to my destination. On this particular day I got caught by the train! Sometimes when I'm in a hurry I get aggravated by having to wait on the train. But on this day I saw the beauty in the train. The Divine. So I rolled down my window, stuck my phone out, and snapped  the shot as it was passing by!  

Trains have always had this mysterious quality to me. I don't really know why, but I tend to be drawn to them. One of these days I will take a real train trip somewhere! Maybe a nice long trip to the West Coast. :) I can see it now.. Me and The Boo will be all snuggled up sitting in our seats next to the window enjoying the scenery.  And of course I will have my writing utensils, camera, and a novel to read. 

Where did you find beauty this week? Show us and use #DivineFriday! Have a great weekend everyone!! 

Ciao! 

Top 5 Ways to be Productive

Hey Peeps! 

I hope that everyone has had a great week so far!  With it being the beginning of the month, it's been super nutso busy at work. Not being your own boss tends to take a toll on you and that got me inspired and thinking about the best ways to be productive. One of the things I want to do is look into Kabbage.com! They are a great company that gives loans to small businesses (Yay!) and they pride themselves on helping entrepreneurs increase productivity. They have all sorts of information on their website and blog, giving you tips & tricks on how to be a successful business owner and I'm excited to dive in! I know everyone has different tactics on how to get things done, but I thought I'd share what works for me! Here are my Top 5:

My Vision Board by ptyfashvic

• Make a List ~ Whether it be on paper or vision board, make sure you have a clear and concise list of things that you want to get accomplished. Quite personally I like making vision boards. Using Polyvore makes it really easy to do this. Or if you want to take it old school, you can sit down with some scissors, glue, and cut outs and paste away on poster board!

• Find a Hiding Place ~ Do you ever have it in your mind to go home and get everything under the Sun completed? Yeah me too, but it doesn't happen. Why? Because there are too many distractions at home. There's always something that needs to be cleaned, or moved, or called about, or something to be done for someone else. You have to find what I like to call your hiding place! Starbucks is my hiding place. I can go in there and grab something yummy to drink and not be worried about what it is I need to get done at home. Plus, if you hang out at Starbucks then you're automatically a kool kid!:o)

• Set a Time Limit  ~ I'm a person that hates to waste time. Deciding how long you want to work on your projects allows you to maximize the most out of your free time. And let's be honest, with the way the world works nowadays you want to use every second you can wisely! 

• Get Some Rest Baby! ~ Yeah yeah, I know..  You've heard it all before, but for really reals it helps! I can't even tell you how many times I've felt like a dunce all because I was sleep deprived. But when I'm really awake (and not coffee awake) and rested I perform so much better. Get.That.Beauty.Rest.

• Have the Right Tools ~ You can't get anything done without all the correct supplies, right? Right! If your hiding place is outside of your home, then make sure you pack a (cute) bag with everything that you're going to need to get the job done. 

Now these are just my ways of getting things done. What do you like to do to get in the zone and scratch things off the list? Let me know!

Ciao!

They're a Knockout!

Salutations!

We made it friends! It’s finally Friday and I dunno about you, but I’m so ready for the weekend!! Tomorrow I’ll be zooming down the race track in a Lexus RC F! Being that I’m originally from Indiana, I kinda have a thing for racing. It’s not a hardcore passion or anything, but I do enjoy watching it every now and then and playing racing video games. I won’t have to pretend I’m on a racetrack tomorrow though! It will be the real in living color thing. I’m geeked!

I'll be zooming down the track in this puppy right here.

~ photo source ~

In-between everything that has gone on this week, a little Divinity decided to pop out in full force. If you missed the first one, here is last weeks find! I saw this little bloom early one the morning and it seemed to be trying it’s best to touch the sky. They are called knockout roses, supposedly because the rain makes them shrink (or knocks them out) and the sun opens them back up! It had rained that morning and so by that afternoon, it had opened up (due to the sun shinning brightly) welcoming all that passed by to revel in its beauty. I love really bright colors, especially in flowers. Whenever I see things like this it just makes me smile.

When I’m out and about I’m always looking for Divinity moments. A lot of times for me, it happens early in the morning when the sun rises and there is a light fog just hanging around and plush dew drops are on the blades of grass.

Did you find The Divine lurking in unknown places that you didn't expect this week? Normally they just pop out at me at random times,  but I think because I was looking for them they came out more than usual. I've already tagged my photo with #DivineFriday on Instagram. Have you? Check out what other people are posting and 'heart' their photos. Let's spread the love.  :)

Ciao! 

Portion Control

Salutations all!

I hope that everyone is having a great day thus far!  Mine was rather wacky and stressful, but I took it all in stride. :) I'm actually quite proud of myself really. Normally when I'm aggravated or upset I just want to soothe it with a nice big meal or junk food. It acts as a salve of sorts, ya know? A yummy salve that generally involves some sort of cheesy goodness! ha ha. However, I decided to take a different path. 

The thing that I realized about how I was eating and how I'm eating now, is that I feel much better in my own skin. And quite frankly I feel more confident! Whenever I've tried to live a healthier life in the past, I was successful because I followed the rules. Unfortunately (since I gained it all back) I don't think I really noticed that I felt better and not so heavy and weighed down. 
~ pun intended :op ~

I'm still struggling with portion sizes, specifically for dinner but I think I'm starting to grasp things better. For any of you struggling with portions like myself, Everyday Health has 10 great tips to help with portion control. You'd be surprised by what you think a serving size is as opposed to what it really is. Here are a few tips they have..

Learn how to estimate serving sizes. ‘Ballpark’ food portion sizes by estimating serving sizes in comparison to known objects,” says Rose Clifford, RD, clinical dietitian in the department of pharmacy services at the Washington Hospital Center in Washington, DC. “For example, three ounces of cooked meat, fish, or poultry is about the size of a deck of cards.” Other easy measurements to eyeball include:

• ½ cup is the size of an ice cream scoop
• 1 cup is the size of a tennis ball
• 1 ounce of cheese is the size of a domino

 Use portion control dishware. Pick out smaller plates, bowls, cups, and glassware in your kitchen and measure what they hold. You might find that a bowl you thought held 8 ounces of soup actually holds 16, meaning you’ve been eating twice what you planned.

If you want to check out the rest of the tips, you can go here to check things out and snoop around. What other tips and tricks do you use to control your portions? Let us know!

Ciao!

Weekly Wishes #25

 Greetings Friends!
 

Its that time again for weekly wishes! Did you set any goals for last week? If so, how did they go? Are you just joining me? Let me explain what happens for Weekly Wishes..

The Happenings: You share your weekly, monthly, or yearly goals/wishes/achievements and you get to be a part of this big group of people that are doing the same thing. Yay! Wanna join in? Check out The Nectar Collective and add a link to your blog!

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Happy Monday all! Look at me.. I'm actually doing my Weekly Wishes post on a Monday. :) Yay! I hope you had a great weekend. I stayed pretty busy by going to the movies, doing a little shopping, and going to The Taste of Atlanta. For years now, I've been wanting to go to THE Taste of Chicago! People have always raved about it since forever.. I kinda feel like I don't have to go anymore since there is one in Atlanta now. ::: shrugs ::: In truth I'll probably still go at some point, just to see what the hype is all about. Plus, who doesn't love a trip to The Windy City? Did you get all of your goals accomplished from last week?

Last Weeks Wishes

• Okay, so I didn't do any studying for coding last week... BUT! I did just do some before we started having this little conversation. Or rather, I tried to.. there are some buffering issues. I'll work it out later.

• I talked about journaling and meditating last week. I didn't do it everyday, but I did get some in. Still in a win in my eyes. I used to do some hard core journaling when I was younger. I'm talking about writing every.single.day. Everything was such a big deal back then and it seemed worthy of writing it down. I guess my memoir has already been written! Hee hee..

• I needed to make a coaster and cup warmer set last week and I totally knocked it out of the park. In fact, I made two. I wasn't all that happy with the color combos, hence how the 2nd one was born. I told the guy I was making them for that he could choose either one. He actually ended up buying them both to my delight (and surprise)! Somebody high five me! ^5 :)

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This Weeks Wishes

• I've really been pushing myself to stay up late, for whatever reason. I suppose that I'm just trying to get a little bit more time out of the day. I've been paying for it, so now it's time to get some rest! It's no fun waking up in a pool of drool because you were sleeping so hard from self inflicted exhaustion. lol. 
  
  

• I've got quite a few crochet projects going on right now and I'd really like to do a little bit of work on them everyday. I can't say that this will be a very hard goal since I am addicted to crocheting, but a worthy goal nonetheless.

  

I'm calling this one a lite week. My brain is kinda full at the moment trying to figure out some things. I hope that you have great goals this week and get them all accomplished. :)


Ciao!

 

Beauty is Everywhere

Greetings friends!

I think Friday is the perfect day for a little beauty and inspiration. You can really find beautiful things anywhere you are whether it be in a city, out in the country or in nature. It's been said that when you notice or see something beautiful, then you are seeing The Divine right here on earth. I thought I would share my divine moment here with you today. 

Everyday I'm at work I see these plants. I'm not really sure what they are but they always look so beautiful, especially in the late morning when the sun is high in the sky. When I see them it's almost like they're glowing with this beautiful energy that surrounds them. Looking at them makes me  think of walking through a great big field of wildflowers and just lazing about and enjoying the day. 

Hey friends... How about we start a thing together? Let's make it an Instagram situation! I'm going to start taking pictures of the beautiful things that I see day to day and post them here on Friday's. I'll also share them on my Instagram @ASparkleThe1 using the hashtag 

#DivineFriday.

I look forward to seeing all of your pictures! Today and everyday, go forth looking for the beautiful things in your life! Have a great weekend!

Ciao!

Meal Planning

Greetings Friends!

It's weight loss Wednesday yet again and today's topic is food glorious food! I've recently started back trying to really watch what I eat. From the different things that I've read, quite a few recommend not counting calories and that there's no need to if you are eating healthy whole foods. Let's be real here... That's all great in theory, but in this food obsessed nation that's all a magical magical lie!

Losing weight is all about expending more energy than calories consumed, right? Right.

And what's that called?

Math!

What do you do with math??

You count!

Now were back to counting calories...

Now don't get me wrong, that might be the way to go once you've mastered adding those 5-6 fruits and vegetables and 8 glasses of H2O into your everyday diet. As for my beginner ass, that's not gonna work so much.. My mind says, "Oh! We're not counting calories? Okay.. Let's not count that foot-long chili cheese dog and fries, because it's okay. We're not counting anyway. Bwahaha!"


I will admit something to you. Just like an adolescent boy that thinks about sex every other minute, I too do this... but with food! The hamster wheel goes something like this:

• 7 AM ~ I should eat breakfast, although I'm not hungry. It is the most important meal of the day after all.  
• 8:30 AM ~ Hmm.. is it time to eat again?? They say your body goes into starvation mode after 2-3 hrs. Oh! It's not 9:30 yet? I'll wait till then.
• 9:25 AM ~ Well, it's close enough to 9:30. I'm gonna snack now. Nom Nom Nom.
• 11:00 AM ~ Damn! Why didn't I pack another snack??? Lunch isn't until 1 PM and I'm starving! I'll just grab one fun size Snicker bar from the candy lady. It's only 50 calories. It's fine.
• 11:30 AM ~ Aw, man.... I ate 3 fun size Snickers. Probably shouldn't have done that.
• 1 PM ~ Whoo Hoo! Sweet freedom it's finally lunch time! Whaaaaaaaaaaaaat dooooooo IIIIIIII eaaaaaaaat!?! I can't decide on what to eat and my precious lunch hour is whittling away. I'll just grab some Wendy's since it's close by. I should get a 'healthy' sub from Subway, but I really don't want that. I want that burger I saw on tv last night! Yes... that will be really good.
• 1:45 PM ~ WHYYYYYY? Why did I eat that big burger and fries. Now I feel sleepy and heavy and bloated. Okay. Let's just get some coffee to make it through the afternoon.

Etc, etc, etc.. on and on it goes! All day. Every day. Sounds exhausting, no? This is the plight of the emotional eater. :) So what can we do to fix this problem?

Meal Plan

It's comes down to that old saying of "Fail to plan and you plan to fail". It's so much easier for me not to obsess about food when I already know what I'm eating throughout the day. If you're like me, here are some great links to help you get started! 

Wiki-How has a very detailed process on how to meal plan.

Loved Parade's explanation of meal planning. They make it like a smooth and easy process.  

Eating Well tells you what to eat, if you don't want to have to think about it.

You can be walked through it in baby steps with Organized Home.


So do you do meal planning? I've found that I really like it, because all I have to do is follow the plan. 


Ciao!