WEIGHT: 127 lbs.
BMI: 23.0
i have recently acquired quite the ass. now don’t get me wrong, i love my big ol’ booty; after all fat bottomed girls make the rockin world go ‘round-but my butt (see what i did there, hehe) has attracted a lot of attention. my family likes to state it every time i come around,”WOW your ass has gotten HUGE”-oh thank you for telling me- i took a little vacation from my body and i hadn’t noticed (imagine the side eye emoji here). of course, along with the new junk in the trunk, ive got a little extra lovin in the handles, and a teensy bit of side boob *sigh*. since this weight gain is harder to hide than it’s ever been, people seem to think it’s appropriate to mention it. some people even find it acceptable to give me dietary guidelines, “do you really think you need that cookie?”, “that’s a LOT of carbs on your plate.” I’M GETTIN HELLA CLOSE TO PUNCHING SOMEONE IN THE FACE. the strangest part is i am in no way over weight, i’m just slightly heavier than i have been before. my BMI is at a healthy number, i go to yoga 5-6 times a week, and i ran a 5K and didn’t die- i’m in decent shape.
now the point of this post isn’t to rant about my weight gain, it’s about reminding us ladies that weight is a unit of mass- but from a very young age, ladies are taught that weight somehow affects our worth as a woman. there is a 3 pound range of perfection, if you’re over that you’re fat. if you’re under you’re sooo anorexic and/or a coke whore. it’s about other women (and men) thinking it’s okay to comment on your weight as if what they think matters. it’s about the pins on pins on pins of girls posting “skinny recipes”, “BIKINI WORK OUT”, “lose 15 lb with our juice cleanse”. it’s about the Abercrombie and Fitch CEO being comfortable saying his clothes are only for “thin and beautiful people”. Seriously?
i never thought i suffered from this weird weight delusion most girls suffer from, but i do. i have found myself recently taking those “big ass” comments to heart. i wear baggy sweat pants whenever possible, i’ve even wore 2 pairs of spanx on a date (super uncomfortable, i don’t recommend it. very hard to pee.). looking back, i have never, ever been “happy” with my weight. i have covered muffin tops that weren’t there, I have jiggled arm fat in disgust that was not actually arm fat, but skin. i am so used to being self conscious of my weight that i never even noticed it. it doesn’t matter what weight we’re at, we’re constantly trying to look thinner. ladies WHAT GIVES?! can we all decide to stop letting a stupid number run our lives and be happy with our awesomely unique, curvy bodies? these bellies and hips will carry children- these bodies are marvelous, incredible machines, WHY THE HELL ARE WE GLORIFYING SKIN AND BONES, and why are we constantly critiquing one another?! clavicles and hip bones are not sexy, CONFIDENCE is sexy. HEALTHY is sexy. YOU ARE SEXY!
So let me be the first to declare it: i am not ashamed of my weight. i will no longer mumble it in the doctor’s office, i will not be embarrassed if my jeans are a little snug, I WILL EAT THAT DAMN CUPCAKE IN FRONT OF MY DATE IF I WANT IT! i will gladly, and shamelessly post my current weight on the internet for all the world to see. JUDGE ME.
and the next time someone mentions my big ass i will respond with what i’m really thinking, “i know, it’s freaking awesome isn’t it?”
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I have said “it’s not fair” a million times in the last few weeks. It seems to be my response for everything lately. It’s not fair people we love die- that good, promising lives are cut short for no reason at all. It’s not fair some people are starving to death, while others have such excess. It’s not fair that I’m healthy, and there are perfect, beautiful babies that are not. It’s not fair that we discriminate and judge one another because of who we are. I want to stomp my feet like a toddler and and throw a tantrum, pound my fists against the floor and cry until the universe caves in and says, “You’re right, it’s not fair! No one will suffer anymore and everything will be perfect!”. But, that’s the thing, the universe doesn’t care. It is not spiteful, or out for revenge- it’s just truly indifferent. It keeps moving, come hell or high water. The sun rises and sets, the waves hit the shore, babies are born, your heart keeps beating until it stops. We have no more control of the universe than the trees or stars do. We are simply on a ride. A crazy, beautiful, tragic, surprising, unexplainable ride.
So, instead of stomping my feet and protesting the unfairness of life, I will enjoy this ride. I will embrace every feeling I experience. The fear, the joy, the anger, the sadness and the love. I will change what I can and accept what I cannot. I will be thankful for all of the people who have crossed my path, whether we share a lifelong journey, or a few fleeting moments. I will find the things that bring me joy, and fill my life with them. I will stop putting blame and anger back into the world when something terrible happens, instead I will fight the darkness with light and love. I will also stand on the side of love whenever I can.
I am going to take it all for what it’s worth, and enjoy it all as much as I can.
This week marks my forth week of regular yoga classes. I seriously cannot believe I’ve stuck to something consistently for an entire month, that is VERY un-Marina like. But that’s the thing about yoga: it’s addicting. Getting to my mat is by far my favorite part of day. I usually go to class around 7- and by 3 I’m ITCHING to get to the studio.
I am in the VERY early stages of my study, but I cannot believe how much it has already changed my perspective on life. It was like a switch has been flipped. So I decided I’ll share my journey, and encourage others to join me :)
Here is what I have learned so far:
If it doesn’t make you uncomfortable, you’re not getting anything out of it.
Let’s talk about Utkatasana (Chair pose). This is my “oh no, please not this” pose. You see before I started going to hot yoga, I had never actually felt my muscles “burn”. As soon as my body started to feel uncomfortable doing something, I would stop whatever I was doing. So, when my teacher had us in utkatasana on my first day of class, I wanted out as soon as my legs started to ache. That is when he said, “When you start to feel uncomfortable, and you still decide to go deeper into the pose - that is yoga”. I held it, and held it, and held it. MY GOD IT ACTUALLY FELT LIKE MY THIGHS WERE ON FIRE!!!!! But I held it, and when the moment passed I had never felt more proud of myself in my entire life. I literally had the BIGGEST grin my mouth could possibly form. These moments still creep up every day on my mat, I could half ass the pose and get by, or I can face the discomfort, embrace the pain- and let it pass, and when it does have the most satisfying feeling of accomplishment imaginable.
Acknowledge the feeling, then let it pass.
Being raised in an Italian/Catholic family I know two feelings: guilt & shame. When I mess up, I feel guilty. I react towards my negative actions or thoughts, with more negative actions and thoughts. I’ll let a 2 minute blip of embarrassment, or anger be the focus of my entire day. It’s a cycle of negativity!! Yoga has taught me that it is okay to acknowledge whatever feeling you are having. Whether it is fear, failure, pride, or anger. But once you have acknowledged that feeling- let. it. go. Do not sit there and get MAD at yourself for getting MAD. Just let the feeling come up, and pass. Turn the light inside yourself back on and let it drown the darkness.
Your ego is trouble, trouble, trouble!!!
99.9999999999% of the time I don’t do something because I am afraid to fail. The “What ifs” run my life. What if I look stupid? What if I embarrass myself? What if I fall? One of the most challenging parts of yoga is not letting your ego interrupt your practice. Something as simple as taking an easier modification of a pose if you are not ready to do the full pose is a challenge because of our egos. “I don’t want to look stupid, everyone else is doing the full pose.” That moment you look at yourself in the mirror and think “my arms are SOO big and flabby”-that’s your ego. There is no shame in wherever you are in life, or in your practice. Once you can let go of your ego, you will find true peace…..too bad that’s the hardest part of life.
I am so much greater than I ever imagined.
I spent 23 years of my life talking myself down. I wasn’t smart enough, pretty enough, good enough, confident enough, talented enough, brave enough. I had talked myself into believing these things when NONE of them were true. I am truly my own worst enemy. As I sit on my mat, usually at the end of the day, in a hot, humid room I acknowledge the fact that I made it there to practice! I am enough just because I came when I had a million excuses not to. I am enough when I want to stop SO bad, but I keep pushing. I am enough when I have to stop, because I am tired, or thirsty. I have found even when I fail- I feel a million times better than when I never tried. Who knew that pushing yourself 3 more breathes in a pose could allow you to see how GREAT you truly are?
1. Taking a nap if I got 8 hours of sleep the night before.
2. Putting off the dishes for “tomorrow”.
3. Pressing the snooze button 2,3,4,5,6,7 times.
4. Impulse purchases.
5. Avoiding returning/ making phone calls.
6. Making a to do list and NOT doing anything on it.
7. Treating my car as my personal garbage dump.
8. Not going to the gym because I don’t want to have to wash my hair.
9. Credit card debt.
10. Not filling up my tank with gas until my gas light’s on.
11. Not trying something because I’m too scared I’ll fail.
12. Any sort of excuse making.
13. Not taking care of myself by: putting poison food in my body because it’s easy, being lazy, caving in to peer pressure, not treating my body like the temple that it is.
14. Treating those around me with less respect than I demand for myself.
15. Being late for work.
16. Feeling inadequate.
17. Passing judgement.
18. Eating because I’m bored.
19. Watching TV from the time I get home from work, until the time I go to bed.
20. Being sad for no good reason.
21. Not taking time every, single day to meditate.
22. Counting the dogs getting loose in the hallway when I open the door as their “daily exercise”.
23. Filling my life with material things to bring myself satisfaction and happiness.
24. Being insecure.
25. Overwhelmingly messy, unorganized apartments.
26. Saying “no” to things because I’m too lazy, or tired, or scared.
27. Giving 50% when I should/could be giving 100%.
28. Putting out negative energy.
29. Not wearing my nice clothes because I don’t feel like ironing them.
30. Spending all of my time wanting what others have, instead of spending my time working towards those things.
31. Buying more books on my Kindle when I have 7 in queue.
32. NOT brushing up on my Italian.
33. Not taking the time to look my best every day.
34. Going to bed without washing my face.
35. Taking the easy way out.
36. Being a hypocrite.
37. Setting my standards low because it’s easier.
38. Pushing people away.
39. Finding the negative in every situation instead of the positive.
40. Binge eating.
41. Biting my nails.
42. Putting hand wash only clothes in the washer, and putting my good knives, pots, & pans in the dishwasher.
43. Not being honest with myself/ others.
44. Avoiding/ tuning out constructive criticism/ taking offense to it.
45. Loving lazily.
46. Not living in New York City.
47. Keeping negative people in my life.
48. Being selfish.
49. Being mediocre.
50. Not taking advantage of my blessings, and opportunities in my life.
it’s almost christmas, but it’s just not the same as it used to be. in honor of the holidays i felt like reminiscing. so i put together a list of my favorite childhood toys. is it weird that i remember chewing on 90% of the toys on this list? oral fixation much? any whoooo, hope this list makes you feel all warm and fuzzy inside.
ALPHIE
My best friend Jennifer had one of these at her old house. I very clearly remember playing with it before I got yelled at and put in time out for unplugging the Christmas lights.
GOOEY LOUIE
My mom wouldn’t let my brother and i have this because she said it was “disgusting”. WHAT-EVER MOM, TALK TO THE HAND!!! my cousins had it though, so we played with it at their house.
DEAR DIARY
One of the many signs I had ADHD as a child was that I would constantly forget the password and never be bale to open my secret diary. I probably reset the stupid things more than I unlocked it with the pass code…so frustrating for a absent minded little girl.
FISHER PRICE KITCHENS:
It is important to note, I had a little tikes play kitchen (the one with the coffee pot), THIS one was Jennifer’s- this kitchen was also used as Cubbies- the most well thought out, successful, and long lived pretend restaurant ever run by 7-10 year olds. I believe a specialty was spaghetti and strawberry ice cream….
LISA FRANK ERASERS
Again, I really just remember always chewing on these, BUT they were pretty cool. Everyone had to have them and they were considered a TOP NOTCH party favor. If you were lucky, sometimes they would be scented. Also, they were never to be used for erasing.
FISHER PRICE ROLLER SKATES
These were dangerous. The wheels were too little, so every tiny rock was a death trap. I once pushed nicky when he had these one and he fell really hard. im sorry nicky….
BABY ALL GONE
THE CHERRIES SMELLED LIKE CHERRIES! This was an awesome doll. I wonder how the cherries disappeared…just kidding the really loud “click” gave it away… To add on to the things I ingested that I shouldn’t have, I bit a whole through the bottle and drank some of the “disappearing pink milk”. It tasted like poison…because it probably was.
PRETTY PRETTY PRINCESS
The official game of choice for any 4-9 girl’s birthday party.
CAT’S CRADLE
We spent hours upon upon hours playing with a piece of string….a $14.99 piece of string.
PUPPY SURPRISE
You opened up the dog’s stomach and out popped a surprise number of puppies. I had three, one of my friends got 5!! I was soooo jealous….
SCENTED STAMP MARKERS
puppy footprints that smelled like chocolate??? I THINK YES!
DOCTOR’S KIT
Please tell me I wasn’t the only one who would put the cast on and try to “trick” people into thinking I really broke my arm?
FASHION PLATES
I seriously thought this was what fashion designers did….until I went to fashion school.
HIT CLIPS
Because everyone wants to hear the same 30 seconds of their favorite song…over…and over…and over….
SKY DANCER
These things were awesome until you did it in the house and it hit the ceiling and the arm broke off and then the fun was over.
COOL MC DONALDS TOYS!
Remember you could dress them in different outfits?
SKIP IT
You would spend days getting the counter up to like a BAJILLION and then your little brother would want to try and erase the counter……and you’d have to start all over again!!!
CHARACTER UNDIES:
Don’t act like you didn’t/don’t still wear them.
TIGER HANDHELD GAMES
The sound effects on these and the picture quality was unreal…
MY SIZE BARBIE
The best way to scare the crap out of a little girl when she wakes up to go to the bathroom in the middle of the night at a slumber party…nooo of course that didn’t happen to me….(may or may not have peed my pants).
REPTAR
REPTARRRRRR!!!!!!!
GAK
Gak was banned along with silly putty in my house after i got a whole jar of it stuck on a couch cushion and thought i’d be sneaky and just flip the cushion over. needless to say, i got caught.
STRETCH ARMSTRONG
definitely chewed on this, too.
TAMAGOTCHI
Remember racing home from school to make sure your mom had cleaned up his poop while you were gone?? because if she forgot it would die and he was like 3 days old!!!!
MY FIRST CELLPHONE….
It had snake. Which is still hands down, the BEST phone game EVER.
What toys were your favorite??
Im a vegetarian. I don’t eat anything that once took a breath. I don’t eat stock that comes from the bones of things that once breathed. The meat industry is cruel and disgusting.
In fact, the dairy industry is just as cruel- forcing cows to become pregnant again and again, injecting them with hormones (which THEN end up in our bodies) so they produce more milk. i’m beginning to feel increasingly guilty for supporting the dairy industry. but there’s a problem: I am OBSESSED with dairy. After I go running, I need to drink a glass of milk to quench my thirst. I LOVE cheese(as long as there’s no animal rennet in it- but that’s another post), i put it on EVERYTHING. I’m pretty sure the calcium deposits under my eyes are from how much freakin’ dairy I consume. I needed to find a happy medium.
So I did. I researched extensively to find a small, family owned dairy farm that treated their cows with respect and not like milk producing machines. Believe it or not, there aren’t as many of these dairy farms in Upstate NY as you might think. I ended up asking the owners of Albany’s “All Good Bakers” for advice. They are a wonderful, family owned bakery that only serves local food. They also source all of their ingredients (which is AWESOME). They told me all about Meadow Brook farms (I posted their blog entry at the bottom that goes through their summer visit to Meadow Brook, check it out!), and I liked what I saw.
So as my first step to eating dairy with a good conscious was making my own butter (obviously….)
It took 20 minutes, and the hardest part was getting the the freakin top of the food processor to lock!!!
In case you want to make your own, here’s how I did it:
1.) Go buy some LOCAL, fresh heavy cream from the store.
2. Take out an electric mixer, a food processor, or a jar with a lid (yeah im serious) and dump your heavy cream in. (***you will only have 1/2 as much butter as you do cream!)
3. Turn on the mixer, food processor, or if youre using a jar, START SHAKIN BUDDY!!!!
The process is fastest in the food processor, slowest shaking it yourself.
After a moment, you’ll have whipped cream- it’s tempting BUT DON’T STOP NOW!!…okay, okay, have a taste- it’s delicious.
4. Keep that baby blending, and you’ll start to see the consistency change. You’ll hear a difference too- little pieces are butter are starting to form (the fat of the cream is separating from the milk!) Keep mixing until it forms a loose ball. Then drain out the liquid. This my friends is buttermilk. Not the tangy kind you get at the store, but definitely the kind you want to put in your muffins, or- BUTTERMILK PANCAKE BATTER!! Put the buttermilk in the fridge, covered, ASAP. and use within the next day or two.
5. Now that you have a ball of butter it’s tempting to just eat it- and you can. But if you wanna keep it good for more than just the night, it’s important to “wash” the butter to get all the excess milk products off. You can do this by adding a half cup of ICE COLD**super important that it’s ICE COLD** water into the processor and run it. Drain the water. Repeat this until the water runs clear.
It’s also important to use a spatula to work the butter while you do this (while the machine is off) to make sure all of the water is out of the butter).
6. NOW YOU HAVE FREAKIN’ BUTTER!!!!! Keep it in a bowl, or wrap it in wax paper and store in the fridge. It’s good for about a week, or freeze it for up to a month.
It’s delicious, and easy, and there are NO preservatives, or chemicals. Check out the ingredients in Land O’ Lakes butter:
And in your homemade butter: Heavy cream.
UM YUMMMMM.
(Source: fromscratchclub.com)
I GRADUATED IN MAY! (that is a sad exclamation NOT an enthusiastic one) i know, the saddest news you’ve ever heard, right? instead of sleeping in until 1:30 and getting drunk for school functions, and binge eating at 3 am, my life now consists of commutes, laundry and bills. a SHIT TON of bills, and 401ks and taxes…it’s like a nightmare, except it’s real and it’s not going to be over anytime in the foreseeable future.
i’m in a serious bout of depression and the only way i can think to cope is to blog about how amazing my life was up until a few months ago. oh the golden days… here are some suggestions for those of you who are still in college. i didn’t take full of advantage of all these things, so PLEASE PLEASE for the love of God learn from my mistakes…
enjoy college, and take LOTS of pictures. it’ll be over faster than you know, and the real world SUCKS.
It’s angel face’s birthday on June 24th, so I thought i’d give everyone a heads up on what she asked for for her BIG FIRST BIRTHDAY!!!!!
Barkin Bandito Plush Toys, $15, trixieandpeanut.com
Just like her mama, Lola loves tequila and cigars.
Pink Feather Canopy Bed, $266, beyondthecrate.com
So the princess can sleep in a princess bed.
Pinot Leasheo Canine Wine, $23, bitchnewyork.com
Every girl needs some wine with dinner, and a nice light and crisp “pinot leasheo” should pair wonderful with lola’s white fish based dog food.
Mule Deer Hard Antler Chew, $17.50 per piece, elkusa.com
The beast chews through everything, we’ve resorted to antlers- she puts a dent in them but has a harder time breaking them down. She’s such a real dog.
Dog Playground, $21,000, dont ask me to source this, i just googled it.
Madison Square Dog Park isn’t cutting it for Lolita baby. I think it’s time she has her own private park to play on.
Wilson 3 dozen Baseballs, $119, amazon.com
She eats through baseballs pretty quickly, so the more we have the better.