Guest Bathroom Makeover

So I am a big fan of neutral walls because I love the fact that I can add any colored decor I want and it will work. Its great that I can change a lot of my color scheme without having to repaint!  I have a tendency to change things around in my house fairly often so this idea works out well for me. I originally was going to just add yellow with the gray and black but once again my fabulous sister Andrea who is great with colors suggested I add another color for interest. I would not have never chosen to add teal to this color scheme but I am loving the way it all came together!

             After

I bought a cheap picture frame than painted and sanded it for that distressed look. For the little pop of blue on my towels, I just cut some of the material I used for my decorative balls and pinned it onto the towel.

Simple soap dispenser makeover. I just used some old scrapbook paper I had to cover the dial label than used packing tape to stick it on.

              Great cheap way to add color to your decor without a permanent commitment. Just stuff  with material.

            Love the way these look when the light captures them.

                                                                                  

Linked to- craft-o-maniac,52 Mantels, A stylish little lady, A little tipsy, chic on a shoestring decorating,The Shabby Nest,,Blissful andDomestic,tatertots and jello, six sisters stuff,Craft-O-Maniac,The shady porch ,a pinch of joy, remodelaholic, fine craft guild,classyclutter,somedaycrafts,sugarbeecrafts,uncommondesignsonline,michellepaige, itsybitsypaperblog,whitelightsonwednesday,  always crafting, notjustahousewife,nightowlcrafting, creatingreallyawesomefreethings,alderberryhill,

whipperberry, gingersnapcrafts,tipjunkie,homestories a to z,positivelysplendid,centsationalgirl,under the table dreaming,thewinthropchronicles,Grated,teaganstravels

Serendipity

In general I totally eat healthy and love the benefits of doing so. However I do believe in balance!  Treats and fattening food are meant to be enjoyed within reason. So when we go out to eat it is a treat  and I do not hold back! No watching the calories and fat content in any way! I usually always end up getting the most fattening food on the menu. I seriously love me some good Fettuccine Alfredo and  great bread to go along with it. Oh and if it is a new place that I haven't been to before, I have to try their dessert no matter how full I am! I have heard people talk about the restaurant Serendipity for months and I knew we had to go check it out. We went with some  good friends of ours and we all made sure to order something different to try out. The food was great but I really loved their frozen hot chocolate! Sugar has always been my weakness of mine. However after overindulging like I always look forward to eating healthy again.

                                                                Yellow wedged shoes-Rhapsodielle
                                                                Green blouse-F21
                                                                  Belt-F21
                             

                                                    linked to-The pleated Poppy,momma go round,The letter 4,Rolled up Pretty,Transatlantic Blonde

Best lower body exercises workout #10

What do most women want? A nice toned lower body! If you are like most real women this is probably your struggle area. Whether you feel your legs are too skinny or you struggle to keep weight off in that area. To tone that all up takes work!  Not just training those muscles properly but eating right. 80% of seeing results in your shape is your diet!! As most of you well know there is no such thing as spot reduction. No amount of squats sit-ups etc. can get you good results without proper nutrition. If you are on lean side and want to tone up you need to make sure your eating enough and properly. Same rules apply if your trying to shed weight, your calorie intake of course will be lower, but you need to fuel your body with the right amount of calories, protein, fat, carbs etc. I will go more in detail about that another time.
         I designed this workout with 3 of my  personal favorite leg exercises. These exercises coupled with good nutrition and  cardio will get you seeing  great results!

Workout plan 
Duration-20min
Equipment- 5-25lb dumbbells
Do the whole workout all the way through and repeat 3 times.


Jump rope- 1 min
Deadlift -15 reps
Jump rope- 1 min
Walking lunges-30 reps( 15 each leg)
Jump rope- 1 min
Squats-25 reps

Deadlift:
I am demonstrating the starting position of picking up the weights. When you  squat back down for the rest of the reps you will not have the weights touch the ground but the weight should come  close (level with the mid to lower part of your shin depending on your strength level.) Make sure to keep chin up and look forward, shoulders pulled back so that your back will be straight (rounding your back will hurt it) Stand up straight pushing through the heels and squeezing your Glutes. This exercise targets your Hamstrings, Glutes,  Lower back and Quads.

Walking lunge:
Make sure to keep your chest up and look forward to keep your back strait. As you lunge forward your back foot should always push through the toe going into the next step. This exercise targets your Glutes, Quads,Hamstings and Calfs

Squats:
Legs shoulder width apart, look forward, chest up. When you squat down go slow counting 3 seconds and when you are coming up from the squat this will be quicker. Make sure to push through your heals and squeeze your Glutes. This exercise targets your Quads, Glutes and Hamstings.

With all these exercises as you are able to do them with proper form and as they get easier , you may be ready to increase your weight.



Disclaimer

Country Crock:Beautiful Butterflies Recipe

              


This post is sponsored by Country Crock. I was selected for this opportunity as a member of Clever Girls Collective, and the content and opinions expressed here are all my own.

                

Doesn't this butterfly made out of veggies look super appetizing?! If you have been following  my recipes  that I post here on my blog, you will know that I generally cook a lot of healthy foods for myself  and my family. However I am always on the hunt to find and try new healthy recipes that will not just sound good to me but will be appealing to my family as well. When I saw the  Clare Crespo Cookbook I was excited to find new fun ways to cook veggies for my kids to eat. This cookbook is full of fun, whimsical step-by-step recipes that your whole family would enjoy and the beautiful bright and cheery pictures of the recipes are very inspiring. Love how there is no need to hide the veggies. You just need to simply season it right with Country Crock, salt pepper,and  herbs being a lot of the main ingredients. So simple, healthy and delicious! I have never made any sort of shape out of my veggies so my kids thought this was the coolest and they were more enticed to try it.
     

Seriously one of my new favorite seasonings. WHY? Well not only does it taste delicious but it has 70% less saturated fat and 30% few calories than butter, 0g of trans fat!

     Ok this is shameful to admit but I never eat squash however, I am now addicted!

Here is the dinner I made inspired by the Beautiful Veggie Butterfly. Grilled chicken that I first marinated in a 30 min garlic and herb marinade and faux mashed potatoes made out of a cooked head of cauliflower, country crock butter, milk, handful of shredded cheese and salt and pepper.



                                                                  Ingredients 
                                                                   { for butterflies}

                                                    6 small or medium crookneck squash
                                                    3 Tbsp. Country Crock Spread
                                                    2 Tbsp. finely chopped garlic
                                                   12 baby carrots
                                                    4 chives (cut in 24 1/2 inch pieces)
                                                    2Tbsp. finely chopped assorted fresh herbs (Parsley,Mint                              
                                                    Terragon, Dill)
                                                    1/8 tsp. of salt
                                                    1/8 tsp. of pepper
                                   
Slice fat part of squash into 24 slices (save the necks for another recipe).Melt Country Crock® Spread in large skillet. Add garlic and cook until golden, about 5 minutes. Add squash and carrots, sauté until tender,about 7 minutes.Arrange carrots on serving dish or individual plates. Place two squash rounds on either side of carrots. Using a toothpick, poke two holes in the tops of each carrot and insert chive pieces as
“antennae.”Sprinkle remaining herbs on squash “wings.” Add salt and pepper.


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Are you looking for quick and simple tips and recipes to make serving veggies more fun? Download the free Clare Crespo Cookbook here for fun and whimsical recipes your family is sure to love!

Easter Traditions

This last week has been awesome! The kids had spring break and we spent a lot of time outdoors. Started off the week by getting an early Easter present for the boys which was a trampoline. Having all boys and the amazing amount of energy they possess, I have been asking myself why we didn't own a trampoline sooner! I have never seen them get so worn out. Its been great! The rest of the week they spent time playing with friends, going to a  museum than headed out  out of town for a day to visit my Brother and Sis in Law. That was my favorite part of the week as my brother lives in the small town and there is nothing to do but enjoy the outdoors and the quietness.
     Easter was such a perfect way to end our great week together as a family. This is probably one of my favorite holidays mainly because of what the holiday is all about but also because we have some really great Easter traditions that we look forward to every year. The Saturday before Easter all of out extended family gets together for an Easter party at a park. We stuff ourselves with great food, have a big Easter egg hunt for the kids and end the party with a water balloon fight. Always good times. Also another tradition  we have is my kids always get new Sunday outfits for church. Sometimes I wish I had a girl just for this season! Its kind of hard to shop for boy outfits when I am distracted by so many pretty girl dresses! However I do love seeing my  handsome boys in their suits and I at least get to buy a cute spring outfit for me.
     Easter pictures in their new Sunday outfits are a  must.  I swore when I grew up I would never be that parent to take a million pictures at every holiday or event. I hated it so much when I was a kid. My dad was extremely camera happy. Now here I am doing the same thing to my kids taking a tons of shots of them to ensure that I get one or two really good pictures. I tell myself one day they will really appreciate having all those family pictures as I do now.

My Easter outfit. Fell in love with these orange wedges from Target!

My handsome boys!

     This one is my favorite because it really shows all of their personalities.

 Our final tradition is on Easter morning. The buckets are set out and all of their Easter toys and candy are hidden around the house.  They then get to hunt for all of their stuff. To make it easy we put these labels on each of the items and let them know which color dots was theirs to search for. If they found someone else's stuff they would just put it back and they weren't allowed to tell. The boys have fun searching for their Easter goodies every year and we have a lot of fun watching them.



linked to-The pleated Poppy,momma go round,The letter 4,Rolled up Pretty,Transatlantic Blonde,g-rated

Lemon Icebox Dessert

I had a great time celebrating my birthday all last week. In our family it seems that we tend to drag out our birthday for a month. We have a huge family. I have 7 siblings and my husband has 9 siblings and the majority of both of our families live by us. So there is always a family event to attend. March is a pretty busy month for birthdays but really it's becoming almost  every month that is busy for birthdays as our families continue to grow. On my husband's side we get together once a month to celebrate everyone's birthdays for the month. We celebrated the March birthdays on St. Patty's day. This was the start of my birthday celebration that was then celebrated another 4 times after that. Next my husband and I celebrated my birthday combined with our anniversary that I already previously talked about. On my actual birthday which was last Monday, we got together with my family at my sisters house and had cake and ice cream. On Tuesday I got together again with my  sis Lauralyn  and my good friend Becky for our monthly traditional  lunch. and My sweet friend made me some super delicious homemade Chinese food and for dessert Lauralyn made this amazing Lemon Icebox dessert. I just  had to get the recipe and make it again! Finally my last celebration was with my friend Shawna who shares the same birthday as me and we have made a tradition to go out to eat every year to celebrate together with our husbands. So far we have stuck with the tradition of eating a Laticia's which is a fabulous Mexican Restraunt. They have the best fried ice cream!. I really am blessed to be surrounded by such a great family and wonderful friends.
       So getting back to that dessert my sister made made for me, it always amazes me how she makes these seriously delicious desserts that are usually always low fat and low calorie yet I never feel like I am loosing out on any flavor and in fact I prefer her lighter variations.
         This dessert in particular I am really  loving as a favorite of mine right now  because it is the perfect spring and summer dessert and its served with one of my all time favorite toppings for treats which is COOL WHIP whipped Topping. COOL WHIP is something that you will usually find in my fridge because I like to eat cups of jello for a treat fairly often and jello to me does not taste as good without COOL WHIP.
Fruit kabobs and dip  is another favorite treat of mine that I  have previously posted using this fabulous topping.

             

               This dessert is so simple to make and it will only take you 5 minutes to put together!


                                                                 Ingredients 
                                                      1 pkg instant vanilla pudding
                                                      4 whole low fat graham crackers
                                                      1 8oz tub of fat free COOL WHIP
                                                      1/2 packet of lemonade Crystal light
                                                      2 cups of fat free milk

Combine pudding ,crystal light, COOL WHIP, milk and whisk for 2 min. Take a 1/2 graham cracker and break up into pieces into the bottom of a plastic cup then poor 1/2 cup of pudding mixture over the graham crackers and place the cup in the fridge for 5- 10 min.  Add  1 TSP of COOL WHIP on top and serve.
           

Nutrition info
112 calories
0 fat
20 carbs

makes 8 cups

Sponsored posts are purely editorial content that we are pleased to have presented by a participating sponsor. Advertisers do not produce the content. I was compensated for this post as a member of Clever Girls Collective, but the content is all my own.