AU girl goes to T-Town

     I've already had many people ask me, "so what did you think?", "how did you like it in t-town?", "you ready to convert?". The short answers are, it was okay, not really a fan, and HELL NAW! But it would be unfair of me to say those things without providing an honest explanation. So, I'm going to take a little time and do a few comparisons. It will explain why I like Auburn better, and not just because it's Auburn, and I am a fan. I have some legitimate reasons.

     Tuscaloosa is NOTHING like Auburn. The town is all buildings and houses and people. There's not a lot of open space. There is hardly any free parking. Unless you aren't within walking distance of the stadium. These things are all VERY different from Auburn. In Auburn, there are open fields, tons of free parking, and most of it is within walking distance. With that said, the traffic getting into Tuscaloosa actually wasn't bad at all, we got right in and found a parking lot to park in for a $20 price tag.

     Tailgating. One of my FAVORITE parts about football at Auburn. People camp out for their tailgate spots the night before. You got canopies and TVs set up EVERYWHERE. People invite you into their area simply because when you're Auburn, you're family. Regardless of which side of campus you're on, you're going to see tailgating. It will either be in the back of a pick up truck, under a canopy, out in the sun, or wherever you can find a place to set your rear end and enjoy a beer. Walking through T-Town, we passed a row of apartments that all had a tent set up outside their doors, another apartment complex had one big tent out in their parking lot, and a few strays had canopies set up, but it was NOTHING like the tailgate experience at Auburn. Mind you, this may not be 100% accurate being that I only saw the west side of the stadium, and a tiny bit of the north side. Maybe all the tailgaters were South and east, but it still couldn't be compared to the experience in Auburn.

Game Time Comparisons

     Bryant Denny has a million gates. Hello! For all the money they spend sectioning off all those gates and walkways for people when they get inside the gates, they could save that and LOWER the concession prices. I was thankful to go into a gate, and be directed right to my section, since I had never been before, but still. I could have just as easily followed signs for my section number and been just fine. $4.50 is how much I paid for a bottle of Dasani water at Bryant-Denny. Last weekend in Jordan-Hare, the same bottle of water cost me $2.00. It's water folks, NOT GOLD. There are also more food options in Jordan-Hare, like CHIK-FIL-A. Yes please! My poor hubby wanted the BBQ nachos last night, and they RAN out. He was so disappointed.

     I told Jon I wanted to be in the stadium a good bit early, so I could see what their pre-game pep rally was like. I'm waiting...waiting,,,waiting some more. Truth is, Alabama's pre-game festivities SUCK compared to Auburn's. There aren't really any cheers to pep anyone up. Their band has always been good, and they come out and do a few things, but nothing really spectacular. It doesn't really help the fans get PUMPED for some FOOTBALL. I'm used to Auburn's legit pep rally before the game. We have cheers, we War Eagle, we have the Eagle flight, and we have an amazing band performance that really gets everyone excited. I appreciate those things about Auburn, and I love for new people to come and experience it. It's something that as an Auburn fan, I am REALLY proud of.

     The fight song. ::laughing:: When I was younger, and even back then knew EVERY single word to the Auburn fight song, I remember my daddy joking that most of the Bama fans don't know the words to their fight song. When I started to get older, I would ask people, "Hey do you know all the words to the Alabama fight song?" 98% of the time the answer was "well some of them" (meaning Yay Alabama and Roll Tide Roll Tide) or "No". I figured I was asking the wrong people. However, after being surrounded by 100,000 bammers this weekend, it is evident that very FEW of them know the whole thing. When it's played, you hear the beginning, a couple of key words in the middle, and that is all. When you're in Auburn, it's an irruption with CLEAR words echoed throughout the stadium for the entire song.Of course, "Go, Go, Go" "Give em Hell, Give em Hell" and "Hey" are louder than the rest, but it's WORDS you hear, not fans just humming the song. Not everyone knows the words, but more people know them than those that don't. So, I've taken it upon myself to help out the Bama nation. I've included the words to the fight song here. If you're a true fan, please learn the words.

Yea Alabama

Yea, Alabama! Drown 'em Tide!
Every 'Bama man's behind you,
Hit your stride.
Go teach the Bulldogs to behave,
Send the Yellow Jackets to a watery grave.
And if a man starts to weaken,
That's a shame!
For Bama's pluck and grit have
Writ her name in Crimson flame.
Fight on, fight on, fight on men!
Remember the Rose Bowl, we'll win then.
Go, roll to victory,
Hit your stride,
You're Dixie's football pride,
Crimson Tide, Roll Tide, Roll Tide!!

    Cheers. Auburn has A LOT of them. They have cheers that I've been doing since I was a kid. Most of those were done even before I was born. They've added new little things with the band as the years have gone by, but there are tons of cheers. The whole fan base knows most of them. They participate in them. It's different at Bryant-Denny. Seems like the student section does the cheers, and the rest of the stadium just kind of sits there. Minus the "Roll Tide" for EVERY single 1st down..(I thought my ears were going to start bleeding..orange and blue of course) the entire stadium was in unison with that. In comparison to Jordan-Hare, it's quiet in Bryant-Denny...really quiet. There were a few times, when the defense needed to stop a 3rd down play, that it got pretty loud, but even at it's loudest, it was NOTHING compared to Jordan-Hare. I found this especially odd, given the shape of the stadium, and the fact that it holds several thousand more people. (By the way, my husband, the bama fan, completely agreed with me about this. He's been to MANY Auburn games in Jordan-Hare.) I was thankful for the Southern Miss band, as they played several of the same songs that Auburn's band plays. It made me feel like I was home for a few mins.

     Traffic. It was better than I expected getting out of T-Town. An hour after the game, we got to the interstate super fast. But goodness, the interstate was so backed up. We found a little shortcut, that helped us bypass some of the blockage. Before my next statement, it should be known that my husband also made the same observation that I did last night. Bama fans CANNOT DRIVE! Holy freaking cow. I have NEVER in my life seen SO many LEFT LANE riders. Not a single one of them would move OUT of the left lane. I'm like what the crap? Is their some weird Bama fan rule that you can't drive in the right lane even if you are going UNDER the speed limit by 15 mph. Most stressful drive of my LIFE. I was so thankful to be home last night after that drive.

     I was trying to take it all in without being biased to my team. I wanted to see what Tuscaloosa was all about. I'm an Auburn girl, and I have no desire to experience the Tuscaloosa "game-day" again. It wasn't really anything to brag about. I love Auburn. I love our tailgating, our cheers, our down home attitude, our family, our spirit, and most importantly our fans. Auburn is my home. Not that I ever questioned it, but being in Tuscaloosa just validated everything I've every known. I knew Auburn was special when I was a kid. As I got older, I understood it more and more. I will FOREVER be thankful to my parents for choosing Auburn and raising my sister and me to love it just as much as they do.

Time for my antibiotic and therapy. I need a cleanse from all the crimson and "Row Tides" according to my Momma. HAHA love her!

War Eagle y'all!

Iron bowl 2011 in Auburn (clearly I've lost weight since then)

Bama vs Southern Miss 2014 in Tuscaloosa

I love you back

I've heard many women lately talk about their interactions with their husbands. I've read articles that depict many of the same things. "It's unusual for my husband and I to speak to each other before bed" "we are usually so busy we don't have time to kiss or hug" "there is definitely no TIME or ENERGY for sex" 

This honestly appalled me when I really sat down and thought about it. I challenge my married friends to really take a step back and think about this. 

If you and your spouse left for work in the morning, and your spouse never returned home, would you be pleased with the last interaction you had with them?

I ask myself this everytime I have to leave my husband, and everytime I can answer yes. Now, let me clarify. I am NOT perfect, and I am probably the MOST stubborn girl in the world, but my husband and my lil boy are everything to me. When I forget to ask myself that question, I can always depend on my husband to make sure I can answer "yes"  to that question. 

Here's how it goes in my house...

When I wake up each morning and my hubby is still asleep I kiss and/or hug him before I get out of bed. When he wakes up, he comes to me for a kiss and a hug. 

If he works the early shift, he never leaves  this house without a kiss, a hug, and an "I love you"

If we walk by one another, there's a brush of the hand, arm, or other body part. Sometimes it's a love tap (in his case smack) on the ass. (Got to keep it spicy)

When we leave each other it's a kiss, hug, I love you, another kiss, and another hug. 

When we return to each other, we greet the same way, showers of kisses and hugs. Usually, an "I missed you" today is in there somewhere.

We definitely don't go to sleep without kisses, hugs, and "I love you's"

My husband and I.. I think we kinda have this marriage thing figured out. Now we have arguments/disagreements and sometimes I just want to shake him, but at the end of the day, regardless of what is going on between us, we NEVER don't say "I love you" or end with a cuddle sessionuntil we fall asleep.

Thank you Jon, for never allowing me to be pouty and stubborn, For showing me what true love is, for not letting me be angry, and for holding on to me like I could be gone tomorrow. I appreciate what we have.

Happy 6th anniversary a little early. :)

Devil's blood

Everybody has been poppin' me the question lately. Well, not THE question, but A question that I dislike more than most. The question "when are you and Jon going to have another one?" gets asked of me literally, not figuratively, on a daily basis. Not only do they ask, these folks tell. "It's your turn." "You're next." "Nicholas is getting older." "You really don't want your children so far apart do you?" While I know that people really mean no harm by the questions and comments, they hurt me more than anyone can know. Truth is, when someone says any of these things to me, I immediately have flashbacks. Eyeballs on fire, tears, pain, agony, fear, and of course lack of sleep, poopy diapers, spit up, drool (oh my the drool). I do my best to be polite.. My rehearsed answer is usually "not right now but maybe in the future". Honestly though, another child scares the shit out of me. (Pardon my language, crap wouldn't be sufficient here) Even some of my closest friends do not know what I went through after Nick's delivery or the severity of it. I had major blood pressure complications. These complications gave my doctor only 1 option. The morning after my precious baby was born, I had to go on a medicine called Magnesium. Take my word for it, this medicine is extracted straight from the blood of the Devil himself. The magnesium was intended to help draw fluid off of me so I didn't die basically; however, dying would have probably been less miserable. My whole body was on fire! I literally thought there were flames coming out of my eyeballs. It hurt to move, to talk, and to be touched. My brand new baby couldn't be left alone with me. I couldn't hold him. I couldn't feed him. I could not enjoy the newness of him because I was miserable. 24 hours of hell, and I still felt awful after coming off of the magnesium.

After leaving the hospital, I was taken back to the doctor to inspect my incision. I had fluid leaking out (tmi sorry). While on the table in the doctors office, they had to re-cut me open on a portion of my incision. No anesthesia. Alone. Fluid poured from my stomach. It hurt. I was embarassed. I wondered what had happened. I was scared because I had no idea what was happening. Turns out I had a seroma. Which is a pocket of fluid that builds up when the outside heals before the inside. The result of this was 6 weeks of hell.. Not feeling well, having an open wound, having to get it packed twice a day, and visiting the doctor's office once sometimes twice a week. The precious moments of my baby's first 2 months of life were over shadowed by my own health problems.

Selfish. It would be selfish of me to choose to have a baby. I want another baby eventually. While no one would come right out and say it, I know that my weight and health problems had something if not everything to do with my complications. I can not knowingly place an unborn child in danger because I'm selfish enough to get pregnant when I am not in good health. Maybe one day, when I'm healthier and more financially stable, my sweet hubby and I will have a serious discussion about whether or not to have a child. When I was 16, I was told that I would have a very hard time getting pregnant, and then Nicholas came to be unexpectedly. I do NOT want to take this sweet miracle God has blessed me with for granted. I must lose weight, get my insulin levels down, and lower my blood pressure before I will even think about having another. This road is NOT easy. I struggle on a daily basis to eat healthy, exercise, and make good choices. Sometimes I slip up, but it's how we bounce back that matters the most! 

Plus, what's the rush? I'm only 26, my female goodness has much life left in it's years. 

What am I doing?

Have you ever been in the middle of a crowded room, sitting quietly by yourself, or with your closest friends and had the random thought? The random thought that eats away at you. What am I doing with myself? What am I doing with this life? What am I doing with my health, my career?

Yeah, so have I. More times than I can count. Absolutely ALL of these things cross my mind fairly often. These thoughts are fairly common though. We are always evolving, changing, learning, and growing. As humans, it is in our nature to never be satisfied with ourselves, and the truth is, we always have room to grow, learn, change, and evolve. No single person here is perfect. That is a fact. We spend so much time being so hard on ourselves, and trying to be "perfect" that we forget to notice how truly fantastic we are. We all have fantastic qualities, and we all bring something to the table that someone else is lacking. It's time we start noticing those things we've worked so hard to get, and the people we've worked so hard to become. Change is inevitable. Many times we change without realizing a single thing is different. Sometimes others notice changes before we notice them ourselves, and maybe they don't like our changes, but usually their lack of approval stems from their own self doubt.

So next time you stop and think, "what am I doing with myself?" The answer is 

Exactly what you should be doing. Making mistakes, learning lessons, messing up, and growing. These are not negatives.. These are the positives. Be you. Whoever that is..be that person. 

You're beautiful. 

The 25 year old view

I felt the need to write today. It has been a while. If I wrote my daily thoughts here, someone would take me to the crazy house, but there are some things that have been weighing on my mind heavily for a month or so...

       I've noticed that the older I get...the easier it is to see where I stand with others. As sad as it is, 10 years ago I never would have guessed I'd have this view... It's difficult to stay at the same level as others when your life has progressed so much faster, and I am definitely not a perfect person, friend, wife, or mother, but I do the best I know how with the cards I've been dealt, and I understand that it's difficult for people to know what you're going through when they've never been down that road, but it's still hard to accept the fact that things are really THAT different. I mean I have friends that are just now getting pregnant, and my sweet boy just turned 5. Last year I celebrated my 5th anniversary, as one of my friends got married. I have a friend going through a divorce. We're all at different places in our lives, and nearly the same age. How do you keep up..how do you stay the way you've always been. It's nice to enjoy things with friends that I went through years ago. It's sometimes difficult though to see how everyone reacts to things now versus when I was there. Age really does change people. At 19 who was really thinking about having a baby? Yeah...neither was I, but I made some different decisions,and God blessed me with the most perfect gift. Lord knows where I would be had he not given me my sweet baby. Yeah there are MANY things that I always say I wish I had done first, but the truth is, when I look back, I have no vision of where I would have gone or what I would have done with myself. This is just where I was meant to be. I have many friends, but my 2 best are my boys...and sometimes it's hard to understand that, but others will get there one day too. When your life changes, you change. When its not all about going out on the weekends or the next trip you can take with the girls, it will be understood. When its more about t-ball games and pizza houses, it will be understoood. When its difficult to leave for 1 day, more or less a whole weekend, it will be understood. When a little human depends on absolutely everything you do, say, and feel, I hope that it will be understood. I'm doing the best that I can even when my heart hurts, and I feel like I've had enough...

<3 Ash

Week 1 results

Okay so I'm a day late in posting my week 1 results, but thankfully my awesome friend Kelle harassed me about it this morning :) 

I will start off by saying I wasn't 100% committed this week. I cheated a couple of times with my good friend carbohydrate, but for the most part I stuck with it and turned down some "devil" foods. Yay a victory! Lol

So.. Drumroll please.........week one I lost 4 lbs!!! I would say that is a pretty good start :)

On the calendar for the upcoming week is lots of tball, football, and my 2nd 5k with some of my favorite gals! I'm ready to get colored again :) and hopefully I will have more recipes to share this week, so be ready for some crazy things that the hubs and I come up with. (By the way the hubby gained a pound this week :( bless him he dropped 40 lbs in 6 months without trying and now that he's trying.. He gained. Maybe he's just trying to make me feel better..hmm..could be!)

Kickin chicken, Hawaii, and harassment

Hello everyone! It has been a while since my last post. I hate to say that I had lost focus for a while on my weight loss journey, but I'm back at it now. I will be requiring myself to make frequent blog posts to share my progress. Knowing that I have a responsibility to share progress encourages me to be more strict. I've designated 1 day a week to be "weigh-in" Wednesday, so if I haven't made a post by Thursday morning please do me a favor and hound me :). I need my friends and family to help me hold myself accountable. I will also be sharing recipes that I've used to help me stay on track. Most of these recipes will be very low carb, and my hope is that I will be able to help someone else that struggles like I do. 

I love my job! With that said, the folks in my department love to EAT! We celebrate and mourn with food. Today is our manager'a 50th birthday, so guess what that means? If you guessed FOOD, you're 100% correct. Snack day at its best, along with an ugly Hawaiian shirt contest to emphasize the theme, Hawaii 5-0! Cute right? The recipe I chose was a low carb one, and unfortunately, I am not one that measures when cooking, but I'm going to do my best to explain in a way that allows you to recreate this delicious snack food. 

Kickin' Buffalo Chicken Spirals

Ingredients

1 pack of low carb tortillas (8ct)

1 8oz pack of cream cheese softened

Any blend of shredded cheese (I used Colby jack)

Franks Red Hot Sauce

Pace Picante Salsa

3 precooked chicken breasts

Ranch

Shred chicken and place into a bowl. Add 1 tablespoon of ranch

Add 2 tablespoons of Red Hot

( taste is the best way to tell if you have enough of each) add more or less accordingly

Place softened cream cheese in separate bowl.

Add 2 tablespoons of Franks Red Hot and 1/4 cup of Salsa

Mix well. 

Spread cream cheese mixture on tortilla, add chicken, then sprinkle cheese.

Roll up tight

Repeat for remaining tortillas

Place in refrigerator over night or in the freezer for 1 hour.

Remove and cut into bite size sections.

Super easy and delicious, and they will be a hit!! 

Adjust hot sauce according to your taste buds ;) I like mine a little milder. 

Hope everyone has a happy Monday, and remember to harass me if I haven't made a post by THURSDAY on my Week 1 results!