Do you spill the beans?

Hey there,

How’s the last week been for you?  You’ll be happy to know (or not care, either or) that I survived my first work trip sans baby.  I missed him like crazy, but Facetime worked pretty well.  He did try to look for me behind the iPad which was pretty darn cute.  Regardless I was glad to be back with him Friday AM, giving him tons of kisses and hugs. I mean, really, look at this face:

And my back is feeling better!  This makes me believe it is due to lifting Bean since it seemed to get better while on work travel.  Maybe Tina’s Best Body Bootcamp will strengthen me up even more so this go ’round so I don’t strain myself again.

This weekend we tried to catch up on some family time, which really just meant running errands, ordering Thai food (pumpkin curry a la Shana Thai (that’s the name of the restaurant)), watching DVRed shows, drinking vino, cleaning, some pumpkin patch fun on Sunday,

and my first experience baking an acorn squash (complete with lentils and feta).

Finally getting to the post title, I read a magazine article last week while on travel (which magazine escapes me) and it mentioned that sharing your goals (aka spillin’ the beans) actually makes you less likely to achieve them.  I don’t know about you, but I always thought sharing your goals made a person feel more committed to reaching them (if only to avoid public shortfall) and are held more accountable for their progress.  But studies (since as early as the 1920′s) indicate the opposite.   You can read more from a 2010 TED talk here.  [Note, the magazine article was recent and once I unearth it again, I will share the source]  The gist of the article was that studies show a sense of accomplishment is felt (feeling of success) by just announcing the goal rather than reaching it.

I got to thinking about what kind of person I am and realize I’m more of keep it to myself / share with only a select few.  Perhaps it’s in part due to fearing public failure and / or it’s that I want to reserve the right to change my mind and my course.  In the past, I was more open about sharing goals, mainly because I felt they were completely in my control (what school to go to, grad school, jobs, etc).  But now I feel like my bigger life goals are family-related and are not as hard and fast as they once were.  My bestie is probably just the opposite.  When Boston was just a glimmer, the bestie announced to all that she was going to interview at a specific company, and then move to Boston.  And whatdya know?  She did!  I swear, she could have a goal of making grass purple and it would happen

So whatever your goals may be: tone up, get pregnant, buy a home, earn a promotion, etc — do you share or keep it to yourself?  Or does it depend on what the goal is?

 

Shoes-day Tuesday! Blame the bestie

Alright, I’ve got some beef with mother nature.  It’s October and in the 80′s, which just isn’t right.  It’s not atypical of NorCal to get some hot days in September, but usually that is behind us by now.  The freakishly warm weather is really cramping my Fall fashion…ha!  Speaking of which, I’m seriously sick of all my clothes.  Any one want to do a full on clothes swap with me?

Despite the heat, I still broke out my new burnt orange skinny jeans (Marshalls purchase) on Friday and paired it with a tee.  They are so soft and will hopefully look good with boots in a few weeks:

But for Shoes-Day, I’m showing a summer-to-fall transition outfit (mostly because of the heat).  I wore this to work last Tuesday:

White Gap trousers, orange Dolman top (over a tan cami), and orange sandals:

See, white for Summer (even past Labor Day which is silly rule IMO) and orange for Fall.  Maybe it’s a stretch, but it works I think.

So why blame the bestie?  Well every now and then, she’ll tell me she’s buying shoes.  Then she sends me the links.  Then I inevitably buy the exact same pair in the exact same size.  And yes we even did this when she was living just a few miles (vs on the East Coast).  So I blame the bestie for making me get these Mix 6 wedges (purchased from DSW.com) in a size 7.5.  The wedge is extremely tall, but oddly comfortable as are the straps.  They were a great surprise shoe and I’m pretty sure, on sale, they were in the $35-range.

Do you follow any of the fashion-season rules?

Pumpkin in July

Hey friends!

We survived another weekend and if you were me, it would be just barely.  You see, I had a particularly tough personal training session on Saturday morning and somehow didn’t refuel enough throughout the day.  Then I indulged in a few glasses of wine over several hours at a going away/engagement party and, well, I ended up feeling like crap Sunday!  I couldn’t even make it to my 9a spin class.  Argh.  But I did manage to eek out 25  min of high intensity on the elliptical along with some ab work.  Somethin’ is better than nothin’ right?

The mother’s group I hosted on Friday was lovely!  I wish I would have taken a pic of the spread, but suffice it to say the chocolate fudge donuts went over quite well

Best part of the weekend?  My bestie is in Cali for the week to visit her family and show off tater tot!  She, her hubby and the tot spent last night with us and will spend Friday night with us.  And it also just happened to be A’s birthday a couple weeks ago so per her request, I made a pumpkin cake!

I followed this recipe for Pumpkin Dump Cake with only minor mods: no nuts, an added dash (or two) of cinnamon, and dark chocolate chips instead of toffee (bestie loves dark chocolate).  And I used ~4 full graham crackers to get the 1 cup coarsely chopped.  My cake took about 53 min at 350 deg.  Check it out:

Pumpkin in July was a huge hit!

Oh and I wanted to say thank you for the supportive comments on my last post about mother’s guilt.   It is a dialogue I’d like to probe into more and perhaps find some solutions to alleviate this guilt many of us are experiencing.

What can you eat despite the season?  Pumpkin is an obvious one for me as is froyo in December