Happenings:

Reading: Mental and Spiritual      
Finshed Reading: I have finished reading these books this year so far, they are in order:
The Maze Runner
The Scorch Trials (still waiting for the third book to end the series)
The Help
The Hunger Games
Catching Fire
Mockninjay
The Count of Monte Cristo (unabridged)

Books I'm Reading: 
The Book of Mormon (ongoing everyday)
The Tale of Two Cities by Charles Dickens


Books to be Read: (the small condensed version)
Great Expectations
Little Women
Pride and Prejudice
North and South
Sense and Sensibility
Emma
Mansfield Park
Still Alice
The Forgotten Garden
More books from Lynn Austin

I could go on but I'm starting with classics and working in some of my favorite authors like Lynn Austin. She has some great stuff and I haven't read them all yet. I would like to read something funny romantic soon, so if you know the perfect book for me, let me know.

Physical:

Everyday at home I do some exercises to tone the stomach.I need to get rid of flubber. Mondays I go to the gym to workout, this week I got the craving and was drawn to do Zumba. It's perfect for cardio. I went back to the gym on Wednesday and did the Hip Hop with power (which means with weights). Not only do you get cardio but you also tone. Perfect for what I want. I've also been eating healthier. Instead of pulling out my Kit Kat, I've been snacking on apples and pears. I've been eating small amounts of oatmeal or fruit smoothies everyday. (check out my recipe blog for smoothie recipes under the breakfast page)   


Culture:
I had the opportunity to attend my son Jonathon's band performance recently and I love to hear them play. They are great. They played some great stuff but one of my favorites was this song named  Fate of the Gods 
Check it out. You can also hear it on my My music blog-Give Me A Beat . 
I have collected a new playlist of songs of theme songs from different movies and also music from awesome composers even the great Paul Cardall.

General:
 
I have been been very concerned with some of my children's habit of brushing their teeth or should say lack of. Every morning before each goes to school or after family prayer in the evening I'm always reminding my kids to go and brush and floss (evening) their teeth. Although it seemed as if they were but with no real evidence. So, I now have several of my children brush and floss their teeth in my presence so that I know without a doubt. Sad really but, one of my children feared to brush his teeth or didn't like the taste of toothpaste. Of course reminding him we aren't to be eating the toothpaste just brushing our teeth with it. I'm not going to go get fruity tasting toothpaste when I know most of that is no good anyway. After several days of it, he now loves to brush his teeth and went as far as to say it was fun. Ha. I don't know about that but if he thinks so, okay...I'm not going to say otherwise. 

One of my daughters also has a fear of water, particularly showers. She doesn't do it often enough I"m embarrassed to say. She prefers the bath but doesn't even do that enough. My debate about a bath was that you can't wash your hair correctly. When you are washing your hair in the bath water, you are only washing it in dirt from your body. Therefore not really washing your hair as it should, because you can't rinse all the dirty soap you put into it. I offered to do it for her. So, she finally came to me and asked me to do it. It was hard on her neck and back but we did it. After we dried her hair and styled it, she was in heaven. She loved the bounce it gave, because it was clean. I'm hoping this gives her the motivation she needs to do it on her own next time.

So as a mom I feel like I'm making a difference in this area. Hoping to improve on my children's habits of being clean in every aspect of their lives.