12 ways to stop overeating.

I hope everyone is having a great weekend, at Thanksgiving I talked about overeating and now that we're past the holidays I wanted to retouch on the subject.One thing my family has been working on is portion control. I've noticed how easy it is to polish off a bag of chips when you have the full bag sitting in your lap or eating another piece of cake when its just sitting out which can be disastrous to a healthy lifestyle. So we've been looking at the weight watchers point system and my mom found this article that I thought was worthy of posting. Its a good encouragement to watch my portion control and to look at why I'm eating and what I'm eating.                                                    12 ways to stop over eating. "All-or-nothing" thinking doesn't help. People who overeat often feel out of control and disgusted with themselves. It becomes a vicious cycle, leading to low self-esteem and even more eating. To regain control of your eating habits, ask yourself why you overeat. Is it your way of coping with stressful events? Has gorging on "forbidden" treats become a substitute for other pleasures lacking in your life? Do you use food to soothe, distract or reward yourself? Breaking It Down Once you've identified trigger factors, work out other ways to address them. Don't beat yourself up with every little lapse. Instead, focus on positive things you can do to replace or avoid overeating. Pay attention to how you feel when you eat certain foods; you'll start to notice patterns emerging (eating after a family argument, for example, or when you're bored, lonely or disappointed). Consider alternative ways to lift your mood when the urge threatens. Perhaps call a friend, go for a walk or see a movie. Breaking the Habit Here are some tips for winning the battle:         Take it slow. Crash dieting is more likely to end in losing control than a slow, steady loss of a pound or two each week. Don't cheat yourself! Eat a sensible amount of food each day. Allow occasional treats. If you don't totally cut out "forbidden" foods (such as those donuts that you love), you're more likely to stay on track, because deprivation often leads to overeating. Opt for low-fat versions of favorite foods. Reward yourself for every win — how about a bath or a walk just to enjoy a sunset rather than a reward consisting of junk food. Plan ahead to stay in control. Facing a big test or other ordeal that you fear will send you straight to the cookie jar? Try to keep healthy snacks around to nibble on instead, and exercise to offset your munching — and calm you down, too! Share your feelings — sad, bad or otherwise — with family or friends. Seek support from others trying to lose weight — family, friends or online buddies. They're there to help, and want to see you succeed. Look to calming alternatives if stress is your trigger. Anything from deep breathing to yoga to arts and crafts could help. And don't forget: Exercise is a great tranquillizer. (It also reduces your appetite!) Count to ten. Is overeating your way of coping with anger? Consider other ways of dealing with negative emotions, such as learning assertiveness techniques. Find other ways to fill the void. If you typically overeat when you're looking for emotional nourishment; stop. Feed your spirit by caring for yourself as well as you can during times when you feel unloved, under-appreciated or unworthy. Be your own biggest fan and try to focus on your successes, not to the occasional lapse. Be patient and forgiving of yourself. Long-established complex habits won't change overnight. Avoid all-or-nothing thinking, such as "I've already blown my weight loss plan, I might as well finish off the box." Accept that you may go off the rails from time to time. So you've lost six pounds and regained three? It's important to congratulate yourself for the pounds that you lost. You're doing a great job! Hope this was an encouragement to you too! I'd love to hear your feed back!  Xoxo Cameron Ashleigh

Mascara!

How was everyone's week? Mine was fantastic and St Paddy's day was fun! We made smoky mashed potatoes, corned beef, carrots,cabbage, homemade rolls and shamrock cookies Yum! What did you do for St Patricks day? Well I wanted to do post on my favorite piece of make up, Mascara! If I had the choice  between lipgloss, blush, eyeliner and mascara it'd definitely be mascara ( Lip gloss would be 2nd) I'm sure alot of you out there would agree, but finding a good mascara is a whole lot harder then it sounds, they all have there pros and cons but I'd have to say Lancome's mascara is the best I've ever tried, only problem with  it is its $28 and if you're like me you really don't have that much money to spend on mascara  so I was trying to find a mascara that was similar to Lancome but not as expensive and I have to say that CoverGirl's LashBlast Volume Blasting Mascara  is the best one I've tried thats under $6.

 So as you know I really like Lancome's mascara, It goes on and comes off easy, it didn't flake, and it volumizes and lengthens really well! I felt like I had control of the brush and it was easy to work with.

 

 

  The Falsie is a decent mascara for giving length, but if your someone who likes to put on two coats then I wouldn't suggest this, I had a bit of trouble with it clumpy on me, thats why I don't care for The Falsie.  The brush isn't very stable, so I had trouble controlling it and doing my lower lashes.

 

CoverGirl's LashBlast Fusion Mascara is probably my lease  favorite of all four, it didn't go on very easy and it took quite a few coats to get it to look nice, its a good mascara it you need some volume, but not length. Towards the end of the day it began to flake pretty bad. I'd have to say I was a bit disappointed by CoverGirl I was looking forward to using this and it didn't turn out as good as I thought it.




                                                                                
 Cover girl's LashBlast Volume blasting Mascara is really a great mascara! I did have to use more strokes to get the look I was wanting, but if I can save $22 by using more strokes then I will. I was very happy with this mascara, it volumizes and lengthened, I love when I find
 something thats not as expensive but works well.

 




















Whats your favorite mascara brand that you use?
xoxo
Cameron Ashleigh

Passed!

Mallory (my younger sister) and I have been working for about 3 months to memorize 3 song, 4 major scales,4 minors scales and some other technique that would come with the level we were doing ( I did level 4 and Mallory did level 3)So on Saturday, Mallory and me went to play the songs we had memorized and all the technique for a very kind lady who was to determine if we would go to the next level of piano or not (yes really nerve racking in the beginning)  I was so relived to find this woman was such a dear and even let us have a treat afterwards, It made the whole process go so much smoother. And yes, we passed! now I'm moving on to level 5 and Mallory level 4. Now we've got to start preparing for the next one in Fall. I think I've been playing for 8 or 7 years, can't really remember though haha. Anyone else out there play any instruments? What kind do you play?

 I  haven't painted my nails for a long time decided and I thought" If I'm going to be playing the piano I might as well have nice looking nails.I chose the color blue and I'm quite happy with my choice. 

                                                             My outfit.

                                                            WhooHoo! I passed!
                                        






XoXo 
Cameron Ashleigh

                                               

Got my Braces off!

I just got my braces off yesterday! I'm so thankful that I'm done with them! I had them on about two years and I have an older sister who's out of braces and two younger sisters who are still in them. Now I just got to work on smiling without braces, its actually kinda hard :) Thank you mom and dad!I love the way my teeth look!

Training

Hi everyone! How was your Valentines day?We celebrated a little bit early because some of us would be babysitting that day and  it seemed that someone always had somewhere to go,( If you wanna know more of what we kinda did check out my parent's blog www.donandmichellefrost.blogspot.com ) So Mallory my younger sister decided to make a red velvet cake for the first time which we ate on Sunday, and it turned out great! She put a lot of work in to it to make it look nice,

So I enjoyed it and made sure I was using the 80/20 rule (trying to eat better 80% of the time and the 20% means go ahead and enjoy that piece of cake)
Well I thought it'd be great to get caught up on what I've been doing lately, which is training my sisters Lindsay (17) and Mallory(14) and helping them get  into shape. My mom had this idea of me trying to write an exercise routine for them, so after some study I started working on a exercise routine when I realized that I would need to make sure it would work for them because one sister is smaller framed, doesn't like to exercise and needs to build muscle and endurance, Lindsay is strong and averaged sized, but trying to get a more lean form, now both of them do not like to exercise and do not like to be pushed and worked hard so I knew that it would have to be short because they would have trouble sticking with me and would end up losing interest after a while. Basically what I did for them was the same except I made Lindsay do a few more reps on certain exercises, and Mallory less reps on others.



So for warm up:

15 Jumping jacks 3 reps
next I go into:

Wall sits for 30 seconds 3 reps
Squats w/ 10lb kettle ball
10 push ups (Mallory does 8 girl style push ups)
Standing triceps kick backs(or because they were having a hard time with these, I switched them to tricep dips)
 Make sure not to use to heavy of weigh, about  2 to 5lb
Bicep curls - Alternating Arms 30 seconds (make sure to really squeeze the muscle and concentrate on holding it)
Up right rows 30 seconds
Plank 30 seconds 3 reps (concentrate on really using your core muscle for this exercise)
Bicycle 30 seconds 3 reps
Mason twist 40 seconds

Cool down:
Cobra or Upward dog 30 seconds
Childs pose hold 30 seconds

 So after about a 20 minute weight training workout
 they would do 20+ minutes of Cardio (running, exercise bike, ect.)
P.s. I've been doing about the same thing 20 minutes of weight training and then 20+ min of Cardio
xoxo Cameron Ashleigh

Getting fit again

Happy New Year! I had a great Christmas and I hope you did too! With the new year here, its a perfect time to take a look at your personal health and fitness routine. With the holidays comes great food, yummy sweets and a busier schedule which doesn't leave as much time for exercise,which results in eating to much food and because of the cold weather I've become rather lazy, so with not exercising and eating more food than normal. I've noticed I've gotten weaker and have lost muscle. Now its the middle of January and I'm trying to move in the direction of becoming more fit, toned, and building more muscle(and hopefully losing the couple of pounds that I gained from Christmas!) But honestly who really wants to get up and move when it cold and wet outside?And I find it can be hard to motivate myself. My mom and I are both" all-or- none" girls,so we have a hard time just doing a couple of push ups and being satisfied but having that mind set isn't always good because I'm tending to do nothing as of right now instead of something. For the past two days I've started running again, doing different types of push ups, Plank, Lifting light weights,jumping on my moms mini trampoline and playing the Wii. Today my mom decided she wanted us to clean up the garage and finish putting together the weight bench that is out in our garage, so for about a hour, my brothers and I cleaned weights, vacuumed the garage, and put together our weight bench,

 now that its all done it'll be nice to be able to use clean equipment thats all put together. I know how hard it is to get back to exercising and also eating better but it does pay off. Make sure your drinking lots of water, it will help you achieve your goal, April, a personal trainer that we know said " Take your weight and divide it by 2, thats how many ounces of water you should be drinking. Drinking  water can speed up your metabolism by 30%." We put the amount of water we need to drink into a separate pitcher in the fridge that way we know for sure that we are drinking the right amount of water, its also nice to add some freshly sliced fruit to it.We add a few lemon slices or orange slices or squeeze a lime into the water.

 Along with drinking water it is important to keep moving, even if its only to chase after a younger sibling(which is a great way to get moving by the way) Another great exercise that I made into a game with my four younger brothers and one younger sister is to chase each other up and down the stairs as fast as you can until you drop down tired, Its a awesome cardio workout and it gets your heart rate up very fast and you get to have a little fun with someone. Another tip to keep in mind is adding a new activity or exercise to your schedule every week and sticking to it for at least a week,as I was mentioning above, it can be hard to get back into a routine, look at your exercise routine and see where you can switch things around or add something new so you don't get bored, I've had better success with achieving a goal by sticking with an exercise for a week and then switching it.

Go for it!
Cameron Ashleigh

visiting widows and learning from them.

My Dad being a mailman knows most of the people that are in our area which include alot of elderly widows. So from before I can remember my parents have made it a point in life to care for widows,visiting them, reading the bible, talking,praying and celebrating birthdays with them, bringing  them cookies and getting cookies and treats from them, listening to stories from the Great Depression, breaking into some of their houses because they had fallen and broken a leg and couldn't get to the door and then running then to the hospital and sometimes even staying by their bedside as they're dying and saying goodbye. I have been blessed so many times from doing this I can't begin to count! but sadly so many people neglect older people because honestly it can take a little more patience be around them, thats still no excuse to neglect widows, God tells us many times of how much He loves and cares for the widows and the orphans.James 1:27 "Religion that God our Father accepts as pure and faultless is this: to look after orphans and widows in their distress and to keep oneself from being polluted by the world."Psalm 68:5 "Father of the fatherless and protector of widows is God in his holy habitation." God loves the widows and He tells us to care for them, visit them, and love them. So my younger sisters Mallory, Samantha and me have been visiting a widow named Mrs. Kimbel who we've known for a few years now, we were over at her house visiting with her and somehow we got on to the subject of pies and she found out that we had never made a pie before, so she offered to teach us how and said she'd make plans for us to come over in a few weeks and two weeks later my sister Samantha and I arrived at her house at about 10:00 she then whisked us into her kitchen where she taught us how to make pumpkin and apple pie.

How to prepare a basic pie crust:
2 cups white flour
1 teaspoon salt
1 cup of shorting (or butter)



Preheat oven to about 400-450. Grease a pie pan and set aside ( Mrs Kimbel prefers to use a tin pie pan but we used a glass for the apple and it turned out fine)

 Add the flour and salt together and mix lightly,Cut in shorting/butter, use a fork to bring together until  it becomes a crumbly mixture ( Do Not Over Mix!) Meanwhile prepare a kitchen towel bigger then your pie glass that you are using and sprinkle a good amount of flour over it.  Dip your hands in to a little bit of flour so that the dough does not stick, grab the dough and roll it into a neat ball and set on top of the towel.

                    Set a sheet of wax paper on top of the dough and with a rolling pin begin to
                     Gently roll it out. Don't over work the dough! It will taste horrible!

                              Make sure you use even strokes for each side, don't over roll one side
           You want the crust to be somewhat thin, not so thin you can't work with it but not to thick
                         also. How unpleasant it would be to bit into a piece of pie that was mostly crust!

                                          When the dough is a little bit bigger then the pie pan then its done
                                             Its ok if there is a bit of crust hanging over the pan

        
                                 Remove wax paper and use the towel to help get the crust into the pan,
                                Be very careful! It will rip very easily.

    Take a knife and begin to cut the extra dough that is hanging over off but not to short.
  Use your fingers to push the dough's edges down. Now to the filling!

 If you are making apple pie (or any pie that has a top) You'll want to make another batch of dough to cover the top with. After mixing all the ingredients together and gathering the dough into a ball roll it out with wax paper on top after getting it to be just a little bit bigger then the pie pan, decorate the top of it using a straw and knife ( Just be sure not to cut all the way though!)

Filling:
4 big Grannie Smith apples peeled, and thinly sliced 
1 heaping teaspoon Cinnamon
1/2 cup sugar
5 Tablespoons floor
1/2 cup brown sugar

                       I just took a knife and started at the top of the apple and worked my way down to the bottom

                                         After peeling the apples put them in a bowl of salt water.

                                            Cut them into quarters and core them.
                                   

                                    You can use a knife to cut them, but make sure they are thin!

               After your done with the apples, add all the dry ingredients together in a separate bowl and mix.
 

                                           Add the dry ingredients to the apples.

                                         Stir until the apples are evenly coated.

                            Place the mixture in to the pie and spread evenly.

              Its ok if there seems to be to much apples, they will cook down.

Next take the top of the pie which you've decorated and carefully put it on top of the pie, (its pie dough so it will rip very easily!) Take your fingers and pinch the top edges together very tightly so that the juices won't run out . In a little bowl  mix a little bit of sugar and cinnamon together, sprinkle on top of the pie and place in the oven, cook for about 45-55 minutes. 

                                

                         Enjoy with a scoop of ice cream or whipped cream.

For Pumpkin Pie:
 use the dough recipe from above just only make one batch

 1 can pumpkin (1lb 14oz)
 4 Eggs
1 1/2 cups of sugar
1 can Evaporated milk
1 teaspoon salt
3 3/4 teaspoon pumpkin pie spice

 Mix all the ingredients together in a bowl and after its well mixed, add it all directly into the pie and bake for 45-55 minutes 
 

                If you have left over dough you can roll it out and sprinkle some sugar and cinnamon on it                                      to make something kinda like a cinnamon roll.

                   Roll up and cut into little bits but on a greased pan and bake for 15-20 minutes
                             Keep a close eye on them, they burn easily!

                              They turned out pretty good, my whole family enjoyed eating them!:)
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