Happy Halloween!

Evelyn: 45 Weeks

New This week:

Walking without being prompted or bribed

first sink bath! 

I want to give credit to Erica From To The Sea for the idea to do weekly update posts.

She did this with her first born, and I loved the idea. I am hoping to have them published in place of the baby book I never filled out. 

Wordless Wednesday

We kennel the dogs when we leave the house, Renji eats everything, and Aiko sometimes has accidents (plus it's not fair to just kennel one.) So we came home the other night and found this. 

Apparently we weren't paying attention when we called the dogs into the kennel, and Taco the cat was asleep in there, which he does on occasion. 

You can tell by the look in Renji's eyes, he is just pleading to be released. "oh mommy, please let us out, this has been really scary"

They don't really fight, the dogs and the cat, but they have a tendency to terrorize each other. Taco is certainly the alpha.  So I am sure the dogs spent the whole evening on their half, while Taco just laid there mean-muggin them.

TMobile Giveaway!!!!

Do you need a new phone?  Do you just want a new phone?  Do you want it for free?!

I have partnered with TMobile and a pretty amazing group of bloggers to get you a new phone!

T-Mobile's new Blackberry Z10 might be one of the coolest phones on the market and Blackberry has consistently been the go to phone for the military.  It is one of the only phones that has been tested and approved by the DOD the be used on the secure military networks and we want YOU to be able to have one!

T-Mobile has an awesome program for military families!  You can check it out by CLICKING HERE

But why stop at one?

T-Mobile has also offered up a surprise second Blackberry Z10 to go to the second place winner!!!

So, without further ado, meet the team of bloggers who are working to spread the news about this amazing giveaway:

But what do you have to do?  How do you win the phones?  It's pretty simple!

Make a 15-30 second video about why you deserver, want, or need a new phone and why T-Mobile should give you one.  Then tweet the video with the hashtag #TMobileIWantaNewPhone.  For the entry to be valid, be sure you copy and past the URL of the tweet into the first entry option for the Rafflecopter widget at the bottom of this post.

Want extra entries?  The contest entry widgets have lots of cool ways you can follow the awesome bloggers putting this shindig on for easy extra entries!

Want to win the second phone?  ENTER TO WIN!!!  And remember, you CAN use the same video entry to win both phones, but you must tweet the video with the contest hashtag a SECOND time and use that second URL as your entry.

That's pretty much all there is to it!

Join in the fun, enter to win a super cool phone and meet some new bloggers.  And don't forget to check out the general contest guidelines HERE

a Rafflecopter giveaway

a Rafflecopter giveaway

*All videos will become property of A Boy, A Girl and the Marine Corps and may be used by her or by T-Mobile for promotional purposes.

Chocolate Chip Banana Bread

I love banana bread. I can easily eat the whole loaf in one day. Just banana bread, no butter, no anything else, just the bread. Yummm. 

Just a side note:

You know what's sad, those bananas, in the photo above, aren't the ones I used, they aren't over ripe. I collect mine in the freezer and I didn't have any "fresh-over-ripe" bananas when I made this, so my bananas are really ugly. Not photogenic at all. I used yellow ones in the picture because I was embarrassed at how ugly my bananas are.

seriously over ripe-previously frozen bananas

3-4 over ripe bananas

1 stick (1/2 cup) of room temp butter

2 room temp eggs

2 cups of flour

3/4 cup of brown sugar

1 tsp baking soda

1/4 tsp salt

1/4 tsp vanilla 

1/4 tsp cinnamon 

As many chocolate chips as you desire, I used about half a bag. 

(optional: a handful of white sugar for topping)

Preheat oven to 350*

Mix/mash your bananas and eggs together, add the butter and mix well. Next add brown sugar and vanilla. 

In a separate bowl combine  your dry ingredients, flour baking soda, salt and cinnamon.

Slowly add your dry ingredients to your wet, like a 1/2 cup at a time. You can just add all the dry but you risk getting flour all over your kitchen. 

Finally add your chocolate chips and put in a greased loaf pan.

Optional: sprinkle the top with white sugar to get a nice sugary crispy top.

Bake for about an hour (I am at high elevation so my cooking time is more than an hour, close to an hour and a half)

It's done once a toothpick inserted into the center comes out clean. 

sprinkled with sugar,
see the bananas I didn't really use

delicious yummyness 

and done!
on my cute little Japanese animal plate.

Evelyn: 44 Weeks

New this week: 

Learned to clap!

First spaghetti! 

Turned 10 months old

Let's be honest

I haven't been writing much, I struggle each week to get Evey's weekly posts done, I don't have a whole lot else going on, besides her right now. I keep telling myself that her weekly posts are going to be like a baby book, I am going to get them published after I get through the first year, so I need to keep it up. But besides her, and my new Beachbody adventure I don't have much else to say.

I am in a bit of a funk, I am a bit down that we are stuck here another winter.  We will still be headed to Camp Pendleton, just not until April. Deep down part of me really hoped that extending would send us to Okinawa, even though I knew the chances were incredibly slim. But we will be in the sunshine state, so I can't complain too much. It's starting to get pretty cold here, it's in the 20's every morning, frost on everything. This week it has warmed up in the afternoon, but it's still sweater required. I find myself extra tired with the cooler temps, my anxiety has begun to return too. I get anxious when I am away from the house for too long. But I managed to get myself out and get my hair done, I've been wanting to go blonde again for months, but didn't want to spend the money, didn't want to be away from the baby for 3+ hours, excuses, excuses. Once we found out we would be here for the Marine Corps ball in. November, I decided to get my hair done, for me, because I deserve it. 

Two days and one allergic reaction later I am blonde:

The pink is just hair chalk, and there is a bit of pink toner in it to soften the blond, it'll fade in a few days. It was a bit scary though... So I have been seeing this hairdresser for a few months, but she has never colored my hair, so when I was sitting in the chair, after the bleach had been rinsed and toner had been applied, I started to itch in my hands I thought "gee that's weird" assuming it was anxiety because I had been away from baby for almost 2.5 hours now. Then my back started to itch, then my stomach, and my feet. I went to the bathroom and lifted my shirt everywhere I had clothing tight on my body (bra, waist of my pants) was hived and red, then I noticed my face was getting red and puffy. We rinsed the toner from my hair and almost instantly I started to feel better. I was mostly cleared up by the time I got home about 20 min later but still took Benadryl, then proceeded to almost fall asleep in my dinner, but I was hive free! I went back two days later and she finished, using another stylists toner, and all was well. And I am blond again, I feel younger, and more confident. 

I have been working out just about daily, we take a few days off here and there, but I really need to step up the diet portion of working out. It really plays huge part in weight loss, and I know that. I'm not eating like a piglet, but I'm not eating great either. 

Linking up with :

Getting my fit girl on (for reals this time)

How many times have I said that.. "for real this time"? and I never loose the weight, I never commit. Well I just said it again, and I think I mean it. I have been doing a challenge of sorts, a fitness challenge, through Beachbody, The folks that bring you Focus T25 and other workouts and such like P90X and shakeology.
Well things have been going really well. I have still been struggling a bit with the weight loss, but I am sticking to the workout plan this time, Week four and I am about 5 pounds down, not much but considering I am not modifying my diet much that's to be expected. But I have noticed a huge increase in my strength and stamina. I did a legit push-up yesterday. I don't think I have ever done that! And then I did several of the girly modified ones (on your knees) way more than I ever have.
I have been finding a lot of success in T25 and this challenge group, so much so that one of the group creators and my own personal coach Lee Ann asked me if I wanted to be a coach.
I know what you are thinking, "Alana, you're a little chubby still, how you gonna be a fitness coach?" well I asked myself the same thing, but I think that doing this will help drive me to succeed in my fitness goals, like extra accountability.. There are also some great perks, and being a Military Spouse I have no fees. So really, it's a no loose situation. I get to keep doing this workout that I love am seeing progress with, and I don't hate doing, and then I can share my success with the world and bring it into other peoples lives!
If you are interested in Beachbody, let me know. I promise to not push it too much on the blog, but I will keep you updated on my personal fitness success.

www.beachbodycoach.com/AlanaMarie
https://www.facebook.com/AlanasLoosinIt

Evelyn: 43 Weeks

New this week: 

First Steps!