Positive Thoughts Thursday

First of all, I want to apologize for neglecting to post any positive thoughts over the last month. Tim and I have been through some stressful, crappy stuff over the past few weeks - which is when I should have probably been trying to really focus more on the positives - and I've been feeling pretty crabby lately. Thankfully, I feel like I'm coming around out of that slump a little at a time, and I felt it was necessary to get back into my positive thinking ways...

• A few weeks ago I started taking a probiotic and man, do I feel great! I am less bloated and gassy in general and my bathroom trips have been less frequent. I'm also still trying to monitor my calorie intake and blood sugars to try and stay as regular as possible. I'm hoping the combination of all of these things will help me start gaining the weight back I need.
• Although I have learned quickly that the end of the year is almost (if not more) stressful than the beginning of the year as a teacher, my class and I have had a lot of fun days in the past couple weeks. We went bowling (supposed to go to the zoo, but it was rainy and cold); we went to the YMCA where the kids were able to swim and play in the gym; and just yesterday we had Play Day where we travel from station to station outside all afternoon. There was a bounce house, inflatable slide, inflatable obstacle course, a water station, snow cones, tug of war, dodgeball, and sack/relay races. I am so happy that I'm healthy enough to run around with my kids and be able to participate in all of this fun stuff with them! :-)
• Tim and I are house hunting! Since I have found a job that I love and Tim's now in a stable job, and we're closer to Tim's family, we're looking to buy a house! This is a huge goal of mine (to be a homeowner) and is one of the things that I wasn't sharing about a month ago when I mentioned I was working towards one of my goals. We are currently under contract on a house and are waiting to close (this has been the stress of my life for the past few weeks because it is NOT going according to plan, but I'm keeping this post positive!). I'm hoping soon that I'll be able to post that we're officially homeowners. 
• Last Saturday was my second Great Strides of the season and it was so much fun. We had family on both sides show up to walk on the chilly, windy but sunny day. After the walk, Tim's sister Katrina,
  Tim and I played on the playground with our nephew, Isaac for a while -it was so fun!! I can't believe how big he's getting! See the adorable pictures below. :)
• Kitten update: The kittens are 4 weeks old today! We were able to see them while we were in town for Great Strides last weekend. They are hilarious. Their eyes are open and they're learning to walk, but they stumble all over the place. They are also learning how to play together which is hysterical! I think we sat there for about 2 hours just watching them. 
• Oh, how could I forget?? I'm an aunt to a third nephew!! Tim's other sister, Elise, had her second son, Liam, on Monday, May 6th! He's soooo cute and I cannot wait to go see him in June to celebrate his big brother's third birthday! :-)
• I've started running again and boy did I miss it! A couple days ago I ran 2.4 of my 3.5 mile route! :) Tim and I signed up for a 5K in June (the same one I did for my first 5K last year) so I'm prepping for that. I'm so happy that my body hasn't lost a lot of the endurance I had in the fall since I took the winter off. 

3 1/2 week old kittens

This is our little guy - still haven't agreed on a name yet for him

My favorite picture from Great Strides! Aunt Colleen & Isaac! :)

Running around the park with Isaac

Tim and I just hanging out on the dinosaur!

Weeeee!

He loved peeking through that thing

Haha...that slide was painful on our hips...I think we were a little too big!