Fitness

Let there be Anger

ashleylfrancis

I started a weight loss bet two weeks ago, catch up here!

Full disclosure, this is how I felt Friday morning as I got up at 5:45 for my fourth workout of the week.

Food-I’ve been doing great with food! Literally have not cheated once. Day ten was HARD. I had my workout in the morning and ate normally but I was just angry. At everything and everyone. So that was a shame but I got over it.
**I do not like the Costco brand of fat free Greek yogurt. It tastes like sour cream. I’ll be going back to good ole Trader Joe’s.

Exercise- I feel like I’m getting in my groove! My body is hurting less and less and it’s hurting in different areas which is exciting. I definitely feel myself getting stronger! I feel like such a bada** weight lifting!

Im having trouble noticing any differences when I look in the mirror but Dan keeps pointing stuff out that’s shrinking. So that’s a bonus! We also go on vacation next week and I’m feeling pretty nervous about falling off the wagon. I’m trying to hook up with another gym there so I don’t have to workout at home.

Bad news is I didn’t lose pretty much any weight this week. Womp, womp. Im told it could be from my body getting used to the diet change/drinking more water/gaining muscle, etc. I’ve lost several inches but the scale is killing me! Im trying to not care. Next week it’ll get better! I wasn’t supposed to weigh myself today (don’t yell at me, Josh!) but I did it anyway for the purpose of the blog and was happy to see a tiny dip!

Total Recap:
Workouts-7
Weeks-2
Pounds lost-7.4

Fitness

Week one complete!

ashleylfrancis

I started a weight loss challenge last week. You can read about that here.

Full disclosure it has been a roller coaster week! I’m going to break it up into diet and fitness.

Diet:

  1. It took me three full days to stop getting sugar withdrawal headaches. THREE DAYS! That was huge for me to feel my dependence on sugar.
  2. I didn’t realize how much I eat after my kids. Just simple stuff, licking the yogurt serving sooon, giving myself a handful of peanut butter filled pretzels when I serve them, eating fruit snacks when I’m out with them. It’s crazy! That all adds up.
  3. The first few days I was super hungry on the meal plan. I’m totally fine now as far as hunger goes but I definitely miss some of my favorite foods. Really just cheese, ice cream, and John Daileys

Exercise:

  1. I somehow made it to age 30 without knowing basic form for things like squats, push ups, literally any exercise that includes a bar, etc. The coaches have been super patient in working with me to perfect my form so I don’t get injured.
  2. I have no idea if I will be in constant pain for the next five weeks but I’m just going to assume I will. Every day all day, quads kill me. I just woke up with shoulder and peck soreness from yesterday’s workout. It hurts but it’s a reminder that I’m getting  stronger!
  3. An unexpected added bonus is that I love this early morning time away from my little humans. I’ve been getting up at 5:45 to go to the 6:30am class. I’ve loved having some time in the morning with other adults that’s just for me! It’s been awesome!
  4. I get to wear my fun Qalo wedding rings so I don’t pinch my finger! 

Week one recap:

  • 3 workouts
  • 7 days on the diet plan
  • 5.3 lbs lost!
Fitness

WSA Challenge

ashleylfrancis

Yesterday I did something insane. I joined a weight loss (life change after having a 10+ pound baby two years ago and not yet losing all the weight) challenge.


A friend of mine opened a crossfit turned fitness gym in my neighborhood a few years ago and I wanted to check it out. So here I am, all signed up, weighed and measured. I have six weeks to meet my goal.

A few things:

  1. I will blog about this once a week. Seven posts total so don’t worry, no inundating.
  2. The parameters of the challenge are that I have to follow their whole food plan and work out at the gym 3x a week while adhering to their in-house and fb group accountability. If I do this I will hopefully meet my TWENTY POUND goal 🤦🏻‍♀️.
  3. I’ve now had a headache for a full day. I miss all of my sweets and creamer already and my body is withdrawling. Ew.
  4. Pray for me. I’m scared and excited and totally apprehensive. I think it’s good. But I also want a milkshake. So many feelings!

Here goes nothing!!

For Katie the Warrior

Almost a Year

ashleylfrancis

Ive been quiet around here lately as I’ve felt the urge to listen and be still. In April we spent a wonderful week in Florida enjoying the sunshine with the kiddos. We were down there for a family wedding but decided to extend the trip!


It was just what we needed.

Before we knew it, it was Judah’s birthday, Mother’s Day and my 30th birthday. Lots of celebrating!

It’s all quieted down except for a 24 hour fever this week that snatched Lillian out of nowhere. I kept asking my niece and nephew to try to give her space but I’d turn around and they’d be practically on top of her. It took my breath away when I realized what was going on.


Their mommy has been “sick” for almost a year. When they visit her we urge them to sit close, to love on her, to let her smell their sweet heads. I was shocked when I realized what was happening in their minds with Lillian being sick. They wanted to be near her, to be gentle and use soft voices. They all sat down and colored around her just like they do with Katie. Cue my heart breaking into a thousand pieces.

This year has changed all of us. I’m somehow less of a germaphobe because no childhood cold or virus seems bad compared to the last year. At the same time if my kids seem weird I immediately wonder if they have some atrocious neurological disease that will snatch them away from me. We live in the reality of both somehow but still keep chugging along.

A few things about Katie’s progress the last few months are worth mentioning. She continues to say “hi”, “yeah”, “no” and once said “Aaaa” when I asked her to say “ash”. We are so stinking blown away we can barely sit still while we’re there. We take turns staring at her in awe.

She’s doing awesome without the trach. Her neck is taking its time to heal but she is a rockstar at breathing completely on her own.

She’s written several words. Mostly names. Sometimes it’s because we ask her to but other times she starts on her own. I brought Lillian in the other day and she wrote “Lillian” unprovoked. It’s incredible. Lillian felt so loved. She just kept telling Katie, “I love you aunt Katie, we pray for you every night in my bed. Gods going to heal you”. Gulp.

So next week makes a year. I don’t know what that will look like. Tears shed for sure, but also I think we’ll celebrate. The Lord keeps spreading the seas for her to walk through. So much in her body is working while so much is left to mend. Please keep praying. It’s working.

We are working on a few tangible ways you can serve our family moving forward if you’d like. Please stay tuned for a few links and ideas now that the summer is here.

For Katie the Warrior

Daughter of the King above all else

ashleylfrancis

I’m having all my **feelings** again. My sister has had some great progress the last few weeks. She got her trach out. I could write a whole post about that! We were told several months ago that it wouldn’t happen. Crushed vocal chords and no lung strength and God intervened.

Then a few days ago she WROTE “love”. Then “Vera”. (Vera was sitting with her, coloring). It’s crazy because there are SO many things she can’t do. If I asked her to scratch her chin she couldn’t. BUT SHES WRITING.

The most shocking thing is during a massage the other day she said “no” out loud when a particularly sensitive muscle was being worked on. Eleven months without a word and then all of the sudden, she spoke!

I was overwhelmed with gratitude. I almost felt myself praying “God this is so cool it’s worth not having the instant miraculous healing. We get to be along for the ride.” A small percentage of myself may believe that if this was in a vacuum. But it’s not! She’s a mommy. Sob.

The hardest part of the last 11 months has been her absence in that role. Her children ache for her restoration. We talk about it daily, then we pray together for it, then we share memories and ask questions and we miss her together. I can try my hardest to be a stand in but I know kate and she is torn apart being away. Her kids and husband are devastated by her absence in the day to day.

She’s still a mom. She’s a mom because two years ago she sat me down and made me promise to watch her babies if anything ever happened to her. She’s a mom when she holds it together while they visit. She’s a mom as she prays in her head for them.  She was a mom when the first word she ever wrote again was “love” in the presence of her squishy two-year-old girl baby.

Mother’s Day brings mixed emotions for most. As I get older I have so many friends that have miscarried, others are single moms, still others are having trouble conceiving. We’ve all had a picture of how life was supposed to be when we grew up and I don’t know anyone who is living it out. It’s not as easy as the pictures we drew as kids.

If there is one thing I’m thankful for in the past eleven months it’s a shift in focus. Somehow God keeps reminding me to walk through this life with my eyes on eternity.

I was reading Psalm 91:9-14 tonight.

“9 If you say, “The Lord is my refuge,” and you make the Most High your dwelling,

10 no harm will overtake you,no disaster will come near your tent.

11 For he will command his angels concerning you to guard you in all your ways;

12 they will lift you up in their hands, so that you will not strike your foot against a stone.

13 You will tread on the lion and the cobra; you will trample the great lion and the serpent.

14 “Because he[a] loves me,” says the Lord, “I will rescue him; I will protect him, for he acknowledges my name.”

Now I am no theologian but when I read this through the lense of last years frame of reference I was pissed. I could cross it out and write in a big sharpie, “WHAT ABOUT KATIE???”.

Thankfully I’m this years Ashley. “No harm overtaking” read through the lense of eternity is quite different. Nobody can take forever in a redeemed body away from her. Period. She’s promised a forever. “For he will command his angels concerning you to guard you in all your ways”. When I read that in light of eternity I think of Katie’s mind, her hope, her faith being guarded. The list goes on.

Don’t get me wrong. I pray daily for katie to be redeemed and restored now. I beg God to miraculously heal her as I sit next to her. It hasn’t happened yet. I truly believe she will continue healing but even if it all stopped today it’s not the end of her story. Mom may be one of her favorite roles on earth but it will continue to pale in comparison to Daughter of the King.

This holiday can bring a world of hurt, it has caused some serious tears the last several days as I continue to mourn the last eleven months and all Katie is missing. But we don’t have to focus on today and what was supposed to be and isn’t. We can focus on what is and what will be. 
Photo cred: Arpasi Photography

For Katie the Warrior

The World Gets Small

ashleylfrancis

I’ve been crying all day. A holiday is coming this weekend and it brings so many emotions. I love holidays; we always do holidays big with family and friends and celebrating. As I’ve said before celebrating in the midst of sorrow sometimes knocks the wind out of you.

This week my sister had an operation and each time she sees another doctor we are given a more clear picture of current pain she has. Again, the wind gets knocked out.

This weekend is Lillian’s fourth birthday and all I can think about is Katie carrying Lillian around my house on her third birthday party last year. I’m reminded of my kids loss as they miss their Aunt Katie, who they’re used to talking to every day. I think of how she knows baby Judah but not toddler Judah. Again, the wind gets knocked right out of me.

Then I think of Easter. I was sitting in my sunroom this morning with a sore throat watching the littles play. I started thinking, ‘if only I could have Jesus AND normal Katie’. That sounded ridiculous in my head. Then I was reminded of a dear friend mourning the loss of her baby. So I thought, ‘okay maybe Jesus, normal katie, and Lucas”. Before I knew it, everyone I know whose hurting was added to the list and the world somehow got smaller. A neighbor, two cousins fighting for their lives with cancer, racism ending, child sex slavery being abolished, nobody in the world in lack of food, shelter, and safety’. The breath kept getting knocked out of me as the world got smaller and smaller. We may not know anyone with the same diagnosis as Kate but we are in the middle of a world ravaged with suffering.

I very quickly saw the entire list fade away as I was reminded of Easter. I get to have all of the things I want because of Easter. I was reminded that my timing is just that, my timing. I was reminded of eternity with restored bodies, fulfilled needs, holy relationships, and unity. I was reminded of Easter because it means that  we get to have it all forever and ever. That this life will pass and we get to live in restoration.

Lillian was telling me the Easter story this week and I asked her if she wanted God to live in her heart. She said “yes!” So I suggested she ask God to live in her heart. “God, get in my heart, amen”. It was hysterical and bossy and oh, so, Lillian but it reminded me of the power we have as Christians. It’s not always in ways  we want it but it’s in good ways. Our lives here are short. They are filled with suffering and joy, glimpses of the miraculous, and breath being knocked out of us.  We have the power to help bring Heaven to earth now but we also get to long for Heaven, with full restoration. That in itself is a joy and even more, is enough. Jesus. Period. Nothing else. He’s enough.

Favorite Things

8 Things I’m loving!

ashleylfrancis

Ok friends, I have a new round of some things I’ve been enjoying this winter!

  1. I had a never ending cold this fall and I found this tea while paruzing the aisles of Moms Organic Market ALONE on Christmas Eve. It’s Yogi’s Decaf green tea kambucha. It’s super yummy and refreshing and it’s supposed to help with digestion.
  2. Along those same lines I started taking Elderberry syrup. You can get it all over the internet as well as Moms Organic Market. Kind of tastes like grape jelly but it’s supposed to help with your immune system. I always enjoy taking it after breakfast. It doesn’t show up on their website so here is the exact one I take. 
  3. Trader Joe’s has these yummy   “Moral Fiber” Blueberry Bran muffins a friend suggested. Let me start off by saying I am downright offended by a serving suggestion implying that I can only have half of something. I am equally a rule follower so I only eat half of the muffin. They’re yummy and they have lots of fiber! Lillian and Judah like them too! Notice I left one persons name out who said “they’re branny!”. Insert eye roll.
  4. While I’m on Trader Joe’s, I’m all about this salad I tried a few weeks ago. Our Trader Joe’s has a terrible parking lot and I swear it is always raining there. So when I get the nerve up to visit, I like to get myself a little treat. Enter: the Mexicali Salad! it is SO yummy. It’s less than $5 for a delicious lunch with lots of different and crunchy ingredients. I don’t use anywhere near all of the dressing so I don’t consider the nutrition facts accurate. Check it out next time you’re there!
  5. *Target, my Target. It’s just SO good to me. A friend bought this runner for her kitchen and I immediately wanted it for our upstairs hallway. Our rug up there is seven years old with some pulling and doesn’t stay still. It’s constantly lopsided and the kids trip and faceplant weekly. SO I used a gift card and a coupon code and got this beauty for $75! $50 after the gift card and we just got our tax refund. My children each chose an end last week to EXPLODE from and mama needed to be affirmed for keeping her crap together both literally and figuratively. Enter: the rug! 
  6. Ghostbed. If you know me at all just skip over this. We bought a ghostbed about a month ago and we LOVE IT. It gets delivered to your home in a box, then you just unwrap it and it expands to a normal size. It’s heavenly! Use this link for $50 off!
  7. Along those same lines, I had no idea how affordable bedding is at Costco! When we bought the ghostbed, we thought the bedding would be super expensive since we upgraded to a King size. I bought a bunch of stuff at Target and Homegoods and ended up returning it all! We got sheets for $19.99! And a king size blanket for $14.99! Insane. I don’t know how to explain the prices online because they are SO much cheaper in store. Give it a shot!
  8. My mother in law gave me this awesome tunic extender. I’ve gotten tons of compliments on it and wear it constantly. It makes any tunic a few inches longer which is great for a tall woman like myself but it also makes you feel a little fancy! Leggings are a go-to in my life and this helps me wear them with more tops I already own. Here’s the one I have!
  9. And 10. Ok So the last few months I’ve been on a hunt for a natural face lotion with spf in it. Skin cancer runs in my family and I want my face and neck covered daily. This is a pipe dream. Each natural moisturizer is either smelly, a weird consistency, is not helping my dry skin, or doesn’t have spf. I was at my moms house the other day and washed my face there for some reason. Who knows why, I have kids I probably just needed a moment. My entire childhood i saw her put on Clinique moisturizer. You know, the yellowish one? I put it on and my face felt so nice the rest of the day. The only problem is there is no spf. So I went on their website and saw this, Super City Block. It’s a moisturizer with 40spf. They happened to be having one of their specials, buy $28 worth of products and get a bag of makeup free. So I bought it! And a travel moisturizer for an upcoming trip. It comes out looking tinted but it really just evens your skin. So in the free makeup kit they had this little gem, Clinique Moisture Surge. Ahem. It’s magic. My nose is peely at the end and I don’t know why. I’ve put this on for two days and it’s perfect. Fixed. I probably will not buy it in the future because it’s $52 but now I know the type of thing I need. Extra moisture on the nose and the Super City Block. Now if anyone with peely skin has a face spf that they love it would help me to not lather up in chemicals every morning but for now my skin is so soft and downright glowing!

Thanks for reading! What things are you loving??

* contains affiliate links. If you purchase this item I will get a small cut. This in no way influences my decision to suggest it.

For Katie the Warrior

Katie Lynn-Lent part 4

ashleylfrancis

I’ve missed a week or so of prayer requests but I am ready to catch up. If you’d like to read lent part 3, click here!

1-Kate has had some great trach progress! She has moved onto a cap vs her normal speaking valve. When she’s capped it means she is breathing just like you or I! In recent months she has totally panicked when the cap was placed on her but miraculously she is thriving! She’s up to two hours already! Please pray for MORE!

2-Her precious babies. They are just 2 and 5 and they miss their Mommy desperately. Like all of us they are hurting and confused, impatient and hopeful. They need peace! Please pray for the Lord to be near to them while they’re apart. They are so precious and the hardest thing in the world is watching them ache knowing there isn’t much I can do to help.

3-Kate has a procedure next Wednesday the 12th. Please pray for it to be successful and pain and stress free. We are always quick to tell any new clinicians around kate that she hears and understands them but we still worry about what she may overhear.

4-As always we pray most for Katie to be restored and in the meantime to have hope and a clear vision of her future. For complete protection from here on out and for divine intervention daily.

Thank you so much for your prayers!!

For Katie the Warrior

Lent for Kate Week 3

ashleylfrancis

If you need to catch up, here is last weeks Lenten prayer requests.

Kate had a good week this week. There was a family and staff meeting last Friday and they seem to be super encouraged by her progress and set their sights on way more!

Here are some prayer requests for this week!

  1. Speaking valve continues to go well! Kate is up to 8 hours on it a day and is doing wonderfully! Her speech therapist is starting to give her ice chips this week to see what her mouth does in response. Please pray that it does what it should! We want Kate to be able to eat again one day!
  2. Kate is getting a massage this week to try to help her relieve some tension especially on the right side of her neck. Please pray that this helps! She is in a good bit of pain when she’s on her right side and we desperately want her to have full range of motion.
  3. Kate has to be transported to a few doctors appointments in the coming month. Please pray for safety for her while she travels and peace for her spirit.

Thank you so much for your continued prayers! We fully believe that they are healing Katie.