We made a trip to the San Diego Zoo to see their Christmas decor and the polar bears. For some reason, I had it stuck in my mind that they went all out for it. Nope. I was totally wrong. They did have some lights strung up and bells, but the park closes at 5, so by then no one is around to enjoy the lights. Anyhow, we still had a wonderful time and checked out all the exhibits we weren’t able to see the last time we went. Our Glow is such an animal lover that she was just completely enamored with all the different animals she saw. It’s Ben’s dream to move down to San Diego, but even though that hasn’t happened, at least not yet (you never know!), it’s nice that San Diego isn’t that far from us.

We travel these days with a light umbrella stroller, we ditched our double stroller awhile back, but I still bring around my sling in the case that Soul really needs to sit and I can still wear Glow on me.  I have so many good memories of baby wearing. I’ve used the same sling (from this company) for all the girls and it is just so much more convenient sometimes, especially when there were teeny tiny.

We recently watched the documentary Black Fish and Ben and I were absolutely shocked. Then, I started questioning our zoo passes (we have it for a year, so we will probably be back). Kids love going to the zoo and supposedly the zoo does a lot of things for the conservation of animals, but I can’t help but be a little skeptical now after watching that documentary. Technically, animals at the zoo are in captivity too, so I don’t know. It’s something we have to keep thinking through and find more articles on, and make a decision on what we learn and feel is best. Have you watched Black Fish?

P.S. I don’t think it’s wrong if you still continue to go to Sea World or the zoo. We all just make the best decisions based on our convictions. We all learn, grow, and change, so that’s part of it too.

***
Alex, a reader, kindly left a comment sharing about the discrepancies that may be presented in Blackfish. You can read about it here, here, here, and here. I think it’s good to read these things alongside watching the documentary and make the best informed decision for you and your family. I started researching articles on zoos and animals in captivity there, but I admit I didn’t research anything regarding the documentary, so it’s a good reminder to always do so (and to always hear both sides of a story). I think both the documentary and the articles against it are very interesting.

These kids are a ball of energy. It’s been almost exactly 4 years since I started working out consistently. It was a month after I had Soul, I was just feeling kind of blah, and I was hoping exercise would change that. Having the girls back to back to back at that point made my body just feel out of it and I needed something to boost my energy levels. I know it’s going to sound cheesy, but I started doing P90X. Yup, those informercial workouts! Ben bought it several months prior and I figured this was as good as I was ever going to get to having a personal trainer.

This was back in the day when True and Brave used to nap too, so I would put them and newborn Soul to nap, and I would pop the DVD in and start working out. After a consistent month of working out 6 days a week, Ben decided he wanted to join in, so we both started waking up early to do the workouts together. That was 4 years ago and we’ve been doing it like that ever since!

I did get pregnant with Glow after almost exactly a year of consistent exercising 6 days a week, and since my body had been used to such rigorous exercise, my midwife said it would be fine to continue while pregnant and I did! I think I missed about a month during the first trimester due to feeling sick, but as soon as I was feeling well, I was back to my morning workouts with Ben. I continued to exercise 6 days a week my whole pregnancy up until I gave birth. You should have seen me, I was full on still doing jumps, pushups, and (assisted) pull-ups with this ginormous belly! I am sure if my mom or MIL saw me working out, they surely would have made me stop (and freaked out!). We wished we would have taken a picture of it then, but we didn’t even think about it. It would have been fun to look back on the picture and just laugh at how ridiculous I looked. I took another 6 week break after I gave birth, but once I was cleared, I was back at it.

Exercise gives me the energy I need throughout the day. I don’t drink coffee or soda, so this is my boost to get me energized to deal with the demands of the girls. Ben and I do the exercises together still and we wake up to do it before the girls wake up. Of course, he wakes up first and then he wakes me up, and I still always have trouble getting out of bed, but I just have to remember how good it feels after.

Four years later, I’m thankful for the time we have invested to strengthen our bodies. If you been following here for awhile, you know how much I love doing the “fun runs,” especially with obstacle courses, and it really has helped us in all we do in our garden. All that shoveling, digging, and maneuvering around really requires muscles, so I’m glad to have strengthened them over the years.

I must also mention that along with working out, I generally eat pretty healthy. I say generally because I do have a hard time saying no to desserts. Moderation is hard when cakes and chocolate is involved (like yesterday’s post), but otherwise eating healthy is not a problem. Being married to a dietitian makes this lifestyle of making good food choices kind of easy. Have I ever told you about how when we started dating I lost 15 lbs?! Usually, the opposite happens when a couple starts dating, but not in my case.

If you ever think you can’t ever possibly get to a place where you’re consistently working out, I’m proof you can! I was never an exercise person prior, but I knew something had to be done to prevent my body from feeling sluggish. The first 2 months are tough, but you just have to keep pushing yourself. Once you get those couple of consistent months in, you’ll be motivated to keep going. It also helps to get your spouse (or a friend) to do it alongside you, it really helps keep you both accountable.

A little disclaimer though… my body looks nothing like the informercials talk about. After 90 days, I didn’t have abs of steel  (and after 4 years, I still don’t!), but I definitely feel stronger and healthier, which really does feel so good. I have more to say about it, but I will save it for another post since this one is long enough already. We’ve moved past P90X and have done a ton of other DVD workouts, so I will have to do a breakdown of each one we did and my pros and cons of them.

So yes, it’s doable to be active and have 4 kids! It takes time and dedication (and someone who will wake you up in the morning to do it), but seriously, if I can do it, you can too!

on me: vintage style shirt, c/o old navy. sweatshirt, c/o old navy. active compression capris, c/o old navy. shoes, new balance. on true: shirt, mightee kids. dolman sleeve hoodie, c/o old navy. pants, molo kids. shoes, new balance. on brave: striped sweatshirt, c/o old navy. active jersey pants: c/o old navy. shoes, nikes. on soul: dress and pants, old navy. shoes, new balances (she’s way into sneakers right now!). on glow: dress and leggings, misha lulu. sweater, vintage. shoes, freshly picked.

This post was sponsored by Old Navy. Check out Old Navy’s latest fashion lineup in store or online at oldnavy.com. Thank you for your continuous support of this space and my sponsors. xoxo

Let’s rewind a bit to last year… when we’re in San Antonio, we try to get away and spend a day together in Austin. It’s a little over an hour away, so it’s not that far, especially for us Southern California folk who are used to driving around town (and in traffic) to get from one place to another. We stopped into Uncommon Objects first, then headed over to some vintage shops nearby. This visit we were hoping to find some shirts for Ben, I’m not in need of anything, so I stayed away from looking because I know I can easily get weak in the knees for something. Sure enough, I did just a teensy bit of poking about in the jewelry section and found a vintage ring that I really wanted, but didn’t get because well, it wasn’t in the budget for the month. We visited about 5 shops and he only found 1 shirt, our guess is the day after Christmas isn’t the ideal time to go shopping. It seems everything was already majorly picked through… oh well!

We had plans to eat at Swift’s Attic for lunch, but by the time we headed there, we realized lunch just ended, so we headed to Torchy’s Tacos instead. The tacos were yummy and their sauces were absolutely delicious. I want to try to recreate them at home! It was just a lovely afternoon out together. With kids and all, it’s hard to find time and a babysitter to get away for a day, so anytime we do get this time, we try to enjoy it as much as possible and do as much hand holding as we can. When the little ones are in tow, we’re holding their hands instead of each other’s, so it’s always so weird and nice when we are able to hold hands. Amidst the hustle and bustle of the holidays, I’m so thankful for this afternoon to get to spend time together. He’s my favorite and I can’t wait for all the adventures the both of us will embark on (with kids in tow) this new year!

Christmas came and went. We went to Texas and now we’re home. Everything about last week flew by so fast and now it’s time to usher in the new year. We never had time to go Christmas lights hunting here in Southern California before we left for our road trip to Texas, so we made sure to do that in San Antonio. We went to the neighborhood of Windcrest and admired all the pretty lights there. There was this insanely long line to see all the houses, but somehow we managed to snag a map of all the winning houses. With the help of my iPhone, we avoided getting in that long line and mapped out house to house, and saw all the lights that way. The best part of it was True and Brave and how excited they were about everything! And in true baby, copycat fashion, Glow was reiterating everything they were saying. It was filled with lots of…

“THIS IS SO COOL!”

“WOW! THIS IS SO FUN!”

“OH! THAT’S MY FAVORITE!”

I have to use all caps in writing it because they were pretty much shouting it with lots of exuberance in their voices. We were just laughing at all the funny things they were saying, and I love how simple things like pretty lights make my girls so happy. We have never done any lights on our home, but maybe we should because they get all crazy happy about this stuff.

Though my main birthday request was to stay home and clean, another one was to go and find a pretty cactus to bring indoors. Yes, it might sound crazy to have an indoor cactus, especially with young children around, but I was sure there had to be a spineless one that would definitely be kid friendly enough to have inside. Thus, Ben took me to a local cactus nursery to see if we could find one that fit the bill.

The nursery looked small, but there were so many different varieties all over the place. Not only that, they were giant cacti that were planted over 40 years ago. Those were insane! The owner lives on the property and has been selling cacti for over 50 years; he had so many different varieties! Ben and I had a good time walking around looking at all the different types. Of course, we had to be careful when we’d take a step back because there were prickly guys everywhere!

We found some cacti that had the shape I was looking for (and would do well indoors), but they had little spines! That was no bueno for being kid friendly. We were just about to give up our search for one when we spotted a little guy about 2 feet tall looking nice and spineless! I internally did a happy dance. The owner informed us that it was a type of mutated cacti and it indeed is spineless. We paid for the little guy and took him home. I still need to get my cactus in a ceramic pot and find the perfect spot in our house. Once I do, I’ll introduce you to him! Are you a cactus lover or do the spines intimidate you?

One of the perks of having a sister who works at Disneyland is that she can take us in sometimes. We definitely appreciate it as it costs jars of pennies to go in these days. It’s crazy how costly it is now compared to 12 years ago when I was able to have yearly passes as a college student. Therefore, we welcome anytime my sister is able to take us in and show us around.

It was a busy afternoon at Disneyland, so we only rode one ride and focused on watching the shows. When we have gone in the past, we just rode rides and forgot about the shows, so it was nice this time to focus on the shows. I was especially excited to watch Fantasmic, which I hadn’t seen in over 10 years.

Considering it was way past their bedtime, the girls mostly did well. Soul did have one melt down during the day where she cried as she walked, but as soon as she had dinner in her belly, she was fine! I never knew my little girl got the case of the hangries (hungry that it makes you angry) too.

I love Disneyland! I was such a big Disney fan as a kid. I even had Lion King decals up in my room until my second year of high school and I even had a Mickey Mouse phone. It was all because I used to dream of being a Disney animator, but obviously, that never happened. I’m glad that my girls get to experience a little bit of that Disney magic now. Disneyland is still very much a very captivating place. Are you a fan of Disneyland?

P.S. True is so cute because she wanted to match me! And sorry if you’re seeing this post twice. I started writing it the other day and never finished and then published on accident.

on true: dress and pants, c/o panache box. shoes, new balances. jacket, thrifted. on brave: shirt and pants, c/o panache box. shoes, c/o old navy. jacket, thrifted. on soul: dress, vintage. leggings, target. shoes, converse. on glow: sweater dress, c/o old navy (worn here). leggings, target. shoes, freshly picked.