Author: teresamunoz91

Posted in Events, Life, Year Review

Looking Back at 2018

Posted on by teresamunoz91

Another year has come and gone. 2018 was a good year for me. So many things took place this year. One of the most exciting things that happened was I found I was pregnant with my first baby. I also got to travel and take part in fun races. Here are my highlights of 2018.

Pregnancy
My boyfriend and I always talked about having a baby, but we didn’t know it would happen so soon. My boyfriend wanted a boy and I wanted a girl. I was thrilled when I found out I was having a girl. This is a blessing and I can’t believe our little one is almost here. I spent the majority of 2018 being pregnant and while I did miss out on a few things, I will cherish all the little moments with my baby. For example, the first time I heard her heartbeat and saw her on the ultrasound, the first time she kicked, and when my belly bump started to get bigger.

Moving
Another thing that happened in 2018 was that my family and I moved out of Montebello. This was after living there for almost 10 years. We moved about 20 minutes from Montebello and while I do miss my old city, I am very happy and comfortable in my new city. Only bad things are that I live further from my boyfriend and my commute to work is a bit longer. When I was in Montebello, I was able to leave my house 5 minutes before starting work and get there on time. Now I need to leave at least 25-30 minutes before I start work. I give myself the extra 5-10 minutes just in case there is traffic of construction going on.

Travel
In February, I spent the weekend in Orlando by myself. I had gone to Orlando before back in 2017, but this was my first ever solo trip. The reason I went to Orlando was to take part in the Disney Princess Challenge. This is a series of races hosted by Run Disney. I ran a 10k on Saturday morning and then a half marathon on Sunday morning. I really enjoyed my solo trip and I’m so glad I got to experience it before becoming a mom.

In March, I ran a half marathon in San Diego. I normally travel with my family or friends, but this time I went with my boyfriend. This was our first weekend away together. It was long overdue. We have been together for 5 years and that was our first trip. Hoping we can take more weekend trips with our baby girl in the upcoming years.

I decided my last trip before the baby’s arrival should be a fun one. What could be more fun than almost a week in Las Vegas? In August, I went to Las Vegas with Giovanna for a few days. There were many things I couldn’t do like drink or ride on the New York New York roller coasters, but I still had fun. The best part of the Las Vegas trip was getting to see the Backstreet Boys in concert. I also got to try a lot of good food and we walked so much every day that I was always walking at least 10,000 steps, which was my goal.

Running
I ran almost 300 miles. I’m sure if I hadn’t been pregnant, I would’ve ran more. Regardless, I am still happy that I was able to run 300 miles. Not only that, but I was able to run one half marathon, one 10k, and two 5k races while pregnant. I wasn’t going to let my pregnancy slow me down!

At the beginning of 2018, I did my best half marathon 2 hours and 9 mins in Pasadena. This was so close to my goal of running in under 2 hours. I’m hoping that in 2019, I can reach the goal. I know this will require a lot of training runs from me, most of which will take place in the summer.

As I mentioned earlier, I did the Disney Princess Challenge in Orlando. I love to challenge myself. This was the first time I ran 19.3 miles in 2 days! What makes the Disney Princess Challenge runs even more fun is the fact that you get to run through the Disney parks and take pictures with the characters. I got to take pictures with Anna and Elsa from Frozen, Belle and Gaston from Beauty and the Beast, and even Buzz Lightyear to name a few. I won’t take part in the races this year, but I plan to be there in 2020!

In 2018, I ran the LA Marathon for the first time. I did not run in under 5 hours like I had planned, but I did improve by 6 minutes over my first marathon. Not going to lie, this was a tough marathon for me. It didn’t help that at the start of the run, I did some have pain in my left knee. I also didn’t follow my training plan as well as I should have. That’s okay, every time I run a marathon or any other race, I always learn ways I can improve my time and my training. The hills after mile 20 were the worst. Now that I know what to expect, I will definitely train for that in 2020.

Concerts
I went to see Brad Paisley in concert with my mom. My mom isn’t fan of country music, but she really likes Kane Brown, who was one of the openers for Brad Paisley. I had to choose between going to see Tim McGraw (my favorite country singer) and Brad Paisley. I decided to see Brad Paisley and it was worth it. He is such a great singer live and entertaining. I really like the song he sang with Carrie Underwood, who sang her parts via satellite/video.

Seeing the Backstreet Boys was the highlight of my Las Vegas trip. My only complaint is that I wish the concert had been longer. They played some of their newer music, along with their classics. It’s great to see them still together after all these years. They are touring this year. They are scheduled to play in Anaheim and Los Angeles. I’m hoping I can see them again. Fingers crossed that I make it to their concert.

Favorite Movies
Normally I am the kind of person who waits for movies to come out on DVD or Netflix instead of going to the movie theaters to watch. In fact, most of the time I only go to the movies once or maybe even twice a year. This year, I ended up going to 7 movies, which is a lot for me. Who knows if next year I will be able to watch as many movies since I will have my little one. Of course, I will make an exception to watch the new Avengers movies. Here are the movies I went to watch in 2018. The little kid movies are the ones I took my sisters to go watch.

Sherlock Gnomes
Black Panther
50 Shades
Hotel Transylvania
Avengers Infinity War
Goosebumps 2
Crimes of Grindewald

2018 was a memorable year for me. I can’t wait to see what 2019 will bring for us!

Posted in Challenge

No Spend Challenge 2019

Posted on by teresamunoz91

In the past I have done many challenges. Some of them include the Meatless March challenge, no meat for the whole month of March, no TV for a month challenge, and I even went vegan for a week. The last one was really hard because I had to read the ingredients of every single thing I ate. Well, there is a new challenge I will be trying in 2019. It is called the “No Spend Challenge”. Another name for it is a Spending Fast. The main rule for this challenge is that you don’t spend any money on anything that is unnecessary. You can do it for a day, a week, a month, or even a year. I plan to do it for the month of January. The purpose of this challenge is to become aware of your spending habits. A lot of us don’t realize how much money we waste on things that we don’t really need. Any money I save by no buying things will go towards my credit card debt.

Everyone has a different idea of what is considered “essential” or “non-essential”. Here are the rules I plan to follow during my No Spend Challenge.

Essentials (can spend money on this)
Groceries
Bills
Gas
Toiletries (shampoo, toothpaste etc.)
Things for the baby

Non Essentials (can’t spend money on this during the No Spend Challenge)
Fast food
Books
Clothes
Take out/delivery/pizza
Going to the movies
Concerts
Soccer games
Jerseys
Races
Magazine subscriptions
Video subscriptions
Dvds
Beauty items such as nail polish, lotions/perfume

Posted in Events, Life

9 Months Pregnant

Posted on by teresamunoz91

Right now, I am 37 weeks pregnant. I have about three weeks left! My little one’s due date is a week before my 28th birthday. I don’t mind sharing my birthday month with her, but I’m hoping she is not born on my birthday lol. Time is going by so fast. I I am excited to meet Baby G, but also very nervous! Mostly about giving birth, but also the fact that I am going to have someone that will be completely dependent on me. I’m the oldest of six, but being an older sister is completely different than being a mom. The good thing is that I’m not alone. I have my mom, who is super excited about meeting her first grandbaby, my sisters, who want to watch my little one when she’s born, and my boyfriend of five years, who is happy to be having his first baby.

I feel like I have been pregnant forever! I first found out at the end of May. I’ve experienced a few of the symptoms. But since I hit 34/36 weeks, it’s starting to get worse. I can tell the baby is getting bigger because I have been dealing with back pain more often. Even just being in the car for 20 minutes, whether I’m driving or I’m a passenger, my back starts to hurt. I also have trouble sleeping because it is very hard for me to get comfortable. Heartburn is something that I also deal with on a daily basis. Supposedly this means my baby will be born will a lot of hair. I guess we will see if this is true in a few weeks!

I have only gained about 17/18 pounds since finding out I was pregnant. I was 114 pounds at the beginning, now I am about 131/132 pounds. I guess being active and eating somewhat healthy-ish helped me not gain too much weight. I officially stopped working out at 36 weeks. I had stopped running at the end of October. My last race was a local 5k on October 31st. For now, all I’m doing is walking for 30 minutes a few times a week. I normally love going to the gym, but this month (December), I’ve had no energy to go to the gym. The few times I’ve gone, I had to force myself to go. I admit I have been feeling a little unmotivated. I did take a month off after the stair climb that I did at the end of September, because at that time I was so worried that I wasn’t gaining enough weight. Even though I am no longer going to the gym, there are days when I feel guilty or like I’m lazy for not going.

I only have two weeks left at work. Then I will go on maternity leave for approximately 12 weeks. It will feel so weird not having to be somewhere at a certain time. After all, I’ve had a job since September 2012 and have never gone more than 2 weeks without working! I will miss my coworkers and even some of the members there, but it’s not like I will be on vacation. I will be busy at home taking care of my little baby girl.

I know having a baby will be difficult. I won’t sleep as much, my little one will need my constant attention, I won’t have as much me time anymore. But despite all this, I can’t wait for her arrival. It’s time for a new chapter in my life and I could not be happier.

We already picked out our baby girl’s name, but will not be sharing that until she is born. Here are the top 10 names we like and fyi, her name is in there. Many of the names were chosen because they have historical significance, are characters in books, or names in Greek/Roman mythology.
1. Samantha
2. Athena
3. Anastasia
4. Anabelle
5. Selena
6. Taylor
7. Charlotte
8. Isabelle
9. Minerva
10. Cassandra

Posted in Life

Christmas Season

Posted on by teresamunoz91

It’s almost Christmas! I love this time of the year. Everything about Christmas season makes me happy. The music, the decorations, the movies, the food, I can go on and on. The only thing I can’t do this year is go ice skating because of the little one in my belly. Oh well, there’s always next year!

One of my favorite things to do is watch Christmas movies. Since I have so much free time, this year I decided to watch a few Christmas movies from Netflix. Here are my favorites. Most of them from 2017-2018, but I did add a few older movies.
1. The Holiday Calendar
2. Christmas Crush
3. A Christmas Prince
4. Christmas Inheritance
5. The Princess Switch
6. A Christmas Prince 2

Non Netflix Movies
1. How the Grinch Stole Christmas
2. Santa Clause 1
3. Santa Clause 2
4. Santa Clause 3
5. It’s a Wonderful Life

Besides watching movies, I also like driving around the cities looking at all the decorations with my family. It’s fun to see how creative people get when it comes to decorating their houses. Some people really go all out. When I buy my own house, my house will definitely be decorated every Christmas season.

Another thing I love is Christmas music. In fact, this year I started listening to Christmas before Thanksgiving! That was only because there was a radio station that started playing music really early. I think they started playing music in the first week of November. Some people complain about the music being played too soon, but it’s very cheerful music and always lifts up my spirit when I hear that music being played. My favorite song is Let it Snow, but I also really like the song Little Drummer Boy.

One thing I really like to do is go to Knott’s Berry Farm. During this time, they call it Knott’s Merry Farm. I love how they decorate everything and all the Christmas themed desserts and food that they have. My family and I also enjoy watching the Christmas shows they have, especially Snoopy on Ice.

Posted in Life

January Baby 2019

Posted on by teresamunoz91

I shared this news with friends and family a while back, but for those who don’t know, I’m pregnant with my first baby! I am almost 7 months pregnant. I am having a baby girl, she is due a week before my 28th birthday.

When I first found out I was pregnant, I cried. I was in shock. I texted my best friend immediately, but didn’t tell anyone else for about two or three weeks, not even my boyfriend. I was so stressed out that the first two weeks or so, I cried myself to sleep. Having a baby was not something that I had pictured myself doing. Finding out that I was pregnant was definitely scary. I heard about all the symptoms and the pain of giving birth. I didn’t think I could handle it. I also started thinking of everything that I was going to give up. Not just the things that I would give up during the 9 months of pregnancy, but also things I would have to give up in the long run and maybe even forever.

Then I started thinking of the new experiences that I will have with my baby and being a mom. These new experiences are so exciting that it makes me forget about the things I will miss out on. It makes those things seem less important. Once I have my baby, I will still be able to run, I can still travel, and I can even start a business if I want to. Having a baby won’t ruin my life or make me miss out on things. She will change my life for the better. I know it won’t always be easy, especially the first few months of her life.

It took me 3 pregnancy tests, an ultrasound, and hearing the heartbeat to finally accept that I was actually pregnant. As time went on and I started telling more people. My family and friends were happy about it. Funny thing is that I was so nervous and scared to tell my mom that I was pregnant because I had no idea how she would react. Lucky for me, she was happy about the idea of having her first grandbaby. I started feeling better about it. My mom and sisters are anxious to meet the baby. My mom and little brother wanted me to have a boy, but everyone else was hoping for a girl. Of course, I wanted a girl too. My sister Destiny went with me to the gender reveal. That same day, we had a little gender reveal party just for the family. Destiny decorated the dining room with streamers and balloons and I made cupcakes with pink and blue frosting. We had my mom cut into the cupcake which revealed pink filling on the inside.

Sometimes pregnancy sucks. Don’t get me wrong, I can’t wait to meet my little one, but I definitely won’t be missing the annoying pregnancy symptoms like heartburn, leg cramps, back pain, and insomnia. I don’t feel cute or like I have that pregnancy glow. Sometimes I feel gross, esp. when I’m working out and see this little basketball popping out from under my shirt. But feeling the baby kicking and hearing her heartbeat is just an incredible feeling. I never really ever pictured myself as a mom to be honest, but throughout these last few months of my pregnancy, it’s become something that I can’t wait to do. I’m so anxious to meet her. I dreamt about her and can’t wait to hold her in my arms. I can tell she will be so loved and spoiled, not just by me, but by the rest of my family. I just hope my sister Ayanna, who is 4 years old and the baby of the family, doesn’t get too jealous.

There are many symptoms that I have yet to experience and I’m worried that I will eventually experience them in the upcoming weeks, such as my hands and feet swelling, getting stretch marks, and having even less energy to continue with my workouts. One thing that has surprised me is the fact that I haven’t gained much weight. It’s suggested that pregnant women gain 25-35 pounds, but at 28 weeks, I have only gained 12 pounds. I’m a little bit worried that I’m not gaining enough, but my doctor says the baby and I are both healthy. Maybe once I stop running and doing so much cardio, I can finally gain weight.

Cravings and pregnancy go hand in hand. I’ve had a few cravings, but nothing too crazy. Some things I’ve craved in my pregnancy are red meat-pizza, hamburgers, hot dogs, pancakes, and ice cream. Of course, I can’t actually eat hot dogs, but that hasn’t stopped me from craving them. There are so many things I can’t eat during my pregnancy that I will definitely indulge in once I have the baby.

I always thought that once you get pregnant, women would be forced to stay in bed and take it easy during their entire pregnancy. That’s not the case. It’s amazing what women can do when pregnant. In the last month or so, I’ve climbed up 75 flights of stairs in 24 mins and ran a half marathon in 3 hours. I’ve heard of women who continue working out until days before they give birth. There are even women who run marathons weeks before giving birth. I give them props because running a half marathon at 6 months pregnant was hard enough for me. I have made the decision to stop running at 28 weeks. While there might be women who run throughout their whole pregnancy, I feel this is the best decision for me and my baby. I will continue walking and doing light exercise, but as the due date gets closer, I do plan to cut back.

I am now in my third trimester and it feels like time is going by so fast. I still have so much to do before the baby gets here. One of those major decisions is coming up with a name for her. We have a few options, but most likely we will wait until she’s born to pick a name for her. We are 2.5 months away from meeting our little princess and that will be the happiest moments of my life. I haven’t met her yet, but I already love her so much.