*Monday Memos*

*Monday Memos*

 

dear ikea and tulip festival, you ended up being IKEA and Scheels instead -  thanks to a blizzard and freezing temps!  My sister in law Karen and I were looking so forward to seeing the Tulip Festival at Thanksgiving Point, but the weather turned on us.  When we saw the storm, we went to IKEA first hoping the storm would pass by the time we were finished.  No such luck.  But we sure had fun in IKEA and I got to eat one of my faves - Swedish Meatballs and mashed potatoes and gravy!  Mmm.....  We watched the storm through the window as we ate. I wish I would have taken a photo of that!  

After leaving IKEA we decided to go check out Scheels since neither one of us had ever been there.  As soon as we walked in we saw so many photo opps!  We knew it was going to be fun!  If we would have had more time, we would've taken a spin on the Ferris Wheel, but instead we went jeepin'!

And did some fishin'

The Bass Whisperer herself...

We got a couple of trophies...

All in a day's work...

I was nearly eaten alive...

We just basically "moosed" around...

It was so much fun!

Next year, the Tulip Festival!  And it WILL be warm! I'm putting in my weather order right now!
I L O V E tulips so much.  I can't wait to get down there next year and check them out!

dear "one of those days", holy!  I don't have days very often when everything goes wrong, but Tuesday was one of them.  From the second I woke up, to the minute I went to bed, it seemed like I had a black cloud above my head.  

I wish I would have made a list, because now I can't remember even half of the stuff that went wrong.  The things I do remember is that it was my son Bryce's birthday and I was trying to do a Facebook post of a collage of photos of him and I couldn't find half of the pix or get my computer to work.  I was supposed to be meeting Jen for our 20 mile run and I had to keep texting her and telling her I need 15 more minutes...again and again.  I finally got it posted (or so I thought), come to find out it never posted because I had my settings on custom and no one could see it. Ugh!  I worked so hard on it so it would be posted before I left on my long run and nothing!  I then ran up to get ready for my run.  I couldn't find my running tights and pretty much threw everything out of my running drawer and still couldn't find them anywhere. I finally remembered where I put them and so I put them on (which is no easy feat!) and realized I had them on inside out and so had to do the pull and stretch routine all over to get them on right.  It was almost starting to be comical! I broke four nails, couldn't find my handheld water bottle I "needed" for my run, ran my last 20 miler training run and had the worst (and slowest) run of my entire life - (not good for the confidence come race day - haha), my Garmin battery died before we started, and my iPod battery died at mile 4, ingested 200 million bugs, and now I have a new injury just three weeks out before the marathon. I was so frustrated that I came home and ate cookies for my recovery meal.  I needed to make Bryce a cake for his birthday, but was afraid I would burn down the house doing it! The list goes on and on. I thought maybe it would be better to just go and hide in bed and not get up until tomorrow. haha  But, I guess in the overall grand scheme of things, I will still take my day over what many others have to go through on a daily basis. (TRYING to be positive!) And I AM grateful that everyday isn't like this! Gah! 

My good friend Dawn has a sticker on her car that says, No Bad Days.  I am thinking I better get that tattooed on me somewhere. haha (joke- just a joke - I know some of you will think I am serious. Nope, just a joshing. I would never get a tattoo for any reason, so relax!)

 This is usually how I feel ↓, but after Tuesday, I am convinced even my attitude would not have survived that day!

dear long run suckfest, you were right up there with some of the worst runs of my life.  Running a 20 miler is always something I fear, mainly because well, it's 20 flippin' miles and you just never know what is going to happen.  I was supposed to run you on Saturday but it was pouring rain and Jen was still sick and so we postponed it until Monday, but she was still not feeling up to it.  I hated to keep postponing it, but I would rather wait so I didn't have to go it alone.  Going alone is never fun for 20 miles.  Been there, done that.  So on Tuesday we ventured out to attack it.  It was our last long run until the big day...and after this we start to taper so there was some pressure.  We drove up to the sheds at Sardine Canyon and parked and then ran from the sheds to Sherwood Hills.  There was some nice down hill, but holy the up hill was wicked!  We turned around after taking this lovely photo of us standing by the sign that says "20" because I did that last year when I ran the 20 alone.  We think we are so funny because it says "slow down" which made us feel uber tough. ☺  We tried a million jumps and this is the only one that we even came close to getting a shot of us in midair because we were off with the timer somehow.  We tried and tried and we got lots of air, but no proof.  

We were then off to tackle the KILLER hill after Sherwood that takes us back to the sheds.  I call it Airplane Hill because when you are in Sardine driving out of Logan in the dark, you can see the car headlights and taillights and it looks like they are in the sky because the hill is so huge.  But we did it without stopping once.  We then had another one, and I think another one.  Seems like we were doing nothin' but hills!  I was getting a bit worried about Jen because she was struggling a bit with her breathing.  She also had to stop and puke at the top of the hill.  She had been sick with a killer cold for two weeks and so this was a huge feat for her to even take on after that.  We got to the sheds and I left my jacket in the car because it was finally starting to warm up a bit.  We headed down the canyon and stopped in Mantua and hit the bathroom and then ran around the dam.  We didn't get far before Jen was really struggling with her breathing again and getting dizzy.  We stopped and walked the rest of the way around it.  We did have our lunch while walking though consisting of at least 200 million bugs!  Lots of protein!  We even inhaled them up our noses. I guess that means we snorted half our lunch.  That wasn't helping with her breathing! 

I wasn't minding the walking because I started to have some serious pain in my arch on my left foot.  I have never experienced anything like this before and Jen said it sounded like Plantar Fascitis.  It usually hurts in the bottom of the heel which I have experienced before, but never in my arch.  Oh great!  A new injury just right before the marathon!  Aaaargh!!!  It was really painful while running and even walking.  I was not a happy camper thinking I would have to run with that pain for 26.2 miles.  Jen thought I could do some stretching exercises and get it to leave before the full.  I sure hope so.  Oh the joys of running! Jen continued to struggle and she had me really worried.  I didn't want to have to call 911 on the trail around the dam. I told her that maybe her body was telling her it was too early to attempt this and she should go home before it got worse.  I could tell she really didn't want to do that, but I really thought it was for the best.  Then I got an idea and asked her if she had ever done an inhaler.  She had once for allergies so I asked her if she thought one of those might help.  She didn't know.  At mile 14 I called my hub the doc and asked him what he thought.  He said it would probably be worth a try and he happened to be off for lunch at the time and so he so kindly made a house call (I mean a dam call), and brought one up for her. Here he is to the rescue!  What a great guy!

He took our picture before he left and we were off again! 

He also took these pix of us running the canyon.  Happily the inhaler really helped.  She was able to breath without struggling and the dizziness was gone. We did a great pace for the next three miles and then it all came back.  She was dizzy and struggling to breath again and felt like puking.  I told her to take another little puff which she did, but it didn't help much.  We ran a very slow pace home and had to keep taking walking breaks.  I felt so bad for her.  I would have not wanted to run that far while feeling like that.  It's not fun even when you feel great.  My foot pain eased up a bit on the downhill which I was very grateful for.  Strangely enough, after I got home, my left foot felt fine, but my right one was in a lot of pain.  It was feeling like it did before when I thought I might have a stress fracture.  Oh lovely!  

We were out there way too long for a long run.  Almost 4.5 hours!  I was surprised how sore I was the next day because I know we didn't push it like a normal 20 miler and so I didn't think I would be sore at all, but being out there for that long of a time takes it toll on your body no matter what your pace. Even if it was a suckfest, I'm just glad that's in the books!  Bring on the taper!

dear bryce, happy 23rd birthday!  Wow, I can not believe you are already 23.  I remember so well the day you were born.  I had an ultrasound and I was almost completely out of amniotic fluid because you must have been drinking it all and so they told me that I was going to have a baby that day even though you were a couple weeks early.  Oh my, you were the cutest little kid!  Every woman young and old in our ward was in love with you when you were two because you were such a flirt and impossible to resist!

And you are still one handsome guy!

You wanted to go to Beijing Buffet for your birthday dinner.  I'm glad you enjoyed it because I was ready to hurl after seeing the octopus, muscles, oysters and shrimp with eyes looking at me!

I'm glad Grammy and Grampy were able to join us. 

Since we are having your family party on Sunday, we didn't have a cake yet.  But we still sang to you with your one little candle on a peanut butter bar.  I just have to laugh at you trying to light the birthday bag on fire.  You may be 23, but you are still a kid at heart.  I hope you know how much joy you have brought to me these past 23 years.  It hasn't always been easy, but you are such a great kid with the kindest heart, most generous spirit, and compassionate soul. I'm so glad I'm your mom!

dear gina, it's hard to believe you have been gone a year.  You were the most amazing woman who lived and died with so much dignity.  You taught us all so much about being strong in the midst of adversity and your strength helped to lift us up each and every day that we had to share with you while you were here.  You touched so many lives with your positive facebook posts.  I miss those so much.  I miss you too, but I know that you are watching over all of us and your sweet family.  Thanks for all the lessons you taught us and for the incredible example you were to us all.

After we put some things on your grave to remember you, and took all these photos (which I love how colorful they are all!), we went to lunch at Hug Hes.  It was so fun to get together in honor of you.  Thanks for being the wonderful friend that you were.  I can still hear that cute laugh of yours.  May you always rest in peace...

dear sweet mona, thank you for the beautiful flowers.  You are the sweetest and kindest person.  I told you that you shouldn't have done that because we both know you can't afford to, but you just said you had to because you wanted to thank me for everything.  What a sweet gesture and what beautiful flowers that remind me what a great friend I have in you!

dear recovery run, I am so happy it's taper time.  I ran a six miler out west to one of my favorite country roads.  I couldn't resist taking pix on this fun little bridge by what Jen calls the Grandma House. 

The only drawback with secluded country roads is sometimes they attract the wrong kind of peeps.  The picture below is of two cars that were racing each other at high speeds.  I couldn't get my phone camera to work quick enough and so I wasn't able to get their license plates, but I wish I would've.  They were going extremely fast and would turn around and do it again.  For anyone that ever thinks running is boring, you just don't run in the right places. haha

dear date night, we had a wedding reception to attend in Hooper for my friend Dawns' son Braxton and so we made a date out of it since Dave actually had a free night.  We went to the reception and then to dinner.  I ran into an old high school friend at dinner and that was fun. The photo below is at the reception.  The goat was the best man.  His name is Dale.  Cracked me up!

dear bonnie, thank you for inviting me to breakfast and to go get some planters for my porch.  I love to spend time with you and with our busy lives, we rarely get to.  It was so much fun to catch up and chat for a bit.  I look up to you in so many ways and I am so happy we are friends.  Some day I hope to be as good as you are.  But, I have a long ways to go!  You make me so excited to be a grandma.   Hopefully that WILL happen someday!

The greenhouse was just so colorful and gorgeous!  The cute little goat in the photo was a brand new baby.  You will have to click to enlarge to even see him.  I found some great hanging baskets and planters.  And the best part is they keep them alive for you until it gets warm enough to set them outside!  Yea! 

dear 10 miler, you were supposed to be a 12 miler, but I went with Jen and she was only going 10 and so I decided after the 20 miler on Tuesday, that 10 was probably a better idea anyway.  We ran to the bird refuge and down the same country road that I wrote about above.  Luckily no speedsters on that road this day.  The only speedsters were us because we were doing a tempo run.  It was pretty tough.  We did however, find a baby snake.  I H A T E snakes!  But he was so little so he didn't seem too foreboding to me.  Jen even tried to pick him up but he escaped into the sidewalk crack.  I think he looks like a sea monster in the first photo.

When we stopped to take a photo, I found this ↓ heart shaped rock!  I was so excited because I don't have too many big heart shaped rocks.  We only had one mile left to go and so I carried it the rest of the way.

It was pretty awkward carrying a huge rock, but I didn't care.  I love it! 

dear dave, this picture says it all.  If Mr. Cat is sleeping in your chair, instead of moving him or kicking him off of it, you are patient and wait for him to leave.  If he is in my chair, I just sit down on the chair anyway and scoot him back.  This time you had to get on the computer and so you moved your chair with the cat on it and went and got a hard chair to sit on.  WHAT?  Yep.  It's true!  I would have never predicted this in a million years.  Either you have a real tender spot for the animal or you just don't want to touch him.  Not sure which, but I have a pretty good idea. ☺

dear family party for bryce, I made a coconut cream cake because that is what Bryce requested even though I had never made one before.  It turned out quite delish!  Both grandparents were able to come and some aunts, uncles, and cousins.  The weather was SO gorgeous and so we went to a park.  It was fun being outdoors in nature with the yummy scent of spring flowers in the air.

Bryce rode his long board home. McKay was driving and I was taking pictures. You can see me in the rear view mirror snapping away. We took him up to the top of a hill and he rode down and all the way home. That kid is so amazing on that thing, but it still scares me! 

Happy 23rd bud!

dear taylor, (aka elder wilding), we got a letter from Missionties from you this week and since that is a rare thing, and because I didn't get any photos from you, I decided to post it here.  You make me smile and laugh and I can't wait until Mother's Day to get to see you and talk to you via Skype!!!!