Proof

Sydney is not as sweet as she looks. She bites. HARD.

Poor Max.

The next day he screamed every time she came near him.

Pumpkin Patch!

We went to Staheli Farm here in St. George to go to their pumpkin patch. It's about 2 miles from our house. They had so much for our little kids to do. Max (and Chris) got to rope a steer.

Then we jumped on the "Redneck Trampoline." A bunch of mattresses surrounded by haystacks.

Sydney laughed and loved it.

Sydney especially thought Max was funny. Other little kids having fun make her laugh more than anything else.

Max, of course, had a blast running around and falling into the hay.

Chris got to try to shoot a tennis ball through a tire out of a potato gun. I showed my ignorance of toys-kids-play-with-in-the-west by having no idea what the thing was.

A great picture of Chris - so rare.

A picture of Max actually smiling towards the camera. He wasn't really in the mood to say "Cheez" that day. What we didn't get was a picture of the purple face that Sydney got as soon as we started swinging her. She held her breath because she couldn't get out a scream. Apparently, she hates to swing. Chris got the pleasure of taking Max down the irrigation slide (something else I couldn't have named if asked) and got the bumpy ride down. Max loved it though so they went down the other one too.

Then came the petting zoo. Max fell in love with sheep (Baaaaa!) and liked the goats too. But especially the sheep. Good thing they are tolerant animals.

Sydney was again scared to death of anything strange until she saw Max. He's so fearless that she overcomes a lot of her fears watching him. That's good because we can't raise a sissy.

Sydney LOVED the pumpkins though. Max is looking at me like, "Why do you keep telling me to look at you when that bright, bright sun is in my eyes?"

He had fun playing in the dirt and by the pumpkins though. And Sydney ended up being very cute.

She constantly does this head tilt and Chris and I both think it's absolutely adorable. Then she gives you a big, cheesy, teethy grin.

Yep, to her parents, she is the cutest little girl in the whole world.

To get a decent picture of all four of us requires something short of a miracle. We all smile, but for some reason, never all at the same time.

I tried to get a picture of the two kids next to the barn. Wouldn't it have been a cute picture if they had smiled and stood by each other?

I'm a Marathoner!

When I decided to do the St. George marathon a year ago, I was two weeks from giving birth. I thought it would be a great way to lose the baby weight and it was on my bucket list.
Seeing our friend, Dave, finish last year was very inspiring. I decided to go for it this year. I found a running partner, she got pregnant; I found another running partner, and 10 months later we both did a marathon. The training was tough and we learned a lot about our bodies, health, and nutrition.
Here are some things we learned about running a marathon: You don't run a marathon to lose weight. It's expensive. We spent more money on running shoes than I have spent on clothes in the past 4 years. We spent more money on energy packets (that are absolutely disgusting and make you gag). We set our alarms for times in the morning I don't think is decent to tell you on a blog - Chris called it "0'dark thirty." Some goats are very, very friendly. Goats urinate on you when you pick them up and they are scared (but the goat is safe from the street! and I still had to run 1.5 miles home). Border collies can't be worn out and the better shape they are in, the worse it gets. A half marathon is FUN; a full marathon is HARD. I realized even more what an incredible, supportive husband I have and how insanely patient he is. I think he may be pretty glad the marathon is over too. I gained a new respect for people who do anything like this and am still in awe of them. There are not currently any marathons in my future.
This marathon has what are called Pace Teams who help you come in at your goal time. I didn't have a goal time but my running partner wasn't with me (she ran a different marathon two weeks earlier) and she is my pacer. So I joined up with the 4.5 hour pace group. It was one of the best parts of the marathon. The pace leader was great, giving us running and nutrition tips, telling stories the whole time. I held back a lot in the beginning because of the pacer and conserved energy for the end. I stuck next to her and the group until mile 23. At the aid station at mile 23, I couldn't get my speed back up and stayed about 10 feet behind. At aid station 24, I lost her. That was the hardest mile I have ever run in my entire life. The sun was beating down and had been for hours. I had tried to keep up on hydration and the energy packets, but I was running low on steam. But I forced down another packet, kept going and it finally kicked in about mile 25.5. So I looked fine for the pictures.

Above: Chris and above him, my brother-in-law Travis, looking for me. Chris was a little worried because I was supposed to come in around 4 hours 30 minutes and by the official clock, I was almost 10 minutes late. We had no idea it would take me over 8 minutes to get to the start line. But I was near the back of over 6,000 people.

Me waving to the camera, happy to see the balloons at the finish line.

Done! It was in the mid-80's and a friend said it was probably 15 degrees hotter than usual for this time of year. My time! Official time 4:31:05. Thank you Chrissy for letting me use your watch and training with me the WHOLE time (even AFTER you did your marathon!). I still can't believe I did it. I think it made it feel like even more of an accomplishment that mile 24 was so hard. I wanted to walk so badly. But I thought of all the people waiting for me at the finish, that I had made it 24 miles without walking unnecessarily, and I just kept going. Now I just need to thank whoever invented gu.

*New* Kitchen Table!

Our little family has needed a new kitchen table for awhile. The one we've had since we've been married has served us well but not only were we outgrowing it by ourselves, but it was impossible to have people over for dinner.
Above is our old table.
So I found this one on Craigslist that had a leaf in the middle and came with four chairs.

I think it turned out great!

Chris came up with the color scheme to match our kitchen.

It took awhile to finish. The one reason it took a LONG time to finish was not my lack of enthusiasm or willingness to do it. I got the table completely sanded and ready to paint. Then I read on the paint and stain that I shouldn't do it when it is more than 90 degrees outside. And it should stay below 90 for 4-6 hours for it to dry properly. Well, this was in July in Southern Utah. The only time it is below 90 degrees is for a short period of time right before dawn! So we finally ended up converting our kitchen to a shop for less than a week (it had taken me 3 weeks to get two coats of stain on it) and it was done! We had to keep kids and dogs away from it though so our kitchen looked like this:

I'm going to do the chairs this fall when I can take it back outside. We'll paint the backs and legs black and stain the seats. I'm sure I'll post those pictures too. It's going to look awesome! and for MUCH cheaper than a new table!
For now it looks like this and it has already been really nice to have the extra space. It fits our little dining area perfect too. Not bad for $110 total :)

Half Marathon!

I did it! I ran 13.1 miles last Saturday. My running partner and I did the Bryce Canyon Half Marathon. It was a beautiful canyon and a fun run. There were almost 1200 participants. It loses almost 1700 feet in elevation during the race which means my legs are still feeling it today. But definitely a fun race!

Me and my running partner, Chrissy
I'm so glad she did it with me!! And yes we match, they were on sale. The family.
Me and Sydney. I think she missed me for the 2 hours I was gone. :)
Max about to get into any trouble he can find.

A couple of the miles were tougher than the others, but I was really surprised how good I felt even at mile 12. I have gotten pretty sick during and after my longer training runs and it worried me for the half. But it turns out when you hydrate yourself properly and eat right, your body does fine when you've trained right too. Who knew water could be so important when you're training in 100 degree heat?? Obviously, not me. :)

Thankfully, Bryce Canyon was much cooler than that and I was nourished and hydrated right. We even used everything we had left and sprinted in to the end. We heard someone in the crowd say "They're going to die at the end" and we wondered that too. Turns out all the adrenaline kept us going. I'm so glad we did it. It was so much more fun than just another Saturday long run and very motivating. Marathon here we come!

To All Private Blogs

To all my friends who have a private blog:

I completely understand. However, I NEVER check your blogs. I'm so sorry. I always forget and I never know if you have posted anything new. So, I have an idea. Maybe you could consider making a new blog that is not private, giving me (and anyone else who wants to read your blog) the address, and then making a short "I posted on my other blog" post whenever you post something on your private blog. Then I will put this new blog in my list of blogs, and when you update it with your short post, it will let me know to check your private blog. See how that works?

Hope that's not too confusing!

Max is TWO

There are quite a few new posts today so keep scrolling down!
We're beginning to really like birthdays around here. Presents and an excuse to make cake are always great. Max turned two last week and we invited people over for dessert. Max got a train table with train tracks inside and a train rug from his parents. (Who also still need to buy him a tricycle for his birthday but he doesn't know the difference so they are procrastinating doing it.)

Normally I would not boast that I got my son's birthday presents at a yard sale, but here I can't resist. I was out looking for sandals for Max when I saw this train table. It was marked $30. I looked inside and the train rug was folded up and included along with the tracks and a few train pieces. It was very much an impulse buy. I brought it home and instantly regretted doing it because I always, ALWAYS regret impulse purchases. Chris kept telling me it was fine and reminding me how we were just looking at these train tables a month ago. I finally felt better when I looked these exact items up online. Brand new the train table and train set together is $160. The rug itself is $50 alone. That is a savings of $180. I suddenly felt much better about my purchase.
And Max LOVES it. Chris is going to build it a stand that is Max's height but Max doesn't seem to care right now. He likes to get in the box when the lid is off and put the bridges along the outside edge. It's a hit and it's nice to know $30 was well spent. (I hate buying toys they never touch!)

We worked on blowing out the candles but Max still needed a little help.
I made frosting filled cupcakes (you fill the inside of the cupcakes with frosting using a #12 cake tip - SO EASY and delicious!) and a strawberry shortcake because the strawberries looked delicious. The cupcakes have strawberry icing too. So we had pink frosting for our son's 2nd birthday. He didn't care and next year maybe I'll do something more appropriate for a 3 year old boy. Here are some pictures of Max that were taken in the last month.
He still LOVES LOVES LOVES water, no matter the temperature of the water or the temperature outside.

He also loves Ring Around the Rosy. Chris's youngest sister Aleksa was nice enough to play it with him and his cousin for quite awhile.

He also loves his dad. Above, he is flying a kite with Chris. Chris was sitting on the ground and Max went over and just plopped in his lap. And below Max was sick and got up too early one morning so I put him in bed with Chris while I took care of Sydney. This is how I found them later (before I woke Chris up with my flash). Chris can't wait to take Max fishing and some days neither can I!

But most days Max has turned into a very sweet boy who *usually* listens and is so sweet to his baby sister it could make you cry.

Max's Quirks

Max does the funniest things. Chris and I just shake our heads and laugh. He loves to line things up and arrange them.

He also has an obsession with shoes and puts on whatever pair is lying around.

And he has a slight obsession with my boots and goes for them first when he is in my closet. Maybe because they are almost as tall as him??