Today I ran in the Pioneer Day 10K down in Provo. I had two reasons for wanting to run this race. The first reason was because I hadn’t done a 10K in a year and I wanted the challenge. The second reason was because I wanted to do something for my good friends, Niki and Flavio, who are anxiously waiting to find out if their in-vitro worked. Niki has been on bed rest for 4 days and has one more day to go and then they still have another week or two until they find out. I knew there wasn’t anything I could do to help with that process, but I knew that I could show them how much I love them and how amazing I think they are. I chose the 10K over the 5K because it had what they called “Goliath Hill” at the beginning. This hill was high. It was steep. And it was long. As I was thinking about Nikio and their experience and the journey they need to take to have a child, I felt that the 10K was a good representation of that. I started out good and once I hit the bottom of the hill I still thought I could run up the whole thing, but halfway through it, I had to stop and walk. The hill won and I was okay with that. I kept thinking of Nikio and all of the ups and downs they have had and once I got to the top of the hill I never walked again until I crossed the finish line. My legs got really tired at about mile 4.5 and I really wanted to quit, but Nikio’s example of never giving up kept me going.

I truly enjoyed running this for them and want to publicly thank them for their wonderful example of enduring to the end and having faith in the Lord. Love you guys!

The course for this run was absolutely beautiful. Provo is one of my favorite places to go in Utah County. It reminds me of my childhood, of when Jeffy and I met, and it is so pretty. As I was running, I thought a lot about Nikio, but also of the Pioneers. Looking at those beautiful, magnificent mountains, I thought of how those Pioneers had to walk up and over mountains, pushing and pulling their belongings and loved ones in handcarts and wagons, and suddenly my race didn’t seem so difficult. All I had to do was run. I am so grateful for the Pioneers and the sacrifices they made to get here and there isn’t a day that goes by that I don’t thank my Heavenly Father for this beautiful land. We truly are blessed to live where we live.

Near the beginning of the race, at about 1/2 mile into it, a dad pushing his disabled daughter in a stroller passed me, and I was overcome with emotion. He reminded me of the sweet love a father has for his child and the willingness to do anything for that child.

I was lucky to have Jeff and the kids cheer me on during the race. This was the first race the kids got to come to and they really enjoyed watching me take off and then continuing to drive around the course, stopping and waiting for me so that they could give me high fives, cheer me on, blow me kisses and tell me they love me. It helped so much to see their cute little faces and to hear their encouraging words. I am so lucky!

I highly recommend a good run like this every Pioneer Day to help remind us of all the blessings we have in our lives.

Happy Pioneer Day!

I am sitting in the car at the 1-mile marker of the 10K Bethy is running, and she just ran past. I think they staggered the starts, so its tough to tell how shes doing compared to everyone else, but shes not too concerned about anyone else (except that she doesnt want to finish last). Its a fun way to start our anniversary, and I am super proud of her.

I am thankful every day that Beth decided to marry me, because she is absolutely perfect for me. Shes my best friend, a wonderful wife, a nearly flawless mother, and pretty much everything I ever would have dreamed of in a wife if I were smarter and knew all the right stuff to dream of.

We spent last night at the Grand America hotel in Salt Lake, capping off six years of marriage with the most wonderful Cobb salad weve ever had. Seriously, if you like Cobb salad, you have to come up here. But anyway, we had a great evening with good food, some time in the hot tub, a movie in our hotel room, and some nice child-free relaxation (thanks Mimi!). Then we got up way too early this morning and watched SportsCenter as we got ready to go (the Dodgers won last night). Its been perfect, although I acknowledge that I think every day with Beth is perfect, so I may not be the most objective person in the world.

I think Ill go drive around and see how shes doing. Happy anniversary, Bethy! Six down, eternity to go! I love you!!!

So, the crazy chick that I am, I signed up for a 10K this Saturday. You know, for our 6th anniversary, I’m gonna run 6 miles. I’m insane. Heidi was so nice to watch the kids for me this morning and off I went. Between new shoes, numb toes, and a constant stitch in my side, I ran it in 1 hour and 20 minutes. It didn’t take me as long as I had feared it would, even though I know it’s not a great time. I’m not doing this to prove anything to anyone. Mostly doing it just to say that I did it, and of course the health benefits of running. But 6 miles is so FAR! Man oh man. But now that I’ve done it once, I can’t use it as an excuse to not ever do one again. I really do enjoy running. Wish me luck this Saturday! I’ll let you know how it goes!

We’ve finally done it. I grew up here and Jeff went to BYU for like a hundred years and neither of us had ever hiked the Y. And since we’re all healthy and active now we decided it was time. It was a lot harder than I had expected it to be but it was beautiful and worth it and fun to be able to do it together. If you’ve never hiked it, there are 12 switchbacks and the 11th switchback is the longest and steepest one on the whole thing. A pretty cruel trick if you ask me. We were about 1/4 of the way up this switchback and Jeff says, “Let’s run it.” I was shocked and proud at the same moment so we started running up this beast of a switchback and about 3/4 of the way to the end we stopped because it hurt so bad. But you should have seen the faces of the people we passed as we were running. They really thought we had done that the whole way up! Totally worth it! Going up was hard and going down was obnoxious. We had a really good time though and thanks Laney and Kelly for watching the kids and sorry again for the throw up.

I’m blowing this baby up.

I don’t care what anyone says, Utah is fan-freakin-beautiful and I’m so proud to call it home.

For some reason these rocks reminded me of New Zealand or something.

Centennial Apartments. That’s where Jeffy and I met.

Side view of the Y.

The Y from the top. If I was still 15, I would have hiked up higher to get a better picture of it, but I’m not, so deal with it.

Picture this: a woman who isn’t showered, her house is a mess, her kids are half dressed, she’s on the phone with her mom. The doorbell rings. She walks to the door, looks in the peep hole and sees a man she’s never met before, with a gorgeous bouquet of flowers and a balloon. The woman says to her mom, “I just got a beautiful bouquet of flowers!” The mom says, “Is it from your husband?” The woman says, “I hope so!” The woman then walks to the kitchen to put the flowers on the table, during which her son trips on one of his millions of cars and is screaming, so she still doesn’t know who it’s from. She’s pretty sure it’s from her husband but she just can’t wait to see for sure. She goes back to comfort her son and then asks him if he wants to come see who the flowers are from and he sobbingly says yes. She goes over to the table, takes out the card and reads this:

“Roses are red, pickles are green
You’re not part of my life,
You’re the whole blasted thing!
(I bet you didn’t know you were married to a master poet!)
I love you SOOOOOOOOO much!”

The woman then starts to cry and calls her husband to thank him and tell him that it truly made her day awesome and that she loves him too.
And scene.

Best. Day. Ever.

Today was the annual Digicert snowmobiling trip up out in Midway, which is right by Heber. It’s beautiful up there and it’s such a cute, little town. Jeffy and I always say we’re going to move there every time we go there. (Don’t worry Mimi!) It just has such a good feeling about it. Anyway, Auntie Laura came and watched the kids for us and we had a really nice time together. I was a little bit nervous this year because last year I went off a jump and got thrown off the ski-doo and was in LOTS of pain for a couple of days. I knew that once we got started I would be fine, but it actually took me a lot longer that I had expected to feel comfortable on it. For the first 10-15 minutes, I was actively scared but then once I got the hang of leaning while turning and all that stuff again, I was just fine. We were out for about 3 hours and I wished we could have stayed out longer, because I felt like I was just getting to the point where I wasn’t scared at all anymore, and then it was time to leave. Oh well. I still had a great time and there is always next year! Afterwards, we had some time to shower and relax and then we had a really nice dinner there at the Homestead.

I love the company Jeffy works for, Digicert. They genuinely care for their employees and are always treating them with wonderful experiences to thank them for all of the hard work they do to help the company move forward. Thank you Digicert! We are so grateful to you (and for you)!

Jeffy and I on our ski-doos sporting our sexy jumpsuits!

Me on my ski-doo on the side of a mountain. I was still a little nervous at this point.

Us and the Heber Valley behind us. Gorgeous.

Another shot of Heber Valley, taken at the top of the mountain. I think the guy said it was 8,840 feet up.

Us taking a break at the top of the mountain. I’m seriously buying myself a pair of these goggles to wear as sunglasses…

Everyone that came.

It’s Valentine’s Day morning, and Beth is lying in bed next to me in a hotel room in Salt Lake, so I thought I’d sneakily pull out my phone and blog about how perfect she is for me. We’ve been best friends for six years and four days now, and I don’t know how I was ever happy without her. Probably had a different definition of happy back then, I guess. She has strengths that complement all my weaknesses, and she has just enough weaknesses to make me feel like I’m contributing something to the relationship too. And now she’s waking up, so I’ll stop.

I love you, Bethy!

So, if any of you live close by, you have seen the awesomeness that has been going on at my house. We have lived here for three full winters now and not once have we ever shoveled the snow on our driveways or walks. That’s why we paid the extra $500 to buy a south facing lot so that we wouldn’t necessarily have to. The sun was our shovel. No longer my friends. My most wonderful brother-in-law Lane has come to the rescue. Not only was he excited about doing it, he did it without a coat on! The kids and I had a great time watching him from inside where it was nice and warm.

I can’t and shouldn’t offer him to any of you but I’m sure if you asked him, he would be more than happy to shovel your walks as well. Right Laney?

So, for the past little while I’ve been feeling pretty guilty about the fact that we don’t recycle. I do take our newspapers to the recycling bin, but I don’t do anything with plastic or metal besides throwing it in the trash. The reasons why I don’t do this, even though there is no excuse, is because my city doesn’t offer any sort of recycling service (SERIOUSLY) and I didn’t know where I would take it even if I did recycle those things. Well, after watching WALL-E about 20 times since Christmas I’ve realized that it’s time I need to be responsible and take this opportunity to teach my children these important things. I know a lot of people didn’t like WALL-E because of the whole people-trash-the-Earth-and-are-extremely-fat part of it, but who’s to say that that won’t EVER happen? And seriously, why should taking care of the Earth be a political thing? Isn’t it common sense, especially to us members of the church, to WANT to take care of the Earth that our Heavenly Father gave to us? Anyway, so the other day I went to the store and bought 3 bins and went home and labeled them each according to what their contents would be. The first day we started this, I was amazed at how much stuff was recyclable and how much less trash we had. The kids have fallen in love with it and constantly ask if there is anything else to put in the bins and because of that I love it too!!

I have looked online and have found some places to take the plastic and metal so now I’m all set. Go me! I hope you don’t think I’m getting all preachy on you because I don’t mean to be, but if you were like me and have wanted to and just didn’t know where to go, I would be more than happy to take your bins with me when I go to the places myself. Thanks for enduring this less than fun post! Earth rocks!

What a fabulous year 2008 was!! As you all know, a year is a crazy long amount of time, and a lot happens in a year, but I wanted to go through all the posts from the last year and put the highlights on here, both good and/or bad.

I started out the year with pink eye and Logan has ended the year with pink eye. Precious.

Logan started walking!!

Lindsay learned how to read. All. By. Herself.

I almost died snowmobiling, but had an awesome time up until that point.

Jeffy and I went and saw the Blue Man Group.

Logan turned one and never looked back!

We took Lindsay to a BYU vs. Utah gymnastics meet that she LOVED!!

Our basement flooded. Again.

I learned the word ba-donka-donk. Totally awesome.

Jeffy turned 31 and I turned 26.

I got new cabinets in my laundry/pantry room.

We did A LOT of swimming!

Went to Cancun and had a wonderful time together as a family!

Bought a new car.

Finished our back yard, and I mean finished!

Jeff and I celebrated our 5th wedding anniversary!

Went to Arizona to spend time with my side of the family and had a blast!

Lindsay started preschool.

Jeff and I started losing weight.

Jeff and I went to New York City. By ourselves. Thanks Mimi!!

Lindsay turned 4 and took swimming lessons and loved them!

Jeffy’s grandpa died.

LIA!!!

Friendships bloomed.

Thanks for the memories 2008!!