May Randomness

Butterfly Project

For Sammie's birthday this year she received a butterfly house/project from Uncle Mike and Aunt Rachel.  You get the house, then send away for the caterpillars and transfer them in cocoon phase to the house and wait for them to hatch.

April Randomness

Easter 2011

Easter morning was fun as always, got the girls all hopped up on sugar courtesy of the Easter Bunny, and then took them to Grandpa's church and told them to sit still for an hour.  Riiiiiggggghhhhhttttt......But, after church we headed to Grandpa and Weeta's house and had a feast, then went home for naps.  Yes, all of us.

Polish Sweet Bread

My mom's side of the family is Polish.  Not just a little Polish either, 100%, the kind where you have Polish Eagles and signs that say "Proud to be Polish" hanging in your house.  My grandparents bowled in a coed league for years that wore bright red polyester shirts with the eagle across the back with the team name "Polish Power".  Yeah...that kind of Polish, but we loved it. 

Every Easter and Christmas would bring with it special dishes which to this day I cannot spell and most others can't pronounce, but they were delicious!  On Easter in particular, my grandma would make her Polish Sweet bread which was WONDERFUL!  It is a lot of work though, and had been years since she made it. 

This year, since we couldn't be there in person, Karen and I (with the girls' help) decided to send grandma some love for her first Easter without my grandpa in sixty-five years.  We made loaves of the sweet bread and sent it up to her overnight.  It wasn't her sweet bread, but it was good, and it was a little piece of love that she really, really needed.

Mr. & Mrs. Kruse

Friends of ours, Vince & Denise, were married in April.  It was a great occasion, and we all had a great time! 

Aren't they adorable?

Sammie's 5th Birthday

First Half Marathon

In April this year I did something I never thought I would do, I finished a half marathon.  That's 13.1 miles.  Friends of mine had done it before, and when I took up running, I told them, "that's just not for me", but that was before I'd really caught the bug.  I still can't say that I love running while I'm running, but I love the feeling when I'm done! 

I had hoped to run the whole thing.  I had trained for 14 straight weeks, 4x a week to run the whole thing. 

I did not run the whole thing. 

First thing, I went out faster than my normal pace, second thing, the weather after training those 14 weeks in winter months was 92 degrees that day, third thing, I started to feel a pain in my chest at mile five, started to walk to get my heart rate down and promptly threw up.  The next two miles were a blur and I was sure I wasn't going to finish, but then I got better and did in fact finish. 

My time was not stellar, my pace overall just over a 12 minute mile, but I was thankful that I listened to my body for the second half of the race as I heard they cancelled the full marathon due to the heat, the fact that so many people were collapsing, and they were running out of first, second and third responders. 

Three other friends ran that day as well, we kept each other on target for training, drove together on race day, and celebrated afterwards, extremely thrilled to finish!

Erin - Rachel - Stan - Me

Rachel ran with precious cargo aboard - I'm still in awe!

Me before the mile five fun

Nathan is actually holding me up here, I'm sure of it!

So what did this first half marathon teach me?

That I can do things I never thought I would.

That training is very, very important.

That having friends and family to support you both in the race and on the sidelines is just as important as all the training.

That walking is not an option for the next one.

That I would like for another ribbon around my neck to someday be simply: Marathon.

So, next step?  Next half this October!

Currently in week five of fourteen for training, and going very well.