Race Day

It's race time again.  This year I wanted to do some of the races I haven't done before so we started out with the Salt Lake half in April.  I had extremely low expectations for this one, I didn't feel very well trained and wasn't sure how the course was, well surprise, surprise, I finally met my goal of under 2 hours.  1:58:59 to be exact.  I was pretty excited about that.  That is the hardest part of racing for me, I never know how I'm going to feel on race day.  Luckily this day was a good one, besides the last mile, that was torture but it always is!

 Cami, me, and Keri

Last week was the Ogden half.  This is a tough one to get into so I was excited to do it, I've heard good things about it but I was trying not to set my expectations too high so I didn't have to fail. :)  I just wanted to beat my last time.  This run was beautiful, around pineview and down Ogden canyon.  I didn't feel quite as good as Salt Lake but managed to beat my time, a little more down hill helped I think.  1:55.  Katie and I crossed the finish line together holding hands. :)  A girl in my neighborhood, Cynthia Fowler, WON the marathon.  2:47, insane!!!!

What is it about running?  Such a love/hate relationship for me. The last mile of this race was killer too, such a mental game that I am trying to get stronger at.  That is my weekness.

Up next, dirty dash next week, then Hobble Creek in August!

Oh Kids...

Kenya was upstairs getting ready for church, when I told her it was time to go she came down with this beautiful blue eye shadow on.  She was so proud it was hard for me to tell her she needed to take it off.

 Leila has been sneaking into my makeup a lot lately.  One day I caught them both in my room, you can't see very well but Leila has lipstick all over and Kenya has eye shadow.  I just love their guilty little faces in these pictures.

 Later that day I caught Leila in my room again being very quiet.  She went to town this time.

 My lipstick is definitely ruined.  I have since secured my makeup a little bit better.

A couple times this spring we've ridden our bikes or walked over to Farmington Station to go to a couple stores, eat lunch and play on the playground.  This is when Leila learned about horses (she calls them "doddies", she calls all animals doddies and gets super excited when she sees one, which is a lot around here.)  On our way home we walked right by these horses and stopped to feed them.  Although Leila loves them if she gets too close she freaks out so it was all Kenya.

Charlie now has his cast off but he got it replaced with a purple cast half way through, which he ended up getting signed by a Utah football player.  We went to artcic circle after.  He also has a gash on his forehead in this picture, I can't believe how many calls I've got from the school nurse for this boy this year.  "Charlie's ok but I just wanted you to know he cut his head on the fire extinguisher on the wall." Or "Charlie's ok but I just wanted you to know he got hit in the head with a hockey stick at gym."  Or "Charlie's ok but I just wanted to let you know he fell off the monkey bars, landed on his back and got the wind knocked out of him."  I am prepared for a lifetime of this, I just hope the calls continue to start out with "Charlie's ok but..."

Red Butte Gardens

Charlie had a field trip to Red Butte Gardens that I got to go on with him.  I have never been there so it was a first for both of us.  It was a beautiful day, the highlight for Charlie was that we saw 3 snakes.  They were climbing through the trees, I hate snakes but it was kind of cool to see them slither through trees.  Charlie's teacher put me in charge of Spencer and Charlie.  She figured that would keep me busy, :)  They were the only two boys in the group.  "Girl trapped"  as Charlie would say. 

 All the girls and Charlie

 All the girls.

 The boys

 The race.

 Beautiful wisteria was growing over this arbor.  It was amazing.

After we went to Liberty Park for lunch and some playtime.  A crazy little storm came in real quick and made us leave a few minutes early, but it was a fun day and nice to spend some time with Charlie and his classmates.

Discovery Gateway

Kenya had her last field trip to Discovery Gateway.  We haven't been for a long time and the girls loved it.  

 Kenya loves Cruz but I'm pretty sure Cruz loves Brighton.  They all play together though. :)

 Sometimes Kenya stops playing with Brighton to play with her little brother Carter, and they play well together.  Pretty funny.

 Leila was certain that this was her car.  She rode around in it forever and was not about to share.

 We went upstairs where the kids put on the dress ups that were way small to put on a little play.  Brighton was off with Cruz so Kenya stuck with Carter again.

 Too funny.

Mothers Day

For mothers day Mark and the kids brought me breakfast in bed.  Cottage cheese pancakes with buttermilk syrup.  My favorite.  Charlie and Kenya gave me their cute gifts they made from school.  I love seeing how excited they are to give me those.  I am so blessed to be a mom to my three beautiful kids.  It is a hard job, but I am grateful that its my job, even though I might complain a lot and need a lot of breaks from it I wouldn't want it any other way!

New Pets!

Mark and I have been talking for a couple years about getting chickens.  Cage free organic eggs are expensive and we both love the idea of trying to be a little more self reliant.  It took some time but we eventually got our neighbors Jeff and Chelsa talked into sharing the chickens with us and putting the coop in the very back of both of our yards, it's actually just beyond our property line in the easement but the city won't mind. :)  Well our husbands are busy and not super handy (sorry guys) so they found a chicken coop on KSL that was perfect.  Chelsa and I picked out some paint and our families got together for FHE and painted the cute little coop.  

It was a fun little cage for the kids to play in until we finally got the chickens.  We have six Rhode Island Red hens.  Our stake president let us have some of his, he has about a hundred so he was happy to give us some.  So far they've been easy and give us about 5 eggs a day, perfect to split between the two families.  One even escaped when Chelsa went in the run to grab an egg that somehow got in there, it scurried away really fast and was gone.  We searched for it and a few hours later it came back! That night Mark decided to let them out and let them roam while he was weeding and they walked around pecking at the weeds, as soon as it started getting dark they headed right into the house and perched themselves on their wood bench to sleep for the night.  What great little pets!


Leila was out playing in the sandbox the morning after we got the chickens when she noticed them for the first time.  She started yelling "doddy! Doddy!" (this is what she calls every animal) She kept pointing at them and slowly walking back to their cage.  It was so cute and such a beautiful morning I grabbed my camera and snapped a few pics of her and her discovery of our new little pets.

The kids can lift up these little doors and check for eggs.