Running The Race

Way back in May, I set a goal for myself. Then I blogged about it and told a bunch of people, so I could have some accountability - or be really embarrassed when I didn't follow through. My big mouth helped in this case, because last weekend I accomplished my goal.

I ran an 8K race!

I started working toward this slowly, using the Couch to 5K plan, and increased my distances a little bit. I bought some running shoes, because I didn't have any, and some shorts and a good, dry-fit running shirt. And then, off I went.

My roommates from college, Kayla and Sara, and one of David's roommates, Aaron, ran the race with me this weekend. Peter and David took care of Micah while we were running.

It was nearly 5 miles (4.9 or so), and we started off down-hill, then ran over McNary Dam into Washington. After we crossed the river, we turned around and came back, ending with a very difficult run uphill. And boy, was it hard! It was SO hard!

At first, my goal was that I wanted to finish the race - I was pretty worried about being able to run the entire distance. I had also heard that my friend Tiffany's 5-year old niece was running, and I was hoping that I wouldn't lose to her! Aaron convinced me to set a time goal for myself, and I thought an hour sounded good. That way, I could run most of the time, but if I walked a little it wouldn't be a problem.

Well, my time was 52:25! I definitely beat my goal, and I finished 30th, which isn't too bad! (There were 79 people in the 8k.) It really helped that Sara and I ran together the entire time, because she was pushing me to keep going. And can you tell that she's almost 8 months pregnant?! That girl is amazing - she ran the entire way, and beat me by 30 seconds!

I really enjoyed running with my friends. Aaron took 6th place over all, and Kayla was a couple people ahead of Sara. I feel very good about my results, and I'm definitely planning to run in some more races with them!

Besides being finished, the best part was finishing to this boy smiling at me and saying, "Mama! Mama!"

If you want to see the results, you can find them here. And I did finish ahead of Tiffany's niece, but she did amazingly well!

A Pumpkin Patch and A Hay Ride

On Friday, Micah and I went on a cousin-outing to Country Mercantile's Harvest Festival to look for the perfect pumpkin, see some animals, and have some lunch. This was the second time I'd been there, the first was a field trip with our students. It's a great fall event, with a hay ride, corn maze and a hay-bale pyramid.

Country Mercantile has a great store, where you can sample salsa and fudge - and it's the most delicious fudge I've ever had! I can't stop thinking about it. We spent a little time in the store, browsing through the shelves, then headed out to the great outdoors. 

Our first stop was the petting zoo. Micah enjoyed seeing the animals, and even tried to pet the sweet little calf.

The weather in Pasco was perfect - it's wasn't hot and sunny, so Micah could wear his sweatshirt, but it wasn't cold at all! And not a drop of rain from the gray-ish skies. We picked out a pumpkin for him, the perfect size for a little guy, and boy did he love it!

Micah also really enjoyed watching his bigger cousin Jonathan, who showed him how to roll pumpkins.

When we made it back to the front desk, we had to weigh Micah's pumpkin, which hit right at half a pound. He wasn't interested in leaving it on the scale though, so we quickly got it back in his hands, and later, in his mouth.

 I wasn't sure how much fun Micah would have at the pumpkin patch, since he's still pretty little, but he really enjoyed it! He was all smiles, especially when he was sitting in the dirt!

On My Bedside Table

Well, I said three days ago that I had a bunch of blogging ideas, and then when I went to write them, I realized that I had fit all of my ideas into two posts! There were a lot of thoughts and happenings covered in those last two.

But, don't worry - I have something to share with you.

I have found a book that I love! Let me introduce it to you:

Readers of this blog, I introduce you to 'Doctrine: What Christians Should Believe' by Mark Driscoll and Gerry Breshears.

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The name pretty well explains what this book is about. It's about Doctrine, what Christians should believe. What I really love about it, though, is that they don't just tell you to believe something. They explain it all to you in a way that is easy to understand.

When I was a junior at Corban, I took Theology - everyone did, because it was required. I learned a lot, but I felt like the textbooks that we used were very confusing - very scholarly. Driscoll's writing style is one that reads easily and smoothly, which means that not only is the information important and life/thought-changing, but it's easy to understand!

Each chapter discusses a different topic, and I've really barely scratched  the surface, but the explanation of the Trinity in the first chapter is great - I feel like I have gotten more answers than I've had before. 

So, if you're a Christian who is interested in furthering your relationship with God - meaning the Father, Son and Holy Spirit, of course, because the three are one - read this book, along with the Bible! It will help you to understand the Bible even better than you already do! If you're not a Christian, I'm not sure how helpful this will be for you - go for the Bible, it's the real deal! 

Getting Things Done on the Weekend

I have about four different blog posts running through my mind right now - that's how I blog. I go for two weeks without a post, and suddenly I have a whole slough of thoughts and pictures that I feel like sharing. So, be prepared for some posts this week - I'm going to hold myself back from posting them all at once!

With my work schedule and David's soccer coaching, added to taking care of Micah, I don't often feel like I get much accomplished. Our house is usually messier than I'd like it to be, I don't go running as often as I should, and many things get pushed to the side that should be priorities. This weekend, though, I decided to take control and get things done! (This includes taking time for some quality family time, of course!)

We went on Friday to dinner at David's parents' house, then to the Farmer's Market here in town, where I bought a cup of the best apple cider I've ever had. Seriously, it was so good, and I couldn't find the words to describe to David how much I enjoyed it. He didn't seem to understand what I meant by, "A little sip just fills up my whole mouth!" It was great, and now I really want some more!

Saturday morning, David, Micah and I went to breakfast at Shari's - a very fancy establishment - perfect for bringing a 14-month old who has figured out how much fun it is to shriek randomly. I just charged my camera battery, so I decided to take some photos:

Micah tasted orange for the first time, and he's in love! He gobbled up the pieces I pulled off for him - we may need to run to the grocery store.



When we got home, I got right to work painting my new/old dresser. It took me most of the day to sand it down, then paint it, but I think it turned out really good. It looks so much better! Unfortunately, it doesn't look much different in the before/after picture, but it definitely looks better in person. I painted it 'Pebble White' by Glidden, and the drawer pulls are 'Oil Rubbed Bronze' by Krylon.

I finished by about 4:30 and then got to work finishing up a project for my friend Emilee. We had talked about this project in the summer, but it took me a few months longer to get it done than I expected it would.

I used a canvas stretcher, spray-painted the same blue as my little owl, and then distressed with brown/black paint. 

I used this tutorial, updated a little to make the center a little different, to make the flowers and glued them onto the frame. The fabrics are a mix of fabrics that Emilee used in her hall decorations this year as an RA at Corban.

It was really a fun project to work on - I'm really enjoying embroidering! I was ready for a good rest on Sunday, after doing all this work the day before! I hope you all had a good weekend too.

Family Pictures

Last weekend we spent time in Everson with my side of our family. It was really nice to have three days with my mom, dad, sister and brother, and we enjoyed the time with them! We celebrated my dad and sister's birthday with a dinner on Sunday, but before-hand, my good friend Jen came over to take some family pictures for us. Many of you have already seen these, but I want to be sure to keep a record on this blog of what we're doing so I can remember later when I'm senile, so I'm posting them!

 

We also spent a little time with David's side of our family this weekend, celebrating his dad's birthday. We had dinner and then went to a Full Moon Farmer's Market on Friday evening in downtown Hermiston. The little ones were all bundled up, but with the 'harvest' theme, we couldn't resist getting a few pictures.

Micah looks confused in most of these pictures... He was about to go to sleep in his stroller all snuggled in his blankets and then we took him out - he's half asleep.

We're very thankful for our family - and that we were very blessed to spend time with all of them in the last week.

On a side note, my mom had an MRI this week, and the results showed that her tumor has gotten smaller! Praise the Lord for that. Thank you to all who are praying!

Another Fun Weekend Project

I've written three posts in three days! What?! Obviously I found my camera, which was hiding in the back seat of our car - I'm really not sure how it got there.

Like I mentioned yesterday, I've been excited to get our house organized. At the same time, I want to change up a few things around the house, because I get bored with our decorations easily. The budget for these kinds of changes is small, as in maybe $10, so I have to be creative.

My friend Sarah posted a picture a month or two ago of a ceramic owl that she found at Goodwill. She spray painted it, and it was totally transformed - very cute! I saw her post and filed the idea away in the back of my mind.

When I went to Packwood over Labor Day weekend with David's side of the family, we spent some time at the flea market - it's always interesting to see what we can find! We bought Micah some great farm toys! I was sort of keeping my eyes open for some kind of owl or bird figurine I could paint and have in the house. And I found one that I thought would work pretty well:

Isn't it ugly? I wouldn't keep it in my house like this, but I picked up a can of aqua spray paint and spread out some newspapers on our driveway. On a whim, I also grabbed a picture frame out of our living room.

I took out the glass and the photo, of course, (isn't Micah adorable though?) and then I got to spray painting. Here are the finished results:

Ignore the dorky plain frame on the top right - I'm in the process of redoing these pictures.

I love how it's a great punch of color in our living room! I even rearranged the shelf, with Micah's Halloween Trick-or-Treating basket in the center - another fun punch of color.

The funny thing is, I went back to look at Sarah's owl after I had put my little blue owl on the shelf and had taken these pictures, and it's the same owl figurine! What is the likelihood of that? Maybe there aren't that many owl figurines out there. Sorry Sarah, I didn't mean to copy you exactly, just to imitate your creativity!

What I Did This Weekend

I mentioned yesterday that I accomplished a big goal in my life over the weekend. I'm so excited to tell you about it!

When we moved into this house as a young newly-married couple, knowing it was only 800 square feet, I thought we'd only live here for a year or so. I never expected that three years and a baby later, we'd still be in this same small house. Our land lords are really great, and have made a lot of changes, including re-siding the exterior, installing new heaters last winter, replacing all of the light fixtures and windows, but it's still tiny!

To be honest, even though I complain about it sometimes, I like that the house is small - it means we're close to each other all the time, and spend a lot of time in the same spaces. We can't have too many belongings because, frankly, they won't fit! We do have a shed, so all of Micah's old clothes and baby gear are stored out there. This has really been a great place to live, even though I thought it would be very temporary.


This is the old paint, siding and windows. I need to take a new picture,
because it looks amazing with the new exterior!

I love doing crafts and making things for our house. But, in order to do crafts well, you have to have a lot of supplies and they take up a lot of space. I've been keeping most of my craft stuff in Micah's room, in an over-flowing laundry basket which has taken over half of his bedroom.

We had a major storage problem. Too much stuff, not enough places to keep it - and I want to use my laundry basket for laundry! That's where my big goal formed. I decided months ago that I needed to figure out storage for our stuff - and if I couldn't store it somewhere I needed to get rid of it! But who wants to get rid of craft supplies?

I had my eyes (and heart) set on a shelving unit from Ikea that I really love. It would have fit perfectly in our dining room, across from the table. Our old heater has an ugly vent that is still in the wall, and we don't use it any more. I wanted to not only figure out a solution for storage, but cover up the ugly vent too!

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I love this shelving system, and the way I could buy baskets and have everything out of sight and put away. The problem, once I started looking into it, was the cost! I need to do this project on a VERY small budget. After I bought the shelf, probably half the size of the one shown, and the baskets, the cost was well over $150. Too much for my meager budget.

I've been seeing old dressers lately, that have been repainted and look really nice. I actually gave a dresser away for free on Craigslist a few months before I decided this storage issue needed fixing - I'm definitely kicking myself about that stupid decision!

A local second-hand furniture store (KC's Art and Collectibles on Main Street) had exactly what I was looking for. It was turned on it's end, and buried under a chair and some other things, but it's perfect! Once I saw it, I knew it was a great solution to our problem.

And the best part - it was only $50! Much less than I would have spent on the Ikea shelf, and way more character.

Micah finally has his room back - not that he spends much time in there anyway - and I have my craft supplies under control. I have the dresser about half full already, with something in each drawer, but there is still room for more craft supplies in the future!

My next step is to paint it, but that will be a long, slow process since it'll require sanding off some of the paint. I got a quart of white paint for free from Glidden a few months ago, so it'll be perfect for painting up this gem!

It feels so good to accomplish something I've been thinking about for months. I no longer have the stress of that growing pile in Micah's room!

Right Now I'm Thinking

Here are some random thoughts for today:

1. I should be running. Instead I decided to get a Starbucks and sit on the couch with David while he watches football and Micah takes a nap. I can go later this afternoon, right? Or tomorrow with the jogging stroller.

2. I'm going to die when I run in the Columbia River Power Run 8k in three weeks. I'm not ready (see #1), and I although my goal is to not walk at all, I might have to for a portion of the race. I really just want to be able to finish!

3. Micah is so sweet. He's in his crib right now, and he's supposed to be taking a nap. He seemed like he'd go right to sleep when I put him down and sang his bedtime "Jesus Loves Me." Now I hear him going, "Hi! Hi! Da-da-da-da-da-da-da. Ba-ba-ba. Hi! Hi! Oof, Oof." He's very entertaining.

4. We are starting a new small group tonight, at Daniel and Marci's house, over Mark Driscoll's 'Doctrine.' We've both been really interested in reading this book, and even bought it for my dad for Father's Day. It should be a great study - I'm excited to unpack some of Mark Driscoll's knowledge and better understand the Bible.

5. I lost my camera. This one makes me really sad! I had it on Monday night, when I went to a family baby shower in Tri-Cities, and then I don't remember having it again after that. Hopefully I set it down and someone picked it up and to give back to me, but I'm afraid it's gone forever. If if is lost forever, I don't know what I'm going to do about pictures - we have a little one that I NEED to take pictures of! I was hopeing to buy a new DSLR camera in the next year or so, but right now isn't really when I was hoping to buy it.

6. Yesterday I accomplished a big goal that I've been thinking about and planning for a long time! It's nothing that will change our lives, but it's great! I'm very excited about it, and hope to do a blog post soon, if I ever find my camera.

I hope you're having a great weekend!
Tricia