Monday, December 29, 2008

Snow Boarding Lessons!



Snow boarding is a ton of fun! I am however incredibly sore! We went on Monday for our first all day lesson, and then we went back again on Friday. Why the long wait until we went back for more you ask...it's because I couldn't move for quite some time! I finally learned to do the S down the hill. It's so fun! I feel like a kid playing all day at a sledding hill or something! Travis caught on so fast, he's actually really good! So Friday, McKay and him left me while I took another half day lesson. After lunch they decided I was ready for bigger and better hills. I proved them wrong! So they ditched me while I went back to play on my fun little "bunny hill". I have conquered getting off the ski lift too without falling!! That is a pretty cool thing actually! Travis got me this cute snowboard after our first time going, and my instructor told me it was a pretty "awesome" one and that all I have to do is stand by the lift and I would look pretty cool, so when I get tired that's what I do. Just kidding!!!

So if anyone wants to try something new this New Year, I suggest snowboarding, its a riot!! It's also addicting...so I think we're going again on Tuesday!


Click to play Snowboarding Lessons
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Friday, December 26, 2008

Our Christmas

Our Christmas this year has to go down as one of the most relaxing and enjoyable Christmas' ever. There was a huge snow storm Christmas day and all of my brothers and sisters and their families were suppose to be coming up to my moms in Midway. We would be spending all day there together playing games etc with 30 plus people (at least 11 of them being under five)..However, nobody wanted to risk driving in such awful weather. It ended up just being my family relaxing at home. Travis's parents came and joined us for our traditional breakfast of abelskeivers. Then around 3pm my parents came over to play with the kids and eat. We had a great Christmas dinner since my mom was in charge of pretty much most of the meal (the meal that my brothers and sisters were not able to make it to). My sister, Carrie, on the other hand, was stuck at home with only the pies that she had made to bring to the party. I think Ben and Celia had stuffing. Oh well, I did kind of feel guilty eating so well though!

Anyway, It was really nice to just hang out at home on Christmas with our family. We didn't even leave the house most of the day. Mckay and Tyson woke up a little before 6 in the morning and wanted to open presents right away of course. And of course I told them they would have to wait until everyone woke up. They did go through their stockings though and ended up watching Kung Fu Panda until Kelsey and Whitney (my late sleepers) remembered it was Christmas around 7. Travis had just finished shoveling a TON of snow off the drive way too, so everyone was ready to open presents.

Whitney opened one of her presents - a Cinderella doll- (her favorite princess) and wouldn't open anything else until we got the thing out of its package and into her arms. The same thing happened with her next present..and the next. She was so much fun to watch opening her presents. I'm going to miss not having a baby around much longer. They get old way too fast.

Tyson opened his first present and it was a Nintendo DS with some games. He was sooo excited! Then he opened his next present which was a lion Webkinz. He looked at it and immediately said oh, he's so cute, I think I'll name him Tuck. Tyson is so funny, I never know what he'll say. I thought webkinz were mainly for girls but he has sure loved his. He's a computer nut anyway. He also got a bunch of Star Wars Lego's which is another obsession. Travis and I helped him put them all together after 2 1/2 hours of work! He was a lot of fun this Christmas. He would wish everyone he saw a Merry Christmas and would ask if we could sing Christmas Carols all the time. He is my happy go lucky boy. Five is such a sweet age!

Kelsey was fun this Christmas too. For a minute she was pretty sad when she saw Tyson open his DS because that is what she wanted. A couple of presents later she was pleasantly surprised with one of her own, so all was well. She also was excited with her "dangly" ear rings in her stocking and couldn't wait to try them all on. Some of her presents were Littlest Pet Shop stuff of which she loved. However, Once it was all opened and out of the packages, Whitney suddenly took it over. Pet Shops our now Whitney's new love. Thank goodness Kelsey is so good to Whitney and doesn't mind sharing!

Mckay..Mckay..my spoiled little boy is what I refer to him as. Anyway, we told him that he would have just a couple of presents this year because he had already got most of his stuff early (I guess that is how Christmas goes when kids get older?) Anyway, he already got a snowboard, board pants, a season pass to the Canyons, and a partridge in a pear tree, so I didn't feel so bad having three little presents there for him. He guessed what one was though, an ipod touch, before he opened it. What to do with these 12 year olds. He was pretty happy with that and some itune cards. At least wrapping gets easier as they get older! He's such a fun kid!

Travis and I decided that we would get snowboarding lessons for Christmas, so stay tuned for that!!

Well, this Christmas turned out really nice this year and we have so much to be thankful for. Our Smith family dinner was postponed until Sunday. So it will be nice to see everyone then! Merry Christmas! We did have a fun time with everyone on Christmas Eve at Trudys. She had a lot of fun games planned. We also had to make homemade gifts (our family each painted a wooden something and glued them to the back of fridge magnets, the kind that hold stuff, they turned out really cute - I used them until I had to wrap them!) Anyway, I put together some of our Christmas pictures from some of our family parties and on Christmas morning.(with Smile box it is the fastest way to post pictures!)

Click to play Our Christmas 2008
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Monday, November 17, 2008

Karate and Potty Chairs...

November for my family is considered a month of routine for us. We aren't usually starting anything new or going anywhere too fun. So we just do the regular everyday stuff, until Thanksgiving comes and then everything is pretty crazy again until February. So I thought I would put Tyson in Karate this month. Oh my gosh! It is the cutest thing ever! Manny is the "sensay" (I don't know how to spell it). He taught a really awesome kickboxing class at the Fit Stop. He is so good with the boys and Tyson caught on really quick. He loves it and asks if it's Karate every morning. I wanted to take a thousand more pictures, but I felt like the "dorky mom" so I settled with just enjoying watching him. I can't wait for him to go again, it was really fun to watch!



Lately I have been getting the biggest kick out of Whitney! She learns things so fast and has the vocabulary of a four year old. I don't have to wonder what is going on in her little head anymore because she just goes ahead and tells me. Today we were running around the house, roaring, and chasing an imaginary dinosaur that she said we needed to "chase and catch it and feed dinosaur some grass." She continued by saying,"shhh, mom, go get it! It's right there!" Where on earth did this imagination come from? I'm blaming Dora the Explorer, which is THE only show on TV worth watching as far as Whitney is concerned. So for her story before her nap I dug out one of Tysons pop out dinosaur books. She thought it was pretty neat to touch all the pop outs. Any other of my one year old babies would have torn the book to shreads. She is so old for her age, but I love it!



Her newest favorite thing is a Dora potty chair we saw at Wal-Mart last week. She ended up taking it and sitting on it in the cart the rest of our time there. Once we got it home, she has carried it around with her (I know gross! But I clean it!) like a doll. The good thing is that she knows what it is for, and puts it on the toilet seat and sits there forever until she goes potty. It would be great, however she tells me to "get the stool and sit mommy" so I don't get anything done while she takes her time on her potty chair. But once again I'm putty in her hands and laugh and smile. She cracks me up! I guess it's time for pull ups.






She also gives what we call "Chunker kisses" - where she puckers up her lips as big as can be at the mention of one, and everyone gets one, well at least Travis and I get thousands a day! This past month we have noticed she has a "hereditary gene" from Travis's family that makes her bite the bottom left side of her lip absentmindedly...in her car seat, or playing with blocks and toys. Travis does it all the time, and so does his mom and sister. It's really funny!



She let me put curlers in her hair the other day. I have been going in withdrawls because Kelsey no longer lets me do braids and crazy buns and fun hair things, and Whitney, bless her heart, barely has any hair for me to play with. So, regaurdless of the out come, it was fun to have her be excited about getting her hair done.

Saturday, November 1, 2008

Trick or Treat

Another Halloween... one of the great holidays where I don't have to buy a gift or even make a salad or dessert for a family party, hooray!! And I certainly don't mind buying candy. I hope when my kids get older they don't blame all their diseases on bad nutritional choices made by their mother.

Anyways this Halloween was the best! No snow, no rain, no jackets! Who could ask for better weather? My kids had a good time trick or treating at the Hamlet with grandma and me, while Travis and grandpa watched a movie and handed out candy. We tried to visit all the family we have in Heber, some weren't there at the time. So darn, I guess they missed out on my cute kids, but hey I really didn't mind. Did that sound mean?

Whitney was a little timid at first when Kelsey and Tyson would knock on the doors, but after she figured out all the people that opened the doors put candy in her bucket, she was running from house to house and even taking candy from the people dressed up in the scary costumes and saying "Thanks." She was pretty cute to watch. Everyone kept asking how we keep the crown on her head. The trick is that she loves it. She had to have it on. I know, what a perfect child!

This year Kelsey insisted on a pillowcase, no silly pumpkin head for her. She needed something to hold a TON of candy. Which she thinks it did the job. Even though she got as much as Tyson, but I'm not saying a word.

Tyson has the Darth Vader breathing down and was the leader of the pack trick or treating. At one time he told grandma and me that we were slowpokes and he wanted to join the group ahead of us.

Mckay has finally decided he is too old to go trick or treating. So he and his friends got together at one home for pizza and fun, then they headed over to our house to watch scary movies, drink A LOT of soda, and vege on candy, chips, cookies...(once again my poor dietary habits!)

Well Happy Halloween to all. I am really looking forward to the next holidays. Kelsey, Tyson, Whitney and I went for a bike ride today and we rode to grandma Dawnette's house. On the way Tyson told me he doesn't like any days except for Christmas. When we walked into grandma's house she had her Christmas music on. I told Tyson he should spend more time at grandmas then.

Click to play Halloween 2008
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Sunday, October 26, 2008

Finally Success!

Click to play elk & deer hunt 2008
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Travis, Mcaky, and even Tyson have spent this month up in the mountains hunting. This is Mckay's first year to be a legal hunter. He has been having the time of his life! Though no success for the elk hunt, Trav did manage to get this 3 point. Mckay is still hoping to get one today, (the very last day of the deer hunt.) Now, if I were the dad, I would have had Mckay shooting this deer, but apparently he wasn't by him, so they say. Now if you think hunting season is over, you're wrong. From now until March I have to deal with the pheasant hunt. And after that it is just in time for golf to start. Gees, I need a hobby!

Saturday, October 25, 2008

Halloween Fun!

Yesterday we went to our annual Halloween Carnival at Jamestown in Provo where my grandma lives. The kids always have such a great time. It is never crowded and they can play the games as many times as they want. All the residents there love it too because they love kids - why else! Travis and Mckay were hunting of course, so much to Mckay's dismay he had to miss this party. (yeah right!) I think he thinks he is getting too old for this kind of thing. Anyway my camera battery died (ahhh!!) and so I am missing priceless pictures of the haunted house and pinata. Whitney actually wanted to do the pinata, it was really cute, and that's when my camera died. Oh well!

Click to play Halloween Carnival 2008
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Also I think I should mention I just turned 30! Wow! So it doesn't really feel that old, I just look at people differently. The ones that I thought used to be old actually are pretty young and the high school students look like babies! I can hold my head up high though, because I am told (much too often!)I look too young to have kids anyway. So can't wait till I'm 50, maybe I'll look 30 by then. For my birthday cake I got tarts from Kneaders (fruit and key lime) yum!! I splurged and ate three, and yes it was worth it..very good! And no, I didn't do anything too fun, Travis of course went hunting, but my dad (so sweet!) took me and my kids out to lunch and then we had the carnival to go to. So Happy Birthday to me!

Friday, October 24, 2008

Introducing the newest member of the Clyde family



Meet Toby..or Boozer..or Trigger..or Riley.. Born September 8th, he is our new 6 week old German Shorthair, soon to be "Hunting Machine" number two. We are just having trouble finding him a name. He's so cute! I love puppies, but then they grow up and stink and jump on me and stuff. So right now I really love him, we'll see how long that lasts :)! The kids are mauling him to death, we've never gotten a puppy so young before.



This puppy looks so much like Katie, our other German Shorthair, that when Whitney first saw him she called him Katie and crawled around on all fours chasing him. Apparently this puppy doesn't mind it and loves to give kisses already.



He loves to cuddle and has already fallen asleep in Mckay's lap. Needless to say, Mckay is attached and can't wait to train him!

PS..Stay tuned for the latest hunting misfortunes of Travis and Mckay, yet to shoot a BIG buck.

Tuesday, October 14, 2008

Thirteen years down, an eternity to go!

Click to play Our Wedding 1995
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I can't believe that it's been 13 years! Actually thinking back, it does seem like it's been that long! Times have sure changed! We have had some great times together, in fact I've almost been married as long as I've been single - well 3 more years. How Crazy! Anyway, ask me what I'm doing for my anniversary and I'll say nothing. Somehow I managed to have my birthday and my anniversary right in the middle of the elk hunt and the deer hunt, so I never really get to celebrate anything in October, or November for that matter. Anyway, I thought I would post these pictures so that everyone could get a good laugh! I try not to look at these pictures ever, in fact not one of these is even framed in my house. I had to dig through my albums to find these to scan. It brought back a few crazy memories, but I'll save those for myself. It is interesting to see how life changes so much in a short amount of time. Well Happy Anniversary honey, love you!

Monday, September 29, 2008

Ahhh...Shakespeare!



So, I love Shakespeare!! Yeah, Just kidding! I really just enjoy the excuse to go with my mom and sisters on a super relaxing weekend getaway where we can stay up until 2:30 in the morning playing Rook and laughing. We have made it tradition to go to the Shakespearean Festival in Cedar City every fall. Super fun! This fall's plays were Julius Ceasar, Moonlight and Magnolias ( a hilarious play about how the script for the movie, Gone With the Wind, was created), and Gaslight (my synopsis: a play about a disturbed crazy lady and a wierd husband). All were really great,well...one was just interesting(ie: Gaslight)! In the fall, the festival usually only does one Shakespeare play, Julius Ceasar was so!!! good. The actors were great, we were on the front row and noticed they were also professional spitters, too! The other two plays were actually pretty enjoyable. Gas Light was suppose to be this great suspenceful play, and I think we heard so many good things about it that our expectations were too high, it was not my favorite. Last year the shakespeare play was The Tempest, and I was kinda glad when it was over too!

Besides the plays, it was my sister Trudy's 33rd birthday on Saturday, which we had fun celabrating all day. Also, while we were shopping, we ran into one of the actresses, Kate Cook, who had been in two of the plays that we had just seen. She was really fun to talk to. It was also perfect timing for us to be in Cedar City because my cousin, BJ, had this spur of the moment wedding which we were able to attend that Saturday morning. It was nice to see him so happy!

While we were eating dinner on Saturday (at this delicious restaraunt on the side of the raod going to Cedar Breaks), we saw this huge dust cloud zoom by the window. Our server said that it was a groom (not BJ!)who was late for his wedding and he lost control of his car as he was driving up the canyon. Thankfully he didn't hit any oncoming trafic and he left his car in the ditch and got a ride with friends in another car. When we went outside to get in our car, the skid marks were only 2 feet away from my moms parked car!! We were so glad that he and our car were saved from tragedy!

Well. can't wait for our next years little retreat!


This is our traditional bench that we sit on so we can get our picture by William Shakespeare himself!

Tuesday, September 23, 2008

Fun with the fam!



Everyday I wonder what life would be like without sisters. I couldn't even imagine it! I am lucky enough to have 3 that I love and we are all pretty close in age. So can you imagine the fun? Within the past two years two of my sisters moved back to Utah and now I live within 30-45 minutes away from any given sister. It's Great! We try and get together as much as possible and this Saturday was one of those times. We took all our kids to Bridal Veil Falls. One of my sisters was at the BYU game, so we had her kids too. Between me and my other two sisters, we had 12 kids with us (ranging 2 months old to 9 years old)(and that's with 2 kids that didn't come with us! Gees, we have a lot of kids!) There were 4 on bikes, 2 on scooters, 4 in strollers, and 2 on foot. It was a lot fun trying to keep up with them all! We had packed lunches to have a picnic and then we were going to let the kids play in the water, however the kids on bikes were too fast and we didn't stop until we got to the waterfall. We figured if we walked a little further past the waterfall there would be shaded picnic tables like the ones that we had already passed on the way to the waterfall, but...we were wrong! The poor kids went for a nice two mile walk,ride,or scoot before we finally settled on the side of the trail to eat. Oh well, they had a blast playing in the water and after their two mile walk,ride,or scoot back to the cars, we had some very mellow kids for a minute. Nice! By the time we got back to my sister's house, my other sister was on her way home from the game and brought pizzas over. Just one of those nice relaxing fall days!


Click to play Bridal Veil Falls 2008
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Thursday, September 18, 2008

Great start to this school year!...so far

I haven't blogged for a little bit, but I have a good explanation. It's "AFTERNOON KINDERGARTEN IS MAKING ME LAZY!" Let me just say that my kids have always done morning kindergarten and afternoon definitely takes the cake! I only have to get two kids off in the morning -well- really only one because Mckay is 12 and heaven forbid I comb his hair. So mornings are a breeze. Then Tyson and Whitney and I do errands, go for bike rides, and maybe even run to Park City. I've even taken them to play in day care at the gym for a bit while I "enjoy" a spin class. Then it's lunch time and then Tyson goes to school and Whitney takes a nap and...Ahhhh, I have 2 1/2 hours to do absolutely whatever I want. Which is normally sitting on the couch thinking I'd better read and take advantage of this time because this won't happen too often. But apparently it does happen and it is going to continue to happen the rest of the school year, so I've set my mind to do more productive things with my time. Even though I really don't want to.. So we'll see what happens...I'm really not that enthused about doing anything right now...I'm absolutely revelling in all this quiet time!

Click to play Tyson September 2008
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So as far as new things this month goes, Tyson has lost 3 teeth and 1 more is loose just in the past month! Yes, he brushes, and he loves milk, I just think it's strange! Also he and all the other 5 year old boys on our street decided to toss the training wheels out and ride a two-wheeler! It's funny how when a child decides he wants to do something it just happens! He learned so fast! He's now my Two wheeling, Toothless, Tyson! He is so proud of it too!

Kelsey is really enjoying 2nd grade, and it's really nice to finally have some girls in our neighborhood in her class this year! She's at such a fun age now, too, we can enjoy shopping together and doing just girl things. We went dress shopping - just ther two of us- last Saturday, and then went to our favorite place to eat (Kneaders) for lunch. We had such a good time! It's pretty cute to see some of the habits that she has totally picked up from me. The other night she came in my room and climbed in my bed while I was reading and she had her own book with her. She said she couldn't sleep yet either, so we both read our books cuddled together on my bed.

Mckay is doing pretty well in 7th grade (yikes! I remember being in 7th grade!). He seems to never have homework and gets it all done before he gets home, so he says, we'll see when the grades are posted. But really, he's always been that way and just sails through school. He's such an easy kid! He, through the fault of his mother, is not playing football this year. But he has been taking golf lessons and has been golfing a lot with his dad and grandpa Smith. So I hope he doesn't hold a grudge that I forgot to sign him up until the last minute when the football teams were already way too full. He has been staying busy with golf, friends, and his favorite pass time - hanging out with grandpa JL helping out on the farm and doing other side jobs JL has for him. It's interesting how he loves to work and help grandpa, but if I ask him to take out our trash that's a big deal! Oh well, at least he's mostly perfect.

Click to play Whitney 20 months old
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Whitney is just getting cuter and cuter, and since she's my last, even the things she's not suppose to do are cute! She's now my little escape artist, which is SCARY! Last Sunday night my mother-in-law came over to visit and said "so where's Whitney?" Travis and I answered, "Oh somewhere playing" Then she said "you mean by the trash can in front of your neighbor's house on the street in the dark?" and I said "Oh!" Thank goodness they came over when they did because who knows what would have happened! Then a couple days later I couldn't find her, even though I had seen her just minutes before, I went outside and Mandy was holding her. She said that she looked over at our driveway and Whitney was zipping down it in her little pink stroller screaming at the top of her lungs, so Mandy ran to her rescue. Thank heaven for neighbors! So now I'm looking for door safety things that will fit our front door. Anyway Whitney is a hoot and hopefully I can keep her safe! She is now in love with Cinderella and Dora. She can point and name the princesses on her pajamas, which is priceless! Then she finally got a Cinderella costume and would not take it off all day, even the crown was hard to coax off of her. I guess she knows that she is our little princess! She tells me "I don't like it" or "I don't want it." Pretty princessish lingo I think!

Here are some of the things that kept us busy this summer.
Click to play this Smilebox scrapbook: Summertime 2008
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Our 24th of July was fun, we spent it with our families.
Click to play this Smilebox scrapbook: July 24, 2008
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Other fun pictures from August and September...
Click to play this Smilebox scrapbook: September 2008
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Friday, September 5, 2008

Cribless!



I can't believe it! My house is now forever cribless! All of my babies have grown up! Ahhh! Whitney came home from California and dicided to crawl into Kelsey's bed for a nap, and thats when I knew it was time. Usually I wait until my kids are 2 or 2 1/2 to switch them over to a toddler bed, but obviously she was ready to have her own bed. She is our last baby and I don't know why she is in such a hurry to be a big girl! Anyway, she's very proud of her bed and had to show it off to everyone the whole first week. "Mere, my bed!" she said and made them come into her room to check it out. Except for a few nights that she ends up at the side of my bed wanting "up", she really likes having her own bed to sleep in. Now if it were only that easy with her bottle! It is a wierd feeling knowing that she is my last baby (well, big girl now), I almost feel old or something.

Sunday, August 31, 2008

Get ready for a long , but awesome story! At least I think it's neat.


If anyone would have told me in May of this year that in August I would be running in a 10 K, I would have laughed in their face! However, I would have taken it as a compliment because running is something that I have always wanted to do but have been way too afraid to try! Anyways, I guess this all started about 2 years ago when my dad and my brother and brother-in-law were in a triathlon. I went to go and cheer them on and it was so much fun. At the time I remember thinking of how cool it would be to actually be in the race with them instead of on the sidelines. This thought was coming from a person who has never intentionally broke a sweat in her life. I told my dad that day that I thought I would like to try to swim, or bike, or something. So, my dad always the teacher, decided to jump on that and had me going to the gym every morning at 5am with him to teach me to swim and he even rode next to me on the stationary bikes. He, not even sweating and me with a heart rate of 190. To say the least, my body was not used to any kind of strenuous exercise. It was pretty fun and I got to where I could swim a half mile, my form was probably not the best, but hey a half mile - Cool! So then, what a surprise, I found out I was pregnant about a month and a half into all this exercise stuff, so I did the obvious -for me anyway- and stopped! Then I had our gorgeous daughter Whitney and thought, well now what? So I started going to the gym again to do the weight classes and spin classes which were great workouts, and I found myself feeling a lot better a lot faster after having Whitney than I did after having any of my other babies. I guess there is something to be said about exercise after all. My dad had hurt his hip and hasn't been able to go back to swimming (yet) so I still, for some reason, haven't been back to the pool. Anyway to the main reason of my whole story here, I have been blessed with new neighbors last September-the Bonners-some might not call that a blessing, ha!ha! Mandy actually taught one of the weight classes at the Fit Stop and one of the spin classes, how perfect! So it was so nice to have a neighbor that was inspiring and likes the same things I do. Again, anyways, to my point, in July my family went to St. George. I decided that I would try out the hotel equipment, something that I have never done in my life, and I got on my very first treadmill. Of course, there had to be somebody right next to mine and I was, for some reason, so embarrassed that I had no idea how to start the thing or even if I could run when it turned on. So that was a big step for me. Well, low and behold, I got it to a pace where I could run and I told myself to not stop until thirty minutes were over. And guess what, I made it for thirty minutes! Running! That was just crazy to me! And I could breathe! I forgot to mention the reason that running has always seemed an impossibility was because I have had asthma pretty much since I was born. I have never even ran a mile before, just for the fact that I tried in high school and couldn't even get around one lap without having to use my inhaler (plus who wants to sweat while your at school with no working showers, ewe!) So yeah, I was pretty impressed with this treadmill thing and it said I had ran almost 3 miles. I did that for the three nights that we stayed there and then when we got home I had to run tell my great neighbor that among other things, I now run!!! So Mandy and I decided to start doing a little running at night and sometimes in the morning together. Mandy being the pusher and believer that she is, told me that we were going to run the 5 K on the 24th of July in Charleston. This is only 2 weeks after discovering that I could run holy cow, I was nervous, but it was three miles and that's about what we've worked up to. So wa la, I pinned a number on me and was running in my very first race. Every step that I took I was thanking my Heavenly Father for this wonderful opportunity he has blessed me with, for me to be doing something that I have never dreamed possible. I was also thanking Him for my inspiring friend, Mandy, and for my dad for getting me started into all of this. I have to give a shout out to my mom, too, because recently she told me that she used to be a track star in High School, who knew? So maybe I have some random gene of hers, called the "don't stop even if you want to" gene. Anyways, I am addicted to running now, partly because I feel like if I stop I will forget how. Then it turns out Mandy, once again, makes me register for the Swiss Days 10 K. Now the 5 K was something, but we both have never ran 6 miles yet, and so I was pretty nervous. Sure, I knew I could stop and walk if I had to, but the point was, up till then, I always told myself to just keep running until I got home. Stopping was never an option (except when Mandy made me run to the Fit Stop in 85 degree weather two days after I told her I could run). The night before the 10K, Mandy called with her bad news that she had twisted her ankle and could barley walk on it. So, wow, was I relieved! However, at the same time I was a little bummed because I wanted to try it, I just didn't want to do it by myself. Anyway, I woke up the next morning and decide to run anyway, not in the Swiss Days 10K, but just my own personal race to see how far I could really go. I don't think I even got into running my first mile that my breathing was totally controlled, and my legs felt like they could go on for ever. I have not felt a feeling like this before and I knew once again that My Heavenly Father really cares about me and that He wants me to succeed in the things that I work hard for. I knew that He was by my side cheering me on. What an amazing feeling it was for me to run like that! Anyway, I got home and hopped into my car to drive the route that I had ran, and when I got to 6 miles and I still wasn't home yet I think I was crying and laughing at the same time. I ended up running 6.7 miles, so I think that I really do deserve my 10K Swiss Days shirt, right? Anyways, I still think that it was pretty amazing and I thank my Heavenly Father for this with all my heart! Well that is my story and I think I am pretty excited still that running is something that I can do now. I know that with Mandy and my dad, they probably won't let me stop now anyway. By the way, the picture is Mandy and I after we got home from running our first 5K!!