Big Fat Quiter

After one week of not getting ANY of my runs in i've had it. While throwing my entire body into pushing all the kids laundry into our washer-i didn't break it, it fits a LOT, just have to be crafty when "shoving" it-and having socks pop back out at me it was sort of the last straw. I guess you could say that.

I quit my half marathon training. There i said it. So here i sit, close to tears, seeing one of my life dreams (seriously) so close and now just slip away.

Let me outline a few things that as a whole just adds up to one big obstacle i cant overcome at this time. I know there are people out there who could daintily "hop" over my obstacle while i just sit at it's feet dumbfounded but another day, another time right?

• I never managed to get up and run in the morning while everyone was in bed. (Too dark to run by myself. )
• I now work on mon. and wed. Get up at 6 and don't get home til 6
• I can't take my kids on even my short runs lately due to the rain and SNOW (i won't even get my butt out in the snow, did you see my bloody knees on a dry night?!)
• I'm not willing to sacrifice family time or me and josh time to run, even if it gets me to complete a dream. Just not worth the trouble it could make.
• Josh doesn't get home on Tuesdays until about 9pm. So that day is out.

This list makes me feel a "little" tiny bit better about myself quitting this goal, it actually makes me feel there is a "little" reason for it. But I'm still frustrated, sad and just annnngggggggrrrrrrrrryyyyy about the situation. I love my family and the role i play in it. I wouldn't ever trade what i have for a good running schedule, i just wish there were many more hours in the day i suppose.

I'll just have to wait until running can be crammed into my life a little better, hopefully when the it's brighter earlier in the morning i can start up again. We shall see. I'm still going to run when i can fit it in, but sporadic runs won't cut it if i were to try and run 13.1 miles. I'm not that dumb!

All this means that i will just have a little bit more time to focus on whatever life dreams i want to accomplish right? Okay, even that doesn't make me feel better right now, but maybe tomorrow :)

Snow Ball FIGHT!

Katie brough Maddy, Morgan and Nathan over to play today. We let the kids loose in the snow and got some cute pictures!

Our cute little snowman, katie did 99.9% of it because i "had to take pictures of them making it" not that my hands were cold or anything ;)
Riley and her painfully cute smile

Snow ball fight...Katie wins "Mother of the Year" award for starting this snowball fight. She threw one at Morgan, aimed for her stomach and got her right below the chin. Morgan was not a happy camper hehe it was cute though! Once the kids caught on to throwing the snow it got pretty fun!

Helping to build our snow man...

They day has been good. It snows, then stops, then rains, then snows. It even got pretty sunny before another good snow :)

You just gotta love where we live. super hot summers and a litte snow in the winter! Can't beat that :)

IT"S SNOWING RIGHT NOW!

Josh woke up to get ready for work and saw SNOW! Chain reaction from there. He woke me i ran and woke up riley-who of course was dead asleep and would of probably slept in for once in her life-i didn't want her to miss it!

It was soooooooo beautiful. TONS of snow was falling (keep in mind i'm a sunny california weather girl, so tons of snow to me might not be a lot to you) but it looked so pretty floating down.

I dug out her snow gloves and a weird assortment of clothes to keep her warm and set her loose in the snow.

Cold but SO fun!

Riley's First Trip to the Dentist

Getting back on track with the dentist-going every 6 months for a cleaning-was one of my new year's resolutions. Growing up my mom and dad made my brother and i go every 6 months, rain or shine, sick or not...no matter what was going on in life, my mom had a talent at stopping time and getting to the dentist. (she was also the flu shot nazi, but that's another story!) Needless to say this is the FIRST thing i stopped when i moved out and went to college. I would only go when my mom would happen to ask if i'd been to see the dentist lately. That and i was paranoid i had some huge cavity getting bigger and bigger so finally i'd work up the nerve to go. I understand how important it is to go and to get my kids into the habit. Last week i called the dentist to set an appt and they had a cancellation that very day and were able to get riley and myself right in! (nice to get it over with and not have to think about it coming for a couple weeks)

Riley has no clue what or who the dentist is, as far as i know, so i told her we were going. I told her he was like a Dr. for you teeth and that he would count hers and maybe tickle them. She was in one of her "moods" that day and almost from the start didn't want to go. I was acting SO excited to go see the dreaded dentist but NOPE she wasn't having it. My mom came along to help babysit in the office and she was even telling Riley all the reasons she loves the dentist.

They were running behind and it was lunch time, good thing i packed some snacks. Riley was acting ok but having an occasional mood swing here and there.

Finally they bring her back to TRY to do x-rays. NOPE. i don't blame her on that one though, i could see how that would be a little scary as a 2 year old. No problem they say, she's young enough that they will only do what she is comfortable with.

I sat down in the chair with her and waited for the dentist thinking she wouldn't open her mouth but she surprised me and was VERY good for him. She was a little on the shy side but did everything he asked of her. He said nothing was "popping" out at him and we skipped the cleaning-i didn't want to scar her on her first appt!

They gave her a snow white toothbrush and some other goodies and sent us on our way. All and all it was a good appt.

An Epiphany...20years late?

When I was driving in the POORING RAIN today Riley noticed something sweeping across our wind sheild and asked what that was. I explained they were our win-shill....wind-shil...whenchell wipers...see i was just coming from the dentist and after 3 shots of the gooooood numbing stuff the entire left side of my face was numb-including my ear, yes it felt weird, and it was a bit hard to spit out the word. As i was stuttering trying to tell her what they were called i realized i've been saying them wrong my entire life.

I've always called them "whenshell wipers"(say wind shield fast). that's how i've said it from day one. I've never thought about it. Never thought about how they are wipers sweeping across my WIND SHIELD.

I had to blog about this so you can laugh at or with me. I'm still laughing :)

DRIVE CAREFUL!

On the way to my Dr. appt today-finally got some medicine for this sinus situation going on-i drove by an AWFUl looking car accident, i flipped a U-ey to see if they needed any help, or if i could offer anything.

What i saw was a little two door truck flipped over and sitting right on top of the cab. The teenage boy had somehow managed to climb out of his passenger side window. I have no idea how, the frame was so smashed up and small. His mom was still buckled into the drivers side hanging up side down!

There were a few people there already seeing what they could do to help, one witness etc. Right when i arrived they were just calling 911. I went to the driver's side to talk to the lady, got her name and told her help was on the way etc.

I'm an LVN but i still feel like, what do i do in a situation like this? i feel a little responsible to stop and see if i can help since i've had more medical training then others. But seriously, i was at a loss when i'm talking to this women hanging upside down. I just wanted her to keep talking to me, i was trying to feel her out, is she hurt? etc. i didn't want her to go into shock i suppose. She spoke spanish better so i had her son keep talking to her, aw poor lady! The boy told me that she swerved to miss something running across the road and then they lost control. The witness told me that they most of flew 25 feet, he said they were super high in the air.

Pretty soon an off duty police officer came up and talked to the lady who was now complaining that her seat belt was getting tight.(she was a stud! the only thing she ever said was that her seat belt was getting tight. she never said anything else hurt or that she was scared or anything! She just hung there with one hand on the roof to help hold her) She wanted us to take it off of her but me and a few other people agreed she needed to wait til the firemen got there to take care of that, we didn't want to move her and possible injure her...well the police man was laying partly in the window talking to her and before we know it she is crawling out that little space of a window-if that's what you call it.

When she got to her feet she grabbed her son and just hugged him for a good while. She had the biggest smile on her face. She look genuinely happy to be alive and to see her kid in good health as well. You could tell from her smile that she felt like the luckiest person in the world. Seeing her hug her son almost brought me to tears. HA. i'm the one almost crying and she just crawled out of her smashed truck, i'm telling you, she was a trooper.

Just a little self reminder that things can take a turn for the worse at any second of any day. I'm so grateful for my family and health and safety. I'm so grateful that this lady and her son were okay.

Please DRIVE CAREFUL

Does anyone have a good Dentist?

I need help finding a good Dentist!

I like the actual dentist we have but i don't feel like the staff does a good job cleaning my teeth, they do it in under 10min. A quick floss and that swirly toothpaste thing(and not very detailed) and they are done...my other dentists had their assistants SCRAPE, floss and brush my teeth...

i know, well, i hope my teeth aren't disgusting but i do know i definetly need the scarping part everytime i go. I feel like without it i don't get that fresh (no pun intended) start on the next 6 months between cleanings!

If anyone loves their dentist and staff please let me know, if you don't want to leave a comment, so that weirdo's surfing the web won't know what city you live near just email me at sweetestjessie@yahoo.com

A post is following shortly to let you know how Riley did at her first appointment!

Early Morning What?!

Whose idea was that anyway?

Ha.

Ya, i haven't done it once yet! Can you believe it! I've been keeping to my running schedule though (except this week due to sinus headache) but just not in the morning like i'd like to do (in theory).

No one wants to run in the mornings with me?

-Please-

It's still my goal and will happen soon...right?

Sister-Brother Bonding

Riley loves Braden SO much and he loves her right back

On a walk to the park, i don't have a sun hat for braden so he was in short leg overalls with a winter hat on, what a sight!

A lesson well learned!

Get up and run when my alarm goes off even if i'm scared of running in the dark alone. Otherwise I have to take both kids in the jogger. egh! And let me tell you, it was a pathetic run...or should a say "rawk"-run-walk.

My newest intimidating adventure...

I have to give some credit to sarah for helping to inspire this post. As i told you a few posts back that i want to, no, I WILL-run a half marathon this year. That was also one of her goals for the year and she sent me a 12 week training schedule.

Now 12 weeks seems like a lllloooooonnnngggg time when:you only have 12 weeks left in your pregnancy or have only 12 weeks left of work until vacation, or 12 weeks left until school lets out for summer, or...fill in the blank :)

So why does 12 weeks until a race seem like NOT enough time?!

I love my blog for so many reasons, but one of the reasons i love it the most is because it's my "enforcer". Anything I want to do i simply just have to write on my blog and because i'm a bit competitive i will do it! (I know all of you out there reading this will just laugh and laugh at me if i don't complete the goals i list on my blog, right?!) Last year for my new year's resolution i wrote on my blog this RIDICULOUS eating schedule for the month of January. (it started mostly to help overcome my addiction to chocolate which i still "suffer" from daily and turned into so much more) but the point is i did it because you all were out there looking over my shoulder ready to point fingers and laugh if i cheated. So here goes nothing, or a whole lot of something...

Starting tomorrow I'm going to run every morning before my husband leaves for work in order to train for a race in april. I tried running at night after he got home from work but it left me with no time for the two of us and no time for us with the kids all combined...and i hated that.

I want to feel that runner's high again, i want to be addicted to running, in a healthy way-is this possible? I used to CRAVE runs not dread them. The only way im going to make this a reality along with my dream of running that race is to get up and run while my family is sleeping. No one loses mommy or wife time, i can, eventually, watch the sun rise as the seaons change and i will be up before Riley so i'm not grumpy when she wakes me up :) win win.

Now, a side note for my running buddy katie. I'm sorry! I know the best time for you to run is at night and i hope you know how much i LOVE running with you. Seriously. I am totally willing to go running before your husband leaves for work which i think you said is really early, just to ensure you as my running partner. So let me know if that's something you want to do.

Please wish me luck, strength and energy as i set my alarm clock for an hour a lot of people don't know exists-okay, so it's an hour of the day most people are getting ready for work but come on, early is early!

I'll also take any running advice, strategies, good routes in our city or people who want to run with!

*correction...the race is 16 weeks away not 12. Phew, that sounds like a little more time to prepare.

Our "fake" Christmas Pictures

Here are the fakies...we took them before church on sunday and they didn't turn out too great BUT i'm glad i got them anyways...my camera ended up working! But i forgot to turn the flash on and the battery was SUPER low so my camera wouldn't focus. These were the only un-blurry pictures we got.