Where God Rests His Head at Night

 As most of you know, I am slightly obsessed with all things BYU and Cougars.  I just love it so very much!  It has become a tradition for Tricia, Olivia, and I to hike to the Y every May.  A friend of mine once joking said that I probably think that its where God rests His at night...right there on that beautiful Y.  If He rested at night, I might believe that!  Ha!  I love this tradition of ours! We hiked the Y on Monday for FHE.  Best FHE ever!

Such a beautiful evening!

 

 

 

 

Love these girls!

Most awesome pic ever!

 

Sorry...had to include this one too!  Love him!

I know I say this every year, but this hike kicks my bootie!  It kicked a lot of our booties!  It was still so fun though!  We went to Pita Pit afterward for dinner which is one of my most favorite little Provo spots.  Then we of course had to stop by the creamery and get some half gallons of ice cream.  Yum!  Until next May, Y!  I love you!

Racquetballers

On Saturday, James took me to play racquetball.  Now I am a fairly athletic person.  I thought racquetball would be a piece of cake and that I would at least hang with James on court.  Boy, was I wrong!  Little did I know that James played in a racquetball league when he was younger.  I felt bad that he was wasting his time playing with an amateur like me.  He was very patient and a great teacher.

I was terrible!

It was a lot of fun!  On the way home James asked me if I would want to go play again to which I quickly responded, "Yes!"  He asked me if I wanted to play again because I had fun or if I wanted to play because I know that he loves to play.  I said, "I want to play again so that I don't suck so bad at it."  So I'm a little bit competitive, but I figure if I don't suck at it, it will be more fun.  Practice, practice, practice!

Vail

I spent last week in Vail, CO for work.  I won't lie...I was 0% excited for this trip.  I didn't want to be away from the boy for that long at all!  I survived the week though, and it ended up being a really quick and fun week.
The first day Jen (my boss) and I drove, we stopped at this golf course for lunch.  It was beautiful!

Then we went to a sushi place for dinner that night.  Jen has never met James but she loves him for helping me like sushi.  It was yummy to my tummy!

The next night I got a half rotisserie chicken with grilled asparagus on a bed of wild rice risotto.  Yes please!  I had to document my delicious meals and send pics to James so that he would be jealous.  I'm pretty rude!

On our walk home from dinner we came across an awesome park with a pirate ship playground.  That is Jen, the best boss around!

I had never been to Vail before really.  I had driven through a time or two, but I had never gone into the villages.  It was so lovely with buildings that look like this...

And bridges going over the river like this...

And walkways like this...

It was their total off season so the hotel was actually affordable and most of the restaurants (the few that were open) had major discounts on all their entrees.  Awesome!
One morning I decided to go for a run.  I nearly died!  I will never try running at 8100 feet ever again.  There is not enough oxygen for me up in those elevations!  It sure was beautiful though!

I watched the sunrise over the mountains on my run.

This was our hotel...the Tivoli Lodge.  It was about a block from Vail Village, and it was so nice!

Here is a little panorama shot that I tried on my phone so you can get another feel for Vail.

  It was a fun week, but I sure was overjoyed to get off that airplane have James waiting there to pick me up!  I'm pathetic, I know!  It's weeks like this that make my job worth it though!

Primary, Race for the Cure, and Ruined Date

I have been called to be a Primary teacher.  I have been in Relief Society for 15 years now, so I am quite excited for the change.  My first Sunday teaching, I had prepared a very involved and informative lesson.  Five-year-olds have about a 3 minute attention span I discovered.  Bring on the coloring!  It has been a real learning experience so far, but they sure are cute and say the funniest things!

Tricia and I kept with tradition and ran the Susan G. Komen Race for the Cure last Saturday.  That 5k nearly killed me.  I don't know how I can run 13 miles one Saturday and then 3 miles the next Saturday almost kills me.  I did donate blood this week week, so I'm blaming it on that.  It was a beautiful day!

 

That same weekend, I planned an awesome date for James and I.  We were going to go up the canyon and roast hot dogs and brats and s'mores and sit around a campfire.  This is my most favorite thing to do!  I bought wood and all the food and packed the cooler.  When James got to my house, we headed toward the canyon.  It was beautiful in the valley, but as we got closer to the canyon it started to rain.  And it got worse and worse as we got closer to the canyon.  Awesome date ruined.  I was really bummed.  I had made so many preparations for this.  James tried to make me feel better by saying we could have a "campfire" in my backyard around the BBQ.  Not the same, but good try!  We did it anyway.  He was one the phone for most of dinner dealing with work stuff so I ate alone.

Then James ate.

Then we roasted marshmallows over the stove and watched the NBA Playoffs.  It wasn't what I had in mind, but it worked!

I'm still holding out for a real campfire though!

"Our" First Garden

A few weeks ago, James suggested that we plant a garden.  I just stared at him.  Where are we going to plant a garden?  Neither of us own the homes we live in and my experience with gardening only involves killing things.  He suggested we buy pots and just do a few things.  Sure, I'm in!
After discussing our plan with his parents, they suggested that we split their garden and we can help maintain it.  We are going to have quite the harvest in a few months!

Several different kinds of tomatoes!

Onions and carrots

Peppers, jalapenos, and beets

Zucchini, yellow squash, and pumpkins.

Raspberries...yummmm!

Herbs...lots and lots of yummy herbs!

There are lots of beans too and radishes.  Our beets, radishes, and carrots have started sprouting above the dirt.  It's so exciting!  I can't wait until we are eating our own fruits and veggies!  P.S. It poured rain on us almost the whole time we rototilled and planted.  We like to keep things exciting!

Happy, Happy, Happy!

WARNING: If mushy, gushy, lovey pictures and dialogue disgust you, read no further and wait for my next post. 

I'm dating the most amazing man on the earth.  I really am the most blessed girl on earth to have found him.  He is the most kind, caring, funny, compassionate, protective, thoughtful, awesome, extraordinary person ever.  We have so much fun together and I absolutely adore him.
This is just a random Sunday afternoon being goofy...

See...I warned you!  I've waited a VERY long time for him and waded through a lot of not so awesome to find him.  I'm allowed to gush every now and then!  Love him!

Bucket List #76 - Win Something in a Raffle - Complete!

The walk for Crohn's and Colitis was the afternoon of my race day.  I love this tradition!  This year it was at Wheeler Farm.  James was able to leave his job at the temple a little early to join us for the Crohn's walk.  After the walk, they did a raffle.  Dan and Amy and all of Dan's family left before the raffle, so James and I got all their tickets.  I won a prize!  It wasn't as exciting as I pictured it being.  Maybe its because of the prize that I won.  I won some sort of slimming toning body wrap session or something weird.  I most likely won't ever call to set it up.  So weird!  James and I also won a gift certificate to Goodwood BBQ with another one of our tickets.

I guess I will count this for my bucket list item.  I always pictured winning something huge and awesome and being the one winner in a huge crowd.  That wasn't the case here, but I did win something in a raffle!  Count it!

Owned the Streets of Provo!

Another half marathon is in the books!  Olivia and I decided in March-ish to run the same race in Provo that we did last year.  We trained for weeks and weeks.  Training includes 2-3 small or medium runs (3-5 miles each run) midweek and then a long run (started with 6 miles and added a mile every Saturday until we were at 12 miles the Saturday before the race) on Saturday.  It is quite time consuming, but we made it happen.  It was so fun to get to see O several times a week and to just gab away the whole time we ran.  We were both hoping to shed a few pounds training for this thing, but it sure didn't happen. :(  Oh well!  It was fun anyway!
The morning of the race, Jake drove us up to the race start and we were able to sleep in the car for an hour or so.  They wanted us to take buses up to the start and then wait in the cold for a couple of hours.  That's what we did last year, and it wasn't very pleasant.  Our plan this year was awesome!  Thanks to Jake for getting up in the wee hours of the morning to drive us! 

Waiting in line for the pre-race porta-potty visit.

The race went far better than I could have ever hoped for.  This race last year was my personal record for a half marathon (1hr 56min), and I ran it in 2 hours flat this year.  I was very very happy with that!  I'm not in nearly as good of shape right now as I was last year so I'll take it!

Jake got us chocolate milk and donuts for after the race.  Breakfast of champions, and champions we were!