August 6, 2014

Beneath the Walnut Tree

This is currently my "About" page, but if all goes the way I want it to, I will be updating that page very soon. :)



Triathlon!
 I've always been an athlete. About 5 years ago, I had placed first in my age group at a local 5k, participated in my first triathlon, then half marathon, and then the full 26.2... and I loved it. I was playing tackle football on the weekends and flipping friends on the mat during some after-work Jiu Jitsu sessions. I didn't know it at the time, but I was at my highest level of fitness to date. When I first started this blog, I was in my mid-twenties, newly engaged, and eager to lose about 5 pounds to look awesome on my wedding day. I was ready to try any and all new activities. When I originally started this blog, I called it The Try-Athlete. It was going to be about all of my athletic adventures and I thought I was pretty freakin' clever.
At the finish line of the LA Marathon









Meanwhile...
My mileage was shrinking to nothing. Well, nothing to keep track of and blog about, anyway. My nights gave way to DIY sessions for our upcoming nuptials. I kinda started falling in love with crafting.

Our wedding was perfect. Outdoors in a walnut grove surrounded by all of our friends and family.


Cut to 3 years later... we are the proud parents of our two year old daughter, our newborn son, and an enthusiastic Labrador Retriever. We are the new owners of a 50 year old fixer-upper. We both work full time. Needless to say, my priorities have changed and I won't be up for consideration for world's most amazing athlete any time soon.

This blog is a little bit of the stuff I love. I love my family. I love making over our new (to us) home with my husband. I love decorating my babies' rooms. I love doing things with and for my family- going to Disneyland in particular. (If I ran as often as I go to Disney, I would be ultra-marathon ready.) I love making things with my own hands. I love party planning. I admit, I have a love-hate relationship with writing and running (and if I'm being honest, cooking and cleaning), but I want to conquer it all. 

And so here I find myself. I might be a little softer than I used to be. My mile time might be is significantly slower than before. And sometimes, just a full day with a toddler and an infant is a real struggle. But my heart is happy and my life is full. Everything that I do, everything that I am- I am because of those precious moments when we shared our vows beneath those walnut trees.


July 14, 2013

Racing Again! Sort Of...

I'm not going to make any excuses about why I haven't written anything in the last, what? 6 months? 10 months? Either way, it's been too long. But I'm back and there's so much catching up to do!

For now, I'm just going to talk about this weekend, because it was a doozy! In a good way, of course!

On Friday, Brian and I went down to Irvine to pick up our packets for the ROC Race... It's the Ridiculous Obstacle Course Race which "combines a 5K course with game show inspired obstacles to give you the craziest run ever!"

After we picked up our packets, we hung out down in the OC, had some dinner, and spent some Brian and Kristen time, sans baby.

The Race
Costumes weren't required but they were encouraged. I've never worn a costume for a race before and Brian is a goofball that usually goes along with my shenanigans, so I figured this would be a perfect time to try the costume thing.

We were Mickey and Minnie! I threw the costumes together the day before. I got some red shorts for Brian, a red tutu for me, and sewed some white dots on them. I also grabbed a yellow bow tie for Brian. and we actually had the ears- my brother's girlfriend made a bunch of them for Giuliana's 1st birthday- it was a Minnie theme... Disney has been kind of a family theme lately!

 Anyway, the race itself was a lot of fun! There were a lot of costumes and tutus and wigs... It was pretty warm outside, but you start getting wet almost right away on some of the obstacles, so it was relatively easy to keep cool.

They had water stations along the course. There was a ton of fun volunteers. It was a fun experience in general. Obviously, this wasn't a race you would take very seriously. It wasn't timed or anything like that. It was purely for fun.

I think this "race" was a good way to begin my quest to get my mind and body back to where it all should be. I cannot remember the last time I went to the gym. I've gone on some runs with my kids at school here and there. I go on walks with Brian. But I am nowhere near where I have the potential to be. Whether or not I would finish this race was never in question. What I worried about before we began was how strong I would feel during it.

Honestly, it was about what I expected. I was able to do everything. Just not as well as I would have hoped. I definitely needed to walk at times. I definitely had jello arms and legs by the end. So now I know how far I have to go. More on that to come in further posts though. I have even better things to talk about right now...

Post race!
After the race, Brian and I were starving, so we stopped at Subway. Then we headed back toward home because we had a party to get to. Our good friends Andrew and Julia are moving to New York for medical school in a couple of weeks, so Andrew's parents threw them a going away party that evening. Brian and I had brought our race shirt and clean shorts to change into post race, but the plan was to go home, take showers, and then head over to the party. Well. So Cal traffic was at its finest and we were in the car for about two and a half hours. Needless to say, the party was already over an hour deep by the time we got back in town and we didn't want to have to leave the baby at Brian's parents' house for too long, so we decided to head straight to the party.

We were literally turning onto their street when my mom texts "Are you guys close?" I wrote back to her that we didn't have the baby, so if she wanted to be the braggy show off grandma, it wasn't going to happen. Or something like that. She wrote back, "I think something special is about to happen, just hurry up!" I looked over at Brian and I said, "Well, they're already engaged. *GASP!* I bet they're getting married!"

Sure enough, this is what we saw when we walked into their backyard:
 And that's our buddy Mike officiating and my brother Jeff as the best man! My brother- who is also currently our roommate- had helped keep this whole thing a secret! We had no idea! It was the sweetest little backyard wedding ever and so much fun! These two have been together for close to 7 years and they are awesome together. I'm so very happy for them. And sadly, they're still leaving for New York at the end of the month.

Because it was a surprise for all of the guests, no one was super dressed up. But Brian and I managed to take the cake as Under Dressed, Party of 2...
Yeah...

Anyway, the only other picture I took last night was this one with Brian and Mike:
That's pretty typical.

The whole day was fun and unexpected! I loved it!

Today I managed to keep the streak alive (2 DAYS- whoot!) by getting Brian, Giuliana, and Kevin rounded up for an easy hike this morning.
And the weekend fun continues!!!