My Marathon!

This picture was one of my favorite moments on the day of the "Top of Utah" Marathon. My hot husband woke the kids up early Saturday morning, fed & clothed them, drove them 2 hours, cheered me on, took us all out to lunch, then ended the day letting me soak my soar muscles at Lava Hot Springs. It was one of the best days of my life. I have been training for over 6 months for this and to really accomplish it - not even die in the process is still euphoric for me. I really ran 26.2 miles in a day, wow. My sister Emily counted up on our 4 month training schedule just to see how many miles total we had run to get to this day - over 400. Is that really cool or just insane? I haven't decided yet.
My Mom & Dad also came along with two more of my sisters (who have run marathons before) and they even ran with us for part of the way. We tease my Dad he started this since he ran a marathon years ago that none of us thought was that cool until recently. Woops. Now I think he's amazing - especially since he beat my time by over an hour and a half!
Here are all my lovely running buddies! Tiffani Adamson, Emily Koenig, me, & Dana Brown - aren't we just gorgeous? Do you see those big smiles? It really was just the most amazingly cool thing I've done in soooooo long (it still wasn't as hard as childbirth-so if you've done that, I still think you're amazing too). I really feel like an iron woman though.
Yes, this is me crossing the finish line - both arms in the air - cheering. The guy who announced my name even said, "Sarah Smith from American Falls, Idaho with a little too much energy to have just run a marathon!" I couldn't help it, I was just so happy to be done.

Walk-a-Thon

I just had to put a quick post in here about my Walk-a-Thon. Have you ever done something you're just so proud of? Well this week was great for me. I have worked lots of hours on this 'Fun'd-Raiser for our little Hillcrest Elementary. I have called I don't know how many businesses, friends, & family asking for help. I have worked on the computer until the wee hours of the morning making fliers, reminders, prizes, etc. And do you know the best part?
It was all worth it!

I was pretty worried when it was around 50 degrees on the day before, but the day of came and it was a gorgeous 80 degrees! Everyone who said they would come did, everyone who said they would help did, and even Joaquin walked the 1.5 miles without a single complaint. I almost cried when I stood in front of that crowd (around 350 people) and had to bite my tongue when I almost called on someone to pray. All week as a family we've just prayed that people would remember to come. We really didn't care about the donations so much, we just wanted families to see how much fun we could have together. We raised over $4000.00 and more is still coming in (from parents who are a lot like me and forget things every now & then).

The music was fun, the prizes were well received, the hot dogs were a huge hit, and even the cheerleaders had a good time. I just loved the whole night!

Potty Training Gone Wild

My beautiful Shelby is constantly trying to be big. She wants to stay up late, ride whatever Josh is, put on make-up, etc. So when she started to ask to go potty on the potty about 2 months ago I thought, sure! She had just turned two but had lots of older sisters & a brother to look up to. Well it's been 2 long months with many accidents, but the classic was yesterday.
I went to get my hair cut & colored at 11:30am here in Am. Falls. Before we left I had her go potty, right when we walked in the door I had her go potty, and yep - you guessed it. At 12:15 pm she came in wet through everything (That's a whopping 45 minutes in case you were wondering). I hadn't brought a change of clothes or even a pull up for that matter and Joaquin was stuck at Napa with no vehicle to help. So I threw Shelby in the pick-up and flew with beautiful foil wrappers all over my head to my house to change her. I got quite a few double takes, lots of smiles, and one all out laugh. Ah, isn't being a mother grand?

Our New Family Picture

Other than Shelby, who was having a rough day - this was our best shot of everyone - including Joaquin. I showed him all the other pictures and he said, "I think the photographer just caught me at the wrong second, I swear I smiled." I just laughed and then beat him. My husband who only smiles when he bleaches his goatie.

This was Quinn & Jessi's 1st Day back to school, aren't they beautiful?
Quinn is so happy this year because she is back with lots of her friends who were in a different class last year. I went to "Back to School Night" with her yesterday and was just so proud. All her teachers (even her Reading teacher) told me how advanced she is. Yahoo! She still loves Math the most, Piano is her second favorite, and this year is trying "Hip Hop." Could you all come buy more filters from NAPA to pay for our children's after school activities?
Jessi has a fresh from college teacher this year, Mr. Blauer, who she absolutely adores. She also loves that she's the only one at Hillcrest this year, what a grown up! She watched some of the Olympics this last month and Gymnastics were her favorite. She has now told everyone at school & church that she is going to do that someday. More power to ya honey! She went to gym today and in my unbiased opinion, had the best kart-wheel in her class. But when the teacher told her to put her feet right in front of her, keep her legs straight, & touch her nose to her knees - she looked up and said, "How?" It was all I could do not to burst out laughing, how many times have I thought that exact same thing?

I just had to publish this picture! Josh absolutely loves "Guitar Hero," even though he can't play even one note correctly. It is so much fun to watch him & Shelby jam out. The scariest part is that Josh knows quite a few words to the song, "Talk Dirty to Me." Great parenting, huh?