Where have I been?

I know it seems like my blogging has dropped off a little.
My computer bit the dust.  In fact, I am so fed up with it that I think I may take it out back and have an Office Space moment. 
But fear not, my wonderful husband got me a new laptop for Christmas!

So stay tuned!

Lazy Dogs

Yay Me!

David volunteered for the 1st Annual Branson Turkey Trot this morning, so guess what!  He kept the kids and I ran!

 

That's me at the start.

And here I am rounding out the last turn where David and the kids were directing runners.

 I finished with a time of 27:14.  Not too shabby for a first race!  I was 137 of 435 runners and 8th in my age group.

 It was a great Thanksgiving morning having my family there to cheer me on. 

And now I will feel no shame about the damage I am about to do in the kitchen. ;) 

Happy Thanksgiving everyone!

Happy Election Day

I am happy to say that I have never missed voting in a presidential election since I turned 18...which also happened to be an election year.

Running across the country

New York City

 We were there.

  David was going to participate in a marathon he had been waiting 5 years to run.

For those of you that don't know, the NYC marathon is so popular that people have to pay $12 to enter a lottery to get into the race.  And if you don't get in after 3 consecutive years of entering that lottery, you get an automatic entry for the 4th year.  However if you have something come up that keeps you from running in the 4th year, like the birth of your son, you can defer to the next year...after paying the $196 entry fee for both years of course.

So that's what we did.  A 5 year wait and $428 to run arguably the most popular race in the world.

 The expo was crazy!  Almost everyone around us was speaking a different language. 

 Packet pickup was like a whirl wind.  I was amazed at how fast they could move that many people.

Even Montel Williams was there.

David was buzzing with excitement to say the least.

 We spent the rest of the day being tourists, hitting the spots that we could like Time Square and a local pub. 

 Then we heard the news.  THE MARATHON HAS BEEN CANCELED.

And while we completely understand canceling the race because of this devestating storm, the timing could not be worse.  We saw people without power.  Many of them were staying in our hotel.  The subways were down, the ferrys were down, central park was closed, we even drove by a hospital that was still pumping water out of the building...4 days later!  If you even mentioned that you were there for the marathon, you got the stink eye.  We get it.  Why have a race that requires generators, food, water, and officials that could be used elsewhere for those in need?  It doesn't make sense.  But they said the race was still on Wed and Thurs so we came.  We came and spent 600 some odd $$ on plane tickets.  Our hotel was $400 a night!  Remember the race fee I mentioned above?  How about cab rides and food? We spent $80 in tshirts at the expo that promote a race that never happened. So much money spent...wasted.  And forget about us.  What about all of those who flew in internationally?  They say David will get an automatic entry for next year.  But who wants to pay for the race fee, flight, and hotel all over again after the bad taste we have in our mouth from the poor decisions and race management this year? Not us.

 

So what did we do?  We ended our trip 4 days early and high tailed it back to Missouri. 

There was another marathon running the same day that new york was supposed to and it was in our neck of the woods.  No sense in letting all that training go to waste right?

 Plus, we missed our kids.

It's also nice to run "where everybody knows your name.  And they're always glad you came."

 David said he would run the NYC marathon next year if they paid for his hotel, flight, and race entry fee.

 

So I guess that means we'll have to look for another race in New York to fullfill the 50 states marathon club goal.

Got Milk? Cause We Do.

 

Being that I have a milk allergy, I never thought my fridge would look like this.

Cashiers at the grocery store give me funny looks when I roll up with 3 different kinds of milk.  "Daddy, 3yr old, 12 month old," I point out for them...once a week.  Yeah that's right, once...a...week.  How do you buy stock in milk?

Recipe Alert!

I'm sharing the love people!  If you love spaghetti and you love garlic cheese bread, then you must make this braided spaghetti bread.  It is a whole meal in itself and it is delicious.  Oh yeah, and it's so easy!  The only time consuming part is thawing the dough.  But how hard is it to set it out on the counter in the morning?  If you are like me, you make spaghetti about once a week because the kids love it so much.  This is a great way to spice up boring old spaghetti.

Here's the recipe!

 

Crazy Lightning

The other night, we saw a lot of flashing outside while watching tv and assumed it was heat lightning.  When we walked out there, we saw a storm system moving south around our neighborhood.  I have never seen so much (and such frequent) lightning.  It was way cool to watch...especially since the sound of thunder was so faint. 

The videos get better as you go down.

Alex's Baby Shower

My mom and I threw a baby shower for Alex while I was in town last week.

She received so many great gifts for little baby London.

Everything really turned out great!

And the food was awesome!

Asher was the only male allowed...which he loved because he got lots of attention.

 Emery was just happy to be the official present helper.

 It was a great turn out and Alex was glowing.

It won't be long now!  Everyone is counting down the days!

Some of my favorite non-family shots from the cabin

Lilies growing up around the old life preserver at the lake.

 Humming Birds

Emery and Nana's "breakfast dinner flowers" as Emery would say...

Hadley jumping in the lake.

Teddy jumping in the lake.



Em and I Save The Turtle

I noticed Henry showing a lot of interest in a strange looking rock yesterday afternoon.  Usually that doesn't mean anything because Henry does things like that...chew rocks.  But when Lincoln started showing interest as well, I decided to go and investigate this "rock."

Turns out it was a turtle!

And though I am always proud of the catch our hunting dogs make, I always feel the need to save that poor animal.  So I put the dogs inside and set the turtle shell on the porch.

Emery and I waited to see if the poor thing was still alive.  And slowly he started to peek his head out.

Emery thought he might be hungry and offered him one of the curly cucumbers from the porch garden.

He didn't seem interested.

The dogs never lost interest.

 Once it was clear that he just wanted to get the heck out of here, we let him go on his way.

 "Bye Mr. Turtle"