Annual GIRL'S WEEKEND- HOLLA!!!!!!!!!!!!!

My. Family. Rocks ;) Last year we started a tradition of taking a girl's weekend once a year. We have my G-to-the-Ma, my great Aunt Larry (Hot-Mo), my Mother the...no mom, I'm not gonna put the acronym you googled on your work computer here- my short sister, myself (who may or may not have been called a slightly crazy driver once or twice on the trip), my SIL's Lyndi Lou and the Tash-Meister, along with my daughter Savannah and my nieces Janna, Hannah and Kiana (who said her name had to be pronounced Ki-ANNA just to fit in with the rest of the girls ;). 4 generations of Towanda-filled FUN!

My beautiful niece Janna

And my amazing daughter Savannah

We headed down on Friday morning and hit the Oquirrh (or however you spell that) Mountain Temple open house. It was beautiful! Then we headed straight for the nourishment we all live and die for- Tucano's! Hold on, I feel a short ode to Tucano's coming on....

Tucano's- Oh how I love thy protein-filled gluttony. Muahhh

Back to the blog: Really the rest was all about shopping and swimming...and shopping. Oh and eating, and shopping.

We hit the Shade Warehouse Sale. Nuff said. We spent some time at Gateway mall. We went to Gardner Village. We went to the Children's Place, JC Penney etc and did a lot of school shopping. We went to Salt Lake Running Co (seriously you cannot go to SLC and not go there)....it was fabulous. We taught my little sister how to swim (and I am not ashamed to say she will be outswimming me speed-wise any day now, even though I have years more practice). I became Mt. Vesuvius for a moment in time (and no I will not explain it nor post pictures of what the heck that means...let's just say I apparently have a hidden talent when it comes to jacuzzis- I'm quite entertaining really). And we laughed :) Isn't that the best part? We painted our nails (even G-ma and Great Aunt Hot-Mo) flourescent orange and green. On Sunday we went to Music and the Spoken Word at Temple Square (with our flourescent nails on display for all the world to see), and then we headed home.

This is always so much fun. I love spending time with all the girls (well we were missing a couple and I wish they could have been there!!!! Maybe next year). It makes me so thankful for my fantastic family- for these people who love me for who I am (which is not always so great), who can have a good, juvenile laugh every once in a while, who can smile for a million and one pictures and paint their nails odd colors. Im thankful for my daughter, my partner in shopping crime, for being my BFF. Thanks girls for a fantastic time! I love you!

Spudman 2009

I am so excited to blog about this :) What an amazing time it was. On July 25th, me and the girls were able to race in SPUDMAN 2009, in Burley, ID. This race is such a popular one that last year, registration (in January no less) filled up in 17 minutes (over 2,000 athletes), so this year, they decided to make it a lottery. Athletes had until April 15th to sign up and then were informed a week or so after that if they had been selected or not. When I got the email, I started jumping up and down and hollaring. My daughter thought it was hilarious. This is the race I most wanted to do the last couple of years but wasn't able to (since I was doing more important, better things, like having beautiful babies!).

Daniel was also selected, as was my friend Debbie. Torrie had an auto entry since she wasnt able to swim last year because of the tragic drowning. However, Tammy and Hidee did not get in, so we were discouraged. We had wanted to race it as a group.

A few weeks after we got our results however, Tammy and Hidee got an email saying there were more spots available and they had been selected! We were so excited that all of us would be able to race!

Daniel decided to sit this one out since he hadn't been training, so us girls headed up on Friday morning. We took Hidee's trailer and parked right on the course with all the other trailers. This was the way to do it, I tell you! We will never drive clear from Twin because that's the only place we could find a hotel-again!

We had a great time on Friday. Ate, got checked in, set up transition one.....

Saturday arrived and we were ready to go! We were all in the same wave except Tammy, who was in the wave starting 10 minutes after us.
Debbie and I heading down to the water.....


And...off we went....

The swim is current aided so it's fast and fun! It went rather smoothly except that I thought my timing chip was coming off, so I stopped moving my legs, trying desperately to keep it on. However, in a wetsuit, I dont feel like it slowed me down all that much. I did the 1 mile swim in 19:43. When I got out of the water (I always expect to be last out of the water of our group since I am the slowest swimmer), I was surprised to see everyone else still in transition, meaning I wasn't as far behind them as usual :) I had a relatively smooth transition and off I went....


Coming out of T1 and heading into the bike....

About mile 4 of the bike, I caught Torrie (I could see her thanks to our matching shirts. I just looked for the pink circle on the back and knew it was my girls!). About mile 14 I caught Debbie. The bike was going well and I think we all felt good about how well we did. It was a 25 mile bike. I finished the bike in 1:15. I got into transition and Debbie and Torrie were right behind me. I handed off some chewies to Debbie, changed out of my clips and into my running shoes and took off....


Me going into the run.....

By the time we hit the run. IT. WAS. HOT. We don't usually train in the heat since we have to go early morning. I have also been dealing with the knee injury and had not been able to run really in 5 weeks or so. The times I had attemtped to run, it had been really painful and I hadnt made it very far. I had (and still have been) doing physical therapy 3 times a week for it. I was still hoping to do a really good time on the run. But with the heat, my exhaustion by the time I got to the run, and the knee, I wasn't moving as fast as I would have liked. That's the bad news. The good news is apparently everyone else was in the same boat, and as usual the run is where I really made some progress and started passing so many people. About 2 miles into the run, I spotted Hidee's back. I didnt actually think I would even see her. She is a much faster swimmer and a faster biker than I am, so I figured she would be so far ahead of me that I wouldn't even see her. She was the only one I hadn't caught up to yet. It's always so fun to race with your friends and it was awesome to be able to spot them-loved those shirts! I caught up with Hidee about mile 4. That's about the same time I wanted to die ;) It was so hot. And I was so slow-or so it felt! But I kept on movin' along for all 6.2 miles. My goal was to finish the race in under 2:40 and when I crossed the finish line, I came in at 2:34:30! I was thrilled with that time. My knee held up surprisingly well! I'm not sure what did the trick but it was better than it had been for a couple of months!

Me crossing the finish line.... I was in wave 5 so that time is off by 40 minutes.

It was just 2 minutes before Hidee came through and finished in about 2:36.

Here we are sweaty and dying of heat. Then we waited for everyone else to finish. Tammy actually came through just 10 minutes after I did (and she started 10 minutes later) meaning her time and my time were almost identical, even though we didnt race together. When all was said and done, she came in just 2 seconds after I did! Crazy that we were that close and didnt even know it since we didnt start together!

Debbie came in just after that, and Torrie just a few minutes later. We all beat our goal times by quite a bit.

The husbands (except Daniel) had come up late the night before to cheer everyone on and they were kind enough to take lots of pictures.

Here we are in the outdoor shower. I seriously cannot explain just how good this felt. We were totally overheated, sweaty, stinky and covered in all sorts of bodily fluids. I don't think anything has ever felt this good- ever.

And here we are showing off our....matching circles on our backs :)

The whole crew- Torrie, Debbie, Hidee, Me, and Tammy

I had an incredible time! I am so thankful for my girls! Training with them every day is a blast! Racing with them is even more fun! They are a light in my life and I feel so grateful to have this group of women as friends and training buddies! Don't know what I would do without them!

I honestly can't wait for Spudman next year. It's an amazing race! I hope we all get in once again so we can do this at least one more time!!!! Thanks Team We Tri! I love ya!

Jayden's cake smash

These photos are from Jayden's first birthday. We did a cake smash. He had no qualms (unlike Savannah when she turned 1) about getting in there and getting dirty. The trickiest part was getting Jaxon to stay out of the photos, and the cake. He kept saying, "Jayden steal my cake!" It really was a fun thing to shoot. I can't believe my baby is already 1!

San Rafael Classic Triathlon- June 20th 2009

First of all, I would like to apologize for the idiocy that is Blogger. I cannot scroll my photos or reorder them (although I used to be able to, it no longer works for me). My photos also randomly disappear after I spent all the time uploading them. So these photos are not in order and make no sense. However, I have spent the better part of 2 days trying to get it to work the way is always has in the past, to no avail. I give up.

Me at the finish line (as you can see, this photo should go at the end...)

Getting on my bike (and this photo should go with the part of the blog that talks about that)

After the race...

Shopping at Gateway.

I have been a busy little racing bee as of late.... On June 20th, I had another triathlon. This one was in Huntington, UT, the town I grew up in. I lived there until I was 16 and that's when my family moved to Idaho. I have only been back a handful of times and this seemed like a good opportunity.

None of my training buddies could make it but lucky for me, a couple of awesome friends agreed to go with me and make a girl's weekend of it. Thanks Sandi and Lisa! You guys were a blast.

We headed out on Friday morning. We stopped to potty 100 times or so (thank you hydration), and made our way to SLC. The only thing I could think about the whole way was getting a pair of tri shorts that I desperately needed. I bought a pair, fell hopelessly in love with them, and lost them in one fell swoop. The truth is, I knew I couldn't live without them, so deep was my affection.... So we went to the Salt Lake Running Company and thankfully they had some left. I checked the hangers and found the 2nd pair to be mediums. I was thrilled and all was right with the world.

Then we went to eat at Tucanos. Tucano's is my faaavorite place. We had fun. See below.

Then we did a little shopping. Well, we didn't actually shop. We just walked through stores and let our jaws hit the floor that acid washed jeans in teal and purple, with bows and zippers are on the shelves once again. Wow for realizing I'm old.

After that, we headed to Huntington and got checked into the race and into our hotel. Right before bed, I tried on my new shorts and *GASP* they were the wrong size! I was soooo mad! I had checked the hanger several times but not the tag! After I stopped fuming I decided nothing could be done about it so just go to sleep and relax.

I had a much better race this time around. My swim went as it always does. Slowly but surely ;) I came in just above the middle of the pack. My T1 went much better than last time and I took 2.5 minutes (still not great but much better than Salem Spring!). The bike portion went well. It was a 7.5 mile climb and then turnaround and descend for a total of 15 miles. I came in 3rd on the bike portion at 55:01. T2 took me 53 seconds which was close to the top. The run is where I always know I can make up some time from being such a slow swimmer :) I gave it everything I had and came in 1st on the run with a time of 22:47. My overall time was 1:43:56.

Overall, I took 2nd place by 6 seconds (argh!) and first in my division. I would have loved to take that title but I know I gave it all I had and I can't be too upset with that. It was a very small race (hence my doing so well ;) but I enjoyed it and hope I can squeeze it in again next year.

On the way back, we ate at Cafe Rio, and stopped at the Salt Lake Running Company again, where the nice man happily exchanged my worn shorts for the right size. And once again, all was right with the world.

I had a wonderful time with the girls and a great race. Couldn't have been better! Except if blogger would let me type a cohesive blog with pictures and all, that is...

A few more family pics

So I was having serious uploading issues yesterday when I posted the first blog and couldn't get all the pics on there. And when I try to edit, half of what I have uploaded disappears. So rather than fix the original blog- over and over- I figured I would just add these babies to a new one.

Thanks to April Farnsworth of April F Photography who took these for us.

Family pics May 2009

This Week's Fave's- Kiddie Style

As I was cleaning my house, I was thinking about each of my kids and how seriously awesome they are. I decided to do a blog about my favorite thing this week about each of them.



Mason- This week I have noticed so much how Mason loves his little brother Jaxon and how good he is to him. Sometimes when I go to put Jax down for a nap, Mason will say, "Nooo! I want him to stay up!" It warms my heart that he loves spending time with Jaxon so much. He thinks Jaxon is the funniest person in our family (he's right).




Savannah- This week, Savannah has been the most incredible helper! She is volunteering to do all sorts of work, and doing such a great job! When someone else complains, "I dont want to...", I keep hearing her say, "I'll do it!" and jump right in. From wiping off counters to folding laundry to helping with the babies, she has been such a great help. She also told me this week that she loves organizing! She has been helping my organize my scrapbook room and has been going through her own drawers and closet and organizing them just right. Such a sweet little girl!




Jaxon- Jaxon has been learning all sorts of new words and phrases this week. His favorites right now are "couple times" and "few minutes" although he says, "Cupa tibes" and "Bew minutes". He puts those on the end of almost every other phrase. "I take out Murphy cupa tibes!", "I eat dinner bew minutes." It's so cute. He also yells out the names of letters as he watches Super Why. So cute! He is such a fun little boy!

Jayden- Jayden has learned several new tricks this week. He shakes his head, blows raspberries, and claps his hands. Clapping is his favorite and if you try to get him to do one of the others, he will usually clap instead :) If you say, "YAY!" he will start clapping and he is so proud of himself! I love watching all the things he is learning.

I feel so blessed to have my 4 amazing children. Every day I get to spend with them is wonderful. While I have many enjoyable things in my life, nothing compares to the joy of being a mommy!