Go BIG

Last Saturday Carson and I ran our first half marathon.  The course was the inaugural Big Cottonwood half. It was BEAUTIFUL!


We decided to spend the night up at Carson's parents house so that we wouldn't have to wake up as early. Also Laurie was going to watch James anyway, so that way we could just let him sleep.

We woke up at 4:30am to get ready and head out.  We drove over to the finish, parked, and loaded the bus that took us up to the starting line which was just below Solitude.  Good thing they provided mylar blankets because it was Fuh-reezing!!

before the race...we look like we got bad spray tans :)

At 6:30am it was time to begin!  We ran in the complete darkness for about half an hour before the sun starting peeking up behind the mountains and it probably took about that long for my legs to stop feeling like they were frozen ice blocks.

We thoroughly enjoyed running with each other and getting to watch the sunrise which highlighted the beautiful changing leaves.

It was interesting to watch people too since we had been training just the two of us.  There was one girl who drove us CRAZY!  She came up from behind us on my left (Carson was to my right) and then cut RIGHT in front of me.  Ok, I'm totally fine with this IF YOU'RE GOING TO SPEED UP!...no, she SLOWED DOWN! Carson and I didn't even say anything, just looked at each other and went around her and got ahead of her again.  Then a few minutes later she pushes forward and passes us again and we see her cut someone else off!  She was driving us insane so we pushed hard and got a good distance ahead of her :)

There were drink/restroom stations every 2 miles throughout the course.  A little after mile 6, I felt the need to urinate. Boo.  We were hoping to not have to stop.  So I thought well, I'll see how far I can go.  Oh, it got uncomfortable very quickly! haha Mile 8 couldn't get there fast enough. So at mile 8 I did my business and bolted out of there.  Carson was so nice to wait for me.  We sprinted to make up our time (and pass that crazy cutter-offer girl that had then gotten ahead of us).

We ended up coming in at 1:51 which was great! About 20 minutes quicker than what we had expected based on our training....mind you, we were practically rolling down the canyon :)

We were really sore after the race for about 4-5 days and my foot really started hurting the evening of the race but I think it was just deep bruising from the pounding.  It is starting to feel better.

We started training at the beginning of July.  It was definitely a roller coaster ride....I HATED training but it feels SO good to have accomplished something we worked so hard for!

look who came out to see us finish!

best running partner ever

Camping

Three weeks ago we joined my family on what is becoming our traditional annual camping trip to Heber Valley Girls Camp.  This is our second year.  They use it obviously for girls camp during the Summer but in August and during the off season, they let families stay.

We had a blast!  If anyone knows about HVGC it is not like regular ol' camping.  They have cabins with electricity and bunk beds (you have to provide your own mat and stuff....which is good anyway), a gas grill, a pantry area with a fridge (that is behind a heavy duty door of course so not to attract bears), flushing toilets, and yes...HOT showers!  Ohhhh it's  rough I'll tell ya.

This year there is a fire ban that has sort of been on and off (mostly on) and we were hoping they'd lift it for us since we had quite a bit of rain the weekend before....nope.  So that was sort of sad, that's the whole fun of camping is the campfire but we made do and roasted our marshmallows over bricketts :)  Hey, at least we didn't come home smelling like a campfire so that's a plus. Also I'd rather it be there overall because of the issues we've been having this year with wildfires.  Better safe than sorry!

We had lots of fun hiking, playing horse shoes, volleyball, making kids crafts, and just enjoying each others company.  This campground is awesome, it is maintained and run by missionary couples.  My mom kept saying she wanted to put in for a mission there.  I agree, I think it'd be fun!

They have lots of challenge courses that you do in groups that are really fun.  And lots of "thrill rides" if you will.  Last year we did a giant zip line (my first ever...and I'm not gonna lie, I was scared).  This year we did this swing where they put you in a harness and hoist you up to the top of this tree (not sure how high, but it was high enough) and let you go.  It was nuts!  James even got to ride it...well not entirely, they harnessed the little ones and just let them hang and they'd push them like a regular ol' swing.  James was so cute :)  They made everyone stay back behind ropes except for one parent and so Carson went out while I took pics.  It looked like James was scared to death, he was gripping the rope but Carson said he was smiling.  I have another picture of James being harnessed up and it is so precious but its on my Mom's camera.  I've been hounding my parents to send it to me but they are taking forever so I'll just share it when I get it :)

James on the swing...hanging on for dear life.  

We stayed from Wednesday evening till Saturday late morning.  We went straight from there to the BYU game which was at 1pm and it was SO HOT!! Poor James was pretty tired but he did surprisingly well despite the heat!  We have Grandma and Grandpa and Uncle Chris and Aunt Emily to thank for that. He even fell asleep for the last quarter and a half! Good thing we came equipped with sunscreen!...no burns, yay.

at the game

Such a fun weekend.  We love camping!...oh and of course BYU games too :)

Being a Stay-At-Home Mom is Hard Work

Just thought I'd blog about something Carson said that was funny.  It still makes me laugh a week later.

This happened the day of the mudslide.  So as I mentioned in that post,  since Carson couldn't hike Timp that day, James stayed home with him while I went to the baby shower and ran some errands.  He had been so tired lately because of not taking good naps etc. so he slept in till 10am.  He was just waking up when I left.

When I returned at about 2pm Carson was watching his cartoons, "The Avengers" (he's such a kid).  I asked how his day went.  He said, James got up, ate breakfast, then went down for a nap at like noon and has been napping since. Then he said, "I've gotta hand it to you.  This staying home all day every day with James is a tough job." To which I laughed and replied, "That's not fair!  He's not like this every day.  How come you get such a good day?"

James is really a good, chill baby so I really don't have it that tough, but as all mom's can attest it is still hard work whether or not you have a chill baby.  I just thought it was so funny the day Carson gets to spend playing mom all day he gets a misrepresentation of what it's really like.  And instead of getting all defensive I just had to laugh at his sarcasm.

By the way James napped till 4pm that day....geez I should've gone to lunch, a movie, maybe done some shopping :)

Saratoga Mudslide

Our weekend was an interesting one.

Carson had plans to hike Mt. Timp Saturday morning with some friends.  I wasn't going with because I had a baby shower to go to and other errands.  Well, early Saturday morning we woke up to a crazy thunder storm.  The lightning was amazing and it was just dumping rain!  But this meant that Carson couldn't hike Mt. Timp.  :(  Poor guy, he was so excited.  Seriously, we have so been needing water this Summer and really welcome the moisture but the timing was just bad.

Carson stayed home with James while I went to the baby shower and ran my errands, which actually worked out nicely in that sense.  And actually James pretty much just slept the whole day....he was such a tired boy.

at the baby shower

Later that evening we went up to Salt Lake where a family member was having his reception held in the Rice Eccles stadium tower.  It was amazing!  Such a beautiful place to have a reception, despite it being at our rival's stadium :)  They did some pictures out on the field so Laurie and Kelvyn took James with them to do that and captured some of their own pictures of him.  Carson and I stayed up in the tower and watched, there was no way Carson was going onto that field ;)  actually it was very windy so we (or I) didn't really want to go outside.  We had a great time there and decided to head back down at about 7:45pm.

James had been so tired lately so I was thrilled that we were entering our city before his bed time!  But as we rounded Redwood into our neighborhood at about 8:30pm, there were a lot of emergency vehicles entirely blocking off the road and were diverting traffic off East onto a smaller road.  At first I thought, oh no, someone's hit a deer but as we came around on the smaller road to try and get around the scene and maybe cross Redwood at a later point, there was another police officer guiding people around a large, VERY large puddle in the road.  As we drove past, I asked him what was going on.  He said there had been a mudslide.  I asked if he knew exactly where.  He didn't know.  I asked if any houses were affected.  He didn't know that either.

As we continued on, we could see that we were at the end of the mudslide and even down at that point, yards were damaged.  We then came to a standstill.  They were not letting anyone through that road as well.  As I mentioned we were at the end of the mudslide so it was blocking the road.  We were told a plow was going to come and clear it so we waited....so much for getting James to bed on time.  But really that wasn't my concern anymore.  My main concern was is my house okay?  Are my neighbor's houses okay?

Then my sister, Andrea who lives in Saratoga called me.  She told me she just read on KSL.com that there was a mudslide and she believed it was in the neighborhood just barely North of mine.  This is where her husbands brother and his wife live.  She had seen a house on the news that she recognized as one in their neighborhood.  Her brother and sister-in-law were out of town so she needed someone to check on their house.  Well, we weren't allowed in and my brother-in-law had tried to come out but of course wasn't allowed in so I made a few calls.  I was able to get a hold of my neighbor.  First, I wanted to check on the status of our house and our neighborhood and then to see if they could go check on the other house.  I was relieved to hear that our house was okay.  My neighbor drove over and checked on my sister's in-laws house.  She said the scene was pretty bad.  The roads were coated in mud.  They had to take a few different routes to even get there (this is like 3 blocks from our house).  Everyone was outside sandbagging and trying to deal with what happened. They reported the house seemed to have little damage on the outside (there was some damage to the side of their yard).  We were also able to get them access inside the home so we could make sure there was no damage inside.  Despite all the houses around them having major basement flooding their house was miraculously dry.  Except for the minor yard damage, the house was pretty much untouched.

In the meantime we were still waiting for the roads to get plowed (it had been about an hour at this point).  We had utilized our time calling back and forth coordinating between our neighbors who were checking up on the house and my sister.  But at this point, we decided to head back up to SL to stay the night at Carson's parents house. James was so tired and was having a hard time sleeping in the car seat.

About half an hour after we got to Carson's parents they were then letting people back to the neighborhood but by that point we had already put James down and decided we would stay.  I was supposed to teach primary the next morning at church and my team teacher was out of town so I had made a phone call earlier on to the Primary President telling her we would try to get back down on time.  She returned my call at about 11:30pm telling me they were also trapped out of the neighborhood and had just got back in.  She had also got word that they had cancelled church and everyone was to help with the clean up efforts the next morning.

So the next morning we headed back down.  I don't think we realized the severity of it until we drove through.  You could see it's exact path, everything in it pretty much destroyed.  Carson went to help with the clean up while I stayed home with James.  When he returned he told me how bad it was.  I think it was 24 homes were damaged, most of them filled with mud up to the ceilings in the basement.  Debri everywhere.  Yards wiped out.  Windows and even the whole side of one house broken.  One of the houses it hit is a total loss.  AC units and trees were uprooted and thrown into windows of houses.  People's belongings were destroyed.  A few teenage kids who lived in the basement lost all of their belongings.  I feel so sorry for these people.  And this is the same area that had the wildfire earlier this Summer.  Can you imagine having to be evacuated because of a fire and the threat of losing your home and then the relief of not losing it to just a few months later being hit with another major natural disaster and not being able to do anything about it?  The cause of the mudslide was definitely a direct result of the wildfire.  Because of the wildfire, there was no vegetation to hold back all the rain we received.

This used to be a park...now it's a swimming pool

Carson also helped yesterday on Labor Day.  There is still so much that needs to be done.  But I can't even tell you how impressed I am with the people in this community.  Everyone was so quick to jump in and lend a helping hand.  People gave up their whole day to help either shovel mud, carry buckets, make and deliver food for the volunteers, watch other people's children so that they could go and help.  I get sort of choked up about it.  There were volunteers from our Stake, neighboring Stakes, and even people from Lone Peak, Eagle Mountain, and Orem/ Provo areas that came to help.  I am grateful to live in a community that cares so much about one another.