I Did It!!

I have always been a walker. It is one of the great things about living in the town we do. There is not only a sidewalk system that makes it possible to walk to the post office, library and Starbucks. There is a developed path that stretches for miles called Pollyann trail. That trail is less than a quarter mile from my house. For the 11 years we have lived here, I have used the sidewalks and trails many times.

In January, I had decided I would like to lose 10 pounds and started walking for exercise. Dean found a treadmill that someone had put out at the curb with the instruction manual attached that he brought home for me. He had to fix a bracket, but it has worked ever since. I used that treadmill through the winter and this spring and I started bumping the speed up to a jogging/running pace. That made me start to consider entering a 5K this year.

My brother in law, Kris, suggested that I needed to move from the treadmill to running outside. I was forced to a couple of weeks ago when we had no power for three day. I was amazed at how much harder it was to run the trail. It took me about a week to figure out how to pace myself. I did not have a machine electronically telling me how fast I was going. After I figured out what pace was a good one for me, I was able to jog two miles but I was having to stop and alternate walking and jogging for the last mile. Today I was able to jog the entire three miles!! I got to the mile marker in 35 minutes so I had also broken the 12 minute mile. These are huge accomplishments for me.

The bad news is I haven’t actually lost any weight. I cannot deny there is a big difference in my body shape, but the stubborn number on the scale just isn’t budging! I have started a different eating regime. I will keep you posted on the changes that come from that.

Book Review Wednesday

Since I am a bibliophile, I thought I would start doing a very short book reviews each week. The book that prompted me to think about doing this was Pride and Prejudice and Zombies. I had seen the book a few times in the store and heard a little buzz about it so I decided to check it out.

The book has the same characters and writing style as the original by Jane Austen with a twist.

An infestation of Zombies is plaguing England. The entire country is on their guard against zombie attacks. The militia spends all their time trying desperately to banish all the zombies. In that same vein, Mr. Bennett makes sure his four daughters are trained in Zombie fighting. People that have very good zombie fighting skills are revered throughout society.

In spite of the infestation, Victorian life must go on. There are balls and dinners that may be interrupted by the animated dead in their quest to eat the living. Courting, flirting and socializing continue with small interruptions to have to kill the attackers. In spite of all the circumstances that seem to keep them apart, Mr. Darcy and Elizabeth find a common bond that brings them together in the quest to rid the country side of the awful creatures.

I was not expecting a great work of literature so I was able to get past the many references to vomiting and the sexual innuendo. The question I was left with after finishing it is, "how did zombies come to plague England?" There is no explanation of how it started. All in all, I would probably not recommend the book for purchase. It is worthy of a library check out to see what all the hoopla is, but I wouldn't spend my money on it.

Milestones

I think it is funny that we spend so much time documenting the milestones our children achieve through their second year of life and then we quit. There are so many milestones that have not been reached by the end of their second year.

This year seems like it has had many milestones for our family.

Our older daughter has taken driver's ed and is now driving on her learner's permit. She has turned into a beautiful, pleasant young lady. I think she has her first romantic interest but I haven't heard it officially yet.

Our youngest daughter has achieve a new level of independence. She now has a cell phone so she can head to the library (with a friend) and choose books. They have even headed to the local party store by themselves to buy candy and pop. She has asked for and started using deodorant and lip gloss!! She has spent some of her own hard earned money on clothes. In other words, she is turning into a pre-teen!

I've even had one this year. For the first time ever, I felt like I needed to clean the house in preparation for our oldest son coming home. The other ones are just signs that I am getting old!

Our family has made it through the milestone of survivng the first year of Dean's company! When he decided to start a home remodeling business in January '08. Initially, it looked like an illogical decision. But after talking about it we agreed he should give it a go. He has had some amazing oppotunities to create some beautiful works of craftmanship.

Fun time last night!!!

I decided to have a Mystery Hostess for my at home business, Usborne Books and More. I sent out an e-vite to all my customers but I messed up the way the I put the addresses in so I had no clue how many people were coming!! I decided to be ready for 10 but I wasn't going to be too disappointed if only 3 showed up. Well, 8 people came!! I had a friend join my team and had a great time talking about our wonderful books with everyone there.

July Flew By!!

I am amazed by the fact we have had to flip the calendar to August already. Where did July go? When I sit back and reflect, I realize it was crazy, busy at our house.

Our oldest son came home on leave. That was quickly followed by ALL of my siblings arriving (one at a time). That is the first time in 5 years we have all been together. We spent the majority of 2 weeks hanging out and catching up. Thrown into that was a party to celebrate my brother's wedding, my mom's birthday and Steve's deployment to Iraq. Here is a picture of the 6 siblings all together in age order.


Then July 18th we said a very teary good bye to Steve, our oldest, as he left to go back to Fort Lewis, WA, where he got ready to deploy on the 24th. He is currently in Kuwait getting equipment ready for the rest of his unit to join him and then they will head into Iraq. We have been so happy that he has been able to contact us a couple of times by phone. I cannot imagine if we still lived in the era of snail mail and no easy worldwide phone connections.

Throw in a few struggles with Tori's diabetes (2 bad sites, ketones and an endo visit) and Teddi's driving and it has been quite the eventful month!

Summer Vacation has truly begun

This is the first day since school ended for the school year with absolutely nothing to do and nowhere to go. What a refreshing change for this summer so far! Of course there are things I should be doing; getting on the treadmill, putting away the laundry, cleaning the bathroom...but here I sit. I am recovering from a busy weekend.

Steve, our son in the Army, arrived Friday on leave. It feels so good to have him home, but bittersweet too. This leave is his pre-deployment leave. When he leaves to go back to base, he will be flying out to his deployment in Iraq. I am trying to just enjoy each day of his leave without thinking about deployment.

Teddi, our middle child, finished driver's education on Friday. The Department of Motor Vehicles was closed Friday and today so she doesn't have her learner's permit..YET! That comes tomorrow. One more day to not think about that.

Our youngest, Tori, has Type 1 Diabetes and we did not realize that she wasn't getting any insulin from her insulin pump from 6:00pm Saturday until 8:00 Sunday morning when she woke up a very sick little girls. We were able to treat her and avoid the ER, but it was a close one.

That is enough drama for a few days.