Mommy Daughter Dinner

Camie and I took the girls out for a mommy daughter dinner at Chez Zee. They got all dolled up and for their special date!!! Emma waiting patiently for Camie and Mia to get there.
The girls scoping out the desserts!!!

They thought the piano player was pretty great.

They restaurant was all decked out in whimsical hearts and strings of red and white lights. Lots of eye candy for sure!

Emma got brownie bites for dessert. She even was kind enough to save a few to bring home for her daddy to enjoy!

Our dates for the evening :)

I had the best time with my precious girl!!! We should go on special mommy daughter dates more often!!! Thanks for a wonderful evening, Emma!!! Notice the necklace and bracelete that she made with Landry earlier today. She was sooooo proud of her "jewels"!!!

Will you be my Valentine???

Emma had a sweet Valentine's play date with sweet Landry. Landry served up yummy strawberry milk.

They made valentine's cards and necklaces.

They decorated cookies.

Notice the frosting in the hair. No surface was safe with these two :)

After cookie decorating, Krista (Landry's Mama) made heart shaped peanut butter and jelly sandwiches. Real food was much needed after the kids started coming down off their sugar high :)

Landry waiting for Emma in his loft for a quick story time before we headed home for nap.

Buddies :)

Emma enjoyed the Valentine's Day stories that Mrs. Krista read!!!

Thanks for having us over, Krista and Landry!!! We had a wonderful time!!!

Happy Birthday, Kiara!!!

Emma's friend, Kiara, had her birthday party at Capitol Gymnastics. The kiddos loved playing on all of the equipment!!! We had a lot of fun!!! Notice the slightly upturned hands. She looks like a natural. She came home and was doing the same thing down the hallway, following the tiles.
The trampoline runway.

rope swing

Rowan, Emma and Quinney

Trampoline

The foam pit was the biggest hit of all!!!

CANNONBALL!!!!!

Thanks for including us in your birthday celebration, Kiara!!!

Found Photos

These were some pictures that were on my memory card that needed to be uploaded. I LOVE Emma's expression in this picture. It was taken on New Year's Eve and she had one of those extra long sparklers. She was waving it around in a circular motion and apparently was pretty amazed at what she saw :)

After Thanksgiving, I got a new camera (canon t3i) and my friend met up with Emma and I to give me a little tutorial on how to shoot in manually. I took these 3 pictures of Emma in manual mode after a quick lesson in aperture and shutter speed :) I thought they turned out pretty good for my first attempt!

This picture reminds me of a school photo :) They always have a backdrop and some sort of prop.

Finding my Inner Runner...

Over the Christmas break, I ate my fair share (and then some) of sweet goodness which prompted me to take action in 2012. Yes, I...like millions of others... made a New Year's resolution to work out. Running seemed to be the quickest and cheapest way to work out for me. We live in a very runner friendly neighborhood with many hike and bike trails...one of which is out our back gate. There were no excuses and I felt myself wanting to become one of THEM.

I have always watched runners from afar and admired them as they gracefully passed by. My history with running has not really been a successful one. In my mind, I have always envisioned myself as a gazelle...in reality, it is as if I was wearing cement blocks on my feet. After about 1 minute of running I would quit with my lungs and legs on fire. I have not really run since high school and even then, it was primarily sprints. I dreaded anything longer than a 200 yard dash!

Last spring, I purchased the Couch to 5k app and didn't do anything but read the workouts until now. The C25K is a 8 week running program that focuses on time intervals rather than distance intervals. It seemed to put running in manageable chunks that I felt I could handle. I loved that I could listen to Pandora and a woman's voice would break through telling me to "run now" and then tell me to "walk now". All I had to do was keep moving forward and change speeds according to her directives. Simple enough :)

Week 1 seemed easy on paper...
5 minute warm up
45 second run
90 second walk
repeat for a total of 20 minutes
5 minute cool down

I thought it would be a piece of cake...I could absolutely run 45 second intervals with a walk break in between. Let me just tell you, I had a hard time with the 45 seconds and wondered how in the world I was going to be able to run for 30 minutes without stopping. I forced myself to keep going, rain or shine...cold or COLDER, and pushed though week after week. I had some really tough days, but after every session I felt extremely proud and continued to gain confidence and strength as a runner. I started to look forward to running, trying to see if I could get farther on the trail than I did the time before. I love that I have started passing the same people running and that we greet each other with a quick nod or a brief smile...we are all in this together and I now feel like I am part of their club.

I am now finishing up with week 6 and Saturday I will run for 20 minutes nonstop. This is a HUGE accomplishment for me! I no longer have burning legs and lungs when I run, I embrace the challenge of each new level, and I just might look more like a gazelle instead of an uncoordinated gorilla :)

I will keep you posted and let you know when I reach my goal of running 30 minutes nonstop...hopefully 2 weeks from now :)