Happy Fourth!

We were excited the had the Fourth off together this year! (Rarely do we both have a holiday off together) We decided to kick it off by hiking at Mt. Charleston that morning.  We've been wanting to go for a while, but just haven't had the chance.  It's only a 45 minute drive from our house and it is so worth it to get away from the heat and blah-ness of Vegas.

It was a perfect cloudy day and so refreshing to see green!  I have to say though, after hiking in Alaska, nothing really compares anymore.  Afterwards, we went to the Charleston lodge to have lunch.  We both ordered probably the most unhealthy things on the menu that just sounded SO good at the time.  Sorry if I disgust anyone.  Just know that we both had heartburn for almost a week after.  

That evening we went to a friend's house for a BBQ.  And of course we had to make a good festive treat!  I found the strawberry recipe in a magazine and they were a big hit.  The pasta salad is something my mom always makes and I could eat the whole bowl.

Hope everyone had a great Fourth!  I have to admit, I am more exciting about the 24th this year.  My brother is getting married on the 21st and the whole fam will be together!  (This also hardly ever happens)  It's always fun to have something to look forward to.

Ragnar

I don't have many pictures from our Ragnar weekend, but I had to post about it before I forgot.  It was something I agreed to a year in advance (naturally thinking I had PLENTY of time to get in shape).  Let's just say somehow that year went a little too fast and I found myself saying "ready or not, let's do this already".  And that we did.  We started in Logan, Utah, and ended up in Park City, Utah.  Making it an almost 200 mile trip.

Team A: Teri(sis-in-law), Jake(father-in-law), Kelli(sis-in-law), me, Anne(sister), Kari (friend)

Everyone did awesome and I think it's safe to say that Teri was our super hero that weekend.  She practically ran a whole extra leg for one of our injured runners on top of the 3 difficult legs she already have.  You might wonder where Matt is... he likes to say that he was the only smart one that didn't agree to this foolishness.  But he did end up helping as a volunteer with his mom at 2am one morning, so we'll let him by this time.

Starting my night run.  It was SO dark the whole way and by this time all the runners were pretty spread out so i REALLY could hardly see a thing.  I think we all got to bed at like 3 or 4 in the morning.  Only to sleep a couple hours, eat, and repeat.

 We were all onery, tired, hungry, and wondering "who's idea was this anyway?" I know was suffering from all of these and it took a good two days until I felt normal again.  It's amazing what sleep can do for you.  Here I am complaining when my legs were combined one of the easier ones and my sister, Anne, was 5 weeks pregnant! (Did I get that right?)

But we all made it to the finish line and can forever say that "we did it"!

Our cheerleaders at the finish line.

My dad and Tyler surprised us at the finish line and they sure made their grand entrance! They weren't quite sure how to enter the place and ended up coming across the finish line.  Long story short, everyone thought the were runners and started cheering for them.  And they sure ate that up.  I'm know they would LOVE to tell you the more detailed version if you ask them.  They were crackin' up ALL night long.  It was pretty funny.

I wish I had more pictures of all our other cheerleaders, but I will have to add them later.  Matt's family came up with all of the kids to support us the last day and boy did we need it.  My sister's that live away sent us cute pics and good luck cards for the race.  That was a fun surprise and definitely gave me a push to keep going.

I was literally hobbling around by the end of the race (not sure how I finished my last leg when I could barely walk).  I had a blister come up on one of my toes and (3 weeks later) I just lost the toenail itself.  Not a surprise since it has fallen off twice before in my life.  Hoping they grow back even after the third time...


Thanks Teri for all your hard work in putting this together! It's hard not to have a great time when Teri is involved- she thinks of everything.  Seriously.