Another Saturday with a ton of stuff done.
We slept in a little since we were up so late last night. Once we woke up, Jenna and I took Aubrey to the rec center and did a brick triathlon training session. We started with a 500m swim. We then hopped on our bikes (which we had put on the bike rack) and went for a 10 mile bike ride. We finished the bike ride at home and thew tennis shoes on and completed a run. Kayla joined us for the run and the two of us proceeded to set a new PR for her in a 5k - 23:54. We were cruising, which is impressive considering we ran on Friday morning and again last night. We did the last full mile in 7:18. My legs hurt when we were done, but it was fun to be pushing and working hard. Aubrey did a good job staying with us. When we finished, she complained that her hip hurt and was crying. I think more than her hip it was just a physically, and especially a mentally challenging morning for her. Pushing to do hard things like a triathlon is good for her... and all of us. We just need to help Aubrey create training plans that she can stick with so she can build up her strength and capability.
After the run, I ran out to the tire store and picked up the BMW wheel with a new tire on it and then rushed home and put the tire on and rushed back out to the store with the car so they could replace the other rear tire. Two tires and $550 I was back on my way home. Since I just spend $1400 on new tires for the BMW, I am really starting to question if it is worth it to keep that car. It feels like a waste of money since it chews through tires and all maintenance is so expensive. I floated the idea of selling it past Jenna and we are now considering what we should do.
I quickly jumped in the shower and got ready in under 20 minutes so I could go to the flower shop and pick up the wrist corsage that I got for my date with Jenna tonight before the store closed. She liked the corsage, but it wasn't the easiest thing in the world for her to manage throughout the evening. We calculated that it had been 19 years since she had worn a wrist corsage... crazy.
With the corsage on her wrist, Jenna and I started our anniversary celebration. We went downtown to the SLC temple and performed sealings. Well, in reality, we performed one sealing. When we arrived at our 3:00 appointment, the sealing office was looking a little overwhelmed as they had and were continuing to deal with a number of weddings. One of the workers agreed to take us with two other couples into a sealing room until he had to leave to perform a live sealing in ten minutes. In that time, we were able to do one sealing before he had to leave. As we waited for another sealer to come, Jenna and I decided we had done one sealing and so we went to the celestial room. The Salt Lake Temple celestial room is amazingly beautiful and it was peaceful and calm to spend some time in there. It took Jenna a little while to come out of the dressing room and she later told me that she "lost" her key. After she got a worker to help her, it turned out that she left the key in the locker and was able to find her stuff. Kinda funny.
After the temple we walked around the new City Creek mall and just enjoyed being together. Since neither of us had ate nearly enough throughout the day with all of the exercising we did, we decided to have a snack of lemonade, french fries, and a yogurt cup from Chick-Fil-A. The food court was very nice and we had a great seat by the window where we could see the beautiful waterfall and pond outside. Jenna and I both noticed how it must be one of the best dressed malls in the country as many people were wearing ties and dresses. Not sure if it was all temple folks, but could have been considering all the weddings going on across the street.
We ended up not purchasing anything and heading home after walking around for a little while. We relaxed for a little bit and then headed out to dinner at Tiburon in Sandy. We had never been there before and wanted to utilize a gift certificate we had been given by my boss, Ted. The location was not what you would expect for a fine dining establishment, but once inside the small restaurant it was nice. I had read online that the crab cakes were award winning, so we started with that and then had beef tenderloin (Jenna) and elk tenderloin (me). The dinner was fancy, but not over the top. I think I liked the food better than Jenna, but I believe she still liked it. Considering the cost, I don't know if we will go back after our next gift certificate runs out since it was $75 with the coupon Jenna brought.
Overall, it was a really great day. Thinking about the day we were sealed 17 years ago while we knelt at the altar was special. Spending time in the celestial room and feeling the spirit with Jenna by my side was special. Chatting and laughing and just enjoying each other's company at dinner was special. I am so lucky to have a wonderful wife and hope that Jenna knows how grateful I am for her every day, not just on our anniversary.
Saturday, May 26, 2012
Wednesday, May 23, 2012
Sunday, May 20, 2012
2012-05-20
Fortunately Bishop Peterson headed off to Japan yesterday, so I could sleep in a little before the usual Sunday meetings started. I needed the extra rest after all the time in the sun running yesterday. It was a busy day with regular meetings (albeit a little condensed because they were shorter with the Bishop not present), three temple recommend interviews, creating the donation with Mike Crookston because Kelly was out of town, and home teaching the Naegles and Berubes.
The highlight of the day was listening to Aubrey share her Bingham cheer tryouts and Sunday competition story during gospel doctrine. Cindy Wooley had heard about the situation and asked Aubrey to share what happened as we were discussing Mosiah 19. Aubrey did a great job sharing how hard it was to stand up for not competing on Sunday, but that it was the right thing. Sister Wooley also asked me to share how the bishopric thinks about becoming a united people.
We fired up the BBQ for the first time this year and ate under our new red picnic table umbrella. It was a beautiful sunny day, but unfortunately the clouds rolled in around 7:00 and we were not able to see the annular eclipse that was happening. Maybe we will be able to see it better in 18 years when it happens again.
Saturday, May 19, 2012
2012-05-19
What an amazing day! Fro the third consecutive year, we did the Running with Ed relay race around Park City today and I cannot remember the last time we had such a good time as a family. We felt so united, it was wonderful. Our team name was Family Rocks and we went with a Flintstones theme. With Amy Sharman's help, the girls all had caveman outfits to wear on top of their running clothes (Jenna and I had "professional" costumes from a previous Halloween) and the girls had bones tied in their hair. We painted our names and team name on the car and tied bones to it in various places for extra fun.
Our start time was 8:45 and we arrived at the field house around 8:00am. Tons of people loved our costumes and kept commenting to us about them. A Park City radio station was at the start line and asked us to come talk to them on the radio. After that, we had a few different people come up to us and tell us they heard us on the radio and came over to the race start to see us. I think the girls liked all of the attention.
Our 8:45 starting group included one of Kayla's friends from her People to People trip to Europe last summer. It was fun to see Sabean and her mother and have a friend out on the course. We also became friends with another team that shared our start time - they were from an insurance company in Park City. We ended up talking to them often throughout the race as our runners were close to the same pace - until the end when Lindsay smoked their leg 7 runner and we pulled away.
We had a great time finding spots to cheer on our runner and ringing cowbells and yelling throughout the course. I am positive that nobody supported their runners on the course as much as we did... of course, the race bible told participants that the team vehicle should drive from one exchange to the next and not stop along the course. I think they let us slide since we had children out running on the course.
All of the girls did AWESOME in their runs. Brenna ran for the first time and did leg 2 of about 1.9 miles and had Lindsay accompany her so she was not alone. Kayla started the race and did legs 1 and 6. She always gets our team off to a good start and did a great job on leg 6 which is the longest leg of the relay. Jenna was super strong running up Olympic park and was so fast that I barely got to the exchange in time for the hand off. She ran the entire leg and passed a ton of people who had to walk up the steep mountain where they did Olympic ski jumping and sliding events. I pushed up the rest of the mountain on leg 4 and was able to beat my time from last year by 3 minutes, dropping my pace from 8:59 last year to 8:25 this year. I had a hard time breathing on my way up the mountain and was never really able to catch my breath, but was able to push through. I handed off to Aubrey who cranked through the 4.4 miles of leg 5 with a smile on her face. She did a great job and appeared to be happier than last year. Kayla was then up for her second leg and then handed off to Lindsay who ran the 4.85 mile leg 7. Lindsay started a little behind one of our friends from the insurance company and ended up passing him and beating him by about a minute. At the exchange, he said that trying to keep up with Lindsay (which he said he could not do) made him run the leg 5 minutes faster than he would have run it on his own. Then it was Jenna's turn again to hit the road. Unfortunately, leg 8 and 9 don't go on or by roads much so we were not able to see her while she was running. She pushed through her 5+ miles and handed to me for the second to last leg. I really struggled with leg 9 last year, including tripping and rolling down a hill on the trail. This year I felt much better and was able to really push myself to go hard. In the end I cut 10 minutes off my time from last year cutting my 6 mile pace from 9:47 to 8:16 per mile. It was a beautiful trail run, but there were a lot of hills and I can't remember the last time I pushed myself to go so hard even when I was tired. I handed off to Emily who ran the file 3 miles and we joined her for the last 20 yards so we could finish as a family.
All in, we completed the 41 mile course in 6 hours and 15 minutes, an improvement of nearly 40 minutes over last year. Even better than our race time, we really enjoyed ourselves as a family. I don't think we wildly cheer each other on enough and this races gives us that opportunity. I am so proud of the girls and how awesome they did and excited to start thinking about what our theme will be next year.
Our start time was 8:45 and we arrived at the field house around 8:00am. Tons of people loved our costumes and kept commenting to us about them. A Park City radio station was at the start line and asked us to come talk to them on the radio. After that, we had a few different people come up to us and tell us they heard us on the radio and came over to the race start to see us. I think the girls liked all of the attention.
Our 8:45 starting group included one of Kayla's friends from her People to People trip to Europe last summer. It was fun to see Sabean and her mother and have a friend out on the course. We also became friends with another team that shared our start time - they were from an insurance company in Park City. We ended up talking to them often throughout the race as our runners were close to the same pace - until the end when Lindsay smoked their leg 7 runner and we pulled away.
We had a great time finding spots to cheer on our runner and ringing cowbells and yelling throughout the course. I am positive that nobody supported their runners on the course as much as we did... of course, the race bible told participants that the team vehicle should drive from one exchange to the next and not stop along the course. I think they let us slide since we had children out running on the course.
All of the girls did AWESOME in their runs. Brenna ran for the first time and did leg 2 of about 1.9 miles and had Lindsay accompany her so she was not alone. Kayla started the race and did legs 1 and 6. She always gets our team off to a good start and did a great job on leg 6 which is the longest leg of the relay. Jenna was super strong running up Olympic park and was so fast that I barely got to the exchange in time for the hand off. She ran the entire leg and passed a ton of people who had to walk up the steep mountain where they did Olympic ski jumping and sliding events. I pushed up the rest of the mountain on leg 4 and was able to beat my time from last year by 3 minutes, dropping my pace from 8:59 last year to 8:25 this year. I had a hard time breathing on my way up the mountain and was never really able to catch my breath, but was able to push through. I handed off to Aubrey who cranked through the 4.4 miles of leg 5 with a smile on her face. She did a great job and appeared to be happier than last year. Kayla was then up for her second leg and then handed off to Lindsay who ran the 4.85 mile leg 7. Lindsay started a little behind one of our friends from the insurance company and ended up passing him and beating him by about a minute. At the exchange, he said that trying to keep up with Lindsay (which he said he could not do) made him run the leg 5 minutes faster than he would have run it on his own. Then it was Jenna's turn again to hit the road. Unfortunately, leg 8 and 9 don't go on or by roads much so we were not able to see her while she was running. She pushed through her 5+ miles and handed to me for the second to last leg. I really struggled with leg 9 last year, including tripping and rolling down a hill on the trail. This year I felt much better and was able to really push myself to go hard. In the end I cut 10 minutes off my time from last year cutting my 6 mile pace from 9:47 to 8:16 per mile. It was a beautiful trail run, but there were a lot of hills and I can't remember the last time I pushed myself to go so hard even when I was tired. I handed off to Emily who ran the file 3 miles and we joined her for the last 20 yards so we could finish as a family.
All in, we completed the 41 mile course in 6 hours and 15 minutes, an improvement of nearly 40 minutes over last year. Even better than our race time, we really enjoyed ourselves as a family. I don't think we wildly cheer each other on enough and this races gives us that opportunity. I am so proud of the girls and how awesome they did and excited to start thinking about what our theme will be next year.
Wednesday, May 16, 2012
Sunday, May 13, 2012
2012-05-12
Another long Saturday. It feels like most Saturday's of late have been of this variety as oppossed to the kicking back and relaxing variety.
I started the day by getting Jenna and Kayla ready and taking them over to the start of their Goldilocks bike ride. They ended up going an impressive 50 miles. I took my bike as well and went for a ride after they started. I rode out to Bachus highway and then home for a total of about 20 miles and then immediately went for a 4.5 mile run. It has been a couple years since I have done a bike/run brick and I could feel it. My legs were very weak and it felt like I was going super slow. Fortunately, the weather was beautful and it was nice to be out.
As I was walking 20 yards back to the house to cool off, I looked at my phone and I had a text from Jenna that her and Kayla were about two miles away... and the text was five minutes old. I quickly ran into the house and grabbed the camera and jumped into the car and was able to get some photos of them as they rode their bikes right behind our house. It was fun to drive next to them as they rode.
From here is where the not so fun began. I proceeded to go to Lowes and two different sprinkler supply stores to find a replacement pump for our irrigation system. I finally went to Home Depot and found something that would work and was about 1/3rd the price of the sprinkler store. There was a lot of cuting PVC pipe and glueing and wiring and what not, but I only had to go back to Home Depot one time to get more supplies. I will have to wait to test it out until tomorrow as the glue needs time to set up. I sure hope everything works right. It feels like we have been putting a ton of time into the yard this year and I want it to look good.
I started the day by getting Jenna and Kayla ready and taking them over to the start of their Goldilocks bike ride. They ended up going an impressive 50 miles. I took my bike as well and went for a ride after they started. I rode out to Bachus highway and then home for a total of about 20 miles and then immediately went for a 4.5 mile run. It has been a couple years since I have done a bike/run brick and I could feel it. My legs were very weak and it felt like I was going super slow. Fortunately, the weather was beautful and it was nice to be out.
As I was walking 20 yards back to the house to cool off, I looked at my phone and I had a text from Jenna that her and Kayla were about two miles away... and the text was five minutes old. I quickly ran into the house and grabbed the camera and jumped into the car and was able to get some photos of them as they rode their bikes right behind our house. It was fun to drive next to them as they rode.
From here is where the not so fun began. I proceeded to go to Lowes and two different sprinkler supply stores to find a replacement pump for our irrigation system. I finally went to Home Depot and found something that would work and was about 1/3rd the price of the sprinkler store. There was a lot of cuting PVC pipe and glueing and wiring and what not, but I only had to go back to Home Depot one time to get more supplies. I will have to wait to test it out until tomorrow as the glue needs time to set up. I sure hope everything works right. It feels like we have been putting a ton of time into the yard this year and I want it to look good.
Sunday, May 6, 2012
2012-05-06
During priesthood meeting today I participated in Ben Young's ordination to the office of a teacher. One of the biggest blessings of serving in the bishopric is being a part of major family events like this. During the ordination, I felt very grateful for the Young family, and others like them that are raising strong, faithful young men. As the girls get older, I find myself worrying about the quality of men that they end up marrying. I am glad to know so many families that live the gospel and work hard to raise their sons in the right way.
During sacrament meeting, Jenna and the girls were laughing at me and sent me a text telling me to wake up. I don't think I feel asleep, but maybe I looked like I was sleeping. I was very tired, so I might have fallen asleep without realizing it. More than anything, it was nice to be able to look out and see them smiling and happy. Maybe I need to act like I am sleeping every week. It made me feel good to see them all smile.
Since I have to leave for NY tomorrow morning, we held family home evening tonight. Lindsay gave a good lesson about keeping the Sabbath day holy. It made me grateful for Aubrey and her strength and the example she is setting for her sisters. I know that one day their strength will be an asset for her. Our combined activity/treat was to do fire pit. It was nice to see the backyard looking so good while we were back there. In preparation for the night, Jenna and I ran to the grocery store last night and got chocolate and starburst and graham crackers and the huge marshmallows (which evidently don't work too great for smores). The girls had a good time roasting marshmallows and just being together. Aubrey wore goggles because the smoke was bothering her. It was a good night.
During sacrament meeting, Jenna and the girls were laughing at me and sent me a text telling me to wake up. I don't think I feel asleep, but maybe I looked like I was sleeping. I was very tired, so I might have fallen asleep without realizing it. More than anything, it was nice to be able to look out and see them smiling and happy. Maybe I need to act like I am sleeping every week. It made me feel good to see them all smile.
Since I have to leave for NY tomorrow morning, we held family home evening tonight. Lindsay gave a good lesson about keeping the Sabbath day holy. It made me grateful for Aubrey and her strength and the example she is setting for her sisters. I know that one day their strength will be an asset for her. Our combined activity/treat was to do fire pit. It was nice to see the backyard looking so good while we were back there. In preparation for the night, Jenna and I ran to the grocery store last night and got chocolate and starburst and graham crackers and the huge marshmallows (which evidently don't work too great for smores). The girls had a good time roasting marshmallows and just being together. Aubrey wore goggles because the smoke was bothering her. It was a good night.
Saturday, May 5, 2012
2012-05-05
It is amazing how much you can cram into a day when you start early and don't take any breaks. Today was one of those days.
The day started with me waking up early to finish writing the bishopric message for May. The message was about using kind and uplifting words. I read the idea of transcribing all the words you speak and binding them in a business book and felt like it was really powerful. I used it to create an FHE a couple months ago and we had a good discussion. The girls made little books and wrote down what they wanted their words to be - things like funny, encouraging, happy, motivational, awesome, etc.
The day started with me waking up early to finish writing the bishopric message for May. The message was about using kind and uplifting words. I read the idea of transcribing all the words you speak and binding them in a business book and felt like it was really powerful. I used it to create an FHE a couple months ago and we had a good discussion. The girls made little books and wrote down what they wanted their words to be - things like funny, encouraging, happy, motivational, awesome, etc.
Thursday, May 3, 2012
Tuesday, May 1, 2012
Queen Nerd
Aubrey gave her speech tonight as part of the National Junior Honor Society induction ceremony.
Thursday, April 26, 2012
Tuesday, April 24, 2012
Bad Day at Work
After nearly two months of waiting, today was the day where we finally notified people at work that their jobs were being eliminated.
Monday, April 23, 2012
Friday, April 20, 2012
Crazy Day
Worked busily until 11:45, then ran to the school to meet with the assistant principal and cheer coach, then off to the airport to fly to Arizona.
Thursday, April 19, 2012
Aubrey Stands Strong
Aubrey met with the school administration first, and then with the cheer coach to tell them that she was not willing to compete on Sunday.
Monday, April 16, 2012
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