It's been a while

In the last couple of days I have been asked a few times why there hasnt been a new blog in so long. In every case my response was "Well I haven't done anything worth blogging about". Today as I was out Christmas shopping I realized that my statement just wasn't true. In my mind I only think it's important to blog when I have had a great race but truth is maybe it's just as important to blog when I haven't had a great race or in this case any race at all.

These two just make my world complete.

One of my favorites this year....Chase as an immigrant heading to the US


The boys in NYC


Halloween......Ultimate Warrior and AJ


Our babies....Molly and Layla


Ahhhhhhh......Mexico


Charity event for abused children

2012 ugly sweater party




Let's recap the year.
My first six months were amazing! The Olympic marathon trials, USA 1/2 champs and my first season on the track ending with the Track trials. The runner in me will tell you after that.........well I had a lot of great training and crappy racing. Seems like 2012 came in promising and left with no marathon to show. But here is the thing. I am a mom, a wife, a sister, a neice, a cousin, a friend, a school volunteer all before I get to become the runner. So while running left me frustrated, sad and alot of times angry the last six months the rest of my life hasn't.

Chase has given me many things to be proud of. My little man is an amazing football player. The whole family (ok maybe not Tripp) enjoyed watching him play on two football teams all fall. He was scoring touchdowns left and right and we had to try and fit his head in the door. In July he turned 8, yeah I am old enough to have an 8 year old......CRAZY! For Chase's birthday the whole family went to a WWE event in Denver which isn't exctly my thing, but seeing Chase and Tripp light up was well worth the headache I had later. As parents we dealt with our first travel team tryouts. Kevin and myself were a complete wreck. Luckily all of our worries were put to rest when he made the team.


Tripp, my little fire ball, is nothing like his brother also gave us a lot of joy. Tripp is my little comedian, my little trouble maker, my little brawler and mommies little boy. After dealing with t-ball last year Tripp made us put him in "real" baseball. Poor little guy was way smaller than anyone else out there, but did a great job of holding his own. Even though he is a little munchkin he insisted on also playing flag football. Well as he isn't old enough I had to stretch the truth a bit and he ended up on a team. Unlike his mom Tripp has some wheels. It was fun to watch him run up and down the field. A huge milestone this year was Tripp starting kindergarten. It was so hard to let him go, my babies aren't babies anymore!

 Every week I spend my Wednesday in school with the boys and really enjoy seeing what amazing kids they are. Which as all parents know makes me breath a little easier.....if only I could get them to act like little angels at home too!

We had a very exciting summer as Molly, our English mastiff, gave birth to 11 little pups. Sadly only 8 survived, but it was an amazing adventure for me. Luckily we found homes for every pup and even kept one for our own. Little Layla has fit nicely in to the family! And yes if you are counting....that makes 4 dogs in our house :)

Even though the marathon got canceled the whole family was still able to make the trip out to NYC. The boys absolutely loved it! Time Square, Statue of Liberty, Central park, room service, Central Park Zoo, Rockefeller and street meat ended up being the highlights.

Since I was suppose to be recovering from my best marathon we planned an adult only trip to Mexico with a lot of our friends. When things didn't go the way they were suppose to we decided that going to Mexico was still going to happen. There aren't many times I get to spend time with my friends without being the odd one. You know....I am off to bed (at 10) I have a workout tomorrow. No beer for me tonight....I have a long run. The list goes on and on. I was excited to hang out with Kevin for 6 days of nothing. We laid on the beach, went snorkling, I got on a boat for the first time, went zip lining, 4 wheeling, played some beach volleyball, pet a shark and most important just good guality time with my husband. The kids, his company and running seem to keep that from happening too often and it was nice to be able to get some time alone.

The year was capped off by our "Annual Thomas ugly sweater party".  I invited a lot of people that I have been introcuded to throughout the year as well as our go to group. The turn out was amazing. The sweaters were hilarious on both the adults as well as the kids. Our house was filled with laughter, cheer, kids, adults, dogs and good times. It was something as parents I think we all needed after the tragedy in CT the day before. Just to see the kids really enjoying themselves was a blessing. Of course I went over board and made the boys sweaters as well as my dress just to be out done by my Uncle's dog. Yes Lacy won the womens ugly sweater division.

So yeah this blog is boring. No exciting news to talk about with running. No new PR's, no new races, but I am not going to allow myself to say that nothing exciting happened in 2012. A lot of exciting life things have happened. The rest of my life roles just seemed to over shadow the runner role and honestly after the time I put in to running in the first half maybe it was time. I'll keep training away and shooting for goals but for the rest of the night.........I'm going to be a freaked out mom who hasn't wrapped the rest of the Christmas presents yet, dinner still needs to be made, dishes need to be done, house needs to be cleaned and I should probably have a beer at the table with my husband while we discuss all the funny things the kids have said in the day.