I MADE IT!

I'm in Woodsfield, Ohio! It has taken me 21 months to run from Mission Viejo to Woodsfield... 2028.5 miles!

Here is a satellite view of the little town of Woodsfield. My best friend whom I never met, Mary, lives here. HI MARY!!!

My next stop in my around the world tour is going to be an even smaller town, Potters Hill, North Carolina. This is where Jim's brother and his family live. The town spans one crossroad on the highway. If you blink as you are going by, you could miss it, LOL!

Hi Don and Carol! I'm on my way!

Happy National Run at Work Day - Friday 5

Today I'm going to share my celebration of National Run at Work Day. So, what did I do? I ran at work! Here are some photos of my lunch time run. I'm so fortunate to have a nice offroad trail behind my building... plus locker rooms with showers!

I start by running behind the building and down the stairs to the park.

There is another flight of stairs at the far end of the park that goes under the street.

From there I hook up with the trail to Whiting Ranch. It's a pretty off-road trail.

Here is the killer hill that I have to run up on my way back... FULL SUN, LONG, STEEP... KILLER!

Unfortunately, it has to end back at work.

That was my National Run at Work Day. Thanks for coming with me!

Weekly Sports Report

Hey, look at the ticker!!! Mary, I'll be there in time for dinner on Tuesday, hehehe!

Cheryl's college team won 1-0 in their first season game. This week they are playing their rival, Santiago. Santiago came in first place last season; Saddleback came in 6th. It's going to be a tough game... Oh, the player bios are up on the Saddleback site. Checkout Cheryl, HERE.

Saturday was a busy sports day. Chris did okay at his first meet of the cross country season. Capistrano Valley has the #1 Junior team in Orange County. Five of the Junior runners at his school are fast enough to run Varisity. He came in 8th with a decent time (it was around 18.50), but he was bummed at his posting. He went running with me on Sunday because he wants to impove... his goal is to be 6th (that will make him the top junior runner behind the varsity).

The Quakes played at UCI in their first season game and won 10-0!!! Cheryl said the little girls played GREAT! She was so proud of them!

Saturday night was Galaxy against (last place) Dallas. If Galaxy won that game they would be in first place in the league! They lost 6-3! Galaxy played terrible! Cheryl said that it's been a long time since she's seen 19 goals in a single day, LOL!

TGI Friday-5

Labor day weekend... the last weekend of summer! Where are we going to spend it? AT THE BEACH! We went jet-skiing for an hour. Everyone drove but me. I HATE those things! When I turn I want it to TURN... not think about it, maybe it'll turn... soon I hope... it'll get around to it... maybe now, hmmm... maybe not...


Chris and I had a nice run down at the beach. Look at my little guy... not so little anymore. When did that happen?!!!


Nothing like doing nothing... Here's Jim and the kids playing video games and unwinding from a busy busy day.

I wanted to get a back to school picture of Chris, but I was told, "no way!" He starts school at 6:45am. I'm so glad he's a morning person, or we'd have some nasty morning battles.

I hope everyone had a great week back at school!

Friday-5

Welcome September! Wow, this year is flying by! Checkout the ticker at the top of the screen. I've almost made it all the way to Woodsfield, Ohio!... and it's only taken me 9 months longer than I thought it would. Slow and steady wins the race... not that I've ever won a race... Mary, watch for me! I'll be there in only a couple more weeks, hehehe...

This week I started a new digital class called "Me: The Abridged Version." As part of the class I took the VIA Survey of Character Strengths from University of Pennsylvania's, Authentic Happiness website. Here are my top-5 character strengths:

Industry, diligence, and perseverance
You work hard to finish what you start. No matter the project, you "get it out the door" in timely fashion.

Judgment, critical thinking, and open-mindedness
Thinking things through and examining them from all sides are important aspects of who you are.

Curiosity and interest in the world
You are curious about everything. You like exploration and discovery.

Self-control and self-regulation
You self-consciously regulate what you feel and what you do. You are a disciplined person.

Honesty, authenticity, and genuineness
You are an honest person, not only by speaking the truth but by living your life in a genuine and authentic way.

Cheryl said that if she saw these character traits on a bio at eHarmony, she'd give that person a pass. Well... even to me I sound boring. Maybe I am boring?! I think I'll have to work on that!

Weekly Sports Report

A sports report with no photos? Yep! It's a bummer being stuck at work while everyone else is playing.

Jim had almost every Monday and Friday off during the entire summer. He's been surfing, A LOT! Sometimes Chris goes with him, sometimes he's running with his cross country friends. Oh wait! I do have a photo! Here's Chris running through the forest at XC camp in Big Bear.

Poor Cheryl... she is on soccer overload. She had college soccer training M-F, she had two college scrimmages last week (they lost both), the Quakes had practice two evenings, and she had four games this weekend with the Quakes(they lost 2, won 2). She said that she needs a day off. Cheryl has another busy soccer week... practice with the Quakes, training at college, and a BIG college tournament in Santa Clarita next weekend.

On another soccer note: GALAXY WON on an amazing shot from this guy! Galaxy is in 2nd place in the western conference. It looks like they will finally make it to the play-offs!

The new blog look

They say white is the new black... what to you think?

I like the clean look. I still have a few more tweaks to make before I'm totally happy, but I really like it so far.

TGIF!!!

What a week! Jim and Chris were gone, the van broke down, and work is crazy! I had to run/walk home from work one day because Cheryl was at work and couldn't pick me up. Welcome weekend!!!

No time to put together a Friday-5 this week, but I do have a share. We are painting the house... FINALLY!!! Right now the house is all one shade of gray. I want to go brown to match the roof, but the association we live in regulates the colors we can use. We have about 15 shades of beige to chose from and they are arranged in sets of three (dark, medium, light). Here are the medium and light from two different sets; one set painted beside each window. We plan on using the dark from the set to paint the front door. Which set do you like?

An adventure with fabric flowers

I joined a challenge at Color Me Daisy where we had to make a card with handmade fabric flowers. I started over the top with this flower:



This flower ended up HUGE! I couldn't see using it on a card.

So, here is TAKE-II. I cut these cute little flowers with my die cutter. I gathered them with a running stitch around the cut center circle and finished them off with a brad.


Doesn't it make a cute card? Is it a challenge winner? I hope so! {grin}

Brush Abilities - Day 9

Let's start with some RACE RESULTS!

First Chris: Chris came in second in his age group with a NEW PR of 19:31! He came in 28th overall out of 619 runners.

I also finished second in my age group with a NEW PR of 23:28!! I was the 18th woman across the finish line! There aren't any photos of Chris this race, but there is a nice one of me.

Chris thinks it's embarrassing to have a photo of an old fat guy wearing a fanny pack passing me... but I'm pretty sure I was passing him... hehehe...


Today in the PSE class, we started with a scanned leaf and turned it into a brush. VERY COOL! Here is the leaf brush stamped in different colors.

Brush Abilities - Day 6, 7, 8

I've been keeping up with my class and working on my homework faithfully every day! Day 6 was test day... I got 100%, hehehe...
The project that I'm sharing today took two lessons to complete. Day 7, we created the tag and inked the edges. Day 9, we added the stitching.

Here is my project a little inked and stitched tag! I didn't even have to thread my sewing machine!