What kind of food do nuclear engineers like?

Fission chips...HA! [get it?]

I felt like I had to start this post off with a good joke told by our dear friend Rachel [aka the Brill Brit].

Earlier in June, Jack and I had the pleasure of hosting our dear friends Jeremy and Kimi on their quick trip to Los Alamos. What a great time of catching up with them and chatting about life and encouraging one another. No doubt friends like them are one in a million.

While they were here we were treated graciously by the Christensens [also, one of the great families we have connected with here in Los Alamos] to an Isotopes game! The Isotopes are the minor league team in Albuquerque which is a farm league for the LA Dodgers. It was fun enjoying the game and sitting in great seats [albeit, dangerous seats as well!]. We participated in the wave, jumped and screamed for free t-shirts, sang our hearts out to "Take Me Out to the Ball Game" and cheered on the home team to a victory. All in all it was fun and relaxing!!

best buddies :)

awesome seats...watch out for foul balls though!

love this girl! both looking a little silly but that's ok, that's what you do when you're with a friend you haven't seen in ages.

Captain Kirk! YUM funnel cake. we all enjoyed a bit of that cake.

sweet mckay-kay...fun to hang out with her. sadly didn't get a pic of Greta her mom!

Half Marathon #9

So waaaay back in 2005, the year Jack and I got married, I decided I was going to train for a half marathon. I trained as well as I knew how (having never run before) and competed with my good friend Kate. It was a bit anti-climatic really because we ran in an inaugural race where it was actually a marathon relay. I started the race, running by myself, and then met Kate half way through the race to swap out our time chip and off she ran on her own. Unfortunately, it wasn't well organized for those of us just finishing the first leg and they had little water and no food for those running just finishing 13.1 miles. I was left cold (did I mention this was in December?), sore, tired, hungry and thirsty. Then I had to hop in the car and drive to the finish line to meet up with Kate when she finished. As she crossed the finish line they cheered on...Becky Brewer! Huh? I guess they missed the part where I ran the first leg and she ran the second. Oh well. It was a start. I remember thinking part way through the race, WHY did I sign up to do this?! What was I thinking? I'm never going to put my body through something like this again.

Welp...7 years later I can joyfully say that first experience did not deter me from trying again and realizing how much I actually enjoy training for and running half marathons. I have been able to run at least one half marathon every year since then and starting in 2007 I had the joy of running my first 1/2 marathon with my twin sister. We have excitedly found, planned, trained for and raced together every year since then. While we rarely actually cross the finish line together there is a delight in gearing up for and racing across the start line together.

 This past May I was able to run my 9th half marathon. I decided to change it up a bit by running a trail race. WOW. What a difference that makes. I never realized how much harder it was to trail run, and at high elevation to boot, but I definitely loved it. A nice perk was that the race was right in my home town of Los Alamos! It was a 13.5 mile rigorous and grueling course but it packed a bunch of beauty and fun along with it. We started at an elevation of 7200 feet, dropping to just below 7000' and then climbed to almost 9000'!! The up was tough but the down was a blast! Looking forward to doing this race again, possibly even next year, and seeing who else I can recruit to run with me in it! 


I'm also looking forward to running my 10th 1/2 (6th half marathon with my twin) later this year. I'm thinking we might just have to try a trail race together!

a group of us from church who ran the race!

Laura, Nate and me around mile 3!

still in really good spirits and with a lot of energy!

We finished!!

Narrator: Ruby!

Ruby decided to tell us a story of Cinderella using her "Bible" that was really "What To Expect When You're Expecting", hence some of the jokes made by the adults in the video :) She also talked about Rubella..her invisible friend. Enjoy!

May

Back in May Jack and I enjoyed an extended trip back home to North Carolina. It was a great time to hang out with family and friends, and it was nice to catch up since it had been almost a year and a half since we had stepped foot on our beloved home land :) We started off the trip with a little disc golf with Debbie and Brian at our old stomping grounds near NC State. It was fun but man my arm was sore after 18 holes (sad, I know). Then the four of us headed over to an NC State paraphernalia store to check out some new shirts so Jack and I could represent back in New Mexico. We made our purchases and it was off to find some dinner.

On Saturday morning Debbie, Brian and I headed to Umstead State Park for a little run. It was fun and yet I was surprised at how much the humidity and heat affected me! I guess living in this dry climate for over a year now has really made me a sissy when it comes to humidity! I couldn't believe how sweaty we got and how our clothes felt soaking wet. But it was fun and beautiful. It was nice to hang out with them in the morning. We ran home after that and got ready for the day. Hung out in Raleigh and then they hosted a fun dinner get together with friends and family. It was so nice to get to see my parents, sisters, Jack's parents and some great friends. We had these awesome things called Spiedies (or something like that, I don't know how it's spelled) that Brian grilled and it was delicious! Then there was some fun cornhole gaming and walks around the lake. It was relaxing, encouraging and fun!

Sunday we enjoyed fellowshiping with the body at Harvest Bible Chapel North Raleigh (now that's a mouthful) and then met up with my family again for one last lunch before my parents had to head back to Atlanta. It was sweet time together. Then Jack and I packed up and headed to Winston Salem to see J,J&K. While in W-S we had really great food cooked by Julie, got to spend time with our niece Kylee (who is a year and half) and good talks with Jon. They are gracious hosts and it was chill to hang out on their back porch watching Kylee play in her water feature and catching up. We also got in a good run together through the neighborhood and played some Dr. Mario tetris on the Wii. Good times! Unfortunately Jack was fighting off what we later found out was mold poisoning so he ended up sleeping for 13 of the 26 hrs we were there to visit in W-S but it was still a fun time all around.

Monday night Jack and I hopped back in the car to head down to Wilmington to hang out with his parents. It was beautiful there! We didn't make it in until after midnight but Jennie was still awake to welcome us in. We got up Tuesday and headed out to meet Gary for lunch. After that Jack, Jennie and I headed to the beach. I LOVE the Atlantic ocean and we had a great time hanging out. Jack and I ran out almost immediately and hopped right in, catching waves and body surfing. It was warm and we had a blast. Then we got out and the 3 of us went for a nice walk down the beach. After coming back Jack and I threw the frisbee around while Jennie soaked up the rays. Then we headed back to the house for showers and dinner and some Pinochle playing.

Wednesday the 4 of us got up and went jogging which was really fun. It was nice to be out exercising with everyone. Then we hung out and relaxed on the back porch for a while, reading books and talking then got ready later that day for a beautiful dinner at the Oceanic. It's one of my favorite restaurants in Wilmington because you get to sit right on the water, enjoy the view and eat seafood!! It was nice and we had a great time talking and catching up.

Thursday we woke up and played some cornhole then Jack and I packed up to head back to Raleigh. We spent the last 2 days in Raleigh with Debbie and Brian, played some disc golf, hung out with friends and just relaxed. It was nice. When we were flying back home on Saturday Jack and I kept reflecting on what an encouraging, relaxing and edifying trip it had been. There's always the old adage that says, "I need a vacation from my vacation" but thankfully after this vacation we both remarked that this vacation was everything we were hoping it would be and we felt refreshed and ready to be home, not tired out and needing a new vacation.

One word summary of our feelings from the trip to NC: thankful.