Say anything twice, just don’t yell…

It is Monday *sigh*

Friday went way too fast. We got part of the deck up. It was nice spending that time with Brian. I got a 5 miler in, fastest pace so far for me for that distance. Woo-hoo. Got a call from Jenny telling her dad that she’s suppose to come out this weekend. Hmmm, last weekend was her weekend, but she was only able to make it out on Sunday. So she wanted to spend this weekend out here. (If it was up to her she’d live with us) *sigh* there went the idea of a childless weekend.

Saturday: Got up at 6 to go to the grocery store. Wal-mart is great at 7am in the morning. No competition. Got it done within an hour. We didn’t get as much done on the deck as we had hoped. Jenny needed her friend to be picked up and then we headed to the grocery store to pick up items for their biology project (One of those “dad I gotta get this done this weekend, but it’s really not due until Thursday” *sigh*) Steven came over and needed help on his new quad. He traded his bike in (after Brian bought parts to get it running) for a quad that is in dire need of repair *sigh again* So, like I said, we didn’t get much done on the deck, but we had satisfied children.

Tori went to her grandparent’s house Saturday afternoon to spend the night (part of our childless weekend), because I was running early on Sunday morning and Brian was suppose to go quadding with some friends.

I left the house at 7 to go to the 20k race. I ran that distance in 2 hours and 14 minutes. The fastest I have run that distance, so I am happy with it. I also won 2nd place in the “Athena” category. Instead of running for an award in my age group I choose to run in the weight group. You can sign up for “Athena” if you are over 150 lbs. I am carrying 173 lbs around right now, so all is fair.

When I came home Brian was working on the deck. Turns out they didn’t go riding and he worked on the deck instead. We finished it up later on in the evening. We plan on expanding the railing around the front of the deck all the way to the steps next weekend.

So, that’s it for today. I hope everyone had a great weekend!

HEAL

Before the deck

With deck

My medal and plaque

Things are going well here. We are taking tomorrow off to start working on the deck for the addition. After this is done we will be done, done spending money like that.Brian already dug the holes for the posts last night and poured quikcrete in it (fast hardening cement). We’ll be getting the wood for the deck and hopefully it will be done by Sunday. I was going to post a pick of the before shot that I took yesterday, but I forgot my USB cord at home. *sigh*

I ran 4 miles today, none yesterday, 4 on Tuesday and 3 on Monday. I plan on running 5 tomorrow, none on Saturday and then 20k on Sunday. My left calve muscle hurts again so I’ll take it easy tomorrow.

That’s pretty much it for the upcoming weekend. I hope you guys will have a nice one.

HEAL

I picked up Micha and Brandon on Friday evening, ran 14 miles on Saturday morning, went to a Lowes (construction department store) bought wood for the addition, stained wood that will be installed as baseboard in the new room, on to my mother in law’s birthday party and then to a gathering of siblings to discuss secret things, watched some TV with Brandon and Micha, and fell into bed at 9:47pm!

On Sunday I cleaned the house (leaving 3 children alone for 4 hours can work over the house. Well, they weren’t really THAT bad, I just hadn’t had time to clean.) Before that I gave Tori a bath, made a pasta salad for lunch, created “The Wall of Fame” with Brandon, helped with making lunch, drove Micha and Brandon back up north (4 hours round trip), helped moved furniture into the new room (which from now on will be known as the ‘family room’, cleaned the living room and the computer room. Then we had dinner with Roger and Carol who, brought pizza over, and read with Tori after they left. Then Brian and I enjoyed a movie with in the family room after he tried out one of his racing games. That’s my weekend in a nutshell!

We still have work to do in the family room. We need to finish the baseboard, paint the doors leading to the deck, put up trim around the doors and windows. But all in all it is coming together nicely. I am attaching a few pictures for your viewing pleasure.

I am hoping you are having a great vacation, Angi. I am envious!

HEAL

Brandon called me last night telling me that he got his JROTC uniform and had to wear it Wednesday (today) to school. (That’s how he plans for paying for his college). He said he was going to try them on and send me a picture. Even though the promised e-mail picture has not come through yet, I did get on on my cell phone. His cell phone is not the best, so the picture didn’t turn out too well, but I think he still looks dashing (of course lol). And he looks a lot like his dad when he was young (of course).

Brian worked on the flooring some more last night. I think he can have it done tonight. We still need trim (baseboard), but we could move things in if we wanted to. I need him to run TV cable to the back of the wall, so we can move the TV and such in there. Other than the trim we still need to paint the padio door, get wood around the window frames, on the bannister, and put in the power outlets. I guess the TV won’t do us any good until that is done. The outlets are there, we just haven’t put the sockets in.

Tonight we have Jenny, but she’s got some stuff to do for her Homecoming, which is this weekend for her school. So we’ll see. I plan on cooking Spaghetti with Italian meat sauce. (the kids eat it with plain sauce or no sauce) It tastes pretty darn good and I’ll have to watch what I eat to make sure I don’t make a pig out of myself!

Oh, and I need to get Tori some winter clothes. We realized this morning that she doesn’t have a single pair of long pants that fit her. *sigh*. I need to stop feeding her Rapid Grow! So I am leaving work early (“Oh boss, I have a Dr. appointment this afternoon so I need to leave at 2, OK?”) ;)  to buy her some at Target. I also NEED to get new running shoes, which will require a trip to the running shoe store. Mine have over 360 miles on them and they are worn O-U-T! After I am done running around I need to come back to work and pick Brian up. Can’t leave him here, now can I? *evil laugh*

Ran 3 miles today at lunch. It’s almost “that time of the month” so my runs are a bit sluggish, but I managed 3 miles with a 9:39 min/mile pace. Not as fast as last weeks, but still, I am happy with anything under 10. Tomorrow I plan on running 4. I am not sure yet what I’ll run this weekend. Originally I was gonna go 15, but last Sunday’s 10 were horrible, so I am afraid to go out even further…stupid, huh?

Well, I think that’s it for now.

Oh, Angi, could you send me Papa’s work email address please? I sent him an email to his herby/AOL e-mail address, but I am not sure if he still has that. Thanks!

Mutti, check out some of the new pictures on the right…There is one in there that has all the Grandkids/Grandstepkids in it from last month.

Ok, that’s really it for now.

On Monday we still didn’t have power, so we decided to stay home. My stomach was a mess and Brian needed to tend to the generator. Later on in the day we went to Lowes to buy the rest of the flooring for the addition. They didn’t have the same boxes there, but a customer service person showed us another box saying that they are the same thing. 28 boxes later, after I schlepped the majority into the house Brian said “They are not the same”. Sure thing, the ones we had put down already have grooves in it, the ones we had bought didn’t. So, we put them back into the truck, schlepped to another Lowes and they had the ones we had previously bought.

The power had come back on by the time we got home from our first trip to Lowes. So after we got back from our second trip to Lowes I tended to house chores (amazing how many dishes can pile up!) and Brian laid the flooring down. He got about 1/2 way done. I also finished painting the basement walls. There is just one more small part that needs to be painted.

That’s about it for now. I would have blogged yesterday from home, but the tower that provides us with Internet was out of power all day.

Hope you have a great week.

HDL