Happy Halloween

Happy Halloween, I just had to share these cute pictures of Evan.  A dragon, chick and a cute little boy.

Can you believe Evan is turning three in a few months! How did he get so big!

The kids carved their pumpkins. All the seeds are left to be cleaned. I'm not sure anyone is going to do this because they are still waiting to be cleaned a day later.

I have no idea of how many kids we are getting tonight. Its also raining a little. I should know better then to get all the good candy. I had to taste test every single kind of candy.

I haven't been doing a good job of keeping up on my blog. It's not the easiest since I have to use Steve's laptop. One of these days, I'll get around to figuring out why my laptop doesn't connect to the internet any more.

On Sunday, I decided to make German Pancakes with apples. They are sooo good and fun to  make when they puff up. I made three in all. I split the first batch into two and then made one more and doubled the recipe. The first two turned out light and fluffy, and the last batch I doubled turned out thick and more custard like. We all liked both the light and custard pancakes. Goes to show you, you just can't wreck this good recipe!

 

Steve and I started off our morning with a two mile run around the lakes. It was a really nice morning to be at the lake.

 

We had the best butternut squash soup. I'll have to make this again.

 

 

Warmer then normal for October!

I don't think this counts as an Indian Summer since we really haven't gotten a hard frost just yet. We've had some light frost but not enough to kill anything off. I'm happy for all the warmer then normal temps coming our way. We might see 70*F today and Monday! I'll take it!

Wouldn't you know, right after taking this photo, I realized that I had stepped in Zoey's poop! I had leaves and poop stuck to my right shoe. How gross is that!

This is the look she gave me after I told her about her poop on my shoe.

I had to skip my morning planks and weights again today. My chest/ribs just hurt far too much. It's getting better but I'm still not pain free. I'll give it a few more days and see how I feel. I just don't want to lose my planking fitness. I've worked up to 2 minutes times, 4 sets and then side planks 1 minute times 4 sets. That's a total of 12 minutes of planking fitness that I don't want to lose. Planks are tough! They never get easier! I always feel good when I can check them off my todo list. I'm not feeling so great about all these blank spaces in my fitness book.

I made it through my long work day on Thursday and now one more to go. Friday!!! I'm working Saturday morning so I'm not celebrating too much that it's Friday. I am happy to say I have more new customers for next week. Love starting fresh and mixing up my schedule to add interest to my day.

I'm back to running. Still doing low, low miles. Just 1.55 today, which is nothing compared to the 6 miles I'd run daily. I'm still at my same pace and know I could run 6 miles right now if I chose to run more. I'm just not loving running. I hate to say that but its a real struggle just to get out there every morning. I just need to keep moving, not think too much about it and go. Soon enough, I will be cross country skiing on fresh snow. Something I enjoy far more then running at the moment. I get to bike again in the warmer temperatures. I can not wait!!!

Another Award for Celina

I'm so proud of this hard working girl. Celina is a National Honor Society French member. They had a candle ceremony for the H.S. kids last night. She has been taking French since 7th grade.

All the French students in the National Honor Society.

 Celina getting her certificate

 

All the honor students, French, Chinese, German and Spanish

Just laying on the floor for a few hours is some time just what I need

I haven't been getting up at 5am by choice lately. Some one, meaning Zoey wants to go out at that time. After getting up, I have been staying on the floor and sleeping instead of going back to bed or doing my yoga. Zoey and I both just kind of lay around for a few hours each morning. I'm still getting better from that month plus virus and as I attempted to do my daily exercises my chest really hurt when I did my plank. So what did I do.. go back to sleep right there on the floor next to Zoey.

I'll get plenty of exercises today working. It's going to be a long work day that starts soon! I figured better to rest up!

Another picture from the band concert.

Have a super Thursday!! Off to work I go....

Some Running and a band concert

Celina had her first 11th grade Wind Ensemble Gold Band concert last night. She is in the 2nd highest band and that's without ever practicing at home.  

The concert started at 7pm and lasted till 8:30pm. Celina's band was the last of 4 bands to take the stage. It was a long night of band music. She is some where in the flute section.

More running miles 3.1 to be exact. I kind of like the quick 30 minute cardio workout. It's just the right amount of time running right now. I do need to get back to doing a full hour of cardio. I'm just easing back into this running. My chest/ribs are feeling a lot better. I'm not in pain when I move any longer. It almost feels like a rib popped back into place that had moved and was causing me a lot of pain. It sounds weird but it was the big difference in how I now feel to the way I was feeling on Monday.

I have to say, Zoey provides hours of entertainment for me. Who else loves me singing, then Zoey when I do the brush-a-brush song when I'm going to brush her teeth. This puppy is almost 11 months old. How has almost a year gone by so fast. What did I ever do with out her?

In other news. (old weekend pix because I haven't taken any selfies lately). Work is going good. I have two new customer meetings tonight. I'm trying to fill up my schedule since losing two customers (one goes to Florida for the winter and the other moved to assistant living). Plus, another customer is down sizing and soon to move. I needed to work more to pay for Logan's braces, Steve's root cannel and misc expenses. It feels good to be making my goals. I just miss my Evan time since I have to work on Mondays instead of spending the day with my favorite little guy.

I have a  busy Wednesday of working and meetings, not to mention I need to get in my run. Life is good! When it's good or not so great, go for a run!

A little less Motivation

I'm slowly losing motivation. It's from a number of things. 1. My chest hurts after the month long virus of coughing. It's a lingering pain that won't go away. 2. It's getting colder in the mornings. 3. I'm back to running and not biking as much, due to the colder morning temps.

I'd sure like to say with the trees all colorful that I'd be all set to get out and run. The colors are past prime and it's looking more and more like winter is almost here every day. It's kind of depressing even though I am looking forward to cross country skiing again. I took this photo of our front maple tree in full color yesterday morning.

 

Having a dog kind of messes with my morning schedule. I sure love having her around. There is the constant attention she needs in the morning that throws off what I can or can not get done. I'm more into reading the internet off my phone or playing with Zoey then doing much yoga.

 

Since my chest hurts just to breathe, I've been taking it easy. Easy meaning I've been doing less planks (not every day), and completely skipping lifting weights. I'm already in pain just moving about, I don't want to make it worse by adding any movements that could irritate my ribs and make my recovery last longer. I'm not sure how long it's going to take for my ribs to feel better. I just know this pain is not fun at all. Its sharp and comes and goes depending on if I'm moving around. It usually hurts most just getting up from laying down or sitting on the couch. Which should make me want to run, but I feel it when I run and breathe too. It's killing my motivation. I'm not giving up, just taking it easy. This too shall pass as I have to keep reminding myself.

I have been doing a bit more baking. Made more 7 layer bars and used peanut butter chips which gave it a different flavor. I think everyone agrees that butterscotch chips are way better! I've also been making a few loaves of banana bread. I should make some pumpkin bread too. This of course does not help me lose weight or keep it off!

I've slowly been trying to sell some items that we no longer need. Logan and Celina's old bikes. The laundry cart was sold on Sunday.

 

I have been slowly getting back into running after taking the summer off with miles of biking. I am sticking with a little over 3 miles a day. Just a quick 30 minutes with a quick rest after 1.5 miles. I know that I could run more then three miles but with my chest /ribs still super sore, I'm just doing something which is better then nothing.

 

 

What else is going on at home? Just working, trying to build up more customers. Dealing with all the fall leaves on the ground, home improvements are still underway. We have yet to finish the laundry room with shelves.

 

Have a nice Tuesday.

 

 

 

 

 

The Start of College Tours

Its the start of touring colleges for Celina. We have a mini get away planned to tour a school. We did some college checking out at Winona last fall and now we have to start getting serious about what schools she plans to apply to attend.

The whole college process is exciting to do once again for one of my kids. Since I never got to live away at school in a dorm, I'm excited for Celina to have this experience. Kendra lived in an apartment so I still need to have that kid that wants to live in a dorm and experience that side of the college life. I'm excited for her future because I know she will do great things and follow in her sister's footsteps.

Bulldogs!

We headed for Duluth on Thursday afternoon. My plan was to leave ASAP, meaning the second I got home from working around noon. It would take a good two and a half hours to get to the campus for our tour at 3pm. It didn't leave us any time. Well, luck would have it, the kids weren't home. Out having lunch and making us late. I really dislike being late for anything so of course this made me mad for the first hour of our trip. I set the GPS to the campus and it showed the time at 3:20. That's 20 minutes late for our tour. Not to mention, all the tours were booked for Thursday /Friday so this was it. The whole point of going to Duluth was to tour the campus and see if Celina and her friend wanted  to go to school there. I finally got over being angry because what can you do? Traffic was super slow in one construction zone. We ended up getting there around 4pm. We got super lucky and there was one tour guy there and he was willing to take us around on our hour long tour of the school. Nice!

We completely forgot to take any photos during or after our tour. We went back Friday and took some photos and Celina purchased a Bulldog Sweatshirt.

The girls liked the school. I liked how you didn't have to go outside at all in the winter. All the buildings are connected.

Walking around the campus on Friday.

Since we started our trip off with the campus tour, we had all of Friday to hang out and do what we wanted before driving home.

We had an early dinner at Tavern on the hill. It's right across the street from the campus.

Celina wanted to see the Duluth lift bridge all lit up, so we drove through cannel park, took a photo then drove to the hotel.

 

I gave the kids $20 to spend on games while I spent $20 on some gambling machines. We all spent our money pretty quickly.

 

Friday morning we got up early, ate a big buffet at the hotel and checked out to go down the street to Jay Cook State park.

 

 

 The new swing bridge

Then we drove to get coffee in Duluth and do a little bit of shopping.

We drove over the lift bridge to go out to the sandy beach area.

We also wanted to go to Goose bury falls which was a good 45 minute drive farther north.