Go Mama Go Mama Go Mama Go!

Vail Jingle Bell 5K Run

Today was the first time ever that I have run in a 5K run!  I am not a runner, and would prefer to walk for my exercise.  I would even prefer to walk at a steep incline on our treadmill rather than run!!  So, what got me into running in this 5K, was a couple months ago, I told Jim and the boys that they were going to get to run in this 5K at Cienega (the high school the boys go to).  Nathan is a cross country runner and knew it wouldn't be tough for him, Aaron can just run...when he wants, and Jim also is a runner.  But, not me!  Well, Nathan didn't think that was fair that they were all running in the race and not me.  So, I told Nathan that I would do it...but I would probably come in last place.  I started to try to train for it.  I figured out how many laps I needed to do around our property to equal 5K, and I also ran on our treadmill.  My first goal was to run/walk it in less than 45 minutes.  Then, after I figured out that I could run/walk it in less than 40 minutes, I was feeling pretty good.  Today, I actually had my best time, 35:06.  Now, to you runners, that's pathetically slow, but for me, it's an achievement.  I actually walked for less than 5 minutes of the entire 5K.  That's huge for me!  There is another 5K in 4 weeks.  Maybe I can get my time less than 33 minutes!!

Nathan easily "jogged" the entire way and got a time of about 23:40, much slower than his normal cross country time.  Jim isn't sure what his time was, somewhere around 26-27 minutes.  Aaron didn't run.  He had to give some blood yesterday and felt like he shouldn't run.  He was there to give us moral support, and hold keys, and take stuff to the car, and to take pictures, and whatever else we needed him to do!  :-)

Now, to explain the title of this post.  When Aaron was a baby, when he was excited about something, he would say things in a pattern such as "look Daddy look Daddy look Daddy look!" or "this Mama this Mama this Mama this!"  It was very cute! 

 And, they're off!

 Nathan, Brian, Shelbi, and Josh

 Nathan and Shelbi (they're hardly breaking a sweat!)

 Jim almost at the end.

 Go Jim Go!

 She actually made it and wasn't in last place!

Nathan with a couple of his cross country friends and Marilee Weston

Dutch Oven Cooking

For a Personal Progress goal, I need to learn a new skill or talent, I decided to learn how to better cook in a dutch oven.  I already made 2 cherry chocolate cakes!  YUM!

Nathan told me that he wants more squash and in my mind I think acorn squash.  (What Nathan really meant is summer squash.)  While looking at my dutch oven recipe books, I saw a recipe for acorn squash that sounded like it could be good and easy to make.  All it involved was peeling and cutting up the squash, then baking it in the dutch oven.  Sounds easy, right?

I decided to try it tonight; I just reseasoned my dutch oven last night so it was ready to go.  I started the coals and planned on cutting and peeling the squash while the coals were heating up.  As I attempted to try to cut the squash, I at once realized this was not going to be easy.  If you have ever tried cutting into an acorn squash, you know what I mean and it didn't happen without Jim's help (ok, he cut most of it).   The outside layer of the acorn squash is very tough! 

Later, I went online to find out more about peeling, cutting, and cooking acorn squash.  One website said,  "Using a strong chef's knife, and perhaps a rubber mallet to help cut the acorn squash in half, lengthwise, from stem to end."  Strong chef's knife is an understatement!!  I'm guessing a rubber mallet would have been helpful!  Another website:  "Acorn squash is often cooked within its shell as its ribbed shape makes peeling virtually impossible."  I needed to peel the squash; yes, it was almost virtually impossible to peel!  It seemed as though I took off half of the meat, and I still couldn't get all the peel!

We finally cut and peeled the squash (the best we could) and baked it in the dutch oven.  The final product really wasn't too bad, but we decided to give the rest to the dogs.  There were too many itty-bitty pieces of hard peel (the part right under the green peel that we didn't know that we needed to remove) to make the squash enjoyable to eat.

I told Jim about an acorn squash recipe that involves just cutting the squash in half, baking it in the oven with butter, brown sugar, and maple syrup.  Now, that sounds good!!  I'll most likely get another squash and try it out.  I'll be sure to bring in the rubber mallet for Jim since he'll be the lucky one to cut the squash in half.  As for the dutch oven adventure, maybe next week it will be a roast!

Fall Break

Nathan with a butterfly

Aaron making an amazing breakfast!

A break in the rain.

The falls.

One thing I love about being in the Vail School District is our 3 week fall break. Unfortunately, the high schools only get a 2 week break, so Aaron and Nathan get to go back to school on Monday. Fall break is the time when I try to get a few things done, i.e. doctors appointments, etc. I saw the optometrist yesterday, my mammogram is tomorrow, and I still need to make appointments to get our kittens fixed.

One thing on my fall break list is to read!! I've already read 4 books and am waiting for 2 more to come in the mail. I read books 9 and 10 of the Tennis Shoes series (by Chris Heimerdinger) and hopefully book 11 will be here in the next couple days.

Another item on my fall break list is to plant new flowers in our containers on our patio. All the previous flowers died and looked pretty bad, but I didn't want to take the dead flowers out yet, because I didn't want our kittens using the containers as a litter box and also, I wanted some pine cones to help keep the kittens out of the containers. So, finally today at Wal-Mart, they had some good flowers, which I bought. I planted in 2 of our containers and will finish the other 2 tomorrow. We went camping last weekend, and I insisted that we get pine cones, so I put the pine cones around the flowers, so hopefully, my flower containers won't become litter boxes for our kittens.

Speaking about camping. We had an amazing camping trip last weekend. We went to a place called Hell's Gate Wilderness and camped next to a creek in the pine trees. Friday, after setting up camp, we hiked up the creek to some falls. The rocks along the creek were amazing! There wasn't too much water in the creek, so there wasn't a lot of water going over the falls. It was a cool little hike. We took the road back to our campground.

On Saturday, Jim, Aaron and Nathan hiked to a place called Hell's Hole. (Jim and I hiked there over 18 years ago and ended up having an unplanned survival hike.) I was also going to hike it, but once we got there, I had a bad feeling about it, and decided not to. I wasn't feeling 100% and didn't sleep well the previous night, so I wasn't sure if I could do it, or I would really slow my family down. So, I went back to the campground to read and take a nap. When they got back, Jim said that it was probably a good thing that I didn't go. It was a tough hike. They did really well, and played in the creek at Hell's Hole for about 1 hour.

When we left, there was a 10% chance of rain. Well, while we were about to eat dinner, the sky broke loose and we received some good rain. We ate dinner in the Tahoe and never made the Cherry Chocolate Cake that we were going to make. It actually rained for quite awhile, it took a break, and started to rain again when we went to bed. We woke up to a very sunny and beautiful morning. We took our time breaking camp, drove home and arrived around 6:30. We had a great trip!

Next week, I get to try to finish my fall break list and get back into the school mode. Wish me luck! (I just added one thing to my list...try to figure out how to get the pictures in the text, not all at the top!)

Getting Started

So, how long will this blog last? I've read a few blogs lately and thought that I would give it a try. Hey, maybe even Jim will add his 2 cents, since this is suppose to be a "family" blog. Wish us luck!