Sad Times...

I got one of those phone calls today...a phone call that comes from a family member and delivers a message of bad news. News that is unexpected and just leaves me feeling somewhat sad. I don't want to go through all the details but it just reminds me of the brevity of life. Tomorrow is not guaranteed to us and our days are numbered. Ultimately GOD is the midst of the situation and regardless of the outcome, we will continue to have faith and pray for healing.

Finally Friday....

I woke up today to skies that are darkening and it looks like we will actually get some rain/storms today. It hasn't rained this whole week so I am sure that we could use some rain. I just hope that the sun is shining tomorrow so I can get in some pool time :)
This week has been busy with work stuff as the family returns late tomorrow night. So I've been plenty busy getting everything in order for their return. I can't believe they have been gone a month already. It seemed to fly by for sure. I also have seemed to have made it through my first week of "training" for the next half marathon. It's going to be a long next 11 weeks that's for sure but I will say that it feels good to be getting back into the runs. Call me crazy, but there is something that is relaxing/stress-relieving about running to me.
Don't have much planned for this weekend. I have been helping out at Pottery Barn Kids again because they are short two managers so I closed the store on Monday night and I am closing it again tonight and potentially one night next week. I don't mind but I am so glad that I am not in retail full time. Ick! Then some friends are having a get together tonight so I might head their after work at PBK just depends on how I feel. It's quite taxing to work all day and then head straight to another job and be on your feet for 4+ hours. Anywho....

Video Fun

So I have to give a shout out to my friend, Ruthann for giving me great instructions to finally get my videos posted on my blog.
Both videos were taken while on vacatinon with my family in Destin. The first one showcases my sister Amy and her musical abilities:


The second video Amy took while we were waiting for our table at Pompano Joe's...just killing time playing on the beach:

Tired Tuesday

Whew....perhaps it's because I have been going non-stop since returning from my vacation last week or the fact that I worked all day yesterday (and I do mean all day). Either way, I knew that when I had snoozed my alarm for well over 30 minutes today, that it was going to be a long day.
The family that I work for has been out of the country since July 2nd and you would think with them being away that I would have all of these free time, yet that has hardly been the case. I have spent the majority of my time planning an event for August 11th. And while that is all fine and dandy, I don't feel like I've been as productive as I had to hoped to and getting their database updated. I mean, I even took my computer with me on my family vacation and did some work from FL. They come home on Saturday and I'm just a little disappointed that I haven't got more done :( Perhaps after I get a good nights sleep tonight, my perspective will be more positive.
Anyways, despite being tired today it's the first week of my next Half Marathon training program. I am going to run the Evansville Half Marathon again this year with my dad. It will be on Sunday, October 12th and hopefully this year it will not be 90 degrees outside when we run. So yesterday kicked off my 12 weeks of training! I am also excited because I found out that a friend of mine from back home is going to be running this as well and this will be her first Half Marathon. She is also doing the training runs (5k in Aug. and 10k in Sept.) so this means I will get to see her the next three months in a row! Fun times for sure.

Canoe Trip on the Harpeth

Today our singles group from church ventured out for a day of fun on the Harpeth River. We rented canoes and took about a 4 hour tour down the river. I met up with Patrick in Bellevue and we rode together as others were meeting up in Franklin and that was out of our way. I am so great that I had a good canoe partner and even though I supplied the camera, Patrick snapped all the photos.

Patrick, Me and Stan (Don't I look a little nervous?)

The boys

Patrick and I in our canoe

We stopped for lunch by this creek that emptied into the river and the river rocks were so cool that I wanted to try to capture them via photo. Not the best picture. Our group during our lunch break Patrick, Me, Jennifer and James
The best canoe partner ever!
This picture doesn't quite capture the beauty of this cliff we came across while canoeing.
The infamous rope swing...it's not everyday that you get to be Tarzan and Jane!

Ocean Adventures

Another sunny day was in store for us on Wednesday. We all got up and decided to grab breakfast at my fave place to go in Destin, The Donut Hole. It was yummy as always! We took our time getting back to the condo and getting ready for another day at the beach. We rented a sea kayak today and took turns going out in the water. I admit that I got a little nervous as we were paddling out in the ocean. With no view of land, I felt a little overwhelmed just paddling out to the great wide open and also the thought of knowing that there wasn't much that separated me from the creatures that live in the ocean. Nevertheless, Amy was a great partner to paddle with and we had a good time. It's also a great workout. Here's a couple pics:




Since Wednesday was my last day at the beach, I moved from the beach to the pool where Holly and Elaysha had been swimming. I was out till almost 5pm that day and got a good dose of sun. Mom cooked a family dinner that night and we sat down as a family to eat. We then ventured out to do some go kart racing and then came back in to watch a movie and have dessert. It was a good ending to another good family vacation.

Girl's Night Out

So we woke up again to blue, sunny skies on Monday morning and I actually ventured out for a little jog with my dad before hitting the beach for the day. Monday also happened to be my parents 36th wedding anniversary so we declared a girl's night out! We walked down the road to eat a late dinner at Pompano Joe's. Of course anyone who has traveled to Destin knows that if you don't show up to an eatery before 6pm you are going to be waiting a while to eat. Our wait time was almost two hours. EEK! So we decided to walk down to the beach and beach bar and kill some time. We enjoyed some delicious fruity drinks and played with Elaysha on the beach. Elaysha and I had a jumping contest (notice the fun action shots below) and we actually only had to wait about an hour and a half. We enjoyed delicious seafood and I needed the nice walk back after eating so much food.

First Day on the Beach

We woke up to skies of sunshine on Sunday morning which meant one thing...beach time! To me there is nothing more relaxing than sitting on the beach, soaking up some sunshine and reading a good book. It got hot pretty quickly and after an hour or so I retreated to the pool. We got about 3 hours of sunshine before the thunderstorms rolled in around 2pm.

A friend of Holly's was actually getting married in Ft. Walton Beach so her and Elaysha attended the wedding on Sunday night. So myself, Amy and the parentals decided to try a new seafood restaurant called Captain Dave's . Amy and I split Surf & Turf and it was delicious. After dinner we rented some movies, picked up some dessert from The Donut Hole and came back to the condo and played the game "Last Word". Family Fun Times!!!

No sunshine today...

So after sleeping in this morning and waking up to mostly cloudy skies, Amy and I took our time in driving over to Destin. We stopped by a friends house in Pensacola to say hi and then Amy took me to one of her favorite places to eat and hang called Beef O'Bradys. We then made our way through rain shower after rain shower and got into Destin around 3pm. My parents, Holly and Elaysha drove down from IN today and arrived in around 4pm. Amy, Elaysha, dad and myself took a little stroll on the beach in between the showers.




I volunteered to go with my mom to Walmart to get the weeks groceries....I now know why no one else wanted to go....it was a zoo! I have never seen that many people with that many carts full of groceries. It was insane and i think it took us about an hour to just get through the check out line. Never again! Anyways we got everything situated in the condo, picked up dinner and just hung out tonight. The weather forecast for this week looks mostly rainy but I pray that we get to see some sunshine! We shall see.

On the road again....

Well I am on the road once again...this time I am heading south for our annual family vacay. It was a much busier week than I had anticipated despite the family being out of the country and it seemed like everything came down the pipe on Thursday but such is life. I worked super late on Thursday night and had a full day on friday before I hit the road around 2:30pm. I used my travel time wisely and was able to catch up with some friends on the tele that is until I hit this major bad storm just north of Montgomery, AL. I can't even remember the last time I had to drive in such bad weather...it was super scary! I took this picture from my car when I thought I was through the storm. You can see the very distinctive storm clouds and those clouds seemed a bit ominous to me.
Anyways...it did downpour once more before eventually clearing up. And when I saw the sunshine to my right and dark clouds to my left I saw in the midst the biggest rainbow I have seen in quite some time. Had to take a picture of that as well (you can almost see the double rainbow)
I pulled into my sister's house in Pensacola a little after 9 pm and was glad to be out of the car. We made a quick run to Starbucks with our friend Shane and then we enjoyed an hour or so playing on the Wii. Amy had rented this game called "Big Brain Academy" and it was much fun. We played in teams and I have to brag that Shane and I smoked Amy and Erin. We beat them 6 matches in a row! After they had enough of that, we all did some Wii bowling and then it was bed time. A great start to some vacation time for me!

5k's, Fireworks and Family, Oh my....

We had a family reunion of sorts planned for the Fourth of July Holiday weekend back in Indiana. All of my mom's side of the family were back in Evansville for the long weekend which meant lots of family fun (aka organized chaos). Fourth of July morning started off with a bang as my dad and I drove to the small town of Sebree, KY and participated in their 5k Firecracker Run. I haven't been running more than one day a week (not good) but was able to finish with a time of 31:02 and my dad ran with a time in the 27 min range...he has always been a good runner! My dad said that we should hang around since they were doing random drawings for cash prizes in increments of $25, $50, $75 and $100. Good thing we did because they drew my name out of the hat for the grand prize of $100. YIPPEE! We both wore our race shirts for the rest of the day family festivities.

We got back home around 11:30 to find out that we had about 30 minutes to get ready before heading out to my Uncle Jeff and Aunt Tammy's home for the family day o' fun. We got cleaned up and headed out to the country. Their home is like my second home and I love that it's so quiet out where they live. We had quite the spread for lunch and a pool to keep all the kids busy. Some of my cousins and 2nd cousins literally swam all day long. Me, well I preferred to watch baseball, take a nap (thanks to Amy for snapping the picture), eating dessert and watching more baseball. We also had some family game time outside with water balloon tosses and a washer tournament. Here's some pics:

Swimming Cousins

A beautiful action shot of my mom playing washers
Nap time

Grandma and Me enjoying the porch swing

The family crowd enjoying the fireworks

It's been so nice to have all the family in for the weekend and I have enjoyed getting to spend time with my cousin Michelle. We are only three months apart (she is older, HA) and really grew up more like sisters than cousins. I love being able to spend time with her and her family.

A short hiatus...

Wow...I cannot believe that it's already been like almost 2 weeks since I've been able to blog. Obviously things have been so crazy busy with work that I haven't had much time to stop and blog. So let me see if I can bring you all up to speed.

The past two weeks have been spent helping prepare for the Ayers Foundation Scholars Banquet. This was the 9th annual event that they host each year to celebrate the students that will be attending college in the fall. Here is a link to the article that The Jackson Sun wrote up about the evening. I thought the event was a huge success and it really brought back memories of all the events I used to work with at Focus on the Family. I just felt totally in my element working this event. The Governor's staff that I worked with that night (The Governor of Tennessee was our key note speaker) also paid me a great compliment to my boss, which totally affirmed all the hard work that I had put into the event. The family is constantly on the go which obviously keeps me on the go but I really am so blessed to have this new job and I absolutely love what I do!

So I am looking forward to the long weekend for the 4th of July. I will be heading back to Evansville to spend the holiday with my family. Actually, the entire family including cousins and their families are coming to Evansville. It will be a really special time to be with all our family and spend quality time with our grandparents (especially since my grandfather's health continues to deteriorate). I think it's been four years since we all got together so even though it will be chaotic at times, it should be fun. I am also doing a 5k with my dad on the 4th of July morning so that will be fun too! Just looking forward to being with my family and I am sure to have pictures to post throughout my visit.