Run, Forrest, Run…

(for those who don’t know me that well – I am in the pink and green – bib #216 on the left.)

(Kyle there in the green/blue!)

Whew…just got done with a great race tonight! Our little town of Zeeland hosted the 1st Annual Zeeland Zoom race. Kyle and I entered the race since we’ve been on a running kick lately. I finished the race in 28:08 and Kyle finished it in 20:50. Both our personal records! It was a great flat, fast, and fun course! There is something fun about races. I have never been a runner and still don’t really consider myself a runner, but these races give me something to aspire to, a goal to work towards! I knew I wanted to beat my Riverbank Run time and I did, so I was happy! I think I did push myself a little too much because I don’t feel very good at all right now. Hopefully a good nights sleep will help! It was so fun to see so many people we knew too! It’s amazing to me that I hated running 4 months ago when my girlfriend Beth talked me into training, and now I almost like it (I said almost!). If you think you could never do it – think again! If I can, you can! I don’t consider myself athletic at all – only played sports up until middle school – never in high school. So next year for the Zeeland Zoom I hope to see even more of you!

My garden is really coming along!!! I came home yesterday after work and went to check the garden and my sugar snap peas had come! I was literally grinning from ear to ear and almost jumping up and down! Funny what planting a garden and tending to it can do for a soul! Kind of a God moment when I think about the fact that I planted a seed and they grew and produce food – pretty amazing that He gave us these things!

We got to get out on the boat this past weekend – went up to Saugatuck for the night. It was a beautiful night and we had a great time! Makes me really question whether we should sell it! :) I guess it can’t hurt to just keep it listed and see if anything comes of it. At least we can still enjoy it until it does sell!

Oh, and I am a nerd and took a picture of the FREE stuff I got on my shopping trip last week! I get real excited about free stuff – still loving my couponing/deal searching!

10 free Sobe Lifewaters

2 free milks

4 free Bestlife Butters

Free Suave Conditioner (for hubby or kids)

2 free Nivea Lip balms

and then the misc. free travel size things!

OK – I am off to catch some Zzzzz’s! Hoping I feel better in the morning! Night!

MandaKay

SUMMER!

I can’t believe I have gone this long without updating my blog! I guess I don’t feel like I have anything real great to write about. Often I will think in my head…”Oh, I should blog about this”…and then I forget or just haven’t had time. I am enjoying my summer though! It is nice to not have the deadlines of school and preschool. Driving to and from preschool two times a week during the school year for the last 3 year years is starting to get old and I have 3 more years of preschool running yet! I still have been driving the kids around a bunch here and there, but at least it’s not quite as structured as preschool stuff. This week we have swimming lessons during the day, VBS at night, and still working and juggling all of that! I think I’ve just come to terms with the fact that i will never just be able to sit home all day for even one day. Just when I think I will be able to stay home for a whole day without having to run somewhere, something comes up! And I am a homebody so it’s kind of tough on me! I married a non-homebody though, so even if I make it a whole day my husband then gets us to go somewhere at night! Gotta love him though!

So what is new with our family…hmmmm. I’ll just do a quick update for family or anyone else interested.

Kyle

Kyle is staying pretty steady at work – not super super busy, but fairly consistent at least and we are so thankful for that! He is such a hard worker and he is so on top of things around the house. So often I tell him that I am not sure what I would do without him! He loves to have our yard looking good, provides a nice home for me and maintains it well – I really can’t take credit for any of that! He has gotten up north twice now with a friend this spring/summer to do some fishing and he loves that!

Amanda

It’s always kind of hard to write a paragraph about yourself. I am down to 15 hrs. a week at work – hoping I can keep it at at least that! I am doing 3 5 hr. days, so I have a little extra time in the morning and get home a bit earlier in the afternoon and that is nice and makes it easier to make dinner and get a good start on our evenings! I have been enjoying baking more and more – love my new kitchen-aid mixer! Because I have been baking more I have been running more! ;) I am starting to somewhat enjoy running, which I thought would NEVER happen! When I first started running in March I HATED it! My legs hurt, I couldn’t run for more than a minute at a time, etc…, but I am just getting to the point that I can somewhat enjoy it! I will say though that running in the heat is not all that fun! Kyle and I are running in a local race next week, so we are training for that right now! I still love to do Jillian’s 30 Day Shred video too – I just haven’t been doing it every day. I of course still enjoy digital scrapbooking, although it seems I have a little less time for that in the summer! Garden is growing great – I don’t have anything to reap yet, but it should be soon! I can’t wait for fresh beans and tomatoes! (as I end this paragraph I think it’s funny because at first I thought it’s the hardest to write about my updates, and yet it’s the longest paragraph. Guess I know the most about myself)

Braelyn

Braelyn is officially a 1st grader! I can’t believe that I will have a child in school full time! Her t-ball season has pretty much wrapped up. I think she liked it overall. She had a bit of an issue with getting tagged out – it crushed her and made her not want to play anymore, but this past game we told her how to hit the ball more towards third base instead of 1st and then to run faster and she made it on base (actually got to home base) all three innings! She was happy about that! She is going to try gymnastics this summer and then soccer in the fall, so we just want to introduce her to sports and see what she might like!

Selah

Selah has graduated three-school and is now going into preschool! She asked today when she goes back to school! She has been doing gymnastics and tonight she had a team meet where they got to show all of the things they learned to family and friends! She did great and was a little crowd pleaser! Selah can be my little back talker, which we are trying to curb that behavior. She also just cut her own hair last week. She cut herself some bangs (which I am adamantly against for my girls for some reason!), and I didn’t notice it until we were at a church gathering, so I couldn’t really discipline right there. We did have a talk with her about it later though.

Gracyn

Our little Gracyn is 2 1/2 now and she is not signed up for anything. Poor girl! Someday it will be her turn for all the fun activities, but right now she just has to watch and wait! She’s really pretty good about it all though! We still do not have Gracyn potty trained. She really has no interest yet, and I am not really pushing it. I know it’s odd, but for some reason I don’t think I’m quite ready for it yet. Weird huh? Maybe because she is my last, and that will just mean we won’t have a “baby” anymore. It will be great though for the first time in 6+ years to not have to buy diapers! We have had a child (sometimes 2) in diapers for over 6 years now – which is crazy! I can’t imagine how the Dugger mom feels – she probably has bought diapers for 25+ years straight! Anyway – I got off on a tangent there! So Gracyn is growing and doing great – lots of fun with her!

There you have it – a quick (or not so quick) update on our little family!

And now for some recent LO’s:

Phew…can tell I haven’t posted in a while! OK – I’m off to bed – hopefully I can blog a little sooner next time! Hope everyone is having a great summer so far!

Fun in the Sun!

Well, we are narrowing down on our Florida vacation, and we have had a lot of fun in the sun this past week! Lots of good family time without the stresses of work, schedules, school, etc… It was quite an experience taking the girls on their first plane rides! We got lots of looks from people as we hauled our 3 young girls, 3 carseats, and 5 carry-ons thru the G.R., Atlanta, and Tampa airports! The girls did great though and behaved perfectly on the planes! We are hoping they do the same on the way home tomorrow! I have snuck a few moments here and there to work on a few layouts, so I will share those now – some of them were done the weeks before we left, but just now remembering to post them.

So, what do you have planned this Memorial Day weekend?! I am sure we will have a few family get togethers, maybe just maybe get the boat out for the first time, and of course do some unpacking and settling back in at home! And Braelyn and Selah are both in the Memorial Day parade. And last but not least we will remember and honor those who have fought for our freedom here in the USA.

God Bless America.

MandaKay

Heavy Picture post!

It’s about time for a picture heavy post! Seems like forever since I have just done an “everyday life” post. We are a little over a week into May, and May for our family means BUSY! It’s the last month of school, it’s garden planting time, it’s spring cleaning, garage sales, its just plain busy! Lots of fun stuff going on! We started May off with something totally new to Kyle and I! We both ran in the 5th/3rd Riverbank 5k Race. On March 13 I could barely do my training of 1 min. run/1 min. walk for 20 minutes. I now this past weekend finished a 3.1 mile race in 30 min. 19 sec. no walking! The whole experience has been so awesome. I hate running, and would have told you 2 months ago that I think runners are NUTS! I still think many of them are (especially the 25k + runners!). I will say I get it a little more now! The 5th /3rd Riverbank Race (25k at least) is the largest in the US – so many people come from all over the world to run the race. 22,000 participants this year between the multiple races they held! On race morning we got downtown Grand Rapids around 6:45am. We already had picked up our race gear the night before, so we just had to wait until we could line up behind the start line. We were supposed to be able to hop into your pace group. Beth and I were going to hop into the 10/mile pace group, and the guys were going to hop into like the 8 or 9/mile pace group I believe. Problem was, by the time we came out of the DeVos building (where we were trying to stay WARM), we could not get up past the 11/mile pace group. By the time the start horn blew we just walked up to the start line (where the chip starts clocking your time), and then had to slow to a walk once right after that too. :( There were 5,000+ people starting all at the same time, so it was MAJOR congestion! My chip time and clock time were 2 minutes off and that was all because of how far back we were in the start and how slow the start was because of all of the people. Basically throughout the whole race we were dodging and cutting around people – it was not a race that I could just get in a good steady pace and stay there, but it was so fun to see all of the people running downtown GR! Just a sea of people! Nothing beats sprinting to the finish line with people cheering and clapping! I really wanted to have beat 30 minutes, but I didn’t quite do it. I think with a little bit better weather, a little flatter course (I never trained on hills and there were two pretty significant ones on the course), and a few less people to have to run around, I would have been under my 30 min. goal. Next time! Kyle however did it in 24:52 – without much training. Crazy guy! Anyway – definitely an experience I will never forget and I am already looking into a few more 5k’s this summer!

This coming weekend is another packed weekend. Sat. morning we have a big Community Impact Day with our church where we send a bunch of groups into the community to work and help different families and organizations! We missed out on it last year, but we are excited to be a part of it this year! After that we are heading to a Detroit Tigers game!!!

And then the end of this month we are heading to Florida with our little family! This trip is thru Kyle’s work and we are so blessed to have this vacation! The girls are excited because we will be flying – a new experience for them! I’m a little nervous of course of all the logistics of flying with 3 little kiddos!

So, that’s the recap of our life lately! The girls are great and they have been loving the spring/warmer weather and playing outside – it’s so nice to be able to send them out to burn some energy! Kyle’s work has been steady, another thing we are thankful for in this economy, and my work has been stressful, but okay. I am truly looking forward to summer and not having to bring kids here or there on my days off! I am finding it very difficult to juggle the house work, work 3 days a week, getting in quality kiddo time, and all the various things that need to be done, but I press on!

And without further ado…here are photos of our recent festivities!

Braelyn’s first t-ball game! She likes it so far!

Tulip Time 2010 – our 3 little dutch girls – thru and thru!

Race bibs/chip/etc…

The race group! Me, Kyle, Jeff, and Beth! Post race

Mother’s day 2010. Selah (4), Me, Gracyn (2), & Braelyn (5 – almost 6) – I had so many cute outakes from this little photo shoot – can’t wait to do a LO with all of them!

My parents came tonight to help us plant the seed part of our garden – they are great garden mentors! I cannot wait to reap what we sowed!!! Green Beans, yellow beans, peas, and carrots! We have yet to plant the plants (tomatos, peppers, cucumbers, etc…) because of the chance of frost yet. The girls had even helped drop the seeds – can never start that involvement too early!

They even got to ride with Dad in this fun loader!

And I just can’t bare to leave out Gauge – he is also loving the fact that he can be outside more and dig up grubs and what not! ;)

Have a GREAT week everyone!

MandaKay

Happy iNSD Weekend (early!)

So we are starting the interNational Scrapbook Day weekend a little early! Isn't that great?! I am so looking forward to the fun stuff going on digitally this weekend! I am even going to get some extra "guilt free" scrapping time this weekend! I can't wait!

Some of you have "hopped" on over here from Lisa's blog - following the Lilypad Blog Hop! If that's the case, WELCOME! After you grab my quickpage you will be hopping on over to Laura's blog for your next gorgeous quickpage! And if you did not start the blog hop yet, then you may want to start it on the first stop, Amy Martin's blog, and then follow from there! I believe there are about 23 QP's that you can grab!!!

So, without further ado...here is the quickpage that I created with my own LO with it to follow!

Download the QuickPage HERE or HERE

Thanks for stopping in and I hope you enjoy the quickpage, and the rest of the hop!

All things Digi

So, I just wanted to hop in quick and tell you to tune in this weekend at TLP! And also to my blog and many other gals' blogs! Super cute quickpages being given away!!!

And I just got an email from Persnickety Prints that they are having a sale on their printing on Mon. and Tue.!!! $1.49 for 12 x 12's, and .74 for 8 x 8! Those are GREAT prices and I have heard GREAT things about them! This deal will come in handy after you scrap all of your great pages that you get done during this iNSD interNational Scrapbook Day) weekend! Here is their ad!

ALL PRINTSMONDAY & TUESDAY ONLY!
MAY 3rd & MAY 4th
12x12 Prints ONLY $1.49!
8x8 Prints 74¢!
25% off all Prints!
coupon code: NSD2010
{please allow an extra 2-3 days for processing during this sale}

And finally, keep your eye out for some new Shabby Miss Jenn goodies and sales this weekend too!!!

A look ahead!

{i}NSD (inter National Scrapbook Day) is coming up next weekend and we have some big stuff going on at The-Lilypad!!! We are preparing even as I write this! Sales, a phenomenal BYOC (Build your Own Collab), and another blog hop - even bigger and better than the last! Hopefully you can find some time to check things out!

Here is a LO - way behind at doing my Project 365 LO's, but I am still taking the daily pics and putting them in a forum at TLP, so at least I can reference the weeks and slowly do the LO's! Looks like I am a month behind. :(

Some answers to some questions a few gals had from my "saving addiction" post. 1st question was "where do I get my coupons"? Well we get the weekend edition of our local paper, so some come from there (and sometimes i steal the coupons from my parents and in-laws b/c *gasp* they don't use them! The other place I get them from is online. There are SOOOOO many coupons for great product available online. And the great thing about the sites that I linked to in that post is that they link you right up to the coupons to print them. So I go thru the Meijer list on SavingAddiction.com and she pretty much tells you what to get and what coupons to take! Easy Peasy! I will add that I am fortunate enough to print some of these at work during down time, so that is somewhat helpful! So I hope that answers your first question! 2nd question was "how much time do you spend couponing"? That is fairly tough to answer b/c it varies per week. But doing the method I just described maybe takes 1/2 hr. The Sunday paper clippings take 2 min. The blog checking for deals - well I probably spend too much time, but it can go quick to check these blogs, so not too much I guess. Is it worth it to me? Heck yes. When I saw a grocery bill start at $135 and go down to $65 I was about jumping up and down! Now last week was not quite that good b/c I had $50 worth of general merchandise (rollerblades that were on sale for the girls!), so my savings wasn't as good, but if I took out that I think I saved $43 with coupons, pop can returns, and in ad deals. Hope some of that info helped. For me it is something that I actually enjoy doing! We made a trip to Birch Run for a some much needed clothes shopping and I used a coupon at almost every store! I really felt like we got a ton of stuff for the amount that we spent! The funny thing is - we even had a coupon for dinner (Red Lobster)!

Follow up on Swagbucks (I noticed a few of you joined!!!) The best things I have done so far is to install the toolbar and the plug-ins. I will randomly get swagbucks just for having these things. I also have the swidget on my blog sidebar that I will randomly check to see if there is a swagcode out for bonus points. And the special offers are an instant way to earn bucks too - just go here and click thru the offers - skipping/saying no, until the end - usually only 5 clicks or so - takes just seconds! I know these types of things aren't for everyone, but I usually earn swagbucks everyday with very little effort. And like I had mentioned previously you can earn more if you shop online by clicking thru their store list - you still buy thru the stores you might normally use, it's just that you get to that store by clicking on it thru Swagbucks. Anyway - I am on well on my way to another Amazon $5 gift card which is fun! Amazon always has such great deals and most the time free shipping!

And in latest news...Braelyn likes T-ball. She had her first practice last night, and I was a little nervous about it b/c she was not excited and didn't really want to do it, but she went out and did her best, which for a Kindergartner, was not bad! It will be fun to see the team progress! I know we will have to endure some very "slow" games, and yet they will be fun b/c it will be cute to see some of the things these kids do on the field!

Ok, signing off. I'm sure I will be back to bother you all later in the week/weekend!

MandaKay