Lost in the landscaping

I logged on to blog  this morning and discovered it has been a month since I last wrote. *hanging head in shame* All I can say is that I have been overcome by a busy life. Not a moment to spare for a random thought to float through my mind, much less to snatch on to it and direct it through my fingers. And yet, I may be worn out, but I am coming through to the other side.

Let's go back a month...

Eric and I spent his spring break working on our backyard landscaping. We had ambitious plans for the week and pushed ourselves to the limit to get almost all of it done.  Starting Saturday, we woke up, got the kids dressed and fed, and then basically spent the rest of the day until dinner hard at work.

In the end we cut out almost a quarter acre of sod, moved some, hauled the rest away in 3 very full trailer loads and then unloaded them. Talk about sore! We tackled the unusable, weedy dog run and made it clean and useable.  Eric moved or capped around 8 sprinkler heads. We replaced sod in the flooded part of the yard.  We marked area for our patio extension.  We ordered and received 5 trucks of mulch, 1 truck of gravel and 1 truck of playground chips. Spread all of that lovely ground cover.  And, in the last 2 weekends we built the kids play structure.  We've gotten bids and scheduled work for the patio extension and concrete curbing. We've priced trees for our landscaping.

Some pics...

Before....

During...

 

After...

I will admit that during our work, there were many times that we concluded we were really insane to take on such a big project on our own.  Two thoughts kept me going:

Number One, the logical rationale: We are doing these improvements on a tight budget and the more work we do ourselves, the further we can stretch our money when making these changes.  I kept saying, "We could be paying someone $30/hr. to be doing this for us." True, after loading 2 trailers full of sod and seeing we had another load left, the following thought was, "$30/hr really isn't that unreasonable!" But, we pressed on and our reward is that we actually have some money left for some trees and flowers!

Number Two, the illogical, but more fun, rationale: As I was chucking sod on to the trailer, I was reminded of multiple challenges on The Amazing Race that essentially involve "finding a needle in a haystack" and how some of those tasks apparently go on for hours and hours. I decided to think of the sod carrying and throwing as a task from The Amazing Race. "If I load all of these sod rolls before the other team, I will get to the mat first and hear Phil say, 'Amanda and Eric, you are the first team to arrive! You have won ONE MILLION DOLLARS!'" Looking back now, I was clearly insane from exhaustion. But, at the time, it was the quirky motivation I needed to press on. 

However we got through it, a majority of our backyard work is now complete.  It has been really nice the past few days to be able to go out there in the sun and really take pleasure in the yard we created.

The Final Frontier

Our backyard... the final frontier. A land of infinite possibility. Limited only by... our meager budget!

One of the things we loved about our house when we looked at it last spring was how big the backyard is. A big, flat rectangle with almost no landscaping to personalize it, unless you count weeds!

We've spent our first 9 months here talking about all the possibilities for our backyard. We have a fairly large playstructure in boxes in the garage, waiting to be built.  Otherwise, we have done very little with the yard to this point.

All that changes in the next few days! Plans are being made. We are going to be expanding the landscaped edges of the yard, putting down mulch, maybe adding a few plants and trees.  Eric's mom, landscape designer extraordinaire has drawn us a few plans to look at as an end goal. It will take time for us to get there. But I am really excited that we are at least starting!!

Today the kids and I hit Walmart, Home Depot and a local nursery to price out some of the items we are going to need for our big backyard project.  By the end of the week, we should have an estimate for concrete edging for the borders. (Who knows if we can afford it? We like what it looks like and more than half of the homes in our neighborhood have it, so it would put us "on level" with the rest of the yards around us.)

Here is a sneak peak of our two plans/options. 

So excited, and ready to do some hard work!

5 Secrets of Mom-hood

1. Guilt is as accurate as a thermometer for diagnosing illness.

I'm actually talking about myself here, not my kids. They aren't old enough for that yet. Someday...

I don't get sick very often, and when I do it is usually just run of the mill bugs - cold, sinus infection, allergies. As a stay at home mom, there is no "time out" button, or "day off" option. This has allowed me to develop a very discriminating system for determing whether I consider myself "sick" or not. Guilt. If I am sick, but have the energy to feel guilty about all of the everyday things I am not doing (playing with the kids, housework, cooking), I am not officially sick. When I stop caring about that stuff, then I get to wear pajamas all day and make Eric cook!

2. Birthdays for small children are about parents more than kids.

I will never forget my daughter's first birthday. What a momentous occasion! Her first bite of cake. Her first "party".  She had no idea what was going on, of course. Frankly , I think the idea of a party for a 1 year old seems silly. But we had the party and I learned secret number 2. It was all for me! All of those cheering people and friends gathering around thought they were applauding my daughter on her big day. Nope! I was off in the kitchen getting more paper plates and soaking in the positive vibes. I survived my first year as a mom! (And, at that point I was close to 5 months pregnant with my son, so that was with extra emphasis on survived)  Every birthday party I have attended since my daughter's has brought this memory to mind and I always take time to say a little prayer for Little One's mom. Thank you that she survived the year too! If I've attended a birthday party for your child, know that I was there thinking of you!  Do other moms feel this way? Not sure. No one else has ever really talked to me about this. But I definitely feel like that first birthday welcomes moms into a new club... we are surviviors of our children!

3. Moms are always fabulous!
My daughter taught me this one.  Whenever I ask her how I look, no matter if I'm wearing pajamas, workout clothes or a party dress, she always describes me in glowing terms.  Her mommy is always "beautiful", "a princess", "fabulous", "fancy" and/or "very gorgeous".  She must only see the best parts of what is inside me!

4. Moms don't have secrets.
Bought a latte at the grocery store this morning? My coffee-disapproving husband is sure to hear about it when he gets home from work.  Not that I ask the kids to keep secrets from anyone. We don't even discuss such things and I would never ask them to do something like that. But one would think that they might forget some insignificant details of our day, like that I got a caramel latte at the store. But, no. Hours later, something conspires against me and suddenly my kids are ordering "caramel lattes" from each other in the play kitchen. Or telling Daddy about how they got to have ice cream on the way to softball practice. They can't remember what they did today, but they can remember that my coffee was "iced" or that I accidentally said "dang it" when I stubbed my toe.

5. What a limited understanding of "love" we have!

My mind cannot comprehend all of the different kinds of love I have experienced in my life. Loving your parents, loving your sibling, loving a pet, loving friends, being "in love" as a teenager, romantic love, the love you share with your husband or wife... (my husband might add "loving your car", but I don't really get that one!)  None of it prepares us for the love we feel for our kids. No books or advice from other moms can describe it either.  How fully I love my daughter! And when I was pregnant with our son, I worried about how my heart would have room for him. And then, he was here and there was a full heart of love for him too! That love gave me a much greater appreciation for my own parents, as I can only now hope to understand how they love me. And thinking about that makes me think about God. How great is His love for us beyond even this? Uncomprehensibly great! Fullness beyond fullness.

But because of his great love for us, God, who is rich in mercy, made us alive with Christ even when we were dead in transgressions--it is by grace you have been saved (Ephesians 2:4-5).

St Patrick's Day 5K

My first 5K was last Saturday.  I had my IPod with my playlist all set up and talked with Eric and some friends before the race. That helped keep me calm.  I was really worried about going out too fast and I think my concern about it balanced the pull of the pack of runners and I ended up right around the speed I had been running while training.  The hardest part about this race for me: I do well running outside when I look ahead a block or more. But when you're running in the middle of a pack in a race, looking ahead that distance all you see is... more runners. So that was a difficulty. And then when I realized that was throwing me off a little, I admit it, I did start to panic.  The middle part of the course turns on to a paved trail that was pretty narrow (maybe 3 people could fit across it if they were careful) and that got a little chaotic as I reached that part still in a pack and not soon after started encountering the super fast sprinter runners returning from the out-and-back. Apparently, those speedy gentlemen have not all learned the rules about staying to the right, because there was a lot of zig zagging and avoiding going on.  But as we got about a mile in, the large group I was with started thinning out and then it wasn't as congested.

I ended up finishing in 32:56 -- about a 10:30/mile.  The funny (or embarassing, depending on how competitive I'm feeling at the time) thing about that pace is I ended up running with 2 distinct groups of people. About 1/2 were people like me: plugging along slow and steady, not in peak running condition but not huffing and puffing. The other 1/2 were men and women who were like I USED to be: I'd be going along and out of no where some random person would sprint past me from behind. Then about a minute later, I'd pass them as they are walking off to the side. A few minutes later... same person would sprint past again! A minute later, walking on the side. There were actually quite a few people working this "tactic". I tried to give the benefit of the doubt -- maybe these people are doing Couch to 5K and they are only on week 2 or something? Eric says, "No, those are people who don't know how to run." He finished 44th overall, so I believe him. (I finished 111th out of 285 women overall, 45th out of 102 in my age group -- not that bad for my first time! AND, I finished before the winner of the 10K, so that's a little encouraging, I think.)

So, I made it through the whole race without walking or throwing up. I was cold for the rest of the day. But, I woke up the next morning with only minimal soreness. Looking for a race in May or early June now. Thinking about trying to head down to Bend the first weekend in June for the Heaven Can Wait 5K that supports breast cancer research.  Get my run on in Drake Park!

Mornings with my girl

I really enjoy mornings with my big girl, L.  She will be four years old in a few months. L is a strange combination of "morning person" and "slow to wake up".  She is regularly awake by 6:30am and would come bounding out of her room, if not for her "light up clock".  But then once she is up, she's usually very mellow and snuggly. She doesn't like to eat much in the morning, takes forever to get dressed, and lays around on the floor near her mommy or daddy.

Because Little Man sleeps in (at least compared to L), we have a little bit of time each morning where it is just Mommy and Big Girl.  We have a nice routine going. It is one of my favorite parts of the day - also, coincidentally one of the quieter and more calm parts of the day.

Usually by the time her light up clock releases her into the world at 7am, I am getting dressed in the bedroom.  L likes to climb into the big bed and get under the covers, or sometimes just follow me around the room.  Typically there is some kind of "embarassing if it were out in the real world" comment about the color of my underwear, whether my pants fit, etc.  Then once I am dressed, I say, "How do I look?"  Before she can answer, it is very important that I stand back across the room from her so she can look me up and down. 

This morning I dressed for our softball practice this afternoon. I said, "How do I look? Do I look like a coach?" Her answer: "You look like...a coach. And... very fancy. And... Beautiful."

Then it's her turn to get dressed.  It doesn't matter how tired she has been up to this point, she always gets very worked up when it comes to getting dressed, especially if it's a school day! I sit on the bed and watch her spin around the room like a whirling dervish as I repeat over and over again, "Take off your jammies, please. Take off your jammies, please. Take off your jammies, please." Most days she chooses her own clothes. Her fashion sense is uniquely toddler. She has very firm ideas about what matches and what clothes need to be paired together, and apparently I didn't get the memo about the guidelines in this area. Today I tried to pick her outfit and was scolded for "not matching", and then she proceeded to choose the socks that were least likely to fall into the matching category.

Perhaps she doesn't know what "matching" is? In any case, she likes it. Outfit is almost always completed with "lighting shoes".

As she gets dressed, L shares with me whatever thoughts run through her head.  It is during this time of the day that she seems like a little girl and I inevitably start thinking about the years to come and talks in the bedroom and the period of time where I won't even be allowed in to her bedroom, much less expect her to talk to me about her thoughts. Aaah... Today she told me about a dream she had - there was a kitty and I was there ("Were you really there?") and then she "thought about" her teacher.  We talked about her best friend and the book her YaYa got her at the school book sale.  We talked about the bruise on her face from where she fell off the bleachers at school last night.   We talked about going to Bible study this morning and playing with her friends there. 

Today when she stood back for her "how do I look" moment, she said, "Tell me the same thing I told you." So I told her she looked like a coach, and very fancy, and beautiful. She was happy to hear it.

And, the final step of the morning, going downstairs to get her "blend" out of the refrigerator. Her daddy leaves her a small cup with his leftover smoothie each morning, and it is a highlight of her day.

5K Playlist

If my husband can run in an Elvis costume, I can run with my IPod!

I've been running to a Couch to 5K podcast and the music seems to help me a lot. So last night I endeavored to create a playlist for my first 5K, which is on Saturday. I probably made it more complicated than I needed to. I tried to keep the beat of the songs relatively similar, which led to the dismissal of some songs that I really like. But I have found the songs that meet my criteria: songs I enjoy, appropriate beat, and songs that I think will distract me, if necessary. I'm sure that more than one person will hear me singing outloud while I'm racing Saturday. Hopefully I won't bother anyone!

I aimed for about 35 minutes of running songs, since my goal is to finish in 35 or less. Then the last song is my cool down song.  It always reminds me to breathe, think about my accomplishments and thank God for what He's provided for me.

Without further ado, my 5K playlist...

"Shut Up & Let Me Go" - The Ting Tings

"Billie Jean" - Michael Jackson

"Ready to Go" - Republica

"Tambourine" - Eve (I could only find a sample of the explicit version, but I have the clean version on my playlist)

"Local God" - Everclear

"Single Ladies (Put a Ring on It)" - Beyonce

"Grace Kelly" - Mika

"Dead Man (Carry Me)" - Jars of Clay

"Hit Me With Your Best Shot" - Pat Benetar

"Live Like We're Dying" - Kris Allen

Cool Down (hopefully!): "Born Again" - Third Day


What do you think?

Hustling

Running, running and running...




This week is my official first week of spring. Newness abounds!

We've been blessed with about a week and a half of beautiful spring weather - high 50's, low 60's and SUNNY! Aaahh... I've been working in our backyard, prepping the ground for the building of the new, gigantic play structure. Planning out some landscaping changes (waiting on Eric's mom for help!).  Last week I was thinking, "I really need to start thinking about how to make a raised bed vegetable planter" and what do you know? The next day in the paper there was an article about how to make a raised bed vegetable planter! One of the many things on my plate.

Saturday is my first real 5K.  "Real" meaning my first 5K that I actually plan to run in it's entirity. I have to admit that 8 weeks ago or so when I started training to do this, I didn't really think I could. And now I am 5 days away from greatness! In 2 weeks I've gone from running 1.7 miles outside with a pretty strong side cramp at the end to running just short of 3 miles with no side cramp at all! I have confidence. And I love the sense of disbelief that I have had every single time when I have checked my mileage (either with my car or on this site my friend Hailey told me about: Map My Run). I check mileage AFTER I have run and every time I make myself double check for accuracy because it doesn't seem possible that I actually ran that far! And, more importantly, I ran that far without passing out, puking, major side or knee pain. I am actually enjoying this! Hooray! I've been keeping track of my runs at Log Your Run because I'm a "keeping track" kind of person.

Also today... first day of softball practice! Yep, I've committed myself to 8 weeks of after school practices and games.  Thankfully a school mom is going to help me with the kids so that is a big stress taken care of (thank you, Pam!) - not having to worry about teaching middle school girls to pitch AND make sure my kids aren't running around in the street or throwing themselves off the school playground.

Getting ready for these first practices, looking through equipment, etc. has remined me of "the good old days" of playing softball, of pretty much living softball.  The song above was one of the songs I used to listen to pre-game in college before pitching warmups.  It still keys me up to this day. Sad. I guess I've become "mom who relives the glory days by coaching". The strangest thing about reminiscing about old softball stories, victories and defeats, friendships and all the rest is that I didn't meet my husband until after I graduated from college and finished playing softball.  He has never seen "Softball Amanda", though I'm sure at this point the hardcore, competitive softball fiend version of myself wouldn't surprise him.  I am hoping that this will be the first step in developing some competitive, softball loving, hardcore middle school girls! (Maybe not quite as competitive or hardcore as I was at this age. I might get fired if they do some of the things I did!)

This will be an interesting experience for me, to be sure.  The girls are in middle school, but many have never played organized softball before. Lots of chances to teach fundamentals.  Lots of chances to use the word "hustle". I was thinking it might be fun to pick a practice at random and say "hustle" as many times as I can and see if anyone says anything. You know, keep things exciting for myself!

I went past the field around lunchtime and found that it has been torn apart by the grounds crew. Practice plan, scrapped. I won't know until I get there in an hour or so what, if any, of the field will be in usable condition. Welcome to the first practice, ladies! Here's a big mound of dirt!

A couple of pictures from my college softball days.  I have tons more, but don't know how to work our scanner!

That's me, batting!

Post game, me and my catcher, Lori. We're showing off matching knee bruises. Hard to see here, but I've actually got stitching marks from the ball on my right knee.