Trading My Clappy Shoes for Running Shoes

My friend Shanna and I who stayed together pretty much the whole time. . .she came in a tad bit ahead of me and she knows I let her beat me! ;)

Me feeling sassy after the race.

Today, I ran my second 5K. It was invigorating. I had a lot of friends running it too which was just really fun. You get to high-five each other afterward and you know that you experienced difficulty together which to me is like super-glue to friendships.

My favorite part about the race is the fact that my kids and husband were there to watch me. My kids were cheering me on (even though I did not come in first. . . .by any stretch of the imagination). They got to see mom working hard each week on a goal and got to see me complete my goal. That to me alone is worth it.

My kids are learning from me. They're not just learning how to spell or how to multiply, but they are learning from me a life skill. . .that sometimes even when things are challenging if we persevere we will finish the race. Not always finishing the race first, but we will win the prize of completing what is set before us! I don't know about you but just finishing something around here deserves a gold medal!

For my husband seeing me work hard at something for me is so important too. Taking care of me is not always something I am good at (even though I do make sure that I am thoroughly shopped for most of the time :)) I often do not take care of my body like I should. This is something that I am working on with the help of my family and my Creator. My body is a temple of the Holy Spirit and I really want to honor my Lord with my body. So, I have taken up signing up for races as a hobby to spur me on. My husband gets to see the results too which I think is encouraging to him.

So this is more than just fun, which bottom line, it is fun to have people cheering you on and getting to litter with water cups in the streets without getting a ticket. Running is about teaching my kids life's lessons, letting my hubs know that I care about my body and it is about honoring my Lord.

Getting Stressed Trying to De-stress

I have had this gimpy neck for like three days and I am in major pain. I guess not surgery pain, but the drama queen in me is coming out. I have not wanted to exercise or do anything that might make it worse. I worked out on Tuesday morning and right after that I got a crick in my neck. I tried to continue with life, but it was just not happening.

My sweet hubby got talked into a gift certificate for a massage by two awesome ladies who dropped the hint on Valentine's Day that he should get me something. Thank you ladies! Anyway, I decided to use my gift certificate for a 30 minute massage.

I thought I knew which salon the masseuse worked at then realized after about 5 minutes of standing in the salon where I thought she worked that I was at the wrong place. So I showed up 10 minutes late to my massage all stressed out thinking that I might miss my one opportunity of getting this gimpy neck to stop hurting. She was very gracious, after I called my husband in a very peeved way (because it was all his fault you know. . . poor guy) and asked him to call the salon and tell them that I was running late.

She started to work on my neck, back and everything else and I immediately relaxed. After the massage was over I thanked her, talked to her for about an hour and a half afterwards and left thinking I needed another massage to de-stress. I woke up this morning with my neck hurting worse than ever! Agh.

I promise to post about more encouraging times another day! "Momma told me there would be days like this."

Works for Me Wednesday - Cheap Soil

I posted on this last year, but it was kind of after the season was over. At my local Wal Mart, you can get bags of soil, rocks, mulch and many other things that have holes in them for 50% off. There is a place that they put all of the busted bags outside of my Wal Mart so all I do is drive by every few days to see what they have. Oftentimes, too much has leaked out and it does not make it worth it to buy them, but most of the time they just have a hole and cannot sell them. Last year we got a bunch of Miracle Grow bags of soil that really made our vegetable garden awesome.

I checked with Home Depot and they do not do this. They send theirs back to the supplier and are compensated for the broken bags. Happy Soil Hunting!

Make sure to check out other Works for Me Wednesday posts on my favorite-check-it-every- day-blog, Rocks in My Dryer.

Monday Menu

Monday - tonight we had teriyaki chicken legs from an awesome Year of Crockpotting meals blog; I'm telling you girls that if you do not have your crockpot out once a week you are doing a disservice to yourself!!! We had Minute Rice and green beans sweetened with splenda with a touch of butter
Tuesday - Gretel had an Asian open-house last week. I have really been into Asian food lately (this is really strange to someone who is a meat and potato kind of girl), but I have a friend who is from Malaysia who fixed spring rolls and I am going to call him for the recipe. What he made before is very similar I believe to this spring roll recipe. Not sure what I am going to make with them, probably some form of chicken stir fry.
Wednesday - Pancakes, bacon and oranges
Thursday- baked beans and Bratwurst on the grill - great idea 3 Blondes and the Law
Friday - Pepperoni Bread from Kids Meal Crowd Blog
Saturday - running a 5K; Yay! Should be fun. . .I better fix myself something yummy to reward myself, right! :) Perhaps, Chicken Parmesan with a salad. . .that sounds good right now!!
Sunday- Last week we had tostadas with refried beans and taco meat with salad fixins. It was perfect. I just need to make sure to defrost my hamburger meat ahead of time so I can fix it quickly.

Update from last week's Menu.

• The Pulled Chicken Sandwiches were "Gag Me With a Fork!!!" I discovered I hate, abhor and strongly dislike the taste of cheez whiz.

• The steak night was superb and it was because of the great company we had! Yay for friends! Thanks for not looking too closely at the inside of my house. You guys are best!

This last week a friend sent me a comparable coupon site to The Grocery Game called CouponMom.com. It is free and awesome.