Committed & Creating Habits

Well, after a month of cleaning my nutritional house, I am ready to begin my training. I have signed up with a nutritionist who worked with a friend of mine who competed in the Kona Ironman last year and she has sent me the first month eating plan. I know you may be puzzled as to why I would be working with another nutritionist when I have a degree in that very field. The answer is accountability. I need to have someone else helping me to keep track and let me know when I am veering off the trail altogether. In addition, since I have never trained for a race of this magnitude I want to make sure that I am not doing myself harm by fueling improperly. This will be a good learning experience for me and I hope to be able to train others in the future.

As for the exercise aspect, I am on a slow path to increasing my endurance. Today was the first time I've run in quite a long time and am reverting back to my run/walk training to build myself up slowly and successfully. I have also begun taking a spin class at the gym to get myself in bike shape. The only part that I'm dragging my feet on is the swimming. I really hate the idea of getting into the water when its cold & then having to go outside after. However I am determined to overcome this. I will get into the pool at least once a week for the next two months to start. Feel free to check on me. The more accountability I have, the stronger my commitment will become. Happy holidays peeps!

Bring It On

Well, seeing as things are finally starting to settle for me and I seem to have found a niche here in the midwest, I have decided to train for the Kansas Half-Ironman, which will happen on 10 June, 2012. Because really, I don't have enough to do-lol.

Seriously, this has been a goal of mine for a long time, ever since my first triathlon back in 2004. This will also be a focus for the winter since the majority of my training will have to happen indoors, which will help to take my mind off of how much I don't like the winter.

How does it begin? Although my weight is not an issue (I am weighing in right now at 135), my body fat ratio is about 26% which is a fair amount higher than I would like it to be. I know some of you may be questioning why I am concerned about my body fat ratio, so let me explain. At this stage in my life, age almost 37, my metabolism is on the down slope. It will continue to slow down until I am in my 60s, when it will finally level out. I have a limited window right now to put myself in a much better position to handle that metabolism slowdown. Raise the amount of lean muscle mass I have and reduce the amount of body fat I carry. It is as simple as that. Or not. The premise is very simple but the real life application is not. In the body composition game, about 60% has to do with nutrition (the what, when, how much & why of eating), 30% has to do with exercise, and 10% has to do with genetics. Nutrition really does play that huge of a role.

Thus far I have done a fairly good job at remaining in decent shape. I've participated in 1 marathon, 9 sprint distance triathlons, and a half dozen or so 5K races. This past year has also given me the opportunity to run 2 adventure races with Scott. Those were great opportunities for us to work together and build our strength and trust in each other and we loved the challenge! Ultimately, my goal is to continue to do things that challenge my comfort zone and keep my quality of life as high as possible for as long as possible. Its my big picture.

On the nutrition front however, I have some hurdles to overcome. Having the background that I do, I still struggle with the right plan for me. I can identify in others the changes that would be most beneficial and be the support for them to make those changes and see success. In myself, its a whole different ballgame. I am very critical of what I need to do and have gravitated to an "all or nothing" approach. If I can't do everything right, then I won't do a thing. Not healthy. For instance, if I have set a goal for myself for the week of 1 small sweet treat per day and by midday I have a craving for something sweet, I eat the sweet and then chastise myself for eating it and continue to the sweets because now I have screwed up the entire day so why bother. I'm not really sure when I mastered this chastization of myself but it has become very self-sabotaging.

So in order to successfully train for the Kansas 70.3 (1.2 miles of swimming, 56 miles of biking, & 13.1 miles of running), I must retrain myself. Both body and mind. And this weekend begins that training. On Sunday I will begin a cleansing process to start retraining. I will start with a 24 hour fast from 6pm Saturday night until 6pm Sunday night. From there it will be 1 day of just vegetables, then limited fruit will be added in, followed by protein sources. Aside from vegetables, foods will be added in one at a time with notice taken to any reactions, either digestive or otherwise. Dairy and grains will be monitored with careful consideration and foods with added sugar will be eliminated. I am fairly confident that by the end of two weeks. I will have a much clearer understanding of what foods fuel me and what foods slow me down.

I tell all of this to you because I need your support. This race, and the subsequent preparation, will be very challenging for me and I anticipate some very tough days ahead. I must keep the big picture in mind, and learn to not let my mind overrule my body. Both mentally and physically I am both looking forward to the challenge and dreading it. So let the games begin.

Big Piney Trail...eventually

I have been meaning to chronicle the adventure Scott and I had in Mark Twain National Forest over Memorial Day weekend for some time now and I wasn't really sure why I was putting it off. I have been finding myself with a lack of focus and a case of procrastination more often than not these days so I decided to take some time and figure out what was going on. Turns out that I am busier now that I DON'T have afulltime job and am shooting myself into so many directions that I think I've overwhelmed my circuitry. I downloaded a little book called the Un-procrastination guide and read it in one sitting (it was only 65 pages...purposely short for those who would procrastinate reading it if it were any longer). Apparently multi-tasking isn't really such a great thing since you cannot really give true focus to any one thing. Also, I was setting some very unrealistic expectations for the things I wanted to accomplish, especially regarding the timeline I wanted to complete them in. Essentially I was setting myself up for disappointment with me, which is the worst kind. The deadlines and expectations I had were with me alone and I kept coming down on myself pretty hard when I didn't follow through. What I realize now is that I shut down because deep inside I realized that I was setting myself up for failure so why bother even starting?

So now I am adjusting. Slowly, but I can see the difference in my attitude and approach to those projects I want to finish. I choose something that I can commit to and then schedule a timeframe to work on it. I work for 15-30 minutes and then take a break for 5 minutes and so on until my timeframe is up or the project is finished. There are some things that will never be finished of course...yard work and landscaping, housework, etc, but this approach seems to be working for me. One thing at a time. The other major obstacles keeping me from being productive were all of the distractions around me. I was getting sucked into them and before I knew it an hour had passed and I hadn't done anything I set out to do. That was aggravating. So now I work on one thing and set a timer to keep myself on track. It seems to be working, seeing as

I am now finally writing the blog that I've been meaning to write for almost two months...

And now, onto The Big Piney Trail in Mark Twain Forest.

Both Scott and I love to hike and experience the outdoors, heck we spent our first date camping in Death Valley. So when the Backpacker magazine came in January describing the Big Piney we marked the page. We made the decision to tackle the 17 mile loop over the Memorial Day weekend since Scott had a 4-day and we could spend Friday packing and prepping and then hike Saturday and Sunday, leaving Monday as a rest and recoop day. I will freely admit that the Army is extremely helpful when it comes to hiking gear and Scott has also acquired some very nice gear that makes our excursions even better. Needless to say we have good stuff. But for this trip we decided to bring the dogs along...yes, both of them. We had purchased running leashes that were stretchy and also clipped around our waists so we would be able to keep our hands free. As a last minute purchase, we also bought a pack for the dogs. Just one, and the plan was to let Chloe carry it for as long as possible since we figured it would help slow her down just a hair. The pack contained two water bladders which we filled and put back. Then we put the pack onto Chloe. Being that it was the night before we were leaving and she was wearing it for the first time, we realized right away that it wasn't going to work.

Poor Chloe staggered from side to side under the 9 lbs of weight. So we took everything out and put in the only thing we could think of...the pillows. She still wasn't very happy about it...

Getting to the trailhead was an adventure in itself. It took us 5 1/2 hours of driving and then another 1/2 hour of trying to orient the map to our surroundings. What we discovered immediately upon getting out of our car was that the humidity was so high that we were sweating before we even hit the trail. In addition, as we hit the actual trail we ran into a group of trail riders on horses. This would prove to be the bane of our trip since the horses had turned an already muddy trail into soup.

As you can see in this photo of Chloe and me at the trailhead, my pack was fairly small. I carried approximately 35lbs to include dog food and water (which weighed a lot!) along with much of the rest of our food and my personal stuff (Scott carried approximately 65lbs to include our tent, and cooking gear). I thought I did a fairly good job of packing until I realized that I forgot the inserts to my hiking shoes and I chose to wear cotton socks. Not smart. Especially not smart since we would be trudging through a trail that more resembled a mud bog. As I think about it now, I am beside myself wondering why the heck I didn't stop and change into my wool socks right off the bat. Hindsight is always 20/20, isn't it...

The trail itself was pretty. All of the recent rain made the forest a thousand brilliant shades of green with little spots of color from the wildflowers scattered about. It wasn't a terribly difficult hike but after 7 miles of hiking in wet shoes I was ready to stop and set up camp. The last mile was almost all downhill with a bunch of switchbacks that Chloe was just befuddled by. She would consistently cut straight down the hill instead of turning on the switchback and just couldn't understand what she had done wrong when we pulled her back and showed her the correct route.

We finally dragged into camp around 6pm. However, much to our dismay, "camp" was actually a full campground, complete with an outhouse and many campers with cars. We were less than thrilled to know that we had just spent the afternoon hiking through muck in wet shoes with wet dogs and heavy packs only to find out that we had reached the Griswold family campground (for those of you wondering who the Griswolds are, think National Lampoon). I was infinitely jealous when I saw Scott strip off his shoes and socks and put some nice cushy flip flops on. I hadn't thought to bring mine (he would later give me his to wear-love that man!). We set up camp and Scott went off to find some firewood. Nothing was dry so no fire for us. Fortunately we brought the jetboil and in no time our one pot wonder meal was ready..... Mmmmmm! It also proved to be a perfectly good marshmallow cooker (one cannot go camping without having s'mores...that would be sacrilege!). After dinner we were so bushed that we crawled into our tent, stripped down to the bare minimum to stay cool and closed our eyes.

Unfortunately sleep would be far off. You see, although we (especially Scott) had toiled for several minutes on each dog, they were both LOADED with ticks and when we shut off the lights the ticks jumped ship from the dogs (they had their flea & tick protection) and onto us. Talk about the heebie jeebies! I felt like I was crawling...yuck! Scott picked off so many ticks that I stopped counting and as soon as he declared me tick free, I threw on my long pants and a long sleeve shirt. I was soooooo skeeved out! Then I went about picking ticks off of Scott and finally we scoured the dogs one last time. By that time we were so exhausted we couldn't fall asleep very easily (not to mention that this was Chloe's first tent experience and she did not care for the idea that the people get the mats and sleeping bags and the dogs sleep on the end).

Although our sleep was not very restful, I still felt infinitely better when I awoke in the morning.

We cooked our morning one pot wonder meal (Muesli-yum!) and of course coffee and broke camp. We decided to take a short cut that would scratch about 2 miles off our our day. The short cut would allow us to walk on a dirt road and keep us off of the muddy trail for awhile. I was overprotective of my feet (which felt surprisingly good considering they looked like golden raisins) and put on both pairs of wool socks, which helped immensely. My feet were snug as a bug in a rug (albeit a damp rug since my shoes were still wet). I was also grateful that we now had less food and water to carry, lightening the load for both Scott and me. Scott is such a great person to do outdoorsy things with because he is so even keeled. He takes everything in stride which has a calming effect on any situation. We finished packing and headed off for day two of our trek.

Day 2 was hot and muggy. We had about 8 miles back to the car and even the dogs were dragging towards the end. When we merged back onto the trail it was still messy, but much of it had dried, making the hike so much easier on all of our feet. Chloe still managed to find fun along the way, jumping into ponds, bouncing after a frog in the brush, zigzagging from one side of the trail to the other making sure she wasn't missing anything. Maggie, ever the instigator, would occasionally let out a low "WOOF" which would send Chloe into a frenzy trying to figure out what she was missing out on. Maggie would then casually walk on like nothing happened. I swear she was smiling...

Here's the old man rock that I climbed with Maggie. Aren't those background colors just marvelous!!

Scott and Chloe taking a break in one of the many times we crossed this stream...

About 2 miles before the trail's end, Chloe decided she was done. She literally plopped down on a cool rock and wasn't moving. We coaxed her up to this area off the trail and stayed for about 20 minutes until she was ready to go again. Chloe really does not like the heat. She definitely does NOT get that from my side of the family-lol

This is the waterfall that was pictured in Backpacker magazine and ultimately brought us to the hike...it looked much bigger in the photo, go figure. It was still very picturesque and Scott commented that it would make a great place for a romantic night of camping since it was so close to the trailhead. I tried to get Chloe and Maggie into the water but neither really had much interest. Chloe however was very interested in what was going on behind the waterfall...

We did not hear a peep from these two during the entire 5 1/2 hour ride home...

Scott took this photo of the butterflies that were everywhere during our trip. There was a little girl on our way out of the campground who had them landing on her. It was an angelic site, with the sun behind her, creating a halo around her body and all of theses beautiful blue butterflies landing on her. We stopped just to watch her for a few moments and enjoy the sanctity of the scene.

All in all, this was a great adventure. I truly love the challenge of pushing the limits of my comfort zone to include as many experiences as possible. And although this trip was full of challenges, I still walk away grateful for the chance to get out there, especially since I got to spend the time with the one I love the most :)

Resiliency

I feel that I have adapted very well to being part of the Army community. It really is very different than the civilian world, but in a good way. Sure, the whole reason the Army community exists is to support the soldiers who spend their careers planning, preparing for, and executing missions of war. However what the Army has really tried to instill in the families of those soldiers is a sense of resiliency towards the many transitions that we must go through. Last month I went through a training where we discussed what the aspects of resiliency were and I found them to be so relevant to both the Army community and the civilian world that I wanted to share them.

First it would be helpful to have a working definition of resilience. Webster's dictionary defines resilience as "an ability to recover from or adjust easily to misfortune or change". Due to the nature of Army life, maintaining resiliency is a constant struggle. But there are some things that help some to maintain balance and stability more than others. These same principles can apply to the civilian world. Upon reading and discussing them in my training, they seemed so obvious. However even I found areas in my own life where I could improve upon, enhancing my ability to adjust especially when out of my comfort zone.

1. Have healthy stress management and coping skills. What are your stress management tools? How to you cope with adversity? These were questions that I had not outright addressed and was surprised to find that some of the things I do just to do turn out to be good coping and stress management skills.

2. Practice good problem solving skills. If you have not done a little research or reading on this, I recommend the blog "Zen Habits". There are many postings on different aspects of problem solving which I have found to be completely worthwhile in helping me to work through issues.

3. Maintain connections with family and friends. This doesn't mean contact them only when you need to complain. Relationships are built on sharing the good and the bad. Make time to share the good so that your friends and family don't feel like you are complaining all of the time. I cherish my friends and family and appreciate the value that each of you have in my life.

4. Talk about your situation with someone trusted. Again this doesn't mean just venting. Use your trusted friends as a sounding board for your problem solving. They can help. I will admit that often times I have difficulty sharing my issues with anyone because I believe that it will appear to be a sign of weakness on my part and I have often tried to give the impression that I can handle anything. As I have gotten older (oh my goodness, did I really just write that?) I am finding that I have less to prove and more to gain by exposing some of my vulnerability.

5. Seek professional help when necessary. There is absolutely no shame in asking for help. I have been to therapy. Many people in my life have needed help in various ways during their life. Strength is knowing when you need help and asking for it. None of us are islands.

6. See yourself as a survivor, not a victim. I have a difficult time with this when dealing with some of my friends and have been harsh at times to them, for which I am sorry. But I truly believe that we each make choices in life and those choices dictate the path we are on. Own your choices and be a survivor.

7. Help others. One of the things I have seen in people around me, including in the Army, is that people tend to see themselves alone in their situation. No one can possibly understand what they are going through. By helping others one can remove themselves from their bubble for a time and see that even though the circumstances might not be exactly the same, tragedy and adversity does not discriminate and people can band together to provide strength and support during difficult times.

8. Finding positive meaning in the situation. I am a glass half full girl. I always have been. Everything happens for a reason, even if you cannot comprehend it right now. The old adage "when one door closes another opens" is as true as they come, just look for the open door (or maybe its just unlocked but not open yet)

I hope that you will find personal meaning in these skills and can identify your areas of strength and weakness to help build your own resiliency. I know that this training has opened my eyes to areas that I can improve upon and grow (I always want to be growing, just not horizontally-lol)...love and light to all of you :)

Smithville 8 Hr Adventure Race

If you would have told me a few short years ago that I would be married to a man who would be my teammate for an 8 hour adventure race, I would have laughed at you. The fact of the matter is that I am definitely a "take charge"kind of girl who does not necessarily work well with others in a competitive situation where I have to rely on someone else to complete my task. Having said that, I am happy to report that I believe I have found the perfect teammate. Scott and Isuccessfully completed the Smithville race in 7hrs and 20min, covering just under 37 miles of terrain, and placing 5th out of 22 two person co-ed teams. Not so bad...

I am amazed daily at our ability to work together. The ease at which Scott & I co-exist is something I never expected to find in a relationship at all, let alone right from the start. However 7 months into our marriage and we have such a wonderfully unchoreographed balance of our yin and yang that we have yet to fight about anything. I'm sure that our previous experiences and age (from which I understand brings wisdom) have helped us to accept each other as we are and love the person in front of us, as well accepting ourselves, all parts included. I suppose it doesn't hurt that we have so many things in common and are great at communicating our needs.

The reason I write all of this is to help you, my peeps, understand why this race was so important to me. It wasn't perfect by all any stretch. I am a slow runner, Scott is a slow biker, and we did get a little off track due to our rusty compass and map skills. However in the end we finished with smiles on our faces and the desire to tackle another race, possibly even longer than this one. And that I believe, is a true testament to the strength of our friendship and our ability to work through whatever challenge presents itself to us.

Here are some photos from the race:

Over 250 people participated and

the teams were di

vided into the following categories:

~2 men teams

~4 men teams

~2 women teams

~4 women teams

~2 person co-ed teams (that's us!)

~4 person co-ed teams

The white and orange thing that Scott is standing next to is one of the markers we had to locate. At each marker is a patterned hole punch that we would punch into the corresponding box on our score card. For this race, there were 31 markers to find, each located by plotting the coordinates given at the race pick-up the day before. We found all 31 markers!

We thought we were so smart to pick out one of the boats closest to the water...turns out it had a leak (which was written, by the way, on the inside of the boat next to a circle that was made around said hole). Huh, maybe that's why it was so close...

I don't know who the guy next to me is, but after being told that we had to carry (not drag) the 650 ton (okay, maybe just a wee exaggeration there) canoe up the hill, he was an absolute angel to help carry our boat as well as his own!

Crossing a finish line never felt so good!

Here is the poison ivy that plagues Scott no matter where we go. Ironically I have not had a bit of trouble with the stuff...

Spring in the Mid-West

Ah Finally. Spring has come to Missouri.

Here are some photos of our blooming life :)

Scott worked so hard to clear this little plot of land for my garden. The ground is almost 100% clay...

So we had to bring in the big guns to get the job done...

Maggie was obviously taking great interest in the vegetable choices I made (she is after all, the one who will clean up the scraps-lol)

A couple of weeks ago all of the fields in the area turned a hue of lavender that blanketed the landscape. I couldn't help but smile when I drove down the road...

Scott and Chloe at Smithville Lake (BEFORE Chloe decided to plow down the hill and into the lake followed by climbing up and down the red clay covered hill)

And here she is, post plunge...

Here's our family Easter photo...followed by our traditional Easter egg photo shoot...

Eggs on a bench...

Eggs on moss...

Eggs on a branch...

And finally, me in a tree with eggs :)

Scott and I send love and light to everyone for a healthy spring full of laughter!

Our First Adventure Race

Looks pretty ominous doesn't it? This was the road ahead as Scott, Maggie and I drove to Milford Lake, KS to camp and run our first adventure race. We were planning on camping at the lake's campground and packed enough gear for what seemed like an entire army but as we drove and passed through rainstorm after rainstorm, I began to think that the cabins listed on the website might sound a whole lot better than being outside. Scott didn't agree. His philosophy was that it wasn't an adventure without a little rain...

I don't think we saw one other tent in the entire campground. Camping was free with your race entry, but I think most people were chicken (I think I might've grown a few feathers if given the chance).

Thankfully we arrived in between rainstorms and had the opportunity to set up camp, make a fire, eat dinner and have our s'mores (I would've cooked s'mores over a butane torch if I had to-there is no camping without s'mores!) before the skies opened up.

We decided to leave Chloe at the kennel (she goes to daycare there and loves it) which was a terrific idea because I cannot imagine how freaked out she would've been in that little tent when the thunder and lightning came through. We did bring Maggie for her first camping trip and she had a great time, especially when Scott was cooking so close to the ground...

So here was the radar photo that shows the nasty storms that passed over us as we were hunkered down in our oh so dry tent. Maggie and I were not big fans of the thunder and lightning that barraged us throughout the night. We got into our tent at around 6pm and didn't come out until 7am the next morning. We were ever so pleased when race day turned out to be a beautiful day-sunny and 80 degrees!

As you can see, Maggie & I ended up being pretty comfortable and warm. Scott unfortunately had about 2 feet of sleeping space due to Maggie's sleep stretch.

So what is an adventure race? So glad you asked! An adventure race is a bit like a triathlon in that you compete in three different sports-canoeing, trekking (trail running), and mountain biking. However there is one additional piece that makes the race a whole lot more challenging. Each team is given a series of coordinates that they must plot on a topographic map. The plotted points are what the teams are looking for. Each team carries a card that must be punched once they find the point. Some of the coordinates are found canoeing, some are found biking, and some are found trekking.

Teams can choose to run the race in whatever order they like. We chose to trek, then bike, and canoe last. Teams are placed according to completion times and time penalties are assigned for things like missing a punch point, littering, going back to find a point once you've moved onto a different section of the race, and being more than 30 feet from your teammates. Scott & I had a great time running the race and as it turns out we are a pretty darn good team! We placed 2nd out of 6 teams in our division (2 person co-ed teams), which isn't bad for our first time out. The great thing about this race was the variety of people participating. There were at least 6 kids who were on teams with theirparents and even a grandparent teamed up with his grandkids to compete, and overall everyone was very positive and supportive.

And while we raced, Maggie hung out in the shade of the tent, guarding our stuff...

We are definitely planning another race and who knows where this will lead...Amazing Race, watch out!!!

Life Moves On....

It is a beautiful, balmy, & breezy 75 degrees here in Weston, Missouri. It is important to mention that because two weeks ago I was digging out of a blizzard that buried most of the country (check out the view from our front porch!). I don't expect this to last long but it is a light at the end of a very cold tunnel.The last few months have forced me to redefine and refocus. Getting married was a breeze. Being married is fabulous. Being a military spouse...not so easy. That's not to say that I am unhappy in any way. It has just been a major adjustment. And of course as many of you are well aware, I do not generally do things a little at a time, I like to pack loads of changes in all at once. I have jumped into Army life feet first. Today I completed my Instructor Training Course (ITC) for Army Community Services (ACS) so that I can teach for Army Family Team Building (AFTB). It still amazes me that I can sum up that entire sentence with three acronyms. They weren't kidding about how much the Army loves its acronyms. I have begun to volunteer on post (the army base) because there aren't any teaching jobs available right now. I'm not sure if I will look for a full time teaching position for the fall but I am completing my application to both Kansas and Missouri for teaching credentials just in case. Army life really is different than civilian life. Soldiers and their families are constantly moving so it is difficult to meet and maintain friends. By volunteering for ACS I can meet a lot of people as they come through the post and also be involved in a rewarding program. Oh, and did I mention that it looks great on my resume? I'm also still volunteering for the Red Cross and trying to get involved with the local schools, although it has been extremely difficult. Middle schools around here don't seem to need volunteers (go figure)...

On the home front, Scott, Kinja and I arrived at the beginning of November. Right after Thanksgiving Maggie arrived. She is a Pharaoh Hound/German Shepard mix that we adopted from my Uncle Steve in CA. She is sweet but such a drama queen. We love her to pieces and she is so easy going (unless Rocky, the terrier from next door, comes a barking-lol)that we can take her almost anywhere.

And then came Chloe. Scott had told me before he left for Afghanistan that he wanted a German Shorthair Pointer when he got back. And true to his word, a month after we arrived in Missouri,

we were driving across the state to visit a breeder about a puppy. We picked out Chloe in December, but did not bring her home until mid January, since we would be gone for the holidays and Scott would be gone on assignment for the beginning of January. So on 9 Jan we drove 10 hours round trip and endured probably a half gallon of puppy puke (mostly on my lap), to bring Chloe home. She was 6 months old and had never been in a house, car, or indoor kennel. Whew. It was an experience. Oh yeah, and then after a week of her being home, Scott left on assignment for 3 weeks...

I can now safely say that I am fully aware of what having children will be like. My days are no longer my own. The vet even told me that having a puppy (especially a GSP, who has the energy of a classroom of kindergarteners) is more challenging than having children. Hmmm. She is infinitely adorable no doubt. And now that she has calmed just a fraction of a hair and learned some manners, she is much easier to deal with. I now have a running partner and Maggie has a friend. Scott likes to think that Chloe is "his" dog, but we girls know better...

he's in a house full of females and we stick together-lol

We've painted the inside of the house (the color was atrocious!) and I have begun to prep for my garden. I am so very excited to be finally having a garden and can't wait to get out there and play in the dirt in my wellies and big floppy hat! I finished my masters program in holistic nutrition and am looking at possibly taking a horticultural therapy course but that is a little ways off. Scott is planning and playing war games (what a job-lol) and is planning to start his masters program this spring. He is loving this duty station because of the semi-normal schedule and being able to have time to spend with me and the girls. We have signed up to run an adventure race in March as Team MC Weston (Massmann Clan Weston). Canoeing, mountain biking, and running, mixed with some navigational work. Should be a blast. Maybe we'll be the next winning team on the Great Race...

Well, that's it for now. Hope everyone is happy, healthy, and loving life!

Sunset from our front yard.....