13.1 Miles Blissful Miles

I ran me another Half Marathon and it was down one of my most favorite canyons.  That alone, usually calls for bliss.  However, this year called for more bliss.  In addition to running with some of my favorite running buddies, my brother joined me for his very first half!  This is utterly amazing and special, folks!

Here we are running in the canyon.
I am in bright orange, Tyler is next to me in black.

Why you might ask?  Well, this cool dude took a serious turn towards a healthy lifestyle and over the last year or so, he has dropped nearly 200 pounds and he can run like the wind!  He eats incredibly healthy, watches portion sizes like a hawk, and he exercises like a champion.  

With his permission, he has allowed me to share his Before-After photo.  A.Maze.Ing!  Need I say more?  So, needless to say, this Half Marathon was indeed a blissful one for more than one reason.

True to form, this half marathon started bright and early.  Race time was at 6am, and we loaded the busses at 4:30am to be taken to the drop-off point in the canyon.  It was still dark when we got there.  

Me and Ty at the starting line.  Seriously . . . the scenery was beautiful!

Race day is always soooo much more fun when I’m in good company.  

Me, Becca, and Jen
I love these girlies sooo much!

I ran with my brother throughout the entire race.  We ran the whole way and only stopped at a few of the aid stations for water.  Here we are at mile 9-ish.  We had some family members come to cheer us on.  While they only saw us for a minute, seeing their faces and hearing their cheers was a nice re-charge for us!  

After crossing the finish line, I was so excited to see two of my most greatest supporters!  My hubby has given up so many Saturday mornings so that I can get my long runs in.  Trust me; this is a huge sacrifice for him. 

And, my little angel has often times spent more time in the jogging stroller than she would ever care for.  They are both troopers and I’m lucky to have their support!

Seriously!  I had such a great time.  One of my most memorable 13.1 miles ever.  We’re all committing to do it again next year.  Come join us!  We would love to have you.  You have a year to get ready.  No excuses!

A Daddy and a Daddy's Girl

Father's Day came and it's always fun to honor Beau.  He is seriously the best daddy in the whole wide world.  The way he loves our little Evie is beyond words.  He lives to come home to her after work, will give up what he loves most to spend time with her, and adores the heck out of her.

The feeling is mutual as Evie loves her daddy.  Her face lights up when she hears the door open as he comes home from work, she can't wait to go out and feed the horses with her daddy, and playing with daddy in any capacity is soooo much fun.  Without getting too sentimental and mushy, tears well in my eyes at the the thought of Evie not growing up with a daddy.  The way she loves spending time with her dad is priceless and does so much for her emotionally.  Adoption . . . what a blessing!  I'm so grateful that these two have each other.

Evie helped daddy open his gifts.  He got a new BBQ set (as he's the BBQ master around here), some new pants, new sunglasses, and an exercise foam roller.  Oh . . . and balloons of course.

And, true to form of being an awesome daddy, he was sure to read several stories to Evie at bedtime.

I love watching Beau be a dad.  He is amazing and I'm so lucky that he's my husband and the father of my children.  He rocks and watching him be a daddy makes me love him more than I already do.

Boating Fun

Along with family members, we also have some friends who have a boat. These fun friends invited us for an afternoon on the lake.  This was our first day on the lake this summer.  We seriously had soooo much fun!

Evie loved being on the boat . . . and, so did we!

Daddy took Evie for her first ride on a tube.
She liked it for the first 30 seconds and then
cried to get off.

Evie begged to get in the water and swim so I gladly jumped in with her.
She insisted on taking the noodle with us so she could "kick" while we
were in the water. The waves in the water took her a little off guard
(not quite the same as the swimming pool) so she
 didn't end up swimming all that long.

A Bubble Birthday

Evie Doll turned 2!  What in the world!?  We officially have a 2-year-old on our hands and we couldn't be more blessed to have this one!

Evie currently LOVES playing at the park and she LOVES bubbles, so we planned to have a family Bubble Party at the park.  The day had seriously been relatively nice, but about 10 minutes before the party the wind picked up and it got chilly.  The party went on and everyone came, including Evie's birth family, and were super accommodating and great sports regardless.  This girl is loved!

We just kept things simple and had some yummy homemade desserts and goodie bags.  While we brought lots of bubbles, the wind was too crazy to blow them.

Dessert Table

Goodie Bags

Bubbles, Bubbles, Bubbles!

The kids didn't mind the windy conditions one bit.  They played at the park and had so much fun!

We opened gifts at lightning speed.  Evie was spoiled by all.

Cousin HaLee was happy to help!

We gave her a bike.  She's WAY into bikes right now so
we thought she would love having her own.

After the party we took a minute to honor Evie's birth mom in our home.  She means sooooo much to us, and the day of Evie's party also happened to be Birth Mother's Day.  We gave her a Shutterfly book that captured pictures, as well as her development, over Evie's first two years.

Man, we love and respect this woman more than you know!

That night we took Evie to her favorite restaurant.  She loves to eat chips and salsa, so Mexican it was! It was just a quiet dinner with the three of us and Beau and I reflected on our last two years with this beautiful girlie, the amount of love we have for her, and the awesome privilege it is to call her our daughter.  All three of us are so very blessed.  It brings tears to my eyes!

I must add that a birthday wouldn't be complete at our house without a horse ride.  Evie is getting WAY into the horses and loves to ride with daddy.

We had a great time celebrating Evie's 2nd birthday!  We're so grateful for the amount of love that is poured out on her by her family and friends.  She's one lucky girl, and we cannot express the amount of joy we feel to be blessed by her beauty every day.  Happy Birthday to our sweet Evie Doll!

Family Pictures - A Nice Finish To Easter Sunday

As mentioned in the previous post, we spent the afternoon/evening with Beau's Mom's side of the family on Easter Sunday.  Because we were all together, Beau's mom arranged to have our family pictures taken.  The evening was absolutely beautiful and the pictures turned out darling!  It made for a fun way to finish off the Easter holiday.

Here are a few of our favorites!

The whole fam.  Pretty people, wouldn't you say?

Our little happy family.  I love them so!

Evie with her cousin HaLee.  They have so much fun together.

And, lastly . . . our pretty Evie doll.  What a gem!

Easter Eggs, Eggs, Eggs!

Evie was WAY into Easter this year.  She was excited to look for eggs, and even MORE excited to crack them open to see what was inside.  Every opportunity she had to crack an egg open, she took it!  She was all sorts of fun.

We had a fun Easter Egg Hunt with my family a week before Easter.  She loved looking for eggs, playing with the kids, and holding baby Mollie.  She loves, loves, LOVES babies!

We then had an Easter get-together with Beau's dad's side of the family the day before Easter.  By far, her favorite part of that day was jumping on the trampoline with her cousin HaLee.

And lastly, on Easter Sunday we put on our new Easter clothes, went to church, and then we let Evie discover what the Easter Bunny brought her.  She got a "basket" full of swim stuff.  She has new swimsuits, flip-flops, and pool toys.  She was thrilled.  Later that afternoon we had Easter dinner with Beau's mom's side of the family.

Here's a little Easter family picture . . .

And, here's a fun collage of Evie at all of our Easter events.  Happy Easter!!!

Happy Green Day!

To us, St. Patrick's Day is basically a green-colored day.  Evie's still too young to care, but it's still fun to do something "green" for fun.  And, I don't know why it is, but I just cannot NOT dress her up for any particular holiday.  LOL!

We started out the morning with green pancakes (served on green plates, of course).  We had green sandwiches for lunch.  If you care for the recipe and/or want to see what we actually ate, you can go to my food/recipe blog.  When Beau got home, we all went to dinner.  I'm mad because I forgot to snap a family picture, but we were ALL wearing green.  It would have been a cute picture!

Hope you all had a fun day!