Third Quarter Covid 19

It's the 9th month of Covid 19. Seems like it's time to make a few lists!

World Events

1. JOE BIDEN defeated Trump. A few times, actually. There have been a few recounts in a few states that just keep yielding more votes for Biden. Can't wait for Trump to leave in 50 days. 
2. I wore every bracelet I own for good energy for Biden on election day. We spent election night at soccer practice, watching the returns for Trump looking like he would do it again. We left soccer and drove home in silence, the weight of the idea of 4 more years under the inanity nearly overwhelming me. We got home and the TV returns were more promising. I watched the states all turn towards Biden as the week went on - Arizona, Georgia, and Pennsylvania. The red mirage faded! Then Saturday morning that the Pennsylvania lead got statistically unbeatable - they called it for Biden as we watched MSNBC. It was a wonderful, joyous moment! 
   
   
   
   
   
   
3. The US elected a woman for Vice President.
4. We also continue to have no strategy for the Covid pandemic, no assistance from the government to feed or help house those who have lost their income because of Covid, nor a plan to keep us all safe until the vaccines come later this month.
5. There are 2 vaccines that will arrive this month.

Halloween and Thanksgiving recap

1. Other than decorating for Halloween, there wasn't any celebration of it this year.
2. We spent the late afternoon/early evening at soccer practice (we were preparing to go to Las Vegas for a tournament that eventually got cancelled). We didn't have any trick or treaters, which was sad. We spent the evening watching TV.
3. The day after Halloween we put up our trees. They got decorated a week later. The decor was a bit schizophrenic until after Thanksgiving when all the decorations changed from Halloween/Harvest/Christmas to all Christmas.
4. I've decorated 4 trees. I keep buying mini ones at Target, along with ornaments that make me feel joyous. There's a tiny one I put upstairs with mom's fairy decorations and some cute stuffed animal ones I got at Target.
   
   
   
5. Thanksgiving was quiet. Vonnay visited for a few minutes on Wednesday. I made rolls and 3 pies (lemon meringue, pecan, and pumpkin) on Thanksgiving Eve
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
6. I messaged with a few friends in the morning. I was feeling a bit sorry for myself and then our wonderful next door neighbors brought over a little pumpkin cake and a center piece. Their generosity pulled me out of my gloom and I had a great day!
7. Shane and I ran a 5k around the neighborhood/Lodestone Park
8. We ate around 4:30. Thomas claimed the rolls were like candy. We all tried the yams. I tried the fruit salad. Boys refused to eat the beans. I enjoyed Vonnay's cranberry relish.
9. We ate pie around 8, still so stuffed we could hardly stand it
10. 
11. Reminisced a bit about last year, when we ate together at the buffet in Las Vegas. That was a treasured memory, funny as that sounds. I was glad to not do the drive, but I wanted to travel again this year, especially with how weird everything is with my family

Therapy updates (these are mostly vague intentionally)

1. Had some eye opening appointments, one about bullies in my life. 
2. I'm trying to find the grey spaces in my life. Some of the characters in the black are ones that I want to move to the grey space, where I can take what they do less personally and just wish them well
3. I did the thing I never thought I would. It was as ugly as I worried it would be. Still figuring out what to do in the aftermath, but it's a relief in almost all the ways, but weighs on me/fucks with my head a lot still.
4. Had the appointment about the salt, and the cliff that can't hurt me with its shadow. Salt has savor and in small doses makes life sweeter
5. I'm trying to remember to walk in line with my people in the rich dark vibrant tropical landscape with the volcano in the distance

Books I've been reading/listening to

1. Magic Lessons - Alice Hoffman - Loved it so much
2. 19th Wife - was ok. It was fun to read with Cindy and Rebecca
3. Harry Potter #1
4. Disloyal
5. Melania and Me
6. Caste
7. Cassandra Speaks

Things we've done in pandemic quarter 3

1. 2 Trips to Desolation trail to snow hike with all of us and the dog. I love these little hikes, even though there hasn't been much snow.
   
2. Dinner with Eugenia and Fred
3. Soccer practices at Real Academy
4. State cup tournament in North Salt Lake - Ben had some great goals
5. Library opened for in-person visits
6. Fabric store visits were mostly for Halloween fabric. I finished the mini quilts for Janna, Cindy, Rebecca, and Camie. I got most of the Halloween panel quilt put together. A few masks. Want to make some tree skirts for the mini trees. 
7. Thomas grew a beard for No Shave November, and finished his Math 1050 class!
   
   
   
8. Ben started making chicken during his almost-all-of-November online school experience.
9. I got my laptop and 2nd screen for WFH. So much more efficient! 
   
10. Spent a day in the office - so strange to be there. I left my little acorn tops from 2019 for the end of the pandemic/return to work.
    
11. Got to order Skirt Sports stuff again! 
12. Bucket got her cyst cut off. She looks so much better!

Places we've been eating

1. Zao (one will open soon in Jordan Landing)
2. Noodles and Company
   
3. Rumbi (on Thursday nights with Ben driving)
4. JCWs in Herriman - I'm a sucker for their turkey avocado
5. Costa Vida - the delicious chili verde returned in October/November
6. Buffalo Wild Wings a few times
7. Jersey Mikes

Workout stuff

1. Need to do more Yoga
2. Speed/intervals on Sundays on the big treadmills are my favorite, followed by a cooldown 10 minute run and some strength by the mirrors
   
3. 
   Ran a few times on Grizzly Way in the leaves.
4. Remembered how much I love watching Willow get a bite of snow when it's snowy and we are running together
5. Am really enjoying the Peloton app. it's been my companion since almost day 1 of the pandemic

Corona Virus Lists: A Post for the Ages - March - May 2020

Things we ate that I cooked:

1. Breakfast for dinner
2. Pork fajitas (cookie sheet baked)
3. Hamburgers
4. Hawaiian chicken
5. Chorizo burritos (with ground beef)
6. Chicken with little potatoes
7. BBQ chicken with fried rice
8. Hershey's chocolate chip cookies
9. Banana bread
10. Brownies

Frequent Takout items

1. Costa Vida (was sad when the chili verde went away - I want my chili verde nachos back)
2. Buffalo Wild Wings (Doordash)
3. Zao 
4. Village Baker
5. Zupas
6. Apollo Burger
7. Papa Murphy's
8. Chick-Fil-A

Books I read

1. Untamed
2. Welcoming the Unwelcome
3. Where the Crawdad's Sing
4. Circe
5. Spinning Silver
6. Getting Past your Past
7. The Path of Liberation (on going)

Zoom Meeting sources

1. Book club meeting with some of my dearest friends
2. Team meetings
3. Buddhist Meditation group meetings
4. Visit with a sister and a few nieces

What we watched

1. Finished Lost for 3rd time (2nd with Ben)
2. Bear Grylls 
3. Shark Tank 
4. Last Dance documentary
5. SGN with Jon Krasinksky
6. CNN/Morning Andrew Cuomo press conferences
7. 50 First Dates
8. Modern Family finale
9. Finished This is Us
10. Some Kind of Wonderful
11. When Harry Met Sally
12. Tiger King (only 1 episode)

Beverages we enjoyed

1. So. Much. Coffee
2. Hot and then iced vanilla latte with amaretto from High Point Coffee (on my way to the fabric store!)
3. Mike's Margaritas
4. Lime Pilsner
5. Birthday Suit 
6. Rogue - Just a Pinch

Types of masks I made

1. 1/2 inch elastic cut down to 1/4 with disastrous results with 3 pleats (geisha cat, Annie Oakley, mom's stash)
2. Hair band (disastrous) 3 pleats
3. Cut open thick-hair hair ties (3 pleats, soccer balls and field fabric, Jeep fabric, Dodge fabric, plain for 1 missionary)
4. Curvy no pleat with regular hair ties (more Jeep, more Dodge, soccer balls)
5. Double folds fabric ties yellow N95 covering for Suzette

Other stuff I sewed - mostly still unfinished

1. 60 Degree diamond top (currently still being quilted)
2. finished UFOs from 3 years ago (put log cabin borders have, need to border, bind, and quilt)
3. triangle hexies
4. fairy star - need to quilt and bind

Stuff I like to wear

1. Callia blue tights
2. 2 Callia sport bras
3. Lagoon print LBS
4. Title Nine tanks
5. Kuhl shorts
6. Various skirt sports skirts - almost every day, different skirt. 
7. Vacay Jaguar
8. Tree of Life tee
9. Blue Title Nine hoodie
10. running shoes for walking Willow
11. My moon phases Alex and Ani bracelet every day

Places I went every week at some point

1. Harmons
2. Sam's
3. Pine Needles fabric store
4. District for takeout
5. Lowes
6. Jordan Landing for Takeout
7. High Point Coffee
8. Costco several times
9. Rarely Walmart
10. Therapy/EMDR (online)

Places I ran

1. Trail
2. Around sunken park
3. Daybreak Lake
4. to Discount Tire

Types of workouts

1. Peloton Yoga
2. Peloton Outdoor runs
3. Walk Willow
4. Run with Audio
5. Sunday Hills walks

What I want to remember

1. Working at the kitchen table
2. Looking so forward every night to dinner that we made a calendar of dinners for 2 week periods, including takeout
3. So much cooking and actually enjoying it
4. Everyone being home all the time.
5. Forgetting a mask and covering my face with a hoodie or my arm
6. Zoom meetings in my front room and at the desk downstairs
7. Yoga in the front room
8. The earthquake/aftershocks
9. Getting toilet paper from an acquaintance who worked at Costco and feeling grateful
10. Getting excited over finding my favorite butter, any flour, and frozen avocado
11. Mid morning getting "ready" for the day - running skirt, tank top, hoodie, sports bra - and wavy hair from braid/humidity
12. Mid morning walks with Shane and Willow
13. Evening trips to park to let Willow chase the frisbee
14. The hawks (or are they falcons?) courting at the park
15. Ben working out at park
16. Thomas doing online school - finishing his second semester at SLCC
17. Thomas's friends coming home and a few going back out to stateside missions
18. Thomas doing maintenance at his work, then missing a month, then going back a few days before they opened again
19. Ben doing online school from his bed in the late morning, coming down to scan a math page, then eating waffles
20. Dog self wash 
21. late bedtimes
22. Marco polos with Camie
23. Marco polos with Rebecca, Cindy, Janna
24. Sewing in the evenings, making masks and finishing projects before Ben went downstairs
25. New birth control
26. Missing the library
27. Getting our side fence
28. rebuilding the back deck, lots of solar lights
29. watching all the neighborhood trees every day go from bare branches to flowers and leaves
30. Finding a random allium in my bleeding heart
31. Blueberry yogurt with blueberries and granola
32. Facetime with the Bells a few Saturday evenings
33. A lot of online shopping

Tools in my backpack

Remember in January when I wrote that I never wanted to write about anxiety on my blog again? I still hold to that, in that I don’t want to have post after post chronicling my day to day successes and missteps with anxiety. But in a different way, I want to still write about it if only to help me remember when times get tough again, and to maybe somewhere, somehow help someone else.

Last Friday, I spent all morning trying to write a post about podcasts. But all of the words that I had were about anxiety, not podcasts. After multiple attempts at writing, I thought I figured out what was missing. For months, I’ve been thinking about drawing a…map of sorts about my anxiety, but I couldn’t think of a way that it would work. I decided that I needed my map for the podcast post, and so I dove in to making the map. And then I had a super exciting creative breakthrough. My quandary was still how to illustrate the nuclear bomb that was my meltdown with what lead up to it and what came out of it. All the vaporous clouds and squiggly lines that were in my head didn’t make a very interesting or satisfying depiction of what I wanted to put on paper.

And then came my breakthrough. A comic strip!  I loved the idea of a comic strip because I could use all the pictures and words that I wanted. It didn’t have to be one concise depiction. It allowed me to tell the story that I wanted to tell using bits of words and, mostly importantly, memories of moments that are already like a comic strip in my head. And while I’m a stick-figure person with no natural art talent, I could still get across exactly what I wanted to. I mean, it’s not as if I will ever share it with the wide world. I just needed it for me. I eagerly grabbed my markers and sketchbook and dove in.

The journey I’ve been on in the past year has been interesting. I got a lot of answers at the end of 2016, but the answers weren’t enough. I had made resolutions, such as:

·         Getting comfortable with being uncomfortable

·         Dropping the story line that constantly ran through my head

·         Not looking for the magic solution to my emotional states

Which are all great things to realize and want for oneself. However, I kept realizing in January and February that I had what equated to backpack (I’m going with backpack instead of purse, because, well, if you know me in real life, you know that purses aren’t my thing. But I’m currently carrying a backpack around, so it works!) with nothing in it that mattered. No wallet or keys or gum or hand lotion or chapstick or notebook or pen or half-read novel, all the things that make a backpack a helpful item.

One of the most important pictures in my comic strip is of my empty backpack. After the initial creative rush that I had on Friday morning (which was essentially an hour and a half of filling up 3 pages of my sketchbook with little boxes of words and stick pictures and one airplane that looked more like a UFO) I spent time on Saturday coloring in some of the pictures and finally working on the items I’ve discovered help me that go in my backpack. Because I can say finally, that I can spend whole days now in which I’m not terrified of remote but terrible things happening to me. I don’t have the electricity flashes that used travel through my body on a regular basis, resulting in my heart beating extra fast and my breath being hard to find. The vague underlying fear that I couldn’t put a finger on but made me withdrawn and stuck in my head and unhappy to the worst degree.

I will say it did not happen overnight. And just like a hammer can’t stand in for all of the other tools in a tool bag, there hasn’t been one figurative tool that could have gotten me here by itself (not for lack of trying - I looked high and low for that one magical tool for almost two years!) But I finally have multiple tools that can all work together to make it so that I can now get on the freeway without fear. And on the days that I do have fear, I can handle that fear. I didn’t think that would ever be possible.

I want to do a series of posts on my tools. Now that I’ve explained where they come from, I won’t feel like I have to go back to the beginning each time. I can now finish the podcasts post, write a post about playing the piano, and another about a book my husband and I read together, because I don’t have to start with anxiety. Which means that maybe it will stop being a major theme in my life.

I’m looking forward to those posts. Mostly because of the pleasure and healing that those things have brought to me. I couldn’t have gotten to them earlier – I had go through the hell of 2015 and 2016 to have them be so meaningful.

If you have tools that have built up your backpack, I’d love for you to share. I don’t think a person can have too many tools. And if you are searching for tools, come back and maybe some of mine can help you.

Weakest link

Last week, I discovered 2 new-to-me podcasts. One was Malcolm Gladwell’s Revisionist History, where he takes an event that happened in the past and goes over it with a new angle, and Happier with Gretchen Rubin, where she talks about, amazingly enough, things you can do to be happier.

I’m happy to say that both podcasts have been very enjoyable and instrumental in me being happier, and in my seeing things from my own past with new eyes.

One of Malcolm Gladwell podcasts talked about soccer versus basketball, and how soccer can be viewed as a sport that the team is only as strong as its weakest player, whereas basketball is a strongest link sport that relies on the best player for its success. Gladwell applied this principle to large donations given to small universities versus giant wealthy universities (your Stanfords and Harvards) to see which would make the largest impact on both the university and the country as a whole. It was fascinating. It got me to think of my current life and the things I’m struggling with – mostly anxiety – in a light of the weakest link.

In August, I started food journaling. I know – it’s super, super sexy to journal all the food I eat! But late in the summer, I looked back and realized that I’d felt mostly shitty in the morning for months and months. It wasn’t anything that was easy to identify or point to as particularly upsetting, but most of the feelings that I tended to blame on anxiety – i.e., bad drives to work, dizzy feelings, a sense of unease, lack of emotional reserves – happened when I failed to eat early enough and/or drank caffeine on an empty stomach. Then, in August when my favorite oatmeal flavor was mysteriously and permanently gone from the shelves and I tried to eat something different for breakfast on the days I went to work, I had some really bad mornings. As I was blaming anything that felt strange on anxiety, I tried to pin two events that happened at work on it as well, but I wasn’t successful. Anxiety just wasn’t the culprit, although it didn’t hesitate in roaring into the limelight during both. So I decided to write down everything I ate, being totally honest and not worrying about the calories or judging my food choices to see if there was a link.

Eureka!

After about a week, I changed two habits – one, my years-old habit of waiting to eat breakfast until after I got to work to eating before work, and two, bringing snacks to work to have between meals. Now, it doesn’t seem like this would be a life-changing event, but it kind of was. Eating before driving to work kept me calmer in the moments that I’ve trained myself to feel anxiety on the road. Having snacks in the mid-morning and in the afternoon allowed me to eat lunch later and not be a raving b**** the moment I walked in the door after work. I even changed another habit of drinking hot chocolate first thing on an empty stomach to eating something small first – an egg or a string cheese or going whole-hog and eating all my breakfast and then topping it off with hot chocolate. Again, such a small change, but I found it made things better.

Eating (and blood sugar) is my weak link. I’m following Gladwell’s example and looking back to see patterns. I realized that so often, the times I get completely overwhelmed or freak out at my kids or husband or get angry for no reason or get emotional at a family function, I’ve usually waited too long to eat. It sounds so dumb. But if you know me or have been around me much in the past 5 or so years, you probably know what I’m talking about. I can have all the best intentions to keep my emotions under control, I can exercise to keep my stress level good, I can speak my feelings instead of thinking about them or pushing them away, I can meditate until my eyes change color – but it all, and I mean ALL, goes out the window when my blood sugar dips. I get hangry. Weak link gets me every time.

Anyone who might be reading this: I cannot tell you how much this helps. In the past year, when I’ve felt betrayed by my body at every turn, when I’ve felt my anxiety get every bit of limelight, when I’ve tried to find out why, why, why do I feel like an alien in my body – to have something that is easy to control that helps me manage is nothing short of amazing.

I know that it doesn’t solve everything. Just today while driving on the freeway where there was a ton of traffic and construction, I got anxious and had to pull off on an exit. But I dealt with it. I talked myself down and got my breathing under control and drove in a circle to get back on the freeway I’d just exited and finished my drive to work. I was kind to myself and wrote myself a note when I got to work and decided that it wasn’t a big deal and that I didn’t need to make any more of it than it was. All of the positive habits I’ve built up over the past year – remembering to breathe, being kinder to myself, taking a break if I need it, and then getting back on that horse – worked, because my weakest link wasn’t a factor. I doubt things would have gone as well if I’d been hungry. I'm so grateful and excited that I've figured this out.

Weakest links. They are important. Do you know what yours is? Do you have one? Tell me if you think this could be a good discovery for you, too.

Brené Brown: an author review, of sorts.

I've always been a huge believer in a book finding you at just the right time. Usually for me, said book is fiction, with a character whose struggles mirror my own in some way, or a setting that feels so familiar it's like being home. I'm not much into non-fiction; I've enjoyed a few (Terry Tempest William's Refuge and John Krakauer's Into Thin Air come to mind, both read with my book group), but usually about a third of way through non-fiction books, especially when they deal with self-help, I tune out and lose interest.

Enter Brené Brown. I first heard about her when a friend posted her TED talk on shame and vulnerability on Facebook. Listening to that talk was so enlightening - I can still remember the little explosions going off in my brain as I identified with her wise words on shame. I always remembered how that TED talk made me feel, but I didn't take it any further.

Then a few weeks ago I had a thought in the shower (because doesn't all wisdom flow from the time you spend in the shower? I saw a meme that said a fraction of our time in the shower is spent cleaning ourselves, and the majority is spent evaluating our life. So true!) about my tendency to ruminate. Since my anxiety blew up last summer, a lot of my rumination time is spent either suppressing or magnifying my heightened emotions about driving to work. I vacillate between the two on almost a minute by minute basis on the days I go to work. Or, if it's not the drive to work, it's my feelings about a person or a situation that makes me feel vulnerable in some way. I realized that if I'm going to live with anxiety, I need to find a way to let it be in my life but not the focus of my life. And to start that journey, I need to learn to get out of my head.

One of the suggested books about rumination and worry was by Brené Brown. I can't tell you which one, because my search resulted in my reserving several of her books and audio books at the library. I started reading the first one that came available as a hold - I Thought It Was Just Me (But It Isn't). (I also picked up Rising Strong, but old habits required me to read ITIWJM, because it was written earlier, and I wouldn't want to "spoil" the series by reading the last book first!) After the Introduction, I realized that it would never do to just read the library copy - I wanted to write all over the book immediately. By page 44, I was sending pics of favorite passages to Amy, and on page 76 (which I read while on a flight to Spokane for Bloomsday - a moment I think I will remember my whole life), I had a revelation about my life and how I use shame and vulnerability against myself that forever changed me. Making a mental note to buy the book as soon as I got the chance, I got out the journal I'd brought along with me on the plane and started writing. I saw the shame that has hampered my adult life with such a clarity and the source that started its terrible trajectory in such a clear-eyed way that I knew I'd never be able to go back. I'm different, altered, changed - whatever synonym a thesaurus can come up with - I'm that.

Shame has been my go-to place for so long that I cannot remember a time when it hasn't been my companion. I don't know what happened or didn't happen to make that be my reality. Brown's distinction of how guilt and shame are different - guilt is the feeling that something you have done is bad, shame is the feeling that what you are is bad - was especially helpful, because I've never wanted to call what I feel shame - I've always blamed it on guilt. But my interior landscape has always told me that I'm fundamentally bad. And as a result, I've spent my whole life trying unsuccessfully to argue with that landscape. (Putting that sentence out there makes me feel so vulnerable - I want to delete it. But allowing myself to be vulnerable and not sell the image that "I'm perfect!" is what will help me to start to alter my landscape, which I want to do with all of my heart and soul.)

I now have my own marked up copy of ITIWJM. I just finished it this morning. I've also been reading in tandem a library copy of The Gifts of Imperfection (another one I need to buy - I might as well start my own library of Brown's books.) Reading them together helped to explain and clarify questions I had about ITIWJM - many of the ideas carry over into The Gifts, reinforcing some of the harder concepts for me to apply.

Like Brené Brown says in the book, reading just one book on shame isn't going to solve my issues with shame and vulnerability. But I'm better armed to change my landscape because of the following:

• I have knowledge of what to call the emotions I feel that cause me to want to control situations.
• I can be better prepared for the situations that lead me to anguish over others' feelings about me.
• I can better process and maybe understand the feelings that start debates in my head that tell me without mincing any words just how terrible I am and why. Maybe I can even head off these thoughts before they start.
• I can identify what my shame triggers are and which screens I use internally and externally to throw others off of the scent of my vulnerability.
• I can be more helpful to others when they are showing me their vulnerability. My go-to mode in these situation is to try to head off their pain and tell them that what they are saying isn't true because I don't want them to experience pain. A favorite quote - "can we be with her in her shame? Or do we feel the need to make it better or redirect the conversation? If we are willing to be open and present, we are willing to practice compassion." And also, "Compassion is not a relationship between the healer and the wounded. It's a relationship between equals." (that last quote is quoted in the book -  it was said by Pema Chödrön, an American Buddhist nun. Love, love that quote and I want to strive to use it in my life.)

If you see or talk to me in real life and I start spouting off these newfound truths, forgive me. Or maybe you can sit with me in my vulnerability and then let me sit with you. Or maybe I won't remember what I've learned and I'll try to fix you - forgive me again. If I get angry and go off on you about things that happened in the past or situations that I make me vulnerable because they show me an part of myself that I don't like - forgive me, I'm trying to change my old patters of shame screens and identities that I want to avoid. If you catch me quiet and scatter-brained because I've gotten stuck in my head again, forgive me and ask me what I'm feeling shameful about and then let me be vulnerable with you. If you respond in a way that doesn't address my vulnerability, I'll try (maybe unsuccessfully) to forgive you and realize that you are doing your best. If I give you a copy of a book to read or send you quotes I like - forgive me; just know I love you and want to share something that felt authentic in me and I sent it to you in the chance that it will feel authentic to you.

I'm planning to finish The Gifts of Imperfection and move on to Rising Strong.

Have you read any of these books? Is it just me? Do I sound completely crazy-pants? I'd love to have your comments.<3 br="">

Happy making: wool socks edition

Lest it sound like my whole life is doom and gloom, I want to put it out there that there are things making me happy these days. I need to complain about anxiety every now and then, and I want to document things I notice so that I am armed for the future, but it isn’t the whole story lately.

So what things have made me happy lately? Let me count the ways.

Wool socks. Oh my gosh, I forgot this when I first posted this. How could I forget though? I went hiking in October with my sweet mother-in-law and she brought me a new pair of wool socks. I looked forward to wearing those socks every week, and so on the day after Christmas, I bought a four pack of the very best socks in the world: Merino wool socks from Costco. I have worn fluffy, warm, beautiful wool socks all winter since. And, I just bought another 4 pack last Friday. I'm sort of a sock slut. But I have no shame in that. No, none at all.

Running. Can I just tell you (again!) how much I love winter running? I am going to. I love the cold air. I love getting warm and sweaty at the same time as my face is delightfully cool. I love running fast in the winter. I even love my treadmill these days. I’ve been doing some different kinds of workouts thanks to the inspiration of taking an Orange Theory fitness class last month. At Orange Theory, they hook up you with a heart rate monitor for the entire workout, which consist of 23 minutes of cardio and 23 minutes of strength. All you have to do is follow the workout plan as set forth by the instructor while trying to keep your heartrate monitor color in the orange or red sections. These are the anaerobic thresholds that, once reached, can help burn calories after the workout has ended. I discovered in the class just how much I love working in the green section – the one right before orange & red. Why? Because I’m not out of breath as much in the green. After the class, I decided I could get myself in the orange by doing pick-ups of 1 or 2 minutes at a faster pace during my runs. I feel like it’s helping. I’m also getting back to doing some high intensity interval training on run days and cross train days. I haven’t done much strength training in the past few months, and I’m can tell that I need it.

Running clothes. I count this in a completely different category than running! I got a running skirt and long running tights for Christmas that make me so happy. Shane also gave me an awesome running jacket that I never would have bought for myself but absolutely love. It is perfect for an outdoor run and keeps me so warm I barely notice the wind and cold. Plus it has a cozy soft inner lining that is bright pink. I love running in pink.

Eating Lindor balls. Shane brought home a giant gift bag of assorted Lindor balls right before Christmas. How had I not discovered their particular brand of deliciousness??!! My faves are the light and dark blue, red, and black. I’ve since bought 2 more bags, and Shane also scared up another partial bag from work that have fed my addiction nicely.

Sewing. As one of my ways of coping with anxiety, I started sewing at night. I had started a Christmas tree skirt 2 Christmases ago that had tons of hand stitching. I spent many nights sewing on that and finished it right before I decorated. I then decided to make table runners as gifts. These were fun projects that forced me to finish the items I was working on, thus helping me get better at quilting and binding. I even tried my hand at free-form quilting, something I had never done before but now adore. In the midst of it, I found an awesome sewing machine that I ended up getting for Christmas. Sewing is so fun now, and I feel like I can do things I couldn’t do with my old machine. I have a few other projects in the works, which is exciting.

I have made three of these as gifts...we'll see if I ever finish the one I  started for myself.

Christmas tree skirt

Finishing our basement. Back before I went to Italy, Shane started working on finishing our basement. It took 2 loooonng years to finish. We used electricians, plumbers, and heating and air professionals early on to finish those jobs, but the rest was done by Shane. After spending all spring and summer sheet rocking, we saved up and had pros do the mudding and taping in the fall (I will forever be grateful for them! They did such a great job at helping our walls look good.) We also had a guy do the tile in the shower and bathroom floor. The boys helped us paint, which was pretty fun. We just got carpet 2 weeks ago. We finished it with all the same paint, doors, and trim so that it matches the upstairs. It’s so exciting to have it all done.

Reading. I’ve finished a couple of books lately, and started a few that I may or may not finish but still enjoyed. My favorites were The All Girls Filling Station’s Last Reunion by Fannie Flagg and The Lake House by Kate Morton. My least favorite was The Heart Goes Last by Margaret Atwood…I didn’t finish it, but I may, eventually. I’m reading The Library at Mount Char currently.

My family. We’ve had some really fun times at home lately, watching The Office reruns (because Thomas, at 14, decided he wanted to watch the series again now that he “gets more of the jokes.” Teenagers. I just cringe!) and our TV watching staple Modern Family. Shane and I had a really fun and casual anniversary dinner together (we were both filthy, having worked in the basement all day cleaning and then went to a late soccer game for Ben – seriously, the game started at 5:40 in the evening. The opportunity to go out sort of just evolved out of a very nice offer of Ben’s friend’s parents who were also at the game.) Shane and I had some very important conversations and started to understand a few things about ourselves and about each other that can help make things smoother. I’ve enjoyed watching Ben’s soccer team get clobbered each week by the club teams he’s playing during indoor soccer. We are like the ragtag team from the wrong side of the tracks with our cotton t-shirts and mismatched shorts, but the kids are learning a lot and getting better thanks to playing teams that have played for years together in indoor and outdoor soccer.  

Meeting someone again that I haven’t seen in over 25 years. It was something I had dreamed and hoped for and am so very grateful happened.

Knick knacks from my mom’s house. While helping her pack, I brought home a few items that have made me so happy. I got a painting that my grandpa painted. I also got a milk glass bowl that was my mom’s moms, and a pitcher with cups that was my dad’s moms. I didn’t bring home a lot of stuff, but what I did get, I really love and am trying to incorporate into my house instead of just shoving them into a cabinet somewhere to never see the light of day. I also brought home a giant secretary that I still have sitting in my garage. The thing is massive, almost 7 feet tall. I want to put it in my basement, but I don’t know if it can fit and haven’t convinced anyone to pick it up and attempt to take it down the stairs. (If any of you local readers have a moving-company hookup that would do a house call and tell me if it will fit or not, I might just love you forever.)

So what is making you happy lately? I want to know.

Snowshoeing at Solitude: A review of sorts

When I was a kid, I made exactly one snowman. I was approximately 3 years old at the time. Later, when I was 16, I went with my friend Cindy to a hill and attempted to snowboard.

That's all I got for winter outdoor activities, folks. I guess I've always been more of inside kind of girl.

So when I started to think about snowshoeing this year, it seemed foreign. But I've realized the past few years how much I love winter running. I'm not in the least afraid of the cold; I actually love it. I'm faster in the winter than I am in the summer, and my asthma doesn't seem to bother me as much. Plus, with my kids getting older, all they ever want to do is hang out with their friends. I'm happy to let them do that, but I'm finding that if we don't find things to actually go out and do, then we don't ever do anything together.

On Christmas Eve, we went sledding at a park near our house. It was really fun and it solidified my determination that we would soon try snowshoeing. Shane found us all boots. Then the day after Christmas, I got my very first pair of snowpants. (They are seriously so cute. I got them at Costco and I wore them for the rest of the day after I bought them.) I found a great deal on snowpants for both Shane and Thomas, and Ben already had a pair. We were ready, and all we had to do was pick a day and go.

That day finally came on Saturday. I had researched snowshoeing in Utah and found that the Silver Lake area at Solitude Ski Resort is the perfect place to snowshoe. The reason are many, but include:

• 6 miles of dedicated and groomed snowshoeing trails.
• Easy and relatively inexpensive rentals. They were very helpful, and asked us lots of questions. Thomas didn't have waterproof boots so they suggested overshoes for him. They asked which of us wanted poles (only I wanted them) as a way to save money. We were all outfitted and ready within 10 minutes of walking in to the Nordic Center.
• Free parking
• Easy to follow trails (once you realize the markings - will explain later!)
• A shuttle bus that allows you to travel between Silver Lake and the main Solitude Ski Resort.
• Color coded maps along the trails.

We got to Solitude about 12:00. We had originally planned on doing a half-day of snowshoeing, but to do that, you have to arrive after 12:30. Even so, it was still around $21 a person for the rentals and day pass. Not bad for trying out a new activity.

I kept thinking as I was getting my snowshoes on that standing up would feel like ice skating, but it didn't. There is nothing at all similar about ice skating and snowshoeing other than they both involve your feet and cold weather, ha ha.

The trail starts right outside of the Nordic Center. However, being new, we had no idea at first that we were on the cross country ski trail. We bumbled around for about 10 minutes, unsure of where we were supposed to be going until the person who helped us with our rental directed us to the trail. After that, it was super easy to follow the blue ribbons to stay on course. They were tied to trees, posts, bushes, and poles. There were other trails marked in other colors - we ended up taking blue around the lake, and then orange around another trail that took us past some lovely winter cabins. The two trails make a figure 8, and total about 1.5 miles.

The snowshoe trail is about 3 feet wide - wide enough for just a single person to snowshoe, and to pass others on the trail. By the time we started, the trail was pretty trampled, which was nice because it was less work, but kind of sad because it was fun to step on virgin snow. We each stepped a few feet off the track at some point just to make our own footsteps. It's fun to watch the snowshoes cut through the snow, and amazing to see how even though you sink a little, you still stay relatively higher than you would in regular shoes.

I used poles, and both boys used borrowed them for a time during our walk. Having poles isn't necessary in any way, but it makes it fun. I liked how they added an upper body component to the snowshoeing. (I've found this when I've used them hiking as well.) The poles were nice to have especially when going uphill. It took a little less strain off of of the legs.

Our little snowshoe adventure took us about 2 hours. We weren't trying to win any speed awards. We stopped and took pictures, laid in the snow to make snow angels, threw snowballs at trees, put snow down clothing (well, some of us), and admired the scenery. It was seriously such a gorgeous day - it was snowing just enough to be beautiful but not super cold. The wind was cold, but once you were moving, it sort of faded into the background, and was completely absent during our time on the orange Cabin trail, which is a little more sheltered.

I wore a pair of ColdGear UnderArmor tights, my snow pants, a pair of wool socks and a pair of acrylic (but my boots kept my feet so warm I would have been fine with one pair of socks), a short sleeve running shirt, a long sleeve running shirt, a running jacket, and a coat. I could have survived (and would have preferred) without my coat. I wore gloves sometimes, but other times I took them off because I was too hot or wanted to take pictures.

Once you get the rhythm down, you sort of forget you are wearing snowshoes at all. The kind I had required me to step toe-first instead of heel first, because the spikes were at the front of the snowshoes. There is a hinge that allows your hill to come up but the snowshoe to stay down.

Everyone had a great time. I would have loved to stay longer, but unknown to us until the very end, Ben had the stomach flu so he was more than ready to be done when we got back to the Nordic Center.We finished off the day by stopping at a cafe called Silver Fork Lodge for a delicious lunch.

Now for some pictures.

Not too bad for an inside girl, I'd say.


Have you ever been snowshoeing? Any advice or local trails you can recommend?

May and June 2015: A summary

I miss doing lists. I miss blogging. I miss writing. I should be able to solve this problem on my own, since I am the one who decides how I spend my time. Anyway.

May and June were busy months. They deserve lists. Wahoo for lists!

Places we went:

• Spokane. The first weekend in May, we went back up for Bloomsday. It was such a fun mini-vacation. We ate a lot of food, laughed with our friends, ran a great race, duped a fancy restaurant into giving us a free dessert, and made great memories. I'm sure you feel like you were there from that very specific description.

• Park City. Just for one night, the Sunday to Monday of Memorial Day. It was super fast, and we spent most of the time at the pool in the rain (gotta love Memorial Day in Utah! It ALWAYS rains.) but it was fun. I might be the only person ever who takes a sandwich maker on vacation with her. It didn't do any good, since we ended up at Taco Bell for breakfast (we all love sausage AM crunchwraps, and will do crazy things to obtain them.)

Places we ate:

• Buffalo Wild Wings. I am in love with the spicy Thai sauce, and the garlic parmasan (which is bizarre, because garlic is usually my natural enemy, but this sauce is sooo delicious.) I highly recommend the Buffalitos. I don't know why it took us so long to eat there.
• The Habit. Great burgers, and the best part: they will add avocado to almost anything. Be still my avocado-loving heart.
• Costa Vida (where I somehow ended up running into Lucy. Man, I love Lucy. And even better to see her unexpectedly, across a crowded room. Yay for running into friends!) 
• La Puente.  When Shane and I were dating, I hated La Puente. It is a Mexican restaurant on State Street that has been there forever, and I was always a fan of Los Hermanos in the UC which kept me from loving La Puente. But after living on the West Side, aka the Mexican-food-deprived-side of Salt Lake County, I fully appreciated our night out at La Puente. I keep trying to get my kids to go back there, but have been unsuccessful.
• Bombay House. I love me some Indian food, but no one else does. So I have to make a special trip to 3 different restaurants typically in order to have it for myself (the kids eat one place, Shane eats at another, and I get BH.) It is worth all the effort to have the deliciousness that is Chicken Coconut Kurma. 
• Zupas. I ate here with my dear mother-in-law on one visit, and again with my bestie Melanie in a very rushed but worth it lunch one afternoon.

New Business (a veiled Mad Men reference. Mad Men ended in May, a fact that I am still mourning.)

• Shane got a new-to-him car. We sold our Xterra after 11 years and bought a Subaru Legacy. It had some problems at first. By "problems" I mean it stalled ON THE WAY HOME which resulted in two weeks of repairs, paid for by the dealership, that included dropping the trasmission, new transmission computer, and another part I can never remember but we lovingly refer to as the "flux capacitor." While it was being repaired we drove around in a brand new Impreza. I drove it as much as I possibly could, which was fun (we put over 500 miles on it. Oops, sorry Mark Miller Subaru.)
• Pebble Greybeard Lovejoy. He is a Russian Blue kitten, and he is a pain in the ass. He is Ben's cat, and he is just like Ben. He is giving our cat Bucket a nervous breakdown, because she looks like his (Siamese) mother. He jumps out at her from behind corners. He attacks her tail. He acts EXACTLY like Ben acts with his older sibling. But he is sweet, sometimes. Like last night, when he crawled up on my chest and forced his way under the blanket. I had him on my chest, and Bucket on my lap, and it was a little bit like kitty heaven. Note: I have a private name for him, that I abbreviate to MLB. It stands for "mean little bastard." I giggle every time I say it. He loves to chase toys, his tail, Bucket, feathers, and pencils. Piles of folded laundry are an obstacle course for him, and he is never as happy as when he is attacking a rolled up pair of socks. (For approximately 2 minutes of me writing this, he was purring on my lap. And now he's watching me type. Can I get an "Awww!)

• A laptop. Which sounds fancy, but it isn't. Laptops are sort of disposable now, so I didn't want anything too fancy. My old one took 300 minutes just to bring up a browser, which may have been because of the fact that most of the storage was full of pictures. I was terrified it would crash before I moved 13 years worth of pictures. It didn't. The new laptop is adequate. It has a 10 key, which was pretty much my only requirement (I don't know how people have a laptop without one.)

Media that was enjoyed

• Hozier. I love this CD album with my whole heart. I can listen to it exclusively for hours.
• Florence and the Machine - How Big, How Blue, How Beautiful. I will always get excited for new Florence music. 
• Uprooted, by Naomi Novik, a new-to-me author. I just finished it last night, but carried it around with me for 3 weeks. Thomas is also reading her Temeraire series.
• My Real Children - I haven't finished it yet, because I could renew it and not the Novik book, but I will be finishing it shortly.
• Headspace - a meditation app that I have been using regularly. It it so helpful. When Amy and I were little, we shared a room. Our closet was always, always a disaster. We kept everything there and most of it was leftover books and papers and clothes and toys and records that we didn't need anymore, but couldn't get rid of. I feel like my emotional and mental closet has been overflowing for years with hoarded emotions, thought, feelings, and experiences that I just didn't have use for, but were crowding my judgement and thought patterns. I'm cleaning out my closet. I'm figuring out how to not take everything so personally, and not get trapped in my thoughts as much. Headspace has helped with this process.

Other stuff I don't want to forget:

• Thomas finished 8th grade and Ben finished 4th.
• We fed a baby bird for a week. It was doomed from the start, and he passed away sometime before yesterday morning. Sad. But my kids were great bird daddies for a few days.
• We watched Jurassic World on Father's Day.
• My kids finished Spring soccer. Thomas hadn't played on a team since he was in first grade (which mostly consisted of him pretending to be Spiderman, or a dinosaur. My how he's grown!) and so it was kind of a big thing for him to play. Ben is obsessed with soccer, so it's just the usual for him.
• I got new running shoes. After three weeks of hating them, I found some inserts that work really well, and now I love them. 
• I started walking once a week with my neighbor friend.
• Started to clean out my mom's house. It's sort of anticlimactic, since I've obsessed over it for years. (See "Headspace" entry above. Deep breaths.) We did manage to get a lot done in a few hours, so that was nice. But there are many more hours to be spent there, sigh.
• Went fishing with the kids at Daybreak Lake. It was hotter than crap, and I missed a lot of it because I was at my mom's house, but it was something different.
• I got 70,000 steps on my Fitbit in one week. I had to try really hard to get it. I almost made it the week before, but my Fitbit died in the afternoon on Saturday. Sad.
• Threw my back out for one terrible week. I didn't mess around this time and went to the doctor right away. He gave me prednisone, which I didn't take last time because steroids make me very bitchy and mean, but it was only 6 days, and they didn't seem to affect me as much. My back quickly got back into shape. I'm so glad. I think part of the reason it got better faster was that last time, we were going through the baby thing, which complicated it immensely.
• Had the first summer without Ragnar in five years. I missed it a lot. But, the weekend of the race was really hot, so maybe I didn't miss it that much. I could have joined my employer's team - they went through runners like wildfire! - but that was that weekend that my back was injured, and I wasn't invited until mid-May. It was hard to turn it down, especially since it would have been free, but in the end, it was the right thing to not participate. 

How were your May and June?

The same old fears, part 347

Year after year,
Running over the same old ground.
What have we found?
The same old fears.

Wish you were here, Pink Floyd

Last night, I went to a Margaret Atwood lecture at my alma mater. The event was part of a lecture series called the Tanner Lecture on Human Values. There were so many things about the evening that I loved - being with my sister, driving my old route to the university past my first apartment, enjoying the beautiful spring light as I made my way into town, listening to Margaret Atwood talk about the necessity of the arts in society and how they are part of our most basic selves, remembering all the time I spent on that campus when I was young, and attending something that was out of my regular routine and being 100% comfortable with it. It was a great time, a much needed bright spot. Plus, Margaret Atwood is wickedly funny and smart and thought-provoking. And, did I mention, time with my sister? Love.

I've been in a mental rut for a few months. I could blame it on other people and their choices and struggles, but really, it's not their fault. They were the catalyst that set me on this path, but I can only blame myself for the way that things played out. It put me into a tailspin of emotions and guilt. It's complicated, but I think I complicated it more than necessary because I slipped back into old habits that don't serve me or those around me well at all.

I was looking through my journal the other night. I found entries from two years ago when I was desperately trying to dig myself out of the funk of our decision to not have another baby. Later, I found entries of when I was in Italy having both the time of my life and a different kind of emotional revolution. Over and over, I read my own words of the hope I had to finally be a grown-up, to pull my shit together, and stop allowing others to steal my zen.

I keep figuring out the same damn thing about myself, over and over, "running over the same old ground" just using different people or situations or trials. As a result of it all, I have the same "revelation" and try to set the same goals to "fix" myself, which I promptly forget when the crisis abates, to then do it all over again a few years later.

Maybe everyone does this. (Please, please say that other people do this!) But I think I'm really here this time. I think that I'm finally figuring out who I am and what makes me fall into the same self-defeating patterns.

I'm participating in a meditation series hosted by Deepak Chopra. These meditations come around every few months; the most significant time that I have participated, other than this year, was in 2013 when I was trying to get over my back injury. Meditation got me out of a very dark place then and allowed me to stop punishing my body for its injury. This time, I am learning about success. Not the success that comes from being wealthy or fabulous, but the success that comes from making choices that are healthy, from understanding what successful thought patterns and effective emotions look like, and ways to quiet my inner critic and fears.

At church, the young women say a theme each week that begins this way: "We are daughters of our heavenly father, who loves us, and we love him." I was thinking about that statement during a meditation. Every week, I say those words, but I don't know if I believe the first part, that God loves me. If I don't know that, are there people in my life whose love I distrust? I started replacing "we," "daughter," and "heavenly father" with other names and relationships. "I am Thomas and Ben's mom, who love me, and I love them." "I am Don and Sue's daughter, who love me, and I love them."There are people in my life that I am secure in saying that phrase about because I know our love is mutual. There are others whom I know I love, but who I shy away from authentically believing their love for me. I think it's important for me to accept that they love me, even if I don't relate to their mode of love. I'm going work on that.

You know how when you learn a new word, you hear that word constantly for a few days afterward? Between the meditations, talks with my husband and my sister and other good friends, a few books on aging and anxiety and dealing with the inner critic, a writing session from a place in my heart that showed me some of my oldest and most irrational, childish fears and motivators, and last night's lecture from Ms. Atwood, I'm starting to hear what the universe is screaming at me.It wants me to grow up. It wants me to be the same on the outside as I am on the inside. It is showing me who I am with certain people and why and how I can stop being that person (if I am brave and self-aware enough.)

I think I'm ready to make some true internal changes in my world view that will last longer than a family party, a blog post, a few weeks, or a month. Wish me luck.

Christmas 2014

I love, love Christmas. This was a great year. A few things I want to remember:

• Watching Elf (I love Buddy the Elf, he makes everyone feel special and has no guile or ill-will towards anyone. I wish I could be more like him.) while I made our traditional Christmas Eve dinner of french dip sandwiches, brown rice, and clam dip. Ben even said, "Great dinner, Mom," as he got up from the table. A true Christmas miracle.
• Laughing with Shane's dad and grandma on Christmas Eve as we visited in her kitchen. I didn't ever think we would have Christmases like that again. I'm so grateful.This picture is priceless.

• Visiting the mall, just because, on Christmas Eve day. I love to be out in the hustle and bustle, especially when I know I'm only there for fun, not for necessity. We found a shirt for Shane to wear on Christmas (because he likes to wash his clothes before he wears them, so he rarely has a Christmas shirt.) We attempted to cash in on some sub-$2 gas at Costco, but the line was insane.
• Watching Shane play with his toy: a Keurig 2.0 coffee maker that his friend gave him for Christmas. 
• Had a Coke (or two or three) for the first time since Halloween.
• Ben's excitement when he saw his Christmas presents. He jumped for joy on more than one present. He didn't sleep at all Christmas Eve, and tried to get up at 1, 3:30, and 4:45, before succeeding at 6am. Yawn.
  
• Observing Thomas. He understands Christmas now. But he still gets excited, and is a good kid about not letting on about the gig. He got one of his big presents early - like October early, so it I kept wondering if he was sad, or felt disappointed. But he rallied and had a great Christmas. I still remember Christmas when I was in 8th grade - I got a brown leather jacket that I can still smell, and some green stretchy pants and a big sweatshirt - but what I wanted was a Nintendo so I could play Mario Brothers like my friend Amber. I still remember how sad I was but trying to not let on. Christmas is hard when you grow up.

• Eating breakfast with Shane's mom and stepdad.

• Driving to my mom's in a beautiful snowstorm.
• Having a nice, teary, one-sided conversation  with my dad in the quiet of his backyard. The snow was falling so softly on the trees. He would have loved the way they looked. I could feel him right there. I'm glad he had some time on Christmas, and that I found a quiet place to feel him.

• Driving home in the second worst Christmas Day storm we have ever weathered.
• Taking silly bow pictures with my sisters. I love them!

• Admiring the beautiful Nativity set my mom gave us.
• Thinking about the fact that next Christmas, it could all be so very, very different. My mom is having a pretty serious and complex back surgery in January, and things might have to change. I feel so lucky to have spent all my Christmases (except for one!) in my mom's home, with my family. I love them all so much.
• Sitting with most of the boy crowd in the living room during dinner at my mom's. All my boys, Amy's sons and husband, and my oldest nephew Zack, and my great nephews all chatted together over the traditional ham, potatoes, green bean casserole, Brussels spouts casserole, and homemade rolls.
• Embarrassing Thomas with an inappropriate conversation with half of the family. It's so fun to embarrass teenagers. Just mention their parent's having sex and they lose all composure.I love it. And my older sister is really good at it.
• Being zen about it all. I didn't let anything get to me (or I tried really, really hard.) I didn't even rush everyone out the door the way I usually do. Or fussed about what was going on in the kitchen. It's true that the cat throwing up noises that Ben made (nonstop!) in the car almost put me over the edge, as did the hustle and bustle before dinner, but I did it. Oooommmm.

• Wearing the running skirt, Deathly Hallows necklace, and slippers Shane bought me all morning. I've asked for slippers for years and years and he finally bought me some. The running skirt I had him buy in September when they were on sale, and the Deathly Hallows pendant was a wild card that I threw at him at the last minute after I realized how much I was envying Amy's. (Every time I think of it I think Amy's story about library patron who saw hers. Amy, you should put the quote in the comments so I can get it right!)
• Perfecting the Christmas morning pull-apart rolls, which have been slightly undercooked for years and years until I realized that you have to put them in the pantry, instead of the fridge, overnight. Thanks, Pinterest!

Merry Christmas! I hope yours was lovely.