2 years down, and forever to go! :)

Happy Anniversary, my love!!

Such a perfect day!

Ok, so I'm a few days late, AND I haven't blogged in forever, but I'm working on it. I have a post in the works, but I need to write for my SECOND anniversary. On our anniversary, I didn't do too much besides reminisce about the past 2 years and especially June 4, 2011. I went running in the morning (something Matthew and I love to do together) and then I sat down to eat breakfast. While eating, I watched our wedding video... TWICE. I am still a hopeless romantic. I love it. I love everything about weddings, especially MY wedding. It was the most perfect day of my entire life. I can't really think of anything I would have changed. Even the weather was PERFECT that day! Literally everything was PERFECT, and I am so glad I have a video that I can giggle through that brings back all of the feelings from that beautiful day and pictures from our entire dating history. Each picture has so many memories and most of them make me laugh my head off. Nothing beats the live video from our wedding day though. It lets me go back in time and feel all of the same feelings I had on that day.

So in love with this man...

 I did have a major realization while watching my wedding video though... I had no idea what I was getting myself into on June 4, 2011. I had no idea what love even was on that day! I feel like our love on that day was merely scratching the surface of what it COULD be in the grand scheme of things. I don't think our love today is near perfect, but I also can't believe how much stronger it is today than it was 2 years ago. We have been through some tough stuff this year, but we have also had some incredible accomplishments. With each failure and each accomplishment, our love only grows. I love Matthew more than my words could EVER describe. He literally is my best friend and I don't know that I could ever live without him in my life.

Isn't he so good looking!?

 This is a super mushy post, but it is true what they say.... Absence does make the heart grow fonder! Matthew is at Air Force training this month, and I missed him way bad on our anniversary. I felt like it was a huge day for me, but no one else really feels the same significance as Matthew and I do, which is understandable! I did get to talk to him for a little bit that night, as I do every night, and that made things a little better. He is doing SO good, guys. He is such a stud and he literally has success written all over him. He is such a hard worker and I don't know how I got so lucky. He tells me cute things, makes me laugh so hard, and always makes everything seem right in the world.

We're so cute, right?? :)

 Marriage is such a big deal. I feel like I always kind of down-played it. I loved the idea of a wedding and was so excited for mine. Only when I met Matthew and we started getting more serious did I realize what a huge deal it was. And even though it is a huge deal.. It was actually one of the easiest decisions I have ever made in my life. I literally just knew he was perfect for me in every way and I could live with him. What I didn't realize, however, is as time has gone on, the "ability to live with him" has truly turned into feeling like I can't live without him.

So, just to wrap this up... As if there was any question as to how much I love my husband... Rest assured, I love him VERY much. More than probably anything else in this world. We may not be perfect (I, for one, am far from it), but we definitely accept each other's imperfections. We work together, make decisions together, and we have a love that can't be beat! We're going to be together forever, and that's all there is to it. I am so grateful that we were sealed in the temple. It was so special to me to be able to have Matthew's grandpa perform our sealing. Every time I go to a family sealing now, I get to hear him perform that ordinance again and all of the memories come rushing back. That is such a special opportunity that I had that not very many other people get to have.

Love you, Matthew! Here's to eternity!

I am so proud of my air force officer, soon-to-be doctor, and I can't wait for year 3!

Big News!

It's here! Tomorrow is December 14th, and it is the day Matthew and I have been waiting for since we started out on this CRAZY medical school process... December 14th is the day that all of the medical schools ask for a deposit to hold your seat at their school (for those accepted before November 14th). Today we finally heard from the last of the schools, so we knew it was decision time.. AHHH!!!

Schools accepted to:
1. Rocky Vista in Parker, CO
2. LECOM in Erie, PA
3. West Virginia School of Osteopathic Medicine in Lewisburg, WV
4. Oklahoma State University in Tulsa, OK
5. A.T. Still University in Kirksville, MO
6. Des Moines University in Des Moines, IA (Wait-list)

Decision...

Kirksville is that little guy at the top of Missouri

 That's right. As of next summer, Matthew and I will be living in Missouri! I am so excited. This school is awesome, and we were so excited to find out that Matthew had been accepted there. :) Yeah, just FYI, they are the school that waited until TODAY to tell us. Talk about cutting it down to the wire! Insane... But totally worth it. AT Still has such a great reputation and it will present Matthew with very promising future opportunities. Most (if not all) of the best DO's we know have attended AT Still. Ever since Matthew interviewed there, I have felt so good about it and I have been hoping he would get in there. Everything I have heard about it is SO good. The academics, the community, the facilities, the ward, the "spouse support group", EVERYTHING! I am really excited to finally get started on this new adventure together.

Want some more good news??

I don't know if anyone knows what that means. It means that Matthew has been offered the Air Force Scholarship! This was HUGE news for us and such a relief! The knowledge that Matthew will graduate from medical school 100% debt free and with a job is the best thing in the world, especially with all of the uncertainty surrounding the future of health care. We were so excited to find out he had been selected! Now we just wait for him to be commissioned (probably sometime in February) and then maybe they will steal him for a month for officer training before we move away to Missouri.

Changes are coming, my friends! It is insane and sometimes it scares me, but I am so excited. We have been so blessed recently and I am so grateful! I am so proud of Matthew for all of his hard work, and I am so happy to see it all paying off. Happy times ahead!

Med School Update! :)

TOOT ALERT! (Meaning this will be a post of tooting my husband's horn... I'm really good at that!)

Wow, what a journey this whole med school thing has been! I will make this quick, but here is an update.

The process started with primary applications. I don't remember how many, but I think we sent the first ones to about 15 schools. Matt got secondaries from... All of them, I think! We were able to eliminate more schools based on more information that was presented to us. We sent secondaries to probably about... 10 schools. Then we started hearing back for interviews. We felt humbled and blessed at the amount of interviews that Matthew was awarded! Virtually every school he sent a secondary application to he got an interview to. I was so proud of him.

His interviews were set up to where we went to Denver first, the next week he made stops in Des Moines and West Virginia, the next weekend included a trip to Pennsylvania, and the next weekend was supposed to be a trip to Oregon. We went to Denver (which will probably be a separate post) and had a blast hanging out with Keith, Angie, and their kiddos. Matt had his interview on Thursday, so we hung out from Wednesday-Saturday. We got really lucky with this interview, because it turned out that the admissions board met the day after his interview, so we found out the next day that HE GOT IN!! :) We knew for sure that next year, Matthew would be attending medical school, and that it's just a matter of finding out where!

Jump ahead... Matthew has now been accepted to schools in Denver, West Virginia, and Pennsylvania. He got wait listed at the school in Des Moines. But wait! That's not all... Just when we were weighing our options, we found out about 2 more interviews! One at a school in Missouri called AT Still, and one at... Oklahoma State University!!! He will now go to Tulsa to interview on November 16th and Missouri on November 30th. OSU was probably the biggest shock to us. Coming into this process, OSU was probably Matt's first choice. We didn't know what the chances were of him getting in because they accept 80% of Oklahoma residents... which we are not... We had all but crossed them off of our list until we found out about this interview!! I was so excited for him...

So I guess this means that we are still at a stand still. Hopefully around the first of December we will know everywhere he has been accepted and will be able to make a decision. We need to let every school know by December 15th... On top of that, as soon as Matthew found out he got in, he went and met with an air force recruiter... He had to get a physical, send in more letters of recommendation, write more essays, and fill out an extensive application. (Now you see why I haven't blogged in so long!) The physical got complicated when they tested his eye sight and failed him, which we saw coming... Then he had to get a waiver from the Surgeon General before the board would review his application... Well, after working his butt off, he got everything done at lightning speed, got cleared by the surgeon general, and now we are waiting to hear the board's decision! We will hopefully know by the end of the month... AHHH!!!

So... needless to say, life has been crazy! I am so proud of Matthew and so proud of all of the hard work he has put in to get where he is now. We have been so incredibly blessed throughout this process, and I am so grateful that he will be given the opportunity to become a doctor. The only thing more fun than chasing your own dreams is watching your husband chase his! :) I am so proud of him! Hopefully I will be able to post in another month about when and where we will be living this summer! Intense!

Until next time. (Sorry for the lack of pictures!)

TOU Marathon 2012... My First Marathon!

Ok, it's been forever again, this will take a few posts to completely update on our lives... but this is a start! On September 15th, 2012, I ran my first marathon. WOO!! That feels awesome to say... What an adventure it was! I can honestly say that it wasn't even bad! Haha of course it is freaking LONG, but I hated life so much more while training than I did during the race! I can honestly say my longest training run (18 miles) was 10x worse than a 26.2 mile race, so I'm glad the race didn't leave a sour taste in my mouth.

So here's the back story for those of you who don't know it. Back in March...ish Matthew and his sister convinced me to train for and run the Bear Lake Half Marathon. Holy crap, that seemed like a crazy task! Knowing that Matt and his sister were (and are) both 10x faster than me, I went on a search for a running buddy who would run it with me at my pace. I went straight to Nicole (thinking, who better to train with than the sister who lives in Smithfield!?). After some convincing, I got her roped into it. Both of us started talking to Angie about it and her response was "I wish I could do it with you guys!!" Well... why not?? She was easy to convince. We just got her to book a flight to Utah! Then I called Josh. If you recall from my past stories, he sounded excited to do it. Then he called me a couple of days later and created the famous quote of "THIRTEEN POINT ONE MILES!? I didn't know it was that long! I mean, I always knew a marathon was 26 point something, but I didn't think about the fact that this was... half... that..." Yeah, awesome. Despite his fear of "I'm not a distance runner, I'm a sprinter", Josh signed up and so did his wife, Ang. (Again, she was much easier to convince than her husband. :)) And there it stood! We all ran the Bear Lake Half Marathon. (If you missed that race, you can read about it here.)

Ok, so we were getting ready to run a HALF marathon (which I was pretty freaked out about) and then the week of the race, I got an email from Angie. It said "So I've been thinking... (Yeah, first problem right there!) I want to run a full. THIS SUMMER. I mean... a marathon has always been on my bucket list, and I figured we might as well do it now while we are already half way there in our training!" Ok, I'm way too competitive to be at the same running level as my sister and then let her move forward without me and move onto a marathon... I'm convinced... We signed up a week or two later for the TOU marathon here in Logan, and the training began. I already told you about how much I LOVED (heavy on the sarcasm) that, so let's just move on to race weekend.

Angie flew in kind of late on Friday night. She grabbed dinner on her way up to Logan and crashed at our place that night. Matt and I ate Cafe Rio (It actually DOES have a lot of carbs in it... rice, tortilla... beans... Ok, maybe we just love it too much!) and Angie stopped at Noodles and Co. (Ok, much more normal pre-race dinner...). That night, we chatted for a little bit and Angie and I were FREAKING out! We had both suffered set backs in our training (Angie got a nasty headcold, and I had actually been wearing a boot during the day for the final month of my training and took 3 weeks off to heal my foot in the middle of training.) but we knew there was nothing more we could do at this point. Both of our stomachs were freaking out, and so we decided to go to bed instead of talking about it any more. We woke up bright and early the next morning and walked to the finish line/bus pick-up. Luckily, my apartment is literally a quarter of a mile from the starting line, so we didn't even have to drive anywhere!

Ok, so we got our packets, got on the bus and settled in for the long ride up to Blacksmith Fork Canyon. The bus ride wasn't as bad as I thought. We just talked a little bit, tried to sleep a little bit (yeah, right!) and nibbled on a half of a bagel. It was pretty uneventful. Once we got up there, we just hit the porta-potties, drank some water, stripped off our warm clothes and got ready to run! We didn't have to wait long at all... Thank goodness! As we stood there waiting to start, Matt said he was going to run it with me. I felt WAY bad making him stay out there on his feet any longer than he needed to and told him to run his pace and I would be ok. I actually felt pretty bad later because it was so sweet of him to want to run with me, but I didn't want to make him suffer! Trust me, running at my pace when you don't have to is definitely suffering. Haha so he ran at his pace and did awesome!

Ok, so we took our place at the starting line and then we started! The whole first part of the race is pretty uneventful. You are SURROUNDED by SO many people, it's incredible! I never thought there were THAT many people who actually wanted to run a marathon! It was way cool. Luckily, the first 14 or so miles are all run in the canyon. It is so beautiful, especially in September! It was really nice to be distracted. Angie and I ran together and we were both feeling so good! We had decided we weren't going to run with a watch and we were just going to run it, do it, and not worry about our time. We had no idea how long we had been out there. Around mile 7, we decided to walk through the aid station, get some water, and pop some shot blocks. Have I ever said how much I LOVE black cherry shot blocks? Well, goodness, I love them! They taste so good just when you need them! Haha so we kept running, feeling awesome, and walked through aid stations here and there. When we got half way there at mile 13, it was the first time we saw a clock telling us how long we had been running. We ran the first half in 2:04! We were SO stoked! We both were feeling awesome and we ran the first half faster than we ran our half back in June! It was sweet. I know that everyone says that is to be expected, but we were seriously feeling awesome. I stopped for a quick bathroom break, caught up to Angie and we started going again.

Around mile 14-15 is when the spectators can actually start sitting on the side of the road cheering you on. There are no words to describe what a boost this brings! There were so many people at the mouth of the canyon screaming and cheering everyone on! I seriously get goosebumps just thinking about it... It was awesome! We ran a little farther and there I saw Nicole and Jeremy with Makelle and Parker! WOW! I never thought that would mean so much to me. As soon as I saw them, my eyes watered so bad (ok, maybe I cried... But Nicole did too!!) It was awesome. They made these awesome signs too:

I loved the signs. They made me laugh so hard. So creative. I loved it.. Then I found out later that Parker had been doing this the whole time until we got there...

Who WOULDN'T smile when they see this face!?

Nicole said he would laugh SO hard when people slapped his hand... How freaking adorable!!

 Seeing the crowd and especially seeing my family gave me such a boost! I didn't feel like I had run as far as I had! It was going my so fast and I seriously was feeling better than I ever thought possible!

Here we come around mile 15!

 Right around this time, however, things started to take an unexpected turn. For how good we felt, I didn't think anything would get to us. The night before the race and the morning of the race, Angie's stomach hadn't been feeling well. We just figured it was butterflies from the nerves and everything and that everything would calm down once we started running. Well... It turns out that was not the case. Around this time, her stomach started cramping SO bad.. I was trying to talk her through it and trying to keep her mind off of it, but I honestly had no idea what to say and I had never dealt with anything like this before! This is when I got sad that I had told Matt to run ahead of us, because I knew he would have known what to do... I was clueless... But we kept running on. We would walk through the aid stations and a little after them trying to eat a banana and drink water to calm her stomach down. Nothing was really working... She would dry heave a lot and I think around mile... 18 or 19 she actually threw up. She lost everything... I don't know if people truly understand what this means... When you are running a marathon, you NEED fuel to carry you through it... Especially if you are out running for 4-5 miles like we are. Things started going downhill. We started "fighting" from miles 18 to about 22. She was worrying about me because she didn't want to hold me back, and I told her I wasn't going to leave her and we were going to finish the race together... This fight went on for awhile. Finally she said "Lauren, I'm not going to start running again until you leave me. I promise you I will finish, but you are making this worse". Ok, maybe that wasn't an exact quote, but she said all of those things for the most part...

Here we are right as Angie's stomach started getting worse and we started "fighting"

 Holy crap!! What the heck do you do!? What would you do?? Call me a terrible person... but I jogged ahead... My eyes filled up with tears and I was so angry and sad. I didn't know what to do. I actually turned around a couple of times and thought about just running back and staying with her. Maybe I should have... Running alone SUCKS! Haha I admire people who do it alone all the time, but it sucks. I saw Nicole, Jeremy, and the kids a little bit farther up the road. I could see the worry when Nicole saw that Angie wasn't with me anymore. I started crying and told her what happened. She gave me some water and told me to keep going and she would watch out for Angie. Thank goodness I had Nicole! I felt so much better knowing that Angie would have SOMEONE there if she could just make it to Nicole. I was so worried about her.

Everyone always told me that miles 18-22 were the hardest, but I honest had the hardest time running alone from miles 22-26. Wow! It was long. Haha I got tired, but at that point you know it would just be silly to quit. I got to mile 24.5 and I saw my sister-in-law, Trisha, and her husband Chett, standing there cheering me on. I just remember hearing Trisha say "Lauren, you are AMAZING!!!" and that was all I needed. I powered through all of the pain and emotions and I knew Matt would be waiting for me at the end. I told myself everything he would have told me in all of the right places. There was a slight downhill, "Let your legs go, Lauren!" and I passed a few people holding their legs back. I got to 26 miles (no one prepares you for that blasted .2...) and I saw Matt. I don't remember what he said, but I do remember that what I thought he said and what he actually said were two different things. I knew I was supposed to kick though. So I just finished as strong as I could and gave it everything I could! I passed a few people on my way in (which I LOVE doing) and then I was done!! Holy crap... Did I seriously just do that!?

Coming over to see Parker and Makelle when I finished.

 Once Matt hobbled his way over, I told him everything that happened, and we waited for Angie to finish. All I can say is, if you want to be inspired by a marathon, watch the finish line at the end of the race! I mean, I'm sure watching wickedly fast people come in in 3 hours is freaking awesome and inspiring, and I respect them, don't get me wrong! But wow, watching people who would not quit no matter what was SO motivating for me! There were a few people who literally limped across the finish line with shredded IT bands, but they made it across that finish line! I respect those people SO much, and I can't help but think that if I was in their same situation, I probably would have quit. That is actually what I told Angie as well. Seeing her come across the finish line was one of the most emotional moments of the race. She finished SO strong, and most people wouldn't even have guessed what she had been going through just a few miles before. There was one point she was so dizzy she could barely put one foot in front of the other. But guess what.... She freaking finished!!! How amazing is that?? You hear about people bonking and dropping out of the race all of the time... But guess what?? My sister bonked and STILL FINISHED! Haha that is amazing to me. Incredible even!

The gang after the race! WOO!!

 Overall, I loved it. I loved the race, I loved that the hills weren't too bad, and I loved that I did it! If I could change one thing (and I'm sure everyone would agree with me on this), I would eliminate the dumb winding through the neighborhoods! Once you know Logan, you realize how close you are to the finish line the entire time, and how irritating that is. Haha from about 3 miles out, I could hear the announcer at the finish line! How irritating is that when you still have 3 miles left!? Overall, I loved everything about it! I came into this race thinking that it would probably be my first and only but... we'll see... :) I don't know when I will run another, but... I think I will probably definitely run another one.

Me and my honey! I couldn't have done it without him! Love him!

Quick shout out to my love! He had to deal with all of my whining, my slow pace, my dumb injured foot, my whining, my worries, oh, and did I mention my whining? I am so lucky to have someone who tells me he believes in me and helps me believe in myself! He finished the marathon in like... 3 hours and 10 minutes I think? I actually can't remember. He did freaking awesome though! Love that man!

Two of my beautiful sisters!

Another quick shout out to Nicole and Angie! I never would have run it had Angie not asked me if I wanted to. She was my little phone and email buddy for the months leading up to the race and she always kept me going! I've said it before, and I'll say it again, the race would have SUCKED had I not had her to run with. She definitely kept me going the whole time. I am so proud of her and for finishing despite having every reason not to. And to Nicole (and fam)... Their support meant the world to me! Seeing them there gave me an additional energy boost that I always needed right when they were there! I was so grateful for their support and love.

I seriously have the best family in the world on both sides! My in laws and my family were both supporting and encouraging throughout the entire training process! It is so nice to know there are people who care and people who are cheering you on! Thanks to everyone who ever gave me words of advice or encouragement throughout this process... A marathon is literally more than I ever thought it would be. You literally push yourself to a physical and an emotional breaking point. It is the best accomplishment I have ever made in my life because it wasn't something that came "easy" to me. That made it all worth it. We'll see if and when I do another one...

I DID IT!!!! :)

Summer 2012 Update

You know, I hate when I don't blog very often because then I don't give the full details on everything. Instead, I just do something like bullet-points... I will probably do that now. :)

• Matthew and I have had a fun, but pretty uneventful summer. We are both just working and enjoying the days we get to spend some time together and do fun things. One day, we went to the zoo and got snow cones. Matthew was impressed with my fabulous choice of flavors. Thank you high school summer soccer and getting snow cones virtually every day!

These monkeys were my favorite. We seriously stood and watched them for like 10 minutes

All of the pictures I took were turning out blurry, so I made Matthew take one and... this was the end result. Oh well!

And a picture that shows half of the table... Awesome. But we love snow cones!!

•  I am still "training" for my marathon... If you can even call it that. Gosh, SO frustrating! My tendonitis in my foot started acting up again, so I have been in a boot and haven't run for the past 3 weeks. Super terrifying considering I am supposed to be running a MARATHON in 5 weeks from today. Not only am I running a marathon, but it will be my FIRST marathon. Not a good start so far... Haha oh well, it is feeling much better, so hopefully I will have enough time to teach my body how to run and how to run for a really long time! I was going to shoot for a time with this marathon, but now I am honestly just hoping to finish... Sad, huh? Maybe I should just stick to half marathons instead... :) Oh well, I am still really excited to do it and accomplish something that always seemed to be impossible.

• This week I went down to Salt Lake from Tuesday-Thursday and got to see {most} of my long-lost best friends from high school. Unfortunately, Jaynee was in Cedar City, but I got to see Breanna, Megan, and Katie! It was so exciting and I have missed them so much. We laughed, talked, gossiped about old high school people, and basically just caught up. I love hanging out with them. You can always tell who your best friends are because when you see them, it truly feels like it hasn't been forever.. I miss them so much, and I am so grateful that Matthew was understanding of my need for "girl time" and let me drive down. :) I also got to hang out with my mom a lot. It doesn't seem like I get enough time with her most trips down because we usually only have a weekend and usually EVERYONE else is there too. Haha but this time it was just the two of us and it was so fun to catch up and spend some time together! We even made me a long maxi skirt that I have been wanting forever! I have been searching online stores for a skirt long enough that fits me around the waist... Apparently that is impossible, so my mom and I just decided to buy some fabric, add 6 inches on to the end of a pattern, and call it good! I am going to wear it to church tomorrow, so I will take a picture and post it later. :)

Three of my best friends at Kneaders for breakfast! {Missed you Jane!!} LOVE THESE GIRLS!!

•   And perhaps the most exciting news of this post (if you have even made it this far...) Matthew has officially applied for medical schools, got secondary applications back from every single one of them, and so far has FOUR interviews lined up! We debated on how many people to tell because... I don't know, it's weird. You almost don't want to tell anyone just in case things don't work out, but sometimes I just can't hold it in! I am so incredibly proud of him. I know this isn't a guarantee that he will get in, but he has worked so hard for these interviews and I'm so glad to see something turn up. I just hope something comes of at least one of them! So the current scheduled interviews are:

• September 10th- LECOM in Bradenton, FL (extension of LECOM in Pennsylvania)
• September 20th- Rocky Vista in Parker, CO (right outside of Denver!!! YAY!! Ok, I'm trying to be unbiased, but let's be honest, I am PRAYING for Colorado. I will go wherever Matthew wants and wherever we feel is best, but I would LOVE to live close to Angie and Keith and this is the closest option we have to home in UT... Ok, I'm getting ahead of myself. We'll just see what happens and what the best option for our family is. :) But I am excited because I will be going out to Denver with him and we will visit Keith and Angie. It will be a fun little trip for us!)
• September 27th- Des Moines University in... you got it! Des Moines, IA. I don't know much about this one, but apparently it's a really good school!
• October 5th- LECOM in Erie, Pennsylvania. This is a really good school as well. It was one of Matthew's top choices from the beginning, so we'll see if he's impressed after visiting the campus and learning more.

So anyway, we will see what happens with those. Obviously, it is getting kind of expensive with having to make all of the travel arrangements and everything, so if he gets any more then we may have to start picking and choosing which one he REALLY wants to go to... We'll see. Luckily, we have been saving for this since... we got married, basically, so we are doing good so far. :) I am so proud of him. Like I said, hopefully something will come of at least one of these interviews, but any prayers are welcome and appreciated! Matthew is a great people-person and a fabulous interviewer (I actually get extremely jealous sometimes), but sometimes a little divine intervention is nice too! :

I think that is basically everything... We have been SO blessed recently and I am so grateful for all of the opportunities that we have had to accomplish our goals. Changes are brewing around the Wright household and we can't wait to see where we will be in the next few years and what we will be doing! I will try to post updates as frequently as possible, especially with news of any big changes! So all two of you reading this will be the first to know what is going on in our life!

Until next time!

Matthew's Birthday and Spartan Race!

Well... I'm only a month late, but better late than never, right? June 9th is Matthew's birthday... It was also the same day as the Bear Lake Half Marathon, so if you ask me, I'd say his birthday sucked, but he was sweet as always and said it was great. I ordered most of his presents off of the internet... I just feel like I have no time for shopping anymore! But I was disappointed because only one of them got there in time... So I made him a card, he opened the one present he got, and then we had to rush off to the race! I was so excited to get him a remote control helicopter, and he was excited when he got it, but then it didn't freaking work!! I was so upset... We returned it and got another one and then the remote on that one was messed up. Freaking depressing... :( So we have received a refund for that one, and I'm trying to decide if we want to go for the best out of 3... We'll see. One of these days we are going to find the time to go out to the Gaucho Grill too! It is a Brazilian BBQ place here in Logan that we have been dying to try. We were supposed to go on his birthday but... again, the race got in the way. Luckily, the day of his birthday he got to run a half marathon, go golfing with my dad and brothers, and... I don't really know what else. Another good thing is the weekend before, his mom made his favorite orange cake for him. thank goodness for good mothers! I tried to make it for him last year (about a week after we got married) and I failed miserably with the frosting! That will always be a fabulous memory of Matthew telling me the frosting wasn't ruined and trying to fix my awful frosting. So this year, I just made a different kind of cake instead of trying to make the good kind. I did made the homemade frosting recipe from his mom (not the orange one, just the regular vanilla) and I am slowly getting better at it! YAY! See the pictures of the cake celebration here:

My hubby is getting too old! The box of candles only comes with 24 candles... He has outgrown that, so I decided to be a cheapskate and get creative instead!

My little hottie with his cake. :)

I always make him make a wish. I doubt he really does it, but at least he pretends for me!

And he blows them out! :)

I seriously have the greatest husband in the world. I was so bummed that I couldn't do anything super exciting for his birthday (we seriously just haven't had time), but he has been SO easygoing and so sweet about it. He is such a hard worker and makes me laugh every single day. I make fun of him for being such an "old man" all of the time, but he still has 50x more energy than me! I don't know where I would be without him in my life. I am so glad I found someone who I can have so much fun with and who makes me so happy! I love that old man. :)

To stay on the subject of Matthew... on June 30th, he had his race that he has been waiting forever for! It is called the Spartan Race. For those of you who have never hear of this race... Holy cow!! It is intense! It's basically a half marathon mud run. Sound fun? No. This is not your average mud run. It is 12 miles and has about 25-30 obstacles. Some of these obstacles include: climbing over walls, climbing up ropes, net walls, carrying a bucket full of rocks and sand up a hill, tying your feet together and jumping up a hill into tires the whole way, shooting a gun, throwing a spear, "run" through mud pits that are seriously deeper than your waist, climb up a hill under barbed wire in a mud pit, etc... And if you screw any of these obstacles up or can't complete them? 30 burpies. Haha Matthew is amazing! He only had to do burpies twice for missing the target on the stupid gun shoot and for slipping off of a wall that was practically IMPOSSIBLE to get across, especially for someone his height. Haha he was running this race in like 95-98 degree weather! Holy cow, I would have freaking passed out! But he did so good and he finished it faster than I finished my half with just straight running. Haha he is way too good. It was so fun to watch him race and watch him do something that was actually hard for him. He did so good! He is always looking for "the next hardest thing"... It is seriously sickening. So what is next on his agenda? Practically the two hardest things I think anyone can do in their life... a full Ironman and an ultra-marathon (100 miles). Yes, I am married to one of THOSE people. He seriously won't stop until he has done everything he can do. He has already done a half Ironman and I thought that was amazing. The thought of a full Ironman freaks me out though... Who does that!? I guess we'll see what comes next for him... Until then, here are some pictures from the Spartan Race!

Just chatting before the race

And so it begins!

Coming out of the first 4 mile loop

Kinda far away, but that's him in the middle climbing the rope. He reached the top at the same time as the guy next to him, but he just reached up with his way long arms. :)

Coming out of the second 4 mile loop

Heading up the mud hill. It's just a picture of his butt though. :)

Coming towards the finish line! YAY!

Doing Burpies... :(

It's over!!!

I wouldn't touch him... haha

Haha I love this picture with his parents... :)

My Spartan!! :)

Bear Lake Half Marathon 2012

Ok, so remember how I was REALLY good at blogging for a while there while I was training? Well... I didn't keep up with that very well... But I am here now for an update! On June 9, we ran the Bear Lake Half Marathon. It was SO much fun to run with Nicole and Angie and accomplish something with both of them. Running with them definitely made the race go by so much faster. I can't even imagine having to run it by myself. We chatted (mostly) the whole time and were so excited and kept each other going. I think we all took turns going through the "just go ahead and leave me" phase... I actually felt really good though and did better than I thought I would.We were like a minute over our goal finishing time too, so I'd say that's pretty good. I mean, if you average one minute out over 13 miles, that basically means your pace was like 4 seconds slower than you'd hoped for. Can't complain about that... Haha  It was a lot of fun though and I was so happy with all of the support! Basically my entire family was there to cheer us on (Dustin couldn't be there because of school), I had 4 siblings running in it with me, my in-laws were there, and then Matthew and my sister-in-law Trisha ran in it too! Overall, it was such a fun race and even more fun because of the time it created for me to spend with my family.

Matthew and his sister, Trisha, after kicking trash and finishing the race. Trisha took first in her age group!!

Trisha was running in her very first half marathon as well, and she did SO good!! She was a collegiate cross-country runner at UVU, but has taken some time off from seriously running to have 2 kids (I know, she totally doesn't look like she has had 2 children! She looks amazing!!) Well, Matt decided he was going to run it with her to give her someone to run with and motivate her and everything. (That poor girl... he is a beast to run with!! Haha just kidding, I love him.) They did so freaking awesome!! They finished in like 1 hour and 42 minutes! Trisha took first place in her age group and Matt took third in his, which also means Trisha basically took third place in Matt's age group... Freaking awesome! What kind of a family did I marry into?? Haha I wonder that every day of my life... I have to work freaking hard to try to compare to them, that is for sure! But I love my entire in-law family. They are such amazing people and so supportive.

Angie, Nicole, and I coming up on the finish line. Haha I look like I'm going to DIE!!

After finishing the race! :)

When Nicole, Angie, and I were about a mile out, I saw Matthew running towards us. It was kind of nice to have him there for about the last mile. Nicole and Angie kind of got the "Will someone please tell Matthew to stop talking" theory, but that's what I trained with the whole time! That's what I have been used to, so I finally have started to feel like it is somewhat motivating... Haha It was nice to have someone tell us about how much further we have to go and where the finish line was. It was so fun finishing that race even though we all  got pretty tired at the end. The weird thing was, it was kind of an emotional thing after working SO hard for something and pushing your body to what you feel could be its limit, finishing and being done is pretty emotional. I feel so proud of myself and my family. After every injury I've been through in my life and making the decision to quit soccer to try to save my knees, it was so nice to accomplish something that seemed to big to me such a short time before. The longest I had even run before meeting Matthew... about 2 miles. The longest I had ever run before deciding to train for a half marathon... 5 miles. I never thought I could do it, but I did and I am so happy about that!! :) Now... Angie and I (and anyone who would like to join us!) are training for a FULL marathon... September 15th, baby!! Top of Utah Marathon, here we come!! Wish me luck, training thus far has been pretty brutal and I am pretty tired on my Saturday runs, but I might as well do it now while I'm already half way there. AHHHHH!!!!

All of the people in my family who ran (L-R) Matthew, me, Angie, Nicole, Ang, and Josh. WOOHOO!!

Like I said, it was so much fun training with a bunch of members of my family and having a goal we were working towards together. I remember Josh calling me after I told him to sign up for it... He had just barely realized how far a half marathon was ("I always knew a marathon was 26 miles, but I didn't realize this would be... half... that..." haha good one, Josh!). Then he proceeded to pull the "I'm not a distance runner, I was always a sprinter! Speed and power, not long distances!!". Yeah, I pulled that one too... Haha but guess what? Ang and Josh signed up too and they freaking did it too? And guess what else? I think they are addicted as well! Haha they are already looking for another race to sign up for... LOVE it!!

Matthew and I after the race. Love this guy!

I guess the last thing I have to talk about is my wonderful husband! Goodness, this guy is awesome!! I loved running with my family during the race and chatting with them while we were training... I loved the feeling I had crossing the finish line knowing I had completed such an awesome thing. I loved training and realizing that running is such a therapeutic thing and helped me really understand my body so much more.... But what I loved the most was finding a love for something my husband has loved all along. I loved going on long runs with him (he even woke up early to run with me on Saturday mornings). I loved sharing a common interest and finding something that we could spend time together doing. Sure, he is a MUCH better runner than me, he is incredible, but he still ran with me at my pace most days unless I went without him. He was such a support to me and has always told me he believes in me and he knows I can do it. Anyone can tell you that, but there is something about it coming from your husband that makes it so much more meaningful. A million other people could tell me that they are proud of me and that I did great, but as soon as Matthew tells me he's proud of me... THAT is what makes it all worth it. :)

Anyway, I think that's it! For now... I still have lots more updates to come! Hopefully today, so stay tuned! Moral of the story is, find something that makes you happy and do it. Find something that makes you work hard, something you never thought you'd be able to do, and do it! There is no better feeling! :) And if nothing else, find something that your husband likes doing that you think you hate, and do it with him! It is kind of fun and I think they have lots of fun teaching you how to do something they excel at. Anyway, off my soapbox!

Until next time!