The Power of FHE

On Monday we were having family home evening and at the end we each take turns bearing our testimonies. Usually when it comes to Eliza's turn we will just whisper to her and she repeats what we say, but tonight she thought she would help Jaynie out. Jaynie paused for a moment to collect her thoughts and Eliza whispered, "you know that Jesus died for us." Both Whit and I looked at each other with tears in our eyes. There are so many times that the kids are running around crazy during lessons and seem as though they are not listening, but Whit and I persevere because the prophets have told us to have family home evening. Now I know why. Even when you don't think they are listening-they are. Maybe they just absorb it through osmosis or something, but they are getting it. I am so grateful for a living prophet that gives us guidance for our days. It is so important to spend that time together as a family learning about the gospel and if a prophet hadn't given us that commandment we may never do it.

Feel Great in Eight Week Three

Well, this week was not the greatest. I came in fourth place this week, but I am still ahead overall so don't count me out just yet. The oral surgery took a toll on me, so I lost some points, but didn't loose any weight. I am just forgetting last week ever happened and starting fresh this week. My mouth is really sore and I look like some chipmunk freak (more about the surgery to come) but this week I vow to have a perfect points week.

so that's what it feels like.... not good

well, as a follow up to the cycling story. Monday night's ride was shortened due to thunderstorms and of course hail. That's right cold winds, cold water, and hail... fantastic really. Let's you know you're alive. Thursday rolls around and my buddy Duane was like...hey let's do a group ride and i was all... okay let's do it. It turns out there is a group ride on Thursday nights. The group follows the same loop as the Monday night ride, but there is one small difference. That difference being the fact that the real men (including some hard core ladies) ride on Thursday. See, I thought the men were out on Monday and i felt cool that i could at least hang with them, uh... wrong. Turns out on Thursdays, cycling robot monster freaks come home from training in the alps or 100 mile rides with Lance Armstrong or 6 hour spinning classes or leg shaving lessons or wherever the fetch else they might spend their days and they look to destroy each other on their fancy race bikes. So i hung with cyborgs for a little more than half of the way and i kept thinking, 'holy crap we're going fast' and 'I think my legs are going to fall off' and 'is that blood in my lung?' and 'do these guys sleep in their lyrca?' and other thoughts like that. Each lap the group picked up the pace and for the most part I was able to hang. We started up the largest hill in the loop and I stomped up the hill with the rest of them. At the top, my legs were toast and i thought that for the most part the group's pace would slow so that i might recover and keep hammering. Not so, not even close, the group gets to the top of the hill and no one slows, in fact the leaders hammer harder and i quickly find myself going from the middle of the pack to the end of the pack in a matter of seconds and then seconds latter the pack is gone and i'm out of the windstream and they are pulling away at 30+ mph. I hit it as hard as I can, but it's too late I've been dropped. Being dropped is the cyclist way of saying, "i am better than you, so much better that i am going to ride away from you and never look back". It was very humbling...to say the least. So that's been on my mind a bit more than i'd like to admit, definitely more than i'd like to admit on the internet, but there it is, I am bothered by getting dropped. A lot of self discovery happens when you are at the limits of physical exhaustion.

down, but not out

okay, I'm what some people might call 'accident prone'. I consider myself a person that pushes the limits of my own abilities to improve my skills (like my bow-staff skills). I usually find those limits by crossing them and... well alright I'm accident prone. For the record, it has been over 1 year since i have needed to go to the emergency room/prime care for any of these accidents, usually i just end up with bruises and cuts. So yesterday Duane and I headed off on a long group ride with the local bike shop. The group quickly broke apart as some serious rain rolled in. After most of the group headed back to the shop and out of the rain, we ended up riding through the city with a dude name 'wade the blade'. We finished the loop, left wade, and seeing that we still had a little time before we had to be back continued on our epic wet ride. We were soaked with the rain coming down and the water coming off the tires and spaying us. The feeling of being covered in road juice was nothing short of nasty, I don't recommend it. Anyway Duane is an admittedly stronger rider than I am. He's lean and mean and has a lot more years in the saddle. I can manage to hang with him for the most part (except on long climbs, he's like a mountain goat) as long as i spend most of the time drafting off him. The real secret to cycling is resting as much as possible behind other riders so that when it comes time to lay the hammer down you have enough juiciline in the ol' quads to sprint (at least that's my theory). So, Duane is out in front and I'm hanging on for dear life. His rear tire is spitting up a sweet rooster tail of nastification road grease and dead possum from the wet street. I found that the best way to avoid the rooster tail was to ride to the side a bit, not too much to get hit by cars and to still keep his draft, and to put my front wheel just a little past the line of his rear wheel. Looking back at it, it is not a good idea to be on top of a guy like that regardless of the weather and especially not in the wet. We were on our 36th mile and he came to the left a bit and I didn't get out of the way in time and my front tire got caught under his rear wheel and... "DOWN GOES GIFFORD". The impact wasn't too severe and the feeling of sliding along the road was very... uh... different. My senses were heightened and i could see and feel the road sliding underneath me, quickly at first and then slowing to a stop. I stayed clipped into the bike and if you were able to look at me from above i would have looked like i was still pedaling away, just laying down doing it. Of course, to add the insult, there had to be a bunch of cars that materialized just in time to see me go down and they all had to stop to make sure i was still alive. After I got up, I just waved and told them i was alright, humiliated, but breathing. All said and done, the left shifter has some scratches and i have some rash on the arm and calf, but very minor. Good times. Tomorrow night there's another group ride, wish me luck, i'll let you know how the sprint goes.

Feel Great in Eight Week Two

So I hate to brag, (sorry to all my friends who will read this and are competing against me)but I am totally kicking trash with my feel great in eight challenge. I had the most points again this week. I am pretty excited. I just have to keep it up and no one will be able to beat me. Unfortunately, this week I have to get my wisdom teeth out so that may mess up my score a little. I think I can still get all my points in if I just make lots of fruit smoothies and drink V8 juice-ugh. Whit tells me it's not that bad. I am mostly worried about my workouts. I'm hoping to get a good walk in in the morning before surgery, but we will see how starving I am. I can't eat anything before the surgery and surgery isn't until 10:45 a.m. Anyway I lost 1.8 pounds this week making my total weight loss 6 pounds. Only 18 to go. I put on some pants and a skirt that I haven't been able to wear since before Addie so that made me pretty happy. I still have a long ways to go, but I really feel like I can actually do it.

Sweet Adeline

Adeline has started sitting up and is doing really well. I practice with her and the girls like to help. In this instance I had laid Addie down on the floor to play in the toy room with Lillie and Eliza and left to do something in the other room. Lillie then took it upon herself to practice sitting up with her. When I came back this is what I found. I don't know how long she had been like this, but she stayed that way long enough for me to get the camera and almost snap the picture before she fell. (this picture is actually a reenactment-sorry) I was pretty impressed at how long she stayed up and I thought it was cute that Lillie and Eliza were rolling the ball to her. Unfortunately Lillie and I had to have the talk about how it is not safe for her to sit Addie up by herself with out mom around because she could get hurt.

Addie has also started to eat rice cereal. Well at least she gets it in her mouth-she spits out most of it, but she is starting to get the hang of swallowing. She really enjoys sucking on the spoon however. Next time I think I will let her suck on on spoon, while I try feeding her with another. Maybe that will work. Also do you like her new high chair? We had some gift cards left over from when she was born so I bought a really nice one. I thought the bright colors in this one were adorable and it matches my kitchen great. It's amazing how different baby things are just from when I had Jaynie. This one has four wheels so I can roll it all around the kitchen and it folds really flat for storage. My favorite thing about it is the tray. It comes with a tray cover so you just pop off the cover, wash it and pop it right back on, rather than removing the entire tray. Sometimes I wish I would have thought of these things. Pure Genius. The high chair is a Chicco brand. We also got a Chicco car seat that I have been very happy with. So if anyone is shopping for baby paraphernalia-Chicco makes great stuff. They are really great quality, but not too pricey.

Slide Show

I have had a couple of questions about my slide shows. They are really easy, but you have to have Picasa (which is a photo editor/storage program that you download through Google) on your computer. I download all of my pics straight into Picasa-it's really great because you can blog straight from there. For the slide show you have to download pictures to a Picasa Web Album and make sure it is marked public. Then you just go to the customize page on your blog click on "Add Page Elements" and select the slide show option. Your source will be Picasa Web Album then check the "Album" box and it will ask for your username-which is your email address associated with Google/Picasa and it will bring up a list of all the web albums you have put on the Picasa sight. You just select the one you want and there it is. Easy peasy.

Feel Great In Eight Week One

I just got back the results from my feel great in eight group and out of the twelve participants I got the most points this week. I am kind of proud of myself. I really focused on it and did awesome and I feel great. I can't believe how great you feel when you eat right. I only had one sugary thing all week and all my other food was good carbs, proteins, and fruits and veggies. It is amazing how great you feel when you eat right.

The exercise was hard to fit in, but I just gave up on my house and did it. Maybe this week I can try and get it all in. I just have to balance. It was spring break so we were off schedule. Hopefully this week we can get in a better routine and I will get the exercise and house work done and still find time for the kids.

One of my favorite parts of this week was the time I took to read my scriptures. I am embarrassed to admit that I am not the best scripture studier. I go through phases and read really well and then life gets the best of me and I slack off. So it has been a long time since I have read everyday for a full week. I read and answered all the questions in the Sunday school manual and read the relief society lesson. I have been in the primary presidency for over two years now and I have missed hearing those lessons, but hopefully I can stay on track and study them on my own.

I also lost some weight this week so that is a great bonus. I lost a total of 4.2 pounds leaving me with only 19.8 to go. My hope was to loose 3 pounds a week, so I am right on track.

Today we had an exercise class with a personal trainer in our ward and she worked me to death. I hope I can walk in the morning. But she got me rethinking my exercise routine so hopefully my workouts this week will be even more effective, at least with toning and shaping my body. Having babies has really taken a toll on my body, and I promised myself that after I had Adeline I would take the time to reshape things. At least in time to have another one:)

whit's first blog

i am an out and proud blogger. i am excited that my wife has found an interest in the blog world and i am anxious to show my support by making my first post (although she may delete it while i'm at work). take a look at the pic, it is a little side project i worked on. it is for a 24' long built-in bookcase/entertainmnet center for the parents of some of our friends in the church. i had my amigo duane help me on the installation and it went pretty darn well. it was quite large, but all fit together well, and i'm pretty sure the family was happy with it. let's see what else...uh.. well, i can also say that while Jaynie is out for spring break i am able to ride my bike to and from work. i am enjoying the road bike and it has been a good break from running. i do miss the quiet mornings doing my long training runs, but riding with friends has been fun. oh ya, i provided the pics for the slide show up in the corner so.... you know... i'm pretty blog savy...

Feel Great in Eight

Sunday I started a "Feel Great in Eight" program that I am super excited about. It is a challenge that requires you to eat good foods, exercise, read your scriptures, and say your prayers for eight weeks. A group of about 10 ladies from church are participating. We each put in $10 and we have to track our points and at the end of the eight weeks the person with the most points wins the pot. We started on Sunday March 30th and it will end on May 10th. I really needed something like this to get me started with loosing my baby weight. I have to turn in my points every week so I have someone to hold me accountable, which is what I really need. I don't do very well when I am on my own. By the end of the eight weeks I hope to have lost 24 pounds, be in the habit of reading my scriptures daily, and be able to run a 5k in 30 minutes. On top of all that winning the money would be a great bonus. I am going to use my blog to track my progress so every week you can expect an update. It has only been two days and I already feel so much better. I can't wait to see how I feel in May.

Nothing like a flood to make you clean out your closet

Sunday morning Whit woke up at 5:45 a.m. to wet carpet in our master bedroom closet. Our washer had flooded our laundry room and it had run into our closet. We caught it in good time-the water only reached half of the closet. Whit got the water stopped, pulled up the carpet and pad, borrowed a shop vac and fans from Kim and Duane and had the problem all solved by 8:00 a.m. Unfortunately he didn't make it to his early morning meetings, but we got to ride to church together for the first time in a long time. Last night Jason Grigg and his family came over last night and we had family home evening together and then He and Whit put down a new pad and relaid the carpet so it is as good as new. It's great to have connections with people like Jason when you have a crisis. Jason serves in the bishopric with Whit and they have become pretty good friends. Thanks Jason. It was great to be able to have FHE with his family as well. On the up side my closet was pretty unorganized and messy so this has given me a great chance to get rid of things we don't need and reorganize everything.