Crikey...Disney World!

Brandon and I went to Florida to Walt Disney World with my cousins.Everything was all decorated for Christmas and just wonderful. We went to all of the Disney parks and came home happy and exhausted!
My cousin Katie is probably the coolest little girl ever-she pulled this face out of nowhere:)
Brandon and his glorious turkey leg.
We are quite good at making ourselves as ugly as possible.I guess we have a lot to work with:)

Below is what first really attracted me to Brandon- his ability to make chins.

My Birthday of All Days!!!

Yay 26! So yesterday(November 30) I came home to this surprise-

Brandon went to my house while I was at work. He did a lot of home improvement things that I've needed to be done for a while-including getting some blinds in my kitchen. He topped it all off with the table of fabulocity! He also gave me the Flight of the Conchordes DVD and an amazing watch-which I l-o-v-e!
My birthday dinner with the fam was at the Porcupine Grill and my parents got me new ski clothes and Sara embroidered towels like the ones we used to play with at my Grandma's house-so cute! Then we went home and had my most wonderful ice cream cake.Thanks family and Beej for the best day!

Baby Maggie!

Here is Nate and Mary's new wee one! Little Maggie Daily was born on Sunday.Congrats!!!

Time to Celebrate!!

We decorated my Christmas tree in my condo yesterday! It's just a teeny, tiny baby tree but excellent cause it's my first very own tree with my very own decorations that I've saved over the years! I was hyperventilating the whole time cause I was so excited:) Now I just need to find a star to top it all off...:)

A Thanksgiving Miracle...from Satan...

Well, I survived the glorious marathon (in a personal record breaking worst-time- ever!) and was sooooo excited that my body held up for me to finish. I guess I'm paying for it again. So lately my nerve pain in my hamstring area has been coming back-but now it's brought friends! I now have a line of hurt all the way down to my foot on my right leg. I'll wake up in the middle of the night will crazy Charlie Horses in my calf, it's nuts! I also have had about a week of having a super sore calf (like the day after you've had a tough workout and your muscles are sore and stiff)for no reason. So I went back to the doctor and told him that and he said that my L5 is to blame (I guess that's the name for the part of my spine, I don't remember doctor lingo :)) and that my nerves are irritated and make my muscles contract, but don't let them release-well that blows! My back is way lame right now-we are in a huge fight. So I guess the point of this whole thing is to say that I have to go back for another epidural. Sad huh? This time he's putting the steroid in a more centralized location or something to just get rid of the pain. So here's an ode to my pity party...

WE DID IT!!!!

New York Marathon...DONE!!! Brandon and I went to New York City with his family to run the marathon. It was the coolest marathon I have and probably will ever run. What a cool race- you start in Staten Island and run across a bridge on your first mile in Brooklyn. Then you run along 4 more bridges while you go through Queens, the Bronx, then into Manhattan where you finish at Central Park. There are tons of people throughout the whole route cheering you on. People hang out of the windows of their apartments yelling, and bands on the streets playing music. There were rock, country, and calypso bands- and a few rappers too. It is so cool how much the city gets into this marathon. We took it very slowly because of the body problems Brandon's mom and I have been having, and I think it payed off because we got faster and at a good pace and I didn't really feel any substantial back or leg pain until like mile 15- which is great cause most of my runs before, this the nerve problem would kick in at like 1/2 a mile-pathetic. There was so much to see (like Katie Holmes...Yes, we saw her but didn't know it was her till the next day when we saw her in the paper and recognized her outfit. Wierd...) that we jogged and just enjoyed the experience. The biggest problem came for me at 20 when for some random reason my foot began hurting like crazy! So...I stopped and walked-oh well, I don't care about my time, and it really hurt so it was okay. Brandon stayed and walked with me(his brother and mom had gone on ahead), then I told him to go and he ran off like a bat out of hell at mile 24. I kept walking to 25 (I had tried a couple of times to run but it was incredibly painful) then I decided to bite the bullet and run the last mile. So I started hobbling and got more and more used to the pain and ran the last mile through Central Park. Yes! The finish line-Hallelujah! Then we hobbled down to the subway and collapsed into nap time.

But anyway, so for the rest of our trip, we hobbled our sore bodies around town to see the sights. We went to the coolest exhibit called the Bodies Exhibition. They had these real bodies that had been treated and they strip them of certain parts to show different systems of the body. It was absolutely incredible. We went to Time Square, Top of the Rock (Rockefeller Center)



and saw "Wicked". It was such an amazing trip and I think that we will probably end up doing this marathon again. What an experience.
Oh and we stayed with Spencer and Nicole Clawson a few nights in their cute apartment by the temple and Central Park-they are the best! Anyway, with all my problems- it ended up being just a randomly great day for my back, all things considered, and it was well worth all the problems I've had. Brandon also did awesome in his first marathon and was so sweet to stay with me when I had to stop and walk those last few miles. SUCCESS!!!

Babies!!!

Mary's baby shower at Lauren's...

Well, baby number one has arrived! Catherine had little baby Bjorn Larson early yesterday morning. He is the cutest blob (he was 8lbs. 14 oz.) and looks like an old man. Congrats Cath and Christian!!!


Brandon is the very first asian Bjorn has ever met...what an honor!

Something new...

I just got some pictures from a month ago and just thought I'd put up something new on my tremendously exciting blog...



The top is my niece Lucy and bottom is Brandon and me with some of my cousins after my Grandma's funeral.

REAL SL...what to say...

We are VERY photogenic...


Brandon and I went to the last Real game because his co-worker was playing the Star Spangled Banner with his electric guitar. It was Brandon's first soccer game (other than my weekly indoor games) and it was excellent!

My lucky day :(

So I have quite possibly the worst luck of all time. Anyone who knows me very well knows that I have had back problems for years. The last two marathons I've run I've gone in for cortisone shots before each marathon, and my Escape from Alcatraz triathlon time was well, let's just say it wasn't as good as it could have been because I almost personally amputated my back during the bike part to ease the pain...

Anyway, so since June I've had this crazy pain in my hamstring and thought I pulled it. After continuing to run on it, it got worse and worse to the point where I would have this stabbing knife pain in the back of my leg randomly/frequently throughout the day when I wasn't running or even doing anything, then it would spread to my bum, hips, and back. I just kept training even though the pain was awful. So finally I went to the doctor thinking that I pulled my hamstring, turns out that I am having Sciatic nerve problems in my back that I've been masking for years with the cortisone and it's just getting worse.

I had to go in for an MRI a week ago (While I've been taking a boat load of pills- a steroid pack, Loritab, and Ibuprofin), and let me tell you what a weird experience that was! So I opted for Valium because I'm slightly claustrophobic, and hello-fabulous! I walk into the room and check for possible wedgies because I am warned over and over that if I move at all they will have to start over- and who can resist picking a wedgie for 20 minutes! Then you lay down and get moved into this tunnel that has zero room and the fun begins. You lay there while the machine goes crazy and is all loud and disturbing, but lucky for me I was so medically-induced relaxed that I could have been in the middle of an open fire battle in Iraq and not flinched a muscle!

So long story short, I have a mild broadbased posterior nerve impingement (yeah not sure exactly what that means, but all my pads between my back bones that lead to my sciatic nerves are bulging or slipped or something) but physical therapy won't do anything and my doctor doesn't want me operated on because I'm so young, so I now have to go have steroids injected into my back with a needle while I'm having a real time xray. Again-not really sure what's going on. But the worst part is that I can't run, bike, or swim-I can't do squat! I have to completely leave everything alone until I can have this intervention done to my back to see if it is effective.

What does this mean- I will probably be setting the record for least fast person ever running(or crawling) the New York Marathon. Ahhhh, how great to have the back of a 90 year old...Life has a swell way of giving you a sense of humor...

It's Business Time!

I know you're all dying to know what has been going on since my last post. I got tired of looking at the same stuff so now that's it's officially fall, we can reminisce about September 2007.

Brandon and I are still training for the New York marathon. I will be honest though-we have not been faithful followers of the training gods. We have tried, but are being a bit too casual about it. All things considered,we have been doing our long runs and we know we will finish the marathon and are way psyched about finding bakeries to visit on the marathon route to stop at and taste deliciousness along the way. Doing these yearly marathons has had the opposite effect on me as I think most people- I care less and less about my time and more and more about enjoying the ride...Hooray for lazy marathoners~!


My teeny tiny grandma Hales passed away two weeks ago. She was the sweetest lady with the best old-lady-raunchy-sense-of-humor personality. She had been sick for some time but always had a smile on her face and was so fun to be with. I will miss her cackle hello on the telephone, her wanting to know all the latest gossip, and how much she loved all of us. I couldn't have had a better Grandma:)

Oh and school is alive and well at my little classroom at West Valley Elementary. This year I have been so lucky as to have an autistic boy and a boy that whips girls and kicks boys in the face at recess-oh and both have the same name. Needless to say that this particular name will never enter into the names of my potential future children...Other than that, school is good. OH! and I almost forgot. So turns out I am probably going to get my masters in education cause I just found out that I'm already halfway there and didn't even realize it (way long story, and no I am not a complete idiot) so anyway-yay for ignorance!

Oh and Brandon's news...he's still a wasian. Thank you and goodnight.

Happy (late) Anniversary!

So our real one year dating anniversary was in July, but because of scheduling stuff, we just decided to celebrate it on Labor Day evening. It's been the best and funnest year ever, so I can only expect that it will get even better. I know I've turned into a cheese ball, but I guess it was bound to happen sooner or later;) Brandon took me on the best date with all sorts of surprises, it was incredible!

Our new arrival!!!

Not to be outdone by all of the peeps who are popping out children these days, Brandon and I got our own little bundle of joy. Don't be deceived though, this is not the Wicky we all know and love- it's our new baby Charly.They are both pekingese's though, the best dogs! Let me remind everyone though that Charly is not replacing Wicky, she is merely adding to his majesty! She is teeny tiny and has the funniest underbite with her sharp teeth sticking out of her mouth. Mostly I love her cause she's and Asian like Brandon...I wonder if she too can weld a Samurai sword?...

The Zoo!!

TO celebrate Labor Day, we rid ourselves of our white outfits and went to the zoo, along with every single other child in Salt Lake County...

Cali!

Right before I had to go back to real life, Brandon, Sara, and I drove to California to visit our friend Richturd Curtison. We drove through Vegas and Brandon took the $100 Sara gave him for gas and made us all gamble at Treasure Island. It was the first time I'd ever gambled, and needless to say I lost all my money from him. I didn't want to spend the money, but Brandon made us use it, and he wouldn't take it back. I lost $20 at the Roulette (I don't even know how to spell it that's how green I am) table in 3 tries, but Sara and Brandon kept us alive, well pretty much Beej did it himself. We ended up with $160 so we used our new $60 for treat money! Yeah! It was especially excellent because I lost everything-well, it's probably because I'm so righteous. Anyway, we got to Cali and Rich showed us an excellent time. We crashed in his room and made him sleep in every day, except Disneyland day. We went to the beach, the horse races (where Brandon got a little tipsy with excitement, oh and we didn't win a race there either), Disneyland, and we also discovered Flight of the Conchords, which is hilarious if you haven't seen it. Anyway, we rocked it in California and love the Curtis's for letting us invade!...I love you Turd!!