Well it’s official; I have the coolest wife ever. She took me to a bike race, “Colorado Crankworx,” for our 6th year anniversary. Crankworxs is a bike event that has traditionally been held at Whistler ski area in British Columbia. I don’t know the background but they decided to hold one at 
And now you moment of ZEN……this is an old picture, but it deserves to never be forgotten..
After seeing everybody warm up in their swimsuits I am convinced that these triathletes are the fittest athletes around. Needless to say, I was very intimidated. I almost backed out because I have been so busy at work I haven’t had time to train. Riding 20 miles on a mountain bike at 9000 feet above sea level and pushing as hard as you can is not the same as 20 miles on a road bike.
Anyway, like I told Eric, “I went crazy fast” on the downhill single track and we ended up being the fastest relay team. This doesn’t mean a whole lot because I didn’t have to swim or run, but we were the only female relay team and beating the boys always makes me feel good. I wore my medal around the house for a few days until Eric said it was getting old.
Eric raced in the sprint course which is a shortened triathlon. He had to swim a half mile, mountain bike 10 miles and run 2.5 miles. He worked hard for his race and lost 20 pounds in the process. He did very well and now he is hooked. They have an Xterra race in Ogden, UT in August and he was thinking about racing until he fell off his bike. Turns out he cracked his sternum, a rib, bruised his calf, and dislocated his arm. It has been over a week and I am still not allowed to hug him, touch him or look at him too hard. He must be hurting because he struggles taking the lid off the peanut butter jar.
The trolley’s stopped at each site every 15 minutes so you could get off at the sites you wanted to see and skip the ones you don’t have time for. It was perfect. I only had two regrets. First: I wish Hannah were there. It would have been much more fun with her. Second: I wish I would have brought warmer cloths. It was 60 in Denver and the forecast for DC was in the mid 50’s…..well it was much colder and the wind chill was brutal. I did the tour in a sweat shirt and froze my nubbins off.
Joe was instrumental in helping me return to the church, and the meeting was kind of emotional for me. It had been seven years since I’d last seen him and I wanted to tell him that I had been grateful every day for everything he’d done, but when I saw him it was the same old Joe, and he down played everything he did. It’s wonderful to have good friends.
As you may have heard,
By Saturday enough of the roads had been plowed that we could make it to the state park just up from our house, so we decided to go cross country skiing. It was a beautiful sunny day, and the snow was light powder – perfect conditions. The park was closed, which was great because we didn’t have to pay, so we skied in. The road to the park is about 3 ½ miles, and has great scenery. It’s almost better then the park. When we got to the park, we decided to do some exploring, and ended up having to make a choice of backtracking or going through a gully of scrub oak. We knew the scrub oak patch would stink to go through, but it was a long way to backtrack so we decided to go through. We found a dry stream bed that had slightly less trees in it and followed it down. The trees were so thick that we had to take off our skis and the snow was up to our waist. I slipped on a covered rock, and banged up my knee. I had a brief thought that I wasn’t going to be able to make it to the main trail, but Hannah broke trail and we made it out in about 35 minutes. When we got home my knee had swollen up so bad it looked like I had an orange under my skin, and now it’s starting bruise nicely.
We went to church on Sunday, and Hannah gave a wonderful talk about the importance of receiving, and showing our appreciation for the gift of the atonement. She also sang in the choir.
That night we cooked a ham, made cheese mash potatoes, salad, rolls, and cherry cheese cake for desert. After the feast, we opened our presents, and being stuffed played “fat dog” (lay on the floor).
A few weeks ago Hannah asked me what I wanted to do for Christmas. This was our first Christmas without family, so we wanted to establish some traditions. I told her I didn’t have any ideas, and she asked me if I wanted to go downhill skiing.
When I worked at
Christmas morning we got up at
That evening we went and saw the new James Bond movie and ate all of our Christmas candy.
Hannah speaking…Christmas was wonderful this year even though we did not get to spend it with other family members. Because I was preparing for a talk the weeks leading up to Christmas I made an extra effort to reflect upon why I really should celebrate the season. Christmas is about celebrating our Savior and receiving our King. I didn’t make treats or buy lots of stuff but I was happy. I was happy with the blessings I do have because of the Birth of Christ…..my life, the Gospel, eternal families, the Comforter, an eternal perspective….life is wonderful.
And now your moment of ZEN.........(I was Santa again this year)
Last week stunk. Our cat Max had been fighting a cold for a few weeks. He seemed to get better, but then he would relapse and get sick again. We took him to the vet twice, but were unsatisfied with her diagnosis – “Max is in perfect health.” Hannah found a cat specialist in Castle Rock, 30 minutes south of us, and she took him there.
Once there, she explained the history and the vet noticed that Max’s coat looked unkempt. He decided to run some tests, and found that he had the virus called Feline Infectious Peritonitis (FIP). FIP is extremely rare, and only 1% of cats are diagnosed with it. He told us that there was no cure, and that Max would appear to get better, and then get worse – never fully recovering and steadily going down hill. The decision was made to put him down.
The morning we were scheduled to put him down, Max was feeling better and purred when we picked him up. It sounds dramatic, but it was one of the more difficult things I’ve had to do in my life. I bawled like a baby. The last time I cried that hard I was a child. I really bonded with that cat. On Sundays when I’d take a nap, he would jump on the bed and sit two inches from my face staring at me until would lift up the blanket and he’d crawl in. If I rolled on his legs, he wouldn’t make a sound, just kick his way out, and then go back to sleep.
Hannah and I decided that we needed another cat right away, so we went to the pound and picked up a 15 pound black male. He’s very mellow, likes Sally (our other cat), and sleeps all day….he’s perfect. We tossed around several names, and landed on Pete…I think. For fun I’ll list a few of the names we tried on:
