Someday I'm gonna be a trend-setter!!!

When I was collecting my talents in Heaven, I think I forgot to go through the line marked 'STAYING UP ON THE LATEST TRENDS'. (i'm not even kidding about this...everytime I think I've found something new I find out I'm like 6 months behind). Instead, I think i got confused and walked through the 'ANYTHING GOES' line twice!!!

So i'm probably way behind on this, but how cool is this app?!
I can test hearing from my iphone (if I had one, but I don't- NOT.EVEN.CLOSE. My old skool free phone knows how to call and text. period. nothing more-not even the internet).

And my research (sample size, n=1) shows that the results are kind of legit (the low frequency hearing thresholds were a little worse by the iphone than a sound booth, but close).

I'm just sayin...once I get my iphone (give me a couple years to break down the 'anything goes' part of me) I just might start working from home!!! :)

p.s. Truth be told, I hear the iphone 4s actually is something else and now I really really want one, like sooner than later!

p.s.s. Here is the link http://itunes.apple.com/us/app/uhear/id309811822?mt=8

My lucky encounter...

Turns out my encouter with THE TROLL was nothing!!!! I was telling my neighbor about the story and I guess Trolly once told her, "I hope you drop dead!!!!"

hehe, I got lucky!

I encountered The Troll...

I've heard it said for the last 3 years that the meanest-lady-of-all-time lives on the lane behind my house. She has been affectionately named THE TROLL by all the kids in the neighborhood. I've tempted fate a few times and walked down that lane and every time I have felt a little creeped out knowing that there is some mean lady somewhere waiting to chase me away, but every time I've made it without even a sighting.

This morning my ward was doing service throughout the neighborhood and cleaning up the landscape of a few homes. The home of a cute 90-year-old lady, who happens to live on Troll Lane, was chosen as a recipient. I provided my service at that house for a little while, left to get some lunch, and then had to drop off a key at a house above the lane (the street the key house is on is connected to Troll Lane). After I dropped off the key I decided to swing back by the service house to see if I could do anymore. Instead of walking all the way around the block I decided to cut through the lane to the service house... This put me in prime position for my Troll encounter.

As soon as I started walking that way, I noticed an old bearded (just stating the facts) lady and her husband standing in the lane and the second my foot left the nicely paved street and landed on the gravely lane, the bearded lady almost forcefully demanded my name. I politely responded and then she insisted on knowing where i live... I knew right then and there who I was dealing with. The husband unknowlingly saved me when he noticed my unsually large muscles (kidding) and decided I could be of some assistance to him. He had been struggling to clear a nearly dead tree branch up in his tree and decided I was just the help he needed. He had me climb up a really tall ladder and toss a rope about 6 feet in front of me over the tree branch so that he could pull the mostly severed branch out of the tree. I glady helped him and then had what i thought was a very pleasant conversation with the man and his troll. :) All the while I was thinking that this was just like the movies...some old lady that seems mean, but turns out she is just a really nice lady who has been misunderstood for years . I WAS WRONG!!! (I should have clued in when the husband mentioned that he loved people, but his wife, not so much).

After our little conversation and the service I had provided them, I figured I had earned my passage through the lane, so I continued on. The wife kind of slyly followed me down the lane, out of earshot of her husband, and then repremanded me for passing through and told me that she does not want me to ever set foot in their lane again!!!! And then she kindly followed that up with, "maybe we will see you....when we take our trash out to your street." And so I think I will side with the kids on this one and forever refer to my loving neighbor as THE TROLL!

Some things never change!

These friendships are going on something like 20 years!!

Hard to believe, but so fun that we can get together and pick up right where we left off!

Marathon Finisher!!!

Never EVER in my wildest dreams did I ever think I would run a marathon, but a few months ago my friend Heather (the one in the green)called and used her strong powers of persuasion on me and before I knew it I had paid my dues and was signed up for the Salt Lake Marathon. I think I was too easily convinced! The whole experience was about as hard as I thought it would be, but was also easier than I thought it would be! There were certain moments that were TOUGH (like mile 13 to 20, but especially miles 17, 18, and 19). I wanted to keep some food with me (cliff bars and animal crackers) in an effort to avoid "hitting the wall", so I wore a running pack around my waist, but I underestimated how much the weight of that little pack (like 3 pounds) would take a toll on my legs. About mile 13 my hips started SCREAMING! Luckily, at about mile 20, the race passed my friend Carrie's house (the one in the orange) and she and a friend named Anna were dressed and ready to join us. Their fresh legs and energy helped SO SO SO much, especially since they willingly took that stupid pack from me!!!! With that extra boost, the last 6 miles were better than the previous 6. I can now happily call myself a marathoner! I haven't seen the official time yet, but according to my GPS watch it took about 4 hours 40 minutes (I was secretly hoping for a 4 hour 20 minute race, but it was so much fun I didn't want it to stop...kidding). ALSO according to my GPS watch, which I started right as I crossed the starting line, I actually ran 26.36 miles!!! Anyway, it feels so good to have completed a marathon. Now I just hope my legs recover quickly...my knees do not currently bend!!

WIP

Long no longer

This one is for you Cari and Nikki.

Wasatch Back 2010

Our team start time for this race was 5am, so in an effort to get some sleep the night before (Thursday night) part of my team and I went up early and spent the night at our captain's aunt's house. Unfortunately for me, I don't sleep well in unfamiliar places, so it felt like I never went to sleep that night. I am pretty sure I was still awake when our alarms went off at 3:15am Friday morning. We had to be up, ready, and to our pre-race safety training at 4am.

My first run happened about 7am Friday morning and was a 5.1 mile leg. Above is a picture of me awaiting my team member (you can see him approaching in the distance).



He is passing the fancy baton (aka slap braclet) and I am off. I let him borrow the GPS pacing watch (that I had borrowed from a friend) and so the watch exchange didn't go quite as smoothly as the slap braclet.

In this picture my teammates are cheering me from the sidelines in an effort to get me to explode off the starting line, but as you can see I was having some trouble multi-tasking. Apparently, I can't run and put a watch on simultaneously.

And then I was off and running (looks like I'm gasping for air in this picture)!!!


Once our first 6 runners ran, we handed off to the second van and our next 6 runners had a turn. In the mean time, our van went to Subway for lunch and just lounged around waiting our turn to start running again.

I don't have a piture of me running my second leg, but I set off at about 5pm and man was it hot!!! This leg was definitely the hardest of my 3 legs...maybe the heat, or maybe fatigue.

We exchanged to van 2 after our second run and headed to dinner and to the Oakley fairgrounds (the race covered the most beautiful 188 miles of Northern Utah). By the time we had dinner and got settled in our sleeping bags it was about 11pm Friday night. We didn't get to sleep long (we woke up about 2:15am Saturday morning to begin our 3rd leg), but it was seriously such a refreshing night of sleep.

I think we all felt refreshed! Here are my van members bright and early Saturday morning loading up the van (we were required to wear reflective vests from dusk til dawn).

Here were my 3 legs.

The finish line was just waiting to be crossed! We just needed our other 6 runners to finish, so that so that we could all run across it together.

These last few pictures are out of order, but here I am posing with my first medal ever!

Team: Roman's Legion (the bald guy in the front is Roman)

Race time: 31 hours and 17 minutes!

Summer of Races!

I'm counting down the days until my first bike race ever!!! I would say my first race ever, but I once got tricked into running the Turkey Trot...SARA!

Anyway, I've been very excited about getting into biking. And very excited about this race on Saturday. Unfortunately, as I was getting all geared up for it (having my bike adjusted at a bike shop) I learned that this is actually a "ride" and not a "race." Funny.

The good news is that I WILL be racing in a few more weeks.....running in the Wasatch Back Ragnar Relay. (more on that when it gets here).

Let me finish this post with a picture from tonight...I had just gotten home from a 23 mile ride with my roommates (third time riding that trail since saturday). LOVE IT!!!

Sneak Peak

I'm about to start a quilting project... wish me luck!!!

I also love these!

Love this!

I've been having a serious quilting bug these last few weeks and I just can't shake it. I've spent my lunches blog-stalking about quilts and finding all kinds of treasures. Today's stalking adventures led me to this cute bag...and now I really want one!

Deliciousness

I'm going to attempt a new recipe this week. Wish me luck!!!

P.s. I made my first lasagna last week and it was so simple that I can't believe I haven't made it before now.

P.s.s. I've been looking for new recipes, now that my roommates and I have started dinner sharing, so if you have any good recipes, send them my way!

Happy Birthday Mom!!

Dear Mom,

Do you remember the time I came home from high school and caught you rocking out in front of the stereo all by yourself? I think you were perfecting your signature "figure 8" dance moves (which by the way you taught me well)!!

Or how about the time you asked for a bean burrito, B-E-E-N!

Or the quarter-twist (that's all I'm gonna say about that one)! :)

Or the time you were in a huge huge hurry and asked me to grab your newly purchased nylons off the stairs so that you could quickly finish getting ready, and I quietly snuck the nylons out of the plastic egg container, replaced the egg in the box, and handed it too you! Oh the desperation in your voice and the look on your face when you thought you had ripped off by Leggs...priceless!

Then there was the time you surprised me and flew up for my birthday just to make sure it was a great one.

And the time you endlessly sacrificed to make sure your children were happy, healthy, and loved.

But not only that, you also sacrificed for so many other people and went out of your way to help people in ways that they could not help themselves...HOTEL NORRIS is probably the best example of this (I can think of at least 7 strangers/friends who experienced a warm roof over their heads as a result)!

The list could go on and on, but mostly I just wanted to wish you a happy birthday and remind you how much you are loved!!

Love you Mom!!

Blast from the Past

So I know these pictures are from Halloween and it is now 2010, but if you are anything like me it will probably take another month or so before my brain learns to write 2-0-1-0 and not 2-0-0-9, so I figured I'm still okay to post these.

My roommates and I went as the clue characters. Our newest roommate (not pictured here) is a professional photographer, so she did this little mini photo shoot for us after our Halloween festivities. (I was the one working the camera for her portion of the photo shoot, but I had the camera turned the wrong way, so her pictures were no good)!

Enjoy!

Hobbies

Here's what I've been doing in my spare time....

Thanks

Thanks for all the birthday wishes!!! It was a fabulous day! Pictures to come.

P.S. I think I am destined to meet all of the Mike Hatch's in this world...I've already known 3 in this short little life of mine!!!

So You Think You Can Dance!!

Last night some friends and I got to see SYTYCD in action and we decided to do it in style. Thank you Walmart for providing such entertaining shirts and Michaels for the lettering on the back.

We had to alter the shirts a little to make them fit (Walmart only had few larges and extra larges), but thanks to my roommate's sewing machine and some awesome iron on letters, we were able to come up with this. Each of us took a word from the title of the show...I was "can" (just in case you didn't recognize me from the back)!

I snapped a shot of the stage before it all got started...I was hoping it would look a little cooler.

And although you can tell from our faces in this picture...we were had a great time. Stay posted for my favorite dance of the night!!

Kid Art

My friend can turn children's art into a masterpiece!! I love it. Check it out. Click on the link below and head to the gallery....
http://www.finedoodles.com/

Wedding Bliss

My roommate Allyson got married October 22. I took the day off work so that I could enjoy the festivities. Here are a few pictures from the event!

Carrie, Kaylin, Melissa, and I snuck out at half-time to go get a little snack. There is an excellent waffle place downtown that I would HIGHLY recommend, except that I can't remember the name of it right now.

I was hoping for more of a cake-smear, but they were too nice.

Congrats you guys!!! (p.s. what is up with my pupils in this picture?).