I like your friends, they're all so Artsy

Friday night we went to the Utah Arts Festival in Salt Lake. I love going to the arts festival. Not so much because I love art, but because it is something to do in the summer, and I love summer. I REALLY love summer. And since the arts festival is in the summer, I love the arts festival (you can’t fault that logic). My brother BJ wanted to come, so we decided to take the Frontrunner train from Roy to Salt Lake. I must admit it is a nice way to travel. We didn’t have to drive, and we didn’t have to park, we didn’t have to worry about any of that, and that was nice.

We arrived in SLC about the same time as a really awesome looking storm cloud. As we walked toward the festival I was getting worried that we would pay our money to get in, but the obligatory gyro, and then eat it in a rain storm. We made alternate plans to go and get pizza if it started raining. But we bought our tickets and went into the festival. We watched some cute girls do their belly dance routine (and ran into my Aunt Lind and Cousin Audrey!)

After looking at some art I started to see flashes and hear rumbling. Anyone who knows me can totally guess my next move. Yep – I ran out of there and to the pizza place as fast as I could. Luckily my group followed me and we were inside just in time for the skies to open and a really awesome rain storm to come down on SLC. We waited for a while and then ate our dinner. We could see it clearing up by the time we were done and we were able to go back to the arts fest.

There was still quite a bit of art set out, so we looked at that for a while, and then settled in to watch some performers. We thought we were going to watch some karate dancing guys like we had seen some years before, and yes they were there, but the show was mostly these very scantily clad girls dancing. It wasn’t what I thought I was waiting for, but most of it was still pretty fun. Some of it was a little crazy – the girls were a little to Vegas at times. We walked around and listened to the last few bands and closed down the show. Then we rushed to catch the last train back to Ogden. We accidentally ended up on the Murray Central train instead of the train to the station. That caused a little stress, but we still made it with a good five minutes to spare.

We didn’t get a chance to look at a lot of the art that was displayed, but my favorite had to be the popcorn art (someone had glued popcorn to a canvas and that was their art – only $300). They also had some nice ones of pressed leaves. I may have to look into do that myself.

I went Goofing

Playing golf is not my favorite way to spend my time. When I was a kid we used to go golfing with my parents. They went golfing each Saturday with my aunt Jenny. The kid that went golfing would be rewarded with their very own Big Gulp at the end of the round. I went a few times, but it was never my favorite thing to do. Eventually I stopped going (I was probably about 10).

Fast forward about 12 years and my friend Bethany somehow signed up for her company's golf tournament. So we signed up to take lessons together. I had high hopes to learn and become a good golfer. The guy that taught our class wasn't the best teacher. He would go on and on about how I was too tall to use women's clubs, and how women can't use men's clubs. He would get stuck on that subject and forget to actually teach. However, after my lessons I went out with my parent's and my sister Val to play 9 holes of golf. So here I am, straight out of lessons - thinking and concentrating on all the things I learned: bend your knees, keep your head down, watch your grip... Here Val is, not having played, and not caring how she does. Yeah, she beat me. Everyone beat me.

Fast forward another six or seven years. I haven't played golf since the day with my family. For some reason I decide it is a good idea for Father's day to offer to take my dad golfing. Oh wait, now I remember, I don't know how to golf! So Matt takes me to the driving range on Thursday. In my first 20 or so strokes I hit the ball twice. It took me a LONG time to get into the groove, but eventually I found it and I was able to hit the ball in a relatively straight line for an OK distance.

I may be ready for this golfing thing after all.

Training - Week 4

I did much better this week. Monday was my last day in Yoga. I like the class, but I don’t know it if it worth the money for the class, and I don’t know if I am just too darn self conscience to be able to go to a class with skinny flexible people. I liked my beginning class, full of people like me.

Tuesday I did my three miles early in the morning. I was working on going a little bit faster than I have been – the same thing on Wednesday. On Thursday I did 4 miles, and I averaged 4.7mph (which is good for me walking). I was happy about that. Friday I took a rest day. My legs were feeling pretty sore by this time in the week and the rest did me good. Saturday I did 6 miles, almost a half-half marathon, and I averaged 4.6mph. That is around a 13 minute mile. I was happy about that. I am finding that I go faster the longer I have been going. It kills me for the first couple miles to go over 4 mph at all. But by mile 6 I was at 4.8 and not even pumping hard. Funny how that works.

So that was my week. I am doing better at sticking to my training. Unfortunately I am still gaining weight like crazy. I am trying to eat well, but a bad meal here and there and I gained 3 pounds last week! Oh well. Hopefully by body will get used to my new routine and pounds will start to go off instead of on.

Training log - week 3

I am hoping that by blogging about my training for the half marathon I will be more devoted to my plan. So you lucky people get to either read about my triumphs and failures as I train for my half (to walk the half - even less cool).

This is the 3rd week of my training program. I didn't do very well in weeks 1 or 2. When I signed up for the half I had this great plan that I would start training in June, but over the winter I would just work on getting in shape. Yep, I was supposed to be about 20 pounds lighter by now. Oh well, I won't let that hold me back. So my training plan is fairly easy - I found it online and it seems totally doable. This week, I was supposed to cross-train, or do an easy workout on Sunday, rest Monday, 3 miles each Tues and Wed, 4 on Thurs, Cross train on Friday,and 8 on Saturday.

I missed Sunday (and most of week 2) so I decided it would be OK to go out and do 3 on Monday. Besides that, I am trying to get my mind and body used to getting up at 6 to exercise. So I get up, I set off, and about 2 miles in to my 3 I just get sick. I barely made it home. I stumbled into the house, afraid I would pass out I wasn't going fast, but I was hit with a migraine half way through my walk. I ended up calling in sick to work and sleeping until 3. Yucky day.

Because I was sick on Monday, I justified not going out Tuesday morning. I knew I would work out after work. OK. I don't work out after work. I just don't seem to find the time. I fooled myself into thinking I would do my 3 miles after work on Wednesday too. Nope! But Thursday I was good and went out in the morning and did 4 good miles. Since I had missed two days, I got up on Friday and did 3. Matt came with me to do those. It is very nice to have a partner. Today I woke up at 7 and headed out to do 8 miles. I haven't done this many in a long time, so I was a little worried, but it felt good. At half of a half marathon, I was almost on my desired pace (I want to do the half in 3 hours. I was about 2 or 3 minutes off that pace). So not bad. It was good weather and I love the trail by the river that I can walk on.

So that was my week. I am also trying to eat more healthy. I have started cooking more often, and using vegetables. Crazy huh? We will see how long that lasts and if it helps.

If you have any advice on how to stay on my schedule, I would love them!

"Disney" "Christmas" and "Train" - it has to be good

When I am bored – I sometimes use the internet to look up all things Disney. I read an article a month or so ago about the Christmas Train Tour that left from LA and was going all around the US. I checked and yep it was making a stop in Utah. Even better, it was stopping at the Union Station in Ogden. I made a mental note to not miss it and went on my merry way. I hadn’t heard anything else about it but I kept it in my mind and would check the web site to remind me when it was happening.

Yesterday was the day. Still, I hadn’t really heard much about it, so I figured it wouldn’t be too busy. My friend Dawn went first thing in the morning and told me not to bother going because the line to get on the train was an hour and a half long when she got there at opening, and was about 4 hours long by the time she left. She said they had carolers, but they only came out once while they were there. There was no good free stuff. There was a short preview for the movie, but she thought it would be too scary for her kids. So it was no good for her.

I was pretty disappointed about this. But since we live so close I decided we should swing by after work anyway. Matt and I hopped in the car, and after the adventure of finding a parking spot we walked over. Dawn was not kidding! We followed the line – knowing we were not going to wait in it, but curious how long it was. We walked the entire distance of the station before we found the end. Yep – about 4 hours. Since we got there about 5:30, the poor people (with their little kids) who were in the back of the line were destined to be there until after 9! I am impressed with people who will wait that long. We walked around and took pictures and then waited about 10 minutes to see the 3D preview of the Christmas Carol movie.

The movie looks like it will be good enough. Jim Carey is Scrooge – Matt said his voice is too young, but maybe they will do something about that in post production. It is going to be a motion capture movie (Sorry Chrystie) and some of it is a little strange. Mr. Darcy is Fred – and I didn’t really like seeing him with bad teeth like that. But that may just be me. We will have to see how the movie turns out. But I won’t be waiting in a 4 hour line for the movie either.

The Outside of the Christmas Train
The people in line Behind the 2 hour wait sign. They have a long way to go.
Me, outside the blow-up theater. Sorry Dad, but they had fake snow

Fun in Up-State Utah

I was reading an article on a SkyWest flight once that was talking about all the fun things there are to do in “Up-State Utah”. They meant Ogden and north. I like the sound of Up-State Utah – Classy.

Saturday, Matt and I attended an Arts Festival in Up-State Utah. There was a free arts fest at the Union Station. I had read about it in the news paper, and it sounded fun – and free. Free makes things a lot more fun. We lucked out and the weather was being agreeable when we went on Saturday afternoon. It wasn’t as big and crazy as the Salt Lake Arts fest, but I didn’t expect it to be. I noticed the art was a lot more folksy – nature photography, jewelry making, and wood carvings – than the crazy art that was at the SLC one. But I liked it a lot. We looked around for a while and listened to the free music. Fun.

We then jumped in our car and drove down to Sandy to go to our niece’s dance recital. At about Bountiful we hit the most amazing downpour of rain I have seen in a long time. I was joking that we were driving under a waterfall, but it really seemed like that. People were pulling over on the side of the freeway, or just stopping. Matt did a really good job of getting us through it, though it was slow going all the way to Alta High with the roads just being soaked.

The dance recital was adorable! The little girls are so cute when they are trying to remember the dances. Cailey was so cute. She did a tap dance to Disney’s “Tail Spin”. Then, during the finale, she did her little dance with her group, and stuck around to do the dance with the next group too. We were all just dying laughing – it was SO CUTE! (did I mention it was cute?) Also, the whole program was only 45 minutes long. Perfect.


After congratulating our little dancer, we went to have dinner with Ray and Joan (Matt’s Grandparent’s). They always make us the most yummiest of food. It was great, and we love to spend time with them.

I will have to see what pictures we have of the dance – but just to ensure that I am not as big of a slacker as last time, I will publish without photos for now. More to come!