Paint balling...wanna go?

About 2 months ago Shawn asked me what I wanted to do for my birthday. I thought about it for a few days then told him, " I want to go paint balling...with a lot of my friends. I just want to shoot them all!" Sounds kind of mean, I know...but I swear it came from the kindness of my heart haha. Shawn found a place to go play, he contacted my friends and family and set the whole thing up. We ended up going a week before my actual birthday, because that is when my brother and his wife could come down. 

Warning...very graphic pictures ahead!!

When Shawn made the reservations they said "We offer full gear" I guess in "paintball" terms that just means a helmet!

This is our group of paintball warriors!

And our awesome guns!

 This was our first time playing...for everyone in our group...so we were all newbies :) 

And man did it hurt to get hit!!!

 Shawn actually got hit behind the ear...and in the mouth, even with a mask on. He was bleeding...just a little.

 Good thing my brother, Cory, has a beard...if you look close enough you can see the paint dripping off if!

And now for a few pictures of some of the wounds we got...

Cory...

 My leg...

This is the group when we were all done:) All in all it was a fun night! I am so glad for the friends and family that could make it. I know a lot of you had other things going on and a lot of you just CHICKENED out...I still love you tho! 

So the question every one keeps asking me...would you do it again? And the answer is, YES! But next time I would wear my winter ski clothes...the more padding the better!

Thanks again everyone...I sure do love birthday fun!

A little Austin update

Austin got accepted to a camp with a full scholarship, just for kids with Crohns!!!

 

Have you ever had that moment when you tell your kids they can do anything!!! Oh, like be an Astronaut, and you are totally supportive and cool with it until NASA comes knocking on your door?? Well that is kind of how I feel about camp Oasis. I really wanted Austin to have the opportunity to go to this camp. We had heard amazing things about it. The camps are all over the country, but the closest one to us is in Colorado. 

The cost to go to camp is pretty expensive, but when you filled out the application there was a part to submit to see if you could get a partial or a full scholarship to pay for it. So first...he had to get accepted to go to the camp, not all kids get accepted. Then he had to get a full scholarship, because frankly with all the medical bills we have had there is just no way for us to afford it.

So when we got the email saying he got accepted we were excited a little, then when he got the email saying he got a FULL scholarship we were even more excited!!!

Then reality hit me...my son...my only son...the sick child...was going away to a camp...in a different state...for a week!!! Oh and he has to fly on a plane to get there!!!!! He has never been on an airplane, nor has he ever been in charge of taking his own medication! 

Needless to say I kind of began to panic...what had I agreed to??

But now that the excitement has settled in a little and I have had some time to think about things, I am doing fine:) Austin can do this! And so can I haha.

And another bit of good news for this amazing kid of mine...His blood work this last week came back as "Stellar" so he no longer has to take his weekly dose of Methotrexate (chemotherapy) yay!!!!!!!

 Good things are happening at our house!

This is Austin with his GI Dr. This was their last visit together, DR. Varier is moving to Oregon in June...sad day.

Ogden half marathon...my 5th half...my favorite!

This past week I had the opportunity to run in the Ogden Half Marathon. I said "opportunity" because the Ogden half is a lottery pick. There are so many people that want to run this race that you put your name in and hope they draw your name out to race.

One of the "not so good" things about this race is that they do not offer "Same day packet pick up". So that means I had to drive up to Ogden on Friday just to pick up my racing packet. They did have a runners expo with booths to visit...but nothing too fabulous.
 

This is the running bib, shirt and timing chip. Love a good long sleeve running shirt :)

The timing chip is different then any other I have ever used. It has a sticky part that connects to the other end. I didn't have any problems with it, but I did see two runners along the race that theirs kept falling off and they actually had to run back and pick them up. Not cool!

On Saturday we, yes me and my whole family, woke up and left the house at 3:30 a.m. The family wanted to support me in my race....but they also figured that if we were in Ogden that it was half way to Logan...and we might as well just drive to Logan and see the new baby my sister had.

This is me in all my 3:30 a.m. glory haha

We drove to Ogden with plenty of time to meet the buses that were leaving promptly at 5:00 a.m. But we didn't anticipate the amount of traffic that would be going to the same spot we were. We sat on the freeway off ramp for 10 minutes, I started to panic a little. Then when we got into town they had closed off the streets that led to where the buses were. So Shawn dropped me off, about 2 blocks away and I ran to the bus...getting there at 4:58 a.m.

The bus drove us up the canyon, around the north side of Pineview reservoir. It was so beautiful. When we got off the bus the sun was just coming up over the mountain, the moon was still out and the skies where clear. It was going to be the perfect day for a long run!

Now as I was riding the bus the family was trying to find a parking spot and go back to sleep for 3 hours. The girls decided to stay in their pajamas while Austin said he wanted to wear his running clothes...just in case he decided to go for a little jog??!! From what I heard no one really got any sleep... there was a lot of giggling going on...and even a few songs from Frozen were sung.

And before you know it the race had begun. Shawn had downloaded a free app that allowed you to follow a runner with their timing chip. He could see my pace and what mile I was at...it was kind of cool :) 

The kids had to take a picture with this horse statue.

 

Here I come!!!!

And there I went :)

It was actually a very emotional race for me...I had a few little personal revelations while I ran my 13.1 miles. A blog for another day...or really good stuff for Young Womens lesson:)  I had two friends that were running the race. I didn't see them the whole time. I just wanted to beat them haha...and maybe set a new Personal Best. I did that...I beat my old time by more then a minute. My new PB is 1:47:17...and when I saw my family cheering for me at the finish line I cried like a baby!

Here is my cool finishers medal :) And my stats :
476 out of 3886 overall runners
48 out of 598 women in my age group
Not too shabby! The race itself was AMAZING!!! I had my fastest mile ever on this course, 7:39! There was only one major hill at 1.2 miles...it was about a half mile long, and a few other little ones. It was a true "canyon" run. The scenery was breathtaking. If ...I said IF, I ever decide to run a full marathon...it would be this course. 

More stomach pain

A few weeks ago Shawn had a strange stomachache...it just wouldn't go away. He ended up at Insta Care and they told him it was an appendicitis...so he went to the ER. The ER did tests and said his appendix was fine, but that he had an infection in his intestines. It could be CROHNS!!! Colitis, Cancer...and a few hundred other things. So they drugged him up and sent him home with the orders to make an appointment with a GI dr.

The next two days were horrible, and when he finally got into the GI dr. they decided he was so dehydrated and still in so much pain that he needed to be admitted to the hospital. Two days and one night later he was feeling better. Austin thought it was fun that Dad was the one in the hospital bed this time and not him!

He slowly got back to normal in about a week, but had to have a colonoscopy the following week...yeah for him :)

The colonoscopy was scheduled for 7:00 a.m.

7:00 came and went...so what do we do?? We take selfies...note neither one of us was drugged up at the time...this is just what we do when we are bored!

p.s the tests all came back CLEAN!!!! They decided it was just a strange infection...antibiotics worked...and we should just hope it doesn't happen again. So glad we got to meet our out of pocket deductible the first 17 days of the new policy year...and it wasn't even from Austin...how strange is that!

Me...a model??????

I follow a group on facebook called "Salt Lake Running Co." They are a company that has quite a few stores here in the Salt Lake Valley. They posted that they were having a "Ladies Night Running Expo" and they were looking for regular ladies to come and model some of their clothes. I sent them an email with my info and the next week they sent me a response saying they wanted to have me model their things!! I was so excited :) 

I am not a model...or even close to it for that fact...I am not stick thin...I am not 5 foot 9 inches...and I am a lot older then 19 :) But I figured how bad could it be, I would be modeling running clothes, which I love! and I would only be modeling them in front of ladies.

They had me and 2 other ladies there to model. They had me model 3 different outfits.

These are them.

 All I had to do was walk down an isle full of ladies...and stand up on a stage while the hostess talked about the clothes I had on, who they were made by, their function, that kind of stuff. The audience was great, they clapped a lot for me...and we were actually laughing together at a few spots.

Shawntell went with me to be my "personal photographer" I wanted the moment documented because I didn't know if I would ever choose to do this again...or even if they would let me do it again. But out of all the pictures she took, my favorite one was actually taken in the dressing room! It was a fun night, they gave each of us a cute headband and a $25 gift card to spend at the store. They had food and fun door prizes to give out. Shawntell won an amazing backpack. It is something I would definitely do again...if given the chance.

18 years...really???

Shawn and I have really been married for 18 years, I have no clue where the time went!

Shawn was in charge of the celebration this year, and man did he do a great job.

First he  came and got me from the school, where I volunteer at, and brought me a rose. He then took me to see my boyfriend haha, Andrew Garfield...also known as Spiderman! The new Spiderman movie was amazing!

Then he arranged for the kids to be taken care of for the night and we went up to Park City to stay the night. We stayed at the Marriott Summit Watch Vacation Resort. One of Shawns friends works there and got us a great deal on a Suite.

It was beautiful! It even had a full kitchen, Shawn brought all the stuff to make me dinner and strawberries with homemade whipped creme for dessert...man he knows me well!

 This is our view :)

 The friend that works for Marriott send us this cute gift basket.

18 years babe!!!

CCFA walk

On May 3rd there was a fundraiser for the CCFA (Crohns and Colitis foundation of America). It was at Wheeler Farm. 

They had the Bear Grizzbee from the Grizzle Hockey team there to start off the walk.

 It was only a mile walk...but if you are Austin, you do it in style!

They had the Bee from the Bees baseball team also there.

 And because the "Walk" was at Wheeler farm the kids got to see the animals...always a fun thing to do.

 They had fun games for the kids to play.

 And they had face painting for the kids...adults too haha

Also they had a photo booth to take fun pictures. It was a fun day, to help raise awareness about Crohns and to raise money for research. We will definitely go again next year.