Weekend Rewind

I totally forgot to do a Weekend post. Lame.

We didn't have the most eventful weekend ever, but it was laid back and fun.

Class update: I ended up choosing to go to both levels at school. From 8:30-10:10 I go to the "hard" class. Then I go the level below from 10:20-11:50. I really think this is the best decision. It means I have to go Mon-Fri, which I'm not a fan of, but again, I think it's what needed to be done.

(Even though this past Friday when I was getting ready to leave for class and Daniel was at home, I second guessed myself, ha!)

My teachers are both really good, and I'm learning a lot. I can actually read a good 150 words now. It doesn't seem like a lot, considering there are thousands. But it's SO better than the zero I was at before.

Anyways...our weekend.....

Friday I had class, spent the afternoon cleaning, studied, caught up on admin and life stuff.  Daniel cooked dinner, which he self-named "Ugly Plate." It actually tasted delicious, but I'll admit it wasn't going to win an award for presentation, ha! We had pan fried tilapia, cauliflower, rice, and zucchini. It was really good!

Saturday, I had the long run, this you know. Saturday was another catch up day. We ended up having dinner with friends last minute, then went to see Captain America, in english again! It's so rare that we go to movies, but funny that we've gone to 2 these past few weeks. They're a little "spendy" as my Grandma would say, but you just can't pass up a new movie in English. You never know when the opportunity will come a knockin again.

Sunday we had a rest day and I read a lot. I just finished The Summons by John Grisham. I really enjoy his books-I'm not that into fiction over all, but his really draw me in.

Monday was a holiday here, so we didn't have class. woo to the hoo!!!!! I "slept in" and we were both up at 6:45. That's AM people.

Monday was pretty busy. I went grocery shopping, ran errands, studied, made granola bars, brownies, and met with friends.

Sidenote: I keep tweaking the granola bar recipe. I added a lot more PB this time and used almonds, cashews, PB chips, and a few chocolate chips. I think they taste pretty good! I also made homemade brownies and put PB chips in those too. (PB chips are cheaper here than CC, and I found the PB chips on sale, so again, woo to the hoo for me)

And again, no real pics. But a while ago, I saw this and thought of TPG!

AND, in good news.....word on the street is that there is a marathon (half, 5k,) about an hour or so by train from my city in the spring. So my plan is to train and run my own half in November, take a break for about a month, then either retrain for the spring half or OMG possibly do a full. We'll see.

love

Laura

Random Culture

• I didn't run yesterday. If you're stalking me, you'd realize that yesterday was Week 2, Day 1 of Half marathon training. But Sunday I decided to wear shoes that weren't my tennies or my flops, so I got massive blisters on my toes. I gave it a day to let them heal and ran today. Don't worry, i'm back in the saddle.
• It is common to see animals, esp cats in restaurants here. They walk around the tables, in the kitchen, on the counters.... More the rule than the exception. If I dwell on this, it makes me sick and I don't want to eat. But the food here is just way too good, so I get over it quickly.
• I'm exhausted. Langauge school is getting the best of me. I know there are people who are "gifted" in this area or it "comes naturally." I'm just not one of those people. I think I'm okay for my level, but full time language study is just tiring.
• I like living here. I could easily make you a list of things that are "hard" here, but still. I like it. It's very hard to imagine being anywhere else.
• Running here is not good for my anger issues. I get pretty angry VERY quickly when I run here. I need to a. get over it, and b. for the love find some patience.
• I made brownies from scratch yesterday. They turned out ok at first. But if I eat them straight out of the fridge, they are SO good.
• We've been having amazing weather. And by amazing, I mean not 110. It maybe cloudy and rainy, but with the temp's in the 60's, that equals amazing. I've worn long sleeves the last 3 days.
• I miss my nephews.

Also, big side note.....I think there are people out there that read my blog, have their own blog, and I have no clue who you are. Leave a comment with your blog so I can read yours too!!

Sorry no pics....i haven't taken any in forever. I'll try harder.

love

Laura

Saturday Stats

(I think i'm going to do a weekly stat update each Saturday for my training)

It's officially the end of Week 1 of training! Only 9 more to go....which seems forever away!

The week went well. I had to run during the afternoons during the week. I don't mind it, but i'd much prefer to run in the morning and get it over with. But with class, it's just too hard. And it's been a very exhausting week. But I enjoyed a delightful iced coffee after my run this morning, that I'd been looking forward to all week!

My "long" run for this week was 4 miles. Next week it's 5. I won't get nervous until it's 8.
8 miles is always my big marker. I'm pretty good up until then, but then each run over 8 is always hard. More prep goes into those runs: hiding a water bottle to pick up half way through, eating before-having time to digest, carrying Gu with me, making time, etc.....

Running long is going to be interesting here. I have a few thoughts that i'll share when we get closer.

I haven't lost any weight, but didn't gain. Again, it's week 1 so not a big deal.

I did realize how much my pride is a part of running, especially long runs. I'm going to be honest....I enjoy when someone asks me what I did today and I get to say " well i ran my 10 miles, then blah blah blah." It's such a good feeling to have a really good long run. But I need to work on the pride. :)

Like most of ya'll, our temps here dropped a lot too. Sunday it was about 110 (or felt like it), but this week it's been mostly in the 70's. I think it was in the high 60's when i ran this morning. I LOVE running in cooler weather!

A few of ya'll asked about the fam.....my parents are moving to South Illinois, i think closer to the Missouri  border (where dad's family is). They are actually there right now house hunting.

We don't have class on Monday because it's a Holiday here. Which makes me feel better about going to class this past Monday when I had to see everyone's tweets and fb updates about them enjoying their Labor Day, ha!

Oh and this week on the menu:

Sat night/Sun nite: Chicken Broccoli casserole (need to find a recipe!)
Mon nite/ Tues nite: Chili
Wed: Local Dishes
Thurs/ Fri: Creamy Garlic Crockpot chicken
Sat: Out-western food

Have a great weekend!!

love

Laura

Calzones and Class

I tried a new recipe tonight. You can find it at my friend's blog here. This was my first time to make calzones. I was pretty excited because i'd heard it was pretty easy. It was.

(the dark spots are the flax seed that didn't quite blend)

You seriously just make the dough, roll it out and put in the toppings. The part that took the longest was just shredding the cheese and prepping the veggies.

Our toppings were:

Pepperoni

Mozzarella

Red Pepper

Green Pepper

Tomatoes

Black Olives (for me)

These were SOO good! I actually couldn't eat all of mine, but i wanted to. Because you don't have to wait for the dough to rise, it's so much faster than making pizza, and it adds a nice twist to our dinner menu. We also just used canned spaghetti sauce to dip them in, because that's what we had. :)

So. Class.

We're still in the deciding stage right now. Daniel is pretty sure what class he will go to, and I'm still deciding. I tried a new class today, that left me more confused on what to do than before. We still have 2 more classes to make our decision. But I am thankful that we get the ability to choose. So that's something.

In other news....2010 was the year of the runner. 2011 is the year of the move. We moved.

BFF Amy moved (to a new apartment but still), BFF Caroline moved to Arkansas, Sarah, Mike and the boys are moving this week, and now my parents are moving! (if i've left you out i'm sorry!)

My dad is a pastor and accepted a new job in Illinois. They currently live in Ft. Worth. I know very little about Illinois, other than Chicago is there and I've always wanted to visit. Any readers from Illinois?!

It will be weird when Daniel and I do go back to the States to visit, to go see my parents in a completely different state, new house, new church, everything. But i'm excited for them  and i'm sure they'll love it!

It's been such a long week already. Seriously, is it friday yet???

love

Laura

Many Firsts

Today was the first day of school. I realized on the way, that this was the first time ever for me to ride my bike to school. I've never lived close enough to school to ride a bike, so I was pretty excited about it. ( I also ran into a motorbike on the way, yes, it was my fault)

Here we are using the self-timer:

So we rode almost 2 miles to school in the insane heat and humidity. I was drenched by the time we got there, and of course, no a/c.So instead of running i'm just going to sweat off these last few pounds, hhahaah kidding.

I'm going to be honest....class was hard. The first week you try out the different levels of class and next week 'commit' to the class you want to go to. I went to a class that I thought would be a challenge for me, but it was actually just hard. I didn't understand a lot of what was being said, and I can't read the language yet, so that made it much more difficult. I'm going to try the class below to see if it's a better fit. It's hard because I want a challenge, but also don't want to be confused the whole semester. I'm thinking a lot about this.

Also, today was the FIRST day of half-marathon training!!! Woo hoo!!! I ran this afternoon and i ran fast! Knowing I was only doing 3 miles I brought my A game, and felt really good! Again, sweating off the weight is my strategy, hhaah!

The first bit of training is always easier and more enjoyable because you start off so slow. I know when i'm hitting the 10 mile+ mark I'm going to be wanting the 3 miles again.

Are you training for anything?? A tri, marathon, 5K? Let me know, I'd love to hear!

love

Laura

Weekend Rewind

Friday ended up being busier than we expected. We found out that our paperwork was ready to get our student visas, so we took a last minute trip to the visa office to file everything. It just happened to be close to a McDonald's and we decided we just couldn't pass it up. But don't worry I got the chicken nuggets and drank water. So it wasn't a complete splurge :)

Friday afternoon I grocery shopped, and FINALLY found chocolate chips! They only had 2 bags so I bought them both. It's so easy to become a 'hoarder' here. You never know when or what the import stores will have, and just because they have something one week doesn't mean it's guaranteed to be there the next. And I consider chocolate chips a surival food.

Saturday we slept in (8 am ha!), and just did things around the house. I baked a bit for visitors we were having over today. I attempted to make homemade donut holes, and it didn't go so well. I made the dough, but had problems getting the oil the right temp and actually getting the dough into the shape of a ball. So we had weird looking shaped donuts. They still tasted good and that's really all that matters!

Saturday afternoon we went to see Cars 2 3D in ENGLISH!! I was pretty excited. It was our first movie to see here. There were only 7 of us in the theatre and we all sat really close to each other. You actually buy a specific seat here instead of sitting just anywhere. It's actually nice because most of the time you don't have to get to the theatre as early.

After the movie we went to eat at a Western restaurant, complete with hamburgers, fries, and pie! We don't go out for Western very often, so it's pretty exciting when we do. Well exciting for us.....not sure if ya'll are really holding your breath to find out what we eat, hahah!

This afternoon is pretty laid back. Tomorrow we start school and will find out how often our classes meet, times, and all that. It's been a while since I've had a first day of school. I'm hoping for a good awkward moments to tell ya'll about later.

But speaking of.....these two little cuties started "school" this week too.

Ethan is in MDO twice a week and Grant is in Pre-K. Sarah and Mike are also moving this week. They're just moving about 15 minutes North of where they are now. I've been on to this girl to start a blog. Selfishly I want her to start one so I can get more regular updates on the boys. She keeps saying she's busy.........

ALSO, my bike is here now. I biked yesterday for the first time in our city. If I thought running was hard, i was dead wrong. Biking here is insane. I'm always talking while I bike, in English, things like "watch out I'm going to hit you!" or "I can't stop.. oh no oh ummmm"  I'll keep you posted.

And in running news, I'm DEFINITELY starting my half marathon training tomorrow. It's a whopping 3 miles, but i'm excited to be committed to the training!!! I might do a weekly recap of the miles and how the training is going.

love

Laura

Get it Together

I am a person who loves having goals. I thrive on them.

So far I've met all my weight and exercise goals for 2011, so I set new ones to keep me going. But they're a little too vague. And vague goals don't get accomplished in my book.

I took 2 weeks of from running bc of being in the mountains and just being really tired and busy after we got back. I ran 3.2 miles on Thursday and felt pretty good. But today I didn't run because I honestly just didn't feel motivated. I'm currently at the lowest weight of my adult life. And when I see some small improvements in the weight area I tend to slack off. I know I shouldn't, but I do.

I want more.

After reading TPGs post today, I became motivated. I have got to just get out there and do it. I need to run whether I feel like it or not. I need to be disciplined again. Which is hard when I'm not training for anything. They have races in this country, but they're all far away and way expensive to go to.

So I've decided to train for a half marathon, even if I never race it. I'm going to be using this training program that I used for my first one. And who knows, maybe I'll do my own personal half and call it a day. (I'll just need a shirt and a medal to feel legit, ha!).

If all goes well, it will put me right at our 2 year anniversary mark. And I've already decided if I lose 5 more lbs, I'm going to let myself have a Smores Poptart. I know you should never reward weight loss with food, but I just can't bring myself to eat these without knowing i've lost more weight. It's a mental thing.

I'm a little nervous about committing to a training program, because school starts on Monday and i'll be getting up on a normal day around 6:15. And that's without running. So I know i'll have to get up about 5ish a few mornings. And that doesn't sound like fun to me. Hopefully when/if the weather cools down I can run in the afternoons. But that probably won't happen  for a while.

Anyways, wish me luck. I need it. I'll take any motivation I can get!

love

Laura