Edward is mine again

I finalllly got the second Twilight book, 'New Moon'. And my sister gave me her copies of the third and fourth books, so I am good to go! Let's see how long it'll take me to read all three. I'm going to guess that I'll be done with them by the end of July! Which may seem like a long time to some, but I can't remember the last time I read three books in that amount of time. And I also can't remember the last time I read a 700-something page book..if ever! This just might be a new record for me. Now...Edward is waiting...so I must go.

Well, now I need a new plan to retire when I'm 26

Josh and I didn't win the lottery. :( But, I have now completed #34: Play the lottery once. We bought 4 Powerball tickets yesterday. Why only 4, you may ask yourself? Because that's how much cash we had left after getting gas. :) I've never really bought a lottery ticket before (not including the ones we bought as favors for our wedding..I don't count that) and the jackpot was reallllly high yesterday, so we figured we'd give it a try. I was very excited--thinking of things we could do with our winnings. Like buy a squirrel farm. Josh really liked that idea too. But sadly, we did not win. I don't even think we matched up a single number on all 4 tickets. Oh well. Maybe next time. Until then, here's a picture of me with our non-winning ticket.





And because pictures are coooool, here's a picture of Josh and me at the Brewers game on Monday. We were happy because the Brewers won!!!!!!!

I made THREE new recipes this week!

And now I will tell you about them. All were good! Two were very good, and one was just plain old good. But I think with some trial and error, that plain old good recipe can be made into very good.

Because I'm lazy, and so this blog post doesn't become toooo long, I'm just going to post links to the actual recipes, instead of typing them all out on here. Same thing anyway. You are in luck, however, because I did remember to take pictures of all three!

Let's start with the one I made first. I made this as a dessert to bring to Josh's family's get together. While it didn't quite look like the picture, it was still VERY good and I didn't have any leftovers to bring home...always a good sign!

Layered Strawberry Cheesecake Bowl

Link: http://www.kraftfoods.com/kf/recipes/layered-strawberry-cheesecake-bowl-112585.aspx

These are all the ingredients used:

Here's what it looks like after the strawberries are added:

And now here's where I encountered my first problem. I realized the bowl I used was bigger than the bowl that is recommended, therefore, my top layer of filled didn't quite cover up the strawberries and pound cake like it should've. Oh well, it still tasted great. Looks aren't everything.

And here is where I encountered my second problem! I was supposed to melt the chocolate and 'drizzle' it over the filling. Yeahhhh right. That chocolate showed no signes of drizzing. Therefore, it was dropped on in clumps. Doesn't make it pretty, but it still was good.

And apparently, I forgot to take a picture of the final product. You can look at it in the link up above, or I can just tell you that you put some whipped cream over this and then add some chocolate covered strawberries on top of that. And walla. It's done.

Caesar Pockets

Link:http://www.kraftfoods.com/kf/recipes/caesar-pockets-112871.aspx

Here are the ingredients used:

The picture turned out kind of weird, but here is everything mixed up in the bowl:

And finally, here are the finished pita pockets!

This is my just 'plain old good' recipe. Everything was good, however, I think for my taste, they could use a littttle LESS caesar dressing. I put same amount in as the recipe calls for, but I feel like all I could taste was the caesar dressing. Next time, there will be less! There have been took to take for lunches to work to mix up my usual, boring turkey sandwiches. :)

Creamy Parmesan Mashed Potatoes

Link: http://www.kraftfoods.com/kf/recipes/creamy-parmesan-mashed-potatoes-112898.aspx

Josh just got his wisdom teeth out today! I made these for him to eat in the next few days when he can't have any hard foods. I tried a bite before I put them in the fridge for him, and they were very good! Definitely creamy!

Here's a picture of all the ingredients used:

Here are the potatoes boiling in the broth:

And here is my final product:

And there you have it. I probably won't be doing this much cooking again for another month at least. It's a lot of work!

If you happen to make any of these recipes, let me know how you like them!!

23 minutes and 59 seconds is LESS then 24 minutes

If I did the math correctly, that means that I have successfully completed #66: Run a 5k in less than 24 minutes! And I beat that goal by ONE SECOND. And it was very windy! There's nothing like cutting it close. I didn't actually think that I'd beat that goal on my first race of the season. I mean, that's why I am doing the 5k training program. I'm still going to continue with the training program, obviously, as we still have 3 more races to go this summer and I'm hoping to get a better time on each one.

And just in case you don't believe that I actually beat 24 minutes, here are the results from the website:


bib number: 590
age: 25
gender: F
location: New Berlin, WI
overall place: 129 out of 646
division place: 10 out of 63
gender place: 28 out of 344
time: 24:03
pace: 7:45
nettime : 23:59

Don't be confused about the 'time' and the 'net time' categories. I did actually cross the finish line at 24:03, which is over 24 minutes. However, I didn't start the race right up in the front of the group, so it factors in the fact that I didn't actually cross the starting line until 4 seconds into the race. So there. I win. Yay.

Our next race is on June 6th! I'm hoping to get at least 23:50.

First 100 Days...

Yesterday was my milestone 100th day with this list. Well, that's assuming I've counted correctly. And if I didn't, it's pretty darn close to 100 days. I figure that if the President of the United States can be rated on the job he did in his first 100 days, then so can I. So here is a summary of what I've accomplished and what I've failed to accomplish so far.

I might as well get my failures over with. Yes, I have failed at a couple so far. I went into this thinking that I was going to try my best and if I didn't get some done, that I'd be ok with it. There are a lot of items here and I only have so much time in my day. I am sorry to say though that I have failed at accomplishing #1: Read the Bible with Josh once a week. Josh and I read parts of the Bible every week anyway for our 20-Somethings small group at church. But we usually do it separately when we have our own time during the week. I put this one on my list to encourage Josh and me to read together and spend more time together. Well, that worked for the first few weeks, and then we went off our own separate ways again. Now, I'm back to doing a lot of the reading during my lunch breaks at work. Oh well. We still talk about the particular weeks' subject together, but we have failed to actual read them together. According to #81, that's $5 to a charity when I'm doing with this list!

After much thought, I've decided that I have also already failed at #20: Take a small weekend trip for every anniversary. While we are going to Washington, DC in August, and Josh and I decided together that that's going to be our anniversary trip since the one we were thinking of taking over our actual anniversary didn't work out; I do not want to count that as an anniversary trip for this list. We didn't actually go over our actual anniversary a few weeks ago, therefore, it doesn't count. That's another $5 to charity!

Now, let's move onto happier times. Things I have accomplished so far. I'm not going to go into too much detail about most of them, but after counting them up, I have completely finished 12 items on my list! (That's $36 to charity!) And that's 11.88% for you math people. And, I am currently up to date on 10 of the on-going items. So I am happy with my progress so far. Yes, it has been painful trying to keep up on my flossing. I hate flossing. And it has been hard to eat one fruit a week (yeah, don't make fun of me), I have managed to do it thus far. And my body thanks me.

And finally, if you're not tired of reading quite yet--here are a few items that I plan on accomplishing very soon!
#5: Go camping with Josh (we already have reservations made at Governor Dodge State park with some friends of ours to go camping in June!)
#21: See the Brewers play in 2 other stadiums (one of those will be accomplished August 22nd in Washington, DC!)
#25: Go on a hike somewhere! (I'm hoping to hike a littttle bit while camping in June)
#54: Get a fire extinguisher (I'm expecting this from Josh for my birthday, yay! This also makes me realize how boring I am by asking for this for my birthday)
#57: Plant flowers on the porch (it's flower-planting time right now, isn't it??)
And finally, #96: Do not watch TV for one day straight (I mean, I can't watch t.v. while I'm camping, can I?) That may be taking the easy way out for that one, but it counts! :-)

I held a baby today

Well, actually, TWO babies. But only one liked me. This isn't part of my list, but now I'm thinking it should've been. Babies scare me. They're small; they make weird noises, sometimes they smell. But, I have come to the conclusion that the perfect baby age is 7 1/2 months. Or, at least that's the age of the baby that liked me today. I held her; she didn't cry; she barely moved. She sucked on my fingers and I felt her weird-feeling, hard gums, and I still liked her. There's still a little hope for me. Maybe.

I got sucked in..

to the Twilight books. I needed a new book to read and asked my sister if she had any I could borrow. And I got Twilight. I will admit that I absolutely did not want to read this book., so I let it sit on my nightstand for a while. Then, I just really wanted something to read. So I started reading it. And as you guessed, I could not put it down. I think that's the fastest I've ever read a 400-500 page book. And now I'm wanting to read the 2nd one. I mean, it kind of left me hanging at the end, and now I'm pretty anxious to see what happens in the next book. Hopefully my sister has that one for me to borrow as well. Welll, this is one book checked off my list for the year in #58: Read 5 new books a year. How many Twilight books are there anyway? Maybe I can get all 5 for the year taken care of with these book.


In other news, I forgot to report a couple weeks ago that I finalllly got new running shoes! This completes #73: Get new running shoes. I'll admit, it's been 2 years since I got new running shoes. And as much as I work out, that's probably not good. But I finally got some. And now that I've been running in them for a few weeks, I can say that I have broken them in and I really like them.


Here they are in all their glory:

Sarah's Stride

I'm on my way to completing #68: Run at lesat 3 5k's per year. Josh and I just signed up for our first 5k of the season. It's going to be on May 16th. It's called Sarah's Stride benefitting the Ronald McDonald House. We plan on doing 4 5k's this summer: one in May, one in June, and two in July.

Josh and I also just started a 5k training program, which will be done right before our last race at the end of July. We're hoping to get our best times at that race, thanks to this program.

If you're interested in our program, or starting your own, here is how we got our's.
We went to http://www.runnersworld.com/.

Click on the 'training' tab.

Then, towards the right of the page, there will be box that says 'Smart Coach Personalized Training Program'.

In that box, you will have to enter a recent 5k race time. I put in 27 min. I believe that's the lowest time I've ever run a 5k in. I suppose I could go back and look up all my previous races to see the exact times, but I didn't want to. :-)

You'll then have to answer a few more questions in that box: what kind of race are you training for (5k), how many miles on average do you run each week (I put 11-15), and how hard do you want to train? (I put hard; Josh put very-hard)

Then click on 'go'.

The next screen it takes you to will be the training schedule. You can then click on the big words in red 'revise your training program'.

You might have to answer some of the same questions again, but this screen allows you to choose how many weeks you want to train for. We chose 12 weeks, because that takes us up to our last 5k in the end of July.

Then click 'go' again and you have your training program!

We started training yesterday! Thursdays are considered our 'speedwork' days. We had to do 5 miles total and including in those 5 miles: 3 800's at a 4.10 pace (Josh had a 3.42 pace) with 400 jogs in between. So we warmed up with a 1.5 mile jog, did 3 800's and 2 400's in between them, and then cooled down with another 1.5 mile jog. I was tired at the end of that!

I'm hoping that by doing this training program, this will help me accomplish #66: Run a 5k in less than 24 minutes. A couple years ago, I got my best time of 24.40 or so (I can't remember the exact seconds). Let's hope I can beat that this year!