Sun Valley

Photos courtesy of Marta

We got to spend our Thanksgiving in Sun Valley, Idaho. Besides the snow storms that almost killed us in our travels, the trip was a blast.

We spent our time in 2 fun condos with Tom's family. We enjoyed the snow

the Turkey day buffetWe also enjoyed girls' shopping trips, games, runs, lots of great home cooked breakfasts and dinners, even more junk food.


and plenty of quality time with cousins and siblings.

This is a super fun tradition that i love to be a part of. Some years, they cook the turkey feast in the condo and some years we gorge at the buffet. To be honest, as much as I love gorging myself on prime rib, butternut squash soaked in butter, fruit and cheese, stuffing, key lime pie, pecan pie, and flan, I missed spending the day in the kitchen with the girls. I missed the friendly competition of pie baking. I missed the stove top vs homemade stuffing debate. I missed creating all the calories we consumed. I missed the anticipation of the feast as its aroma fills the house all day.

But nothing beats sitting in the pool-sized hot tub after the feast, whether we made it ourselves or not, with temps hovering around 0 degrees Nothing beats playing fox and geese in an unspoiled snow field. Nothing beats being surrounded by loved ones as we celebrate all we have to be thankful for.

Turkey Tri

Porter just completed his first triathlon. We are so proud of him. Not just because he did so well (5th out of 22 in has age-group) but because he trained so hard and put in the effort before the race.

He has diligently been running, biking and swimming since the summer. Since the pool closed on labor day, he has only been swimming twice. But both times he swam his 50 meter workout without complaint as well as played. He takes after his parents and isn't the greatest swimmer. He basically doggy-paddled the 50 m swim, but even with being the 4th slowest swimmer, he still rocked it. In training, he always had to take a break after the length of the pool, but on race day he rocked the whole thing without rest.

His transitions were great and helped him make up ground on quite a few kids.


He is riding a bike that is way to small for him, but he still passed a few and was not passed.

He also rocked the run. I only wish it was longer than half a mile because this is his strength. He has really put in the training for this portion. There is a mile loop around our neighborhood he runs a couple times a week or he runs at the track when we do.

This was definitely a proud mama moment.Total time: 16:40
50 m swim (2:41), T1 (1:26), 1 mile bike (7:06), T2 (:28), 1/2 mile run (4:57)

Tom and I also participated in the Turkey tri and didn't do too shabby. We both placed in our age-groups. Tom took off 7 minutes off his time from 2 years ago for a time of 1:00:24.

And I took a minute off. 1:09:03.

As always it was super fun to train and participate with the family and with our friends. Porter is already excited for the April Tri and Eliza says she wants to do it, too.

For full results click here.

smile

I know I haven't blogged for a while--life is crazy! but just wanted to share a link to a great post. click here for a step by step on how to genuinely smile.

i needed the reminders and the new things. i am not the best smiler or the most positive person in the world. but i will try to do better. i bet my life will seem a lot less crazy if i genuinely smiled more.

Kokopelli Triathlon 2010

I signed up for this race when I was big and pregnant because they were having a limited-time promotion. And I decided it would motivate to keep moving after little Millie arrived. It worked. I wasn't well-trained for the event, but I wasn't completely out of shape.

I trained a lot with my friend Karrie. This was her second tri and first open water tri. She rocked it! and deserved to, because she really put in the hours of training.

I participated in the olympic distance tri, which is 1500 m swim, 20 mile bike, and 10K run.

Swim 1500 m, 33:53
The swim was okay. I wasn't last out of the water, but I was definitely in the back of the pack. I have decided I need to take swimming lessons. I think I have the most room for improvement here. I was almost 15 minutes behind the fastest female swimmer and 10 behind the faster swimmers.

T1 1:37
Besides my bag getting stuck on my pedals and that causing my whole set up to get messed up, transition was ok.

Bike 20 miles, 1:06:26, 18.5 mph
It is a familiar course, so I like it. But I haven't been out on the bike enough since baby was born. The nice thing about finishing the swim in the back, is you have a lot of people in front of you to pass. It was fun and I hit 43.3 mph on the backside of Nemesis. I was a tad embarassed by my bike since I was parked by super nice tri bikes, and I ride an entry level Novara. But maybe next year, I'll save up enough for a fancier bike

T2 1:05
A good transition. Just had to switch my shoes. I wore no socks, which was a mistake and probabaly not worth the 15 seconds I saved.

Run 6.2 miles (6.4 on my watch) 53:54


Hot! The run was super hot! I don't know what the exact temp was, but it was supposed to hit 99 on saturday and it was closet o noon. I dumped water on my head at every aid station and drank Heed. I was sloshing a bit, but it was worth it. The run did not feel good and I wanted to basically die by the end. The run ends on a substantial climb back into the State Park. That sucked.
All in all a fun race with good friends. I ended finishing in 2:36:54, 10th overall female and 1st in my age group by default (the top 3 overall were in my age group, so they got bumped up leaving me as number 1. I'll take it even if they were 30 minutes ahead of me.)

Click here for full results.

Facebook is the death of my Blog

I am alive and kicking, but life sure is crazy with 4 kids.

And I have decided that facebook is not a good thing for my blog. Whenever I have a great thought to share, I facebook it in very short form instead of blogging about it.

We recently celebrated our 10 year anniversary!! Hip Hip! Tom took me and Millie to Zion where we hiked Angel's Landing, not quite making it to the summit on account of Mille. Just over 10 years ago, Tom and I hiked to the top and decided we were going to get married. It wasn't official at that point, but it is where our phrasing first changed from "if" to "when."


Then he took me to the bench where he proposed to me and we reflected on the promises he made to me on that night. He's doing great and has kept them all.

Then he took me to the park for an awesome dinner under the full (or nearly full) moon.

It has been the greatest 10 years of my life. I love Tom more than I did the day I married him. He has shown me what a great man he is. He changes diapers, he makes dinner, he cleans the house, he honors his priesthood, he loves his kids and he treats me much better than I deserve. I couldn't have married a better man.

Welcome to the Family Amelia

Amelia Rose made her debut on her due date, Thursday, June 24 at 6:15 pm. Labor was horrible but awesome (as all unmedicated ones are) and worth every second.

I had the most awesome nurse midwife ever who made the labor more bearable. I highly recommend Laurie Hansen to anyone who lives in Southern Utah. She let me ski, we always talked biking or skiing at my prenatals (depending on the season). My only complaint is she told me not to run for 6 weeks. I just laughed at her and told her I would wait 2.

She was born healthy and weighed in at 7 lbs 2 oz and was 19 inches long.


She had a full head of dark hair and was perfect.

We did have to stay an extra day at the hospital due to her being Coombs positive and being more susceptible to jaundice. She spent a day with a bili blanket and was able to come home on Saturday.

The kids all love her And I love having her to hold in my arms instead of in my belly.

Welcome the family Amelia!

New Year's 2010

I continue to catch up.


We celebrated New Year's in Salt Lake with Tom's family. We enjoyed the snow, family, and festivities. We actually let the kids stay up until midnight (I don't think James made it). They loved being with their cousins and eating lots of great food and just enjoying the festivities.

Thoughts on Being 38 Weeks Huge

38 weeks along in my fourth pregnancy is a lot less exciting then the other three. Ok, maybe the other 2 were just as bad. I am excited and filled with anticipation of the arrival of our sweet 4th baby, but I am also sick of being pregnant. The heat is hard, but not that bad, all of my pregnancies have taken me into the hot summer months.

The hardest part is not being able to be as active as I like. Race season is fast approaching and I can barely run 3 miles or bike 15. But I'll keep doing what little I can until she arrives. I have already planned to bike 30 miles on her 1 week birthday.

I rode 15 miles this week to celebrate a friend's birthday. I wasn't going to miss out on the celebration.

Enough of the negative. I am so excited to be a mother to a newborn again. I anticipate great things. I am looking forward to nursing her and having that special bond only a mother and child can have. I picture quiet moments where we get to spend this quality time together. I know that might not happen with 3 others running around demanding my attention, but if nothing else, she and I can enjoy this priceless bond in the wee hours of the night.

I look forward to seeing her dressed in many of the same outfits Eliza (and even Porter and James) and I wore. I have already filled her dresser with her tiny clothes. I reminisced as I folded them and put them away. Memories of Eliza as a newborn flooded back to me. And I imagined myself as tiny newborn as I folded some of the more vintage dresses. I still haven't decided on what to bring her home in, but Tom said he won't be ready for the baby until the bag is packed, so I better decide soon.

I am thrilled for Eliza to have a little sister. I know that she will take great care of her baby sister. And I hope they will be great friends. She does such a great job with James when she isn't teasing him. The two will share a room, and Eliza is so excited.

James is a different story. He is not quite 3 and demands a lot of attention. But I am thinking positive. I know he will be jealous, but luckily the other kids will be home to entertain him. By the time the others are back in school, hopefully, James will be used to the new member who demands so much of his mama's attention.

So here's to her soon arrival. I know, I still have 2 weeks left, but I can dream she'll come early, right?

Chicken-Zucchini Bake

Here is a super easy, super healthy dinner. My friend, Ty, introduced it to us and we love to make it. It is easily adapted to what you have on hand as well.

Chicken-Zucchini Bake

1 lb. chicken breasts, pounded thin or chicken tenders
1-2 zucchinis or yellow squash, thinly sliced
1 can diced tomatoes or 3 small tomatoes diced
1/2 onion, thinly sliced
fresh or dried basil
salt and pepper and seasonings to taste


Spray casserole dish with Pam. Season chicken with salt and pepper and garlic powder. Layer in casserole with zucchini and onions. Top with tomatoes and basil. Bake at 350 for 30 minutes until chicken cooked through. Top with cheese if desired for last few minutes, but it really doesn't need it and why ruin the uber-healthiness. Serve over brown rice.

Christmas 2009

The rest of Christmas.

I love Christmas and all of our traditions. Some of them we have carried on from our families, some we have started on our own. We start our festivities on Christmas Eve with a very traditional program filled with drama, music and the spoken word. All of the extended family is invited.

We act out the nativity either live or with Playmobil.

We play and sing Christmas hymns. This year, much of the family prepared special numbers. It was fun, even if it wasn't perfectly harmonious.


And of course, we read from the scriptures, the story of the birth of our Savior.

A tradition from the Fisher side that I love is the whole ritual of Christmas morning. We all dress in our Sunday best, we sit down to a formal breakfast (the Dansies do not eat the traditional oysters).

We used to always have puffy oven pancake, aka German pancake (a Dansie tradition), but we have it so often that I wanted to do something a little more special. So this year, we had crepes with all sorts of delicious toppings.

Grandma and Grandpa are always invited, but we like to be in our own home. After a delicious breakfast, the kids line up, youngest to oldest in front of the sheet covering the living room. By this point they are so filled with anticapation, it is almost painful to watch them.

Finally, after someone goes around the other way to be ready with the camera, the sheet is parted and the kids are allowed to see what Santa brought them. Santa brings our children one gift and stocking filled with fruit, candy, soda and maybe a small toy or so.


James' favorite gift this year was a littel football Santa put in his stocking.


They spend the morning enjoying all the fun before we open one gift at a time from under the tree. Again, we try not to over do the whole present thing. We enjoy a relaxing morning before heading over to Grandma and Grandpa's for a delicious dinner.


Merry Christmas! And I will soon be caught up in my blogging.