Being Thankful

...How Amanda is Going to Start Writing Daily...again.

I was reading this article about "10 Simple Things to Make You Happier at Home." Check out number four:

4. Start a one-line-a-day gratitude journal. Before bed, simply jot down one happy memory from that day. (If you have kids, you can ask them, "What was the best part of today?") Reflection is an important part of happiness, and pausing to reflect on a positive event from each day cultivates gratitude. (An added bonus: Later, when your memory is defunct, you will already have all of your meaningful adventures recorded!) If you have trouble getting started with journaling, consider buying a book to guide you. Simple Abundance, by Sarah Ban Breathnach, is a great one.

I've had this thought before but I always get sidetracked. And I've been seeing people's 30 Day of Thanks on facebook and have been inspired. So here we go:

Today, I am thankful for phone calls that last over an hour. I haven't been on the phone with someone  in forever in a long time. Back in high school days, most of my evenings were spent on the phone. You'd do your homework, watch TV, doodle, write notes while having a conversation with your best friend or boyfriend. It's been a really long time since I've talked to someone that long without a purpose. It was nice and definitely made me smile. :)

Tonight I was told that I "embody energy."

I'll take it! :)

Days 4 & 5

It's so hard to take the time to update sometimes, but I know that I'll forget it all if I don't. So here we go!

Sunday.
Since I had enormously slept in on Saturday, I decided to get up and take Amanda to breakfast. Breakfast has always been a tradition of ours. She used to wake me up in the mornings and we'd go to breakfast in our pajamas. So we decided to actually get dressed this time and go have breakfast. I literally had one of everything, pancakes, egg, hashbrowns, bacon and sausage. And it was DELICIOUS! Oh, sometimes breakfast is so good that it makes me want to wake up early all the time. Okay, not really. :) Then we went over to a cute little town called Gig Harbor. I went there twice last year and just loved it! So we went back, went to a Christmas Shop and went to a farmer's market. The farmer's market was not as exciting as it was last year so that was a let down. I was really on the search for green zebra tomatoes because they are AWESOME! But alas, no tomatoes.

We ventured back into Lakewood to see ParaNorman. But we had about an hour to kill. We looked for an antique shop but couldn't find, but then (wait for it...) we found a FARMER'S MARKET!!! Can you tell I LOOOOVE farmer's markets?! And guess what I found? Green Zebra tomatoes!!! WIN WIN WIN!!! So excited!

So we finished up just in time to go see ParaNorman. It was...interesting. As an adult, I enjoyed it, but I'm not sure I'd take my kids to go see it. It was kinda scary (I'm a wuss). And I was shocked because they used the word "jackass" in a PG movie. What? Since when is that PG?! Crazy, my mom would have NEVER let me hear that word when I was a kid and there was kids as young as four there. Insane.

Monday.
So since the five miles didn't happen on Saturday, today was THE day. I plotted my course, ate well the night before, got my running shoes on and set out. However, as I've learned this week, maps and the actual location are NEVER as matching as they seem. :) I thought I was heading to the parking lot I had planned for my route to start at, however, I ended up at the bottom of a mountain at the parking lot in the middle of the loop I had planned to run.  BUT I was determined this morning and made it work. I ended up running in a circle three times at the end, which I hate, but 5 miles needed to be done! So...guess who finished 5 miles today?!

THIS GIRL!!!!!!!!

And the rest of my day involved making alfredo sauce from scratch with my pasta from Pike Market and then getting my ass handed to me by a pregnant lady in a personal training session. Uber embarrassing, especially after you conquer five miles. Hope all is well back home for you guys!

Days 2 & 3

Day 2 (09.21.12)

My dear friend Amanda's mom has been diagnosed with breast cancer. Friday she had an appointment in Seattle to determine what the next step was. I decided to hitch a ride along and let them go to the doctor while I piddled around town. I decided to start out at Pike Market and basically eat my way around it. I had BIG plans. I made a list...yes a list, and then talked to someone there to get his recommendations as well. I started off with a crumpet covered in ricotta cheese, honey and walnuts. Holy moly, it was stinking good! I might HAVE to figure out how to make crumpets at home! Next stop, donuts! I went to the Daily Dozen and lo and behold, they make 'em fresh right there. I was debating for a half dozen, but a dozen was only a dollar more, so who wouldn't upgrade?! I visited with the cashier and turns out he frequents Texas regularly, he handed me my bag of assorted donuts and said "I threw a couple extra in there to keep your hands warm." Turns out, he threw in another HALF DOZEN. I say down with the intention to eat only a few...but soon, I looked in the bag and there were six left. Yes, I ate a dozen mini donuts, AFTER eating an entire crumpet. Kinda put a wrench in my eating all day plan because at the point I was full! I decided to keep walking. I made my stop at MarketSpice, watched the fish throwing, took in a couple of market musicians, who are SO entertaining. I saw a guy who wheeled a piano out on the sidewalk, a gal playing guitar while tap dancing, and another guy playing guitar while hula hooping (all the pictures turned out blurry which is a shame). It was insane. I really wanted to try homemade sausage and piroskhys but my stomach wasn't allowing it. I continued walking through the market and now can successfully said I have made it all the way through, on all floors AND across the street. Now by this time, I was hungry. The chowder I wanted to try had a line waaay out the door, the sausage was sold out (how does that happen?!) so I went to my old faithful, Beecher's Crab and Grilled Cheese. I headed to the park down the way and enjoyed it along with a beautiful view of the harbor.

I decided to take the monorail up to Seattle Center, which is where the World's Fair was held in 1962 (and for which the Space Needle was built). Fun fact: the monorail was built specifically to take passengers from downtown to Seattle Center for the fair. As I got off, a lady was there offering help. She told me about an exhibit that was about to close celebrating the 50th anniversary of the World's Fair in Seattle. I decided to go check that out instead. It was REALLY cool. I'm glad I did. It seems so weird how much we have developed in 50 years. And to see where we THOUGHT we were going to be in 50 years. The exhibit was so well put together; the pictures, videos and various memorabillia took you back 50 years and let you image what it was like to be there if you weren't. I'm making this promise to myself, if there's ever a World's Fair in my vicinity, I'll definitely be going. The city of Seattle tore down buildings to make way for the World's Fair...I mean, can you even imagine the spectacle that it was? Everything had to be bigger and better. I bet it was a sight to see.

After finishing up my history of the World's Fair, I decided it was appro to go to the Space Needle and see the result of said World Fair. While the view was amazing, the history and the making of the Space Needle is what is so fascinating. I highly recommend you doing a little research or at least reading all of the signs if you decide to visit it. I also celebrated my journey to the top with a Seattle dog, a hot dog with bacon onion jam and cream cheese. Holy cow, make me go weak in the knees. You can see all the pictures on Facebook but the view was pretty spectacular! Afterwards, I headed back down and returned to Tacoma.

TODAY, was a slow day. I slept until 11:00 Seattle time, that's a long time btw. I needed to run 5 miles according to my half marathon training plan. I got a waaaay late start and wasn't feeling up to par. But I decided I was gonna do it anyways. I headed out to Point Defiance Park was has a 5 mile road, so I figured it would be perfect. The run started off great, but around mile 2 I got a sharp pain in the leg. Stretching was not helping at all. I tried to walk it off. I did everything possible but it was not leaving. At the point I was at, I had to either run 1.75 miles back or keep going. So I kept going. I then discovered a shortcut back to the truck and decided to take that. Right around then, I hit my stride and was feeling better. But at that point, they had opened up 5 mile road back to cars (it had previously been closed off) I had already resolved to cut my run short so that my whole afternoon wasn't gone. So I only ran 2.5ish miles and headed back to the truck, but Monday, I *WILL* run 5 miles. It's gonna happen. It's gotta. And then next weekend, I'll return to Point Defiance and concur that 5 mile road again. I mean, how can you not want to run when this is your backdrop?

Afterwards, I got back into my photography stride and took some maternity pictures of Amanda. I haven't looked at or processed yet, but I promise, I'll give you a sneak peak by the end of the week. :) That's all for now folks, I've gotta head to bed. One goal that I will reach on my vacation is that I plan on catching up on sleep!

I've arrived!

...Or How You're About to See a Lot of Posts About Washington State. :)

The day has FINALLY come! I am now on "vacation" in Washington State. It only took forever to get here and the road was quite stressful. In fact, I didn't start packing until 12:45 this afternoon and I needed to leave town at 1:30. If my mom hadn't been so persistent, I would have just packed a suitcase with shoes and my fancy shampoo and conditioner, left with an almost empty suitcase and just bought clothes up here. Instead, my suitcase weighs EXACTLY 50 pounds so I can't bring anything back...or I'll have to mail it.

One of my best friends lives up here and I haven't seen her since February and that was only for a few hours. I miss her terribly and it's always so good to see her. Tonight, she reminded me why she's one of my best friends. We were getting ready for bed and I asked for a pillow and she said, "I know you only sleep with just a sheet when you get hot, but I know you also get cold up here, so there's a sheet on your bed and here's a blanket to use in the middle of the night." It blew me away that after all this time, she knows EXACTLY how I like to sleep. It's when you know the little details about someone that, to me, show your true relationship. Anyone can know my mom's name or where I graduated from college or what musical instrument I play, but if you know how I like to sleep because we've slept together a million times, or if you know how I like to order my mexican food (no lettuce as a garnish), or if you know that I like my Sonic drinks with easy ice because the ice takes up too much space, then that's when you know me. And it's even better when I don't ask or tell you these things, but you just pick up on it. I've never explicitly discussed my sleeping preferences with Amanda, but we spent two summers and countless other nights together that she just paid attention and knew. THAT'S how to get to my heart. Yay for best friends! It's gonna be an awesome two weeks!

Dear Mother...

...Or Why You Should Never Let Your Mother Do Your Chores After You're 24.

"Dear Mother" could be followed up with "...of pearl." or "of Christ." or another word that isn't appropriate to type. All of those cliches come to mind when trying to do the simple task of laundry with my mother. You see, I'm leaving tomorrow for Washington State...YAAAAAAAAAAAAAYYYYY! and my mom made the nice gesture of offering to wash some clothes for me to help me pack. HOWEVER, I returned home expecting most of it to be done, however, she had only washed my work clothes. Which I have no intention of wearing while in Washington. She then wants me to sort through my clothes and tell her which to wash so that I can take on my trip. Let's be honest, I don't really sort anymore. I wash everything in cold. Dry my t-shirts and line dry the rest. That's it. I wash my bras with my work clothes, my reds with my blues, and my greys with my whites. Yes, I know it's risky, but I've been doing it for six years and somehow I still manage to have wearable clothes after everytime I do laundry. My mother, however, doesn't see it that. She acts like I have NEVER done laundry before in my life. In fact, we almost got into an argument about whether or not my bra could do in the wash with some work shirts. She tells me that it's going to ruin it as she turns one of the cups inside out, to which, I then flip out...because YOU'RE NOT SUPPOSED TO DO THAT! Obviously, we have different opinions when it comes to clothes...

The same as loading the dishwasher now that I think of it. My mom must have an instruction manual somewhere in which it indicates there is only one proper way to load the dishwasher...and that is her way. I guess it must have gotten misplaced over the years because I sure haven't seen it around.

Dear friends, if you love your mother, don't do the dishes with her or laundry. It'll just end badly.

Random Thoughts of the Day

...Or How Amanda can't Focus Long Enough to Write an Entire Post.

• I finished a 4.5 mile run. Longest run ever, seriously. It's exciting. And scary. Next week is  5 miles and then every week afterward, my Saturday mileage goes up 1 mile. I feel like now is the turning point. There's no turning back now. I can either maintain my mileage or push ahead and go for this half marathon. So I'm going for the half marathon, hopefully there's not too many shin splints or puking along the way. :)
• I've gotten the chance to have some really cool opportunities recently. Last night, I got to run a comedy show with Scott Kennedy. This guy has had a Comedy Central special and has been Craig Ferguson's show. He threw me a shout out during the show and him and his opening act wanted to take pictures with me when it was over. How crazy is that?! 
• So there's this guy in my life, we'll call him "Joey" for purposes of this blog. Last night, Joey and I met up after the comedy show and after he got done with work. I was super exhausted but stayed out later than usual because I hadn't gotten a chance to see him this week and truth be told, I just REALLY enjoy his company. We talked until 2am, he walked me to my car, we talked for another hour, which is generally what happens. Then we maybe ended our evening with a little kissy face time. :) It's gonna sound real cheesy and girly and probably too romantic movie stuff, but I love the way my face feels after we kiss. It's a little tingly from the scruff of his 5 o'clock shadow. It doesn't last long, but it's a nice reminder on the drive home of what just happens. It usually manages to keep me smiling until I get in bed. Any other ladies experience this or am I the only one?
• I still owe a post about the launch party and my trip to my dad's. I'll try to make it happen tomorrow. :)