PORTLAND

In our hotel in Portland...
Papa Randy and Grandma Eilene stopped by our hotel for a visit after the marathon!
Jafeth found a fun place to hang out in our hotel room!

After Jafeth ran the marathon???? :-) Celebrating our finish with our fams...

Race morning, while we were still fresh...

On the trip down there...
Mama, hold me:-)
Caravaning down with the McClees's!

Keri and Kim, We Did It!!!!!

Hey, we did it! We came, we ran 26.2, we finished. I knew I could do the miles, the 12+ bathroom stops killed our time, but all we wanted to do was finish and we did. Saw a lot of crazy things out there. A lot of blood, puke, tears, pulled muscles and people crying on the sides of the road because they could no longer go on, literally. Saw a lot of people running that made you wonder... my favorite shirt said "the victory isn't that I finished, the victory is that I ever started" also an old lady had on a shirt that said "this is my 39th marathon, how about you?" Awesome. Watched someone puke up a red bull at mile 20... saw the cops pull someone out from under a train/bus at mile 22, I guess you are bound to see a lot of things on a run like that. Unless you have run a marathon the pain is undescribable. I could not get my mind past how much my muscles were hurting, I could not get my mind to grasp that soon I would be finished and the pounding would stop. Mile 22-to the finish were incredibly hard both physically and mentally, and I would say that I had a good run and felt strong the whole time. I can't imagine how a "bad" marathon run would have felt. I will say that I have no regrets although I could have run it harder and considerably faster, the real victory was in the journey...

Thank you Zach and boys and mom, I love you all. Thank you Andrea for sacrificing your weekend to be with me, you are my biggest support and strength, thanks to your family too. Thank you all my friends who have encouraged me, thank you family who came, especially Uncle Butch and Papa Randy and Grandma Eilene, the highlight was seeing you both that evening. Thank you Gabbie and Breanna and Brettney, you ladies are awesome! Thank you all my inspirations, Olivia-my own personal running hero and Patti L. I hope I am as strong as you one day. Thank you Nelson clan, you all rock! Thank you Keri for putting in the miles and running this with me, I love you so much. Thank you God that it is over!:-)

The Joy of the Lord is your Strength.
Nehemiah 8:10

Huh. Have you ever really thought about that verse in the Bible? I have a gift bag that says that up on top of the armoire in our bedroom so every morning and every night I stare at it and the more I read it the more I think...huh. If the joy of the Lord is my strength then I am going about this all wrong, you know what I mean?? Think about it. Think about this too...Proverbs 3:5 says "Trust in the Lord with all of your heart and lean not on your own understanding, in all of your ways acknowledge Him and He will make your paths straight." Huh. So basically everything you know and understand...don't lean on it, it won't hold you up. Trusting in the Lord with all of your heart...that will hold you up.

Feeling a little scared...

Well, there is 31 days until the Portland Marathon, I am really starting to feel a little scared. My ankles hurt all the time and my muscles ache from all this running, and I am fairly positive that there might be a small fracture on the top of my right foot...yet I must run. Pray for me if you think about it, and please don't leave a "you are crazy to run" or "I would die" comment, just pray...
One thing I am determined to know is how I can soar on wings like eagles; and how to run and not grow weary (Isaiah 40:31) I love the movie Chariots of Fire, what an inspiration! The Lord is my strength, and the Lord has called me to endure. Whenever Keri and I are running (especially long runs) we pray and ask the Lord why He has called us to run this crazy thing and the only thing we KNOW is He is teaching us to learn to endure so that we can teach our children that you can do anything. You can do anything. I take my boys on 12 mile runs (they ride bikes) and they absolutely love it! They are building strong character, becoming strong physically and have learned to not whine! I always say "God would never make Nancy run a marathon, she gets to hang out on the beach all day!" Or Keri and I secretly pray that Karen will meet us along the way with cookies made by her and her girls!! Well, all my family and friends, at least you know that about once a week a set aside a four hour block to torture myself, but you are benefitting because I am praying for you and blessing you all! I will not quit.

A few of our favorite summer 2007 pictures!

Driving towards Mt. Bachelor and the three sisters in central Oregon... (dont mind the glare on the dash) Mt. Bachelor in the background, this is little lava lake, cool!
Zach and his little guys...

Kim and her boys (yeah thats right, I'm wearing a do rag)

A deer in our campground, came right up to us!

Zachs birthday!

My good friend Nancy, she visited from Hawaii and her and her kids stayed with us for about a week and a half, I miss her!!!

Zach at Red Robin, isnt he cute??

Happy Birthday zoolan..., I mean Zach... he can't help it if he is really really good looking right?

Kevin and Cole eating whip cream...yeah right, remember he is Kevins kid, you know what he is eating? TARTER SAUCE!!! YUK!!

That is Caroline with my Aunt Gerry and my Aunt Cookie, sorry it went on twice but I don't know how to remove one??








The Adams brothers and Kim... Chandler snuck in there too, but isn't he cute? The siblings reunite!

My sister in law Anne and me, she is so beautiful!

This is a typical Kevin/Kim type picture, especially the horrified crowd of onlookers...Zach and Anne being the wise people that they are, snuck off to wait in the vehicles until we stopped making fools of ourselves...I miss you Kev!

Well, it was a great summer and it is almost over. We have already started school with the boys and things are starting to get back to normal, whatever that may be! It was fun seeing Kevin and Anne and their family. (finally)! Hope everyone had a great summer too!

Hey Andrea!

How hot is this??

Seinfeld lives on baby...

On My Way...

Have you ever heard the song "On my Way" by Phil Collins off of the Brother Bear Soundtrack? Well, it is exactly how I feel every time I go running with Keri.

Tell everybody I'm on my way

New friends and new places to see

With blue skies ahead yes

I'm on my way

And there's nowhere else

that I'd rather be

Tell everybody I'm on my way

And I'm loving every step I take

With the sun beating down yes

I'm on my way

And I can't keep this smile off my face

'Cause there's nothing like seeing
each other again
No matter what the distance between
And the stories that we tell
will make you smile
Oh it really lifts my heart

So tell 'em all I'm on my way
New friends and new places to see
And to sleep under the stars
Who could ask for more
With the moon keeping watch over me

Not the snow, not the rain
Can change my mind
The sun will come out, wait and see
And the feeling of the wind in your face
Can lift your heart
Oh there's nowhere I would rather be

'Cause I'm on my way now-
well and truly
I'm on my way now

Tell everybody I'm on my way

And I just can't wait to be there

With blue skies ahead yes

I'm on my way

And nothing but good times to share

So tell everybody I'm on my way

And I just can't wait to be home

With the sun beating down yes

I'm on my way

And nothing but good times to show

I'm on my way

Yes, I'm on my way

I love you and I am glad we are in this together. Sore arches, sprained ankles, pulled groins, strained knees, shinsplints, tired tendons...

WE CAN DO THIS

NEVER, NEVER GIVE UP

Runnin' Runnin' and Runnin' Runnin'...

Okay, okay... I am posting per request about my marathon training... (see I hear you Jim:-) I have been trying to avoid it so then I am a little less accountable right?? Well my good friend and I are currently training to run the Portland Marathon come October 7, which is closing in on me by the way. We are using the Team Oregon beginners training guide found on the Portland Marathon web site which includes a long run every week. I have ran the Seattle 1/2 Marathon 3 times and several other races but this will be my first marathon. We are trying to bump our mileage from about a 40+ mile week to a 45+ mile week which doesn't seem like a lot but is surprisingly hard! This week I will have to run every day to make my mileage goal which is difficult with four kids, and my friend has seven kids! We are often known to frequent the trails around here with a gang of jogging strollers, babies, toddlers, bikes and kids of varying ages, often including friends kids who like to bike ride along with us as well, we are quite the site! So as you can imagine we have absolutely no time goal (i.e. keeping a "9 minute" pace or whatnot) all we can hope for is that we finish without dying! So all that to say that we met at about 4:30 this morning and ran about 19 miles, torturous (is that a word?)! My arches hurt, my legs hurt, and I am really tired! Let me tell you the only way that we keep going is mile by mile... we don't let ourselves think about 20 miles, we break it up into miles/hours/landmarks, etc. whatever we need to so that we don't get to overwhelmed! We have many many mantras that we repeat and say over and over. We can do anything for one more mile. This is what seperates the weak from the strong. Never, never quit. God has called us to endure. We will run and not grow weary, our strength comes from God. With our really long runs (17-20 milers) we get to about mile 14 and we are done, so our newest saying is "we can always run for one more hour" Andrea gets a kick out of that one! You know you run way to much when you look at your watch and think "yes, only one more hour!" She said we should make a poster, but I don't think very many people would buy it...
Thanks to everyone who supports us, you know who you are. Especially my family who is learning to endure along with me!