Settled In

The past 2-3 weeks have been crazy!!  I still can't believe I don't live in Texas anymore.  Here's a recap of how we got here and what we've been up to.

June 13-My car was loaded onto a moving truck.  That was hard to watch.  I was afraid the guy was going to drive my car off the truck.

June 14-  The moving van came, I cleaned the town home cleaner than it was when we moved in, and my parents arrived late that afternoon.

June 15 -  Matthew and his friend Rob started the 3 day car ride to Seattle.  I had my last eye-brow waxing by the best lady ever, and I stayed in a hotel with Joey and my parents for the rest of the long weekend.

June 18 - I had one last haircut by Kelly :(  I won't be able to replace her, and late that afternoon my parents dropped me off at the airport.  My dad tried really hard not to cry, my mom was a mess, and I had blurry eyes.  Of course, I had the dog and the plane was late.  Not cool.  Dallas Love used to have a dog area but after all of the renovations, they forgot to add in a new one.  So, Joey and I spent 1 1/2 hours outside in the Texas sun to make sure his little bladder was empty and I wanted to wear him out before we got on the plane.

June 19- Matthew and I spent the day looking at apartments.

June 20- We signed a lease

June 21- The moving van was supposed to arrive but it took them 2 days to unload another man's stuff. He clearly had a lot more than we did.  We spent the afternoon getting to know the town.

June 22-  Moved in!  Our town home wasn't big but it was a lot bigger than this little apartment.  We got rid of a lot of stuff in Dallas but not enough stuff.  We are currently trying to sell the washer/dryer, grill, kitchen tables and chairs, coffee table, and Matthew's desk and chair.

Matthew didn't start his job until July 1st so we had an entire week get settled in and explore.  We've eaten way too much food.  The food here is delicious and I have gained some weight.  I'll be working on losing those extra pounds asap.  We walked around downtown, did the duck tour, shopped in Bellevue, spent a lot of time in our downtown, gone to the beach, and took Joey to the dog park on the beach.  Last Sunday we tried a church here in our town but I think we're going to keep on looking.  Hopefully we will find a church soon.  I hate being without a church home and I need some friends.

Last Wednesday, I met with a running club.  The leader of the group told me that it would be an easy run because so many of their runners did the Rock-n-Roll over the weekend.  It was not an easy run.  They ran 8-9 minute miles and included speedwork.  That was after the warm up that kicked my butt.  I was in pain for several days.  I wanted to run with them on Saturday but my legs were still feeling Wednesday's "recovery" run.

Yesterday for July 4th I ran in the local 5k and it was by far the hardest and slowest 5k I've ever done.  I was slower in this 5k than I was in my first 5k before I started training with Run On!  I knew I was out of shape but dang!  The entire first 1.2 miles was ALL UP HILL.  Yep.  I walked half of that hill.  It was horrible.  I wish I could say the rest of the race was flat or downhill but nope.  We went uphill, then rolling hills, then a long downhill (down the hill we started up), 10 yards of flat then it was back up hill and the last 1/4 miles was somewhat flat.  I know that if I stick with it, I'll be a stronger runner but man are those hills tough.  I have definitely been humbled.

Girls on the Run

Today was the Girls on the Run 5k!  The weather was perfect, our tutus were the best, the girls did fantastic, and we all had a lot of fun.  This year I have really enjoyed being a coach for Girls on the Run at school.  We have some amazing girlies that I know will soon become exceptional young women.  I hope to have the opportunity to be a coach in Seattle.
What exactly is Girls on the Run?  Find out here!

Getting Ready . . .

I haven't taken the time to blog.  I wanted to blog about the Rock-n-Roll Half with my bestie and then the Willie McCool 5k with the family but I haven't time.  The only thing on my mind right now is school.   Lately, school has been a near nightmare.   It is draining every last bit of energy that I have.  This year has been a rough year.  Once I'm not employed I might share some stories.  Right now, I'm just thankful that I've learned to become queen of documentation :)  Add on the Boston Marathon bombing and West explosion hitting way too close for home.  I had friends run in Boston (they're okay) and a friend's family lives in West and were devastated by the bomb, physically they're okay.  

I've really struggled focusing on the positives in my life and our new adventures of moving out of God's country.  When I was in Lubbock for the 5-k, my dad mentioned that he wanted a coffee mug with all of our pictures of our move to Seattle on it.  So now I really have to make sure I document, or at least just take pictures of us from now until whenever I need to order the mug for christmas  :)

I'm really excited about moving to Seattle but I just get overwhelmed when I think of the cost and energy of moving.  I mean really, who enjoys packing and unpacking their crap, err belongings. 

Our first step in moving... we hired a moving company a couple of days ago for way too much money.

Yesterday, they delivered the moving boxes!!  Guess I know what I'll be up to on the weekends.  

  Grrrr. . .   My photos won't upload. . . .

  

M-o-o-o-o-o-ving!

It is official!  We are moving to Seattle!  Matthew starts his new job on July 1st.  This is a really great opportunity for Matthew and he's so excited to start his new job.  I'm a little jealous, his office overlooks Pike's Market.  I'm expecting fresh flowers once a week :)  I'm excited too but I'm also nervous.  I've never moved this far before, my parents still live in the same house that I was born in and I've never lived more than 5 hours away from any of my family members.  Matthew on the other hand, has lived all over the place and isn't as close to his family.  I currently don't have a job yet but I've been looking.  Over the weekend I had to look up the location of every single school district in the Washington area to see which ones were in the areas that we're thinking about living.  This process of finding a new job and figuring out how we're going to get all of our stuff up there is very overwhelming but the excitement usually puts my worries to ease.  

This afternoon as I started the car, the very first thing I heard from the radio was "Fear of the future never comes from God."  The perfect thing that I needed to be reminded of.  

The Fiscal Cliff

This morning we called our US Representative, Pete Sessions, to encourage him no to vote on the fiscal cliff deal.  Our phone calls didn't work magic :(
This deal is all about increasing taxes.  For every $1 in proposed cuts, there will be $41 in taxes, $600 billion in new taxes.
I hope that isn't true.  Hopefully I'm reading all of the wrong news columns and political blogs.

I hate that its so hard to really figures out what's going on in our governments.

Dallas Half Marathon

This post is long overdue, I'm terrible at updating this.

On December 9 I ran in my first half marathon with 30,000 of my best friends at the Metro PCS Dallas Marathon.  It was stupid humid and really warm for a december day but this is Texas.  I ran the majority of the course with my running buddies which always make running so much more fun.  As we headed to our corral we passed by several porty-potties but we decided to wait until we found our corral to take care of our business.  By the time we found the corral, there were no potties (that we wanted to use) in sight so Jennie, Deb, and I snuck into the fancy Adolfus hotel just to pee!  Yes, that was the highlight of the day.  Because it was so humid outside we decided to take it nice and slow and I felt great the entire time, just walked by the water stations when we needed to.  At mile 10 I was surprised out how great I was feeling so I told my running buddies "See you at the finish line!"  and ran ahead.  I'm glad we started out slow because towards the end, there were a lot of runners that had to end up walking and I was able to run past (slowly, but surely).  Matthew was at the finish line waiting for me and I'm so glad he was there and that we found each other.  I was really worried that I wouldn't be able to find him.  I waited at the finish line for the rest of the group and we all had our pictures taken then we headed to Eddie Deans ranch for some celebrating.

I'm so glad I was able to finish this race.  I've wanted to be a runner my entire life but was always told by doctors and others that I would never be able to do more than a few miles and only during certain times of the year.  I think I proved everyone wrong.  I sent my asthma doctor a thank you note for helping me get here and for encouraging me to do this.  

I am planning on running in the Dallas Rock-n-Roll Half in March. :)

It Isn't Ours

Over the past week or so, I have been reminded that everything that I have isn't mine.  Everything I have belongs to the Lord.  He's the only reason why I am where I am, doing what I'm doing, and have what I have.

This past Sunday morning I went to go get gas.  When I arrived at the gas station, there was a U-haul truck, a BMW, and a super fancy Mercedes.  As soon as I pulled up to the pump and got out of my car (which was next to the Mercedes) the man from the U-haul truck came by and asked if I could give him some gas money.  As this guy was talking to me, I could tell that the older gentlemen in the Mercedes was listening in on this conversation.  I told the U-haul guy I would be glad to help and as soon as I started my gas pump, I went over to his, put my card, and started pumping his gas.  I didn't ask the man's story, but from what he said, it seemed that they had recently been evicted and were just living out of the u-haul for now until they found a place to live.  I told the man to pump as much gas as he needed and he only pumped $35 worth.  When he was done he was greatly appreciative and tried to shake my hand a give me a hug but I was way too sweaty for any of that non sense.  

When I walked back to my car the older man in the mercedes was waiting for me.  Mercedes man was on his way to church by the way.  He thanked me for what I did and then handed me $10.  I wouldn't accept it from him.  He told me that he felt guilty for not helping the man out and was encouraged to see me help him.  He asked what made me want to help the guy and I told him that the money doesn't really belong to me.  The Lord has given it to me to bless others.  The money isn't mine to keep.  It felt good to encourage another believer to realize everything we have isn't ours and it was nice to bless someone in need, even if it isn't much.  

The purpose of this post isn't to say "hey look what i did" but to remind myself and everyone to be sensitive to the needs of others and find someone to show them Father's love.  Way to many times I drive by homeless people and make a huge effort not to make eye contact with them and I never give them money.  I see people at the grocery store who could use a little extra help with carrying their groceries or even paying for them but I never offer my help to them. 

My prayer is that I will not be so consumed with myself that I miss daily opportunities to minister to others.