Crazy I Guess

This past weekend was the Wasatch Back Relay-- a 188 mile (although it ended up being almost 190 miles due to a surprise detour) race up and down the mountains from Logan to Park City. Brigham and I ran this crazy race with six of our best friends from Baltimore, and despite only 2 hours of sleep in the almost 28 hours it took us to finish the race, it was awesome! It was definitely hard-- we started at 1:30 pm and ran in the heat, ran all night long in the pitch dark with only little headlamps, up steep mountains and down steep roads. Each runner had at least one leg that made everyone else glad that they were not running it. But unlike most teams who had 12 runners to spread the joy around to, we only had 8. That meant we each had to pick up some extra legs. But it was a surprisingly good time! Cheering for the other runners on our team (the Fantastic Four Couples) and supporting them through difficult sections of their runs was really cool. Each of our team members did an awesome job-- even though it was a tough run and we had to pick up extra legs. Brigham ran like an animal (his second leg was uphill on an unpaved road in the heat of the day, smothering in all of the dust from the support vehicles) but unfortunately on second to last run, something tore in his leg. He managed to limp/run to the exchange point, but after that we all knew he was done. I picked up his last leg for him, which fortunately was only a flat 3-miler. The run that earned my place on the team was an 8 mile run up a mountain at 2 am about 35 minutes after my previous 4 mile leg. Our team finished in just under 28 hours, and we took 38th place in our division of about 656 teams-- which put us in the top 5% of teams. We are quite proud of that-- especially since the other teams had 12 people instead of 8! It was a great memory-making experience and a wonderful way to strengthen our bond with our friends. Even though I was dreading it for over a year, I'm glad that we did it!

Utahans Once Again

After seven years, the prodigals have returned to Utah! Those were seven very challenging years, but they were also wonderful. I loved meeting such amazing people and exploring the different cultures. We've picked up things in both Baltimore and Albuquerque that are now a part our daily lives (Old Bay seasoning and green chilies for example). We've made lifelong friends and seen a lot of neat places. But we are glad to be home. How great it is to have family around! I want to thank everyone who helped us with our move, but I especially want to give a shout out to my parents and brothers Chad and Brett who all took almost a whole week off of work to come down and help us move out of ABQ and move into our new house. They were awesome and amazing. I shudder to think of how long it would have taken us to do all of that by ourselves!

Brigham is back in New Mexico finishing up his residency, but the boys and I are official Utahans. The work around here never ends, but it is so awesome to live in such a beautiful house in such a great area! And I've never felt so welcomed to a new place! We've already met all of our surrounding neighbors, and they are all SO nice. Benjamin has made friends with a couple of the neighborhood kids but is too shy to go over to ask if they can play, so he waits for them to come out. It also turns out that this is "the place" to be for special needs programs-- that people move here just to get the programs. Everything has fallen into place so beautifully, and we just couldn't be happier unless Brigham were here. For so many years I've wondered if it could all be worth it, and I'm pleased to say that the answer is YES!