We just returned from a wonderfully relaxing and full road trip up to the northern woods of Montana. Here is a peek at the trip up there.
One of the great things about driving through N. CA is the varying views of this awesome mountain.
The mouth of a lava tube.
The family exploring the depths of the lava tube.
The vast impact of a volcano.
I discovered that the Crow’s Nest at the wharf offers a rather detailed gluten free menu. This provides the gluten free diner hope for an informed kitchen, and my server was very gracious and helpful as I pieced together my dinner (taking part of the evening’s special and part of the standard menu.)
The Crow’s Nest receives very high marks for location and view, and that view will bring me back again, particularly because I don’t have to agonize over the ingredients in the menu.
The Crow’s Nest doesn’t usually receive very high marks for the food. It is good, but not excellent. Nothing to write home about, save for the fact that I can eat it without anxiety, and I can see the sailboats while I eat it.
“Runner” 594, that was me.
I wasn’t really a runner, more of a walker, trying to be a fast walker with a little bit of running thrown in for good measure, but I did complete my first 5k this month. Thanks to the kind and persistant work of my sister Anna (who ran, really ran, the 1/2 marathon, finishing 1st in her category and 33rd over all) and the kind and persistent nudging of my friend Sara, I decided to go for it.
Can you imagine how nervous I was? How silly to be nervous, but I was. I was nervous about finishing last, I was nervous about feeling totally out of place among all the runners, I was nervous, nervous, nervous. But having set my first personal record at Crossfit earlier that week (213# on the deadlift), I had finally wrapped my head around what everyone around me was trying to tell me-I just needed to do it, take that step, and set a time to beat next time.
All of my nervousness was for not-I didn’t finish last, I didn’t get lost (on that very long, convoluted 5k trail with miles markers and orange cones 
), I drank a ton of water and still didn’t have to stop during the 5k like the lady in front of me to visit the bathroom, and no one asked me what I thought I was doing at a race.
Actually so many people were nice, helpful and encouraging. It was fun and almost other-worldly to be greeted at the finish line by people with huge grins and hearty congratulations, it was a treat to have a free massage because I was a racer, and I now have my first race shirt, a rather hideous, day glow yellow shirt. And now I will have to work up a whole new level of determination to actually wear that thing in public…
My friend Renee, from the Add More Chocolate blog, has graciously granted me a bloggy award. She is very, very kind, obviously offering this in the hope that this blog will in fact live on.
Thank you, Renee. You are a wonderful friend, and I look forward to seeing you again soon!
Although I proudly blog without obligation, even I must admit that this has been a disappointing dry spell. It is certainly time to re-enter the blog world, and I have absolutely no reason for the long absence.
No excuses, but I do have something new. I have entered the crazy world of Crossfit, and Crossfit and I have a very complicated love/hate relationship. Crossfit is a fitness program that has been pushing me to my physical limits, bringing sore muscles, nausea after a workout, and the feeling that I might not be able to even go one more step. It also brings strength, endurance, a sense of accomplishment, and the knowledge that I am taking giant steps toward better health and fitness.
You can go here to see a picture of me and some of my fellow CFers. I will warn you that a few minutes of browsing the CF West Santa Cruz site with the thought that I go there will probably bring your jaw to the floor. It is truly shocking, I know.
I will try to not become a tedious CF workout of the day poster here on my blog, but I just might pop out with something now and then. I have even discovered that Crossfit is the classical fitness program. Stay tuned for that fascinating connection!
(and my brother just got a cup stacking set for his birthday…)
The idea of “hysterical optimism” (pg. 11) strikes me as such an interesting phrase. Weaver states that this is our current state and we will be in it until we again distinguish good and evil. I think this is another aspect to our discussion on sheltering and training- we must teach our children good and evil but they need the capacity to see the difference.
If we have to recover a “ceremony of innocence”, we have to have the time to clearly and definitively teach our children truth, goodness and beauty. In being indoctrinated in the transcendence of truth, students will later be able to see the evil that is always there. The sheltering and training we provide students allows them to see the “alien and destructive.” Weaver argues that we must pursue this appreciation and love for truth now, before we are too accustomed to evil.
1. Ask kids what they want for dinner.
2. Rule out their three different choices – Arby’s, Taco Bell, Pizza Hut.
3. Go to freezer and open door.
4. Pick up items that immediately fall out, having been jammed in tightly.
5. Set aside the one that lands on top of the pile and shove the rest back in.
6. Read directions on back of the “winner” of the freezer avalanche and turn oven on to appropriate setting.
7. While oven is heating, choose a nutritious vegetable. Open can.
8. Put entree in oven.
9. Open jar of applesauce and set on table.
10. Direct youngest to get out paper plates and put on silverware and napkins.
11. When timer rings, direct oldest to remove entree while middle child pours milk.
12. Call husband for dinner, have everyone pray and begin.
13. Go in and lay down on bed for first quiet moment of the day.
Hey, try it, you’ll love it!!!
Weaver keeps reminding us that modern man has lost his referense point. I think we all would have to say this is why we are home schooling. To try to help our kids have a better referense point. Christ of course is that reference point. All things filtered through the view of truth proclaimed in the World of God. Your ideas to shelter are appropriate. The real world people often speak of, does not include God. We live in a very anti-God world. The difference is this,… from my perspective. In Weavers book, he speaks about the media, showing things like a woman crushed by a subway train, and this is used on the front page, he calls this obscenities. He is correct, but this information needs to be passed on to our children(the truth about it being obscene). Its not a matter of never showing them the front page, or trying to protect them from the front page. It is about preparing them to live in a world , where this is what is on the front page. This is what I believe the bible means when it says we are to take all things captive for Christ. We are to take the junk that is on the front page, let them know whats there and then say, this is JUNK, why? because this women and her emtions (back to the crushed woman) are being exploited. This front page tries to suggests that this is the “real” world. and it is only one aspect of the real world. This is junk because if you view it too often you will not “feel” anything for this woman -eventually a regular diet of these obscenites will cause you to be less human….etc. Of course the preparation comes at an age appropriate time, and because you and I are still pioneers in how this is all done, there is no text book for good timing. One example that comes to mind for our generation is the Vietnam war brought into the homes of Americans. The affect of this was monumental. Should we have hidden ourselves from the realities of war? I think not, but do we need them served up in our living rooms? And how aware we all became of the easily manipulated point of view. The camera so easily swayed americans against the war, as it still does today. Do we shelter ourselves from the reality, again No, but is there an appropriate place? I think so…
So
Ladies, I tried this out last week and it was super-easy, fast and the whole family loved it. Kudos to Martha Stewart!!
http://www.marthastewart.com/page.jhtml?type=content&id=recipe2417
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