Color Run

Remember back in May when I told you all that I was training for my first 5k?  Well the Color Run has come & gone & I survived!

 I was a little worried that I wasn't going to be able to run the entire thing since I had been averaging about 2 miles on my  twice weekly runs, if that. (Training kind of came to a halt after mom's accident- priorities tend to shift when you almost lose your mom.) 

However, Rebecca stuck by my side, encouraging me to keep going & I did! Aside from a very sore knee when I finished, I felt like a warrior! Ha!

 We didn't get too much color during the run, despite trying to get as close to the "powder tossers" as possible... 

 

 But after the run, there was an "after party" where they jammed music & had big color explosions every 15 minutes!

 

Then we were covered in color!! So fun!

 They had blowers there to blow the color off as much as possible before getting into your cars. Good thing, because even with the blowers, we still carried a lot of it home! :) 

Thanks, Becca for being my cheerleader! And thanks to Randy for always being proud of me, whether I ran my first 1.5 minutes or 1.5 miles! 

Just who is this Mary Jo?

 Memorial Day weekend, Rebecca & I were able to get away for 1 night. Mom & Peto had been talking about a place called Mary Jo's in Gastonia. We heard raves of walls & walls of fabric. Any kind of fabric you could think of. Sounded like a place we needed to see first hand!

So, we made a plan to go up on Sunday afternoon (it was almost a 4 hour drive!) and spend the night so that we would have a full day shopping on Monday before driving home late that evening. We were joining Peto, Mama, Ms. Janet, and Jennifer. All to shop til we dropped! Randy just couldn't wrap his brain around this. In the week leading up to the trip we had various conversations about this.

"You are going to stay in a hotel just to go shopping for fabric??"

Yep.

"Ya'll aren't going to do anything else?"

Nope. 

"Sooo.... what exactly is this store again?"

A fabric store.

"Just fabric?"

Just fabric & sewing stuff.

"I don't get why you would need to drive 4 hours to go shopping for fabric."

Would you get it if I said I was going to go 4 hours to shop for sporting goods like at a Bass Pro Shop?

"No"

What if the Martin guitar factory was 4 hours away. Would you get it then? Would you want to go stay the night to ensure you had enough time to see what you wanted to see?

"Well, yeah.... I guess you got me there."

I don't think men get the whole women-like-to-spend-time-together thing. We don't care what we are doing, we just like to be together. Although, fabric ups the cool factor!

 

I really wish I had taken a picture inside the store. The outside of the building was very inconspicuous. Plain jane, nothing fancy, warehouse. But boy, once you walk in, the wall to wall fabric was enough to make your head spin. There was so much that it took me a while to even decide on what I was willing to use my budgeted money on. I bought a few half yards of fabric that could be used for versatility.

 

 and a few especially for "boy" stuff...

 

I think those cute shoes will look really great with some red/grey/black fabrics for a "big kid" quilt for Jackson....

 

Before we knew it, our morning was gone at Mary Jo's! We "broke" for lunch then resumed our afternoon there looking for just the right fabric for a Rollie Pollie Bean Bag pattern that I had bought last year. It's time to put that pattern to use! I finally decided on this fabric...

 

And i was inspired by this fabric & plan to re-do the boys bathroom in a pirate theme this summer! FUN! This will be part of a shower curtain!

I happened to stumble upon some really cute black/white fabric that I couldn't leave there. It was screaming to be a curtain in my laundry room (I have actually been on the lookout for something like this since we moved into this house!)

Before we knew it, we had to head home! We had officially seen it all (or spent all our money, whichever came first!) We had about an hour & a half time to spare before we had to meet up to get Rebecca's girls on the way home. So.... Mama & Rebecca humored me & stopped in at IKEA. I had never been before.

 An hour & a half didn't scratch the surface of that place! Whoa.

All I can really say about that, is that we WILL be planning another overnight trip just to spend a day at IKEA. Right ladies...... RIGHT?????

Falls Lake through Jeremy's lens...

Above is the crew we go camping with. That's Randy's brother, Jeremy, our sister-in-law, Marie & their boys Kaleb & Ethan. Even though I had already posted about our trip to Kerr a few weeks back, I couldn't help posting more pictures once Jeremy shared his with me.

All my pictures were taken with my cell phone because, yes, I forgot my real camera. Bummer.

But Jeremy had his & takes some great photos so I thought you might want to see a few pictures through his lens! Enjoy!




This sunset is by far my favorite photo he took. It's like you can see God shining in those rays of sunlight. Beautiful!
Thanks for sharing with me, Jeremy!!

Hanging around the Cabin

Sometimes, just hanging around & having no real plans pays off! As I mentioned in older posts about our trip to Blowing Rock, we hung around the cabin all of Saturday. We took a hike out back but even then, we never got in our cars to go anywhere. We just hung around exploring where we were.

Jackie, my mother in law, is a perpetual teacher. That is one of the wonderful things about her. And she brought along several nature books for the kids to use to learn & explore with. Jackson put these right to use!! His nose was in one of these books for a greater part of the day! He took them outside with him & would pick up leaves & compare it to the pictures in the books to identify them. It was so cute to watch.

It also helped the cute factor that Nanny & Peto brought all the kids a surprise... and my boys got a super hero cape!

They literally wore them all day, exploring in style!

Peto went outside with them for a bit to explore too & showed them a few fun things to try!

I just enjoyed getting outside & taking lots of pictures!!








I know you are wondering what Randy was doing during all this fun, right? Well, this was it...

He never passes up an opportunity for a good nap! Vacation or not! I think he needs one of these shirts!

As luck would have it on another walk up the (very steep) driveway, my mom found a treasure that she carried all the way back to the house for the kids....

There was a lot of excitement! And they got out the book that Mema had brought to identify it of course, before setting it free.

Yeah, that Nanny is pretty awesome. She also brought along craft supplies for the kids. Together they made these awesome lanterns! Aren't they beautifully lit!?

We fit a lot of fun into a day!