Three Little Birds

So we are control freaks. There. I admit it. We are 100% Type A control freaks. We are list-keepers and item-crosser-offers. We adore predictability. We like to plan ahead, make arrangements, put away for the winter, know what's ahead of us and then basically orchestrate the steps before, during, and after that "thing". We will ensure that we are taken care of. "What wrong with that?" you might ask. Self-sufficiency is a good thing. To a point. Glorification of your own self-sufficiency is  sometimes always a sure-fire way to separate yourself from spontaneity, from freedom of guilt, and from our Creator. The Creator of the stars and blue birds and mountain ranges and the desires of our very own hearts. Let me back up and give you some insight into this revelation I/we had this evening. But first I am going to rewind even further. When we were matched with our birthmom 3 weeks ago, we found out that she was due in 3.5 weeks. YIKES. With our other adoption...

We have had quite a few changes going on. I’ll give you a quick version, so try to keep up. 🤣 Justin had major ankle surgery. About a mile in to a long trail run, he had a sudden sharp pain in his left ankle. Long story very short, he had a bone chip lodged in his ankle joint along with severe tendinopathies of the ankle joint (thanks for decades of repetitive ankle rolling). On Oct 24, he underwent surgery to repair all this - it’s called micro fracture repair. The tendons were all tightened up and reconstructed, holes were drilled into bones to stimulate a faux cartilage to grow (it’s complicated).  He’s been 100% NON-weight bearing since that time. Not a lot of pain, but simple things like getting in and out of the shower, going up steps into the house, helping with laundry, etc are all much more difficult. I’ve (jokingly of course) said that Justin’s been “useless” to me these last few weeks. Haha!! So helping him get his knee scooter to the jeep with the garage door closed...

My eyes are heavy with the haze of anesthesia as I feel the weight of a warm post-op blanket cover my body. I’m suddenly aware of the pain. And then my eyes shoot open and I slur with a heavy tongue and a raspy voice to my husband there at my bedside in the sterile recovery room, “Is it over?! What did he say?!” There’s a pause and a sigh and I suddenly feel a weight in that moment, you know that heaviness of a moment that you know will change your path from here on out. “Babe, he said there’s nothing he could do…” Hot tears stream down my cheeks and the pain of a surgery meant to pave the path towards bringing life into this world is now a dead end. It was my 4th surgery to restore order to my uterus and ovaries, which were a tangled mess of endometriosis & scar tissue from a condition known as Asherman’s Syndrome. When I met my husband, I had already had one surgery that seemed benign enough, but it led to the eventual difficult journey of infertility. Of course we didn’...

A stage race is something that takes a lot of preparation - not just with physical training - but in planning ahead!!   During my long week there in the remote Colorado Rockies, I gave a LOT of thought as to what worked and what didn’t work for us, what items I could have left at home and what things I could not have lived without, items I wish I would have brought with us, and certain reservations/amenities worth the extra money. Here is a compilation of those thoughts for those of you considering TRR or for those of you who’ve already made the leap and are now scratching your heads at where to start… beware, it’s a long post!! But I looked for something like this before we left and found nothing. Reservations / Amenities Hotel/cabin reservations before the race - you will need to book early, like as soon as you register, if you want something good and in downtown Buena Vista. We stayed at a gorgeous cabin about 6 miles out of town - this doesn’t sound like far away, ...

"You don't need a 'WHY'. The day you were born answered that. You are ALIVE. There is only one of you. And you get ONE life to do all that is in your heart. You don't always need an explanation. You don't need people to understand. What you need is 'TO KNOW'. KNOW who you are. KNOW your life is valuable because you simply exist. KNOW that nothing is impossible ." - Sally McRae Here we are at the last 2 stages of the 6 day Transrockies Run (TRR6). If you've read all my posts about the race up to this point, you da real MVP. Haha! Stage 5 and 6 were probably the most challenging for me! By the time we toed the line at Stage 5, we'd run 74 miles in 4 days straight, and had already climbed 11,491 feet, which is a lot -- however, we had 8,509 feet of climbing to go in only 2 more days!  So our hardest days were ahead of us for sure! As you can see, I'm not feeling Stage 5... bahaha!! The pre-race briefers the night befor...

"And then the sun rises. Again. Faithfully. A NEW day is YOURS. Yesterday remains to never change. Tomorrow is not yours to touch. Only TODAY. Live all your days. The hard, the joyful, the frustrating, the rewarding, the scary, the crazy. Treat them as gifts. Precious & unique. Live all your days... Gratefully." - Sally McRae Stage 3 started us off in the town of Leadville... an old mining town that is a pretty sleepy little town that sits at 10,152' above sea level. That's where we slept the night before, on a high school baseball field... so we started out day 3 already slightly hypoxic. We had 23.8 miles (give or take, depending on your GPS) and about 2500' of climbing ahead of us. I was nervous that AM - how would my hip hold up?? I had never ran (or even walked!) that many miles in a week at that point, much less for 3+ days in a row! I was a little sore but overall the legs felt refreshed at the start. As we walked to the sta...