Seft Portrait

This is seriously scary. When we were at my mom's during Easter, she pulled out this self portrait I drew when I was in first grade. I am horrified. I mean, I knew I was a poor artist, but this is completely off the charts. The sad thing is, right when I saw it, I remembered drawing it and thinking it was pretty. Jabba the hutt herself.
Our teacher asked me to write things about myself- each one starting with a letter of my name (Marisa Ann) and here is what I wrote:
My dad's name is Mark.
A good speller.
Really nice to people.
I like to swim.
Sings terribly.
A good student.
Apples are my favorite fruit.
Never gets in trouble at school.
Neat at home and at school.

I showed this disaster to Emma (who is also in First Grade) for laughs and she thought is was great! (I love how my kids love me unconditionally. I will not welcome the day when they think everything I do is lame.) So, Miss Emma decided to make her own self portrait:
Here is what Emma had to say about herself (she didn't do the letter thing):
I am mostly cheerful
My favorite fruit is bananas and apples
My mom's name is Marisa
My dad's name is Shan

I think we can all agree that Emma (thank heavens!) does not take after me in the artistic department. How cute is her picture?

Look Who's Playing Soccer

Emma's team is named the Bluebirds. They are awesome! Emma likes to play forward best, because that's where all the action is. But she suffers through defender too. And makes a great goalie!
Madeline can't wait to play next year. This year, she sits on the sideline with me and cheers.

Canyonlands Half Marathon

We had so much fun running the Canyonlands half marathon with my sister Jennifer, and her husband, Jake. My mom watched the kids and we spent a few days in Moab eating out, sight-seeing, oh, and running 13.1 miles. This first picture is of Dead Horse Point, which is one of the most beautiful sights in Utah I think. (p.s. it's National Parks week and you can enter all National Parks for FREE this week! For info, click here http://www.nps.gov/npweek/) I wasn't as well trained for this race as I wanted to be. The longest run I had done before this one was 10 miles, and it was pretty slow. So I decided in order to get through the race, I would just enjoy the immense beauty all around. As I started to run, I was totally overwhelmed at the glorious creations around me. I was pondering about Christ and so many of His miracles, when I looked up at the rock formations and "saw" Him. Can you see Him?
The naturally occuring rock formations looked to me like Christ talking to a little girl sitting on a rock. It looked best from far away, but here's one a little closer.
Isn't that miraculous? So the race was absolutely stunning to me. The course took us winding around this gorgeous canyon with red cliff walls and the Colorado River. They had a drum circle close to the mouth of the canyon and the beat echoed up the canyon for miles. It was motivating to hear myself getting closer and closer, and then I was there! Oh, but I still had 3 more miles... and I made it. And only 6 minutes slower than my last race. And only 10 minutes behind my hubby. Not too bad!
Me with everyone who beat me. Thanks for a great time guys!

Heavenly Fome Evening

Most of you know that we spend time together as a family every Monday night. The official name is "Family Home Evening," but my darling Madeline said on Monday at about 5:00, "Mom, I'm so excited for Heavenly Fome Evening!" Sounds fun, right?