Half Marathon Numero Dos

I ran a half marathon in August in Atlanta, GA with Kellie and my college roommate Kate Rasnick. Kate is a running expert (she runs a half marathon a month), and Kellie was still faster than me even though she was pregnant. But I did it - even if I threw up at the end!

Newsies!

Chavis Park Pool

Annual beach trip

To the Races!

Rylan got an invitation through cub scouts to visit the Orange County Speedway for basically free, and I decided this former car lover had to go.



To start, all of the drivers lined up their cars for a meet and greet with the fans.


Then the cub scouts grouped together to sing the National Anthem.


Finally the races began...sort of. During the first race, a piece of metal flew off the track into the stands, hitting a random guy, so the race was paused while we all waited for an ambulance to come take the man away. Then during the second race, one of the cars crashed into the wall (no one was injured), so the race was paused while they cleared the track.

Car racing is either really exciting or really boring - we weren't sure which!

By the time the second race finished, it was about 8:30, and since the next race involved 100 laps, we decided to cut out and get ice cream. I asked Rylan if he would ever want to go back, and he said, "Only when they do ride alongs."

Eli's Room

We've been working this summer on updating all of the boys' rooms. Here's the before picture of Eli's room:


I think that when the original owners built our house, they had only finished the family room, and the rest of the basement was slowly finished over time by various owners. The whole basement feels like an amateur DIY job, and Eli's room in particular is odd. It's situated behind the laundry room, and because of a small step leading into it (which I can't figure out the point of), the ceiling is slightly lower than the rest of the basement, making it feel like a cave. It was not built to be a bedroom - there's no closet, and since the previous owners were using it as an exercise room, there were mirrors on every wall and a TV wall stand that we cannot remove. Also, the vent was a large pipe sticking out of the ceiling, the window is a tiny basement window, and the light fixtures are the kind of long fluorescent bulbs that you find in office buildings.

So starting with this blah canvas, we transformed the room. I am so pleased and so proud.

Eli painted this mural on one wall. After helping to paint the murals for his 5th grade class production of Beauty and the Beast, he has been talking about being a scenery painter when he grows up, so I suggested letting him practice on his wall. We looked at ideas on Pinterest and found one that used this tape resist method. Since then, I have seen some really amazing murals using tape resist that Eli might want to try when he's older. For now, we are loving what he came up with.

I plan to sand down and paint all of the built-in bookshelves in the family room, but since I've never painted furniture before, I decided to test out the method on some of Eli's furniture so that the room would match and feel more cohesive. This is a $50 desk from Target that we were using to hold the rat's cage before we got their current abode, so I knew ruining it would not be a big deal. The top was black, but I sanded it down and painted it white. I also did the little wall shelf on the floor in the bottom right corner.

We also put a vent over the pipe in the ceiling and curtains covering the awful window, and voila, it felt like a finished room. Next year, we hope to be able to replace the window and door and repaint the ceiling.

Due to picture-taking limitations, you really can't get an accurate idea of how great this room looks. Guess you'll all have to come visit!