Seattle Rock’n’Roll

Today I completed my first half marathon!  Besides a little charley horse in my calf right after the 2nd mile, everything went well.  I was really nervous because I wasn’t very good about getting in my training runs (eek!) but I FINISHED and I did it averaging 12 minute miles – which, all things considered, I’m very pleased with it!

Here’s the starting line at 5:45 am…nothing like being early 

My corral right around starting time…can’t even really see the starting line!

and we’re getting close!

and closer! let’s get this show started!

 

Yeah!!! I’m a finisher!

ugh.

I got stuck with a bunch of these this week:

I haven’t missed work yet, but am definitely not on my A-game.  who gets a nasty cold in the summer??

apparently I do.

Dreaming of the Beach

I’m not going to lie, tonight’s episode of the Bachelorette inspired this post.  Ashley and the remaining bachelors are on the island of Phuket, Thailand and the scenery is absolutely gorgeous.  Southeast Asia, specifically Thailand are very high on my must-see list, so consider this a little pre-trip (very pre-trip since it will probably be a few years before we make it there!) planning.  Do you think I can convince Joel that trip planning is the reason I seem to be addicted to watching the Bachelorette?

There are so many places to see in Thailand, I don’t even know where to start. Of course we’ll probably hit up Bangkok and Phuket, and we’ll spend some time in Pattaya to help out 3L Foundation to finally see the hard work my cousin has poured her heard into….but besides that, I don’t know how to pick where to go (in my mind, there is no time limitation on this trip)!  Since some of the favorite places we’ve travelled to are smaller, low-key, less touristy places it seems like Ko Maak, a small island south of Ko Chang might be the place for us.

Who can pass up crystal clear water like this?

And these views?

So beautiful!

The first settler on the island established a coconut plantation.  Most of the island is still owned by the original family that settled there.

Totally a side note – I stumbled across this picture while looking for pictures of Koh Chang. What in the world??  The website didn’t say anything more than that you too can have a close encounter with a whale shark….ummm – I love snorkeling and really all things water sports but I DON’T really want to get this close to a whale shark!

Our home: Before–the bathroom

When we first purchased the house we had 1.5 bathrooms.  The bathroom with the shower/bath combo was in the hallway and the master bath was just a toilet and a sink. Unfortunately I only have a before picture of the full bathroom – you’ll just have to imagine the half bath – it had the same seashell sink as the picture below and had beautiful bows and flowers stenciled on the walls like the master bedroom did.

Semi-Before:  the main bathroom (we had started painting this bathroom – the true “before” bathroom was all that sunshine yellow color)

photo organizing…and a cute kitty

I’ve been trying to figure out the best way to organize and share my pictures online.  For a few years I was an adamant user of flickr but this past year when my pro account expired I decided not to renew because off all the other free online resources out there.  Now I have the tricky task of choosing which resource will be the best for me.  Anyone have a recommendation?

Since deciding not to continue with flickr I have been going through my account to make sure all the pictures saved out there are saved on my hard drive.  Without my pro account I can only see my 200 most recent pictures, so part of the process I’m going through is deleting the pictures that I know are saved.  If you read any of my older blog posts some of the pictures won’t show up – sometime I’ll go back and repost them (sorry for any interruption!)

 

I stumbled across this picture of cute kitten we found in the streets in Peru while cleaning out flickr. 

good reads. No One You Know

This was the first book of Michelle Richmond’s that I have read, and I am definitely looking forward to picking up (okay – checking out) another one of her books.  I laughed, I cried, and the detail made me feel like I was next to Ellie, the narrator; from the coffee fields in Nicaragua to the coffee shops in San Francisco, I was right there the whole time.

good reads. the NOOK

Growing up I was quite the book worm. Ask anyone in my family - my nose was always in a book.  I remember one summer of lifeguarding in highschool I was reading 2 or 3 books a week; it was a really slow pool and I had A LOT of downtime…it was AWESOME (almost as awesome as my tan was that summer )  Over the past several years my reading material shifted to CPA study guides, financial statements, and accounting guidance…not exactly my definition good reading.  I was excited when I left public accounting last summer because it meant I would have more time for leisure reading.  As a late adopter of the e-reader craze and being the incredibly cheap person I am, I did a lot of research last fall to decide exactly which e-reader would be the perfect fit for me. 

I narrowed the field down to the Kindle, the Nook, and the pocket edition of the Sony reader.  After many hours of research and too many trips to Barnes & Noble, Target, and Best Buy, I jumped in and purchased the Nook.  The ability to check out library books put the Nook above the Kindle in my book (no pun intended), and the size of the screen was the determining factor that took the Sony reader out of play. I’ve been really happy with my purchase and my Nook is now a required item on any packing list. 

 

The Seattle Public Library has an awesome inventory of digital books and so far I haven’t had to actually purchase any books to read, another major plus for my thrifty lifestyle!  They do have limited licenses on books, so I’ve had to put holds on some of the newer releases, but there is always something good to read and the holds don’t take too long.

 

Since I’m always looking for good reading list I figured I should probably start sharing some of the books I’ve been reading too; so be on the lookout of some of these books over my next few posts!

___________________________________________________________________________________________________

Okay – I just went out to Barnes & Noble to link to my Nook only to find out they have a NEW Nook – a few inches shorter than mine – but the same display size, full touch screen, better battery life than the Kindle and all sorts of other fun features.  SO COOL! 

Before–the outside version