Adventures on my bicycle

well.  in case you remember my mileage goal for July and have been just dying to know how that went down, here it is.  The goal was 180 miles on my bike.  And. . . . I made it 174.  I was 6 miles short.  six.  But I'm really not too down about it because that last ride on the last day of the month I was pushing my way up Provo canyon loving the ride, feeling great and like I could go forever, and. . . I had to turn around to make it home on time to feed my baby.  And those are just the kind of little sacrifices that you have to make when you're a mom (especially one whose baby decided to refuse to take a bottle anymore.  future moms--you should listen when you're doctor tells you to give her a bottle every couple of days so that she'll remember how to take one).  And it's ok.  Sometimes I wonder how far and long and hard I could go on that thing without time restrictions.  If I didn't have to squeeze in my ride between the end of my shift and the beginning of my husbands and between feedings.  But then I'm just grateful to be able to squeeze them in at all, and grateful that I have a nice bike and a healthy body and beautiful places to go riding, and a hard working husband and lovely baby to come home to and then I get over it. 

Here are some of the adventures we've had together so far this summer and the things I've learned:

I ventured out into west Provo.  Far enough to pass cornfields and lots of sunflowers, cows, and horses.  And something about knowing I live that close to cornfields, sunflowers, cows, and horses makes me feel good about life.  And there is one spot with a good view of Mt. Nebo that completely makes me feel like I'm in Guatemala and it's beautiful.  Utah Lake is a common destination of mine.  If I have time I stop and sit by the Lake and wish so hard that it was the kind of lake without disgusting water--one that you could actually swim in and come hang out with your friends on the beach kind of lake.  Then Provo would have everything I think. 

One day I got caught in an absolute downpour and it was the highlight of probably my entire month.  I LOVE getting caught in the rain.  I made it to bridal veil falls that day, and by the time I stopped to rest there I was completely soaked and dripping.  It had been so dang hot all month and that ride was so nice and cool and refreshing and I can't even tell you how happy it made me so I'm just going to stop trying.

Let me just say I feel really dumb having such a nice bike but knowing absolutely nothing about how the thing works.  I need like a bike mechanics 101 class or something.  It leads to some really awkward moments like having to ask the bike shop guy to come look at my bike to tell me what size I need to replace my tube.  And one day when for some reason my brakes were misaligned and rubbing my tires and I could not figure out how to adjust it even though I could tell it was just some tiny little thing that needed to be done if I just knew where to tighten it.   And it was.  But it made me feel a little better when the nice high school kid in the bike shop couldn't figure it out either and had to get his boss to come help (who fixed it in about 2 seconds and didn't even charge me.  Thank you Mad Dog Cycles).   The kid also made me feel better when he told me that some guys will come into the shop with like $10.000 triathlon bikes (yes, people do spend that kind of money on athletic equipment) with flat tires.  It made me feel less spoiled and incompetent if that makes any sense. 

My dad taught me how to change and patch a flat tube which is way harder and than you might think (or maybe just for me).  While doing so he said my tires looked practically brand new which totally hurt my ego.  He also told me never to go on a ride without a patch kit, spare tube, hand pump, and your cell phone so that you don't get stranded miles and miles from your house with no way to get home but walk.  Which advice I did not follow and had to learn my lesson the hard way.  I had only gone 4 miles and did have my cell phone except that almost every single person I know in Provo decided not to answer their phone that day.  And to be honest, even if I had everything I needed, I'm not sure I could have fixed the tire myself anyway in a reasonable period of time.  So I got to have the really awkward experience of accepting a ride from a good Samaritan college freshman who pulled over and asked if I needed help.  Making smalltalk for 4 miles made me feel like I was on a first date and I will probably never forget my patch kit and pump again.

Roadkill is pretty hazardous for a biker.  And I have seen more varieties up close and personal lately than I care to go into detail about.

I really really really appreciate bike lanes and smooth, clear roads more than ever before.

I discovered while on vacation that Jackson Hole, Wyoming is pretty much the cyclists paradise.  I felt like I could explore the place for an entire summer and still not even hit every trial, not to mention that most of them are in beautiful national parks.  I got in a few completely amazing rides and want to go back just for that.

I also had a long chat with my husband about how someday we are going to bike across the entire country, coast to coast.  Yep, totally doing that.

As I was lamenting to my dad the fact that I need some cycling buddies and that I don't know any other girls who are into cycling, let alone that live in Provo, he told me that most bike shops have "bike clubs"  that will meet weekly or so for rides and that's a good way to learn a lot about biking, to get a lot better, and make friends who you can go with!  I just found out Mad Dog Cycles has a ladies only group Thursdays at 10:00.  But I'm pretty sure Tanner has class then.  I may need to recruit a babysitter and muster up the guts to go!

All of you should start roadbiking.  It's the greatest thing ever. 

180 miles

Happy Monday! I have a new goal/dare challenge: make a mileage goal. Mine is 180 miles on my bike for the month of July 2012. I've made fitness goals in the past, but never a mileage goal, and I think this will be perfect for me right now, since I'm not really concerned about how fast I'm going or anything, just that I get out frequently and for a decent amount of time. This # might be a little ambitious, since I've been tracking my miles and for May I came to 28.75 miles, and for June--a whopping 42.85 (and 35 of those were last week, if that tells you anything about how June went). But I should have a lot more time to go now that Tanner is out of school and done with the MCAT (yay!). (or it could be a really lame sissy goal, don't judge. it's where I'm starting) I just got a bike odometer which I'm really stoked about! As both a runner and a biker, I tend to like to wander, explore, and do a different route every workout, which makes mapping my ride and logging my miles trickier. I also got a pair of legit cycling shorts. You know, the kind with a ridiculous amount of padding to keep you from getting saddle sore. Before I started biking, I had no idea these existed, so for those of you who don't bike--they exist.

So wish me luck and I dare you to set your own mileage goal to keep you going strong for a whole month! Whether it's running, hiking, walking, swimming, biking, rollerblading. . . whatever strikes your fancy :)

I'm throwing this in as well. I'm sure you've all seen challenges like this bouncing around pinterest. I'm going to do this one 5 days a week for July (with absolutely no delusional belief that I will look like this by the time I'm through)

300 ab challenge here

Now I'm off to go set up my odometer and take my first ride of July!

Happy excersising! (excersise is one of those words I will never know how to spell correctly. I'm leaving it like this)

Utah Arts Festival

I have a new dare for you:  I dare you to go somewhere that inspires you.

I dragged my husband and baby to the Utah Arts Festival on Friday and had a lovely time.  Tanner was amazing and spent most of the time in the shade making sure Camryn didn't overheat, which allowed me to walk around and feast on all of the beautiful and inspirational ART.  I can't tell you how much I love doing this.  And I also love that the artists are in their booth most of the time because it's so cool to meet them and ask questions about their work.  A lot of times they end up telling me something amazing that makes me love their work even more, or explaining their process to create it, which is always fascinating.  

These are a few of my favorites:

She told me that a lot of her work (like this first one) is inspired by and includes drawings from her 2 and 6 year old.  These "nice creatures" are so cool! She has two of them tattooed on her forearms. She says  "The big eyes and long legs represent, to me, a willingness to see the world in all its glory, and to move about in it fully." She also lets her children name the paintings (the ones that include their sketches)  which is how they end up with awesome titles like "a girl taking a walk with a nice creature who is a boy."  I also love her other titles, bright colors, abstract ideas, and overall amazing creativity.  I wish I was rich so that I could support her art and have it hanging all over my house.

Lisa Kattenbraker:

"a girl taking a walk with a nice creature who is a boy"

 The big eyes and long legs represent, to me, a willingness to see the world in all its glory, and to move about in it fully

This is not Chaos

"All those things I feared would bruise him, he caught with grace and ease"

 A change in the weather II   

"Strong will, fast wheels"

Gia Whiltlock:

This woman had her 6 month old baby on her hip, which added just one extra component to me being impressed.  I love collage.  

Liz Collins

This next picture unfortunately does not at all give credit to how cool this lady's work looks up close.  She does 2-D mixed media collage/painting using a lot of maps and cut up pieces of her own writing.  

One more.  I just like this guy.  That's all. 

Richard Curtner

I wish I had a better picture, but there was an infant play yard with this AWESOME toy hand made by some creative carpenter.  It was a big box painted funky with a bunch of fun knobs, door handles and hinges attached.   And a couple of huge tubes sticking out the top.  I thought it was so cool and kids were going crazy over it.   I thought it would be so fun to make one myself!

Sand sculpting

Growing Something

Here, I dared you to grow something.  And here, I'm doing it.  I think the rest of my 6-plex has probably started calling me the plant lady.

If you want to feel really good about yourself, plant green beans.  They grow really fast. 

Here is my geranium and 2 tomato plants.  I'm afraid I don't have enough sun for the tomatoes, but we'll see.

I've already got one!

Thank you, mother-in-law, for this beauty.

Vinny III

Next:  I dare you to do something that puts yourself out there. 

For me, this means I am going to enter the Utah Original Writing Competition.  Since not all of you (or any of you?) write, I'm not going to dare you specifically to enter, so interpret this dare as you will to your own circumstances.  Someone posted a link to this competition on Facebook and it's exactly what I needed right now.  I really want to do something with my writing, but right now, I'm just not exactly sure what.  I have a lot of ideas . . . but not a lot of work to show for it.  So, I want to start doing things that actually put my work out there.  The competition deadline for this year is June 29th, which isn't a whole lot of time, so I'm going to submit a children's book I have already written to the "Juvenile Book" category (which, coincidentally, is about a plant lady).  Next year, though,  I want to write a piece to submit to the Biography/Autobiography/History category (which I just realized is a bit ambitious, since there is a minimum length of 60,000 words requirement.  But still doable!) I have some ideas for pieces that would be perfect for this competition, and this might be just the push I need to really get serious about working on them. 
With that said, my childrens book isn't something I want to post here, but I do need some help and feedback on it, so if you are someone who would be willing to read it and want to, comment or send me a message and I'll send it to you.  But only if you promise to give me honest, thoughtful feedback on it!

Something Creative

Proud to present my first completed dare: something creative.  If you don't know what I'm talking about click here.  I collage-covered a notebook as a graduation gift to my little sister and I'm pretty happy with how it turned out! 

 I've made quite a few of these for myself over the years and it's just something I really like to do.  It makes my notebooks a lot more personal, unique and fun.  I just buy a blank-covered sketchbook from Michaels or Barnes & Noble, glue magazine clippings to the cover with Mod Podge, and then give it a couple coats of Mod podge over the top when I'm all done so it's smooth and none of the clippings start to peel off.  I used to have a huge stash of magazines under my bed, but I decided I needed to throw it away during this last move and I'm cursing myself for it!  You can never have too many magazines to attack with that pair of scissors. . . Luckily I still had a stash of clippings. 

The quote on the front I borrowed from Corrie, I hope she doesn't mind!

Next Dare:  I dare you to grow something.  Edible or beautiful, it doesn't matter.  If you have a lot of garden space, great.  But if you're in a tiny apartment like me, that doesn't mean you can't grow anything!  Try planting a vegetable in a bucket or other container by your door, or hanging a basket--inspiration here.  If nothing else,  get a little indoor houseplant that you can set on the windowsill.  I have about 100 little baby plants growing off of my spider baby plant all ready to pot, so if you want, call me and you can come get one!

I Dare You

I've been thinking about this for a while (which you'll understand in a little bit is kind of ironic).  I've been thinking about how there are a lot of things that I think about that I never actually do.  Things that I want to happen in my life, or things that I want to accomplish.  Things that I pin, people I mean to call, hairstyles I mean to try, dreams I mean to follow, gifts I mean to give, trips I mean to take, DIY projects I mean to try, races I mean to run, bucket list items I mean to cross off, you get the picture.  Intentions you might call them--good intentions.  We all have them.  Some of you may be at a time in your life when your entire existence is so consumed by one intention that there is no space for side projects (i.e. graduate from college, raise 5 kids) and that is 100% acceptable.  Not that I'm not busy, but right now I do not have such an all consuming task at hand you might say.  Obviously, I take care of Camryn, but she's a good baby and let's be honest--sleeps a lot.  And I work too, but I have a lot of down time at work that I probably could be really productive during but instead I really just waste that time (that down time is the whole reason I even started a blog, because I have to be at a computer then anyway) when I could probably do something a lot more productive.
Bottom line is I've been kind of down on myself lately about lots of things I'm not doing.  I want to be someone who pursues their passions and doesn't just sit around thinking about it.  SO.  I decided to start something of a blog series where I dare myself to do things.  Initially, I thought I'd pick something to dare myself to do, then do it, then write a blog post about it daring all 10 of you that read this thing to do it too.  But--that cheesy saying that says 'it's not a goal until you write it down' is kind of true, and a few weeks have passed without me doing anything about the things I've been thinking about due to lack of motivation.  I think, then, that I will dare myself (along with you) in a blog post first, which will then hopefully give me motivation to follow up!  Some things will be very small, and some hopefully big.  So, follow me if you'd like and get inspired to do a thing or two with your life and turn it into what you want!

First dare:  I dare you to do something creative this week.  Anything at all.  Paint it, sew it, write it, bake it--whatever.  Just get your creative juices flowing, make a big mess, and create something.  Go!