Running

It has been a long-time goal of mine to run a marathon and I always told myself that after I was done with school I would do it. I thought that working would allow me a more established schedule and more time to train. This is not true, of course. However, I woke up a few weeks ago determined and excited to run the Salt Lake City Marathon on April 17, 2009. I found all the information online and put together a training schedule for the next 15 weeks. The next morning was the first day of training. It was at 5:45am and the temperature was -6 degrees outside. I bundled up and went for it. Nothing is gonna stop me from running this race, not even the freezing cold of Vernal! Lots of my training can be done on my days off but I will probably have to wake up and run before work several times a week.

These are pictures that I took of myself this morning at 6:19am after I finished my run. It was wretched cold, but I keep pretty warm. I wear regular socks, soccer socks, two pairs of running pants, a long-sleeve thermal shirt, a hoodie, a rain coat, a winter coat and a beenie with a built in flanel mask! Most of my body remains warm, but some unfortunate parts do not. Usually my eyes water a lot cause its so cold. This causes ice formations in my eyelashes that continue to grow throughout the run. My nostrils and everything inside of them also freeze. My gloves, coat and beenie accumulate ice crystals. And because I run so early in the morning, I have to carry a small flashlight in my hand so that I can make oncoming traffic aware of my presence, if necessary.

The benefit of all of it is that I am going to accomplish an awesome goal of mine, I'm gonna be in shape, I'm gonna learn to get my butt out of bed and I'll have something to look forward to.


The other benefit is that after some of my runs and while I'm getting ready for work, I get to witness these awesome sunrises!

Get ready Salt Lake Marathon! 26.2 miles have nothing on freezing your face off!

Happy New Year 2010

Another awesome Sorenson Family Tradition that started a few years ago because we were all sick of New Year's Parties that never seemed to work out. We now have a family New Years party. This year we started early at 4:00pm so that we could have lots of time to play games and have fun before midnight. My mom always cooks the best prime rib ever and we eat stuffed mushrooms, mountain dew love (I think thats what its called) and lots of other delicious things! After dinner we start the games and the fun doesn't stop until the New Year (ask Trisha, who tried to take a short nap just before midnight, and got ridiculed by not only my siblings but also my nephews who love this tradition just as much as the rest of us). This year our games included guitar hero and some other wii games and a good game of Ticket To Ride that ended just before the new year. As the time gets close to midnight, we bust open the Martinelli's and prepare to make some noise and a big mess to celebrate the new year. We all stand in the family room of my parents house, we grab handfuls of confetti and we count down with the ball in New York. As the countdown hits zero, there is massive amounts of yelling and screaming and jumping and there is a storm of metallic confetti flying everywhere possible!! After that the confetti fights start. I may be to blame for this because I used to like to have confetti fights and my nephews caught on (who knew they would remember such things) and now they gang up on me and they especially like to throw it in my face. I got plastered with confetti!! Next comes our oldest family tradition for the New Year- leaving the house and making obnoxious noise outside so that all of our neighbors know that it's the new year. We used to run around the whole block banging pots and pans when we were teenagers but after we ruined all of my moms pans and got older, it has changed to just making noise in the front yard. Next the kids and the wussies go to bed and the rest of us (usually just the siblings cause the inlaws don't seem to enjoy staying up late like we do). For the die-hards, the party wasn't over until after 3:00am. Despite the fact that Lisel kept telling us that she was so tired she was gonna vomit, she stayed up. The best part of all is trying to find places for all of us to sleep. We were everywhere in my mom and dads house. Shayne was on the couch in the family room that was covered with confetti still, Trisha was on another couch, Lisel and myself were on the floor. It's all worth the fun that we have together as a family!!!

Sitting around the table after dinner (you can see the "new" kitchen in the background)

Guitar hero. Its funny to look at what the people in the background are doing, mostly Matt

Lily holding Clara

Mario Kart was another big hit

All of the Martinellis and soda that we consumed

Shayne, Megan, Lisel, CJ and I played Ticket to Ride. I won!

Makin noise!

We laid on the ground so that we could get a good picture of what the party looks like after midnight. We try to tell my mom that she should get the paper confetti but she just loves this stuff and she cleans it up every year!

We got invited to dinner with two of our good friends from Boston. Esther moved back to Utah a few weeks ago and had us over. Esther was one of Trishas roommates in Boston and a good friend to both of us. We are excited she is in Utah now! She also invited Tristan. Tristan was one of the first people that I met in Boston because we had mutual friends that always had us over for parties. Later she moved in across the driveway from Trisha and we became even better friends. Both of them have had immense impacts on our lives and we are grateful for their friendships. It was great to see you girls! And Thank you to Esthers sister (Amy) for letting us have dinner and chat at your house!

Saturday we went to Lunch with our friends, Jill and Rob, and then we all went to see Sherlock Holmes as well. We don't make it to Salt Lake very often these days, so when we do make it and we get to hang out with our friends we are so happy. Jill has been one of my best friends since we were in the Sound of Music together at Eisenhower Jr back in 1997. I'm glad that even though both of our lives have changed a lot and we've both started families that we are still friends!

On Sunday we headed up to Richmond, Utah (about 20 minutes North of Logan) for the baby blessing of our new niece, Clara. It was such an amazing blessing, given by her dad who is both blessed with an amazing ability with words and a spirit that can touch any heart. Clara is already blessed to have such great parents. We had the chance to eat lunch at their house and hang out with the family for a minute. We also got to tour their house and it is beautiful! We left Richmond early to make our 5 hour journey back to Vernal. Trisha was sick so she slept nearly the entire drive (from Logan until Roosevelt) and I jammed to my music and enjoyed the scenery around me. This time we drove through Morgan, Utah (up Ogden canyon) cause that's where our friend Ester grew up and we wanted to see what it was like. It was small... Actually it was an amazing drive and it was nice to see some different scenery.

Here's to hoping that 2010 is just as great as 2009. Hard to top but it could happen...

Christmas Parties

CHRISTMAS TIME!

I love Christmas and this year was awesome! We spent lots of time with family and lots of time eating delicious food.

We bought a new house at the begining of the month and we are all moved in. We love it and are so excited to live here for a few years and grow into this house. This is the exterior of the house. To see more pictures, including the inside, visit Trishas awesome blog.

Clara is the newest addition to our family and she is so cute! I loved holding her while she slept all the time

Santa Clause brought me a new camera for Christmas and apparently Santa is also into color isolation cause he (she) made it a point to find a camera with this feature and I must admit it's pretty cool. I like that you can see Ammon and Logans red cheeks in it

Christmas night we got to visit with two of my best friends from High School and it was so fun to remember all of our crazy and fun times. Jill and Dan are awesome friends!

Trisha was mad that we didn't get any pictures of christmas but that isn't true because we did get this beauty while opening presents christmas morning at my grandma and grandpas house

The day after Christmas my whole family made the trek out to Vernal to visit us at our new house and have a sleepover. We live across the street from the Dinaland Golf Course so we decided to go sledding with all the kids. Some of us adults enjoyed it just as much as the kids. We all took turns riding down the hill and pushing each other. We stayed there a couple of hours until nearly every tube and sled that we brought was broken and destroyed. It got so cold that the saucers would break in mid-air going off the jumps. This time my dad pushed CJ and Tania as they tried to stay on this small saucer the whole way down the hill

My turn

Trishas turn

Matt pushing Landon. I think my nephews had a great time and loved going off the jumps and watching everyone else go off the jumps too

Lily, Landon and Caleb say there is nothing like a warm cup of hot cocoa after being out in the freezing Vernal air! (I am pretty sure it was in the negative degrees when we left the golf course) Trisha made us all hot chocolate and chilli and the night of fun began

Lisel and Tyler playing Trishas christmas present. She loves her new Wii and she tells me every day how long she exercised using wii fit each day and also tells me how many calories she burned. I guess that means I don't have to buy her a gym pass anymore?

This is the disaster area of our front room. I guess thats what happens when you invite 13 adults and 7 children to come stay at your house

Caleb and Ammon hanging out on the floor. Ammon is a tank at only 5 months

Mario Kart seemed to be the biggest hit in terms of games on the Wii. The boys seemed to especially love it

More Mario Kart

Even Mom and Dad played and were getting into it

Tyler, Shayne and Trisha were gonna play Risk until they realized that they didn't have 10 hours available. I like this picture though cause I told Trish she couldn't do her regular "cheesy" grin in this picutre while everyone else was being serious. So instead she gave me attitude and Tyler gave her a dirty look

Trisha cooking in our kitchen while talking to Shannon

It was one of the funnest Christmas' that I have ever had and it was awesome to have my whole family spend some time at our house. We hope that more family (Cheney clan) and friends come to visit us!

Happy Halloween!

Last week was our annual Halloween party hosted by my sister, Lisel. It was so much fun!!! Most of us dressed up and each year the costumes are getting better and more fun.

The food:

Dessert Table

Food Table

Trish and I made these gummy mummies cupcakes

Trish and I also made these edible eyeballs which were delicious!

These are pumpkin bread bowls for our soup

My sister, Lisel, made these awesome Jell-o worms

The costumes:

All of us in our costumes

Me and Trisha riding her broom

The wicked witch of the west (Elphaba) and the scarecrow (Fiyero)

My dad is a train conductor and Logan is a pirate

Tyler and Shayne came as Bert and Ernie

CJ and Tania always come up with great costumes, this year they came as two fatties

Little Ammon is the crocodile from Peter Pan

Zach is an Indian from Peter Pan

Landon as Captain Hook shoving worms in his mouth

Caleb got to be Peter Pan (all the kids had taken off some of their costumes by the time we got there)

Logan is a pirate

Mom was Uncle Fester

Lily is the cutest Tinkerbell I've ever seen

Who knew that Halloween could be so much fun as adults too? I know now and it's becoming one of my favorite holidays!! I can't wait to wear my costume one more time for our ward halloween party this saturday. Hopefully, we'll win the costume contest!!!