Half Marathon Preview

Hello folks!

I am creaky, sleepy, sore, and exhausted so a full blog post will not be coming tonight.
To sum up the half in a sentence though I would have to say that I didn't do as well as I would have hoped.

Hope you all enjoyed your Saturday evening...my body already hates me, can't wait to see what tomorrow is like! Here's a sneak peek of pics to come (btw, I did NOT finish at the time on the clock! hah!)

The day before my 13.1 mile demise!

Hello readers! So today was a weird day, but it ended pretty well, don't you worry.

So I woke up with Michael cause I needed him for his parking pass so I could go the library. Welllll once I got to the library I realized I didn't have the right computer software to study, so I had to go back home. FAIL. Anyway I headed home and made an apple care appointment for Michael's Mac and ran up to the mall.

Well for some reason I saw a million people I knew at the mall during the short time I was there and the 2 stores I visited. Ok, it was 3 different people, but that's close to a million!! Apple kept Michael's computer to fix it, and its covered under warranty AND they gave us a new power cord thingy FO FREE! wooo!!

After I left the computer I went to get a new battery for my watch cause I wanted to us it for the half tomorrow. Well turns out my watch is a piece so there was no way to use it tomorrow. Well as I turned around after finding out about my watch my jaw dropped as I saw Mr. Eloy Vargas (UK basketball player). As you all may remember, I find that any UK athlete are as big of celebrities as real celebrities. I got all sweaty and nervous and then he came over to the kiosk to look at watches. I nervously said, uhh ELOY?! Could I get a picture with you so I can send it to my husband?! (voice is shaky) His response, " Yeah, are you sure he won't be jealous??" (I had a really hard time understanding him). Well after my awesome quality picture on my phone (GEEZ he's tall!) I tried to make awkward convo, but then just said thanks, gave up, and walked away. (P.S. I'm on my tippy toes cause I was afraid I wouldn't even be in the picture!)

But GOODNESS, that was exciting!!

After more studying it was time to head to Louisville to go to the half registration packet pickup. I love that my GPS takes me through 13 miles of hilly country before I get on the highway and today was the perfect day for it. Windows down, sun shining. Perfection! (moving car pics)

So I arrived in Louisville around 7 ...needing to pee..badly!!! We headed straight downtown to the convention center and then I was on a mission for a restroom! Then it was time to head into the packet pickup. Dustin thankfully went with me to this because I had to pick up FIVE different packets for people. It was very overwhelming!

We headed back to Dustin's hiz-house and made a spaghetti dinner, with salad and garlic bread. Got my carbs on ! And now I sit here, relaxing before the race, as usual I'm nervous. I hope I can sleep well tonight..urgh...Please think positive thoughts for me tomorrow between 7:30 and 9:30 am!

Well that's it for tonight! Later Gators!

ARGH!

Michael's Mac will not turn on.

We've watched tv all night and simultaneously tried to get it to start to no avail.

I was saddened by Michael Scott's last episode on the Office.

I am frustrated, we cannot afford to get a MAC fixed.

I have important things like my resume saved on that computer.

And pictures.

Also, I have not had a single blog comment since last Wednesday.

Boo.

Goodnight.

Please pray for our mac.

Wacky Rainy Blank Wednesday

Hello friends, as my day was filled with studying and pretending to ignore the various Tornado warnings, UK alerts about tornadoes, and the ever rising flood in our front yard, I really don't have much to talk about ...so today... we will fill in the blanks!

1.   Wednesdays  are  hump days and very close to my weekend. I am normally unproductive after class.

2.    people who stop driving when an emergency vehicle is coming down the road, my puppies, my husband, the color green, chocolate, traveling, and weddings make me terribly happy.

3.  Something that inspires me is     people who lose massive amounts of weight. I could never be that strict with my eating...you all are awesome! Also, people who eat vegan or vegetarian, it seems nearly impossible for me and very expensive if you want to eat something that tastes good.

4.  If I had the day off today I would     finish the entire Ugly Betty series on Netflix, eat a bag of popcorn, go on a ENJOYABLE jog, take the dogs to the dog park, and then return to my sweatpants and blankets. (this would assume that the weather was not like todays, if it were like todays I probably would just eliminate the outside activities and replace them with eating or baking!)

5.  If I had to put a label on my home decor style, I would say my style is   green, comfy, traditional, homey ...not sure, it's hard to have a home decor style with a small budget. We do have a good amount of pictures hanging around though so maybe personal touches would be included in the description.

6.  Concerning politics I would say I'm       not going to talk about it. People can have their opinions and beliefs, that's what they are, personal. No need to tear each other down about politics, that's just silly!! Let's just be nice to each other and respectful!

7.  I'd like to go to       anywhere     so I could       be away from school and studying and taking a break from the Lexington death storms!

Well that's all the blanks for today folks!! Hope you had a great hump day!

Saying my "see ya laters" to a friend

Today was Ashley day. OH no, not me. Don't you all realize that there is more than one Ashley in the whole entire world?! Nahhhh...no way!! Whattt??? Yep, sorry to break the news to ya but there is more than one Ashley.

This evening all of the bstud girls met up to send off our dear friend Ashley S. as she and her husband embark on a new life in Little Rock, Arkansas. (Her husband has been living there for 5 weeks, but Ashley is finally getting to move in with him this Friday, she has missed him sooo!) We met up at Johnny Carino's and took FULL advantage of happy hour. I treated myself to a glass of sangria, yum (I had a stressful day so I believe it was well deserved). We all enjoyed our time together and feasted on bread and pasta together, laughing and cracking jokes.  And I'm lucky to have had my part time wifey, Nicole, there to share a salad and entree with. What would I do without her?! OHHh probably eat entirely too much!!

I am sad that Ashley is leaving, she is a super funny, energetic, awesome girl but I only hope for the best for both of them and their 2 super cute doggies! (Ashley and Nate, you are in our constant prayers, and lucky for you, you are the couple we get to pray for this week! yay!) 

I asked Ashley about her new city that she was about to take on and she sound pretty pumped about the whole thing. And to be perfectly honest, after hearing her talk about Little Rock, Michael and I might add the city to our list of possibilities for Michael's residency because Ashley made it sound pretty cool, awesome, and gorgeous!! Has anyone else been to Little Rock?! What's your opinion?!

Well that's all the positive stuff I wanted to write about today, I decided I would not include the negative of the day and devote the blog to Ashley and Nate!! Now back to studying!!

Monday is not Funday!

Hello friends!! Yet another Monday where I do not have much to tell you about.

I started it off with a 4 mile run, as you approach the race during the week of you slowly decrease your mileage. Well either I am not fully prepared or became lazy because I was a running stuffed pinata of Easter candy, either way, my run was stinky. My legs felt like lead and I just wanted to lay down on the sidewalk and nap.

I spent the majority of my day at school working on a group project and trying not to fall asleep while studying until class, which I sat in for a little over 2 hours still trying to not fall asleep. I have had this semi-headache annoyingness all day and I just want to SLEEP yo!

Then I had to head to the grocery for food and ANT KILLER (AKA Raid) where I encountered a multitude of people that I decided should not have their licenses because they are incapable of driving safely in parking lots. RUDE!

As soon as I got home it was RAID time. GOODBYE Ants, you are not welcome back at the Kasten home!! Although, I think the Raid may have caused my headache to worsen. BOO!

Sidenote - does anyone else have multitudes of caterpillars outside of their house?! We definitely do, those sneaky furry buggers are trying to crawl up our house, in our doors, on our welcome mat....GROSS....  I saw AT LEAST 10 of them as I was carrying in the groceries! I used to think they were fun and cute and I think it was until the time that I figured out they were on me by feeling their nasty hair on me and it freaked me out. So no caterpillars in our house please and thank you!

We just now finished up dinner, I had to wait for Michael to return from playing tennis with his friends and we had delish fish filets, au gratin potatoes, and Zucchini!! Michael and I LOVE zucchini, I could probably dominate one on my own easily! We finished up dinner with a small slice for me and a HUGE slice for Michael of his mom's chesscake (not cheesecake ..CHESScake)...aka...pure fat and sugar..but yummy...but now I feel like I need to brush my teeth. FURRY...like caterpillars!

Anyywhoooo that's about it for today. I've got to get back to studying for my big exam on Wednesday, and BEC is quickly approaching on the 5th! Enjoy the warm evening friends!

OHHH Happy Day -- Easter!

My bunny bowl and I wanted to wish you a very Happy Easter!

So did Michael...

So did Carson and Willis..

And I had to show off how much Easter candy we got. Remember Michael is 25 and I am 23 and we got more candy than I ever did when I was younger...this portion of candy is only the candy from the Kasten's, Lisa also prepared Easter goodies for us as well...yes, be jealous!

mmmm candy....ooohhhh food/sugar induced coma!

Another rainy evening in Lex-vegas, lets hope that Lake Kasten in our parking lot does not decide to grow and explore our first level of our house. Yes, spring makes things green and pretty, but it is also EXTREMELY RAINY!

Hope you all had a blessed day spent with family, friends and good times! I am so thankful that Jesus is alive!

Twelve Miles and Tornados

Hello friends. Sorry about my lack of post last night, luckily Michael put in a brief explanation as to why, while I was passed out on the couch. Yesterday was a pretty great day if I may say so myself...wanna recap?! Ok, sure, I'll tell ya!

Well Michael and I woke up yesterday and Michael didn't have to go into work early because he had an exam at 1. So we kinda hung around a little in the morning and then I drove him in for his test around 9:30 and headed to the library. The weather was icky and I had to do my 12 mile run, so I was planning to run at 1pm. If there was rain I'd be inside, if not outside. Luckily I have my great friend Elyse to step in and be my running buddy!

Elyse and I met up at 12 and began our 12 mile journey around Lexington (which ended up being a SUPER hilly run, I am not a fan of hills, so we may have allowed ourselves to walk up a few of them, like the 2 on Landsdowne that are HUGE!). Y'all I'm not sure if you understand how much more enjoyable running 12 miles is when you have someone to run it with you. It made my run a million times better knowing I had someone to talk to, someone to complain about every hill in Lexington about, someone to keep me motivated, and someone going through the same pain and tiredness as I was.  And in about the last 3 miles we were lucky enough to be graced with some rain, which I was totally fine with, it motivated me to finish and cooled me down. The only problem about rain during a long run is the whole sweat issue. You see, you've already gathered up a good amount of sweat on your brow, and then when the rain comes so does the burning sensation in your eyes as the sweat drips in. FUN. haha, but its also fun to be running in the rain and people in their cars give you that impressed, "I can't believe she's out running in this weather" look.

After gladly finishing our run and hugging Elyse goodbye, Michael called and said he was done with his test, perfect timing!! I headed over to pick him up (I was already on campus) and then we headed home where I immediately jumped into the shower. The rain and wetness on your is nice while running, not once youve cooled down and your body is covered in goosebumps!! So lets just say the shower was PERFECT! While I relaxed after my run and ate some junkfood Michael headed over to the Lexington Tennis club to play some tennis with his friends, shortly after I headed over to pick him up and head to the mall. I had to pick up a gift for a bachelorette party and I wanted to look for a new pair of jeans. As we drove to the mall we saw another storm beginning to brew, lightning in the distance, dark skies even closer.

As our shopping excursion began, I as usual became very discouraged. Apparently I have the oddest shaped body around and could not find a pair of jeans that fit right in ANY of the stores I went to. So that was an epic fail in the jeans department. So why do jeans not fit me? Well 1. I am short, and a lot of stores don't carry short length jeans in my size. 2. I have a skinny waist and runner thighs, therefore causing a weird bunching under my behind cause they are too tight at the top of my thighs but then I have to find pants that stay up on my waist and hips. ARGH! So I gave up on the jeans so we made the trek over to the other side of the mall to the Victoria Secret.

Well look, oh swell. VS was closing it's doors as we were approaching it, no it wasn't closing time. Apparently a tornado was on it's way through Lexington and they didn't want to have the liability of having people in their store. GREAT...so we decided to head to Macys to look, who also wouldn't let people in their store. So Michael and I got to hangout in the middle of the mall, watching the doppler radar on the DISH Network kiosk. Oh what fun. We did hear that there were funnel clouds reported in the arboretum, which is less than a mile from our house, so we were nervous about our puppies. This morning I saw this picture, taken at the football stadium which is a mile from our house, lets just say if I were home I would have definitely been freaking out!

Scary right?! Well we made it home from the mall after a trip to Culvers for a late dinner (we had coupons) and found everything to be safe and sound at our house. We decided to relax for the evening, which is where I passed out on the couch.

This morning we woke up to this lovely new pond in our front yard after apparently a night full of rain. I mean I always have wanted to live on a lake but not really a part of a parking lot!! oohhhh well!!!

Oh and if you are curious, the ants are still here going strong. And annoying me a lot. Please me them go away. Thank you.

Well that's about it for now. I will be heading to Louisville shortly for a bachelorette party and heading back tonight, so hopefully that will be loads of fun!! Chat with you all later!

Tornado sadness

Bad news, the Lexington tornado blew our house over and there will be no blog tonight.

Just kidding, Michael is writing. Ashley is passed out on the couch. 12 mile runs, studying at the library, attempting to shop whilst tornadoes were imminent, Culver's Butter Burgers and catching up on Modern Family, The Office, Community and 30 Rock were just too much for her. She's beat. Expect a full blog tomorrow.

Take some time this Easter weekend to think about what it entails. I'm thankful for Good Friday, most historians believe it happened. Easter/resurrection is what it's all about.

Happy Birthday Lisa!

Today is my stepmom, Lisa's Birthday!!! Here we are together spending a day at the beach in Maui while my dad was at work (he worked there for a couple months) Happy Birthday to Lisa!

Lisa and my dad came down to Lexington for the day to celebrate her birthday. They spent the day with Ryan (step bro) and Liz (his girlfriend) at Keeneland (my dad's first time). They are very lucky people, I was at school all day either working, working on group projects, or in class....poooo. And Michael was at home studying for an exam he has tomorrow. Anyway.... we were able to meet up with them after Keeneland.

After class I quickly headed over to Richmond Road in the rush hour traffic to pick up some cupcakes for Lisa from a bakery called Babycakes. They have a cupcake happy hour, all cupcakes for $1! So I definitely hit up that deal that I discovered on their webiste! I got a random assortment of the cupcakes and then we headed over to meet the family at Saul Good for dinner! YUM!

I had the delicious big breakfast meal which is half of a waffle, 2 eggs over easy, 3 slices of bacon, and potatoes. Enough food for an army and I finished most of it cause I was starving!! Then it was time to celebrate Lisa's birthday with the delish cupcakes. Everyone loved what they had. The flavors were brownie, cookie dough, blackberry, peach, butterscotch, and banana with peanut butter icing!! We all had a good time talking and chatting during dinner and then it was time to say our goodbyes! Glad we got to spend some time with the family! Here are some pics from the evening for you to enjoy! (photo credits go to Mr. Michael!)

At Saul Good they give you chocolate covered popcorn on your birthday, before dinner!

If you can't tell, dad is about to dig into his cupcake!

I had the blackberry cupcake

Lisa had the brownie cupcake

Michael had the super proper butterscotch cupcake, with butterscotch filling

Michael's cupcake

That's all folks! Enjoy your Thursday evening!

It wouldn't be a picnic without ants

ANDDDDDDD the ant saga continues...gross, gross, double gross. Today I returned from my loonnggg day at school to find our counters COVERED with ants once again. Lets just say my mood changed instantly.

The part that really perturbed me was the fact that when I went to lift up my black kitchenaid mixer it was covered with at least a hundred ants...EWWWWW!! I screamed and told Michael to come down immediately and then the craziness ensued. We had to determine their source. They were everywhere now. And totally grossing me out.

I convinced Michael to pull out the stove because it seemed like they were coming from behind it. Well we pulled it out and saw the nastiness that was under the stove but couldn't determine whether or not they were coming from there. So we cleaned up the area underneath and then went to move the stove back. went to move the stove back. went to move the stove back. No, I'm not repeating myself, we literally kept trying to move the stove back and it wouldn't fit back into its place between the counters. Michael became SUPER frustrated during this process. It probably took 20 minutes at least to get the sucker back into place. Michael ended up having to pull out the floorboard of the cabinet because it kept getting stuck on it.  Luckily it is safely sitting where it belongs against the wall now. I was afraid we might have to learn how to cook standing in the middle of the kitchen!

While he was fidgeting with the stove I was being the ant killer. I took our nifty little hand held vacuum I purchased with my birthday money and sucked up every little sucker ant that I could find. I even continued to do this as Michael began dinner. I want these nasty little rascals OUT of my house!

Do you have any ant tips or advice?! I am going to go insane soon if they don't go away!! I leave the kitchen feeling like I have bugs crawling all over my body!! Well that's all for today folks!

Carson goes running!

Today was a day of trying new things...ok well maybe one new thing. I knew that after class today I wanted to run, sure thing. Then I get home from class and the husband wants to run with me. AHHH wow ok great!! Then as we are about to leave Michael coerces me to agree to take Carson running with us. The farthest I've EVER ran with him is maybe a quarter mile so it was definitely going to be interesting. The saddest part of it all was when we had to leave poor little Willis behind. He's just not made for running, with his sad outward facing paws that he constantly licks because they hurt, and he's only 3!! We knew what was best for him so we sadly said goodbye and left with Carson in tow.

As we crossed Alumni to begin our run Carson was PUMPED to say the least. He was bounding up the sidewalk, panting and smiling as his tongue hung to the side. He is a good little runner, but what he is not is consistent. Stop...go...fast...slow...left...right.... I almost toppled over him at least 20 times, no joke. And yes, he even stopped to poo in the middle of the sidewalk. I feel with practice he may become a real runner doggy, I mean, he is only 9 1/2 months old! I also believe that he is not in full running shape, about halfway through he definitely slowed down. We had to reassure him that he was a good boy and he made it all the way home. Carson has now completed his first 5k and if I had to guess it was probably around 9 minute miles!! Go Carson!

Here he is immediately after the run. It was about 75 degrees outside and humid so he was hot for sure!

But man was he happy!!

Michael and I were very sweaty ... seeing that we are humans and cannot pant, we were very nasty!

While we cooled down from our run I quickly threw together a spaghetti and meat sauce dinner. Afterward we headed to Kroger where we bumped into our entomologist friend Jonathan and his awesome wife Kara! Michael actually decided it was the best idea to sneak up behind Kara with our cart, as she was smelling the flowers in the floral department. Well some guy that thought he was funny called us out as we were trying to surprise her. He was like, "Where's the Mission Impossible music?". But we still scared her. It was funny!!

Speaking of entomologist friends we sadly still have the ants but have the greatest hopes that they will be dying off very shortly. Michael told me my blog yesterday needed a picture of the ants, which I thought you all would think was gross, but heres some Michael took today if you want to see the ants near what is going to make them die!!!

Well that's about it for today. I have a butt-ton off stuff to do for school and not to mention I need to study for the CPA exam. BLECK..not enough hours in the day!!

Ants bring out the worst in me!

Hola readers...how has your Monday been?

Well I spent most of the morning studying for an exam that I had this afternoon, vacuuming, OH and KILLING ANTS!! OH goodness, you should have seen how enraged I was today while killing ants. So how did we get the ants? No idea, last night we returned from bible study to find our kitchen counter to the left of the sink and next to the stove COVERED in ants. GROSS!! I just feel so dirty when I see them. Well we sprayed the whole counter down twice with cleaner and they were gone for a bit. Then I woke up this morning and HELLO I now have ant friends again in my kitchen. I attacked with the vicious windex multipurpose cleaner. Screaming, DIE ANTS! and I HATE YOU! and look out look out wherever you are!! My killing spree only resulted in the use of multiple paper towels and spray because every time I came back to the kitchen they had returned. Wellllll friends, I am a very lucky girl. Thank you to my awesome bible study group I now have an entomologist (the dictionary defines them as a zoologist that studies insects) friend. He happily came over with his beautiful wife after work and delivered his special ant killer with petri dishes that he had burned holes into to keep the food in. The ants will carry this stuff back to their homes and they will allllll dieeeee!!  Hopefully this stuff will do the job. I cannot handle these ants!!

Easter eggs hunts!

Today was a good day. Like Sundays normally are.  They are always busy but atleast they are busy in an enjoyable fashion. I 'll start the day off with the early morning hours...like midnightish since I didn't really talk about stuff from yesterday.

Lets just say the social butterfly in me wanted to get out. I wanted to get out on the town and socialize badly. So I made plans with my friend in the masters program Shelley, her boyfriend Eric, Drew (in my program and bstud) and his wife Catherine to go hang out together. We went to this German bar called Marrikas. Michael and I were the only ones that had been there before, its a pretty chill place and they have 800 different kinds of beers to try and a sand volleyball court out back. We all had a great time sitting at a table and chatting all night long. Michael and Drew split a bucket of beer with 6 randomly picked beers. One of them had a pirate on the front of the bottle and one of them was just shy of the size of a wine bottle and titled "The Lion" and I believe it's alcohol content was a bit ridiculous. It was funny watching the guys try each one, not knowing what they were about to get themselves into! But honestly, Michael and I had a legit good time, nothing to complain about, no one was annoying or anything, it was perfect, fun, and low stress!! I have great friends! :)

For some reason this morning my body decided to wake me up at 7:15 and I decided to finally get out of bed around 8:15, we went to bed around 2, it was completely unnecessary of my body to do that to me!! Well anyway, today was my Adrielle day.  Michael and I had planned to pick her up, take her to church with us, then to lunch at his parents house and then an Easter egg hunt in their backyard!! What a fun day!! Here are some pics from the Easter egg hunt, Michael hid a total of 38 eggs for Adrielle and the gold egg contained $5!!

So to sum all of that up, we all really enjoyed the whole Easter egg process!!

After dropping Adrielle off back at home Michael I headed back to our house and crashed. I allowed myself a 20 minute nap and then got right into the studying. Then before I knew it it was 5:45. I needed to get a run in so I devised a little plan. We were going to bstud at the Hestad's house, which is out past the Horse Park. So I told Michael I'd start running out towards their house (which is like 12 miles away) and when he left to go out he could pick me up on the side of the road where-ever I may be. I left at 6 and bstud starts between 6:30-7 so I wasn't expecting to make it all of the way out to their house. I did however make it about 4.5 miles out to their house where my lovely husband picked my sweaty self up and we headed out on the rest of the BEAUTIFUL drive past the horse farms to the Hestads.

Bible study = awesome as usual!! AND when Catherine walked in tonight we were twins!! YAY!!

Aren't we cute? Yes, super grainy iPhone pic AND I am sweaty and nasty from running out and Catherine smelled of shampoo and wonderfulness, but I had to document our twinning-ness!

So that basically sums up my crazy Sunday! And now I should be heading towards bed because Michael has to get up super early and I have a test tomorrow (they are never-ending!!). Hope you all had a great weekend! Grace, peace!

Fill in the blanks friday on saturday?!

I'm gonna fill in the blanks for you on this gray and dreary Saturday: 

1.   My favorite daily responsibility is,  (well Michael says bossing him around) I guess I would say cleaning out the lint trap in the dryer is a pretty satisfying job, although it is not daily, I also thoroughly enjoy cleaning out the vacuum canister to see how much fur I have successfully vacuumed off the floor, gross maybe but I don't care!

2.  My least favorite daily responsibility is,  making the bed. I LOVE getting into a made bed but it's annoying to make the bed when you have to walk back and forth making it and straightening it out. I will make the bed 6 days out of 7 normally though.  I enjoy it a little bit more when Michael is around to help me, it makes the process A LOT shorter!

3.  My favorite cuisine to eat when going out is dessert? OOOOOHHHH real food?!? I really enjoy southern comfort food like chicken, mashed potatoes, cornbread...ohhhh cornbread yum!!  ya know. Not a huge fan of how southern veggies are prepared though, I like them plain, not cooked in salt and nastiness until they are falling apart at the touch of a fork...GROSS!

4.  My favorite cuisine to prepare at home is   Can I say the easiest to prepare is Italian, boil some pasta cook up some kind of meat or whatever and you've got a meal. I would like to learn more in the cooking department but that would require more time and money!

5.  Andy Warhol said that everyone is famous for 15 minutes. My claim to fame is   (Michael's answer: Marrying me). Well this isn't necessarily me but you know how there are 6 degrees of Kevin Bacon...well my degrees are like 2?! My dad grew up across the street from Kevin Bacon when they were children and they played with Kevin and his older brother. Apparently they didn't think Kevin was very cool, cause he was younger than the rest of the boys but my Dad still knows him! But personal claims to fame?! I won Miss Future Business Leader for the state of Kentucky my senior year of high school in Future Business Leaders of America (FBLA) which I was the co-president of our chapter of, and went on to compete at nationals. I was in the local paper and was invited to a lunch at the rotary club, how cool am I?

6.  If I could have 3 wishes I would wish  1. I was done with the CPA exam, Masters Program and had a job.

2. My jaw and teeth worked properly, I have a weird jaw problem, therefore my jaw decided to move and align oddly, you can't notice unless I actually show you, sounds weird right? When I bite down only one molar on each side of my mouth touches ...I can show you if you ask :) 

3. A HUGE yard where our doggies could run around with a super cute farmhouse on it, that didn't need tons of repair, oh and daffodils grew everywhere.

7.  My biggest pet peeve is  (Michael agrees with this one off the bat) Flaky People. Seriously I think it has become this because in the past couple years I have encountered some REALLY flaky people and it used to hurt my feelings SO bad. I would cry to Michael about how so and so blew me off again or whatever and I didn't understand how they didn't realize they constantly hurt my feelings by blowing me off.  If you take the time to make plans with me, stick to them, no lame excuses.  I have now just come to the realization that I will try to no longer allow it to hurt my feelings but it will just be annoying to me and make me mad, which I'm trying to get over that too. 

Taking a close second is being late.  I blame this on my Pops, he is early all the time and I like to be too! :)

 

8. (I added this one to end on a positive note, unlike the last question) What's your favorite color baby?   Ok, so the correct UK fan would say BLUE AND WHITE...but in reality my favorite color is GREEN! I love it, so fresh and so greaen green!! IT really is such a nice and clean and relaxing color. Coming in second though is a Kentucky Blue, I like that color a lot as well!

 

 

Rainy Friday...again?!

Hey y'all!! I just stepped in from another rainy Friday. It seems that every Friday I do Flo Critt stuff it rains. Tonight we went with the girls to The Gardenside Baptist Passion Play. To be perfectly honest, none of us were really excited about going to the play but it was actually a REALLY impressive production. The stage set was  awesome, the cast was huge and pretty talented and it was overall a good time. I had never been to this church before but glad we got to join the girls for the evening. Although the play was about 2 hours long, which is a tad long for a church musical play.

Today was a boring, unproductive day. I woke up and got my long run on. 11 miles, VERY SLOW for me, took me about 1 hour and 48 minutes to do 11.25  miles. Afterwards I took one of my eternal post run showers, the ones where the hot water runs out, which then forces you to end the wonderful warm shower. And then I studied for about an hour and then passed out on the couch. Michael's theory behind long runs is that for every mile you run you deserve 10 minutes of sleep, so I deserved about 110 minutes of sleep, and I probably got that. The run definitely took it out of me.

Michael ended up getting home very early today so we watched our netflix movie that we have had for a few weeks and then I headed off to the play. That's about all for today folks, enjoy your Friday evening, I'll probably be catching up on our Thursday night shows tonight!

Feelin' Needy

So far, so good. I've been feelin' the blog vibe lately and haven't had troubles writing posts. The troublesome thing to me is that I'm not getting any feedback love from anyone, which is rather discouraging to me. I don't mind writing every day, and I know people mention reading my blog but it's hard when no one comments. So comment please! I'm feeling needy!!

In other news, this morning I had an interview at Accountemps, which is an accounting temp agency. It was very very short and simple, that may be due to the fact that I surprisingly knew the girl interviewing me. So keep your fingers crossed about job opportunities!!

Also, if you are unaware, golfing makes you sore. My shoulders, arms and torso are SORE ouchies!! Tomorrow will be another long run, probably about 11 miles. If anyone is interested in running with me and being my running buddy, I would greatly appreciate it. Lately I've had to run my long runs by myself and I really need a friend to get me through. That sounds really lame, but you try running for that long without talking to anyone or knowing someone else is going through that with you! :)

Well that's all I've got for today!! Lator Gators!

FORE!

Well hello readers! How has your Wednesday been?! Well mine wasn't particularly awesome (we got our tests back from yesterday, worst test grade I have ever received) but it didn't end too bad!

Michael got done with school early today and told me we were going to do something fun outside and it was going to be a surprise. He tells me to put tennis shoes on as soon as I got home from class and we headed out. As we drove there I kept trying to guess where we were going. Humane Society? Raven Run? He kept saying nope. And then we arrived at Man O' War Golf. He was taking me to the driving range!

Some of you may not know this but Michael enjoys playing golf.
 
He grew up with his dad having a membership at a course and he isn't too bad at the sport. Well for our engagement he bought me a set of lefty clubs and I have been to the driving range once. Yes once since, lets just say I am not very good at golf.

First off I get super intimidated when we walk onto the driving range. SO MANY MEN. And they are all swinging away. Then there's the 5 year old little boy who is hittin' like a dream. And I only hit the ball every third swing. Well despite my utter failure at this sport it was nice to be outside in the perfect weather swinging away. At least my arms got some good work in!! Now my hands hurt from swinging and grasping the clubs so hard!!

Here I am getting ready

And here I am with the worst form you have ever seen, PLUS I look terrible, thought it would be  a good laugh for you! Looks like I'm hacking the ball BUT my left arm muscles look cool! haha

I'm glad I can trust my hubs to brighten my day!! YAY!

Torrential Tuesday

Hello readers!! So today was a rain, rain, rain, rainy day. I mean it rained all night and practically rained all day, and I believe it was due to me extremely horrid no fun exam I had today, because about the time we finished the exam the sun decided to come back out. The exam was AWFUL. Apparently no body passes this first exam, so it should be interesting. You know what else? After a 2 hour exam our professor decided she wanted to teach for another HOUR after. AHHH!

Anywhoooo, onto a few other things, good things... like....:

Yesterday I had already written my post for the day so I didn't get to include this butttttt...my husband was super awesome and super sweet because he could tell I was uber stressed about my test. When I asked him what he wanted for dinner he said you pick. Which normally results in a groan from the indecisive me but his statement was not complete. He actually said, "You pick, I'll MAKE you anything". Emphasis on the word MAKE! awwww love it!! Well anyway, Michael's mom had given us some breakfast sausage patties (she randomly gives us food, which I love) and I thought we could put them to use by having breakfast for dinner. And then Michael came up with an even more brilliant plan.

Biscuits and Gravy!! Neither of us had ever made gravy before (yes I know it's not that difficult but it's something new and different from our normal cycle of food) but Michael was willing to take on the task while I was studying and it turned out great. He also scrambled up some eggs to go along with it and I threw a bowl of grapes out on the table to munch on. The dinner was delish, and I'm a proud wife! Here are a few pics, yeah I know gravy is kinda gross to look at in pictures but it's proof!

See!! Isn't he awesome?

-Also, another good thing to help cancel out the awfulness that was my exam today was that
1. Steve stopped by - He never stops by anymore and it was great to see him and talk to him!! He even joined us for good thing #2
2. We went to ORANGE LEAF..yum.... it was Steve's first time and he really enjoyed it too! It was  PACKED as usual and chaos but oh so delish!! I got pomegranate, blueberry, and vanilla (they didn't have coconut today) with granola, strawberries, coconut shavings, and a few butterscotch chips.

3. Coach Cal was walking INTO Orange Leaf as we were walking out. And I got so excited. I have this thing with "celebrities" (who really aren't THAT huge of celebrity) and freaking out when I see them so I got excited. But then I reminded myself, we came to orange leaf cause it's about a mile from our house, its also about a mile from Coach Cal's, he's a normal guy...geez Ashley!

See even my friend Kayla spotted Coach Cal at Orange Leaf. He frequents it often. AND you know what is funny?! Steve thought that Coach Cal was an investor in Orange Leaf, I'm guessing cause he goes there so much!
4. NETFLIX + LAZINESS because of test = A handful of Ugly Betty episodes watched. I started watching the show on Netflix cause I had never seen it before and now I'm getting pulled into it, I think I've watched 14 episodes from the first season (not all today, in the past couple of months!).

Well that's about it for today, may try and watch a little more Ugly Betty so that I can continue to not do anything productive. I like it. It's nice. Good night!

The Happiest State in all of America

As I was driving home in the dreary spring rain this afternoon I began thinking about what the weather was like in other areas of the US. My stepmom, Lisa is in Florida right now and I know it's not raining there. And then I began to think about how in a little over a year from now Michael and I may be moving to another part of the US because of Michael's residency (we don't find out until March of next year, fyi). And then I became curious, what states in the US are the happiest?!

What do you think is the happiest state?
Well I decided to do some research

So I pulled the ol' Google move. I typed in "happiest states in the United States" and this little article came up, I mean, I realize it's not really possible to actually gauge an entire state's happiness but I found it kind of interesting. I would have assumed that all of the top states would be in warm, southern climates in the US, cause being warm makes me happy and I am basically miserable during the winter season unless it's a holiday, well that was wrong for the most part....well except for the number one state.

States that made the top ten part of the list include:Massachusetts, Utah, Connecticut, Colorado, South Dakota, Minnesota, Alaska, North Dakota, Wyoming...and drumroll please....the number one happiest, healthiest state is...surprise surprise...Hawaii! (very slim chance that we will be moving there). But I can understand why people are happy in Hawaii, especially when you see stuff like this everyday:


I loved having the chance to spend Thanksgiving on Maui in 2008. But Michael and were discussing the other day before this thought came into my mind that we wondered if people in the warm places didn't realize how good they have it all the time and just accept the warmth, sunshine, and vitamin D as the norm.

It's also is  sad to realize that NONE, I mean not one of the states Michael and I are interested in are in the top 20 that made this list...do we have poor choices of living locations or is this survey just wrong?
Also, Kentucky is a pretty good place to live, I'm happy here. And it's pretty and there are horses and bluegrass and bluegrass music and bourbon and Keeneland and so many other great things. But I guess there's also Appalachia and obesity and many other things working against Kentucky to keep us off of this list.

So what's your take on this ... are you surprised?
Do you think your state deserves to be on this list?
Defend your state or maybe convince me to change my mind about some of these states that I wouldn't automatically choose on my own.

Sunburnt Sunday

Hello readers!! I hope you enjoyed my little video yesterday, it was kinda fun to do! Today was a good day, although once again not filled with as much studying as needed. Silly weather gettin in the way of my studies, lets just say I am GLAD I moved my CPA exam to May, maybe somewhere during the time between now and then I will be able to find my focus again.

Today I woke up on my own at 8:30 after going to bed kinda late and decided to get my butt out and run. For once in a long time I just left the house without mapping anything. I mean, I'm used to running in this area so I have a general idea of the distance but I ran something I don't normally run. I saw SO many runners out running, they all knew how hot it would be today. It was already 70 at 8:45am, I was a very sweaty girl when I returned home and mapped my run, finding out it was 4.75 miles, not bad.

After the run I decided to wake up Michael and start getting ready for 11:30 church, which was great as usual. You know what was great too? I got to wear a dress to church!! Yay warmth!! After church we headed over to the Kasten's for Sunday lunch. While lunch was cookin, I sat out on their super awesome patio and attempted to study and sun bathe at the same time. Little progress made in the studying department, a good amount of progress in the tanning department. For lunch we had STEAK, baked potatoes, corn, salad, garlic bread, and an assortment of cheesecakes for dessert. SUPER HEAVY lunch!!

After lunch we headed back home and I dragged our patio chairs and the pups out into our common yard and threw on my bathing suite and sunbathed and studied while the dogs roamed the yard, poor Willis and his black fur, he was panting away!!

Well then it was about time for bible study. I LOVE BIBLE STUDY. It was a girls and guys separate night and we were talking about Romance, ohh la la. It was fun, interesting, and good to see everyone. The guys ended up staying at our house and now our house is SUPER toasty, but what can ya do!?

Well that's all I've got for today, I'm tired, and my skin has turned a lovely shade of pink from the sun. But hey, I can't complain, that nasty pastiness that I had this morning will surely be turning into a much more pleasant hue!

ummm...k...I'm not THIS sunburnt!

 I may have something exciting to write about tomorrow but we have to see if it actually happens (depending on Nicole and her plumber) but I'll let you know! Hope you all enjoyed your weekend! I will begrudgingly be dragged into this school week...boooo!

Video Post?! whaaaa?! Heck yes

So yesterday I hit my 100th post and I didn't realize it or mention it in my blog, so to celebrate today I made a video post to change things up a bit... It's the standard blogger's "accent" post....It was kinda weird watching my mannerisms afterward and how I speak and what I sound like and how big of a dork I am, oh well! what I am reading in the video is posted below the video!~ Comments and Responses are favorable! :) Enjoy!
  

 

Accent/Speech/Language Quiz Thingamajig: 

Say these words: Aunt, Route, Wash, Oil, Theater, Iron, Salmon, Caramel, Fire, Water, Sure, Data, Ruin, Crayon, Toilet, New Orleans, Pecan, Both, Again, Probably, Spitting image, Alabama, Lawyer, Coupon, Mayonnaise, Syrup, Pajamas, Caught

Now answer these questions:

-What is it called when you throw toilet paper on a house?
-What is the bug that when you touch it, it curls into a ball?
-What is the bubbly carbonated drink called?
-What do you call gym shoes?
-What do you say to address a group of people?
-What do you call the kind of spider that has an oval-shaped body and extremely long legs?
-What do you call your grandparents?
-What do you call the wheeled contraption in which you carry groceries at the supermarket?
-What do you call it when rain falls while the sun is shining?
-What is the thing you change the TV channel with?