Igloos, Icicles, and Insurance Deductables!

January has been an interesting month in our house. We started off the new year with Aron's 35th birthday! We celebrated with a golf themed cake and presents. The year then lead us to lots of illness and injuries with several visits to the doctors' office and even the ER - which means our health insurance deductible was met in less than 2 weeks! Aron is managing well with his casted arms and I am surviving without his normal hands-on help. We are both hoping the next 5 weeks go FAST! Now we have entered into a deep freeze with snow and ice everywhere you look. The kids have bundled up on several occasions to play in the arctic weather. We even managed to walk to the park and play on the super slippery slides! The kids had a ball landing in piles of snow at the end of each. I have begun my 1/2 marathon training which means that yes, I am running in this bitterly cold weather. I ran 8 miles yesterday in -4 degrees and 6 miles today in -6 degrees! By the end of my run today, I had icicles on my eyelashes. If it wasn't for my running partner, Leigh, I would never be caught out in this weather! I just keep thinking how beautiful it will be in Nashville by the end of April!

Aron's Birthday Cake

It seems like just yesterday we were celebrating his 25th birthday! Help from the kids to blow out the candle.

Russell worked extremely hard at building his "igloo!"
It is dark by the time we get home and eat dinner, so most of our outdoor time has been in the evening. There was a full moon this week. The kids LOVED it!

Sloane spends most of her time in the snow making piles with her sand shovel and pail.

Sticks and Stones Never Broke My Bones, But Ask Me About Football!

After 2 weeks of cleaning up vomit in the Carlson house, I finally thought we were on the mend and heading in the right direction for 2011. That was until 4:00 a.m. this morning! My wonderful, healthy, athletic, and very competitive husband still plays flag football with a group of buddies 2 nights a week. Over the past few years he has chipped a tooth, fractured a finger, sprained an ankle, and bruised a few ribs, but he insists this is a terrific way to keep his "heart healthy." He headed out last night for a late game that began at 10:00 p.m. while I was fast asleep with Mac curled up at my feet. At 4:00 a.m. I woke to find that Aron was still not home. My first thought was that he had gotten home late and fallen asleep on the couch. When he wasn't on the couch, I began to panic and went looking for my cell phone. As I was grabbing my phone to check for messages, I saw headlights coming up our driveway, but it wasn't Aron's car. At this point I became nauseous with fear. As I watch, I see Aron's buddy Johnny fumbling with Aron's keys trying to get into the house. I open the door to see Aron in not one, but TWO casts! He had broken both arms while jumping to intercept the football. Yes, I said BOTH arms!!! So needless to say instead of our house being on the mend, we are now trying to adjust to not having Aron there to help out physically. Anyone interested in shoveling our driveway???

One of Aron's x-rays

Johnny took this lovely picture of Aron while in the ER

Training Time!

"Our running shoes are really erasers. Every step erases a memory of a past failure. Every mile brings us closer to a clean slate. Each foot strike rubs away a word, a look, or an event that led us to believe that success was beyond our grasp." ~John Bingham

It's that time of year again. Training time!!! I have decided to run the Country Music Half-Marathon in Nashville, TN on April 30th! I can NOT wait!!! I guess that means I need to go buy a new pair of running shoes. Yippee!!! I will be running this with Aron's best friend Gregg (our Best Man). It will be his first 1/2 marathon. Awesome! Now I need to work on Aron :-)