April Showers

Does anyone else remember the saying “April Showers bring May Flowers”? I remember making flower and umbrella crafts in my gifted class in elementary school, because we did an April Showers and May Flowers bulletin board each Spring.  I say this as it’s currently pouring, with lots of loud thunder claps.  I made it to my car in time to miss the rain, but the downpour started just in time for me to have to go from my car to my apartment.  I sat for a few minutes, then made a dash for it!

My April challenge was to make four new recipes this month.  I successfully complete this challenge (and also continued with no-makeup), but I have zero pictures to prove it. And I lost the links I used for each of the recipes.  The links would be kind of irrelevant anyway, since I make my own tweaks on every recipe (I am my mother’s daughter).

The first recipe I made was a lemon tilapia filet.  It was delicious! I paired it with a strawberry/feta/spinach salad with local raspberry balsamic vinaigrette and it was a fabulous meal.

The second recipe was eggplant parmesan.  I had roasted eggplant in a salad a few weeks before, and wanted to try to make it for myself.  It turned out really well, and even my roommate who initially turned her nose up ended up trying it!

The third recipe was oatmeal chocolate chip cookies.  I wanted to bake for my Bible study group, and had all the ingredients on hand.  I didn’t think they were very good, but everyone else seemed to like them and I had none left over.

The fourth and final new recipe was a super simple fruit dip.  I made it up myself, with some inspiration from Alex and Pinterest.  I mixed two 6oz. cartons of plain Greek yogurt with several generous scoops of PB2 (amazing if you haven’t tried it before!), a scoop of real peanut butter and a dash of cinnamon. I took it to our end of semester party at work and it was a hit.

I haven’t drawn my May challenge yet, but depending on what it is, may have to wait until after finals.  Happy Dead Week and Finals to everyone!

Never Stop Running

A lot of things have been said since the bombings at the finish of the Boston Marathon on Monday.  I certainly have many thoughts on the matter, but don’t feel like I have the eloquence to say them.  I was following the race already, to track my favorite elites and some runners I know through social media, so I was able to “see” things happening in real time on Twitter.  The running community is such an amazing one, and I am proud to be a part of it.  My first thought was shock; I couldn’t believe someone would attack such a celebration of hard work.  I wanted to run Boston before this week’s events, and now I want more than ever to qualify and run the Boston Marathon one day.  I’ve taken some time off running since my last half, but Tuesday morning, I wanted nothing more than to run.  It was a short run, but a great one.  Following a Facebook event created by a man in Texas, I dedicated Wednesday’s run to the victims of the attack.

#Run4Boston

A few days ago, I saw a post from Claim Your Journey on Instagram, about an event here, Baton Rouge Runs for Boston.  So this morning, I dug out some blue and yellow and headed downtown to meet Kayla and Jenny to run 2.62 miles with some of the Baton Rouge running community.  There were so many people! It was amazing to see.  We heard from the Lieutenant Governor, and from the teams from BR that ran the Boston Marathon on Monday.

More people than I could fit in a photo!

After a moment of silence and a prayer, we ran. I didn’t get to run the whole course because I was also signed up for another event: the Geaux Teal Ovarian Cancer Walk, put on by the LSU Softball team. The turnout was also wonderful! We heard from survivors, and a woman who lost her daughter to ovarian cancer.  We learned about knowing the signs for ovarian cancer, and how it’s only treatable if caught in the early stages.  Over $16,000 was raised for ovarian cancer research! After a prayer and some pictures, the walk began.

I was a little bit hyped up from my earlier run, so I sprinted the first half-mile or so with Dylan, until my mind got the best of me and I let her go on.  (She’s tall and fast, so I’m working on talking her into pacing me for speed workouts!) I jogged back towards Alex, and we walked a bit with some of her other teammates.  When we got closer to the end, Laney wanted to run, so I ran with her to the end.  I forgot how good it feels to go fast!

Dyl and me after the walk!

Me and Bou!

Simone and Bou!

The running community and culture is really like no other.  I have to say again how proud I am to be a part of it.  I used to have a hard time calling myself a runner, but I am!  I am a runner, and I will keep running and keep racing.  I cannot wait to begin training for my first marathon!

 

 

Thursday Thoughts!

1. I can’t believe there are only two days left of Lent! Today is Maundy Thursday, when Jesus and His disciples took part in the Last Supper.  This Lent has been difficult, but full of lessons and blessings.  Easter will be quite the celebration!

2. Kids love Easter baskets! I got to help hand out baskets to all the patients at OLOL Children’s today.  SO SO much fun to see those kids light up!

3. If you want to move a final, you need forms.  If you knew that, shame on you for not telling me.  I got an email at 1pm today that I needed to get forms from the dean’s office by 4:30. I usually leave for OLOL at 1, so cue panic! Thankfully, I was able to get it taken care of and only be a few minutes late.  It was a whirlwind few minutes though!

4. Traffic is the reason I will never move back to Baton Rouge.  Today it took me 45 minutes to travel about 8 miles.  Highland Rd has nothing on Essen!

 

5. A good quad and core kicking was the perfect start to Spring Break! The class was led by a guy who I took two session of boot camp class with two years ago.  Back then, however, he weighed over 300 lbs. He’s since been on the Today show and in the school newspaper.  It’s been inspiring to follow his transformation and he teaches one tough class!

 6.  This might become my new “on repeat” movie.  While it hasn’t replaced Steel Magnolias, it’s a wonderfully fabulous movie.  I requested this instead of sweets this year for Easter, and mom mailed it to me this week!

7.  Sweet potatoes are cheap, tasty, and easy to cook.  Pair with some greens and you’ve got a complete meal!

8.  This gal and I have some adventures planned for tomorrow and I absolutely cannot wait!

 

 

 

Good Morning World!

I’m home all day today on doctor’s orders to recover from a wicked virus that took over my body a few days ago. The steroid shot they gave me has kicked in, so I’m feeling human again.  Thankfully I’m only missing one class today, so there really was no better day to be home sick!

While I have some time (though I still have a test to study for and paper to write), I wanted to tell about last weekend!

Thursday night, I attended the first performance of BCM Presents: Fiddler on the Roof! It was our second annual dinner theater to raise money for summer missions.  Last year’s production was great, so I knew this year would be too.  IT WAS EVEN BETTER!! I didn’t know the storyline, which helped me pay attention better.  There were two acts and an intermission, but you barely noticed that the musical was 3 hours long.  I was friends with most of the cast, so it was exciting to get to cheer on my friends.  There were also people I didn’t know, so it’s great that our production pulled in people from outside the BCM.  We laughed and cried through the entire show, and gave roaring cheers and a standing ovation at the end.  If you didn’t get a chance to see it, you really missed out!

The Fiddler Cast!

Bren was a Mama and Caroline was the Fiddler!

Friday afternoon, I checked another item off my LSU to-do list and went with Em to a women’s tennis match.  They were playing A&M, and didn’t do well, but we still had fun cheering for them and getting a little sunshine! I was glad we took tennis class last year, so we could understand the scoring and rules of the game.  We stayed for all of the double and some of the singles matches.

Source: lsureveille.com
Em’s friend Kari is a rockstar on the tennis team!

Once our friend Caroline got into town, we donned our gold shirts and went to cheer on another set of Lady Tigers at the LSU Softball game! They had their SEC opener and beat Kentucky 7-1, and then we headed to Fuzzy’s Taco Shop for dinner the second time last week.

Saturday morning, we had intentions to go the St. Patrick’s Day Parade, which is bigger than Mardi Gras parades here in BR.  Instead, we stayed in our pj’s until noon, watching movies with Alex’s little brother, who spent the night.  Dylan’s mom came by for a visit, then the rest of Alex’s family.  We got outside in the BEAUTIFUL weather to play some frisbee until Em’s family got in.  We all donned our Bou’s Crew shirts and headed to game 2 of the series.

Sunshine, sunglasses, and great friends!

The game went into extra innings, and Alex got put in to pinch run, scoring the tying run! Moments later, Jacee got a hit, getting a walk-off win for the team!

Hey there statue Mike!

Sunday was church, and then a dessert show for Fiddler! I was in charge of getting desserts organized, so my car was loaded down with sweets galore.  Girls dropped them off at my apartment and brought them to me at church. (I baked Mississippi Mud Cookies from my SEC Tailgating cookbook!) We got everything set out nice and pretty, then I sold tickets at the door.  I didn’t stay for the show, but headed home to do some work before going to dinner with some old friends.

Other than getting sick Sunday afternoon, I had a wonderful weekend! 7 more school days until Spring Break!

 

 

 

Makeup-Free March

I’ve posted before about my version of New Year’s resolutions for this year – I came up with 12 things I wanted to try out this year, put them in a mason jar, and I pick one the first of each month.  January, it was 12 hand-written notes, February, it was #PlankADay, and for this month, going makeup-free.

Now, I’m pretty minimalist when it comes to makeup anyway (just ask my mother!), but I do wear mascara almost every single day, even going to workout.  Being a redhead, my eyelashes are all but invisible.  I feel like I look like some combination of young and tired without any mascara/eye makeup.  At 20 years old, I feel like makeup helps me look at least a little bit “put together” when I leave the house.

Though there is virtually no time commitment, this will be quite a challenge.  It’s going to be about attacking my insecurities, facing my freckles, acne, chicken pox scars, and invisible eye lashes.  It’s about presenting my most basic self to the world, and being okay if they don’t accept me for it.  To start, here’s me – no makeup. Once the internet world has seen it, everyone has seen it, right?

 

So will you join me this month? Maybe just go without makeup one day a week.  It’s a start!

Here’s some interesting articles:

Opinion: It’s time to go makeup free

Katie Couric goes makeup free