Spring Traditions

For those of you living in Knoxville, you are probably aware of the beautiful flowers that line Pellissippi Parkway. If you are not from the Knoxville area then you are missing out. There are hundreds of beautiful white and yellow daffodils that line the parkway and its exit ramps. People line the edges of the parkway every spring trying to get shots of this beautiful sight. We have decided to start a tradition. Every spring we will take pictures of the kids among the flowers. While the first year was not a huge success, we hope the following years will be a bit easier.

Warm days...ice cream....and the park!

I love this time of year! While it feels really early to be so warm, we are loving it. This past Sunday we had a night off from our regular devo with the teens. We took Isaiah to Busters for some ice cream then headed for the park. I meant to get pictures of our ice cream adventure, but somehow didn't.

Going to eat Ice cream!

Somebodies excited!

Could someone help me out?

waving to mommy

Daddy teaching Isaiah how to use his legs.

somebody woke up

Isaiah's Birthday Party

Well, we decided to go low key this year for Isaiah's birthday. We just celebrated with our immediate family. It was nice and very laid back. My sister and her family drove in from west Tn, and so did Keith's mom. We had one of Isaiah's favorite things to eat "pizza" and some yummy cake. I'm not sure why I went through the trouble of buying Isaiah an organic cupcake.....he didn't eat it.....he just painted with it. I should have just given him grapes. I've never met a child who picks fruit over sweets? He received some much appreciated college money, and some other small treats from my family, and a slide, that he loves, from my mother-in-law.

My niece playing on the trampoline.

Isaiah and Leah jumping.

Watching mommy light the candles.

He didn't eat a single bite. I tried to get him to taste the icing.

We had to take off his clothes because they were so dirty from the icing.

Sweet Violet...she ate her muffin!

They wouldn't be still! Keith was trying to put the slide together. 

5K Update

First, I must apologize for the fact that I have gotten so behind on my weekly updates. I have let almost a month go by without a single post. The second week...warp drive week...wasn't as warped as I wanted. I faced more weather opstacles and sheer tiredness. I was able to get in two days of walking, none the less. The third week went a lot better. I uped my brisk walking from one mile to two, and felt quite well doing it. I realized that I was the only one going in the direction I was taking and everyone else was going in the opposite direction. It soon hit me that I was taking the more up hill route. I decided to stay with this course, because I felt that if I started hard I wouldn't be so surprised later. The fourth week was the week I was supposed to officially start my "running". We had a ton of rain, and cold weather, on top of my major struggle with being so exhausted lately. I'm not sure what is up with my body, but the desire to sleep has been overwhelming lately. Anyway, I finally started my program and I have done great with my first week. It has been pretty hard, but I have done it. The running park I use is right by our house. It has a lot of large hills, but I wanted to run where there are hills because I know there will be a lot of hills in the race I am doing. I had mentioned that I was going to use the Mayo Clinics 5k program, but my wonderful friend, Benet, showed me a free app on her iphone. It is called c25k. It stands for couch to 5k. Another friend had mentioned this program earlier, and I told her that I had already picked one, but when I had the option to use the one on the iphone I decided it would be best. It times everything out for you. I can listen to music while I run, and also hear the ladies voice telling me when to walk or run. I LOVE IT!!!! Thanks Benet! There are alot of apps for couch to 5k on the iphone, but if this has sparked your interest make sure you search C25K....don't spell it out! Thanks for all the encouragement!!!

Week one....check!

So, my first week of training and, "getting back to me," didn't go as well as I wanted. It wasn't horrible....just some bad weather and crazy schedules made my walking not so productive. I was only able to go out two days. I did get thirty minutes of cardio inside on one of the rainy days. Overall, I feel better. Isaiah is my walking/running buddy. He loves it so much that he gets mad when we have to get back in the car when leaving the running park. My first objective is to just get in better shape so my body can handle actually running more than twenty feet. By the time I actually run this 5k I definitely want the weight to be coming off as well. I was a little surprised that I had lost a couple of pounds with such a slow start week. It was nice to see when I got on the scale! I guess I can sum up the first week as a success...just slow. This week I plan to go into warp drive.....that means super fast in star trek land.

Getting back to Me!

You might wonder what I mean when I say getting back to me, so let me tell you.....
While I haven't lost myself emotionally/mentally, my physical body has had its own struggles over the past 10 years. Most of you following this blog of mine know of my tumor, but for those of you who don't I will try to explain in short form. Just like a lot of people who hit their early twenties, I put on a few pounds. By the time I got to my Junior year of college I had grown out of my size 4/6 pants into my comfy and more roomy 8's. I can't be certain, but I think that small amount of weight gain would have happened whether I had the tumor or not. But, two years later, around the time I got married I started having strange symptoms. I formed a dark pigmentation on my face...specifically my upper lip...that mirrored pregnancy mask. I guess I should have been more concerned, but it didn't seem like that big of a deal. I had some other issues we won't get into to, for the sake of any male readers, but I lived with all the changes and summed it up to getting older. By our year anniversary I had gone up yet another pant size. I still just went with the thought that I was getting older. I mean, I was in my mid twenties, isn't that when things start changing a bit? But then it happened. Sometime in our second year of marriage I put on a whopping 30 lbs within just a few short months. Something was obviously wrong. I went to my OB and she did some test. Low and behold my testosterone levels were really high. She diagnosed me with PCOS, which causes weight gain, and put me on medication. This was a total misdiagnosis, but not the doctors fault. Needless to say, the weight kept creeping on until the real problem was found. It was a large tumor on my right adrenal gland.We were told  that it was cancer, but found out two months later it wasn't. By the time I had surgery I had gained 80 pounds...yes ....80 pounds! After surgery I immediately lost 20 pounds, but I have kept the rest on. I can't say I've tried real hard to get it off, but eating what I wanted most of my life isn't an easy habit to break. So, I am doing something about it. I have decided to train for my first race. I will be running the Knoxville 5k in April. I know it isn't a long race, but I am starting small. Lets face it....I'm 33 and I haven't worked out in a long time. So, this is my first week of training. I am excited to get back to me. To feel healthy again. Join me on my journey. I will give updates each week so you can share in my joys of finding myself.....if you wish.

"Sykes" Christmas

Well, we finally had Christmas with my side of the family the second weekend in January. Keith and Isaiah getting the stomach bug postponed things for a little bit, and then we had to go to Florida for our annual youth ministry conference for a week. The good thing is that Isaiah was able to stay with my parents for the week we were gone. We flew in that Friday and just went straight to mom and dads for the weekend. My sister and her husband came up later that night.
Our "Christmas" was great! We got up and had our big breakfast, opened stockings, opened gifts, played games( I don't have the pictures yet, but we played Just Dance on Dad's Wii...it was hilarious!!), watched the kids play with their toys and then prepared our Christmas dinner. Our day in pj's was great. Even though stores were opened on our late Christmas, we held to tradition and just stayed in for the day enjoying one another. Hope you enjoy the pics!!

Stockings

Isaiah's sofa/bed from my parents.

He thought he could sit in it. Got pretty upset it didn't work.

Just chillin.

Candy!!

Uncle Mike reading Isaiah a book....he sure loves his Uncle mike

Santa put a car in his stocking.

Had a hard time waiting for this to be put together.

After I opened my gifts in my stocking, I got to the candy. I then noticed the money. We immediately started laughing because we knew mom had to put it in there to make things even between everyone.

Just when we had gotten over the laughter of my stocking Casie found some fair money in one of her gifts......we laugh mom, but we are thankful that you are so thoughtful to keep things fair!

Violet loving on Uncle Keith

My sister and her little girl.

Leah loving on Aunt Casie and her doll that she got in her stocking.

Watching the tv while we all played Just Dance.

Our precious niece Violet!