75 Days

It's now 75 days until the Rock the Parkway Half Marathon in KC!

And the half marathon is now sold out! I finished an easy week of training with only a 4 mile long run. I completed another 4 miles today to start the weeks training and will have 7 miles to accomplish for a long run this week.

The boys finished up session one of ice skating lessons this week! I never really learned to even roller skate when I was little, let alone ice skate...so I'm glad they are getting the exposure!

And we started the weekend with more Lego original creations. Creativity at its finest with lots of original designs made!

Assistant Leo was right in the middle of the action and made sure that the Lego explosion reached the far corners of our living room. He doesn't look like a kitten anymore, but he still acts like one! :)

Booked

We have agreed as a family that 2014 is going to be a GREAT year for the Bunger's! And what better way to keep with this than booking a family trip-of-a-lifetime to Walt Disneyworld!!!!!!

This picture (and last one of my parents) is circa 1984 (ish) and marks my first trip to Disneyworld. Despite the look on our faces, this was such a GREAT vacation. All my trips to Disney are still some of my favorite childhood memories and I am so excited for us to take the boys there in November!!!!

While finalizing dates about our upcoming trip, Collin was trolling through the glossy photos of the Disneyworld catalog/brochure given to us by our travel agent.  After going through the whole thing multiple times, he looked at me and while pointing to the catalog asked excitedly "can we take this home with us?!?!"

It will be so awesome to see Chad and the boys experience Disney for the first time.  I am very thankful to my parents for all the wonderful opportunities they gave to us growing up....family vacations being just one of those!  As you can tell from the first picture, I'm sure they weren't all happy and stress free times dealing with three kids and their demands/moods...but the memories and time together were well worth it.  Can't wait to make these same kinds of memories with our boys!

Run. XT. Run.

Week 3 is in the books and this weeks long run is a 10K distance.

It's been awhile since I ran that distance and with a busy work week I am planning my workouts and trying to be good about NOT skipping out on my cross training (XT) days. Trying to gain some strength with weights and mixing up my cardio routines on those days.

Along with training and completing the bathroom last weekend, we also went to Chapman to see the Ingram's and cheer on the Irish. Looks like that prearranged marriage idea still has some promise?? ;)

And both boys are taking ice skating lessons again! Collin was excited because he didn't fall so much during the second Saturday lesson. 

We had such fun weekend that Monday morning was especially difficult for this guy above. He had a major case of The Monday's this morning.......

Finished Product

Our newly remodeled bathroom off our master bedroom!!

Our house as been a labor of love.  There are still so many projects that need to be accomplished....(if someone could find that money tree we could happily accomplish them all much faster!)  But when I look back at all we've done since we moved in February of 2009, the house has come a long way!

1. Shrubs, saplings, tree, weed and/or poison ivy removal.  This was no small task indeed.  We have a large and awesome fenced in backyard.  When we bought the place in the dead of winter, it had LOTS of trees, shrubs and saplings growing....everywhere.  I think initially before spring hit, Chad took out 3 or four large shrubs, one tree and about 50+ (no joke here) saplings from our backyard that were just growing all over.  While our backyard has tons of amazing annual flowers for us, initially several flower beds were also overrun with poison ivy!  Thankfully, our neighbors had warned us about this before things started to grow so Chad was ready.  Chad also constructed limestone pathways from the front to backyard and lined all of our flower beds with limestone rock.

2. Swing Set Play Area.  With the help of both our folks, Chad transformed a mud pit full of weeds into a beautiful play area for the kids!!  He has also worked tirelessly to turn our yard into actual grass with very few weeds/dandelions....it was the exact opposite when we moved in.

3.  Paint.  Nearly every room has been painted to date in our house.  You can also add wallpaper removal to that list when we first moved in!
 

4.  Carpet in bathrooms.  Who thinks this is a good idea?!  Ironically, BOTH houses we have owned had carpet in the bathrooms.  I am happy to say ALL carpet is gone out all three bathrooms in our home now.  If you are the mother of boys, you understand my happy dance over this!

5.  Bathroom remodel.  Chad completely gutted our main bathroom a few years ago and basically redid it floor to ceiling.  It was a huge undertaking!!!

 

6.  Deck.  Two summers ago, Chad completely redid the steps and foundational aspects and most of the railing of our huge backyard deck after he discovered the beams were rotting.  Again, a HUGE undertaking!
 

7.  Exterior Paint.  During the first (and hottest) summer at our home, we painted the entire exterior and trim of our house to give it a new and updated look.  A huge thanks to our neighbors who lent us their paint sprayer.  And I only almost fell off the latter and dropped a buck of paint to the ground once during this undertaking. 

8.  Master Bathroom Remodel.   Will be finished by weeks end!!  Frosted glass mirrored wall...gone!  Last carpet in bathroom....gone!  Sink and mirror from the 60's....gone!

 

9. Tile, Tile and More Tile.  Chad tiled our main bathroom floor.  But we will admit, while most projects at our house have been of the "weekend warrior" type where we do the work ourselves (again ourselves meaning Chad), all other tile we have decided to pay to have done.  It's a messy, expensive and tool specific process that takes multiple days.  And when your handy man is also a busy City Planner...sometimes it's worth it to have it done.  We have now installed or had tile installed in all 3 bathrooms, the entry way to our front door, and garage entrance and in front of the fireplace as seen in my previous post.

And did I mention how excited I am for my new bathroom?! It rocks!!!

Sweat Equity

We are in the final stretch of the latest home improvements! And when I say we....I mean Chad. I'm an ok go-fer gal to get things at Home Depot, or hold something in place...but this really is all my fabulously handy hubby. ;)

Sunday night Chad put in some serious sweat equity taking out the LAST of the funky 60's style tile. This small section of tile took over two hours to remove!

But the finished product down here is worth it! 

The tile is also done in our half bathroom and we will be able to walk on it and put the room together tomorrow! I'm so excited!!! More bathroom pictures to come soon.

I think in my next post I will include all the sweat equity that has been put into this home with lots of "potential" was bought almost 5 years ago....it's extensive!

Extra

Mitchell is playing basketball again this year and was excited to be asked to join a 4th grade team this year.

The season has just begun and while the team is still looking for their first win, they are improving each game.

And he is having fun! He's made some new friends along with some that he already new from school.

And while at the game today we learned that due to the sub zero temperatures we will have an extra day of vacation on Monday. 

Collin says "who's got two thumbs and no school tomorrow....THIS GUY!"

These boys have been goofy while on break. How Collin knew to flash this gansta style pose is beyond me....

But with all this time together, they still really do, in fact, love each other.

Okay, maybe they were just wrestling after all. :)

680 Miles

I ran 680 miles in 2013! Didn't run in as many races this year, but I did run in one 5 mile race, a 10K and a half marathon this past May.

For 2014, I have the goal to complete my 8th Half Marathon! I also want to stick to my complete training plan this time and do a better job on my cross training days to build more strength.

I tend to just run on these days or skip out on any weights/building core strength as my training goes along and things in our lives get busy. However, I know sticking to this would help my overall fitness level and stamina for the final 13.1 mile race.

Looking back on this crazy year, even with several months of inconsistent running, it was still my third year in a row of running well over 500 miles! I'm hoping to continue this lifestyle through 2014 and beyond.