Wow! The marathon was amazing. I knew a few people running in it which made it fun. My brother's wife Lori came down from Oregon to run it. Lori's sister Brandy and her husband Mauri ran it also. Then there was my good friend Julie and her sister in law, who is 7 weeks pregnant. That makes me look horrible, I have no excuse why I don't run....well, except for the excuse that I don't like it at all. I am just amazed at all the different people that ran the race, including very old people. It is just awesome. I can't describe the feeling at the finish line. There is an adrenaline that is freaking cool! It is emotional, inspiring, fun, exciting, and so much more all rolled into one. The only draw back is the thousands of people. I am talking thousands and thousands since there was 7500 runners. Times that by their families and friends and you got a whole lotta people in one place. Okay, here we go photo essay:
Lori as I dropped her off at the finish line to catch the bus up to the starting line. It was 4:30am and she didn't sleep because of nerves. She was pretty tired but still cute for this time of morning don't you think?
Lori's personal cheer squad. Weston and their four girls and me with my two kiddos makes for a lot of kids to keep track of with thousands of people everywhere. At the running expo the night before we made some signs to help cheer her on.
We ran into some friends from Nyssa. Lyn and Trevor Ellsworth. Their wives were running this marathon for the second time. Crazy to run into people from back home.
Lori, Mauri, and Brandy
Way to go Lori, way to go!
I forgot to have a clear photographers head and get a bunch of photos and so I completely forgot to get one of Lori, Weston and all of their girls. At least I got one of Lori and Weston. Weston was pretty proud of Lori and got emotional when she finished. So much for the tough guy routine. You are found out now.
Sisters, friends, and now marathon runners.
These are some of my friend Julie's kids waiting at the finish line for their mom. Cooper and Charlee are some pretty cute kids and good friends of Howie and Livy.
Here comes Julie! Looking Good. Even after 26 miles she is still smiling.
She swings by the fence and grabs her two year old Griffen and packs him across the finish line!
Julie's family. Her pregnant sister in law ran it also! Way to go girls! All three toddler boys had shirts on that Julie had made. They say, "My mom (one of them said aunts) runs like a MOTHER!"
Julie's cute family.
Ah, love this girl and proud of her that she ran a marathon.
At the finish line with their medals
Mauri looks good when he runs.
Did I tell you that Brandy runs fast? Ya, she does. She ran this race in 3:05 a PR for her, even faster than her time at the Boston marathon. She got 7th in her category! Nicely done Brandy.
Love you so much Lori and impressed of your accomplishment.
Check out this farm girl that can RUN!
Lori's bib number. Another item of proof that this was real, she really did it.
Abigail swiped her medal and was taking care of it.
I think it is pretty cute how she sacked out with it still around her neck.
Hard earned medal, symbolic of lots and lots of hard (sometimes painful) work.
Lori, way to go! This little farmer's wife just made up her mind and ran many miles on the farm roads of Nyssa as the onion and harvest trucks zoom by, many times pushing her kids in the stroller and sometimes her runs went late into the night. But she never gave up and look what this girl did!
Simply amazing. Way to go Lori, Brandy, Mauri, Julie and Shauna, we are proud of you. Inspiration for us all.
Found a cute way to make an Elmo shirt for her. I used a shirt she already had. I found an Elmo coloring page off the internet and used it for the pattern to cut out the colors of felt for Elmo. I used Wonder Under to fuse it to the shirt. Then I machine sewed around the pieces. (Don't look close!) I think it turned out okay for novice sewer. I can't remember where, but somewhere under a google search I found the fun idea for the foam Elmo hats for the party participants.
I love Livy's faces in these photos! The most fun party was making these adorable Elmo cupcakes. It was a combination of a few cupcakes I had seen on the internet. I used red frosting for Elmo's fur, white Wilton candy melts for the eyes, orange gumball for the nose (ran out so some had orange frosting), Oreo cookie cut in half for the nose, and black frosting for eye balls. Oh, they were so so cute!
The cousins and their party hats! Oh, and Walmart had Elmo fruit punch juice boxes which were a hit with the kids.
