Merry
Christmas & Happy New Year! We hope you have a wonderful holiday season.
Our year was filled with family,
friends, fun and adventures! The beginning on 2018 started with the wedding of Kim’s
brother, Mike and his new bride Linda. It was a fun, cold Wisconsin wedding!
The Super Bowl was in Minnesota this
year and we had a lot of fun participating in all the activities. It was a fun
week!
We started the half marathon season in March
with a trip to Montgomery, Alabama. It was a surprising chilly start to this
race but turned into a nice day. We crossed Alabama off our list, our #13
state.
In April, we crossed North Carolina off
the list with the Rock ‘n Roll Raleigh half marathon. This race was quite a
struggle for Kim. On top of the hilly course, she was suffering from strep
throat and bronchitis! She probably shouldn’t have run, but it was state #14
and when would we get back to NC?
Two our Godchildren celebrated First
Communion this spring. Evelyn in April and Joseph in May. We are grateful that we
could attend both. Kim played a special part as Joseph’s sponsor during his
Mass.
The next two weekends we had graduations
for Eric’s nephews. First was Noah’s graduation in Colorado. Luckily there was
the Colfax races going on that weekend in Denver. We ran the half; Eric’s
brother Phil ran the full. The course went through the Zoo! State #15 was
crossed off the list. Memorial Day weekend
we traveled to Rapid City for Albert’s graduation. We hiked up 3,000 feet to
the top of Black Elk Peak (Harney). Eric’s sister, DJ and niece, Juanita joined us.
We got a little lost and ended up doing 9 miles!
In June, Kim attended Abbie’s pinning
ceremony. She is officially an RN! We also
ran Grandma’s Marathon in Duluth, MN. It was a great race for Kim. She managed
to finish over 30 minutes faster than her first full in 2017. The temperature
was just about perfect, but we had fog for the first hour so no great views of
Lake Superior. DJ was our support staff and she did a great job!
Kim’s sister, Nancy came up in July for
Melissa’s Bridal shower. It was a great party hosted by Danielle.
Our big trip of the year was in early
August. Kim was heartbroken to miss her hometown church’s annual festival but
the Rock n’ Roll Dublin Half was the same weekend and she really wanted to run
it. The course was very hilly, they had to change it last minute because of the
Pope’s visit the following week. While in Ireland we toured all the normal
sites, kissed the Blarney Stone, drank some Guinness, visited many castles and
saw the amazing West Coast. The best part was the Cliffs of Moher (our picture).
We had a busy September with two half
marathons (states #16 & 17) and a wedding. The first half was in Sioux
Falls, SD. We had a great weekend getting together with Byron’s family and
Eric’s old friend, Kevin and his family. A couple weeks later we ran in Cheyenne,
WY. We were able to catch up with Eric’s brother Matt and his family. The last
weekend in September we travelled down to Milwaukee for Dylan and Melissa’s
wedding. Kim was honored to be a greeter and a reader during the ceremony. It
was a poem that they found about how kitties taught us how to love. It was
cute. Kim even wore some kitty ears.
State #18 was crossed off the list in
October with the Nebraska Half in Omaha. It was by far the most miserable race
we’ve ever ran. It started chilly with rain. By the time we finished it had
dropped below freezing and sleeting. It was awful. We had great support though
as Eric’s sister, Bonnie cheered us on and picked us up at the finish with our
nephew, Michael.
We ran the Madison Half Marathon again
in November. Dylan meet us on Saturday for the day. After the race on Sunday,
we got together with friends who recently moved to Madison. It was great to see
Jenny, Nathan and the kids!
For the first time ever, we split up
for Thanksgiving. Kim went with Danielle, Bradley and Blake to Nancy’s in Texas
while Eric went to DJ’s house.
We ran our last half marathon of the
year on December 1st in Memphis, TN (state #19). It was the St.
Jude’s race. It was a very emotional race as we ran through the St. Jude campus
and patients and parents were out cheering us on. There were a lot of people
who were running the race in honor/memory of kids that were treated at St.
Jude.
To recap, we ran nine half marathons in
nine different states/countries (Alabama, Colorado, Nebraska, North Carolina,
South Dakota, Tennessee, Wisconsin, Wyoming & Ireland). Six of the half
marathons were in capital cities! Thanks Dylan for pointed that out to us!
Swirl is still going strong. He turned
15 this year!
Love, Eric, Kim and Swirl
No comments:
Post a Comment