Birthday Random Acts of Kindess

January was awesome! Usually January drags on and on for me, but this year it flew by! Maybe it was because my birthday came and I had something super fun and special planned for myself. I turned 31, so I did 31 Random Acts of Kindness. My awesome kids, mom, sister, and my nephews came along for the ride and helped me out tons! Thank you guys!!

I'm really praying that these little acts of kindness touch people that need it and they then "pay it forward". Here is my Random Act of Kindness List that we accomplished.


1. Took Cory lunch
2. Picked up trash everywhere we went
3. Left money at the car wash
4. Payed for the person behind me at McDonalds
5. Hid dollar bills in the toy section of the Dollar Store
6.Took treats and cards to Firemen
7. Left change and laundry detergent and fabric softener at Laundrymat
8. Left a care package at a bus stop
9. Left encouraging post-it's all over town
10. Took flowers and a card to Gramma Lucy
11. Took "Chemo Care Packages" to the Cancer Center.
12. Posted a "Take What You Need" poster at the hospital
13. Took treats and cards to librarians
14. Left diapers and wipes at changing table at the store
15. Left coins on the games and toys at the store.
16. Mailed cards to out of town relative.
17. Left stamps at Post Office
18. Left bubbles at the park.
19. Left Caw Bruce some of his favorite juice.
20. Decorated Caw's truck
21. Let someone go ahead of me in line.
22. Donate blood.
23. Hold door open for someone.
24. Take treats and cards to police dept.
25. Put carts away at the store.
26. Put donuts in the teacher lounge at Parker's school.
27. Have manners all day and make sure to say "please" and "thank you" to everyone.
28. Mail a card to a Veteran.
29. Use re-usable grocery bags all day.
30. Leave toys for dogs at the dog park.
31. Donated treats and food to animal shelter.

It was a long day, but fun. I'm hoping so keep this tradition going in some way or another next year.

Do you ever do Random Acts of Kindness? What is your favorite one to do? I found it hard to find anonymous acts of kindness!

Skydiving!!

Cory jumped out of a plane at 13,000 feet!! Guess he sure knows how to celebrate a birthday. He's not a man of many words, but he did say that it was the most amazing thing he's ever done. I guess that means I finally gave him a gift he likes. Success is sweet.

We waited a looooong time for Cory's turn to jump. He was in the last group of the day (even though out appointment was HOURS earlier, they were running behind), and I think the tension was slowly easing up. It was actually really peaceful and exciting at the same time watching all the parachuters. Crazy they only give you like a 10 minute prep and you are up and going in the little cargo plane. Callie loved the fact that Daddy's parachute was rainbow colored. What are the odds of that?

So Happy 30th birthday to my adventurous husband. Here's to checking lots of stuff off our bucket list together for all our birthday to come. Love you babe.

Cory is Going Skydiving!

CORY IS GOING SKYDIVING TOMORROW!!!!!!!!

We've been swabbed.

Thank you for reading all about Ronan from my previous post. That kid sure touched a special place in my heart. Well Cory and I did sign up on the bone marrow registry and our little packets arrived!

Me, the nurse, was a little confused by the packet. Huh? Q-tips? In my mouth? That can't be right! But after I put on my smart-girl glasses, I figured out that yep- it's that easy!

MMMMM!!! Cotton tastes good!!!!

I think you get extra points for not brushing your teeth before swabbing. At least I hope so! For Cory's sake anyway. But really, from what I understand (from my extensive wikipedia search) it takes about 2 months from when you send in the swabs to actually being put on the registry. So who knows, maybe one of us could give someone out there an amazing Christmas present!

Be a Rockstar Like Ronan!

Did anyone watch the Stand Up 2 Cancer telethon on TV the other night? Well Ms. Swift sang a song that nearly broke my heart. Take a listen HERE. At the end of the song, this adorable little boy's picture came on the screen.

I ended up googling the song to find out more about this beautiful little boy named Ronan. He reminded me of Parker with his sweet eyes and smile. Surely everything turned out okay and the lyrics were wrong. No way this handsome little man died. I came across rockstarronan.com where Ronan's amazing mom, Maya, blogs about finding out her son has neuroblastoma, going through treatment, and ultimately Ronan's death. She still blogs today and is on a mission to kill cancer and keep her son's memory alive. I read Maya's blog from start to current over the next 2 nights. I bawled. I am still crying, thinking about Ronan and how unfair it is his mom doesn't get to hold him, touch him, watch him grow. Cancer sucks!! On their blog, there is a section called How to Live Like a Rockstar that is inspiring and touching. I don't know how you could read this blog and not want to do something. Anything. One of the ways to "live like a rockstar" is to register to become a bone marrow donor, which is something I've always wanted to do. So guess what? I did it. I registered today. I think Cory's gonna do it too and that's awesome because Cory HATES anything medical-related (except his hot nurse wife).

So check out Rockstar Ronan and visit marrow.org to register to become a donor. It's SUPER easy and you could save a life of a little child like Ronan. If you are ages 18-60, they want you to join the fight! Do it now!

Cross Training: Biking

Last night I had my first "real" bike ride for exercise. I rode with my sister and 2 friends from work. It was a 10.8 mile ride along the river. It look us about an hour and 15 minutes, but we took lots of breaks and even sat on a bench for awhile to rest our behinds.

I really don't have a fancy bike. I think it was the blue light special at WalMart.It does the job though so I don't mind. My sister and I bought the same helmet without knowing and noticed we have the same bike, just different colors. Weird, huh?! We must be on the same wavelength or something. I actually found biking to be much easier than running. My butt is the only thing that is super sore today. It hurts to sit down! I think I'll get used to it though (along with some padded shorts!) and will try to incorporate more biking into my exercise routine.

ALL DONE!

Somethin' New

So you guys all know one of my goals this year was to try a new thing every week. I have no plans on what these new things might be, just flyin' by the seat of my pants. The point is just to get outside of my comfort zone and do something I wouldn't normally try.

Are you ready for my new thingadaweek this week?

I tried Quinoa!!

I was really excited to try quinoa since I've seen so many yummy recipes on . I was at work, so it's Cory's job to make dinner Mondays and Tuesday since he gets home first. He went for simple and fast- the rice cooker.

Sad news my friends...none of us liked it. :(

Anyone have any suggestions? Perhaps a free almost full bag of quinoa?