Seattle Mania!

I promise I am still alive! It has been way too long since I've blogged but I've been busy and am finally getting around to it. I go back to school in TEN days! I am so excited and seriously cannot wait to see everyone again and start another fun and adventurous semester. Plus, I found out my favorite Coloradan is going to be riding on the bus with me from Salt Lake to Rexburg next week, which will make for a fun 5 hour drive :)

Earlier this month I went to downtown Seattle with Elizabeth and her roommate, Ester, to go spend time at the Pacific Science Center. My friend Thad recently moved to Seattle so we invited him to come along and it was SO much fun! (Well, except for the butterfly exhibit...didn't enjoy it at all!) After we went to eat lunch at Red Robin in Redmond.

I rode my first ferris wheel! My aunt, mom, sister and I spent the day in Seattle and had a great time. We rode the Great Seattle Ferris Wheel, strolled through Pike Place Market, added gum to the gum wall, had lunch at Ivars and visited my grandpa at work. Even though we live just a few minutes away from Seattle, we don't get the chance to go very often, so its always a good time when we do!

We also had the opportunity to go to a Mariner's game. My grandparents, mom and I were lucky enough to go to the yellow t-shirt King Felix night! Everyone was wearing bright yellow and holding up King Felix "K" signs. It was such a fun and relaxing night at the ball game. I don't know much about baseball but it definitely was fun to pretend like I knew what was going on. I am excited to go again next season! Go Mariners! (PS - they WON!!! This doesn't happen very often!)

Feeling Pretty Good

We had A champs today (for those that don't know what this is, it is the big championship with all 27 teams that are part of the league we swim in). It's safe to say that going into the meet, I was nervous. We spent all day Saturday, part of Sunday and Thursday night putting these line ups together. Every possible line up had been thought through and considered. No joke, we spent hours and hours and hours staring at the same 10 papers we had to go off of. Lucky for us, all of us coaches get along really well this year, which made all of this a little bit easier. Anyway, after some exciting, nerve wracking and even some "bummer" swims (1 relay DQ and 1 individual DQ), the points were tallied up and the results were announced.

FOURTH.

You read that right...Samena placed FOURTH!

Grant (one of my assistant coaches) and I literally screamed our heads off when this was announced. In the past, Samena hasn't place very well at A champs (usually any where from 10-15th), so this was huge! I seriously almost cried I was so happy. All of the hard work that we had put into the many hours and days of practices, meets, line ups and champ line ups had paid off!! Such a great feeling! I went from being so exhausted after a long day at the pool to overwhelmingly happy and excited. I know this is super cliche of me to put on here, but I really am so proud of my swimmers for all the hard work they have put into the season. I'm so grateful for the parents and especially my amazing parent reps that helped me out soooo much this summer...seriously couldn't have done any of this without them. I am super lucky to have the boys (my 3 other coaches) by my side, I am so glad that we were able to have such a strong team of coaches this year that worked so well together! Can't wait for next year...the stakes are high :)

I've got about a month until I go back to Rexburg...pretty crazy, huh?! I love being home but I'm definitely ready to be back. I'm going to be taking some really fun classes this year, which should be exciting. Oh, and I'm excited to see my Shmannalee and Mikele and all of my other buddies that I miss so much!

Pretty darn happy right about now :)

And the countdown begins...

3 more weeks and my summer can finally begin! I've been out of school since April, but work has taken up a lot of my time. The swim team season will be over in 3 weeks, and the day after the final championship meet, I am going camping for a week with my family for a huge family reunion. I am so excited to get away for a few days and enjoy a few days up in the mountains!

The theme for last week's home meet was super heroes. My grandma and I made the coaches some capes to wear at the meet. Usually I hate dressing up for the theme meets, but it was fun to wear the capes and I think the younger kids liked it.

Confession time: I didn't realize how short I am until I saw this picture! I laughed pretty hard when I saw how short I am next to these two giants. Tomorrow is team picture day, and lets just say, all 10 of my kick boards that I will be standing on are ready to go :)

I can't believe how fast this summer has been going so far. Pretty crazy to think that I've been home for 3 months already, and before I know it, it will be time to go back. I am so excited to get back to Rexburg and let the adventures begin. My classes are all signed up for and we got our living arrangement a few weeks ago, so now its just the waiting game!

Victory!

Last night we had our first swim meet, which was super scary as it was my first meet as the head coach.  When putting the meet together and getting in touch with the Edgebrook coach (our opposing team), I was shocked and a little frightened to hear that they have 270 swimmers....which is almost double the swimmers that I have! The boys (my 3 other coahces) and I spent 7 hours putting line ups together this weekend...we did a lot more talking that we should have, but it ended up being really fun! Any way, we WON!! The final score was 368 to 290, which is awesome! We had about 1/2 of the DQ's that we had at last years first meet, and twice as many best times!! I am so proud of my swimmers and all the effort they put into the meet last night!

We have another meet tomorrow, which again, I am a little scared about. We have some very fast swimmers, but they have even faster swimmers. But, who knows, fingers crossed I will be surprised at the end of the meet again!?

Green Corn Starch

For mothers day, my family decided that we would volunteer as color throwers for the Color Run in downtown Seattle, which was a fundraiser for the Ronald McDonald House. About 6000 people had signed up to run a 5k in white clothes and were sprayed with 5 different colors along the way. It was a lot like the festival of colors that I had gone to in March, only this was a fundraiser. We were in charge of the green color and we definitely got our share of color...to say the least! It was so fun and such a great way to spend one of the few sunny days we have had this year. After the race was over, we walked around the park/fountain area next to the Space Needle for a while...we had SO many people stop us and ask to take our pictures. I guess that it isn't an everyday event to see 8 people covered in green corn starch from head to toe :)

Swim team started on Monday and its going pretty well so far. Just a few little registration problems, but nothing too major, which is always a good thing. We have about 150 swimmers this year and luckily I have been able to remember/learn everyone's names with the exception of a few here and there. I am hoping that this season goes well and is fairly quick!

I am so excited for LB to come home. I miss her so much! I am super excited for the adventures that I have ahead of me with my friends that are home so far and can't wait for the last few to finally get here already!

One of my friends from high school just go married and found out she is having a baby boy this coming fall, which is super exciting! And, one of my other friends that I've known for a long time just got engaged!! Everyone is growing up and its pretty crazy how fast things have changed in such a little time since graduation high school. I'm excited to see what happens next!

Let the Craziness Begin...

We had swim team try outs on Saturday, and I was surprised to see how many people we had try out. I am excited for the season to start and to get the ball rolling! We finally have our coaching staff finalized...it looks like it should be a pretty fun year! My fingers are crossed that everything goes well this year and that we can win a little here and there. It was fun to see the kiddos that I haven't seen in a while, and loved all the little hugs that my little kids gave me when they walked in and saw me at the pool. Practices start on Monday, which means that I start living at the pool again...which is okay with me as long as I get a nice tan ;)

I got to Skype with some of my college friends yesterday, which was really fun! I talk to Annie a lot, but of course it was still exciting to see her! Colin and Thad were having dinner at her house. It made me miss Rexburg so much and I cannot wait for September to be here already so I can go back. 

Sorry - my posts have been super boring lately...not much has been happening, but as more people slowly start to come home, it should pick up a little!

This will happen.

Since I've got nothing to do for a little while...or until swim team starts up and my friends come home from college, I've decided its time to get back into my habit of working out. It doesn't matter what type of exercise I am doing, just as long as I am doing something, thats all that matters! Summer is just around the corner, so its time to get back in shape! Wish me luck!!!