Triathlon Update

My sister Emily blogged about it. I had some awesome cheerleaders!

Mom and Melissa sent me a couple pictures they had taken but I'm not gonna post them here cuz they all showcase my largeness. Its a good thing most of u don't have access to Melissa's blog!

OK, I'll post a couple from the end.

Here is where I am explaining to Melissa how I ran into a girl while on the running course. They did it dumb this year and you had to cross over on-comming runner traffic. So we were running at each other with no clear direction as to who goes where. At the end she happened to be standing right next to me so I pointed her out to the crew and she said I motivated her to catch up and pass me :-)

And this picture is from Melissa. Unfortuantly we didn't get one of all of us together.Emily has a good one of Melissa, Me, and Mom.

Oh yes, one more thing. I was one of the few who didn't wear a wetsuit to swim. In the past, Melissa always told me I didn't need one so I didn't even think about it this year. Good thing the water was 73 degrees!

Around the Triathlon

I could post a long post about the triathlon, but since I have no pictures of it, I will have to post pictures of activities AROUND the triathlon.

See - my loving Mother, Sister, and Friend all forgot my camera and the video camera for which Wednesday night I had painstakingly cleared off a tape so they could film 60 minutes of me in all my triathlon glory.

But don't worry. I shore don't feel bad cuz I'd much rather have them there cheering me on than pictures! Why didn't I bring my own camera you ask? Because I arrived an hour or more earlier to set up camp in the transition area. I was already in the water when they got there.

Back to the story.

Actually, perhaps its a good thing my mother wasn't in charge of my camera. My camera and her don't get along. Of all the pictures she took on Thursday night as I taught the RS "Cotton Eyed Joe" (and I know she took lots cuz every time I came around the circle she had that camera up and flashing), these are the two pictures my camera that actually saved. Do you see me on the other side of the circle?And there is my yellow back with the long braid right behind the red shirts. Just pretend this is me in the water at the beginning of the triathlon swimming at the back of the pack fighting for position.

I am usually so slow so I started out in the back, but this time I kept passing people as they dropped out and began to do the breast stroke because they started too fast.

Eventually I found a rabbit to follow. Mandy says drafting in the water is one of the best preserver of energy. I was swimming right next to a lady all around the first buoy, so I slowed down and got behind her. I was trying to take it easy cuz my main goal this triathlon was to actually run the entire 3 miles at the end. Of the three sports, running is my worse one.

Here is Emily showing off some of the produce she brought to share after we met up with her Friday afternoon. We are in the 2 bedroom condo in St George I rented at the suggestion of Melissa. It nice to have 2 seperate rooms so I could go to bed before everyone else did. Lets pretend this is Emily cheering me on at the first transition. Go Melanie!

And here I am trying to put my socks on over muddy dirty feet. Makes for pretty colorful socks, huh?
I was feeling pretty good on the bike even though I did stop once to make sure I had put my tires on right and my brakes weren't slowing me down. I remembered later that I did this last time on Kokopelli because on the way out the road is a little deceptive. Although it looks downhill, its really pretty flat and maybe even a little uphill. I couldn't figure out why I was going so slow, but when my computer read 20mph on the way back, I realized it was actually uphill out, and downhill back. And that big hill didn't kill me this time so I probably should have pushed it harder. All that biking up Mt. Charleston every Sat. morning woulda paid off if I actually had pushed it! I did speed up about halfway up the hill when I realized this. Still, I was trying to take it easy so I would have enough energy to finish the run and was feeling pretty good when I got back to transition.

Here we are watching the Woman's Broadcast on Emily's laptop. Look how spiritual we are! (I figured out how to use my timer on my camera!) OK, so we watched it after watching the BYU game during which Emily texted Melissa updates since she left us to drive home. Yes, I have no pictures of Melissa. Probably because SHE's the only one that remembered her camera at the triathlon.

Lets say that last picture was of Emily running with me out of transition and that the red shirt I have on is actually the red hat I wore as I ran. My cheering squad told me it was easy to pick me out. There were a couple other people who had my same outfit on or an outfit that looked similar, but I was the only one with white legs and a red hat.

And I ran the WHOLE WAY! So proud of myself. As I was coming around below the finish line, I realized I could probably go faster. Then as I started up the hill, I realized I could probably go even faster. But by then I was just enjoying the fact that I was almost done and feeling pretty good. I hadn't taken a drink at the last station cuz the one before had made my stomach cramp up a bit. As I ran in, I couldn't believe that my watch said 1:44. I had taken 15 minutes off of my time from last year! My official time was 1:43:15. And I thought I was taking it easy!

And here we are on Sunday, sitting on the church lawn in St. George eating the rest of the shakes we had gotten the night before. They kept surprising well in the cooler in our car during church. We had decided to stay in St. George so Emily didn't have to drive an extra 4 hour round trip to Vegas. Since check out of the condo was 11, we packed up, stopped at the first chapel we found, and went to 11am church. I made us hide behind the bushes so no one would think we had bought the shakes on Sunday!Lets just say those pictures were of us at the end of the triathlon. I got Melissa a banana from the free food and myself some orange slices. Then Emily made me wait for the awards ceremony to get a piece of paper that said I would get my plaque in a couple weeks. Yes, I got third place in the "Fat people under 39yrs" category.

Anyway, it made me kinda want to do another triathlon fairly soon so this time I could push it, but since Kokopelli is one of the last triathlons of the season, I don't think that'll happen.

Thank you so much to my cheering section! I felt a little bad being the only person competing with THREE cheerers. You are the best family and friends a girl could hope for :-).

PS. Yes, the post time is right. I couldn't sleep. I did go to bed at 8pm so I guess its kinda understandable.

And yet another Craft

I seem to go through crafts like Red Cross on steroids.

But I always come back to crocheting... eventually.

You know those beautiful crochet edgings I do on baby blankets? The beautiful edgings I give to those I love... and the ugly ones to people I don't love. YOU of course were the one I love.

I do make beautiful things. I would never say it of myself, but my friends say I have quite the eye.

Well, when I first started I didn't quite know how much fabric I would need so I have some scraps left in my closet. I even bought a quilting square and was going to make a quilt using up my scraps. What a great way to use up leftover fabric! Fast forward many, many months.

Two weeks ago while biking, I mentioned to Melissa I was pretty bored of crocheting again, but not interested in any of the other things I sometimes waste time with... puzzles, embroidery, cooking, sewing, scrapbooking, preparing lessons. She had a couple suggestions, one of which was quilting. Oh yes, right! That day I pieced a little nine square. Then I had to go to Walmart to buy batting and fabric for my backing. Kinda ruined the whole "use up extra material" idea. My mother told me you always end up buying more material for a quilt, but end up with less left over overall.

OK. We'll shoot for that. Sometime in the future.

Last night I finished the first one.
Notice the different materials? Yes, I used to make fun blankets, now I just stick with solid blue for boy, pink for girl. Less thinking involved.

Here's the back. I hand quilted it all that first week, but what took the most time was the edging. I sewed one side on the sewing machine but had to finish the other by hand (according to my 1970's Readers Digest book "Needle Work"). Man that takes forever. I'm also thinking about quilting a star in each of the blue quadrants on the front. Wouldn't that be cute?

And today, I pieced and started quilting another one (instead of cleaning the house in preparation for company, cleaning the car in preparation for company, and swimming in preparation for the triathlon).

Birgit might recognize the turtles.

Quilting is the fun part. Binding... not so much.

Any ideas of what designs I might quilt into the plain quadrants of the yellow ones? And who might want such a small little quilt? Its only about 27.5"X28". Yes, its supposed 2 be square.

I'm a civil engineer. Its close enough.

Puberty

I was complaining to Sister Thomas after Choir on Sunday.

I run, swim, bike more than twice a week and am now slow, fat, tired, and sometimes moody.

"Must be puberty," she said.

Puberty?! At 33?! 32? 33.... 32... Wait, born in 76, already had my birthday... THIRTY THREE?

I agree. Must be puberty.



PS.. Mother is coming to cheer along my triathlon endevors. And to read... and watch movies... and generally loaf around without any responsibilities (except making me dinner).

YA!! I have fast Internet! Look at these cool pictures I can put up now.

The poor sad pepper plant after I woke up one morning and discovered it was being eaten by 7..8... no NINE ugly tomato worms! (number gets bigger every time)
And here is the other plant that somehow remained unscathed.

I sprinkled both liberally with poison and watched with glee as the little devils curled up. When I came back from work, the ground was covered with dead little bodies. DIE AQUA SCUM!

Then here are two blankets all laid out and blocked.

I thought the blue and pink looked kinda cool on the floor, although the picture doesn't do it justice.
I think I might have accidentally switched the edgings. The blue is kinda girly. Too late now buster! The blue is on its way to Birgit.

Wait? That's it? No more pictures? Mm.. guess I didn't take as many as I thought. Never fear, I'll be sure to fix that problem in the future.

For now, I've spent almost the whole evening looking for a video to show me how to do "The Stroll" from the 1950's for an RS activity (they do it in Grease). I learned it my first year in college when one of my roommates taught it to us on a big group date but I don't remember the details.

Apparently I'm the RS entertainment!

OK, so I'm just supposed to teach everyone Cotton-Eyed Joe but on the invitation it said "Line Dancing" and there is only me! I thought I better be ready.

I did learn a little Latin stroll that I could do too.

Mom, do you know "The Stroll"? Maybe u can help teach cuz the activity is the night you arrive. Aren't u lucky :-)

Frustrated

So.. I was going to blog with pictures but dial-up just can't cut it. I'm a little frustrated with this weekend already. We'll just blame it on low blood sugar. (I MISS MY FRIDAY AFTERNOONS!)

I don't blog at work anymore and I want better Internet at home cuz:

first - I don't want to stay at work any longer than necessary (with our tight schedule I'll probably be there more than I'm at home).
second - I don't know if Angus was just being a pain or if they really are monitoring our web access there, but I certainly don't want any more people at work reading my blog! I want to be able to complain without consequences. I've already discovered you have to be careful what you put out on the Internet. You never know who is reading ur blog!. (Sorry Bishop, I do like u! I just like to complain and do it dramatically on my blog... makes for some funny reading in my humble opinion :-)
third - I can watch shows upstairs on the computer and keep any crafting mess up here instead of lugging everything down.. then back up again when people are coming over.
fourth - I can stop my phone service cuz I don't use it except for dial-up.
fifth - I like to have at least five things in a list.

So.. they are coming on Monday. Unfortunately, it takes 30 bucks to buy a modem, 30 bucks for them to "activate" the cable at my house, and another 10 for them to set up my computer. This is all in addition to the monthly service fee. I wasn't going to pay them to set up the computer, but since they had to come out anyways and Aaron won't come visit me....

You'll just have to wait with baited breath for the wonderful comments I will leave on blogs and the awesome pictures here.

Till then then.

Hungarian Sweet Rolls

A couple of weeks ago I wanted to make something sweet on a Sunday out of my "America's Best Lost Recipes" cookbook I got from Christmas. Unfortunately most of the lost recipes contain Molasses.. that's why they were lost :-). I found one with ingredients I had on hand and decided to try it out. These sweet rolls worked so well I decided to make them again for Melissa and Valerie when we had out biannual get together (sad, I wish I lived closer. But Valarie has friends and family here so she doesn't feel the loss). Melissa asked me to put the recipe up since Dan liked them so much.

Be forewarned. This recipe takes THREE sticks of butter. Three! That's why they taste so good. And you roll out the dough in POWDERED SUGAR! There is no way you can go wrong there. Why didn't I think of that before? All this time I coulda been rolling cinnamon rolls, dinner rolls, pizza.... OK, so maybe it would just work with cinnamon rolls.

Anyway. As I'm sure u all know, the way to a good flaky pastry is a good mix of butter and flour. Since I don't have a food processor, the cookbook suggested this method for getting a good mix.

Grated frozen butter.
Do you know how long it takes to grate THREE sticks of frozen butter?

I need a food processor. Hi Mom and Dad.. are you reading this? Rich friends? Loving family?

Perhaps I'll get one after the holidays.

Grating works, it just takes a lot of elbow grease.
Then the butter gets soft from your warm hands, but only the outside. So you turn and turn and turn but the inside stays frozen.

Three years later you have a nice dough which you refrigerate.

Here are the rolls waiting to be cooked. You have to put it on baking paper cuz the meringue center is pretty sticky. Lucky for me my coworker Marcia doesn't bake so when her neighbors house went into foreclosure, I got a whole roll of baking paper. One of the few perks of the present economy. The first time I made this I halved the recipe (one of the few times I remembered to do so). It calls for 3 eggs. As Heidi asked before, how do you halve eggs? I put 2 yolks in the dough and made two egg whites worth of meringue. Then I tried to put all the meringue in the center of the rolls. Got kinda messy. This second time I had just the right amount and it didn't spill out.

Believe me, they look much better in person.

I had 24 rolls. 9 for me, 8 for Melissa, and 5 for Valerie. If that doesn't add up to 24, we aren't counting the 2 used for tasting.

Hungarian Sweet Rolls
DOUGH
4 c. all-purpose flour
1 package yeast (~2 t.)
1/2 t. salt
24 T. (3 sticks) unsalted butter, cut into 1/2-in. pieces and chilled (if you have a food processor)
3 large egg yolks (save whites for filling)
1 c. sour cream
1 t. vanilla extract

FILLING
3 large egg whites
1 c. granulated sugar
1/4 t. vanilla extract
1/2 c. walnuts, chopped fine (I never used this cuz I didn't have any... and I'm kinda glad)
Confectioners' sugar for rolling out dough (ah.. so fun)

1. Pulse flour, yeast and salt into food processor until blended. Add the butter and pulse until the flour is pale yellow and resembles coarse cornmeal. (Or grate frozen butter if you are unfortunate enough not to have a food processor. Someday).
2. Beat the egg yolks, sour cream, and vanilla in a bowl. Stir the yolk mixture into the flour mixture to form a sticky dough. Divide the dough into two pieces, wrap tightly with plastic wrap, and refrigerate until well chilled, at least 2 hrs and up to 24 hours.
3. Heat oven to 400 degrees (I had to turn my little toaster oven up as high as it would go to get the dumb things to brown. I think it doesn't get as hot as an oven). Line 2 baking sheets with parchment paper. Beat the egg whites until frothy. Increase the speed to medium and gradually add the sugar until incorporated. Add the vanilla, increase the speed to high and beat until whites hold soft peaks (I made my meringue stiffer the second time (not quite stiff peaks) and it seemed to hold its shape better). Using a rubber spatula, fold in the walnuts (if you want to take the time, otherwise don't bother).
4. Heavily (and I mean HEAVILY) sprinkle a work surface with confectioners sugar. The dough is pretty sticky and needs alot of sugar. Roll out one piece into a 16 in. circle about 1/8 in. thick. Spread half the filling over the dough. Using a pizza cutter, cut the dough into 12 equal wedges. Starting at the wider end of each wedge, gently roll up the dough ended with the pointed end on the bottom (I'm still perfecting the rolling with filling... I still haven't gotten it quite right). Place them 2 in. apart. Bake until the tops are golden brown ad puffed, 15-18 minutes. Serve warm.

These are best straight out of the oven. And FYI, you can't put a couple in the fridge to cook later cuz its taken you ALL DAY to cook them by 3's and 4's in ur toaster oven. The meringue gets all melty.

PS. I'm getting busy and with the new arrangements at work I won't be blogging much. (big sigh) Goodbye dear blogging friends and family! (sweaty eyes) I still love you even if I don't comment 2 hrs after you post anymore. (sniff) And I'll probably only be posting at the most weekly. It was bound to happen as interest waned.. I just wanted to decide by myself when that happened! Excuse me, I need a tissue.