2013 at a glance.

2013 was a good year for us. In a nutshell, here's our year.

- We visited 5 new temples:

1) Redlands, CA

2) Jordan River, UT

3) Billings, MT

4) Draper, UT

and 5) Los Angeles, CA

- Oh wait, we graduated college.

- Brandon traveled to Miami for PA school interviews, and got in! (No pictures, sadly.)

- We started running together, and I ran in 5 races.

1) Color Fun Run

2) Dirty Dash

3) Temple to Temple Relay

4) Tater Trot

5) Santa Run

- We got to send Dallin off on a mission, and all the fun that came with it (aka Dane time).

- Got to see one of my best friends get married!

- I started my first teaching job.

- Celebrated our second anniversary by camping out in Yellowstone.

-Traveled to Mendocino with Brandon's family for their 30th wedding anniversary (which I need to blog about... whoops).

I'm sure there's a ton that I'm missing, but I'm so grateful for the blessings 2013 brought me. I'm also SO grateful that it's over, because it was a challenging year for sure. I love Brandon, and am so glad he is with me every step of the way.

2014 has a lot of life experiences in store for us- a move, a new job (gulp), a missionary coming home (yay!), PA School, lots of more running for me, and basically a new start for us. Bittersweetness.

Temple to Temple Relay

Yesterday we ran the Temple to Temple Relay. MAN it was tiring!

We were in the earliest wave, meaning we were the slowest. Butttttt that was pretty typical. I loved the team spirit that was everywhere. People pulled off the side of the road to cheer people on, and not just for their teams.

Brandon ran the leg right before mine, which was 5.2 miles. Of course he did great, he ran it in less than 50 minutes. He is such a good athlete, even if he gets nervous before his runs and doesn't think he'll do well.

I ran the 5th leg, which was 6.8 miles. Umm, up until that point the furthest I had run EVER was 4.5 miles. I was so nervous beforehand, and I just kept praying that I wouldn't succumb to the cold. It was really cold and windy. I would be lying if I said I didn't walk, but when the wind is against you for so long it takes it out of you. They had mile markers, but I'm pretty sure they weren't in the right spot. For example, it said I ran my first mile in 6:30. Now I KNOW that can't be true, but it was great motivation.

When I hit mile 5, I said, "Ok, I have officially run further than I have ever run before. Now let's finish this sucker." And I tried my very hardest to run my bunnies off.

When I crossed the finish line and passed off the baton (a snap bracelet), I sat down and my legs immediately went to sleep. I rested for a minute, then we were off to the next leg. Something scary happened on the way there. We were driving, and saw a huge combine with the sign "oversize load" driving behind some runners. One girl in neon yellow did not seem to notice it. I commented to the people in our car, "Man, that guy's going to hit her if he's not careful." But we kept driving, with our friends behind us. When we got to the drop off zone for the next leg, our friends weren't behind us. Rachel called her sister, who was in the car. They said the combine actually did hit that girl about 10 seconds after we passed her. We didn't even see it, but they said she had a huge gash over her eye, a broken arm, and a pretty bad concussion. She was talking about her laundry when they pulled over. Of course, that freaked me out! The last full song that was playing during my run pushed me to run has hard as I can for those couple of minutes, and I think if I had walked there she would have passed me. Who knows, that could have been me. But I think that I had a guardian angel watching over me, and he or she helped me get to that finish line when I did.

Brandon snapped some pictures of me running up to the finish line... embarrassing.

I have my tongue stuck out... because I'm just pretending to be tired.

Phew.

Pain. As soon as I sat down my legs went numb.

Yes, I'm smiling!

Rachel and I... between the 2 of us we ran 14 miles. I'm glad I have a friend to challenge me!

Oh, and PS, Brandon had to go straight to work instead of to the finish line. What a champ.

(At the finish line, Idaho Falls temple)

This made me think a couple things. One, I need to work on my pace. Two, if I ran 7 miles without too much strain (after the fact), then I can definitely do my half in May. I just need to keep running, and both of these things will come to pass.

Oh yeah. One guy ran it by himself... and he ran it faster than our team. He ran the entire 39.5 miles by himself. It was insane to watch.

This weekend.

We had an eventful weekend. While everyone else in the world was out running races, we were taking care of Rachel and Cody's puppy Teddy. He's super cute, and CRAZY. They're training him well.

He clearly has a favorite... he wouldn't leave Brandon's side when he was there. He even went over to our room when Brandon was doing online homework and started whining.

We took him on long walks (all the way to Porter Park, about 1/4 mile from our house), and wore him out. These two...

Saturday was a nice warm day. We headed on over to Lake Rigby, then with our friend Jared to a demolition derby. It was the MOST redneck thing I've ever been to, but it was great!

I guess it wasn't a "traditional" demolition derby, but it was pretty intense. I realized that driving like this would be an awesome stress reliever. Because when you're coming close to someone, you can just smash them! I knew that if I did this, that would be the kind of driver I would be.

So right behind the car that is on its side are 2 huge tires filled with dirt. It's what the drivers are supposed to go around, and he just got a little bit too close and went up on 2 wheels and over. When the car flipped, everyone started screaming and cheering. It was such a mob mentality moment.

And then everyone jumped out to push the car upright.

This was CRAZY. So many of the cars hit each other head on, but when this car was hit it just burst into flames. Everyone started screaming again, and pulled out their phones and cameras to get pictures. Unfortunately, I could only see it through 2 beams so this was the best shot I got.

So many of the tires were either flying off or close to flying off during the races... it was intense. At one point an entire wheel came off- not just the tire but everything. That car won the race.

We also had the water truck that allowed the cars to get stuck a lot more.

It was way more fun than I expected. There was a lot of mud, a lot of screaming, a lot of crunches (of metal, not humans), and even a fire. By the end of the races, I was up on my feet screaming "GO! GO! GO! KILL! KILL! SET THEM ON FIRE!" I'm not ashamed. It was something we wanted to do before we left Rexburg, so check!

Synopsis of Summer 2012

So, summer is coming to a close. The more I think about it, the more nauseous I get. The only thing keeping me going is 1) knowing I get to see "baby boy" after the semester ends; and 2) it's my last semester of classes! I'm sure that my Kindergarten Practicum teacher (despite the fact that he is what's making me nauseous) will help me get ready for student teaching in January.

Anyways, just to sum up our experiences in the summer, I will list off the things we did with pictures. The italicized one are from our "Rexburg Bucket List"... we're almost done with it!

1) "Dark Knight Rises" midnight premiere

(Our only picture from the night. The flash was really strong.)

Then Dallin came into town! And while he was here...

2) Wind caves hike with Mikey

3) Big Judd's

 4) Saw Ririe, Idaho

 5) Rexburg Rapids (for free, which made it better)

6) Twin Falls, the temple, falls, and Grandma's childhood homes

 7) Rigby Lake... we didn't get a picture but we will!

8) Family Reunion in Aspen Grove... just some highlights.

 The one picture of us from the week.                    4 Murphy girls... and baby Austin!

Dad being a balla. Obviously.

Then Bethany came back to Rexburg with us!

8)  Bear World

9) Drive-In Theater... Bethany and I did not get pictures but it was great.

10) St. Anthony Sandbar

11) Birthday party for this little guy:

12) Celebrated one year of marriage together in Logan.

13) Job hunted (and finally got one, thanks to Dianne!)

14) Celebrated my birthday, and made it great thanks to Brandon.

Dinner:

 Cake:

 15) Finished my baby blanket for the little guy.

It's going to be a great semester! Terrifying, but great. And Brandon put in his 2 weeks notice, which is a miracle. I get my husband back, and it means we can actually go places now on the weekends if we need it.