Vegas and a Marathon

Ok, so it was only a 1/2 marathon.

Last weekend I ran the Painter's Half Marathon in St. George. I've been training for the past few months for this, and it felt so good to finally do it! I hit my goal of running it under two hours; my time ended up being 1:53:47. It was a tough 13 miles, but the atmosphere was so pumped and it was a really fun course. I ran it with a group of kids from my ward, so it was fun having a bunch of us spread out along the course. Since my Bishop was running the marathon also, we all rode down together in 3 cars and spent the night in my Bishop's condo. Bishop Beckstead is 70 years old and still runs half marathons a couple of times a year. He is so great! So we all ran the marathon Saturday and then that night about half of us drove to Vegas to hit the strip. I've never been to Vegas so it was fun to finally get to see the sights a little bit! Although I wouldn't recommend walking the strip after running 13 miles, it was so much fun. We ate ice cream in the Paris Hotel and watched a couple of the fountain shows in front of the Bellagio. Plus half of the fun was just watching the people who populate sin city. So interesting/hilarious/wonderful!

All of us with our wonderful Bishop Beckstead after he
finished the race. What a champ!!


Don't Worry. . . I couldn't figure out how to pull the slots.

Dave, Nat, Scott, Jamie, Trent, Connor and Me post-race

A New Year

So I've been thinking. Life is wonderful. I mean truly, it is! Who can dispute it. I just turned 20. This is strange because I somehow still feel like I am that little girl who sat on her grandpas lap and told him stories. But I think I really must be getting older because the other day I had a thought process that really surprised me. In light of recent events, I was having a sit-and-feel-sorry-for-myself-moment. But then I thought, well, Katie, If you could change something about this, what would it be? And you know what? I realized that I wouldn't change a thing. Granted, sometimes life is so frustrating and so hard, but I am so glad that it is filled with ups and downs rather than a plain old boring level of bliss!! Trials are interesting. They give you something to look back on and laugh about, or maybe even cry about. But nonetheless, they keep us alive; thriving; feeling. They help us remember how to breathe. How numb we would all become if all we ever experienced was happiness. Anyways. Since this little epiphany cheered me up, I figured I would share it with anyone who is experiencing something of the sort. Don't worry. Just smile and make it through, because every experience is truly changing us for the better. We all change, we all grow and move on. And most of the time, we never end up where we thought we would. But I think that's ok; because usually things are even better than we could have pictured.