Warrior Dash/Stroll

Today was the big day, the day of the Kansas City Warrior Dash. This year is the first year the Warrior Dash came to Kansas City, and I was so excited to give it a try! A group of my friends signed up together to join the fun. Here's a group photo before the race.


Little did Red Frog Events know, they scheduled the Warrior Dash to be held during one of the most trying heat waves in Kansas City. Today, we dashed in 97 degree heat at least that's the temperature it was during our wave. I use the term DASH figuratively. There was not much dashing on our part, more power walking/strolling instead. We jogged for maybe the first mile of the course, and then it was all over. The heat was so intense, the heat index was over 100 degrees, and the course was MUCH more challenging than originally expected. That, coupled with our 11:30am start time, made for a good 50min 5k course time. We should have expected trouble, when the starting line announcer told us to hydrate about 20 times, and then found it imperative to say that "they have seen over 30 people go down just this morning due to the heat". Fan-friggin-tastic. That really motivated me right from the start.

My friend Kate had warned me that the course was full of hills, but I was completely caught off-guard at the quantity and significance of the elevation changes we experienced throughout this course. The incline and decline were so steep, that just walking up these hills was trying, let alone the 10 challenging obstacles sprinkled in between. One participant actually had already ran in the Chicago Warrior Dash held earlier this year, and said that this Kansas City track was ten times more difficult. That made me feel like much less of a pansy. :) It was challenging, but still very fun! The obstacles ranged from cargo nets, to jumping over fire, to balance obstacles 6ft in the air, to tires, to a mud pit at the very end. The link in the beginning of this post will show all of the obstacles we encountered if you want to check it out. It kept us on our toes with every turn and every hill. A few were a little out of my comfort zone--mainly those that required climbing over a tall obstacle to climb down the other side--but all in all, I am so pumped that I finished every one of them! This is my favorite image of the day--My best friend Lindsay and I tackling the fire pits:


My friend Abby was a spectator at the event, and I have her to credit with some of the rockin photos she captured. Thanks Ab! It was fun, but the jury is still out whether or not I would participate again next year if the event is held at the same time of year. That heat was crazy bad, so bad that they cancelled the event shortly after our wave finished. I'm glad I had the opportunity to participate before it was called off! Whew! Otherwise, I would never have known what crawling under barbed wire in utter sludge felt like:


Cake vodka & what's for dinner

Why eat plain ol' pizza, when you can have pepperoni pizza bites!? This recipe popped up on Annie's Eats, one of the MANY cooking blogs I follow. I couldn't resist, so I made this delicious, pizza-riffic finger food tonight for dinner. Super easy to make, and super yummy!

*I substituted 2% cheese and turkey pepperoni, so I could eat more with less guilt. :) Pair it with a side salad, it was a satisfying little meal.

Prepared, ready to hit the oven

After only 20min of baking. It smelled amazing


Ready to eat with a side of marinara for dipping!

Drool

The cheesy, gooey, yummy

I treated myself to a dinner cocktail as well. Anybody ever heard of this cake-flavored Vodka?
Well I heard it was amazing, and I had to try it for myself. The smell of it alone was DIVINE. Mix it with a little Sprite zero, and I had myself a nice dinner time refresher. :) Seriously, try this stuff. The mixing possibilities are ENDLESS. Tomorrow night is my high school 10yr reunion, (if that doesn't make you feel old, what will)? A few of us are meeting up over at my house for pre-reunion cocktails. This is sure to be a hit!Link

Making lollies

I have no idea why, but I really want to make some homemade lollipops for the girls at the office (and myself I suppose). :) With all of this inspiration and easy how-to recipes, it shouldn't be too hard. Check out these lovely lollies:

Linkphoto and recipe cred



photo and recipe cred


photo and recipe cred

I'm seeking out some fun molds and then the candy making is ON. :)

Bag-Pipes--Game time!

It was the weekend of the fourth of July, and Jared and I really needed a break from all the wedding planning festivities. We quite literally spent the entire fourth of July weekend doing ANYTHING BUT talk, plan, buy, or do whatever associated to the wedding. It felt great to shut the ol' brain off for a bit.

As Jared is quickly learning, I have a tendency to not understand how to just sit and be completely unoccupied, especially when there are so many things we could be doing instead! I figured, this was a perfect opportunity for a DIY project I have been really wanting to try. So off to Home Depot in an attempt to make this new yard game! We have dubbed our game, Bag-Pipes (we're using bean bags instead of tennis balls. I couldn't imagine what a nightmare tennis balls would be if you're playing on concrete, and although I searched, hacky-sacks are not that easy to come by these days. Bean bags it is).

As with any DIY project, the instructions always seem to appear easier than what you actually go through when you attempt to DIY (especially when you do not own either a circular saw, or a jigsaw--lots of hand sawing and sore arms). Case and point: three days later we are finally done. Also, we opted for PVC pipe rather than the drain pipe, this may or may not have contributed to our extended assembly time. Now that it's done, our test runs to determine fun-level of the game went over really well! It's a nice change from bags, washers, and yard golf for sure, and is actually more challenging than it appears. Of course I got lots of photos during the process. I DO have a blog to update after all. Check it out!

Sawing, the seemingly never ending process. Jared and I took turns, as much as I wish I could have just sat around and taken pictures. :)


That's 4inch PVC. Not as easy to saw through as originally expected. Also not recommended, is our sawing support--a step ladder. :)


Rupert had to get in on the action. :)


All 20ft of PVC cut up into their correct sizes


The pieces arranged in formation.

(not pictured--borrowing my parents jigsaw to cut the tops of each tube to a 30degree angle, or whatever was close to that in our case. It wasn't pretty, I'll just say that, by planning, or execution).


Next step, spray painting the inside of each tube


Then I spray painted the outsides with a contrasting color--probably unnecessary, but I can't help myself apparently. My neighbors pretty much had no idea what I was up to, and likely thought I had some strange idea of yard decor.


(Also not pictured--the process of gluing the pipes together. Way challenging when you are dealing with unlevel tubes--due to handsaw cutting. Once again, it wasn't pretty)



Next, on to the point-level labels


It's finally starting to come together now!


One complete set, ready for action! (pay no attention to the uneven spray paint. Two days in, I started to care quite a bit less about perfection) :)


Matching bean bags, of course!


Two complete sets! We're done, finally! Hooray! Who wants to play?!


And what does one do with a scrap piece of PVC that just happened to resemble a crown? Spray paint it yellow and photograph Rupert in it of course! :) He looks thrilled about it, doesn't he?

So there it is, we're primed and ready to try our new Bag-Pipes game out at the Royals game this Saturday for Lindsay's birthday! Yippee! Here's hoping it doesn't fall apart. I might cry...The good news, is that Jared and definitely can work well through adversity in a rather difficult DIY project. :) It's meant to be.