Share the Journey: November 2014

Oh my dear friends, I have so much to catch up on in this little journey of mine. I apologize in advance as my posts may be a bit sporadic and random for a while (that seems to be how our lives have been a bit lately too). I've enjoyed taking a break from blogging for the last several months, but oh how I've missed sharing and connecting with you all.

We've had a lovely Thanksgiving with my in-laws in Western Kansas. The kids absolutely love one on one time with Gramma Chelle and played games, painted, sewed (they made the bags and hats in the picture below), went to the park and played outside. It's such a blessing to see these special relationships grow!

When we were packing and getting ready to head to Western Kansas I checked the weather to determine what clothes needed to be packed. When I saw the weather was in the 60's and 70's, our packing requirements changed :)

Although we spent some time doing some Black Friday shopping online, we were excited to hit the 'Blacktop for Black Friday' as well! Josh's mom and dad blessed us so much by keeping the kiddos so that we could go on a ride/date together. The weather was absolutely gorgeous (despite a bit of wind). We started heading south of Leoti and had set out to ride 40 miles. It was a bit of an aggressive goal as neither of us had been on our bikes in about two months. I've still been cross training and running, but I forget how different biking is. We had a decent head/side wind heading south but as you can see on the map, we had about 5 miles where we headed east and oh my goodness was that fun with the wind pushing us!!! Joshua ended up going about 35 miles an hour and I hit about 25 miles an hour during this part of the ride. My only problem was about halfway through this fun little jaunt, I realized we were going to turn around soon and have to ride with a nasty headwind. Yuck!

When we first started biking, we both got Garmin Edge 510's, which have a live tracking option. Josh's parents and the kids really enjoyed following us on the computer. They could see where we were on the map, how fast (or how slow) we were riding, when we stopped, etc. They're a bit expensive but definitely worth it for safety purposes, great for collecting data, and make it fun for friends and family to follow too!

We made it to our halfway point at the Kearny county line and had to stop for a few fun pictures. A special little friend of ours was riding her bike today too (in Colorado), so we told each other we would share pictures as if we were riding together (hence the goofy pictures of Josh). I just love how technology can bridge miles between special friends! #teamMadelyn

I love this guy and his fun personality! I never would have guessed 3 years ago that we would be doing things like running half marathons or biking 40 miles together. Truly blessed!