Like a lot of bloggers, I’d like to regularly do “updates” posts talking about what’s going on, keeping me active on the blog and doing general updates related to my blog. Ideally, weekly updates posts would be relatable for people, but that might be too ambitious for me. I have tried this in the past without much success. So, twice a month to start, I’m going to try to keep some updates including current likes, obsessions, books I’m reading, tv shows I’m getting into, updates with each job have, etc.
Kicking it off, here are some updates from the first half of July!
Where have I been?! That’s been the latest question people have been asking me. I have not been nearly as active on social media, blog posts or even emails. I have not been very good with texts, calls and being social… all for a great reason.
Right at the end of last month, Ben and I signed a new rental (home) lease! If anyone one knows us in person, you know that this has been much-needed and long-awaited. It’s been 3+ years in our grimy basement apartment and that’s 3 years too long in that place. We’ve been living with mold, asbestos coming out of the walls, rodents in the mudroom and a landlord that just doesn’t care and doesn’t take pride in his own property. But hey, you get what you pay for right?! We’ve got stories for days and hopefully, if this place hasn’t already doomed us health-wise, we’ll eventually be laughing about it.
Without going too far into our personal lives, we’ve been WANTING to move just haven’t been able to due to many factors. We have been trying and searching for a while now and finally found an opened door (literally?!?) and took a chance and huge leap.
We found a place that is both residential and a HUGE potential for our business, Golden Mountain Guides. We’re talking office, retail space, parking, storage, bathrooms for clients….it’s pretty amazing and perfect for us and in a prime location – I can literally wave to the people taking the Coors Brewery tour in Golden!
However, to make it affordable for us, we’ve made a deal with our NEW landlord to fix up the place. Essentially adding value to pay less per month. It didn’t need too much work, but due to our different personalities, the boyfriend decided to do ALL the projects at once and we haven’t been able to move our belongings over yet. Don’t worry, we are remodeling on a budget and using friends and family to help and taking advantage of the many area discount building/construction material places.
So…thats where I’ve been…every extra minute has been at the new place to get it liveable. Even in its pre-remodel condition, it was better than our old digs. We’ve been eager to get in there.
In addition to the new place, I’ve been keeping my time filled with work and a tiny bit of fun:
July, Week 1:
-Fourth of July week was pretty busy for me for the last few years because we have two races with 3W Races that we produce (job #1). I race directed the Longmont Half and we had packet pick up plus the race itself that week.
-That’s always an early morning (report time at 3am) and leaves me pretty beat for the rest of the day. But after a nap, we headed to my Dads’ house for dinner and fireworks viewing. He lives close to Mile High Stadium so the big fireworks display is easy to catch without going farther than the sidewalk out front.
-With the remaining hours of the week we spent, you guessed it, fixing up the new place.
-We did get to celebrate Ben’s brother in law’s birthday at the famous Casa Bonita!
July, Week 2:
-Sunday started off with a trip to the Renaissance festival with my oldest friend and then back to the grind of work and working on the house. That’s literally all I did that week.
July, Week 3:
-I got the opportunity to go on my first ever work conference! The running company I work for, 3W Races, use Run Sign Up for all their races’ registration platforms and we went to network and learn at the Run Sign Up Symposium in Philly!
-A got to do a TINY bit of sight-seeing and saw the Liberty Bell and ate my first ever, legit, traditional Philly Cheesesteak, with cheese whiz!
-As soon as we got back, we were in race mode as I had a race to direct on the weekend, the Summer Prairie Dog Half.
(I think my regular updates post will include stuff like the following…)
What I’m reading: I always have a lot of books on my “currently reading” shelf on Goodreads (follow me!) because I’ll start something and then get a book from the library that I need to return. Currently, I just finished “My Name is Memory” by Ann Brashares (Sisterhood of the traveling pants), a book I’ve had on my shelf from our local library’s book sale and I got it super cheap and it looked interesting. I’m also finishing up “American Wolf: A True Story of Survival and Obsession in the West” by Nate Blakeslee that was on the Outdoors Magazine Book Club for June (way behind). “My name is Memory” started out great, but ended very badly and left the story very open, without a sequel. “American Wolf” is a non-fiction book about the wolfs in Yellowstone National Park and the struggle between the hunters and the people trying to keep them protected. I have one chapter left and it is a fantastic book; I highly recommend it.
What I’m watching: I’ve been watching “Hemlock Grove” on Netflix. One of the original made for Netflix shows. It’s super creepy and has a lot of supernatural characters. I’m 5 episodes in and not sure if I like it! Ha!
What I’m Listening To: Every time I’ve been driving, I’ve been listening to the Game of Thrones audiobook. I’ve never read the book and reading the print version seemed daunting. I’ve only seen seasons 1 and 2 of the show and surprisingly, they’ve done a great job following the story (so far!).
What I’m loving: I’m LOVING my new shoes! Even though I haven’t been running as much, when I do run, I have been using my new Under Armor HOVR‘s that I got from being a Bib Rave Pro to test and review.
What I’m working on: The house. See above. 😉
New in the world of Golden Mountain Guides: As you read, the new house is a HUGE potential for the business. While we’ve been spending most of our time on the house, we’ve been allocating our guided trips to our employees and STILL have seen growth from last year!
New in the world of 3W: After the symposium, I feel pretty special that I got to go. I met a lot of the staff on Run Sign Up team, including the user experience staff and they asked me, personally, for my opinion on features and the appearance of the website. So cool! #geekingout
New in the world of coaching: Cross country camp is NEXT WEEK, marking the official start of the season! YAY! We’ll be up in Winter Park for four days running, talking about running, and dreaming about running with all the kiddos. I really enjoy this part of camp.
As always, Instagram is my go-to social media. So if you want to keep up with my life in semi-real time, that’s the place. Usually.
Follow me on Instagram: @RacingTheStates
Or on Twitter: @Racingthestates
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