Tag: busy life

I was a selfish idiot

by Ariana Peters, posted in healthy lifestyle, kids, life, running, training

It has taken some time and reflection to realize how selfish it was for me to sign up for a marathon at this point in my life without fully thinking through the repercussions for my family.

I am not saying running races is selfish, or being a wife and running marathons is selfish or even being a mom and running marathons is selfish. Simply that for me, at this time in my life, it was.

I didn’t really discuss it with my husband before I signed up….oops, I’ve been married for 5 years and sometimes still forget I’m in a partnership now.

Running a marathon is a HUGE time commitment and can be a large financial one as well. Both of these were/are true for me. Currently I am a slow runner so my long runs took a LONG time. Meaning, we lost most of our Saturdays (during my training) to my long run, especially when you add in that my youngest (and sometimes my oldest) still needs to nap. This means we had no opportunities to camp or do any overnight trips this last summer.

Financially it was a big commitment as well since I chose a marathon in another state (my home state). I did use this as an opportunity/excuse to spend time with my family there but this meant plane tickets, days of extra food costs, and all those miscellaneous costs that come with traveling.

I am not saying I regret doing it. My husband was pretty gracious about it all. My kids got to see family and we as a family got to do an awesome Disneyland trip and make lots of memories.

Also, doing something for me is not selfish (that is not what I am saying) but doing something that impacted my whole family for a big part of the year…….was pretty selfish…..in MY case.

I love to run and will keep running, I love doing races too, but this isn’t my time for racing. That time will come again. For me and my family, this is the time for healthy fitness for me…..and lots of family fun together.

This coming year I look forward to lots of family camping and fun family weekend trips.

What are you looking forward to in 2024?

Day 4 at California Adventure

by Ariana Peters, posted in kids, life, travel

California Adventure kind of sucked hahahahaha. There were only a small handful of rides my son was tall enough for and even less for my daughter. So many rides were closed, things didn’t open when the park did. There was just a lot that was disappointing. We did manage to occupy ourselves for the whole day but we were super glad we only went there for 1 day.

My son loves the Cars movie so Cars land was a hit
Frozen snacks……so cold they almost broke your teeth
The rare picture of just us
I found the Starbucks!!!! Both parks had a Starbucks in them but they don’t outwardly advertise that they are Starbucks until you get up close.
He thought Chip or Dale (not sure which hahahaha) was cool but he was a little wary. My daughter wouldn’t even go near him.
There was this cool redwood forest place in the park with lots of fun stuff to climb and explore……but even parts of this had height requirements. What the heck??!!!
Nap time
My sister and brother-in-law got to come and spend part of the day with us! The kids were so thrilled
The ‘san Francisco Pier ‘ area in the park.
My sister!!!!
They both like Monsters inc.
He LOVED this wrecked car outside one of the shops in Cars land. It would smoke and make a noise like it was trying to start. He stood there forever! And we went back several times.
Micky’s philharmonic 3d show.

And that’s a wrap!!!!

It was long and exhausting but I am so glad we did it. I loved watching their little eyes light up and watching them explore so many new things.

I wish the food was better for the prices they charge. I wish some of the characters were more easily accessible or accessible at all. There were no characters from Encanto which my daughter loves and to see Anna and Elsa you had to wait in a line forever and they were behind doors until you got up there so you couldn’t even wave at them and see them if you didn’t want to wait in line.

I don’t see us going back for a very long time, if ever. It’s just soooooo dang expensive! They really do nickel and dime you…..or should I say like $20 and $50 you.

I was very happy with the time of year we went though. Granted with small kids we didn’t go on some of the most popular rides with the longest waits but with the use of watching the app for wait times and trying to be smart the longest we waited was about 20min for a ride. So, I am incredibly thankful for that because I don’t think they would have tolerated much longer.

All in all I am so glad for the memories but I don’t need to do it again.

Lincoln City Kite Festival

by Ariana Peters, posted in kids, life, travel

We took a quick overnight trip to the coast to spend some time with friends and see the kite festival. This was my first time going to the kite festival…….and will probably be my last hahahaha. The kites were cool but I found it pretty lackluster as far as a festival goes.

It will go down as a good memory and I’m glad we did it but it was absolutely not our best executed trip hahaha. We had a fair few tantrums.

The kids napped on the way there.

We played on the beach until we had access to the AirBnB we were going to share with friends

The house was right on the beach and had a great view

We can’t go anywhere without injuries hahahaha

After an early afternoon of playing on the beach and walking around we played on the rental houses deck and ordered a pizza

Little man slept in a big boy bunk bed!!!

Sleeping was absolutely terrible. The room was facing west so we had the sunset which in Oregon is not until 9:30 with full darkness, not until about 10: 30pm and while he doesn’t sleep in a completely dark room, it’s a pretty dark room so it took him forever to fall asleep. He did not go to sleep until about 10: 15 p.m.

Then the casino about a mile and a half away had fireworks and some drunken neighbors decided to sing along to them, thankfully this did not wake either kid up. Then at 11:45 p.m. drunken people on the beach set off a huge fireworks that lit up the entire room for about 30 minutes which woke the baby up.

The next morning was a slow leisurely morning (I ordered Starbucks through door dash because I could not keep my eyes open). Little man woke us all up at 5:30am We had breakfast with the whole house then played on the very windy beach.

There were lots of tantrums a long the way hahahah
Cheese!!!
We went through so many outfits with the sand and water hahahahhaha

My friend and her family were in the house with us too. The babies played together a bit

Then it was time for us to pack up and head home!

Both kids were asleep within about 15min of leaving and slept pretty much the whole way home.

It was an absolutely exhausting trip and I’m still exhausted today even after going to sleep an hour early, but I’m glad we did it. I’m going to try and go to sleep early again tonight

2023 life update

by Ariana Peters, posted in baby
Easter 2023

My little man is now 2.25 years old and my little girl is 11.5 months old. Life is crazy over here. Wonderful and exhausting all at once.

We just finished having back to back stomach bugs and colds. But my daughter’s sleep is still super screwed up and my husband and I are TIRED! But, I just tell myself ‘it won’t be like this for long’, and ‘you’re gonna miss this’. Both of those are songs lol, pull them up I YouTube when you feel overwhelmed, I do.

We are full swing into muddy spring days over here and go through 2+ outfits a day hahaha. I am currently nap trapped under a baby and love it so I thought I’d update you. More soon!!

July 29, 2018

by Ariana Peters, posted in mini-farm, school/studying

I feel like I did so much and yet so little this weekend. Got two great workouts done and spent hours out of the house exploring and also spent a full afternoon/evening doing HW. But I got NO housework done, no meal prep, no canning/food saving. It was a successful and unsuccessful weekend hahaha.

We have been hot here this week, mid to high 90’s the whole time. Today we are supposed to get close to 100 then we start swinging down and are supposed to be in the low 80’s by Thursday.

My drive to work.

Every day a few more tomatoes are starting to turn a light orange-y, pink meaning in just a few more days they will be ready to pick. Zucchini are still going strong, I just pulled 3 HUGE ones from the bottom of the bush that had been forgotten. I need to pick a few peppers and oh man, our cucumber plants are just really starting, i have 5 pint jars of refrigerator pickles in the freezer and 4 cucumbers on the counter i need to can.

Chili for dinner!!

I have 3 weeks left of school, the next 2 are going to be a bit crazy because i have something due every day except Saturdays. With that i can feel the garden gearing up to explode more zucchini and tomato on me and i am just praying it can hold out for 2-3 more weeks when I will be able to devote a lot more time to canning and dehydrating and preserving.

And now i need to get back to school work. I currently have A’s in both my classes and i am keeping it that way!!!!!

When you should do more HW and workout but you are tired so you stop in the middle to watch Chuck, be a dork and go to sleep early.

Good night.