Living away from home, I have found what it means to keep your word and to pay attention to what promises I make to people.  If I tell my nieces or nephews that I will call at a certain time or be home for an event, I have learned how important it is to follow through with what I've stated.  It's not enough to say that I will be there in order to smooth things over at the time.  I hate disappointing people, especially my nieces and nephews.  This is what drives me a lot of the time now.  

I don't think I have ever been one that was comfortable lying to someone else.  While I hate the uncomfortableness that I feel when having to deliver unfavorable news, I hate more having to lie and then having to later come clean.  It doubles the disappointment.  Not only is someone then disappointed in a situation, they are then disappointed in me.  I want me family and friends to be able to believe in what I say and trust my word.

The elections are upon us.  How do I know?  TV commercial breaks are flooded with election ads that are constantly pushing the public to not trust the other candidate and shining a light on the lies that are being told.  Based on these alone, I will never hold a public office.  LOL I don't think I could handle the guilt of lying or hold my tongue to the point of not being honest.

A little over a year ago, I found a random page on Facebook called "Because I said I would.".  The founder, Alex Sheen, wanted to honor his father and keep his memory alive by taking such a profound positive attribute and turning it into a movement.  The idea behind this movement is keep your word.  You can order free promise cards from the website to keep track of things that you want to follow through on.  What a cool concept right?  You take a card, write your promise, give that card to the person you are making a promise to, and then following through.  Once your promise is kept, that person can give you the card back.  It's amazing to me how such a simple concept can have such an incredible impact.  I've used the cards to commit to marathon training, eating better, calling home more, and many others.  I think the coolest part is giving the card to someone.  Not only are you making that commitment publicly, but you are saying to that person, you are important enough to me that I want to keep my word.  

The basic 10 card order is always free but you can support the cause with T-shirts or larger orders of cards for sale on the website as well.  I bought a shirt and wore it in my ALS ice bucket challenge video as a way of proving my dedication to keeping a promise.  

I need to order my next set of cards but I'll let you know my latest promise early...

Now that I know just how cool Google hangout is, I plan on having a weekly chat with my nieces and nephews on there.  Technology can make miles seem to melt away and I need to start taking advantage.  

Flying turtles!!

It's always been my "thing."  It seems more appropriate now that I'm a slow runner but I have always loved turtles. Favorite book as a child? Yertle the Turtle by Dr. Seuss, of course. My friends and I stayed at La Tortuga Hotel (the turtle, in Spanish) on spring break and got turtle tattoos to match. I even have an email address with turtle in it. 

These are the presents I get.  Seriously.

Now, living in South Florida, turtles have a larger share in the spotlight. There are nesting areas that are roped off to avoid disruption, streetlights that are dimmed to help the migration back to the ocean, and hospitals to help the turtles injured. Just 15 minutes down the road from me, there's an awesome nature center called Gumbo Limbo that provides education about the surrounding marine life and nurtures turtles back to health.  One of the coolest things they do is a release back into the ocean for the public to see.  This is Lightning, the latest Loggerhead turtle to be released from Gumbo Limbo back into the ocean.

Another cool place is down in the Florida Keys called the Turtle Hospital.  With the help of boaters and fishermen, the Turtle Hospital is able to rescue many injured turtles and often nurse them back to health.  This was a big week in the news for them down here in South Florida!  A 129-lb Loggerhead turtle named Sapphire was going to fly!  That's right, Sapphire was taking to the sky, courtesy of FedEx, to her new home in California.  This poor turtle was the only two-time visitor in history to the Turtle Hospital and unfortunately, she wouldn't be able to recover enough to be released to the wild again.  It's a pretty cool story...

I have always loved turtles, but now I'm a pretty big fan of FedEx, too!

If you want to see the rest of Sapphire's journey, be sure to follow her on Twitter, @SapphiredUp or watch for updates from her new home @thelivingcoast on Instagram!!

Twenty-Six point Twoooooooo

Some days I get crazy ideas in my head… and it takes very little encouragement for me to just run with these ideas. The year of my 30th birthday, I got a postcard in the mail about training for a marathon. Hmmmm that sounds like an epic thing to do for my 30th birthday. This postcard also said I could walk it… which was good because I didn't run. Then the postcard says… oh, this marathon is in Dublin, as in IRELAND.  Yep. Sign me up. Ireland was my dream destination for the longest time. Turns out, this magical trip would require me to do some fundraising for the Leukemia & Lymphoma Society. Sure, whatever, I'm going to Ireland. See? Crazy ideas!  Many months later, I had finished my fundraising, which included a keg party, selling candy bars at my workplace, and begging for money in front of WalMart. Didn't care… going to Ireland. Allllllllll worth it. Have I mentioned those early wake-ups for Saturday morning trainings? There's some maniacal about getting up… let's be honest, in the middle of the night… to get 20 miles done before breakfast for most people. Did I care? Nope! Going to Ireland. 

And so, my best friend and I took off to Ireland for our biggest adventure yet and the trip we had been dreaming of forever. 

We had our first Irish beers in Dublin! Delicious!! 

I even managed to finish the race that brought us all the way there… 

I'm on the right. I even made a friend over the last 6 miles to help pass the time. I couldn't have asked for a better first event than the Dublin Marathon. 

How long it took me really doesn't matter. The entire journey started with a postcard.  It got me to the finish line and so much farther. It created new dreams for me. Since then, I have completed many other races and started running, too. Now, 8 years later, I'm preparing yet again to go 26.2 miles for the Leukemia & Lymphoma Society. This time I will run with the marines and finish the Marine Corps Marathon in Washington, D.C..  The early morning wake-ups are still worth it mostly for the friends I've made along the way and the sunrises I get to witness. 

To think this all started with a random postcard… craziness. 

Gracie the bulldog

Anyone that knows me knows that this dog goes EVERYWHERE with me. This is Gracie. She's half American bulldog and half Olde English bulldog. I'm not married and don't have any kids.  I have this dog.  For almost 12 years, she has hopped in my car and moved state to state with me. If we are counting moves between apartments, that's 14 moves. It's a good thing she doesn't get car sick, right?! ;) 

She came to me as a puppy. I say came to me because I was checking out other puppies and she came and plopped herself down on my foot. She was the last of her litter and was 2 weeks older than the other pups. It made her look huge in comparison, even though she was the runt of her own litter. She decided she was going home with me that day. 

I know she wasn't a rescue but I think I might've saved her that day. What I know now is how much she saved me, too. 

I can't imagine driving 4 days in a row across the country with anyone else honestly. Although, I wish she would take a turn driving every now and again. LOL (I promise I'm not really a crazy dog lady!)  

This year has been particularly tough for us. In May, Gracie was diagnosed with mast cell tumors, a type of cancerous tumor that is unfortunately common to her breeding. After 3 long months, her medicine is finally regulated so that she can be normal. Luckily, chemotherapy doesn't affect dogs the same way it does humans. She's doing so great now! Her tumors are getting smaller and she's been acting really normal… her normal is sleeping on the couch while I'm gonna all day, even if I've raised the cushions… 

As you can see, cushions are not really a problem. Gracie can make any situation work. 

These days, I'm concentrating on keeping her comfortable… not comfortable enough to put those cushions down for her though! ;)  We're focused on getting to her next birthday. #steadyuntilnovember

Go Gracie Go!!