vision board

A fun project that I worked on this past month was creating a vision board. The 'directions' for this were to gather magazines and to look for words and pictures that I want to invite into my life, things that speak to my {heart} and appeal to me, things that might relate to my 'one little word.'

After cutting out a bunch of words and pictures I then laid them out on large (22x28in) canvas and layered them to a design that I liked. I then used Mod Podge to glue everything down. I had so much fun creating this board and I just love the way it turned out. I now have this hung in my office as a visual reminder of things that make me happy, things that speak to me, and things that I want to invite into my life.

"The board itself doesn't impact reality: what changes your life is the process of creating the images--combinations of objects and events that will stick in your subconscious mind and steer your choices toward making the vision real."  Martha Beck

end of an era

Drew had his District hockey tournament this past week. The team did really well, better than expected and with only a one game guarantee they kept on advancing to another game. With the last game on Sunday, a win of that game would have taken them to Regions; but it was a tough game that ended in a loss and a 4th place finish.

And with that we ended a 15 year era of 'youth hockey' for our family 

and are now looking forward to Drew's high school years of hockey.

It doesn't seem that long ago that the boys were learning to skate and learning the game of hockey. :)

And in the process, learning many life lessons as well.

Source: clearlypresentable.files.wordpress.com via Kathie on Pinterest

weekend lens

A fun weekend filled with the right mixture of fun and relaxation.

a day of shopping finding some cute new clothes

outside hockey for Drew's team... and a player & parent hockey party to follow

a birthday party celebrating  a bunch of birthdays {my Dad's, my nephew's and Pete's}

a first district tournament game with a win for Drew's team {including a goal and 3 assists for Drew}

dinner out after the game

And an extra long weekend with a bonus day off today! :)

Valentine's Day snapshots

exchanging cards :: fondue for dinner :: making my Valentine's a giant cookie

all made for a special day filled with love from the heart

anniversary dinner

We went out to celebrate our anniversary at one of my favorite restaurants: The Sanctuary. It is a small, romantic restaurant that has amazing food!

A perfect spot to celebrate 23 years!

weekend lens {a birthday & anniversary}

This past weekend was one of celebrations for us. Saturday was Pete's birthday. We started the morning with some homemade Mickey Mouse waffles per Pete's request. :) I haven't made these in years, but it was fun to dust off the waffle iron and whip up a batch of waffles (and a batch of memories of all our Disney trips from when the boys were little. :)

After Drew's afternoon hockey game, Pete and I headed out to the Wild game with a stop first for dinner at Shamrock's in St. Paul. This is a fun place to go to before the game and they even have green buses that run to the Excel for the game, so it saves time and the hassle of parking. :)

We had a great evening and I think Pete had a fun birthday. :)

Sunday morning was our 23rd anniversary!! I woke to flowers and coffee! Mornings don't get much better than that!

Pete even stopped and picked up a little breakfast for us. So sweet!

That evening we planned on making dinner.

While we were in Italy this past Fall we had so much great pasta. and we thought it would be fun to try and make some fresh homemade pasta back at home. So this past Christmas, Pete gave me a pasta attachment for my Kitchenaid mixer and we thought it would be a great day to try it out.

It was so much fun making dinner together and a perfect way to spend an anniversary.

The pasta making was a bit of work, but it turned out so good!!

We opened a bottle of wine we had shipped home from the vineyard we visited while in Tuscany.

I tried a new sauce recipe: Tomato Alfredo with Italian Sausage; which was fabulous!

The noodles turned out perfect and were so good! We will for sure be making these again!

Another great recipe:

23

23 years ago our hearts became one

 

happy birthday

**may all your wishes come true**

my {heart}

Today is 'Wear Red Day', a day to support the fight against heart disease in women by wearing red. This year, this day has a new meaning for me.

This past November (the day before my birthday), I went out for my usual 4 mile walk. It was a windy day and I was walking into the wind for the first mile, when I started having bad chest pains. I thought maybe it was just from walking into the wind, so I pushed through and finished my walk. The pain in my chest eased up a bit, but never really went away.

The next day, a Sunday, was my 44th birthday and we celebrated by taking a walk around Lake Harriet in the beautiful 60 degree weather and went out for a family dinner that evening. I was still having chest pains and told myself that if I was still having them the next day I would go into Urgent Care. (Really dumb, I know, but I didn't want to ruin my birthday by spending it at the doctor.)

Monday morning arrived and I was feeling a bit better, maybe just a twinge of chest pain. After getting everyone off to school and work, I headed over to Lifetime and worked out on the elliptical for an hour and then came home and jumped in the shower. This is when I started really not feeling well. My chest was really hurting and I started shaking uncontrollably. I was afraid I was going to fall so I sat down and called Pete at work. He was at a client's site but came home and took me to urgent care.

Urgent care ran a bunch of tests: EKG, blood sugar... which all came back normal. My blood pressure was high, but it has been consistently 'borderline high' for the past few years. The doctor thought it would be a good idea to go to the ER to get looked at further given my family history of heart disease. After hours at the ER and many more tests, they still couldn't find a reason for my chest pains. Frustrating but the good news was that there was no signs of a heart attack.

ER scheduled me for a stress test for that Wednesday (the day before Thanksgiving). The day of the test I was not nervous at all because after all of the other tests done I thought this test would come back normal as well. I started the test by having an echocardiogram (sonogram of the heart) and they immediately paused the test and brought in a doctor. The Dr. looked at the images and told me that my heart appeared to be enlarged. He wanted me to continue with the stress test and would talk to me after about the results.

I was told I have cardiomyopathy which is a weakening of the heart muscle, my heart is enlarged and it can't pump as well as it should. I have been put on 3 different medications, am having some more tests done and am regularly see my cardiologist. Other than fatigue and very low energy, I  have been feeling really pretty good as I continue to process my diagnosis.