Dinner in 20 minutes, Heirloom Tomatoes and Fresh Mozerrella Pizza

Summer seems like it just keeps rolling along even if I am not ready for it to be compeletly done. The days are starting to get shorter, and my morning runs seem like they are going back to running in the dark. Lately I just have wanted to eat a lot of fresh produce and cook very little. This is one of those meals, a margherita pizza, with fresh garden tomatoes, and fresh mozzerella. It is quick and easy, and always a crowd pleaser. The secret to making this dinner so fast and easy is I get the dough for the crust at California Pizza Kitchen. They sell the thier dough already rolled out for you for ONE DOLLAR. They are smaller pizzas so I normally buy two. In fact I actually just bought six last time and froze the extras for when I need to take a meal to someone, or for a quick weeknight dinner. They sell white, or whole wheat multi grain dough. I always go for the whole wheat multi grain dough because the dough is still light and is a little better for you.

It is hard to tell from these pictures what is on this pizza. What you are looking at is yellow and red hierloom tomatoes from Jacobs Cove Farm, which is an amazing place where they grow so many different varieties of organic tomatoes.

Here is what the crust comes like, already rolled out for you, and ready to go.

Fresh Tomato and Mozzerella Pizza

Caifornia Pizza Kitchen Multigrain dough

Red Sauce

Fresh Mozzerella

Garden Tomatoes

Fresh Basil

Parmesan

Spread the sauce on, then top with thinly sliced cheese, and next the tomatoes. Sprinkle on chopped basil, salt and pepper, and a little parmesan on top. I baked mine in a 400 degree oven on a pizza stone for about 15 minutes.

Tip: to make this gluten free, I have topped a portobella mushroom before with sauce, the tomatoes, and cheese, wrapped it in tinfoil and baked it at the same temperature until the mushroom is soft. Then take off the tinfoil and broil it to melt the cheese.

Windy Rivers

We just took a backpacking trip to the Wind Rivers, or should I say the "windy rivers". The wind blows so fast there it makes the clouds run by. It was a lot of fun, our original plan was to back pack in Isaiah. Luckily Scottie's sweet sister took him last minute. I am so glad that we changed our plans and decided not to take him. Don't worry Isaiah we are going to take you down south to camp. Scotty and I were both itching to take him camping because he would love it. What we didn't think of was the cold temps at night and the hike in. One night it got down to 17 degrees. I slept really warm which was a blessing, but the morning was COLD. The hike in was amazing, the scenery in the Cirque is breathtaking, massive peaks on all sides for a 360 view. But the hike was not conducive to little ones, we hiked 9-10 miles in and the last three were boulder hopping. Without Isaiah and all of his stuff our pack were already heavy, we brought food for an army.
It turned out to be a really amazing trip, I read a ton and finished a really good book, Scotty went on a multi pitch climb up the face of a steep cliff, and I hiked to the top of a peak. It had been way to long since both of us had been backpacking and I almost felt like a novice all over again, wondering what to pack, what food to bring. It made me want to go again soon. The joy of being outside all day long and having nothing to do was glorious.
My perch rock that I laid in my sleeping bag on a rock and read, it cut out all of the wind.

An amazing lake of glacier water that we all jumped into.

More reading, wow I think this is the most I have read in years.

Hiking, this was the base of our camp ground.

Scotty on his multi pitch climb. When his mom saw his pictures, she started crying and said "maybe you married the wrong girl, I can't believe she would let you do this". The climb was not very technical but really exposed and high. As a side note Nancy was joking we are really close, and I believe she Nancy is the best mother in law you could ever ask for.

Running in the buff

Today I was looking at my little boy and I had an overwhelming feeling of gratefulness to be a mom come over me. He is so small and sweet. I was looking at his little sticky hand prints on the window and a quote I have hanging up came to me, it says, "enjoy the little things in life for one day you will look back and realize they are the big things." I feel so lucky to be his mom, watching him grow, and learn He is my little bud, making me laugh constantly.

The other day was no exception. We were coming home from the pool so I stripped Isaiah down, and put a clean diaper on him for the way home. While I was loading everything in the house, I let Isaiah run around in the backyard. When I came back out to grab him he was totally buck naked, digging in the sandbox. I found out later that while he was running around naked as a jay bird he tapped on my renters window to say hi, she looked up to see a little boy in the buff squatting in front of her window. We had a good laugh.

Summer has felt like a familiar friend returning home. I love the warm nights, and carefree days. It is so fun to play outside, go to the pool, eat watermelon on the back porch, bike up the canyon, and go for long runs without snow on the ground! Being a mom in the summer is way cooler than being a mom in the winter. Isaiah is learning to say a few words and by far truck is his favorite. He loves to spot them, you would be shocked how many trucks there are in this world. Today we were reading a book and it had a picture of a truck in it. The story stopped there, we had to look at the truck picture for a good five minutes. After the book, I tried to put him down for a nap after and put the book away, but he wasn't having it. He kept yelling for the truck, so I propped the book up next to his crib with the picture of the truck open. He was content to go to sleep after that. Being a mom is the best job. I hope I can remember these precious little moments that make my heart smile. Time goes by so fast, and I think I am ready to add another little bundle of joy to the mix. My running friend told me she is pregnant today. She inspired me to stay running when I get pregnant. She is still running so fast! We did speed work outs today and she was leading us with a 5:40 pace for the minute pickups. It made me realize that I can still run and maybe even race pregnant. Obviously not fast, but I can still not totally loose all of my endurance and lungs. I think I am going to train for the Xterra race in September, it is a mountain bike, trail run, lake swim triathlon. Unless a little bambino changes the plans, which I would change happily.

Scott's Project

Scotty had a brilliant idea to damn up the irrigation water rushing past our house to water our lawn. We recruited the help of our neighbors metal boards, our weights, and whatever random boards we had laying around. Needless to say we ended up creating more of a swimming pool, but we did manage to water half our lawn. Isaiah was loving it, he kept trying to drink the water, so gross, so I gave him a sippy cup with clean water. He took the sippy cup happily and dipped it in the dirty water, and then drank from it. At this point I just had to laugh. Scottie's brilliant idea turned sour when we got home later that night and had a written out complaint from the city left on our door step. Turns out people don't appreciate a swimming pool in the street.

If You Want a Good Laugh Watch This

Kids do the funniest things. I decided I need to start writing more of the day to day things, because there are so many funny things that happen that I want to remember, this is one of them. Isaiah wanted to play in the Vics Vapor rub so he kept handing us the jar to open it. To which Scotty would pretend he couldn't get it open, because we didn't want him playing in it. Sweet little Isaiah took his turn at opening the "tough" lid.

Utah Valley Marathon

This is the finish line of the Utah Valley marathon, I made it! What a journey. After months of training for the Salt Lake Marathon only to pass out at mile 24, I had to tackle this beast one more time. So I decided to do the Utah Valley marathon, six weeks more of early mornings, a lot of long runs, and tired legs paid off. Quite honestly I am really going to miss training, I enjoyed getting up early, the chatting sessions with Amanda, and Melody, and the sitting in the river after long runs. It is so nice to have time as a mom to yourself, and time to talk, even if it comes at 5 in the morning.

The marathon turned out even better than I had hoped for. My goal was to pace myself with the 3:10 pacer for as long as I could, and hopefully keep him in site. (The winner of the marathon last year volunteered to pace the men who wanted to qualify for Boston, men have to have a 3:10 to qualify.) I was worried about going out to fast with him in the beginning because my fastest marathon, before this was a 3:35. The Salt Lake marathon was faster, but we all know what happened there. I started running with the pacer, and to be honest it felt like a training run in the beginning, we were all talking and having a good time. I ran with him for 16 miles, 7:15 minute miles. After mile 16 I still felt really good, so I picked up the pace a little bit and started running with another guy. We kept right on talking until mile 20. At that point I saw a couple of my friends that had run the half marathon and had come to cheer, they told me my other friend Amanda was right up ahead of me. I picked up the pace and ran a 6:45, and kept running 6:50 for the next six. It felt so good. I didn't look at my watch I had no idea how fast I was going, I just felt really good. My family and friends were there cheering, I think that made me pick up the pace. The last two miles my friend Marie ran with me. It was funny because I was so zoned out, that I didn't recognize her, she was jumping up and down waving her arms, and it didn't click in my brain that it was her. It was nice to have her there. At the end I could see the time clock and I couldn't believe it, 3:06!!!! My goal was 3:15!! It was such a fun race, for the first 20 miles I was just talking and having a good time, the last six were just getting it done.

Honestly the time didn't matter as much, the most empowering thing to me was to set a goal and finally realize it. I am so glad that I didn't give up after Salt Lake, because I knew I had it in me. It taught me that really you can accomplish anything you set your mind to, with goals, hard work, patience, and the belief that you can do it. That might sound so cliche, but it taught me such a powerful lesson. In fact I wrote Jesse on his mission about it, because it reminded me of my mission, and life in general. Training and running a marathon taught me that you have to have an end in mind, a point that you are moving towards, and with that focus and direction everything falls into place. Because you will naturally start doing things that will bring you to that end goal. Most importantly if you have the whole purpose of this life in mind, to return home worthy, then naturally you will start making the choices necessary to align your life with that end realization. It isn't always the easiest choice, or the most convenient, but the Lord knew we were capable of hard things, and that accomplishing hard things refines us and makes us more empowered to accomplish the things that await us in the future.

My sister in law Jen, this was her first marathon and she finished strong!

I finished third place in my age group, and tenth overall.

Hard Work Pays Off

I look like I just ran a marathon in the rain!

My friends that I have been training with. Lot of EARLY mornings with these fine ladies. When I say early, I mean middle of the night early. A lot of long runs at 4:45 in the morning so that we could be back in time for husbands to go to work.

Wow!! Don't know these people but they are definitley blog worthy.

Running with my friends that I picked up along the way. The one in the black was trying to qualify for Boston, and the other one I ran with for a good five or six miles. They were so nice, and since my Ipod did not work, thats right 26.2 miles sans music, it was nice to have company. We talked about kids, missions, and how he got into running because his mom would drop them off a couple of miles from home and make them run home, apparently he had a lot of energy. Good idea mom, I think I will try that in the future.