Ryan and I (along with Walt the Wiener Dog) went up to Malibu on Friday. We had booked a camp site a couple weeks ago at Leo Carrillo State Park, so after Ryan got off work we made our way up the coast.
We got up to the campgrounds Friday afternoon around 3:30pm. We set up our little spot and then decided to head to the beach to catch the sunset. We even got a little rainbow before the sun went down!
Walt does a lot of maxin' and relaxin' while we set up...
Not sure if I have shown the build out before... Here is a little idea of what it looks like.
A view from the cab into the bed of the truck (complete with foam, camp pads, and sleeping bags)
Saw this on our walk over to the beach
RAINBOW!
Beautiful, right?!
We love our self timer!
Ryan was able to catch some of the amazing color in the sunset (no filters added)
Sometimes the birds fly by at the perfect time
Wispy clouds are some of my favorites!
Sometimes it looks like the sky is on fire
Ryan quickly realized that after he washed all of our camping cookware last trip he didn't put it back in our camp box... So we had to do a bit of improvising. Ryan ended up boiling water for his coffee in his old Arizona Tea can, he used my Arizona can as a "spoon" for the eggs, and we used Frisbees for plates... It's always an adventure with us!
Gotta do whatcha gotta do...
Roughin' it ;)
Soy sausage on a frisbee? YUP!
We were able to test out some of our new camping gear! Ryan's hammock worked great (and we found that Walt loves to snuggle in it by himself - must be like a little cocoon), our cast iron skillet and pie press worked suburb (after we burnt three sets of monkey balls trying to find out how best to use it), and the hot dog/ marshmallow sticks were winners (they even have a little spinner part by your thumb so you can rotate the stick like a rotisserie!).
Testing out one of the his Christmas gifts!
When I went to get s'more goodies they only have normal sized STRAWBERRY
marshmallows (for Valentine's Day I guess) or GIANT normal flavored. This was
just HALF of a mallow...
Not sure why the color looks purple, it's more of a grey color
The only time Walt likes to cuddle with me is when we are camping...
Saturday we went over to hike the Hollywood sign. It was a little over 4 miles round trip, and we had to slow down a bit for little dachshund legs, but it was still a nice hike. We made sure to get a few pictures once we made it up (I mean, if you don't document it with a photo it didn't happen, right?!).
The bottom portion of the trail allows for horses (so watch where you step...)
Walt didn't like the "big dogs"
Not sure if you can see through the smog, but that is downtown LA in the distance...
WE MADE IT!
Maybe we should have brought the tripod so the camera wasn't sitting on the ground...
Took us more tries than I would like to admit to get a jumping shot...
This one looks higher but my arm is covering the D...
It is tough hiking with those mini legs ;)
I think Walt might look stoned in this picture, but man he looks happy too!
I guess my watch wanted to let the world see its shine too ;)
Ryan likes to shoot in black and white sometimes.
Smokey the Bear says "YOU CAN PREVENT FOREST FIRES!"
Hollywoodland sign on one of the arches near where we parked
Not too bad for all the picture breaks and sniff stops...
Saturday afternoon Ryan did a little surfing at the county line (LA and Ventura counties), while Walt and I watched on (well, I watched and Walt barked at the surfers and wanted to chase the birds).
Not too shabby of a place to watch the hubby surf!
Another evening called for another sunset! We were even able to watch a whale for a bit. He was maybe 50 yards away from us in the water. He was blowing air/ water out of his blowhole and even breached once! It was pretty AMAZING!
Trying to get a "nice" shot
Um... I guess we moved into WEIRD...
As Ryan was going to get the camera it just kept taking more pictures!
Alright, maybe this one was the best out of the bunch...
Let your freak flag fly!
Ryan saw me take a picture through the twigs so then had to copy me ;)
Even though we didn't have clouds for this sunset, the colors were AMAZING!
Sunday morning we packed up and made our way back down to Oceanside (we had lots of laundry to do before we could go watch the Super Bowl with friends). It was a great little campsite. We were actually surprised at how many people were up there for it being in the winter season.
The McDots and our Adventure Mobile
We didn't have cell reception for most of the weekend, but somehow I managed to register for my fourth marathon while we were camping (oops!)...
How many of you watched the Super Bowl last night? Thankfully I liked both teams, so was on team "All Time QB".
I remember "back in the day" when we would watch the Super Bowl JUST for the commercials. I mean if these companies were dropping that much money to get a 30 second spot on TV, they BETTER be good, right?!
I would say there were only two commercials that stood out to me last night (maybe I wasn't paying that close of attention this year, or maybe they really just weren't that great).
The first was the Loctite commercial. Um.... can you say HILARIOUS?! Now obviously I am not running out to buy super glue any time soon, but I still give them BIG PROPS for making me chuckle!
I mean who doesn't love a good fanny pack?! #AmIRightOrAmIRight?!
The next one was an Always [Yes, the feminine hygiene period pad company...] commercial that resonated with my heart.
REALTALK: I would say I definitely grew up with terrible self esteem. And if I was completely honest with myself (and you), I would say it is the same today.
I grew up thinking I was "too fat", "too stupid", "too flat chested", "too ugly", you name it I hated it about myself. The unfortunate thing is, I don't think I was/ am alone. I think society imposes all kinds of crazy expectations on us (not just girls, but for some reason it seems as though we are more impressionable) and we are continually battered down and down. Any self love we may have had at one point (the commercial says that it tends to happen around puberty), quickly turns into self hatred.
Last night I noticed my Instagram feed had a bunch of pictures of women doing things #LikeAGirl. It was so empowering to see ladies CLAIMING the phrase! It wasn't something to be ashamed of, it was something to OWN! I jumped in and posted a picture of me "running like a girl".
I posted it with a comment that said: "Proud to RUN #LikeAGirl! Strong, sparkly, and speedy!". But then I got to thinking today, am I proud of who I am? Do I love myself? How is my self confidence?
It is easy to say (or hear) things like "God made you in His image and He doesn't make mistakes", "It's what's on the inside that counts", "Your heart is beautiful", but do you I actually believe them? Here comes the transparency... Some days are easier than others, but the majority of the time I don't...
I think that is one of the reason I try to be as encouraging to others as I can be - because I know what it feels like to hate yourself and think no one is in your corner. I would never wish that upon my worst enemy, so if there is anything I can do to try and prevent others from feeling that way, I will do my darndest!
Honestly, I think running has helped my self esteem a bit. Instead of seeing my body as something to be ogled (which is what society tells us it's for, right?), I started seeing it for what it could DO, what I can accomplish. Instead of seeing my thunder thighs as being fat, I have started seeing them as strong to help me conquer hills.
I am not saying that it changed overnight, but eventually it can help. I mean, if you think of yourself one way for 25+ years, you aren't going to be able to change that opinion overnight... Running is great, but it isn't a magic pill.
Sorry for the rambling and jumping all over the place - just trying to keep it real. As you can see, my self esteem is still a daily struggle (last week was extra craptastic with it), but I felt it was important to address, especially in light of the #LikeAGirl campaign.
This week didn't go quite as planned (Wednesday was supposed to be a 5 mile tempo run which I ended up missing altogether and Thursday was supposed to be my cross training day which I ended up doing on Wednesday). It seriously bugs me that I didn't do all of my workouts, but I know I need to listen to my body or else it will be BAD NEWS BEAVER TAILS! (A day or two of extra rest now is better than weeks of injury later!)
