Better Than Okay

So many of you wonderful, supportive people understand that 2022 has been a challenging year.

Thank you to everyone who has held me in their thoughts.

I am doing surprisingly well. And I do mean surprisingly — I know the extent of all the things and that means I also know it is kind of a miracle that I don’t sit in bed eating cookie dough all day.

I don’t. Not at all.

I have continued to be very, very intentional about thriving.

The dogs have been key. They needed me to be okay.

They gave me reasons to celebrate…

…and they give me dreams to dream. #nlitter2023

I learned to bake sourdough bread with a starter my sister delivered from California…

I have a garden!

And today I will ride my 800th Peloton ride…

My friends and family have been incredibly supportive — my sister sent me a collection of encouraging post-it notes. I love them.

And I write at msontag.com

Life with Dogs. Thank goodness for Life with Dogs.

Half

Dear Daughter, inspired by the fun of the Missoula Half Marathon we did together in June, signed us up for a virtual Half Marathon.

A virtual Half Marathon doesn’t mean you sit at your computer and watch your avatar do 13.1 miles while you eat chocolate cake and ice cream. Although you could, I suppose. Your Virtue Scoreboard would suffer but the worthy charity would still get the donation and you wouldn’t be sore.

I guess it should probably be called, “DIY Half Marathon” or maybe “Honor System Half Marathon” because you just do 13.1 miles, log them into the website, and await your swag.

Yesterday was my official race day.

Since I have not been running lately — and it was basically a DIY Half Marathon — I decided I would do it my way. This meant the only zooming was on my computer between stretches of walking — I layered the miles into my work day, and walked all of them — with members of my DIY Half Marathon pacer team.

First up was 4+ miles with Capella — here she is encouraging me to speed things up…

And then I did an hour of Zoom before Pozy and I headed out for about two miles…

Another Zoom session and then it was Claire’s turn for two miles…

Oh Claire.

Another Zoom meeting and then Sparkle took over to keep me company on three or so miles…

Last but not least (I went youngest to oldest), Harper B for Biggest Tongue finished things up with me…

Eleven in less than two weeks!

We did it!

And then a certain pacer dog had a bath.

I love a good challenge — and I love my dogs! It was an awesome day.

Happy Friday — and good luck with your challenges today.

Family Fun

Wildflower Chase earned his BCAT (a Fast CAT title) last weekend and yesterday he added the Novice Draft Dog title to his name…

Congratulations Team Chase! That is awesome. WOWZA.

Claire wonders if there are water polo titles she could earn…

But Sparkle notes that would require Claire to share the ball sometimes…

Capella nominates Claire for the Ball Hog title…

Claire, however, thinks she just plays really excellent defense…

One thing they all agree on is that they will miss the pool fun — we are heading back to Montana later today.

I hope your weekend is amazing!