As you may remember, the LIVESTRONG Challenge is the Lance Armstrong Foundation’s signature fundraising event inspired by the hope, courage and perseverance of Lance and the nearly 12 million Americans affected by cancer. Each year thousands of people take the Challenge, uniting individuals to stand together to fight cancer. This was my first year participating, and I chose to ride the 100 mile option. It was both a personal challenge and a way to honor those affected by cancer.

I learned of the LIVESTRONG Challenge last year, in the aftermath of my surgery to remove the malignant melanoma from my chest and as I was becoming very interested in cycling. It seemed like the perfect opportunity to take my new found love and use it, not only as a way to show cancer that it cannot defeat me, but to honor the memory of my parents- both of whom I lost to cancer, and to do something to help eliminate this terrible disease from the face of the Earth.

So I registered in January 2008 and sent out my first round of emails to friends, family, and coworkers. The response was tremendous and by the end of the month I was well on my way to my fundraising goal. As the year went by, I continued to send out updates of my progress as I worked on building up my cycling endurance, and the donations kept coming.

It was my goal not just to finish the Challenge, but to do so strongly and in a reasonable time. My first ride of the season was on March 23rd and I did my best to ride as often as possible. I rode into work each shift along the B&A Trail, from Glen Burnie to Annapolis which would take about an hour and each week I tried to get in a longer ride that I had the week before.

The down & dirty.....
Went for weekly OB appointment Tuesday afternoon (15th) the day after his due date, Mary had lots of edema and her blood pressure was up. Doc thought it might be the beginnings of preeclampsia and told her the she just bought herself a trip to the hospital. Sent us home with instructions to pack our bags and head to Bel Air.

Got to the hospital, direct admit around 8:30 or so. Got settled in, they let Mary eat something and started her on Pitocin around 10:30pm and slowly built up the amount overnight. Shortly before 4am her water broke and she went into active labor. She got an IV shot of Nubain pain killer around 5am, decided on the epidural at 6am. By 10am she was fully dialated. At about noon she felt like she had to push. Doc & nurse came in and she started pushing. By 12:15 she had the hang of it and was pushing really well. 12:54 Big Nate burst his way into the world.

Mary was cut & torn & ripped and they went into hurry up mode to try & get her stitched back together. Poor girl, I think that part was worse than the labor on her. The unnamed at the time Nathan was whisked away by the hospital pediatrician to be checked out because Mary had meconium in her amniotic fluid and they wanted to make sure he hadn't inhaled any.

All is well with both. Breastfeeding seems to be going well. Mary seems to be holding her own.

Everybody was released from the hospital and came home on Friday the 18th, after meeting John's aunts. We're settling in and getting the hang of things- so far - and looking forward to welcoming Gramps & Gramma Brown this weekend.

I'll feel much better to be reycling, for years it has bothered me at the amount of trash that we throw away that could be recycled.

We try to conserve energy and be environmentally concious when we can. We also have solar charger for our electric fence and a few solar lights around the flower beds and front walk. Composted manure is spread back on the fields. I suppose you could also say that some of our grass is "cut" by the horses in the back field. We also have a digital thermostat & keep the temperature a little warmer than most people in the summer & a little cooler in the winter. We also go "paperless" with a number of our bills.

With the price of gas being so high, I've made a very concious effort to combine trips, so I'm conserving gas. I also think 'is a trip necessary?' before I make the drive. Often, I decide to just stay at home. John saves gas, gets exercise, and has a lot of fun riding his bike part way to work. He does this almost every shift when the weather is good!

Both of our jobs are involved in helping the environment as well. Annapolis Fire Department has a recycling program and has seen a drastic drop in the amount of trash that is disposed of. Bank of America has paper and soda bottle recycling programs. They also have drastically reduced the amount of paper memos that were produced by sending memos via e-mail. Most of their education classes are also conducted online instead of having printed packets. Bank of America also encourages customers to go paperless. In 2007 they rolled out a $20 billion dollar, 10 year initiative to address climate change & help the environment- more on that can be found here- http://www.bankofamerica.com/environment/ -- if you're interested.

I would like to get Amber sold to a great home before my baby arrives, so when the weather broke in March, I started her in training with Shawn Bigley. Shawn & an assistant come out a few times a week (weather permitting) and are getting her started under saddle.

She's just had a few rides and is still on the lunge line. She's making more progress with each lesson and is trotting quietly under saddle on the line. Keep your eyes on the New Photos page to see updates in her progress.

Amber is a 2004 buckskin AQHA mare, registered as LC Special Light. Her pedigree is available at http://www.allbreedpedigree.com/lc+special+light Her bloodlines show potential as a working western horse- cutting, reining. She's certainly athletic enough... as a young foal she loved doing rollbacks & working on her fast circles! I sticked her at 14 hands 1/2 inch, so it looks like she should stay a large pony... her movement gives her potential as a large pony hunter. She's been free jumped and looks like she should have good form over fences. Amber also could do well in lower level dressage. Amber also enjoys when I lead her on trail walks, so I could see her being a great trail horse as well. She's super intelligent and athletic, so there are many different directions she could easily go with proper training.

Amber has been show in hand, western, hunter, & dressage breeding. She won Quarter Horse class at the 2005 Fair Hill Dressage Sport Horse Breed Show and has placed in all in hand classes she's been entered in.

Unless we follow the horse naming trend in which case we'd need L______ C_____ Smith... lol... The name would need to be dignified & distinguished to go along with Remington, Winston, & Wilson. Somehow I don't think that would go over too well... I have more than one friend who's banned "W" names... since we have Wilson, Winston, Willow, & Winnie already... speaking of that... Wilson's PHR papers came in the mail today... he's officially LC Grand Surprise!

And back to painting the room... I want to extend thanks to my parents who very generously spent their time on Saturday, April 5th, painting the baby's room. I chose a light blue and green. The theme of the nursery is going to be farm animals/ baby animals & kiddo will probably end up some of my horse artwork in his room. I figured blue & green were nice to represent the grass & sky... plus they're my two favorite colors.