I graduated!

...from the Couch to 5 k program, that is. Today I did my last run in this program, which was week 9 day 3.

You can find the program here.

Amy is starting out with week one, so we could begin together today. Brianna came along on her bike with my camera to document this big milestone for me:)

Here we are still walking the 5 minute warm-up together.

Here is where I start running my 30 minute run.

This is on my way back. Totally sweaty and full of mosquito bites.

Here I come around the corner of our barn. Almost there...

And: I MADE IT!

After over three months of training,

I can do what I never could do before in my life!

At age 39 I can run a full 30 minute 5 k!!!



I'd like to thank some people here:

• My blog friend, Ellie, for mentioning this program in a post
• My sister, C, for encouraging me to keep on
• My husband and daughters for cheering me on
• The website I mentioned above
• DJSteveboy's podcasts!
• My sister, J, for buying my MP4 player for me in Canada
• And all the countless people passing me on the streets early in the morning or in the evening, that didn't think I'm crazy!:)
• The Couch-to-5K Running Plan on facebook, for all of the Kevin Pauleys there that encouraged me the reach the goal I set myself!

8 k I'm coming!

Our trip to Carmelo Peralta, part 2

If anyone of you is wondering where Carmelo Peralta is, you can check out the map below. We live close to Filadelfia and Carmelo is on the paraguayan side of the river, across from Porto Mortiño (on the brazilian side) Usually the trip takes about 3 hours, but because the roads were so bad, it took us 4,5 hours.

As soon as we got there, our little fisherman (Cindy) went down to the river with her fishing gear she got for Christmas. We didn't fish anything big enough to save, and because it's off season, we couldn't fish from a boat.

There was this pesky duck that was running around the grounds. It was so curious, it almost checked out our guiso (meat and noodle stew) in the "olla".

The house we rented was very sparse in furniture and comfort. :P The kitchen didn't have a countertop to work on, so we had to do everything over the sink.

The girls loved spending time looking over the water. Thats a lot of water for a Chaqueña.

 Someday I'd like to book a cruise on a river boat like this. But it needs to have air conditioning, mosquito netting and internet access.:)

Thats all for today, but I still have some great pictures to show you all next time.

Have a great week!

Our trip to Carmelo Peralta, part 1

Friday morning we headed out of Filadelfia with 2 pick-ups and our SUV. We traded kids for a while, so that they wouldn't becaome bored (and start fighting with their sisters:) This is Anna (Brianna's friend), Princess Polar (Brianna's newest teddy bear and Brianna in the back seat of our Toyota Runner. We tanked the vehicles and started out with mixed feeling about the 270 km of dirt roads in front of us. It had rained 140 mm at out house two days before, and the roads could be tricky.

 We had to use the 4-wheel drive to get through this part of the road. I was glad when it was over.

As you can see, the bridges don't look very sturdy, and some were broken, so that we had to drive on the lower part of the road.

The water was still rushing underneath the bridges 2 days after the rain. And because the water covers a lot of gras and other plants, it soon starts to smell very foul. Yuck!

This was out first view of the Paraguayan river. Brazil is on the other shore.

I'll post more tomorrow. I really have to get to the dirty laundry and to my couch:)

Speaking about my couch: I'll be doing W8D3 of the Couch-to-5k program tomorrow. That means if all goes well, I'll be graduating from the programm in one week. I used a little more than 9 weeks to complete it, but I'm totally amazed by the results. On W1D1 I could hardly jog for one minute without my body screaming to to stop. On my last run, I ran for 28 minutes non-stop. As I already wrote on my facebook wall: I wish my P.E. teacher could see me run now.:)

Theme Thursday, #1

Go ahead and jump!

I'm linking to ThemeThursday

I'll see you all next week,

when we get back from our weekend vacation:)

Book review, finally

It took awhile, but now I’ve finally sat down to write my book review from the book I received from Booksneeze.




This is my review of the book: “Cast of Characters” by Max Lucado

Max Lucado introduces us to various different characters of the bible in this great book. He weaves a story around each one, which makes you think, they are sitting right across from you and telling you their story themselves. And in each life he portrays, you can see the mighty hand of God leading and shaping this person.



One of my favorite chapters is the one about the paralyzed man. Lucado describes Jesus walking through a crowd of suffering people near the pool of Bethesda. He could have been in the temple or in a more sanitary crowd. But he chose to be here because: “When they suffered, he suffered also” (Isaiah 63:9) And even though we might be healthy and not in need of physical healing as this man, who had been lying near the pool for so long, waiting for the waters to heal him, we need Jesus to heal our hearts. Max shows with the verses in Colossians 2:13 – 15 what exactly God did for us, when we accept Jesus as our savior.

• God made you alive

• God forgave

• He canceled the debt

• He took away that record

• God stripped the spiritual rulers

• He won that victory

• He showed the world that they were powerless.



We were trapped and God came to the rescue.



After every chapter there are helpful questions for reflection and discussion.

I used one chapter as a bible study with a group of ladies and we all enjoyed it.

This book is filled with hopeful stories of real people. You can almost imagine they live today and Max Lucado had coffee with them yesterday while asking them about their personal experience with God.