Life on the Runn...

Yesterday marked another milestone in the recovery process.  Though it was a relatively small moment, it was a moment, and I am learning to cherish each step I take toward a full recovery. My first major victory was my ability to put weight on my left foot.  After that, I celebrated the removal of my stitches and the ability to shower normally.  Next, I was able to walk on both feet and touch my toes without feeling pain.  Now I am even able to bend my toes a bit.  This made me feel especially victorious because it facilitated another accomplishment.  Add this to my list - - I was able to bend my toes enough to polish my nails :) Though they're not there quite yet, I am very close to looking upon normal feet again.  Hooray.

Since I cannot drive yet, my friend Amanda has graciously volunteered to be my chauffeur for the begining of the school year. She and I spend a lot of time together getting into trouble, and we were very happy to reunite with our friends Star and Katie on the first day of the new school year. We are developing a reputation of being quite the entertaining group, and we do find ourselves to be rather hilarious, but yesterday, we were quite the sight, even for us. Allow me to set the scene. Imagine two tall women moving at normal-person speed and two very short, very slow women waddling behind them. That was us. Star, who is very pregnant, and I, who am very gimpy, did our best to move as normal people move, but we could not. That meant that Amanda and Katie had to run ahead of us to open doors, pick up things we dropped, find us seats in a packed auditorium, help us up and down stairs, and pull cars around building to pick us up and drop us off. If you happened to be one of the in

Never able to sit still and extremely picky, I've been spending some of my time on the Injured Reserve working on configuring my blog.  Since I couldn't perfect the look via my old blog, I figured I needed to make bigger changes.  Hence, you can now find me here... Enjoy

One of our greatest accomplishments as a team, a 15+ mile hike along Glacier National Park's Highline Trail/Swiftcurrent Pass. I certainly will never forget this wonderful experience!

I haven’t been getting out of the house all that much, so when my mom suggested I head out to my cousins’ softball game, I immediately called Brian at work.  He answered the phone with a simple “Yes”.  I thought he was short on time as I didn’t get a very pleasant greeting; turns out he was responding to my yet-to-be-asked question (he’d seen my mom’s message of Facebook and was ready for my call).   We used to live much closer to the softball diamonds and to my aunts/uncles/cousins/parents, and regularly attended family activities, even the impromptu ones.  Now we’re a good 35 minutes from the central hub of my family’s activities, and don’t get to see everyone quite as often.      I’m so glad we decided to take the drive west last night!  While chatting with my mom and dad, I looked over my shoulder and into the bleachers and couldn’t help but smile.  We were surrounded by so many family members - two of my aunties, three of my uncles, four of my cousins and their babies (some big,

Perhaps my most notable quality is what I shall call my attention to detail.  Be it my love of cleanliness, my innate desire to organize or my inability to put off what I am thinking of doing, it probably seems like I'm not very relaxed.  Oh on the contrary.  I find cleaning, organizing and planning to be very soothing...odd, I know.   I realize that I might be wound a bit tight, and I've been working on relaxing my obsessive-compulsive desires.  Crutches have certainly made that process a bit easier as I can't do a whole lot too quickly.  So, with my new-and-improved relaxed nature, today I planned to do only a tiny bit of work and save some of it for another day.  Well, that plan backfired. I now have the following established:  the first literature unit (day-by-day), the first grammar unit/test schedule, seating charts, library visits, and a general idea of my classroom layout, though I’ll have to call on my trusted pal Amanda to do the heavy lifting.   All that work

August 13, 2010 Though I’ve made a habit of visiting the Wisconsin State Fair with my parents on its opening day, this year I was unable to do so; I was still recovering from surgery. Understanding my love of the fair and my need to get out of the house, Brian agreed to take me to the fair on Friday night.  We met up with his cousin, Amy, her husband, and our sister, Becky. There was some rain in the forecast, but that did not deter us, and neither did my inability to walk.  I got my first wheelchair riding experience (see my previous post for a picture of wheelchair-bound Amy).  I haven’t yet recovered my normal appetite, but I did my best to sample some of the fair goodies.  Most important on my list of must-eats was flavored milk - nothing deep-fried or on a stick for this girl!  I’m convinced that it’s not only the tastiest treat at the fair but also the most economical - it’s only a quarter per glass! I really enjoy the root beer milk.  We saw some of the animals too.  That always

August 13, 2010 Both of my parents come from relatively large families, at least by today’s standards, so that meant that, with dozens of cousins, I was never short of company growing up. Though we’re all grown (and some of us have babies of our own —I’ll get there one day), we really do love to reminisce about our younger days.   One topic that tends to elicit a lot of laughter is my “Why It’s Great To Be a Knak” list (my Auntie Lynn’s family).  I believe this list was formally introduced at a co-ed softball game a few years back.  I probably had more drinks than balls hit to me, so I had time to generate the list.   For your pleasure, I thought I would share it with you…and add some explanation for those less versed in my oddities.  1.  Donuts holes  - When we would spend the night at the Knak house, we could always count on Munchkins (donut holes) for breakfast courtesy of Uncle Skip.  Such a breakfast was unheard of in the Unti household.   2.  Dress-up clothes  - After a hearty b

August 9, 2010 Well, not a whole lot has been happening as of late.  I guess that’s to be expected considering I have a brace/cast on each foot. However, I did get a very exciting tweet from a friend the other day. Turns out that I am making daily appearances at State Fair.  You can see my image at the Adventure Rock climbing wall.  How cool, ha?!  So feel free to come see me at the fair…and try out the ol’ rock wall while you’re there.  The image on the poster comes from one of our trips to Rocky Mountain National Park.  It really lifted my spirits and inspired me to stay positive.  I cannot wait to be out of my casts and running and climbing again.  I plan to be unstoppable.   

August 4, 2010 Yesterday was surgery day.  This was the second time I’ve had my right ankle operated on, so I had a general idea of what to expect, but there were also some unknowns that could only be addressed once my ankle was opened up.  That left me with a little anxiety.  Turns out that there wasn’t much time for me to become too anxious.  While my lead nurse was going through the pre-operative questionnaire, my doctor arrived to tell me that his other patient, the one scheduled for early surgery, had an allergic reaction to some medication and needed to rest.  That meant that he wanted me to become the early surgery.  It was time to kick it into high gear.   At that point, I had no fewer than six nurses in and out of the room prepping me for surgery.  Vitals were taken, questions were asked, and veinS were stuck.  Turns out I have very tiny and very deep veins (I inherited this trait from my momma).  This made starting an IV a difficult task.  When an attempt in my left arm fail

Just as there are fewer and fewer days of summer left to enjoy, so too are there fewer and fewer days of me free of crutches and a cast.  As such, Brian and I made the most of the weekend and the weather.  Friday, I spent the day with Amanda shopping and preparing for her party.  We stopped at Trader Joe’s and also explored Bayshore - I had to get Brian’s last birthday presents.  I was happy to finally get to  erehwon , the outdoor store there.  While I was checking out, I was asked if I know Brian.  I admitted that I am married to him, and the cashier was beyond excited.  Turns out, he met Brian when he was in Texas last November.  Brian will downplay it, but he’s really made a name for himself with his website, climbingnarc.com.  Lots of people know him and his site now, and I am so proud of him for that! Friday evening was Amanda’s party.  Her cousin was on that night’s episode of “Chopped”, one of Brian’s favorite shows, so we ate pizza and snacks and cheered on her cousin - not t