Charleston lately...

How easily time gets away. I can't believe it's been over a month since my last post! Here's a quick recap on how summer 2009 has kicked off here in Charleston...well, and Portland too! I've really taken to experimenting with various pizza recipes lately - Fridays are pizza nights usually!

While in town for my dad's birthday, and to check in on Papaw Graf and Mamaw Phillips since their recent surgeries, I was so happy to see Mamaw doing so well!

Since we would be out of town for Matt's birthday, I cooked him an early birthday meal. I got his mother's meat loaf recipe and attempted my first ever meat loaf. Much to my surprise, he said it was spot-on! For my "meat" I made an eggplant bake, then for sides I grilled some white cheddar corn, and made oven roasted rosemary potatoes. We enjoyed this meal on the patio before heading out for an afternoon at the beach, followed by a Sister Hazel show!

I finished the triathlon training program with one of my friends and it was a great experience, as well as thrilling sense of accomplishment in the end. Here we are at the "starting line" gearing up for the swim, bike, then run. We celebrated our big finish with her husband at a local pizza shop - what a happy ending, right?

I had the honor of representing my company and local chapter of UPA at the annual UPA Conference in Portland, Oregon last week. A colleague and I drafted a proposal for a small presentation and it got accepted; however, only one of us would be able to attend due to budget constraints. Here's what my forum looked like - great experience!

Of course we had to take advantage of the idyllic Portland setting and plan a weekend getaway! Matt's actual birthday fell on the last day of my conference, so he flew up to join me in Oregon. We celebrated with one of our favorite things, which is wine tasting. What we tend to enjoy more than the tasting itself is visiting the vineyards and wineries, learning about how each does theirs differently, the unique flavors that go into each sip, and the scenic drives! The weather was superb - didn't creep out of the 70's once! We also have a habit of finding really good eateries - who knew McMinnville, Oregon had delicious Spanish tapas? Here's a slideshow of our perfect birthday celebration weekend!

That's all for now, but here's what I'll be looking forward to in the coming weeks!

• Kacie, Marc, and Matt in town for the 4th of July


• Training for some running events


• Likely some more work travel...possibly Santa Barbara, California


• Meeting up with Cynthia, (and hopefuly Nathan and Jessica too!) for the Wild West Relay in Colorado!