Moments that make you cry...

This past week was an intense week.

On Wed. the 29th I received this beautiful news from my brother and sister-in-law:

We're so happy to announce the birth of our precious daughter Eliana Deniz Brown.
She was born at 9:57pm on April 29, 2009. She weighed in at 7.7 pounds and was 20 inches long. She was delivered by a C-section at the International Hospital in Istanbul. She came out with her eyes open and has been taking in the sights ever since. Here's a link where you can see her beautiful face, her proud parents and her jet-lagged but excited Grandmother. Feel free to pass the link on to those who might be interested!
http://picasaweb.google.com/thebrownfam8/ElianaSFirstDay?authkey=Gv1sRgCJfh1tiMmIqNsgE#

How precious is she! My beautiful niece. I can't wait for the day when she will come to the States and I can hold her in my arms. I'm sure that I will be crying more than her. Everytime I see her pictures, big tears just stream down my face (even as I type this). She is such a beautiful gift and she makes my heart feel so full.

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Then on Sunday, the 3rd of May Nancy and I ventured to Philly for the Broad Street Run!

On Feb. 2nd I posted this:

"Today was the start of my training for the Broad Street Run in Philly (a 10 mile run), which is held on May 3rd this year. I am not an avid runner and I think this challenge will be a big stretch for me. I did do the Jingle Bell Run in December, which was a fun moment in life. The thing about training is that it takes a lot of discipline...a lot of sacrifice...and endurance. "

Haha...yeah isn't that the truth.

The run was an incredible experience, one that I didn't think was going to be possible. If you had asked me about doing this a year ago I would have laughed and said I enjoyed playing sports but I was not into running unless it was chasing a soccer ball or running down a basketball court.

Jonerik and I ran together in Philly on weekends and Nancy and I ran together here in Lancaster during the week. I pushed myself each time I ran and trained at a faster pace than needed. I prefer to run faster because I feel like I'm making more progress.

Before the Broad Street Run I decided that it would be sweet to run and finish the race with Nancy and Trish. I knew that my training tactic of pushing myself was not going to last the distance and I needed to pace myself. The three of us paced each other and we ran the whole 10 miles next to each other. Note that the most I had run at one time up to this point was 6 miles.

We didn't have a great time in the over-all scheme of things. We were beat by a 90 yr. old man (but he beat about 19,000 other people as well!) but that's ok. We were all amazed that we were able to finish. We started the run with a few rain drops falling and crossed the finish line as the rain started to pour down. It felt great.

The most amazing thing to me was all of the people along the way that were cheering us on. That was something that was completely different than training! We ran past Love Park (good memories) and I even ran past and high-fived Ed Rendell! He wasn't running but he was standing out in the street high-fiving runners.

Some pictures:

For some reason it looks like we weren't running here but trust me this was mile 9 and we were not stopping now!

We were oh so excited to see Shera! My other roommates braved the cold rainy weather to cheer us on too. We saw Kristin and Joy around mile 9 as well.

We had a great time and I am still surprised that it actually happened. God has knocked me off of my feet this week. I am grateful for each moment.