Jeff & Laura

This post is just about Jeff and I.  So much of my life and blog revolves around my children. But not today! Here's what you need to know about the parents! :) 

On April 11th, I ran my first 5K.  I decided in November that I wanted to do it, and started training for it by running in our clubhouse gym.  I have always wanted to run in a race, (ever since my 7th & 8th grade years in track! ha) and this seemed like a great time to work towards a New Years Resolution.  It was fun to have a tangible goal to accomplish. 

I signed up for the 5K in Bellevue - at the Mercer Slough park. It was a beautiful trail run - it was harder than when I practiced because I had to run on wet bark and mud - a great leg workout! 

The run was with the Soroptimist organization for Congo Women. I have a bright lime green shirt that says that on it now. :) 

All my training paid off! I finished really well and even got a medal! Maybe they gave medals to everyone. ha ha. I was with the little group in the front by the end and it was fun crossing the finish line. 

I had a great trainer, my friend Natalie who gave me lots of tips. She helped me with best running practices and also mental pep talks. :) 

I like running, and had a great time.  I'm so glad I did it! I couldn't have done it without Jeff's support. 

Jeff has been busy with work as always.  And when he's not at work, he is still clued in to the stock market. :) Our old ward invited him to come teach them about financial preparedness for a Relief Society activity.  He did a great job! I spied on him and got this little video:

He loves to teach people about finance, and I see more of these teaching opportunities in our future. :)

Our new ward recognized his talents in other areas....he provided the sound system for our ward talent show.  He mixed the music and made sure the microphones were ready to go for all the musical numbers!

So that's what we've been up to individually.  But here's what we've done together!

We went on a trip to Omaha, Nebraska for the Berkshire Hathaway Shareholder Meeting with Warren Buffett. It was my surprise gift for him from Christmas!
We flew there on a small plane from Seattle to Omaha.  When we got on it, we got to walk on the ground and up some stairs. I liked to think it was our personal jet taking us to a shareholder meeting. ha!

It was filled with other people heading to the shareholder meeting! I liked seeing what the people around me were reading..everyone I saw was reading some sort of financial book.  Ha! Jeff and I were not alone in our nerdiness. :) 

We were welcomed at the airport! 

Everywhere we went there were signs welcoming us. It's a pretty big event in Omaha!

We got a taxi to our hotel and then went out to eat. There was a movie theater and restaurant - Ruby Tuesday - right next to our hotel! We went to both places both days. :) Convenient!

Jeff used to work as a waiter at Ruby Tuesday.  So he had fun reminiscing.
I had fun stuffing my face.

We sat in line for good seats to see the Avengers in 3D.  It was fun!

We had an early morning the next day. We woke up at 5am --- 3am our time!! The taxi picked us up from our hotel at 6am. We were all ready to go with our credentials and lanyards!

We drove to the CenturyLink Center - a HUGE convention center.  I thought we would easily get good seats...the doors opened at 7am.

But there were already tons of people lined up at each door of the building! So we waited in the morning sunrise to get inside!

Can you spy Jeff? He's near the man in the orange coat.

It took us 20 minutes to get inside the building after the doors were opened.  So many people! 40,000 in fact. We raced inside and got nose bleed seats that faced the stage. Here's my panorama shot of where we were:

And here's the big man himself: Warren Buffett. What, you can't see what he looks like? Well, thank goodness for the big screens they had above the stage!

We listened while he and his 90 year old partner, Charlie Munger answered questions for 3 hours from journalists and shareholders. Some were boring for me, but most were interesting. I even took notes!

Here are a few of my favorite quotes that I wrote down:

"You have to understand human behavior if you are ever going to run a business." - Warren Buffett

"Trustworthiness is more important than brains (in employees)" -Charlie Munger

(to an employee) "If you lose my company money, I'll be understanding.  But lose a shred of reputation in the process and I'll be ruthless." - Warren Buffett

(in regards to customer service) "Treat other people as if our positions were reversed." - Charlie Munger

(In making business decisions) "I'd rather be 100% more cautious than 1% less cautious." - Warren Buffett

"If I die a little earlier because I eat too much sugar, well then I avoided a few months drooling in a nursing home." - Charlie Munger

"I don't see smiles on the faces of people at Whole Foods." - Warren Buffett

As you can see the topics were wide and full of variety. :)

There was a break between 3 hour sessions and we went shopping at the convention hall.  All of the businesses that Berkshire Hathaway owns were represented. It was awesome! I bought some rubber duckies that looked like Warren and Charlie for the girls. :) And Jeff bought the 50th anniversary book.

When it was all over, we headed back to dinner at Ruby Tuesday and another movie: Age of Adeline. We got to relax in these reclining leather seats in the movie theater!

It was a super fun time with just me and my hubby.

We flew back Sunday afternoon and had a great reunion with our girls who were happily taken care of by my parents and Claire. THANKS!

They were treated to ice cream and parks and lots of play time! Brielle has been talking about her "white" ice cream ever since. :)

Ok, I had to sneak in one picture of the girls. hee hee.

And that's it for Jeff and I! Now back to my regular blogging installments. :)