Run like a mother

I ran a 10K race this morning.  Good times, aside from my back going into a spasm in the last mile, which somehow caused my groin muscle to also spasm.  That felt good.  But it was only a mile, so I survived.  I may not be able to walk tomorrow, but who needs to walk?

The kids ran races too.  There was a 50-yard dash for two & three year-olds, and a slightly longer dash for 6-8 year-olds.  They even got to wear numbers!  They've been very excited about racing for weeks now, and B has been regularly going out in the back yard to train -- running as fast as he can back and forth across the yard.  I was a little worried about Z -- she's not super-fond of loud noises and big crowds, and I was afraid that she wouldn't want to run a race all by herself.  Well, I worried for nothing!  She ran as fast as her little legs could carry her, and you should've seen her face when she finished -- she was so proud I thought she was going to explode!  Here we are after her race:

Here's B's race just taking off at the starting line:

And here he is mid-race (he's right on the double-yellow line in the center of the picture, wearing a long-sleeved black top and gray shorts):

And here he is coming in for a strong finish:

Here's me coming into the finish in my race (I'm #1012):

And me with my B right after the finish:

I'm pretty happy with how I ran, considering that I really made zero effort to train for this race.  I've been trying to recover from multiple injuries for the past four months, and just haven't been putting in many miles.  But my time is annoying me a little -- 1:01.  So close to being under an hour!  I know myself well enough to know that by the end of this coming week, I'll have found another 10K to run in a month or so, so I can finish in under an hour.  I'm an addict.

Z took this picture of M while I was running - I love it b/c it looks exactly like what a girl's-eye view of her daddy must look like:

After the race we headed to my parents' house for a picnic lunch with them and my brother and his wife. I'm afraid I somehow didn't take any pictures while we were there. But after lunch, while M & Z were napping (I KNOW!  It doesn't seem right that I ran a race, but M got to nap, does it?!), B and I went to The Best Park Ever. I snapped a couple pictures of him there:

Happy Mother's Day everyone!

Hoppy Easter!

I'm sure my Christian friends will be disappointed (yet not surprised) to read this, but Easter is ALL ABOUT THE CANDY in this house. Easter has hands-down the best candy of the year, and I get very excited and a little out of control when I go shopping for it. But oh! So yummy.

I'm not really sure why, but this is what happened when M asked Z to say "cheese." Probably she was too focused on all the candy to be able to summon a real smile. Or maybe that's a defensive smile; she thought he was going to take her candy and replace it with cheese.

And for some reason, both kids gave us pirate smiles this morning:

The best part of the morning though? B was so kind to his little sister. He helped her find eggs, and even gave her some of his. That's right, B shared with Z. It's an Easter miracle.

Christmas morning

What?! I told you I was behind.

This is B holding his cousin Andy.  He was terribly proud of his ability to entertain Andy & his twin brother Sam, and even went so far as to tell me I should have another baby so he'd have a little brother to play with.  Riiiiiiight.  

 Z was easy to please at Christmas.  When asked what she really wanted, all she could come up with was a box of band-aids.  So Santa brought her a box of Elmo band-aids.  There were hours of amusement in that little box, all for about $1.  And band-aids stuck on e.v.e.r.y.t.h.i.n.g.

This last one has nothing to do with Christmas, although it was taken on Christmas morning. I just wanted to show off what truly spectacular bedhead Miss Z is capable of pulling off:

All dressed up

to go out to dinner for Mid-Autumn Festival with the neighbors.  We went out for Chinese, of course.

4th of July

We went up to my hometown & spent the 4th with my parents. The town puts on a really good fireworks show. Some friends of my parents live right on the park where they do the show, and they always host a big party on the 4th. Their kids & grandkids come, so there are plenty of people for all of us to talk to & play with. I didn't take many pictures, I'm afraid. Here's what I've got:

B hypnotized by the TV

Silly girl

Stop taking my picture!!

My dad

I may not have a lot of pictures, but I do have a funny story. After the fireworks, we went back to the house to have dessert while we waited for the traffic to thin out. M was sitting in a chair that Z had been sitting in earlier in the evening. You know the toddler mind-set: if I think it's mine, then it's mine. Well, Z marched up to M, and with a very stern look on her face, she shook her finger at him and said, "Get out of MY chair....RIGHT NOW!......one....two....three..." and proceeded to count all the way up to seven. The whole room burst out laughing and I practically fell of the couch I was laughing so hard. She didn't get the chair, but she looks very pleased with herself any time she overhears us tell the story now.

The 5th of July pictures are much better than those from the 4th -- we went to the Best Park EVER, and I have somewhere in the neighborhood of a kajillion pictures. Or maybe it's only a bazillion. Anyway, lots of pictures. Tomorrow, I promise.

Happy new year

I'm able to take a minute to do a blog post because both kids are upstairs playing happily in my closet. Yes, you read that right. They each got a new flashlight for Christmas. B's is shaped like a horse, and Z's like a chicken. When you squeeze the tail, the mouth opens up, it makes an animal sound and a flashlight shines out through the open mouth. They adore those flashlights. Right now they're hanging out in the walk-in closet with them, but they've been known to cram themselves into the two-foot square coat closet together too. They also like to turn off all the lights at night and have me hide things for them to find with their flashlights. That was $10 well spent by Grandma, I think.

B and I started out the new year with a hike yesterday morning. We went up to an open space park in the foothills west of here where you can see an actual castle from the trail. B must have asked me at least half a dozen times if a king and queen lived there, or if they ever used to live there a long time ago. No, I told him, I'm afraid it's only regular people. Or as "regular" as you can be if you choose to live in a castle, anyway. And a rather creepy looking castle at that, if you ask me. He decided they probably didn't have a dragon either, since "dragons aren't real, and neither are dinosaurs or unicorns." Lots and lots of hiking pictures follow.

We spent New Year's Eve pretty quietly, considering the monkey house we live in. Not that we used to go out and whoop it up before we had kids, at least not since we were in our 20s. My sister & her husband (and their unborn baby -- I'm going to be an auntie!) were here with us that night, and left for home (Maryland) yesterday morning. Here we are roasting marshmallows on the back patio on new year's eve:

Last week, we started a new family tradition. We went to volunteer at a homeless shelter/food bank/clothing donation/etc. center, all four of us. I had thought we'd sort food in the food bank (a job that sounded like it would suit itself to the skills of a two year-old and a five year-old), but we ended up filling little bottles with lotion and shampoo out of bigger bottles. They wanted one-person sized bottles to hand out. This wasn't really something that Z had the dexterity for, so she lost interest pretty quickly and multiple hizzies ensued. We're going to do this once a month though, and next time we'll make sure we find a job she can help with too. It was fun, and B keeps asking if he can go back. Doing this together as a family is my sort-of a New Year's resolution.

Frozen Bear Creek

My hiker B

Clutching the new digital camera he got for his birthday -- he's taken hundreds of pictures of the floor, the walls, the dog's paw, etc.

This was the highlight of the hike for him, even better than the castle

Look at that sweet, shy grin

And how quickly it turns sassy

Back to sweet

Then he shoots me with a stick-blaster

I love this pair of pictures. You can just see the wheels going around in his head as he gazes at this stick: Can I possibly hold a third stick?

Look at the expression of pure satisfaction when he figures out a way to do it

B doing one of his absolute favorite things, although he didn't enjoy the rock climbing class he took last winter, which is odd

J's annual family Christmas party, v.1

B and my aunt Carolyn (aka "Aunt Fluffy") play Christmas carols together. She couldn't find sheet music for "Rudolph," so she played it by ear and did it perfectly, even with a cast on one arm. Impressive!

My grandpa, Poppy

My mom & dad and my dad's brother Chuck (he's the one on the left)

B & his cousin Sophie

Now it's Z's turn to "help" play Christmas carols on the piano

B & his cousin Tea in a pillow fight

Me & my monkeys before we left for the party

Osama bin Lulu, the terrorist cat

This and that

We spent 4th of July with my parents. Some friends of theirs live right on the edge of the park where my hometown does their fireworks, and they always have a big party with lots of kids. We were crazy enough to let both kids stay up to see the fireworks -- Z went to sleep around 10pm and B not until after 11 -- but we didn't pay too high a price for that, believe it or not!

Most of the kids there were older, and B was determined to get their attention. He very earnestly demanded that they watch him do all sorts of crazy tricks, and that they go into a dark room in the house to see how his glow sticks worked. They all did a pretty good job of humoring him, and it was funny to watch.

B had seen fireworks before, but not since he was 2, and I'm pretty sure he didn't remember that experience. He's pretty sensitive to noise, so I gave him some earplugs. He put them in before we walked over to the park, because all the little backyard firecrackers were making him jump. When the big show started, he immediately backed up about four feet into someone's lap -- he thought they were going to get him! But he relaxed after that & really seemed to enjoy the show. Z watched about a third of the fireworks, then entertained herself by demanding that my mom, her friend and I repeatedly pass her back and forth among us.

On Saturday morning, my saintly parents agreed to feed the kids breakfast and take them swimming so M & I could go out to breakfast by ourselves. It was delightful. We had a scrumptious cajun breakfast and scoped out some neighborhoods in the town we'd like to move to. Most importantly, we had a leisurely adult conversation without any interruptions.

M found a quarter and gave it to B just before we left for home on Saturday. Half an hour later, as we were driving home, B asked me "Mommy, do you know where I put my money?" I offered the logical guess: in his pocket. "Nope! It's in my underwear!" Why? I have no idea. But I'm not borrowing change from B any time soon.

I have learned that both of my kids can open a child-proof medicine bottle more quickly than I can. I'm not sure whether this says more about their marvelous dexterity and intelligence, or my total lack of coordination.

B informed me last night that he has 14 fingers. He even counted them for me to demonstrate. He still says 11, 12, 14, 16, 11-teen, 20 when he counts in a hurry, but when he takes his time, he gets it right and can count up past 200 now before he loses track.

I am a woman on a mission. I've heard that Barack Obama's acceptance speech has been moved to a venue that will hold more than 75,000 people, and tickets are going to be given to lots of Colorado citizens. Did you know that he'll give this speech on the 45th anniversary of Martin Luther King, Jr.'s "I have a dream" speech? It gives me goosebumps just to think about it. I want to be there! And I am on a mission to somehow obtain two tickets.

There you have it -- my brain-dump for the day. I warned you with the title that this post would have no coherent theme!

Friday catch-all

First of all, the only thing I know most of you want to know about: we haven't heard from CCAI yet. There are conflicting rumors as to whether they're working today or not, so I'm not expecting a call anytime earlier than next week. I'll keep my cellphone on me just in case though.

I'd like to post a bunch of pictures from Thanksgiving, but somehow I forgot to take any, except this one of the dogs:

Poppy got a bag of treats out of his pocket, and before he even got a word out or got it opened, the dogs heard the crinkle of the plastic & gathered round.

I made this yummy yummy cake for Thanksgiving -- it's got two chocolate layers with pumpkin-cream cheese stuff in the middle. We had pumpkin pie too, of course -- Mom brought that. But here's a picture of my first attempt at the cake:

Martha Freakin' Stewart I ain't. Fortunately I had enough of all the ingredients left that I could make an extra layer, and this one went in chunks into a tupperware, and we've been snacking on it ever since. The cake came out delicious (and very attractive after the do-over), but we ate most of it before I could take a picture. Oops.

Last but not least, the dining room. Almost five years we've lived in this house, and we've never had dining room furniture. We have a very spacious dining room, but it's always just had a bunch of leftovers & junk in it. Well, we finally bought dining room furniture last month. Then I decided I needed to paint the room. It had one red wall, which we'd had in our condo and loved, but it just didn't look right here. The rest of the walls were tan, and they didn't go well with the rest of the house. Plus it seemed dark. So I decided to try a green, and paint over the tan with white. I've had a long & tortured history with green paint, and it continues today. Here's the closest I have to a before picture (I forgot to take one until I was almost done priming over the red):

Here's the first green -- it was just a little too bright, even for me.

And here's the green we currently have -- I think it's a little too minty. You can't really tell it in the picture though.

And here it is almost finished:

I haven't painted the white walls yet (they're just primed in the picture, so they'll be a little less harsh than they look here after they're painted). We have a bamboo shade for the window, and I'll paint something for the big long blank wall that's on the left in the picture. Maybe one big canvas, maybe three that hang side-by-side. But we finally have a dining room! I feel so grown up.