How to ruin a perfectly good run

I like to tease Jerry that running is better than biking because the only fancy thing I need to run is a good pair of shoes and an open road.  Biking of course involves so much more gear.  A couple of years ago I decided that there was an exception to this.  I love running in the spring and fall because it's not too hot or cold, obviously, and I just need a pair of shorts and t-shirt.  But sometimes in these seasons my forearms get really cold.  They don't move at all and so the blood doesn't flow so much through them, but it's not cold enough to be wearing gloves or a long sleeve shirt.  Sometimes, by the end of my run my forearms are so cold that they're frozen in some weird shape like Chandler's Claw (watch some Friends reruns if you don't know what I'm talking about).  So, I decided I wanted a pair of arm warmers.  I've never seen them sold as running gear, but they have them for bikes and so I decided that was the one extra piece of gear that I wanted.

Well, while Jerry was checking out bike gear, because there is so much of it to be checking out, he saw some arm warmers for 10 bucks and he surprised me with them.  I was totally excited.  Today I thought might be the perfect weather to wear them in and I was right.   I even got an early start on my run thanks to Abby now being awake for the day starting between 5:30 and 6.  I like running early in the morning, it's my second favorite thing to do in the morning.  Sleeping in is my first favorite.  Anyway, I was feeling pretty good, running a good pace and enjoying the cool morning air.

Then comes the part of ruining my great run.  I was cruising along and a half step in front of me I saw a snake, which forced the yelp and 10 ft jump in the air and the mandatory, "Ugh I hate those things."  Now, in all fairness, I can't say with 100% certainty that it was a snake.  I don't run with my contacts in which makes Jerry mad at me, but they always hurt when I put them in and it's hard enough to keep my eyes open in the morning.  I have in the past confused a bike in a garbage can with a deer about to attack a group of middle schoolers waiting for a bus.  And one day near Halloween, I was caught suddenly flailing my arms in panic becuase I didn't see the ghost and skeleton decorations hanging down from a tree until I was running through them.  So, maybe it was a snake, maybe not. 

Either way, that actually wasn't the thing that ruined my run. 

Later in my run I started choking on phlegmy stuff in my mouth.  Not real choking, but annoying choking so I spit it out.  I'm not very good at spitting so I don't typically do it when I'm running, or ever really, because I usually end up with half of it hanging off my cheek.  So knowing that, I tried to spit with real force so I would spit out and not decorate my face.  In an effort to spit hard I forcefully turned my face and then all of a sudden, my spit came out (half on my cheek) and the end of my ponytail smacked me right in my eye!

Oh, such pain!  It hurt so bad.  I had to stop running and hold my eye shut while it watered and I had to wait literally a couple of minutes before I could even open my eye.  And then, I tried to start running but I could only have my eye half open and it was hurting so bad, so I was weaving all over the side of the road like a drunk lady.  I'm sure it had to be the funniest looking thing.  It still wasn't even normal before the end of my run and I wore my glasses all morning because the thought of putting my contacts in made my eye hurt.  Even now, halfway through the afternoon and I still have a twinge of pain in my eye. 

It started off so well.  It could have been a great run.
Note to self: Don't spit.  Ever.  And beware of those ponytails!

Spring running

The running group I run with had an Easter race for kids on Easter weekend.  I love involving my kids in running so I was totally excited about it.  I ran with the group and Jerry brought the kids to the track and met me.  It was a lot of fun and luckily the weather was pretty decent.



Sara's age group went first.  I realized that she hasn't participated in any fun runs with me.  What?  This has to change.  Anyway, I didn't know what to expect with her and she asked me to run with her.  She started off so fast though and I knew she didn't need me at all.  She was so fun to watch and cracked us all up.  



I was so proud of her for finishing strong even though she was amazingly far ahead of the next person.  It looks like she was 100m ahead and when you're only running 400m, that's quite a bit.  She was very proud of herself for finishing first and getting to break the tape.  We were all so excited and a little bit surprised at the way she just took off and never looked back!

Kate's group ran second.  I was also very proud of her.  It was hard to follow Sara because all of a sudden the bar was set so high.  She starts out great and I was very proud of her confidence.

Here she is finishing second!  She did a fantastic job.  I was so proud of her for keeping her pace and not giving up.  She was very pleased with herself too.  Both her and Sara said that on the far side of the track, at about 200m, that they both felt very tired and considered walking.  I was proud of them for pushing through it.  They were both very tired at the end, but excited to win medals.

 

I'm choosing not to post Matt's video.  Ahh, bless his heart, he does not love running.  I've really tried to work with him on his running technique and getting off his heels and onto his toes, but I can't fight genetics.  His age group had to run 2 laps and as he came around the first lap I said, "Matt, it looks like it's painful, pick your knees up."  He yelled back to me, "It is painful, my lungs hurt and my legs hurt."  But I was so proud of him and his excitement for his sisters.  He was really genuinely happy for them and handled it very well that running is not his thing.  I was proud of him for trying and finishing and not walking and he wasn't even last.  It's good to have things that keep us humble!

Win a date with Napolean Dynamite

Ahh, my Sara.  She definitely has her own personality.  I love it.  Most of the time.  This spring she has continued to wear her snow boots everywhere we go.  Everywhere.  She would probably wear them to church if I let her.  It's not so much because of a love of snow boots, more it's the ease of slipping them on.  She would be wearing flip flops if I let her.  In fact, usually the way it goes down when we leave the house is like this:

Me: "Sara, put your shoes on."

She does.

Me: "Sara, it's too cold to wear flip flops today, it's freezing out there."

Flip flops off, snow boots on.

I just laugh and shake my head.  I don't really care.  This is the day that really made me chuckle though.  She was in a wing wearing phase and the wings, skirt, tights and snow boots was just hilarious.

 

Last Friday she had her kindergarten orientation.  She is so excited to go.  I've really enjoyed having an extra year with her at home.  But I'm excited for her to go too.

 Here are all the kindergartners enjoying their cookies and milk after they met their teachers and had a story.

And here's my future kindergartner.  They had the kids all go out of the gym while the parents had to stay for a snooze fest, I mean meeting.  She didn't even hesitate.  She jumped right up, waited for the girl next to us who was a little more shy and lined up with the yellow group.  She gave me a wave as she was waiting to be led out of the gym, but she was ready for her business.  Such a cutie.  She'll have a great time in the fall!

A few words on freedom of speech

I typically keep my blog light and airy and that's the way I like it.  However, since I just spent 10 minutes talking at Jerry about a certain news story, I decided to put it down on paper or screen. 

In the car today I flipped the radio station to a news channel wondering if there were any new developments in the Boston story and there was a talk show on and the host was talking about the boy in Virginia or West Virginia or something that got in trouble for wearing an NRA shirt to school.  I understand that gun rights are a big issue right now, but I have to put it out there... I was really annoyed with this boy and his family and I support the school.  I probably haven't heard all the nitty gritty details, but I don't need to know them to say what I want to say.  I am tired of people saying, or in this case wearing, inappropriate things and then saying they shouldn't be held responsible because they are just exercising their right to free speech. 

I support gun ownership.  However, school is not the place to have this battle.  That kid should not have worn that shirt to school and his parents should not have allowed him to.  From the description I heard of the shirt, it was not an appropriate shirt to wear to school.  End of story.

The kid should have changed the shirt when he was first asked.  It's called respect for authority figures and in this case the teacher is the authority figure.  I heard the teacher was yelling at him, but whatever, he should have changed his shirt.  This exact situation has been a big deal at my work lately.  As you can imagine, residential treatment centers have a lot of rules.  Many of them have been made because of something negative that has happened or to help maintain control of the environment.  It would be impossible to write down every little rule, because they can change depending on the situation.  As staff we have the right and the responsibility to keep the students safe and can make up, change, or enforce a rule at our discretion.  It is our job, we are held responsible for our choices and the students are expected to listen and follow our directions.  We have the right to enforce the rules with varying consequences up to restraining students and calling in police.  Luckily, it doesn't get that far very often because we are trained to maintain control and set expectations long before it gets to that point.  My point is, teachers should be allowed to enforce or set expectations as needed to maintain control in their classrooms.  I realize that that opens the door for someone to abuse their authority, but there should be protocol in place to deal with that.  There is at my work.

An eighth grade boy should not have a criminal record over a t-shirt.  He should probably not have been arrested.  That says to me that the school has lost control and authority of the students.  What I see happen a lot in families is parents are permissive, permissive, permissive and then they lose control and have to take drastic measures to gain their control back.  It sounds to me like this is what has happened.  And that's too bad. 

It made me angry to hear this kid saying they were infringing on his right to free speech.  No. Again, you're at school, it's not an appropriate place to be wearing shirts with guns on them.  And shame on your parents for not teaching you that.  You can't break rules and be defiant and hide under the "oh, I have free speech, you can't tell me I'm breaking a rule" card.  It is so irritating and again, shame on his parents. 

Anyway, I briefly mentioned this to Jerry and then I just couldn't stop talking about it.  Apparently, I felt really strongly about this.  But now I feel better.  What are your thoughts?  I can handle it.

For the love of science and my son

Matt, again this year, chose to participate in the science fair. It's not required until next year so I was proud of him for choosing to do it.  It really wasn't even a hard choice for him.  Last fall, either right before or right after baby, Matt asked me some question about would plants grow if you gave them  milk instead of water.  I distinctly remember it because right then I knew I should get him two plants and let him see for himself, but I was too tired and not in that mentality.  So, even though I felt bad about it, I kind of brushed the question off with a quick answer and probably changed the subject.

 

But Matt is an enquiring mind so I wasn't surprised when the topic of the science fair came up and immediately said he wanted to do it and his question would be, "do plants grow when given milk instead of water?"

 

He worked really hard on his project.  He started it early so the plants could have at least a month to grow so that we would have time to see some results.

These are the plants right after we planted them and watered them for the first time.  As we were planting them, the thought crossed my mind that maybe the milk plants might stink a little bit.  But I didn't say anything, because we were already committed.

 

Oh. My. Goodness.

The plants stinking a little bit is the understatement of the century.

I felt like I had a full on dairy in my kitchen for the last month.  It was horrible.  I mean really, there were times that the smell would make you gag, it was that bad.  Even Matt had to confess that this was pretty gross.  But we had to push on, for the love of science and my son.  We found some tricks to help it be less stinky, which was the only way we made it through.

 

In the end, one of his milk plants died, and the other one didn't grow any.  So, we felt pretty good that all our suffering was not in vain!  And it's always good to see something happen even though it is the opposite of you hypothesis.  After all, that's science.  There is no failure in science!

 

He worked really hard on his poster and his journal.  I was very proud of him.  This is a bit of a challenge for him in that he does not spend much time on his homework.  We never practice spelling words, his math takes him 5 minutes and he doesn't have too many extra projects.  This poster however took him probably 3 hours.  It was frustrating for him at times, but he persisted.  I was so proud of him for that!

His project qualified for the district fair which he was really excited about.  His journal however, did not score very well at the school fair so he put in  probably another 2 hours of work on his journal.  Again, I was really proud of him.  He said his interview went well and he was excited and relieved to have it all done.  He didn't place at the district fair, but he didn't care at all.  Plus, the awards night is the same night as baseball and I know he'd choose baseball over that so it all worked out well. 

 

I do love science and I was really happy to experience it in its finest form: having a question and working hard to find the answer.  It was a really good experience!

Abby's 7 months old!

I can't believe another month has passed and our baby girl is 7 months old.  She continues to grow and develop in amazing ways.  This month she continues to work on her physical coordination, mostly by sitting up well and her manual dexterity.  She shows no signs of rolling over and only scoots around when she's on her back and her legs get going crazy.  She will soon enough and I continue to enjoy my little girl that is not into everything quite yet.  She is making more and more noises and will now make sounds with her lips closed.  She really loves to do that while eating and then opens her lips ever so slightly so that she blows food all over me. 

 

As of the last few days she is officially only drinking from a bottle.  It was maybe a bit before I was really ready, but one breast infection and the beginnings of a second made me decide she was done.  She loves to look around while she's drinking her bottle and the kids love feeding her, so it's good news all around.

Apparently she loves to swing.  While at the park one day I put her in the swing and pushed her and she laughed and laughed and laughed.  Maybe one day I'll post the video.  It's so cute!

 I have a picture of all my kids in a bathtub at 6 months.  Top left is Kate, right is Matt, bottom left is Abby, right is Sara.

 She loves going on walks in her stroller.  I think this day we were at Matt's baseball game or practice.  She loves to be outside.  Speaking of Matt, he has given her the nickname "Fuzzy head".  I love his connection to her and it makes me smile every time I hear, "Hey there, fuzzy head."

 She can sit up by herself, but she still spazzes out and kicks her legs and back straight so I still sit near her.

 And I still like having her in her Bumbo chair on the counter while I'm cooking dinner or cleaning up.  I love being with her.  And I love Bumbo chairs.  I don't know how I raised my other kids without one!

She has always loved to bang.  We've referred to her as our tambourine player.  If she's on my lap drinking, and I put my hand out she'll give me 5 the whole time.  Another funny thing she does is with her legs.  She'll lift them both up while she's laying down and then slam them down onto the floor or bed or wherever she's laying.  She does it all the time, even in her sleep.  Often Jerry and I will hear this thud, thud, thud coming from her bedroom.  It makes us laugh.

 

 And this is a picture of her with my brother Rex.  He spent a lot of time over our reunion weekend holding her so that she would like him.  It sort of worked.  At least she's happy in this picture!

 

As for sleeping she is still really bad.  She is up several times in the night and her naps are very short.  But we manage.  For the first 6 months I didn't mind getting up with her, but now I'm pretty much done with it and hoping she gets it all figured out soon!

 

As for me, I feel pretty normal.  I am still numb all around my incision sight, but it is getting better.  So what I've learned about me and surgeries is that I don't like them.  In fact, I don't really like any medical stuff.  I always thought I did and with my dad being a doctor I spent a lot of time in hospitals and I've had my fair share of x-rays, but I really don't like doctor stuff.  And thinking about being cut open still kind of freaks me out.  I'm so glad I couldn't see anything and when I remember the whole experience in the OR, I kind of wish I could have just been asleep for that.  It was weird.  Anyway, the only thing to really make our life better around here would be to have some more summerlike weather!  Here's hoping for month 8!

Celebrating 50 years

Last weekend we had the most awesome time celebrating my parents 50th wedding anniversary.  All of my siblings and spouses gathered together along with all but 5 of the grandkids.  There were 36 of us all together.  And what do you do when there are 36 people all wanting to stay together and hang out and have fun?  Why, you rent a ginormous cabin that fits us all with room to spare!  The cabin was incredible!  The weather was not great so it was awesome that we had so much to do at the cabin.  We all had so much fun together and wished we could all have spent more time hanging out. 

 

The party started as soon as the first people arrived and only got bigger as more and more people came.  Stephanie made cupcakes representing each member of the family.  This was our family.  Notice the eye color and hair color.  It was really fun to look at each person on their cupcake! 

I think mine and Jerry's favorite activity was playing z-ball.  It's this crazy game using 2 pool games and then all sorts of random rules like doubles and triples and no touching and ends of the pool table...  It was a lot of fun even though neither of us ever won.

The indoor bounce house was a huge hit.  Yes, it had a gigantic bounce house inside the cabin.  As well as an indoor pool, which I didn't get a picture of, but we spent plenty of time there too. 

 We had a lot of fun eating all together and surprise surpise, there were table and chairs for everyone, plus extra!

 

But even with all the entertainment in the cabin, we still spent some time celebrating my parents.  We watched old movies from our childhood days, looked at photo books that my mom has spent years working on, and had an awesome talent show.

Here we watched Clarks family perform "Tarzan Man".  The pictures are bad.  I really didn't focus on taking pictures.  I'll just get some good quality ones from everyone that had nice cameras there.  I spent more time hanging out than photographing.  Anyway, my favorite talent was Jay's family singing their rendition of "Call Me Maybe".  It went something like "Our number's 50. Hey ain't that nifty."  It was fun. 

At the end of the talent show, my dad handed my brother a cd and told him to play a certain song.  When it came on, he asked my mom to dance.  Probably my favorite moment of the weekend!

 

And then there was the cake.  I got the awesome job of buying the cake.  It was the best.  Tasting the cupcakes to decide on cake flavors was my favorite part!  I was a little worried about the transportation so I put it in my sister's van so that it was her problem.  Ha ha!  (Catch my tribute to Scott?)

 

And then the cutting of the cake...

 

So, like I said, the pictures are few and bad, but it was so fun to be all together.  The kids were crazy.  We all went to bed so late each night and played all day.  We had to cram a lot into a short time so everyone was pretty exhausted by the end.  It was all so worth it though.  And I have to say I'm quite proud of all my siblings and families.  It's no small feat planning a weekend where stake presidents, bishops, doctors, mothers and kids each with their own schedules can get together at the same time and place.  But we did it!  Pretty amazing what can happen in 50 years!