Sunday, June 23, 2013

Some Fun Lasts

This time of year is full of "lasts", here are a few of our last school day events.

Julian's preschool class took a field trip to the Portland Aquarium.  This is Julian with his friends Lila and Isabelle.

He got to touch a sting ray!

And hold a bird, which he thought was pretty cool:)

I started a "Mommy and Me" playgroup and for our last get together we had a Hawaii themed party.  All the kids got to make a lei out of candy and fruit loops and flowers.  It was a lot of fun.

After our art project we went outside for some water fun.  It was great getting to know the ladies in my neighborhood a bit better, I think I'll continue this play group next fall.

Julian and his teacher Miss Christy on his last day of 3 year old preschool

Julian with his assistant teacher (also named Miss Christy)

Emerson on his last day of school with his teacher Miss Delplanche

Townsend on the last day of school with his teacher Ms. Marshall

The boys have been on summer vacation for a little over a week now and so far we have traveled up to Washington to visit Grandma and Grandpa, they watched me run a triathlon, we went to a splash park and for a few hikes...and the summer is just getting started!

Triathlon #1

For some unknown reason (temporary insanity?) I signed up for 3 separate triathlons this summer.  I have never raced in a triathlon before and I don't know what made me think I should start, I guess I just wanted a goal to work towards in the hopes I would be motivated to stay fit.  Well, I finished my very first race on Saturday, June 15th.  This race was up North of Seattle so I drove up on Friday with the boys and checked into a hotel.  Hyrum came up after work on Friday and then stayed the night with us and watched the boys while I raced.  I was super nervous, especially for the swim because I had never raced in a lake before and I had been training in a pool (which is much different than a lake) but I survived and am super proud of myself for finishing this race.

 Me and my friend Cynthia before the race.  I was one of only about 4 people that swam in just a swimsuit.  Most people had on a wetsuit or at least a triathlon suit.  I felt pretty awkward.

After transitioning from the swim to the bike.  Hyrum took this photo as I was on my way out to start the bike leg of the race.

Coming in after 9 miles of bike riding.

At the finish line after the run leg of the race.  I was soooo happy to be done! 

My cheer squad

Cynthia and I after the race.  She beat me by 7 minutes!

This is mostly for my own records but just so you know:
Swim 1/4 mile: 12 minutes 6 seconds
Bike 9 miles: 36 minutes 24 seconds
Run 1 1/2 miles: 16 minutes 38 seconds

I will do this same exact race at the beginning of September so I will see how much I have improved... or gotten worse



Saturday, June 8, 2013

A Day of Fishing

So I'm not really into fishing at all.  I don't like hooking worms or catching fish and watching them flail about because they can't breathe...but a nearby lake was hosting a free day of fishing and I thought my boys would have fun so I signed up.  The lake provided the use of fishing poles and bait as well as a ride out onto the lake in a boat to try and catch some fish.  I think all the boys had fun but we didn't even catch one fish so I think they were also a bit disappointed.  The lake sponsors this each year so maybe next year we will have better luck with the actual catching of some fish.


Townsend on the boat

Emerson fishing from the shore

Julian was too young to go out on the boats so I just stayed with him on the shore

He had a lot of trouble casting so I was helping him.  He only lasted for a bout 5 casts and then he said, "OK, I'm done."

Right as we were leaving they called one of our raffle ticket numbers and Emerson won a brand new fishing pole:)

Tuesday, June 4, 2013

Sisters Weekend

I have 6 sisters, so 7 girls total in my family.  We don't get together very often so it was a real treat this past Memorial Day weekend to meet up with all my sisters.  We are all spread out over the US so we decided to meet up in Michigan.  I flew from Portland to North Dakota where I stayed the night with my youngest sister, Paige, and then together we drove to Michigan...about 15 hours!  Luckily we had a pretty good book to listen to and also, luckily, Paige isn't afraid to drive fast:)  My oldest sister, Eryn, lives in Michigan so we used her house as our base and had a lot of fun sitting around playing games, watching silly movies, eating yummy food (thanks to DeNae mostly who did all the cooking and makes a FANTASTIC Thai chicken pizza!) and basically laughing and laughing.

With 7 girls in our family there have been moments of drama in our lives but I'm so glad that we love each other and that at the end of the day we will always have each other.

My wonderful hosts in North Dakota...Paige and her man Zach (love this photo!)

Confucious says, "When driving 15 hours in a car one must eat burritos..."

..."and deep fried cheese curds"

DeNae, Eryn, Kristen, Riann and Paige (where're your sunglasses Nae?)

I kinda liked this picture of me and DeNae

Paige bonding with some of our nieces

Girls lunch...the hummus at this restaurant was super yummy

Sisters can't get together and not get pedicures, right?

One night we played "minute to win it" games...it was lots of fun.  Kristen is trying to empty out a whole box of tissues in just one minute...

Eryn totally rocked the cups and plates stacking game...

Tanya dominated the ding dong stack...

And another one of Kristen, I just love the concentration on her face...get that noodle!!!

I love all my sisters and I'm so glad we got together for the weekend.  It was fun catching up on what's going on with all of them and mostly just fun talking and laughing.

PS
After driving 15 hours from Michigan back to North Dakota, Paige and I pulled into her driveway around 10:00 PM ready for bed.  She had given her garage door opener to her husband before we left town so we couldn't get into the house through the garage.  No problem, Paige has a key to her front door.  Ooops, Zach locked the storm door so we couldn't get to the front door, and Paige didn't have a key for the storm door.  What to do?  We waited until about 11:30 when Zach got home from work and then he busted out the glass on the storm door so we could get in.  Quite the exciting ending to our weekend:)

This is Paige's "I can't believe Zach locked the storm door" face

It was the first time I had ever witnessed a house getting broken into and was quite thrilling I have to admit:)