A Marathon, in Bites

I was asked in April if I would be interested in participating in a marathon relay. Meaning I would be on a team of four other women who would all run approximately 5.2 miles, adding up to a full marathon at 26.2 miles.

This is most of the larger group. There were two teams of 10.

Knowing myself the way I do, I knew if I didn't have anything to keep me motivated over the summer, I would probably take the summer off and never exercise. I figured the pressure of knowing other people were counting on me to not make a fool of myself by running 1 and walking 4.2 miles would keep me going.

This is my team of 5.

It did.

But the pressure was a little more than I bargained for in the two weeks leading up to the race.
The dreams were ridiculous.

I didn't get to the point where I could do it in under 50 minutes like I planned in April, but I finished strong and didn't have to walk once.

Burke came to watch.
He was the only husband able to make the drive and support us (thanks to Grandma for watching the kids). He was so sweet. He stalked me at the mile markers and snapped some photos of me.
My first mile was in 9 minutes! A personal best for me. I love that Burke knew that when I shouted it out to him at mile 3.

Mile 3. I improved my time over my 5k in the spring!

Although mile 5 took a good 11 minutes (plus), I didn't stop, even when the pigeon hiding in the bushes jumped out to get me.

Mile 4. Getting tired, but no longer freezing to death.

I kept going.
I knew Burke was waiting for me at the end with a big hug and an "I'm proud of you".
'Cause he knew how hard it was for me.

At the finish, almost there!

I'm not a runner. But I try hard.
And I made it.

Done! Passing the baton. And rejoicing!

My Boy

Nathan is my first born. He's my oldest child, and yet remains an enigma to me much of the time. He and I are very alike in some ways and complete opposites in others.
Which makes us butt heads more often than I would like.
But more and more I find myself being pleasantly surprised by his attitudes, opinions, and ideas.
And I like it.
He is growing up and we are finding interests we can enjoy together.
We spent the weekend up at my parents' cabin. Nathan inserted himself into an adult game of Pictionary.
I am sorry to stay he surprised me, but he did very well.
He was so proud and so am I.
It is nice to be able to associate with him in that way.

I think I am ready for the teen-dom. The good and the bad. Because the good is going to be a lot of fun, and the bad can't be too much worse than we have already endured, can it?

He keeps me hopping, that is for sure. Like yesterday when he brought home a progress report from school that had all A's. Except for vocabulary. Where he said he ran out of time (4 days) to look up definitions for his assignment in the dictionary, so he made them up. **Sigh**
Looking at the positive, trying to work with the negative; we congratulated him on his good grades and offered to help him learn how to use a dictionary more effectively. He took us up on the offer.

He started his first "job" this summer as well. He is mowing the lawn at our bishop's business with the bishop's son. The first time they went, it took them 4 hours. The second time was three. Mowing time has been speeding up for them and they finally did it in under two hours the last time. And were rewarded with a sundae.
He is saving his job money for an electric scooter. Not just the namby pamby kind. He wants the one with the most power (hear the manly grunting?).
He has been very diligent about saving, tithing, and putting some money in a long term savings account.
He is hoping to have enough money by the end of the mowing season. It should be enough, perhaps with a few household job ideas from mom and dad.
I am looking forward to seeing more goal setting from him.
He has told me he would like to run a 5k with me next year.
I told him to get his running shoes. His teacher gave his class an assignment to write what is called a Bio-Poem. I have never heard of one, but this was Nathan's:

Nathan
Small, nice, gamer, and smart
Brother of Kade, Annika, and Adrienne
Lover of candy, fun, and science
Who feels happy, entertained, and weird
Who needs fun, games, and candy
Who gives laughs, smiles, and winks
Who fears homework, death, and fire
Who would like to invent something, go to space, and get a job

The Birthday Girl

Adrienne had her birthday in August. She was more than thrilled to finally turn 5!

We decided to celebrate with a party with friends. (I am a bad mom-- this is only my second friend party ever).

We had a big waterslide courtesy of Grandma and Grandpa T. There was a watermelon cake and many gifts.

Adrienne was in heaven.

I would have liked to post some pictures, but they are all gone into cyberspace.

It was a great day and she felt like the VIP that she is in our family.

Now for the interview:

Favorite color: Pink and Purple

Favorite food: McDonalds Happy Meal with Chocolate Milk

Favorite book: Olivia

Favorite movie: Pink Panther, Aladdin

Best friend: Ella

Favorite thing about going to school: going in the keva to listen to stories

What she wants to be when she grows up: A doctor

Favorite thing to do with family: go out for ice cream

We love her so much.

She is our last little princess, and is off to school this year. I miss her, but I am excited to be able to help out in school this year a little more than I have been able to in the past.

Wrapping It Up

So, I would like to post some pictures of the rest of our summer, but between our camera, computer, and the operator, the rest of our summer pictures and the first day of school pictures were deleted!
Grrrrr.
Oh well, life goes on, and I'm sure they will be kept in my mind's eye forever.
Right.

Anyway, I do have some great pictures from when our friends invited us to come on their boat for some end of summer fun.
We had a great time. I attempted to waterski with minimal success, but Nathan and Burke took on wakeboarding. There are no pictures of my skiing, unfortunately. I think Burke and company were too busy laughing at my self inflicted water torture to think of taking pictures.
For his first try to do anything like that, Nathan did fairly well (better than I did). He got up on his first try, but his chatty mom missed the photo op (which lasted about 2 seconds).
Burke did great. Got up (after a few tries) and cruised all over the place. The rest of the kids went swimming around in the lake and played on the beach when we took a break. We all had a great time, despite being unable to move the next morning.
We even got to take in a beautiful sunset. Thanks for a wonderful evening of family fun!
Here is some video of Burke's Sweet Moves:

High Adventure Camp: The Conclusion

Nathan finished up his high adventure camp with indoor skydiving.
He really liked it until they turned up the air flow on his last turn. He panicked and started flailing around because he said he couldn't breathe.
His poor instructor thought he had a wild man on his hands.
Needless to say, that last turn was cut short.
Other than that, it was a lot of fun and we were sad to see it end.

The organizers said they will try to do a parent-child camp next year. I'll be all over that one!


Here is Nathan on his second run. You can tell when they turn up the air speed. He freaks out and his instructor gets a little frustrated.


He missed the last activity of the session (kayaking) because he decided to stay with his out of state cousins for a week.
That was high adventure itself. He has never been away from us for that long. I think it was a little difficult for him, but he had so much fun.
Thanks to them for being such great but sudden hosts to a shy but excited cousin.

Funnies

I love kids. They are so funny and say the most hilarious things.
For instance:

We have some stray cats that hang around our backyard. Actually they hang around the field behind our backyard, but seem to have adopted our yard and our garden as their personal hunting and litterbox area.
(Hunting mice is fine, the litterbox I have a problem with...eeew. That is why Burke got a pellet gun for Christmas. He is too soft-hearted to use it, however.)
Anyway, one of the cats is expecting and we were talking about kittens over dinner one evening when Kade announced that he thought he had seen one of them "laying her kittens" in the garden. (Thankfully, it didn't really happen. I think he was just witnessing something else. Eeeeww....)

Adrienne loves swimming lessons. She thinks she is a pro. She thinks she already knows how to swim. How wrong she is. She jumped off the side of the pool with no floatie or teacher around.
Once she was rescued and after I regained my ability to speak, she told me, "See, I told you I can swim."
She has been repeating the desire to not wake up on the wrong side of the bed whenever she says her prayers. I finally asked her what that was all about when I tucked her in one night. She told me she had to move all the way over to the side of the bed against the wall because if she slept close to the edge of the bed, she might fall out and land on the floor. And that-- she said-- is the wrong side of the bed.

We had a ward pool party last month. Burke told me he was going to take Annika and Kade over to the diving pool. I assumed (you know what they say about ass-u-me) that he was going to have them hang out in the shallow area while he dived.
When he came back about half an hour later, he told me, "Hey, did you know that if the lifeguards have to rescue you, you have to fill out paperwork?"
Apparently Annika jumped off the diving board and floated like a rock.
Burke didn't realize that when I told him about the kids jumping off the diving board at swimming lessons, they always had a floatie.

Nathan keeps telling me that he thinks he has hit puberty. I hear it every day when he comes up with something else. The latest was when he left me a message on the answering machine. He listened to it himself later and then proudly told me, "See, I don't sound like a girl anymore."

Cousins and More Cousins

We have had lots of family time lately. We spent the 4th of July with Burke's family. Everyone gathered together to remember Burke's dad, as it has been one year since he passed away.
The cousins were so eager to play with each other.
Adrienne especially loves her cousins Acacia and Ava.
They are joined at the hip.
They absolutely love each other.
I'm sure they made Grandpa laugh.
We also were able to be present for the blessing of my newest nieces, Paisley and Zoey. I forget how tiny and sweet babies are until I am around them.
They were adorable and fun and I loved holding them and giving them a bottle, and everything else that comes with babies.
I am sure Grandpa would have loved to have been in the circle to bless his granddaughters, and celebrate their birth at the family gathering afterward. He was missed.
Later that week we traveled to visit Burke's brother Justin and his family. Justin was called to be in the bishopric in his ward, and asked Burke to ordain him as a high priest. It wasa wonderful opportunity for all of us to be there and for Burke to perform the ordination in place of his dad.

As we were leaving, they invited Nathan to stay with them for another week. He jumped at the opportunity, and we (a little wistfully) re-packed his belongings and said good-bye.

He was so excited, and I was thrilled for him. But I am a mother hen and have been worried about him already and it has only been one day.

Burke and I called him tonight. I reminded him to brush his teeth. Really good. Because his aunt really can't tell him they look gross the same way his mom can. Can she?
He sounds like he is having fun, but maybe missing us a little more than he thought. (Or that's what I'd like to think.)

Maybe we're missing him a little more than we thought too...