Father's Day

I've had no time over the last couple weeks to update the blog - been on the road!

On Father's Day we finally made it over to Darby Battelle Park to see the bison.  It was a nice walk (on a 90% humidity day!) on the trail back to where the bison were.  I haven't been to that park in many years and I'd love to go back there to run or ride bikes on the trail. It's a really nice park!

Si, Ella and Mason

One of the bison

Justin and the kids -and yes, it would kill Mason to smile!

We managed to avoid the rain that was looming and had a really enjoyable morning.  We also went to a Father's Day cook-out with the family but Justin had to do some work and missed out on that. But he felt better for being productive!

We missed Grandpa J on the day...and continue to miss him a lot, especially as the 4th rolls around and we have Mason's birthday and the July 4th celebration that he always has been here for...

More updates coming soon!

The Little Phone That Could...

Do just about everything! I got an iPhone this week, mostly for work reasons and I was due for an upgrade. I am really liking it. The 2nd reason I have wanted one is for the cool camera apps. There are SO many apps...I found and downloaded 40 (almost all free) within a few hours.
Of course several were camera apps. I got a flower picture of course...



Justin fell asleep watching a movie with the kids tonight, which is common these days.




My LA trip was good but dang, that is a long flight!! Next week is Denver for a conference, then hopefully not too much more travel for the summer.

We had a few ripe strawberries from our patch today. They have been coming in pretty good this year. Justin worked a ton on the garden last weekend. The last few years the garden had so many weeds that it really was hard to keep with. He put mulch down this year and so far it has helped a ton.



Ok, that is all for now. My pointer finger is tired now :)

- Posted on the go from my iPhone

I Love This Kid :)

Silas has been asking for a mohawk for a couple months now.  I wasn't too keen on it during school but now that school is out, Justin decided to whip out the clippers and give Si a trim on the deck. 

He absolutely loves it - he was grinning from ear to ear all evening after the cut.  Ella and Mason were oohing and aahing over it and I think that made him feel really special.

He said something funny the other day -

Me: where did  you get those mosquito bites?

Si: when I was outside eating my ice cream sandwich, because mosquitoes like ice cream sandwiches

Me: ouch

Si: yeah, I wish the mosquito would have taken bites from the ice cream and not ME.

It was funny how it said it - very deadpan :)

I travel to Los Angeles this week for work.  I'm excited but I always get nervous about leaving the household.  We all know it won't run nearly as smoothly without me (ha ha) - hopefully they will survive! ;)  

Today was an incredibly gorgeous day.  The temps went from 90 yesterday to 75 today - it was beautiful! 

This was Silas on the swings...

This will be one of those photos that I'll look back at and know just how the day felt...

Much more to update - we had NY Youngers in town this weekend, but the alarm will go off in 4.5 hours and I need to get to sleep!

Me No Like Fire...

And it's pretty obvious from these photos taken by the Warrior Dash photographers!

From the look on Justin's face though, he had a ball the whole way!

 

I guess that MUD isn't too high on my list of favorites either... 

(note the wig hanging from the barbed wire - ick!)

Weekends when we don't have something like this planned seem so boring now!  :)

I am Warrior - Hear Me Roar :)

Warrior Dash 2011 - WOW!!! 
What a fantastic and muddy great time!

We started off nice and clean.  I was nervous.  I really had no idea what to expect or how I would do.

We got to the race at 8:30am and our wave was at 9:30am. Donna, Lee, Cheri, Tom and Colleen found us and they decided to run in our wave too.  It was great that we all got to run together.

Once we got started, the nervousness subsided and it was all about the fun.  It started with an extremely steep uphill run.  It seemed to last forever!!   And going downhill was just as bad because it was just as steep and muddy so it was hard not to fall/slip down the hill.

When I jumped into the water, I about freaked out - it was quite a bit deeper than they said it would be!  I was up to my mouth and nose in parts. It was very mucky on the bottom and I really couldn't stand up in it.

Cheri brought a disposable camera - me and JP at the back here.

Justin, me and Donna - this was an over/under kind of thing.

 We made it up and over!

Amanda went and was able to get some pictures of us at various obstacles.  This is me and Donna getting pretty close to the end.  There were 2 or 3 more obstacles after this one...including the FIRE and MUD!

The fire was tricky because it was really pretty high AND they had TWO set up that you had to jump over and not much room between to get a running start.

No mud pictures of us yet, but this is my high school friend Tony (he ran in the 1pm wave)

The Mud Warrior Princesses!

This is how we looked at the end of the race - the term "happy as pigs in sh*t" comes to mind...

we're pretty sure that the mud may have had some pig sh*t mixed in!  the stench was terrible!
But we were pretty happy to have finished!

Donna, Lee, me and JP

Lee, DZ, JP, me, Colleen, Tom (as Richard Simmons) and Cheri

After the race we got hosed off (kinda) with big fire hoses that were very COLD and powerful (Justin about lost an eardrum).  I wasn't brave enough to get fully cleaned off so I still had quite a bit of mud caked on me after the hosing down.

These were my shoes AFTER the hosing off...good thing I could leave them there.  They were taking them as donations for Green Sneakers. They got my socks as a bonus!

We enjoyed out Turkey Legs and Beer while sitting in the hot sun.

Results for Saturday:  3.5 miles and ~15 obstacles. Justin came in 4,945th (about 37 minutes) and I came in 5,000th (~41 minutes) out of 9,836 people for the day.  Can you BELIEVE they had that many people running in ONE day?!?  And just as many on Sunday too! Justin would have done better if he hadn't stopped to wait for me a few times. He wanted to make sure that I was able to climb up the wall.  Such a gentleman! :)

One of the best parts was hanging out afterwards people watching.  There were some crazy costumes!

This was a totally fantastic event and VERY well organized. We never had to wait in line for a bathroom or for a beer!  I will definitely be doing this again next year!!

You can view a bunch more pictures from the day here:

Preschool Graduation and All Star Soccer

Busy week for the OH Youngers!  While still recovering from the fun but tiring holiday weekend, we had to get back in the swing of things pretty quickly with Silas' graduation on Wednesday night.  It was so cute and made me cry (or course).  He was so excited and proud of his cap and diploma.

They sang a graduation song


and he got his preschool diploma.

It sounded SO crazy for his principal to say that he will be the Class of 2024 - and yet, (not) so long ago, I remember thinking that Mason's class of 2013 was forever away...and now it's just around the corner!

I love seeing my little guy still holding hands and looking little.  I know those days are numbered.

On Thursday night, Ella had her All Star soccer game (the one that got canceled with all the storms last week).  It was a great game!  Ella scored an awesome goal and her team won 4-3. She is so competitive on the field.  It's so fun to watch.

I love when she sits on the ball and watches the game.

She and her Cheetah teammates (Avery and Alice) had fun playing together one last time.  We get new teams with the Fall season :(  We will really miss the Cheetah girls that we played with the past 2 seasons!

I'm already looking forward to the next soccer season.  I hope to get E in a summer soccer camp so that she can learn some new stuff over the summer. 

Tomorrow morning, Justin and I will set out on our own competitive adventure - it's FINALLY Warrior Dash time!  Really, the only competition is between me and death.  I'll be happy with crossing the finish line in one piece so that I can sit (or lay) and enjoy my Warrior Beer!

Mom-ma

Today would have been Mom-ma's 92nd birthday! She died in 1996 but 15 years later I still miss her sense of humor and remember how smooth and soft her skin was when I'd kiss her good-bye.

Mom-ma in her moo-moo :)

We love and miss you!