Go Ducks!

The game time of 5:00 is pretty much guaranteed to prevent most parents of trick-or-treating aged kids from seeing the game, but ESPN is here in town and the Ducks are playing USC tonight. It's time for a little pre-game Oregon-colored fun, just before getting into the Halloween costume mood!

Mom Vs. Coach

I've been very lucky in my mommy career that my worlds really haven't collided all that much. In the first two years of Mackenzie's life, I was a working mom, and those times were tough all the way around. He was a high-needs baby and toddler, and it was hard to leave him each and every morning to go in to work. Fortunately, my husband was a stay-at-home parent during the day, brought him in to me every single day at lunch to nurse and play, and then went to work every night. That took the edge off of the conflict for me, and made it workable, at least in the short term.

Since I quit full-time employment though, I've really had it pretty easy. Hubby is an incredibly involved dad who hangs with the kids through my novel-writing, photography, and coaching gigs and even through my training and competing in the Ironman (no small time commitment there). The last few weeks though have brought my mom role and my role as a coach for a Team in Training triathlon team into close proximity with each other. For one thing, his job as a corporate pilot means he can be gone on the spur of the moment with very little notice. Lately, his flying has coincided with almost every critical training for my team, leading me to drag my kids around to lakes and campgrounds and hang out while I help people into wetsuits and onto bicycles. Luckily, they're very good sports and after what we have jokingly referred to as my "suck it up" speech (something about kids in Africa being responsible for their entire family's goat herd all day), they've been great at helping me out in my responsibilities, or at least keeping themselves entertained (for example, by biking around the parking lot in a pirate costume!)

This last weekend was the culmination of six months of training for my athletes, they were to attempt an Olympic distance triathlon near Bend, Oregon. Again, at the last minute my husband got called to fly and the kids and I took off in our camper van without him. Rushing around registration tables, at the same time as juggling my daughter into the kids' triathlon I had promised her she could do just about turned my last hairs grey (and there aren't that many that aren't already!), especially in a crowd of around a thousand parents and a very unexpected (by me at least) five hundred kids participating in the race. I had unwisely hopped out of the car without my cell phone, leaving my friend to park it and bring my son to meet us. It was a total mad house, but we finally did meet up and got to watch Asa smile her way through her second triathlon. She especially loved how the "swim" part of it was really a gigantic waterslide.
After the race, I briefly lost her in the finish line confusion. Fortunately, we had talked about what would happen if we got separated, and she followed our plan and walked to the bike transition area and sat next to her bike. Having a plan in a crowded place is definitely always a good idea! I was so grateful to see her sitting there.

The kids also got to come with me (and the athletes) to the pasta party. They hung out with the other athletes and listened to inspiring speeches, and also to parents describing their children's battles with leukemia (leading Asa at one point to say, not so sotto-vocce, that she hoped she never had to have leukemia. I hope not either sweetheart, which is one reason that Team in Training is so important). Fortunately after that point hubby made it over and my days of juggling coaching and mom duties wound down for the weekend. From that point on I could concentrate on my athletes, and if you want to read more about their experiences, I'm writing it up in segments on my Ironmom Blog.

Summer's Half Over, And We're Busy As Bees

I just realized today that summer is about halfway through. This one has seemed to go unusually fast. My hubby's been out of town a lot more than he's been in, which makes my days a whirlwind of trying to do all the stuff I normally do (take care of 14 animals, two kids, all the kids' activities, housework, etc.) plus all the stuff he normally takes care of (mowing lawns, fixing things, pumping bicycle tires, all the little things I never notice he's doing until he's gone and then Wow, they add up!). Still, we've managed to do a lot of cool things in the last couple of weeks since I posted last (as you can tell, getting around to blogging is much more difficult when he's gone, and I'm asleep before my head hits the pillow on more nights than I can count!)

So, since a picture's worth a thousand words (and it's 11:34 pm already and I'm running short on both brain power and words), here's a little picture history of our last two weeks:

We went to a homeschool park day, took a hike up a local butte, and discovered an Eagle's nest complete with at least one baby eagle we could hear (we've seen the parents flying out over the playground to the river to bring back some dinner). The nest is huge!



















The very next day, I crazily packed up the car to go camping at the beach with some friends. The walk-in campground that we love to go to was full (and they don't take reservations) but we used that as an opportunity to discover a new campground (at 6:00 in the evening, hoping we weren't going to be sleeping in the van at the side of the road!)
The beach was beautiful. It was warm and sunny and there was lots of sand and blue water. We had a kite. Who could ask for more?
The next day we went to a different beach, with a small river coming in, a lighthouse, tide pools, and lots of seashells to find.

The very next day, after unpacking all of our camping gear, and packing all of my triathlon gear, we set off for Washington so I could do a triathlon. I qualified for the National Age Group Triathlon Championships next year! And Asa did her first triathlon ever: 50 yard swim, 3 mile bike, 1 mile run. Hubby ran with her the whole way (including trying to keep up while she biked) so she would feel safe. She finished with a big ol' grin!
And a medal, of course. Now doesn't that just make this triathlete-mama's heart beat with joy!

















After the triathlon, we got to have dinner with my sister and brother-in-law who live in Washington, and also with an old friend of my husband's who lives in Texas but was up for a wedding and to compete on the bagpipe at the Highland Games. So of course, we had to go see her play. It was really cool to watch, I've never seen an individual bagpipe competition before, and she is amazing (she has been playing since she was old enough to hold a set of pipes)! We got to watch her father compete as well, and enjoy the rest of the games, look up a family clan (each clan had a tent there, ours is the Kerr's), and watch big burley guys in kilts heave big stones and hammers and poles around a field. Unfortunately it really started raining and we took off for home.

Once back at home, we took our newly adopted cat to the vet to have her spayed. I also wanted to ask if we were feeding her too much as she was getting rather round. Surprise! She's pregnant! We are about to have kittens. The kids over overjoyed. Cat may never give birth with children hovering over her every move.

Also on the homefront, our spring chickens began laying. The Aracanas lay the green eggs, aren't they cool?

And finally, this past weekend, we went to a Living History Festival at a local historic ranch/park. They had lots of old-fashioned kids' games like fishing. Here's Mackenzie hoping to pull out a cool prize.












And of course, the piece de' resistance, the Civil War re-enactment. Lots of big booms, horses rushing around, big guys playing soldier. Fun!

Well, that's two weeks of summer in a nutshell. Imagine all of this plus our usual karate, Asa's violin lessons and playing at the local marketplace, the kids' never-ending play, crafts, creativity, playdates, science experiments, trips to the library, etc. Wow! Think I'll go to bed now before I nod off at my keyboard

That Time Again

We had an incredibly hectic weekend that included karate belt tests for the kids and I, my mom visiting, my husband and I going out for our anniversary and spending our first night ever away from the kids, and then on Sunday a memorial service for our dog. I feel pretty wiped out right now and ready to sleep but we've launched into Monday and will be going full-tilt for the next few days.

My husband has decided to join the karate class, which will be fun for the kids because they will outrank him for awhile. I just got my blue belt, so I'll probably be moving into a different class, and the kids will be testing for their gold belts in three months. I couldn't believe how many students were at the test. There was a gymnasium full of gold belts and blue belts for my test, and then another gym full of white belts with various color stripes for the kids' test. And that didn't include all the rest of the colors! As always, I am blown away by the kids' focus, determination, and abilities. And not just my kids, it's really cool just to watch all of the kids out there trying their hardest at some techniques that are really quite difficult to master.
They had to remember three kata (series of movements) for this test, along with the associated bunkai (application of the kata to self-defense), sparring techniques, other self-defense techniques and the basics (kicks, punches, blocks). It's a lot of stuff to remember! As for me, I had to remember this kata, which we had just finished learning all of the moves to in the last month, and I was pretty nervous that I'd get lost somewhere in the middle and have to just stop. But muscle memory kicked in and I just got through the whole thing without any major hitches.

A Backyard Full of Trampoline

Our backyard is not very large and it has a heck of a slope, but we still managed to squeeze in this wonderful device! Already the kids are loving it, even in the middle of winter they're out there playing. Some friends came over who had a whole arsenal of trampoline games to play, including "popcorn" and the one in the picture which included trying to leap over the kids who are rolling around (I'm not sure what that one is called).

We've been wanting to get a trampoline for awhile now, but a local sporting goods store that went out of business provided the final impetus by marking everything down by 50%. We got the last 14 foot trampoline in the store, and I couldn't be happier! Now if I didn't get so dizzy when I jumped (notoriously sensitive inner ears), I'd be out there more myself. As it is, I try to get out with the kids, but I can't do it for very long.