100 MILES

In August, Sarah and I did a 50+ mile bike ride and crazy me says, "hey!  If we can do 50 and feel so good, let's go do a century!!"  And crazy Sarah says, Ok!  And off I went to the computer to find us a Century Ride and that's how I found the Wonder Woman Century Ride.  I was thrilled it was all women (sorry guys, but I'm not a fast rider and you make me feel slow), it was also close to home, and it wasn't competitive.  I talked Rach into doing the ride too - and lucky us, another dear friend of mine, Susan, was looking for someone to do the ride with!  That's how our group came together.  

Here is a pic of us that morning - smiling and ready to ride!  Susan has already decided that today is not a good day for 100 miles (due to knee surgery) so she'll do the shorter loop.

THE RIDE WAS LONG!  LONG!  LONG!!  I've done a century before - but I did it alone.  It was a very different experience to ride with friends -- lots of great conversations and I'm glad they were there to encourage me along.  Overall, I wasn't as prepared for this ride as I was two years ago.  I hadn't planned or prepped for a century ride - I think we had a month of "preparation"!  I think we all had our moments of discouragement - but since everyone else was still going, we just stuck together.  Susan had her chance to turn off for a shorter ride, but she turned to the left with us!  We were so happy to have her along for the long haul, but I'm afraid it really did hurt her knee (and she is still having issues).  I'm so very sorry about that!  But, she wasn't in pain while riding, so she kept enjoying the ride!  The effects were felt later...  

Most of the ride was beautiful.  I need pics from Rach - she was good about taking pics with her phone along the ride.  We rode up in a canyon at the break of dawn - LOVED THAT!  And we rode past orchards that smelled SOOOO good.  There were also stinky fields followed by a strong head wind that made you feel like it would never end.  After lunch, I was riding along and I thought to myself, I can do this.  Then I looked at my spedometer and realized that I had only gone 5 miles since lunch and it felt like HOURS.  I wasn't so sure of myself at that point in the ride.  But, the end of the ride was the hardest.  We were coming towards the finish line and we knew we were close.  We also knew there were 15 more miles to get on those spedometers, but when the path started sending us BACKWARDS and further from the finish line, it was very disheartening.  The miles worked out in the end, but to go the opposite direction after so much riding was honestly a huge frustration and it made me so discouraged.  But, we kept pedaling and eventually we were heading back the right direction.  

As I came around the corner for the final block, I saw my dad standing there with his camera.  I felt the tears well up and I couldn't stop them!  I'm so glad he was there for me (Shayne had other committments)!  Here I am riding to the finish - 100 miles on my bicycle.

Here's our group at the finish line - we did it!!

Was it hard?  Yes!  Was it worth it?  Yes!  I love being on my bike.  And I also love knowing that I can do hard things.  I'm hoping my example of doing hard things will help my boys know that they can do hard things too!  It felt very empowering to go beyond myself and I plan to do it again!

Ten!!

Hunter was able to invite a few friends over for a 10th birthday party (we do parties on the even years).  He wanted to go to JumpOnIt - which was great.  Shayne, the coupon king, managed to get us all in for under $15 - yeah, he's the best.  And then we went home to eat Ice Cream Sundae's - with toppings galore.  To top off the perfect 10 year old, they spent the next hour(s) playing Minecraft.  

Favorite Video Games: Minecraft and Halo with Daddy
Favorite recess activity:  Lightning (basketball)
Favorite Food(s):  Pepperoni Pizza and
What do you want to be when you grow up?  A video game engineer or an artist.
Favorite sports: Soccer, Basketball, and Tennis
Favorite thing to do: play with friends!

Special Visitors

My former orchestra director from High School came to town!  Yup, I still keep in touch with this amazing woman and what a treat to have a weekend with her and her husband with my chaos in action!  We enjoyed the fall colors in the mountains and even went to a live performance of the Mormon Tabernacle Choir on Sunday morning.  It was awesome!  My boys IMMEDIATELY loved these "special visitors" and Danny keeps asking me when we'll see my friend who loves kids again... she radiates love!

yummy

I finished lessons one night, and found these treat made especially for me.  It's 2 different yogurts decorated with freshly picked raspberries from our garden.  Cole can be the absolutely sweetest and most affectionate kid when he chooses to be!

And this is a new favorite photo - Skyler eating a peanut-butter banana, happy happy boy!

A dollar to burn...

In our church, we have 2 gentlemen who will come visit us monthly to share a little message and also offer their services should a need arise.  We call these our "home-teachers."  Well, one of our current home-teacher's knows EVERYTHING about electronics and computers and of course, has Cole MESMORIZED by his vast knowledge.  He also gave Cole some left-over computer parts - it was like Christmas.  So, I shouldn't be surprised when I hear about Cole's most recent adventure...

Cole and his best friend decided to find someone to take them to the store to buy a treat.  Connor had a dollar in his pocket and they were determined to get to a gas station.  But, I was busy teaching lessons and from what I hear, Connor's mom was busy with a project of her own.  The boys set off to Bro. Peter's house (our home-teacher).  He's not at home, but his wife answers the door and they ask her if she could take them to the gas station.  She's a little concerned about these two boys walking through the neighborhood and asking for a ride.  After she convinces them that she is not able to take them and they should go talk to their moms ("Oh no, our moms can't take us because Cole's mom is teaching lessons and Connor's mom is busy too) she makes a quick phone call to us both.  (But I didn't pick up the phone since I was teaching!)  The boys proceeded across the street and decide to ask another friend's mother if she could take them to the gas station.  She was very sorry that she could not help them since she was babysitting other little kids and it just wasn't a good idea for her to take them and they should go talk to their moms about this.  They said they understood and left, but only to the front yard.  They hung out there for 5-10 minutes and then came back to her door to ask if the kids had left yet that she was babysitting.  Thankfully, she thought it was funny and amusing and sent them on their way with a laugh.  I'm not sure if they asked anyone else in the neighborhood for a ride - but those are the two I heard from personally.

When I heard about this I was upset!!  First of all, that he was asking neighbors (and possibly strangers?!?) for a ride and that he was NOT where he had promised to be during my lesson time.  When I approached him about the whole incident (which unfortunately was a couple days after it had happened) Cole looked at me with that that "deer in the headlights" look and said, "oh, you finally found out about that?"
Yes I did.  Do you want to talk to me about it?
"Well, we really wanted to go to the gas station 'cause Connor had a dollar.  And our home-teacher promised to help me if I ever needed anything!"
It was hard to be mad after that...

Mommy vs Daddy

Cole says to Hunter:  Why are girls smarter than boys?

Hunter: They AREN'T!

Cole: Yes they are.  Mommy is smarter than daddy.  She knows more.  She always know what's going on, what's going to happen, and she always knows what we did.  It's interesting...

(me in the background, laughing to myself with a smirk!)

Crawling like a sniper...

Cole is responsible for teaching Skyler to crawl!  He kept putting out a little bell and every time he inched forward, he'd move the bell further away!  Skyler didn't seem to mind since it had finally clicked - "I CAN GO FORWARD!"  Up to this point it was a lot of rolling around and scooting backwards.  He's now a pro. and we have to be vigilent to watch that quick boy!

And I just wanted to show you that Skyler is not afraid of my vacuum.  He'll chase me around while I vacuum and he was quite happy to have caught up with me at this moment.  I saw the camera sitting there on my dresser and I took a few pics and a video of him talking to the vacuum.  (He also kissed it...)

Some of my favorite things that Skyler does lately:
-sniper crawl
-sucks on the edge of his blankets to go to sleep  (he never did take a binky!)
-he turns on his own music - his music mobile (which no longer has the mobile part on it) has buttons to play 3 different classical songs - sometimes when going to sleep and sometimes when we take too long to get him up in the morning/naps.
-he LOVES baths.  If I turn on the water, he'll go into "HYPER-drive" crawl and comes to the edge of the tub and hits on it babbling in his own language, "Let me in!!"

Back to School

2 Carpools

2 piano teachers

1 preschool music class

2 afternoons/evenings teaching private clarinet lessons

Chess Club, School Choir, and extra carpools to manage extra activities

homework and more homework

read, read, read, read, read, read

Here we go again..

PS I don't think that list really represents how busy we are - sounds so nice, and concise and it doesn't feel that way in action!

4th grade at school #1

2nd grade at school #2

Preschool with neighborhood co-op (2x's a week)