Today Might Just Be the Day...

What happens in the daily life of the family.. the drama of foster care, the adventures of parenting, & pictures to share with everyone!

Changes

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I am *finally* on our desktop sitting down–the last couple of blog posts have been from my ipad while I was either hanging out with the husband or on the go with the kids. I think the term summer “break” is a total misnomer! There has been no “break” in our days!

We have been filling the time with friends and swimming and outings. We have been so busy that I’ve forgotten to send out the typical e-mails inviting our friends to join in. So, if you’re local and free, drop me a line and I’ll fill you in on where we’ll be. This week we have 4 play dates planned already!

But, before we jump into another crazy week, I wanted to take the time to post photos from the end of the year. Little d’s teacher was so sweet this year and on the last day sent them home with a card for the parents.. on the front there was a photo from the first day of school, on the inside there was a current photo. It was adorable. And my how much d has grown this year! So, I thought I’d do the same sort of thing for you all…

First day

Last day with her teacher

First day of school (this photo is my desktop photo!)

Last Day!

 

 

Keep on Moving

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I struggle with depression. Some people don’t know this about me. I am on medication. I work really hard to be as healthy mentally as possible. But, it is a struggle. No doubt about it, it can wear me down.

However, I have to say that the past year or so has been a lot better. There have been fewer really bad days. And that is a good thing. And I think that there is one thing that I am sure that has helped me and that is running. I can’t say that I wake up and itch to jog or anything crazy like that. But, I do feel better after a jog. It gives me time alone. It pumps the endorphins. And, I hear it’s good for weight loss (although, you really can’t tell by looking at me).

One of the things that I *need* if I want to keep going as far as running is a goal. Last year, it was my first half marathon. After that one, I signed up for a couple more so I couldn’t slack on the training. Now, I’m working towards being able to jog all 13.1 miles next November without doing intervals (for the ones I’ve run so far I’ve done 8 minutes of jogging, 2 of walking throughout the whole course).

And I am very excited that the husband has now signed up for his first half early next year!!!

While I’m working away, my mom actually asked me about training, too. She’s considering doing her first half 🙂

So, I wanted to share a few links that I use.

First, to find a run near you check out www.active.com

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Ack!

I just re-read this post and saw that half of what I’d typed is missing. I am guessing I was a victim of myself–not saving my changes.

Anyhow, there are a few things that were left out!

If you’re just starting to jog/run, I highly reccomend a program called “Couch to 5k”. If you google, you’ll find a bunch of hits and sites that talk about this program. It’s 9 weeks long and uses intervals to build up to being able to run 30 minutes straight. If you jog with a ipod or MP3 player, search for podcasts and you’ll find a bunch that will guide you through each workout. Now, I know I *just* said that it’s 9 weeks long, but I encourage you to make it your own. Personally, I’ve always been able to skip the first couple of weeks–even though I’ve not always been a runner, I’ve always done some cardio so I was able to skip ahead. Also, you may find that some weeks are just too tough. It’s just fine to repeat a week. I fall back on the intervals for nearly all of my long runs and used intervals for all of my half marathons (I’ve jogged 8 minutes walked 2 for the whole 13.1 miles!). So, go take a look–http://www.c25k.com/

After you’ve mastered the 5k you can move onto a 10k or start your marathon training 🙂

For marathons I’ve always been told that Hal Higdon is “the man”. Don’t ask me his story or anything like that (I don’t research these things, I just go for it! Ha!).. But, he has some awesome training plans. Check out his site (http://www.halhigdon.com/) for his training plans.

Now, as I built up my distances I needed more info.. I’ve turned to a few running magazines and blogs.. I don’t think it really matters where you look as long as you trust the source and make sure that you’re not taking on more than your body can handle.

I would love to hear if you are doing any races or runs or resources that you use for your training!

 

 

 

 

…. Bed time yet…?

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Summer is here. Nana & Papa are gone, Daddy is out of town for work. So, it’s just me and the kids. Here was our day:

Breakfast, laundry, coupon clipping, CVS run, movies, mall run (Claire’s, Lego store, Build a Bear & Bare Essentials), snacks, reading, math worksheets, cut more coupons, grocery store, home to put up the groceries, library, Lego Club at the library, Kumon, more laundry, dishes, dinner, desert experiment (frozen, chocolate dipped bananas…), clean up all of the mess from dinner & desert, more laundry, movie from the library….

So.very.tired.

And tomorrow will be here too soon!

Pride

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Nana is in town which means that there is lots of game time. Bean has been her typical drama queen self… So, she usually plays a round or two, then has a meltdown.

 

Anyhow, during one round of UNO, things were going her way and she was in good spirits. She gets a chance to play one of her “mean” cards (I think it was a draw two). And, of course, she wants to do a little taunting… And her line was, “You guys are not going to be proud of me!”

 

That kid cracks me up.

School is Done!

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And I think I might be happier than the kids. For the first time, as a parent, I have had teacher issues. There was one teacher who simply refused to work with me to educate my child. She wouldn’t answer calls or e-mails, wouldn’t meet with us outside of school hours. And pretty much welcomed us to leave the school. But, we made it through! There was learning done and amazing progress in spite of her total lack of professionalism.

I am so glad that the fight is over!

And, if nothing else, it had made me appreciate the good teachers! I gave extra gifts to the good ones & left the naughty one out. 🙂 Not too diplomatic of me, but I can only fake my kindness for so long. Ha!

I took photos this morning, but we have a full house (Nana & Papa are in town) and I anticipate bring extra busy… So, look for them in a bit.

Hope you are enjoying the beginning of your summer, too.

Triage

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In my former life, as a restaurant manager, there were days when I felt like all I did all day was put out fires. I would move from one crisis to the next. I remember talking to myself and trying to prioritize as I went… Beer for the bar, get yelled at by a guest, see if the kitchen had the ticket I was waiting on, run discounts for a server..

 

This past week has been a little like that. It feels like triage at times. What things needed my immediate attention, and what things will survive for a day. Thankfully, it seems to be winding down. Maggie (the pup) had a broken leg and surgery last week. She is feeling better, but very unhappy to still be confined. Grandpa had more than a couple medical issues… He, too, is feeling better and is happy to finally be discharged from the hospital. One Aunt is scheduled for surgery soon and one Uncle just had surgery while another has a broken foot. Oh, and did I mention that Dad is still traveling a ton for work?! Of course, we are never without our kid and parenting issues either. From poor decision making to lying and the drama of not having homework–less of our routine means amped behavior issues.

 

But, like an ER or a restaurant, there are lulls… We cleaned a lot to get ready for visitors–Nana & Papa are in the air headed here right now. And I think that I will get to put my feet up a little this week. Well, after all of the end of school stuff..

Eh,  who am I kidding? School is out after tomorrow. I’ll rest when it restarts!

Really?

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The conversation I had last night with d in the car.

d: Mom, I want to say a bad word.

me: What bad word do you want to say?

d: The F word.

me (after slight hesitation as to what I *should* say in this situation & deciding to take away the power of the word): O.K. Go ahead and say it.

d: No.

me: What? Why not?

d:… giggle… I don’t know. You’re going to get mad at me.

me: No, I told you I wouldn’t. Go ahead and say it if you really want to.

d: No, I can’t.

me: No, really, I told you you could.

d: No, you’re going to tell Dad.

me: Yep, I’m definitely telling Daddy about this conversation….

 

And we were both giggling at that point.

The kid cracks me up. I don’t get his obsession with “bad” words and the such, but it is what it is. And I’m pretty glad that the urge to say bad words left as quickly as it came.

Lather, Rinse, Repeat

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With all of the drama in the media regarding stay at home moms lately, I often ponder my role in the world. I definitely think that I can have an opinion on politics and the world, even if I don’t bring in a paycheck.

And sometimes I do think that it’s the hardest job in the world. Other times, I think I’m downright spoiled.

But, no matter what kind of day it is, I know that the next day will hold something entirely new.

Yesterday, Bean and I were at Costco (she was my adorable helper as we figured out the self-scanner) when I got a phone call. The reporter who interviewed us for the last piece wanted to know if he could come by again. We loved the segment he did last time so we were happy to participate again. However, that meant a change in plans. In the morning, I’d been pulling out drawers and sorting through them and making all sorts of messes. It seemed that now I had to reverse gears and clean. Nothing helps me crisis clean like a deadline and a television camera headed to my house. I succeeded in cleaning the entire middle floor and most of the downstairs before the kids even made it home from school.

The kids were all well-behaved for the reporter and we are looking forward to seeing the piece–I will, of course, share when it airs.. But, it should be a couple weeks.

And as a reward we took them out for dinner & dessert!

And then we crashed.. for a couple hours. V woke up in the middle of the night though. He had a pretty high temp (103.5) so B and I went to work getting it lowered and trying to get him comfortable. And then a couple hours later Maggie decided that it was time for her to be up.

So, that’s where my mind is. Everyday is something new, but it’s all in a day’s work as a parent. Never a dull moment.

V is feeling better this morning and we’ll be off to the pediatrician as soon as he can fit us in. But, we’ll be able to nap in a nice clean house in the meantime 🙂

 

Chase the Night

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With B losing all of that weight, he’s now running like me. And our kids, obviously, have tons of energy. So, a month or so ago I was looking at races that I wanted to try and I came across a new one in Phoenix. It’s the Firefly Run. I showed D the photos and asked if he’d like to try to run a 5k with me. He said he was interested, but then nothing more really happened. And I *always* hesitate when it comes to actually registering for a run. So, I sort of wrote it off thinking that D didn’t really care so I’d just save the money and not run it.

But, I was pleasantly surprised a week ago when he brought it up again out of the blue. So, I registered D and B and me to run in our first night 5k and D’s first 5k 🙂

Grandma and Grandpa came over to watch the rest of the kids on Saturday night and we went down to the run. It was pretty chilly by Phoenix standards (65) so D was shivering, but we layered him with one of the race shirts and he did fine. The theme to this run is “chasing the night” so they encourage costumes and anything that lights up or glows. So, we made sure that we dressed the part.

 

I knew that the biggest challenge would be pacing. I am *much* slower than B. And D doesn’t really “get” jogging… he only knows how to run full out and there’s no way that he can keep it up for 3 miles. So, we ended up starting somewhere between my pace and B’s pace. D had a hard time going that slow–sometimes he was power walking, and when he’d go to run, he’d push ahead. And after a mile or so, he was ready to be done. He also needed a bathroom (whoops!). We stopped and walked a bit at the halfway point where there was a water station. And then he was ready to keep moving. Just before the 2 mile mark, D & B slowed down to try to look for a place to go and I went on ahead. I started off going slower so they could catch me and then after a quarter mile or so I just got into my comfortable pace.

Later B told me that D kept asking him how much longer (time wise) the run was and he told him that it depended on how fast they went. So, D ended up powering through.

I finished with a sprint and walked back to find them, but I was only a minute or so ahead of them.. and I finished for a second time with them 🙂

Our chip times were:

Me 32:48

B 33:37

D 33:36

As soon as we were done, D admitted that it was a bit of a challenge. And he looked at me like I was nuts when I asked him if he could do another 10 miles, like my half marathons.. But, by the time we reached the car, he was over that & said that it was easy 🙂 Gotta love the youthful enthusiasm.

I loved running with my guys and am so happy that they’re willing to go along with old Mom and do that sort of crazy stuff!

Before and After

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I started this post *months* ago, but it still applies 🙂

 

So, I alluded to the huge life change that B has done over the weekend.

For those of you who don’t see us/him on a regular basis I wanted to share his huge accomplishment. B has lost over 80 pounds in the last six months. He did a very calorie restrictive diet to drop the pounds so quickly. Now he’s slowly transitioning to a low calorie balanced diet with exercise to maintain. He would still like to lose a little bit of weight, but he’s working on maintaining for a little while before he drops the last few. What I love the most is seeing the new man he is. He has more energy and life. For Valentine’s we did our first 5k together. And in a couple weeks we’ll be doing another local run (4.2 this time–see you all at the Tillman run!).

I asked his permission and he says I can, so I’m bragging and showing him off!

 

 

This is the fall of 2010

 

One more "before"

Last month

And a shot of all of him on Christmas

 

Aren’t I a lucky girl?!? For our 9th Anniversary, I got to be married to a whole new man!

I’m so proud of you, Baby-baby!!