Just So I Don't Forget...

So, Jack did the cutest thing tonight. We were over at my mom's house and my sister was playing the piano. On the piano bench, there was a piece of sheet music for the Simpson's theme song. After we taught Jack all of their names (it is so cute to hear him say Homer), he took the music and said...
"I going to read it..." He then opened up the music and looked around, a little confused and said..."Oh no, it's broken!"
What a smartie! He can tell when the words are missing! It will be a few years until he can read piano music, but it will happen! It was the cutest thing ever.

Run, Eat, Sleep? Repeat!

The title of this post was my mantra for this weekend. I have just returned from the Wasatch Back Relay Race. It is race that is a few years old, where you run from Logan to Park City. In short, it is a 181 mile race that you do in teams of 12 people. Every person runs three times, anywhere from 13-18 miles total. My team was called "The Roadrunners," and it was a group of people from the gym with a few others thrown in. We had a great time! I'll break it down for you!
FRIDAY:
545am: Picked up from my house by Kim for the journey to Logan
615am: Pick up Brian and Stephanie
830am: Arrive at the starting line! It was really cool and energetic! Met up with the rest of our car... Robin, Jen and Justin (who didn't run but came along for moral support) Got us geared up for upcoming 24+ hours!
1000am: Kim starts us off with a 5 mile run through Logan.
1045am: Off goes Stephanie
1130am: Robins turn!
1230pm: My turn. I ran 5 miles up into the canyon. It was a grueling run... the elevation was harder on me then I thought. I am surprised that I managed to finish 5.1 miles in 43 min.
115pm: Brian takes off for 6 miles on an uphill, dirt/gravel road. He was awesome and we had a hard time keeping ahead of him in the car. As soon as we stopped to give him water (we stopped for everyone about every 2 miles) he was coming up behind us.
210pm: Jen finishes us up on the downhill dirt/gravel road into the town of Eden. Her run was one I don't envy! At this point we met up with the other 6 people on our team and they took to running as we hung out and drove to Snowbasin, which was where they would finish up.
630pm: We met up with the other half of our team and Kim takes off again. Down hill from Snowbasin... looking pretty good.
745pm: Stephanie runs 3 miles in 21 min. WOW!
806pm: Robins turn again?
900pm: Here I go again... am I sure I want to be in this race? I ran 3 miles in 23 min.
923pm: Off goes Brian. Our schedule had him running 6 miles at a 7:30 pace... He was skeptical... but he did it!
1010pm: Jen takes off. By this time, it was as dark as could be... we had a hard time seeing her coming. She did great though... finished us up strong!
1100pm: Met up with van 2 and sent them on their way! We stopped here for our first "real" meal of the day... lots of spaghetti and bread. After we ate we started the drive to the next exchange point in the hope of catching a few hours of sleep. However, it took us about an hour to get there. The traffic was bad... there were 576 teams, 12 people to a team and 2 cars to a team. Throw in the runners... it made for some congested roads.
SATURDAY
1ooam: Threw our sleeping bags in some grassy meadow around Rockport. (Erica, I thought of you!)
300am: Received wakeup call from car 2... Our last runner had just started her 5 miles so it was time to get up and get Kim ready to run!
345am: Kim takes off on her last five miles. Anyone think we are crazy yet?
430am: Stephanie
515am: Robin (I don't remember much of their runs... I was still half asleep and dreading my last run.)
600am: Finally down to my last run. This run was up Highway 32 as it passes by Jordanelle. So mostly uphill. Pretty tough, but my favorite run. It makes me feel strong to run uphill. I was happy to finish that in 45 min. (5 miles)
645am: Brian's turn for 4 miles downhill. He cruised at about 6:30 pace.
715am: Jen's last run. Easy 3.6 miles.
750am: Passed the torch and we were done!! Our second car had a really tough last leg... I was happy to be done. We went and waited for them at the finish line. We were the first runners to get our massages.
115pm: Crossed the finish line as a team in 27 hr, 9 min or so.
It was such a great time! We had a great team and a lot of fun. Although the highlight was when the horse stuck his head right into our car. :) It was fun to see so many people being crazy together. We came in 147th out of 545, so not bad! The BYU track team won... They started 7 hours later then us, but beat us by 10 hours. They passed us up on my last run... boy can they run! Their time was 17 hr, 19 min.
Jason and Jack came and picked me up and when I got home I slept for 4 hours. Then I slept for another 12 or so last night. I feel better now. All in all a wonderful time (very beautiful!), even if it was a little crazy. I can't wait to do it again!

Happy Fathers Day!

To my sweet hubby,
Happy Fathers Day to you! It wasn't very eventful and I am sorry for that, but I hope you know how much I love you and how proud I am to have you as the father of our sweet boy. You are so good with him... so patient, loving, fun and caring. I love to watch you and Jack together. You can tell that he just loves his daddy! You are a great example for our son to grow up with and I know that you will be a wonderful teacher for him. You are a awesome partner for me and I am so thankful that I can always count on you and all the support you give me in everything I do. I am bascially free to do whatever I want because I know that you will back me up and that is so special to me. I love you so much and look forward to the years to come and all the parenting that we get to do together!
Love, me
PS: The leaf is a gift from Jack in nursery today. It says, "Sorry if I bug you. Happy Fathers Day." And the black "bugs" are olives. How cute is that???

10 Mile Run!

What's this picture you ask?? Well, it is the time that I clocked in my 10 mile race this weekend! My friend Kari and I ran the Provo Trail 10 Mile Run this weekend and had a blast! It was down Provo canyon and was a really pretty run. We started at 8 am and were kind of using it as a training run for the Wasatch Back (which is next weekend) and so we weren't sure how fast we would do the run. We started at the back of the pack but our speed kicked in and soon we were passing people right and left. I felt really good the whole way, except that running down hill is harder on your legs then you think. My calves started feeling pretty tight around mile 8 but surprisingly my pace held steady. So, if you don't mind... I am going to brag a little... I hit mile 3 at 24 min... mile 5 at 39 min... mile 6 at 47... mile 8 at 63 and finally mile 10 at 1 hr 19 min and 34 sec! My goal was to do it in 1 hour 20 min, which would have been an 8 min mile and that is a fairly fast pace for me to sustain over 10 miles, but I did it! Yay for me! Now on to the Wasatch Back!

Wheeler Farm, Jungle Jims and A Movie!

In keeping with my "weekly new thing" for the summer, Jack and I have done a few more things. On Friday (last week), Jason and I had no idea what to do and the night was looming ahead of us. We decided to go to Jungle Jims and see what Jack thought of it. It is very cheap... only $5 for Jack and the adults get in free. The rides were fun, but I think that Jack might be a little young for most of them. He did enjoy seeing the sights though and being somewhere new.
This last Friday, I took him to Wheeler Farm. I had heard about some big thing going on there but didn't know if that was really the case or not... I drove by and saw that there indeed was something going on so Jack and I stopped in and walked around for a bit. He loved it! He saw bunnies, cows, chickens, horses and ducks. He ran around and just enjoyed being out in the sun.
On Saturday, Jason and I decided to venture out and see how he would do at a movie. We went and saw Kung Fu Panda, and I am happy to report that Jack did awesome. We bought him a kids meal (popcorn, candy and a drink) and he sat on my lap and watched the whole movie. The movie was cute and funny and the perfect length. Anything longer would have been too much.
It is so fun to introduce Jack to all these new things and to get him out into the world. This week we are going to go swimming!

Fish Days!

Yesterday we were able to go to a fun activity at a park close to our house. It was called "Fish Days" and the city had set up a really fun afternoon for families. There is a pond at the park and people were able to come and fish, they had a huge bouncy castle and free hot dogs, chips and drinks. I heard about it from a friend and so I called Celeste and Shane and we were able to meet up with them and Belle and take the kids and have a lot of fun.
Jack loved the bouncy castle, the ducks, the hot dogs and most of all, the sprinklers. The other really cool thing about the park is that they have a sprinkler system (like the Gateway, if you know what I am talking about) and the kids can turn it on and run through it all they want. It was a lot of fun to see Jack and Belle having such a blast! I love summer!!

A Day At The Zoo!

I took Jack to the zoo last week. He had a good time, but I think he may still be a little young for it. He was really tired and seemed to lose interest towards the end, but he had a great time with the kids that we went with and really enjoyed seeing the bears, monkeys and the baby alligator. We rented a wagon and had a bunch of good snacks... he couldn't have asked for a better afternoon. For me, it was fun to get together with other ladies and their kids. Playdates will have to become a weekly occurence for the summer!