Relay Rocks

Relay was amazing this year! My cousin Sara stopped by to walk with me. She was only going to walk/run 3-4 miles with me, but soon we were running and ended up running for 10! It was just awesome! It was really rather hot however,so her and I were just dripping with sweat!
After she took off (around 2am) I headed over to our campsite to rest my legs a bit before walking some more,and I sat on my air mattress and just couldn’t even move! I fell fast asleep until 5am for the morning ceremony.
They had a pianist that was only a middle schooler playing some really beautiful music. Some people made balloon memorials for the balloon release that was about to happen! This poem was read:
Where do balloons go mommy when you set them free?
Do they float into clouds or get stuck in a tree?
Do they fly high in the sky or get popped by a bee?
Do they soar with the birds and the bugs in the air
Or stay close to the ground and get chased by a bear?
Does the wind blow them out over the Big blue ocean
Or do they climb up and over small hills and big mountains!
Do they go out in space and circle the stars
And then fall back to Earth after traveling so far?
Or does God collect them all in a big bouquet
And give them to children in heaven each day?
Where do balloons go mommy when you set them free?
I hope they go to Heaven as a gift from ME!
As if I wasn’t crying before, this just really made me cry,and actually I’m tearing up just thinking about it. It was so beautiful! Next year I’m definitely doing a memorial balloon! I’ll post some photos later,but i’m Oh so tired!

Trip to Bayfield/Madeline Island



This past weekend J and I celebrated our 5 year wedding anniversary! To celebrate we took a trip up to Bayfield Wisconsin/Madeline Island.

We left on Friday around 2:30pm after we dropped off Kirra and Tyler with the in-laws.
We stopped along the Namekagon river a few times to snap photos and check out canoe trips for the future. Around 6pm or so we finally pulled into our Cottage. Woodside Cottages. Coincidently and no prior planning these are the same cottages J’s co-workers stay in every winter. Soon we met our cabin hosts who might just be the sweetest people on earth. Gary – gave us the area run down and a few pointers…and even called us dinner reservations.
We got situated in the room and were off to downtown Bayfield to take a quick look at things before dinner and buy some wine.
Dinner was at Wild Rice Restaurant. My new favorite place ever! The food and atmosphere were simply to die for. Jason had Bison with prosciutto wrapped asparagus, and I had Whitefish and Trout.
Saturday we woke up and headed up to the Apostle Islands Golf Course. We decided to play just 9 holes since we still wanted to head over to Madeline Island via bicycle. We unfortunately got caught behind a group that took 3… yes THREE hours to play 9 holes. We couldn’t even believe it. When we got back to the club house we mentioned something to management so they bought us a free round at the clubhouse.
Finally – around 3pm we were off for Madeline Island. We got on the ferry and went exploring. Our first stop was Tom’s Burned down Cafe,however they had no bathrooms so we headed to Grandpa Tony’s instead. There we had some pizza and then headed off to Big Bay State Park looking for cliffs. We found no cliffs, but the beach was kind of pretty… but crowded,so we headed off into the woods for a little hike to the lagoon.
The hike would have been better… if we were wearing appropriate footwear, and had mosquito repellent on. The path wasn’t really a path…it was just a barely there path that you could kind of decipher. I put J in charge of deciphering where to go. Meanwhile I was getting eaten alive by mosquitos and deer flies. It was just awful. I just wanted to take a bath in Benadryl gel. We eventually found the lagoon, but still had about a mile to hike in, so we gave up after 35 minutes of hiking and headed back. On our way back we saw Darla the deer!
We biked back and went back to Toms Burned Down Cafe for a drink. They do not lack in alcohol or skimp at all on Madeline Island!!! We headed back towards the ferry, but it had just taken off so we went to the Beach Club for another cocktail where they again didn’t disappoint. Plus their views of Lake Superior was amazing!
Sadly it was time to get back to Bayfield but we decided to come back each year on our anniversary weekend. We got in and headed to some hotel bar that had a huge deck overlooking Lake Superior. We stayed there for several hours abandoning our cares of riding our bikes back to the cottage in the dark (I had a back light at least).
We were starting to get hungry but unfortunately we weren’t finding any food.
Finally we found Morts Pub a hole in the wall bar that had so-so food, but I wasn’t completely sober so it didn’t bother me too much. I even tried to play the piano at the bar,and did a so-so job…. but again… I wasn’t completely sober…. 🙂
Today we woke up late and packed up to drive the four hours back home. It was a wonderful trip and I can’t wait to go back again next year!!!!

Too jazzed up

So I’m way too jazzed up to fall asleep, so I decided to blog,and update my design, because I have total ADD and can’t stand to have the same design for more than a few weeks, but hey! At least I’ve had the same e-mail address for a whole year. Small steps!

Monday was the 2nd Annual – Red,White & Boom! TC Half Marathon. I had to wake up at 2:00 a.m. to meet up with my co-helpers Andrea & John to set up the course. We had a bit too much fun at 3:00 a.m. almost walking right in front of a semi truck in our zombie like state,and then nearly poking out Andrea’s eyes with the tip of the mile marker. But the real fun happened at mile 7 when Andrea almost killed John and I with her Mini-van. I’m for real LOLing right now, and almost choking! We were parked on a small hill and Andrea thought her car was in park. John and I were standing outside at the hatch trying to open her door, when John shouts to me, “oh my God, L watch out…” at this point I noticed the van coming at me with increasing speed. I run into a grassy median and watch as Andrea starts running after her car which is rolling backwards down the hill and  trying to get back in her van while it rolled down the hill toward Johnson. She made it with no casualties including her van. HHAHAH. I practically fell down in the grass rolling and laughing. We were now all even for nearly getting killed.

The race went off without a hitch and I enjoyed the rest of my day at the beach then napping,then watching fireworks with a friend and K.

Now laying in bed here… not tired…[this is what happens when you run twice and play tennis in one day] ~ I keep thinking of how to make my garage sale great! I want this stuff to sell like hotcakes, so I’m pricing everything to sell and to make $$$. If you have any super amazing tips feel free to comment. I hardly get any comments on my blog so this would easily be as exciting as Christmas.

Well its now 12:30. I can almost hear Caribou Coffee calling my name in the morning…but first I gotta fall asleep. 🙂

UPDATE: So I went to bed for about 8 minutes but somehow my house has been invaded by mosquito’s! Those little bastards are in my bedroom biting me! I HATE them. I already look like I have small pox because they’ve been particularly bad this summer….I’m considering spraying Deep Woods Off all over me! (kind of gross though). Here’s to me NOT being dinner!

Weekend Re-Cap

Friday was such a fun mommy and daughter day!

Friday during work I drove around the RWB! Course with our intern and put up road closed signs. So much better doing this task with two people vs. just one. Last year it took me about 7 hours, and this year it only took about 3.5.

After work I went and picked up Kirra at my parents, and brought her out to the Mall of America! We went to Sea Life… which is the new “Underwater Adventures”…and boy has it improved!!!

 

 
 

After Sea Life we went into the American Girls Doll store, and was that an adventure! Kirra had a blast playing no hold barrel with all of the fun babies and accessories! I ended up getting her the front pack carrier, but I’m sure I’ll be going back for the diaper bag soon!!! 🙂

 

After AG store,we went on a ride. The Wonder Pets ride. It was so nice and NOT crowded at all at the mall. Definitely the way/time to go.

Finally it was time for a little dinner. We had Panda Express, because its just like what Kai Lan eats… We both got a pop,and even got a fortune cookie (well this is no shocker). I read my fortune to Kirra and it said…”Buy someone you love a special present”….so that was cute since I had just bought her the carrier… so Kirra opens her fortune cookie and says…”mama…this is what it says…..”Thank you for the yummy food and the baby present”….

Aww. What a sweet girl!

Once we got home Kirra refused to play with the front pack carrier stating that she didn’t like it…. and even on Saturday morning she told me again that she didn’t like it…. so regrettably (on my end… because maybe I liked it more than she did… it will be going back to MOA!)

Saturday we woke up early for MOTR. I wasn’t looking forward to going, but one I got out there it felt great as usual! I’m still in the early stages of training, so some of my MOTR runs can count towards training, but I think I’m going to need to bring my running stuff with me to work so I can run over the lunch hour.

After MOTR we went home and cleaned ship. Well… I cleaned ship, while Kirra got out the 50 Cal machine gun and went to work on her room!!! I suppose it’s my fault really… I didn’t specifically tell her not to trash her room!

Then it was time to get daddy from work,and head over to Wisconsin for Jason’s brother’s open house. It was a great evening with great company. After watching a terrifying show on the History channel I’ve been terrified of the Stillwater Lift Bridge going over into Wisconsin… and driving over there I pushed the speed limit to get across…. well on our way back we got stopped ON the bridge for about 20 minutes while boats went through. I thought I was going to have an aneurism, but I did survive.

Today was a nice day. We went to church in the morning, and then I did some pregnancy photos for one of my friends, and returned the carrier to the MOA for the diaper bag  (pictured above). She was thrilled with it, and hasn’t stopped playing with it… well… except to wash the dishes tonight!!!

(Yes she is wearing a swimming suit specifically for washing dishes!)

Swimming!

 

 

Kirra is now a Pike for swimming, and she is very very excited about it! In fact, she will tell anyone who will listen (a skill she learned from me I think…) Lessons went good today. They “dove” right in (no pun intended) and did a quick review of everything they learned. She even learned how to do the backstroke!

Yeah… this video is totally crooked,because I don’t know how to operate this thing yet!!! I’ll get better! Notice the kid who couldn’t be patient,and swam by himself up to the instructor!
Well… take a look at that! Lindsey learns how to properly film using her phone camera!

Family Update

No-No-No… I knew with a post title like this you’d automatically think we’re updating our family as in (more kids)…. but I realized after going through my blog that i haven’t really posted a writing post in quite a while! So I thought it was about time to update y’all on the family!

Jason:
Still putting in long hours at work,enjoying fishing and golfing whenever possible. Stopped doing tattoos this past winter. He is officially on an undeclared amount of time sabbatical from it.

Kirra:
Gosh…did I ever tell you how much that girl changes? (and I’m not just referring to clothing changes…which by the way she does an awful lot of) but she changes so much from week to week, getting smarter and smarter! She can give you directions if you ask her how to get to Cub, or home, or a certain place we travel too a lot…and just some of her phrases are so adult like….We start swimming lessons again on Thursday. Kirra is past excited about it. She tells everyone that she can! I’ll post some pictures, and do a blog post on that after her first lesson. We are in the Y’s program, and this session she will be a Pike! Pikes learn basic paddle stroke, kicking skills and floating with instructor support.

Me: I’ve been a runnin’ fool lately! I’m still helping to coach a beginners running class with Moms on The Run. I’m really enjoying that, and I’m amazed at how much its really contributing to my overall running! I’m consistently running a sub 9 minute mile which I am pleased as punch about. I’d been stuck running a 12 minute mile FOREVER….which is fine if that’s what you want to do… but I wanted to be faster… I knew I could be….so….my declared races are two trail runs….a half marathon and a 10K…..and Women Run the Cities 10 Mile. There is one more race too….but I will see how training goes,before i go officially public with that race!

Human

I know it’s not Tuesday’s Tunes today….but I thought I’d share this song anyways. I love this song!  I think its really beautiful, and reminds us to be loving to all people…we’ve only got once chance to make a difference, and to be good humans towards each other! We’ve got to do better than what our current standard is…..

Enjoy!

My fall race preview #1

I’ve been pretty consistent runner over the past several months, but this week I started my training for my fall races! I strategically planned all I have on the books and am very excited about them… Last year I ran a half marathon and it went fabulous. I PR’d after-all, but I wanted to get back the animalistic running I love so much…trail running!

Here is a video preview of the race I’m most excited about this year!

Tuesday’s Tunes!

So….we have this CD full of children’s music, and Kirra and I listen to it on our way to Tally’s in the morning and on our way home….well this song is one of Kirra’s favorites. Today… I literally listened to this song about 9 times!

Christmas in June!

Photo Story Monday

One of my blogging friends does a “segment” called photo story ______. So for lack of a better blog post I thought I’d share my photo story!
Tonight… Kirra wanted to help me with the dishes after dinner. So I brought over a large stool. Popped an apron on her, and let her do her magic!
Surprisingly she did a really very great job! We only had to check two dishes and re-do them!
I’m slightly embarrassed to admit that she does a better job washing dishes than I do!