Things never to do with kids.

Oh are there plenty.

(Be hungover is my #1. I have endured one and only one since having Ella over 4 years ago and the hellish nightmare that was the next day following "Mommy's night of fun" was so scarred into my brain that ever since after 1 or 2 at the most drinks, I am done. Just not worth the fun anymore, for me.)

Today, I had the perfect storm of things not to do with kids.

The bike store. Two kids. A leotard and a potty break.

I would not recommend any combination of the above. Ever.

Trust me.

So, I picked E up from gymnastics camp (hence the leotard). Headed to the bike store to have my bike computer moved so I can fit in my aerobottle for my race this weekend. (I am acting as if I am racing. As if there are no other alternatives. Power of positive thinking, right?)

Just getting all 3 of us and my bike in the store is enough to make me run screaming back to the safety of the car. Finally get in. They get to work on my bike. E tries to ride one of the kids bikes in the showroom. Falls. Cries. Alice is crawling. Everywhere. Past the yellow line that is off limits to customers as I deal with Ella's tears and convince her that yes, I am in charge and she is not to mount any more bikes, even if they are all for kids, mommy. E has to go to the bathroom. But, wants her "privacy". Fine. I head in just to help take off the leotard. I then get escorted out by the 4 year old in charge. Fine again. As I am checking on my bike, a naked 4 year old comes running out of the bathroom screaming "MOMMY, I WENT POO POO!! WANT TO SEE???"

I shook my head. Laughed. Went to see (of course). Then got ourselves the heck outta there.

And I wish I could say I learned my lesson and will never do that again. But, I know I will have to and I know it will be as much of a gong show as it was today.

Bam. Bam. Bam.

Did you hear that?

Yes, that was me banging my head on the wall in frustration.

With myself.

My level of annoyance with me was already hovering near the mid-way point for messing up my race last weekend by riding the wrong way on the bike course. And adding 4 miles. Therefore, subtracting myself from any chance of an AG placing. (Sure, the volunteer pointed me in that direction, but, heck, I should have checked the course layout beforehand.)

I was over it pretty quickly though. Ready to move on to my race this weekend. Chattanooga Waterfront Tri. Did this race in 2006. Mike did it last year (I swear spectating with Ella sent me into labor with Alice. I had her 10 days later and spent a few of those days in the hospital trying to keep her cooking until 37 weeks!). It is a great race. Really competitive. Not too far from home. All good.

Our hotel is booked. And paid for. I am starting to taper (well, what Jen considers a taper. 100% different from my normal "don't do sh%# race week" taper. Taper? More like suffer.) I go on the race site to check to see what time to be there to register. Funny, I have not gotten any emails and I know I signed up for this race in December when I signed up for all my races this year.

Hmm...let's see who is racing in my AG.

Hmm....where's MY name?

Um, it is not there. Oh crap. Oh CRAP. OH CRAP!!!

I totally messed this one up. I have no idea what happened. Guess I just didn't actually pay the money for the race....or thought I had or who the heck knows?

BAM. BAM. BAM.

Level of frustration with myself just hit record levels.

I am currently wait listed. The Race Director (who was so nice) assured me that they have "never not let anyone in off the waitlist". But, I may not actually get a # until race morning. Argh. More stress.

Like racing. Away from home. With a 4 year old and an 11 month old wasn't doing it for me already.

BAM. BAM. BAM.

DO NOT follow this person on a bike course, nor trust them to register you for anything! Consider yourself warned.

Mile-stones

This may take me a long time to write. I am a loud typer (ist?) when I type fast and I don't want to ruffle any baby feathers.

I am sitting on the stairs outside Alice's room hoping she finally falls asleep.

It seems that my limited knowledge of the lyrics to the Carpenter's classic "Close to You" and my patented warble/sway combo is not doing the trick tonight. Every time I go in there, she's sitting up with the saddest look on her face peering through the crib slats at me. Looking like a baby in jail. And crying.

She's quiet now....CLACK. CLICKETY. CLACK. I AM TYPING LOUD AND FAST!

Alright, I am done celebrating the fact that we have two sleeping girls. But, man, that is always a nice place to be in the day.

Due to my inherent laziness and aversion to becoming (gasp!) a "scrapbooker", (I just can't go there. I can't. I've resisted your recruitment too long to give in now, Amanda:) Alice's baby book is essentially a book with important papers (i.e height, weight, stuff from the hospital, cards, etc.) shoved in the front and stuffed in a drawer. (Thank you...thank you...yes, I know. I am a wonderful mother.)

So no baby book. Yet. So, here is what I am going to include when I finally get it done...probably right around her wedding.

Alice at 11 months....

Crawled for the first time yesterday. Kind of late, but you never have trouble getting what you want. You frequent the army crawl, the roll and the scoot. Seeing you roll across the playroom floor to get a toy you want is hilarious.

You have 3 (almost 4) teeth now. 2 top and 2 bottom. The top ones are um, pretty large. Daddy has taken to calling you "man-tooth" now. Or Wes, for short.

I don't think I will ever wean you. I would if it were my choice. (Apparently, it is not.) I don't think you're going to allow such craziness to happen though. Not on your watch. You love it. Sheesh. I was going to try at a year....but I can see that is not going to happen. 13 months, kid. That's all you get.

"Dada" and "Mama" are your words. Good choices. I like your style.

You don't really like to sleep. At all. Ever. Okay, maybe that is overstating things. You do nap well. But, I think that we have 10, maybe 11 full nights of sleep since you've been born. Good thing you're cute.

You love to dance, giggle, rough house with your sister, pull on Annabelle's tail, throw (all of your) food to the floor, YELL, be held, be tickled, get baths, go swimming, have your feet eaten, pull Ella's hair (out!), and generally be the cutest baby in the world, 100% unbiased opinion here.

So those are Alice's 11 month milestones. To be included in a book. At a (much) later date.


My MILEstones? Ran, biked and swam a few over the weekend. I feel back on track after a sluggish week and ready to kick some a$$ (or at the very least ride the bike course correctly) at my first Oly race of the year in Chattanooga this weekend.

Weak Week

It is only Thursday, but I am ready to call it a week already.

My "race" on Sunday (and I use that term loosely) really took it out of me.

Must have been that extra 4 on the bike that really put me over the edge. :)

Well, either that or Alice's double ear infection (yes, again. We are working on ear infections 11 and 12, I believe) that made the poor girl sound the "wah wah" alarm 4-6 times a night.

Or it could my perma-sinus infection that came back this week. 3 weeks without one is my limit....apparently.

I am calling it. 10:28pm on Thursday. Week. Over. Done.

We ended it with a bang though...literally. Neighborhood fireworks tonight. Always fun. Mike came prepared to pass the time in our driveway waiting for the start.


Yes, that is a bottle opener on the bottom of his flip flop.


We got bored. Started having cartwheel contests. I won. Obviously.



My hero.


Mike's off tomorrow and we have a babysitter. Things are looking up already.

Just pretending...

I am only pretending to have a good attitude about the race today.

That counts, right?

'Cause when I think about it. I am still mad. So, I am trying not to think about it anymore. Okay, tomorrow I will not think about it anymore. I will allow myself the rest of the day to wallow and stew.

I raced IronGirl today. And I was really excited for this race. It was one of my "A" races. I wanted that necklace. Really did. My mom and dad were there, Mike and the girls came out. They had signs and everything...it was so great to see them all there. Triathlon is a pain in the a$$ to come and watch, especially with little ones. I really appreciated you guys today. Thanks.

Swim was great. Jen told me I needed to get tough and deal with the scary front of the pack swimmers if I wanted to place in my AG. (I normally like to hang back and be a scardey cat.) It was really fine. No contact and I felt like a bada$$ standing right up front and sprinting into the water. Was 6th out of the water, which is good for me.

The bike is where I lost my temper a bit. With myself, with the course, with the "Woo Hoos" of the people whizzing by me while I replaced my dropped chain, with the lady with the flag that told me to left when I should have gone right.

I can explain.

Miles 1-8, I was fine. Right on track. Feeling good. Trying to reel in people ahead of me. Checking my mph and time. I see an intersection ahead and there are no cyclists in sight. Which way do I go?? Flag lady has the flag to the left. Okay. I go left. I start passing a ton of people. (Before it was really spread out. There was no one in front of me before to see.) Now, there's age groupers from the waves behind me. WTF??

Argh. I knew something was wrong. Asked a few people who had no idea if we were supposed to do this loop twice. I knew immediately my race was done. Sprints come down to seconds. An extra 4 miles on the bike (my bike computer had me at 22 miles for what was supposed to be an 18 mile race) does not really help you place in your age group. I wouldn't recommend it.

Enter negative thoughts. Quitting. Cursing. Eye rolling. Thankfully, I was alone on the bike...a very nice place to be to take out aggression. I biked as hard as I could. Shifted like an angry dumbo. Dropped my chain. Replaced my chain. Cursed some more.

Thought about quitting after the bike. Just leave. Take my bike and go home. Thought about it some more and realized I would feel worse if I did that. Felt a bit better. Decided to run hard...good practice for my first Oly distance race in 2 weeks. Even if I wasn't going to have a good race today, I wanted to at least have a good run. (20:53) I am very happy with that. Especially since I took some time during the run to tell Mike my saga of the bike leg and almost break down in tears in front of way too many people. (Today was not my best day.)

So, good swim and run and the rest I am letting go. (This is SO not like me.) :) Let's see if it works. Trying to be an adult here. Or pretend like it.

I have some pics I will post tomorrow. Camera is currently MIA and I am way too tired to go searching.

Found the missing camera. Phew.

E and I heading up to the race expo on Saturday.


I was dying to get a picture of E with these studs, but she was too shy....


So, we got autographs instead.


With the girls before the swim.


Swim exit.

Job Well Done....

...IronGirls PR person. You got me.

Congratulations. I am officially excited for your race this weekend.

After flooding my email box with first weekly emails to get me training, then bi-weekly emails to let me know how cool and fun your event is going to be and now daily ones to give me logistics about race weekend, I get the picture....

IRONGIRLS sprint (1/3 mile swim/18 mile bike/3 mile run) IS ON SUNDAY. AND I'D BETTER BE READY. :)

I have gotten more emails about this sprint than any other race. Combined. Even Ironman.

Actually, the sheer volume of information in all the emails is confusing me. I just want to know where to go and what time to be there. That's it. More than that and I tune out. I am more than likely missing some huge piece of important information, like it is mandatory to race in high heels and pearls. This being an all girls event and all.

Two things that did catch my attention were (1) AG winners get these necklaces as awards.

Do I ever want one of those. Seriously. That's my goal. Get me a necklace. (well, try to get me one. Hard to make goals based on AG finish, but I have a time goal in my head that I will be completely happy with if achieved.) I want to look like a triathlon Mr(s). T. Layer up my Ironman necklace with this one and pity fools all over Atlanta.)

And the other thing was this.
Today, Iron Girl, the premiere all-women's event-based brand, announces that the third annual Aflac Iron Girl Atlanta Triathlon will be televised nationally on NBC Sports. The broadcast will air on Saturday, Aug. 23, from 1 p.m. to 2 p.m. ET. The telecast will showcase a highly competitive professional field as well as a diverse group of athletes varying in age and fitness level.

As Ella would say, "dats pool".

I am so excited to see the pros race. In person. ON THE SAME COURSE AS ME. Just so excited about that. Yes, I've raced with pros before, but never in a sprint and never with pros like this. I can't wait to see how stinking fast they are.

Michellie Jones
Kate Major
Samantha McGlone
Mirinda Carfrae
Pip Taylor

Yes, some definitely bold face names in that crowd.

The lemonade shill-er and I are heading up on Saturday for the expo and (hopefully) meet some of those fasties.


Then Sunday, as Jen says, I am ready to SUFFER. I can feel the butterflies already. (Nice, lady friendly, pink ones, of course.) WOOO HOOO. Bring it!

Happy Father's Day.

Hope everyone has a great one. Especially all the great dads in our lives, Mike (duh), my dad, his dad, and my brother...hope you all did exactly what you wanted today.

Not sure if Mike wanted to wake up 4 times with Alice in the early, painfully early morning today (will those teeth NEVER come in?!?!) or strip Ella's bed at 5 am due to an "accident". (I heard the whole thing go down since I was in Alice's room feeding her, but couldn't really help E and couldn't really help myself from cracking up either. What else can you do? Exhaustion makes me giggly.) I am also pretty sure that you didn't want to get woken up by Ella, on the one morning that you could sleep in, who insisted you had to open your presents by 7:30. She just could not stand the sight of unopened gifts.

Well, we loved spending the day with you. Fingers crossed we don't all get to spend the entire night together again. Awake.


I love messing around on imovie. This is my third year doing this Father's Day montage as one of Mike's gifts (2007 and 2008). Hope you liked it. We love you. :)

I hope this works...

The dog days of summer are upon us in Georgia.

Woof.

Well, technically, it is not yet summer. But, calendars be damned.

I define summer by asking myself a few questions.

1. Does my first shower after a workout not "take"?

2. Have we taken out a second mortgage for camps to exhaust my seemingly inexhaustible 4 year old ball of energy?
(Gymnastics camp -- check, American Girl camp -- check, Craft camp --check, some other camp -- check...something about dancing and crafting and um, I am not sure, maybe...jousting?? As far as I can recall. Guess I'd better remember what exactly that last camp is about before she gets knighted.)

3. Could we protect all of Roswell from a painful sunburn with the excess of sunscreen that I buy?

Yes. Yes. and Yes.

So, for me? Summer is here.

When the real feel temp is over 100 and I am sweating merely putting the girls in the car, I really wish for October. But, whatever. We're here, let's deal with this the best way we can, right?

I can't change the oppressive Southern heat and humidity (and am fine trading it for our awesome springs, falls and winters).

BUT, I can do something about that pesky "school is out, so I can't knock out a workout out while Ella is in school" dilemma I've been handed.

I've hired a babysitter! Woo hoo. (Really nothing earth shattering here, but I have never done this before. Babysitter, yes. But a regularly scheduled one? Nope.)

Yes, as the title of this post states, "I hope this works..." The plan is for two times a week in the afternoons, I can swimrunbike to my crazy, little heart's content. Hopefully, getting some of the long-ish stuff that I save for the weekends done.

Hope being that Mike and I won't be spending most of those precious Saturdays and Sundays dealing with the logistical nightmare combination of getting 5-7 hours of our cumulative workouts done along with 10 month old nursing, 2 naps a day-er and a 4 year old please-take-me-to-the-pool-for-5-hours-er.

Sometimes that leaves so little time for me and Mike to crack jokes on each other while drinking margaritas, eating enough Mexican food and chocolate chip cookies to make us sick, and watching the Red Sox.

A pity. But, we usually...somehow find time for that. :)

Some recent "summer" shots.

Her sprint next door after hearing that they had a slip n'slide out.


Slipping and sliding away.


E is a non-tradionalist. Rockin' the Rudolph shirt in June.


Yes, I am cute. If cute means not sleeping through the night at 10 months old. Then yes, I am cute. Adorable, in fact.:)




Dora crocs are the must have accessory this summer.

Wow!

Check it out. Here. Super cool. Thanks, Training Peaks!

Oh, that is never a good sign...

That was the thought in my head yesterday after bringing E in to the pediatrician for what I thought was a simple sore throat. (Let me just state up front, that she is 100% fine and her crazy water lovin' self as usual. In fact, playing in the sink (one of her favorite games) as I write this.)

Easy. Kid wakes up with a sore throat. Food doesn't "taste right". Won't eat her cheerios. I check. Yeah, sure...it looks a little on the medium rare side.

Okay. No big deal.
Let's cancel gymnastics camp and head on over to our good friend, the pediatrician's. They haven't seen us in over two weeks...they're probably getting worried. :)

No strep. That's good. But when checking her lymph nodes, the doc lingers. And lingers. And checks again. And then checks some others.

Um, that's not good.

Then calls in another, more senior, doctor.

Never a good sign.

(I am aware what is going on at this point and am hanging on by a very thin thread. Just ready to scream....PLEASE TELL ME IT IS NOTHING. ALL I WANT TO HEAR OUT OF YOUR MOUTH IS THAT THIS IS NOTHING. THAT IS IT! IF YOU CAN'T SAY THAT...THEN DON'T SPEAK.)

I manage to squeak out a small, "Um, what do you think is going on?" on the verge of tears.

The more senior doc says that he would get an X-ray and CAT scan...today and this week, respectively. He doesn't know what it is but is throwing some strange terms at me that I was ill equipped to understand much less retain in my panic-stricken-pleaseletmykidbeokay-frame of mind.

They set up the x-ray for RIGHT THEN.

Again, never a good sign.

Drive over to the radiologist's, stopping off for a minute in "LET'S NOT PANIC-VILLE" after a call to Mike, who lives there.

Me? Not a resident.

My mom (ever my savior) just happens to be close by and is happy to come and hang out with Alice while E gets her x-ray. (Thank you.)

X-ray looks good. Nothing bad. (I couldn't and can't even say the word of what I am assuming they were looking for.)

THANKYOUTHANKYOUTHANKYOUTHANKYOU.....

Radiologist confirms. CAT scan this morning confirms it as well.

Nothing bad. The hard mass where her lymph nodes are was nothing. Just a few extra ribs. Two to be exact. Nothing to worry about. Seriously, the kid has what we (yes, I am now an expert.:) like to call "bilateral cervical ribs". I am sure that there is some sort of funny joke here that if I wasn't so thankful that Ella is healthy that I might be able to figure out or make.

Phew....