Staying Busy

We are so busy that I have not taken any pictures of the kids or posted on my blog in almost two weeks. With working two days a week, homeschooling five days a week, track practice two to three days a week, exercise almost every day, I have very little free time anymore. My Tuesdays and Saturdays are spent catching up on housework and schoolwork from the previous day. Now that fall weather has arrived, I find myself spending more and more time outside. I hibernate inside during the summer months and do not go outside anymore than necessary. But, I become "alive" again when the temperature starts to drop. To top it all off, the U.S. Open tennis tournament starts today and lasts for two weeks. I LOVE to watch tennis especially this tournament. The American players have not had a great summer but a lot can change when they take a turn on American courts (it is played in New York) and the fans get behind them.

Results of the Bodock 5K

When we were picking up our t-shirts at the race, we were handed a piece of paper with the website on it that we needed to check the race results. I was shocked to look it up when we arrived home and they were already posted. The website is www.pontotoc.net/lions . Everybody's times were really good, especially for the first race of the season. It will be fun to see all the improvement made by all the runners by the end of the season.

Bodock 5K Race in Pontotoc

We went to Pontotoc last night so the kids could run the Bodock 5K.

The kids visit before the race begins.

Talking race strategy. Kirsten sizes up her competition.

Getting last minute instructions from the coach.

Catherine, Olivia, and Danielle confident before race time.

The girls love to be together and to have their picture taken -- that is, everyone but Catherine.

The runners line up at the starting line.

And they're off!!!!

Waiting on the awards to be announced. We had several winners between the kids and some parents. Many of the kids had never run a 5K before and we had good times out of everyone. We are definitely looking forward to watching them all improve over the course of the season. I am a little hoarse this morning because of all the cheering I did last night. I looked at the results on-line and I counted 53 kids and 12 parents (unless I missed someone). GO TEAM SPARTAN!!

Happy Birthday Grandma and Grandpa

Last Sunday, we went to my in-laws house to celebrate their joint birthday party. They both have August birthdays so we usually get together once for both.

Alec watches as Grandpa blows out the candles on the birthday cake.

Kirsten loves to swim in their pool.

Grandma and Grandpa get ready for all their kids and grandkids to sing to them.

Alec loves all birthday parties - especially if cake is involved.

A photo with the grandkids -- two of them could not be there.

I DID IT!!!

I just registered for the St. Jude Half Marathon in Memphis, TN, in December. This will be my third St. Jude race in as many years. My plan right now is to blow my previous times out of the water. I am NOT going to let my knee dictate my training schedule. I plan on overcoming any pain that I feel and keep training. I would love to finish under 2 hours 40 minutes, but I am not sure that is possible. I am going to train for real this year and give it all I've got. The other cross-country moms are going to inspire me to continue training no matter what. My fitness level needs to be improved a great deal in the next four weeks to really get on track to train for the half. I hope to really increase my mileage this month (walking mileage) and try to run a little between now and September; in September, I hope to bump up my running and continue the walking. Every time I have signed up for the half, I start off strong in training and then life gets in my way and the training gets left off, but Lord willing, that will not happen this year. I realize that my finish time is not "great" as some other moms have times that I just envy, but it will be an amazing accomplishment for this Mom. Besides my time goal, another goal is to finish and not be in pain for the two weeks following the race. My previous races, I have been in so much pain the next few days, that going up and down stairs is extremely painful. For those of you who don't know why -- it is lack of training. See, I do know these things and this is the year that I will be properly prepared, I HOPE!!!

Ice Age, Dawn of the Dinosaurs

Last Saturday, we went to see the new Ice Age movie in Corinth. Yes, I know that it has been out in the theatres awhile, but we haven't had a chance to go until now. It was very entertaining, as have all the other Ice Age movies.

Looking Forward to the Cross-Country Season

Today, we had another cross-country practice. It was very hot and the kids were tired but the biggest majority of them really performed their best. The practice was at a trail that my kids have run before and really are not that fond of, so I had a lot of groans when I told them where they were running. But they BOW-ED UP (our team slogan from last season) and ran anyway. Kirsten finished just a few seconds behind Alec and she was excited about that. Both she and Alec need to mentally prepare to run better than they have so far. I hope that serious practice two times a week will really help them improve their times. From the beginning of last season to the end in October, my kids improved by leaps and bounds. We have several "pint-sized" kids on our team that really can run and they run fast and they run hard. I really enjoy watching all of the kids improve over the season. I counted heads today (they moved around a bunch) and I counted at least 55 heads, so our "little" team has jumped to a "large" team. GO SPARTANS!!

Back to School!!

Yesterday, we started back to school. We have been talking for almost a month now about when we would start and so the kids were ready. On Sunday, we looked at some of our new textbooks trying to excite ourselves about the upcoming year. I was hoping that the kids would actually look forward to the new school year and not dread it so badly. I think this idea worked! I also asked them for some ideas on how we can make each day better. They came up with some really great ideas:

BETTER ATTITUDES!

WAKE UP ON THE RIGHT SIDE OF BED!

EAT HEALTHY BREAKFAST!

EXERCISE DAILY!

DO NOT GROAN ABOUT SCHOOL!

NOT BEING DISTRACTED!

MANAGE TIME WISELY!

Those are the ones that the kids came up with and I hope that they will be more interested in following through with these ideas since they are the ones that said them. I came up with one that they are not too excited about:

NO ELECTRONICS UNTIL 3:00!

The children spend too much time thinking about what to watch on TV or which game to play on the Wii or Nintendo DS that I thought this would help them focus on the task at hand to know ahead of time that they could not do any of that for most of the day. I am hopeful that they will not rush to the electronics at 3:00 but instead find other stuff to do.

Our official cross country season started yesterday with a practice at the Park Along the River in New Albany. We had fun seeing old friends and making new ones. We have a big group of kids (about 50-60) I am guessing. I think this year will be exciting. We have practices two times a week and the kids are supposed to run those plus two other days as well. It looks to be a very busy school year/cross country season and we are looking forward to the challenge.