Sicknesses

No, nobody is sick in my house...at least right now.  I have a friend who thinks that her kid's constant sicknesses are caused by daycare.  On one hand I agree a little bit, but on the other hand I totally disagree (does that make sense?).  Yes, illnesses can be spread at daycare, but they can spread elsewhere instead.  I have several stay at home mommy friends whose kids are constantly sick.  I also have friends who work full time whose kids are constantly sick.  But on the reverse side, I have both working mom and stay at home mom friends whose kids are never sick.  I think the majority of it is just the kid.  Some kids are prone to ear infections, some are not.  Some kids have a better immune system than others.  My kids don't really get sick much (besides the occasional runny nose) and they go to daycare.  A close friend who stays at home has 2 kids who have had more ear infections than I can count.  I also think the term 'stay at home mom' is totally misused...because non of the moms that I know who stay at home are actually home all that much!  They are at Gymboree, the library, other mom's houses, play group, the ball pit at Chick-Fillet, the YMCA, the park, the pool, the zoo.  One friend is literally never at her house.  It makes me tired to think of how much she is out and about.  And most of the places I listed above aren't all that clean.  They aren't regulated like my daycare is regulated...my daycare sanitizes all the baby toys every night.  If your kid has runny poop and poops out of the diaper more than once, they send them home.  If they even see a hint of pink eye, they send them home.  They don't mess around.  Okay, enough of that.  I feel better.

So tomorrow I have a swim lesson.  Sounds weird right?  Well, for some reason I decided to sign up for a triathlon in September.  Actually, the reason I signed up was because I got so pumped up watching Ryan in the triathlon earlier this month that I decided I had to try one too!  I know how to 'swim', meaning I was a lifeguard in High School and College and I am very comfortable in the water...but swimming laps is a whole different story.  When I lived in New Zealand in 2004-2005, I decided I was going to try and swim.  Everybody there swam for exercise.  There was a YMCA a few blocks from where I was living and they had 3 pools!  So I bought a new (one piece) swimsuit and tried it.  I can't believe how frustrating it was.  People who weighed 3x more than me were lapping me.  I was out of breath by the time I swam 25 meters, and they were going back and forth like nobody's business.  Yet, I could lift a decent amount of weights and go hard on the elliptical for 45 minutes.  It didn't make sense.  So I quit.  I probably tried it for a couple of weeks.  Flash forward to now....last week actually.  I got in the water again at the gym....guess what?  SAME PROBLEM as 2004!  And I am in the best shape of my life right now.  I can go run 6 fairly quick miles with no problem, I can jump rope forever, I can do some serious plyometrics...you get the idea.  But I still can't swim!?  So I ask my husband, who has taken many a lesson.  He gives me a buoy to put between my legs, and tells me to swim without kicking.  He also gives me a few pointers on my stroke.  Then I try it.  WOW.  I can swim back and forth without getting too winded.  So I try without the buoy...and I immediately run out of breath.  I get home and google it, and sure enough, the kicking is what most people have trouble with.  If you try to swim distance and kick too much, it just makes your heart race because it uses up all your energy.  Distance swimmers barely kick.  So this is what I hope to learn at my lesson tomorrow!   Somewhat along those same lines, when I started running a few years back I realized that I was trying to run waaaaay too fast for my skill level, but I didn't realize it until I started monitoring my heartrate and my running pace.  I strapped on Ryan's GPS watch and found out I was literally sprinting.  How did I not realize that before?  No wonder I couldn't even run around the block without dying.  Breathing is really the key to a lot of things.  I have learned a lot about breathing in Yoga!  Enough rambling chatting for today...more later on my swim lesson!  

Mother's Day

We went down to Fort Scott for Mother's Day weekend this year.  My Aunt Marilyn and Uncle Ron were flying in from Phoenix to see Grandma, and my cousin Kate decided that she was going to surprise her parents and drive in from St. Louis.  It was great... I hadn't seen Ron and Marilyn in over a year (since Matt and Sara's wedding in September 2010) and I hadn't seen Kate and Brian in almost a year.  Liam and Lola had a slumber party in the trundle beds, which was interesting the first night but totally fine by night #2.

The 2nd cousins.  We actually ended up with a decent picture!  

Pushing Luca around...she would have let me do this
for hours if I would have let her.  

It's great to have 4 generations!

Happenings

I really thought I would be better about blogging, but alas, it's pretty obvious I'm not. We've had a lot go on in the past month. Ryan turned 40 on May 5th! I had a surprise birthday party for him on Sunday night the 6th at Extra Virgin Restaurant in Kansas City. It turned out really well, he actually didn't suspect a thing. The surprise almost got blown at the last second when Ryan decided to drive around the front of the restaurant to try and find a parking space, even though he had specific instructions to park in the alley and go through the kitchen door (since they are actually closed on Sundays, and we were just going to meet Michael and Nancy there for a drink before we 'went out to dinner').  Ha ha ha.  He is a weirdo and recognizes cars of people he knows, and he started seeing a few cars and was naming who they belonged to.  But for some reason he still didn't suspect anything.  We finally got inside and he was totally surprised.  It was awesome!   

Not the best picture, but you can see
the shocked look on his face.  He
had been looking down at his phone...

He also competed in his first triathlon in 7 years.  He didn't learn to swim until he was 30 and he is still a bit unsure in open water, but he made it through the swim and did good on the bike and run.  It was the first time I have ever watched a triathlon and I was hooked.  It's so different than watching a marathon or other running race.  By the time I was watching everyone running, they had already swam and biked.  Talk about not so fresh legs!  Ryan did the longer course, which was a 1,500 meter swim, 26 mile bike, and 6 mile run.  There was also a sprint course which was a 500 meter swim, 13 mile bike, and 3 mile run.  I'm crazy and decided to sign up for a sprint course race in Olathe in September.  Interesting considering I haven't swam (laps) since 2004 and haven't biked since 2001.  And the last time I biked it was mountain biking... This should be interesting!  

Right before the start, he had already been in the
water for a practice swim

Last part of the bike before transition to run...
you can see he already has his shoes off