Lots of Wine: April 2013

Monday, April 29, 2013

Triathlon season 2013!

My first triathlon is 3 weeks from yesterday! Yikes! It has really snuck up on me. The majority (okay, 99.9%) of my anxiety is in the swim. It’s a short triathlon, so the swim is ‘only’ 500 meters, but it will only be my 2^nd triathlon and the swim was pretty traumatic in my first one. Plus I haven’t had an open water swim this year and I will be wearing a wetsuit, which I have never done. I am very nervous about the cold water. I have heard that really cold water will literally suck the air out of your lungs, and I am nervous enough about the swim that I don’t need that too. Ryan keeps telling me that the water won’t be that bad, but we have had a really cold spring and not enough warm weather to warm up the water! I have sprint triathlons (500 meter swim, 13 mile bike, 3 mile run) in June, July, and September. I have already signed up for an Olympic distance (1500 meter swim, 26 mile bike, 6 mile run) tri in August. Once again, it’s the swim that makes me nervous! I figured by August I would have 3 sprints under my belt, so surely I could double my distance right? Ha. I know I can finish, but I am very competitive and just finishing is not good enough for me.

Thursday, April 25, 2013

money, money, money...

This is going to be a whiny post...just a warning. Maybe this is just more of a vent. There are no pretty pictures to add to this post. Just complaints. I hate money. I hate dealing with money. I hate not having money. I know I should be grateful for what I have, but lately I have been wanting to "keep up with the Jones'". I want to re-do our bathrooms which are literally falling apart. I want to renovate our kitchen. I want a house with a freaking garage! I want to go on a 'real' vacation. I want to not live month to month. There's nobody to blame but ourselves though. Could I have bought an older car? yes. Could Ryan have kept his old car instead of buying a brand new one? yes. Could I have stopped shopping on Zulily EVERY day? Yes. Could we have watched our spending much more carefully? yes. Could Ryan have not registered for 2 expensive Ironman events this year? Yes. Could I stop getting allergy shots? Yes. Could we get rid of our gym membership? yes. Could Ryan stop going to physical therapy for his foot and shoulder? yes. Could I have not taken Luca to get food allergy testing? yes. Could I have let the fillings that needed to be replaced in my teeth wait a little longer? Yes. Could I have lived without a new retainer since I recently broke my old one? Yes (but my teeth would have moved). Could I have not gone on girls trips each year which I always end up putting on credit cards? yes. Could I spend less at the grocery store? yes.

I'm sure there is more that I can't think of in this moment. I am just frustrated with a lot of things right now. Ryan's business is up in the air and he hates going to work every day, and our kids have been acting so bad that we don't like being parents. I know it will all pass and we will look back on these days and maybe crack a little smile...I am just ready to be at that point right now. Okay, vent over. :)

Monday, April 15, 2013

Eggs and trips!

I’m way behind on blogging! Easter was a few weekends ago. It was a bit bittersweet because we have had our friends go to our neighborhood Easter egg hunt with us for the past 3 years. They moved away last July so this year we planned on going solo, but my parents and my friend April came up to go with us so that helped me not be as sad. That and the fact that Lola and I were going to visit them a week later (more on that below). It rained last year but thankfully the rain held off this year. I thought Luca was going to be terrified of the Easter Bunny. I guess I just assumed this because she hated Santa a few months ago. But it was the complete opposite...she kept wanting the Easter Bunny to hold her and she kept running back to him (or her). We had to keep going to get her, since other kids were trying to get their pictures taken with him. We also had an egg hunt at our house on Easter morning. Lola loved it…Luca was a little slow collecting eggs but she still had a good time.

Lola and I took a trip to visit her friend Julia, and my friend (Julia’s mom) Elizabeth last weekend in Memphis. I was just there in September for a girl’s trip, so I had seen them then, but Lola hadn't seen them since they moved last July. We were supposed to arrive on Thursday evening at 6:15pm and leave Sunday at 2pm. Perfect trip time – 3 nights and almost 3 days. On Thursday morning just before 11am, I got an e-mail and phone call from Delta saying my flight had been cancelled! Apparently the crazy snow and ice weather in Minneapolis had messed up flights all over the US, but I wasn’t expecting my flight to actually get cancelled. After an hour on the phone with Delta, I booked a flight that same evening but it went through Atlanta and didn't get into Memphis until 10:20pm. Kind of a bummer, and Atlanta is not exactly on the way to Memphis, but whatever… Then my dad calls not even 30 minutes later and says that Atlanta is going to get pounded with Thunderstorms right around the time we are supposed to land there. So after some weather channel watching, I decide that it would be smart to re-book for Friday morning. The problem with Friday morning though is that the flight is at 6:15am. It is direct though, but still…6:15am flight with a 4-year old. Turns out I was smart to re-book because the Thursday night flights were delayed and the plane didn’t get into Memphis until almost 12:30am. So Friday morning, I get up at 4am and I get Lola up at 4:15am. We get to the airport at 5:20am, look at the board, and our flight is delayed over an hour already! I never got a notification from Delta either. If I would have received something, we would have hung out at home for a little while longer. Fast forward, we finally arrive mid-morning. We had a great time overall! We went to the zoo, the park, went for a run on the trail, and we played in the back yard. The weather couldn't have been more perfect – 70’s the whole time. Elizabeth and I went out to dinner on Friday night by ourselves which was a nice treat.