Caves & Marshmellows

On Sunday, we decided to take the boys on a spontaneous "surprise" day trip.  A co-worker of mine had recently visited a restaurant in Anamosa, IA and posted a pic on Facebook.  This was the inspiration for our little adventure.

From the start, both boys were pretty aggravated by us calling it a "surprise" trip and not revealing where we were headed.  They kept saying "you know I don't like surprises!"  On our drive to Anamosa, James said that he wanted to go for a hike.  We had plans to visit Wapsipinicon State Park as our first "surprise" location so we worked his request into the plan.  Haden wasn't too thrilled at first about hiking, but he soon turned his attitude around when he spotted some water to play in.  The park has a creek that runs through it, and the water forms small waterfalls in various locations so that was pretty fun.  The kids found a small toad pretty quickly and chased it around for a bit. 

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Next, we spotted some signs for caves.  The kids loved the idea of checking out a cave since they've never been in one before.  The first cave had a few steps leading up into it.  We hadn't really planned out this impromptu trip very well - we didn't have any flashlights with us.  Kye used a flashlight app on his phone and it worked pretty well.  The first cave only went back a short distance and was pretty narrow so we had to stay single file.  The kids were a bit scared and the cave had a ton of mosquitoes so we backed out of there pretty quickly.

We continued out hike, following the creek upstream.  The next cave was called "Horse Thief Cave."  It started out very wide and then narrowed into a tiny little area.  The kids were loving their cave explorations!  After this cave, we spent some time practicing for the circus - a.k.a. tight rope walking across fallen trees.

It was starting to get late so we headed back to the van and then drove around the rest of the park to check it out.  It is a very pretty park and we decided that we need to return when it's warm enough to play in the water and we have more time to hike and explore. 

After exiting the park, we drove the few miles to Stone City.  We ate at the General Store Pub.  The pub was hosting an open-mic night while we were there.  I didn't really care for the music - it was mainly folk/bluegrass type of stuff but the atmosphere was fun nonetheless.  The kids thought it was awesome that their lemonades arrived with gummy worms on the lid.  It doesn't take much to impress my little guys!  The dinner was good - but I really was excited for the kids to see what they could do for dessert.  This pub offers free marshmallow roasting at your table so of course we had to try it out.  The boys loved this.  Once again - it's the simple things that impress us :)

On our way home, both boys agreed that we'd had a fun adventure.  We discussed caves for a while and decided that a trip to Maquoketa Caves is in order. 

Race Recap: IMT Des Moines 1/2 Marathon

On Sunday, Oct 19th, I ran the Des Moines 1/2 Marathon.  For this race, I followed the Hal Higdon intermediate plan.  This was my first time using this plan.  I had previously used the Novice 2 program.  The intermediate plan incorporates more speedwork.  I loved doing the 400m repeats, but wasn't a big fan of the tempo runs.  My friend, Tara, was training for this race too.  It was her first half marathon.  Near the end of training we began talking about pace and her long runs were much faster than mine.  I did all of my runs alone, so I just plug in my earphones and try to get into the "zone" running a comfortable pace that I can maintain.  I can't say that I followed the training plan exactly as written.  On days that I worked, I skipped running completely due to lack of energy and time.  But I did get all of the long runs done.

Kye and the kids came with me out to Des Moines.  We came out a day early and stayed in a hotel that was just across from the race expo.  The kids were complaining about having to attend the expo with me, but ended up having a great time.  One booth was handing out cowbells and boom whackers to use while cheering.  Of course, my boys decided the boom whackers made much better weapons but that's to be expected, right??  They also got to spin a wheel to win Univ of Iowa prizes.  We ended up with 2 t-shirts, 2 sunglasses, 2 bags, tattoos, and some window clings.  They also played a ring toss game and received toothpaste and another shirt.  I bought a new pair of running shoes at the expo.  My current shoes are about to be retired and they had a good sale going on.  Running shoes should be 'retired' after accumulating 400-500 miles.  I start to feel some knee pain when mine reach around 400 so that's when I retire them.

Our hotel was right next to an ice hockey arena.  The hockey team was playing a game the night we were staying there.  Kye, James, and I thought it would be fun to attend the game, but Haden refused to go so that plan was out the window.  The kids ended up swimming in the hotel pool and then we went to dinner at Old Country Buffet.  I had a ton of carbs - probably way more than needed.  I had two helpings of spaghetti, rolls, mac & cheese, and 2 desserts.  The kids loved that there was an Icee machine at the restaurant!

After dinner we just chilled at the hotel and headed to bed early.  I always sleep like crap the night before a race.  I've read that quality of your sleep two nights before a race is more important than the sleep you get the night before.  The hotel room was very warm so we tried turning on the A/C but the fan kept shutting off.  It didn't help that the boys wouldn't sleep together so I ended up with Haden next to me.  He moves around alot while sleeping and kept pushing his stuffed dog in my face.

I got up around 6am on race morning.  The race started at 8:00.  The hotel offered an awesome spread for breakfast, but I only chose a bagel.  I nibbled my food for a bit then headed for the starting line.  Our hotel was a 7 minute walk away from the start of the race.  The morning was really chilly so it was really hard to decide what to wear.  I knew I'd warm up after I started running, but I also didn't want to freeze my butt off while waiting to start.  I had brought along a "throw away" jacket and gloves.  Many athletes wear an extra layer for the first few miles and then toss aside their extra clothing.  The clothes are collected, washed, and donated to local people in need.  I met up with Tara and another friend, Shonelle, right before the race began.

Tara had a goal of finishing in 1:55.  She wanted to try to maintain an 8:40 pace which would allow for a few miles to be slower and still reach the finish my her goal time.  In training, my long runs had been averaging a 9:10 - 9:20 pace so I really didn't think there was any way I'd be able to keep up with Tara at an 8:40 pace.  I know that during a race, with all the adrenaline pumping, that I could go faster than I had when running alone for training but I was still not sure about 8:40.  My plan was just to stay with Tara as long as I could and then let her go on ahead of me so she could meet her goal.

After about 3 miles, I was about to tell her to go on ahead and that I needed to slow down.  Then I just decided that I could do this and that I would take it just one mile at a time.  It helped that the course was so pretty.  We started off in downtown Des Moines, running right at the state capitol and then winding by some other historical buildings.  We also went through a park and around a lake.  The scenery was awesome with all the trees changing colors.  The temperature warmed up nicely and the sun felt great - it ended up being the perfect race temperature.

So, mile after mile I kept up with Tara.  By around mile 9ish I knew that I could finish with her and that I really wanted to stay with her in case she needed some encouragement.  I knew she could run 13 miles, but by around 10 miles your mind can start playing with you and it really all becomes a mental game.  I'm proud to say that we stuck together and finished strong.  I really enjoyed the final half mile.  I was looking for Kye and the boys - it helped that they had a helium star balloon so I could pick them out in the crowd.  I kept checking my watch during that final mile and challenging Tara to keep picking up the pace.  We both were able to kick it up even more during the final 200m - to a full out sprint.  Our finish time was 1:54:35 (8:45/mile average pace).

I'm so happy my friend was there to make me push my pace faster than I thought I was capable of.  It showed me what I can do and that I need to challenge myself more when I'm training on my own.  I've been on a race "high" this week and that allowed my to step outside my comfort zone and join my local running club for a group run.  This race made me realize that I need to surround myself with more people who enjoy running as much as I do.  I'm also hoping that the running group will have someone whose pace is faster than mile so that I'll be encouraged to keep pushing myself to run faster.

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Rounding the corner - heading to finish line.

Randomness

This post will be a bunch of random stuff.  I ran a race yesterday, and I'll do a race recap in a couple of days. 

Let's start with pop.  About once a year, I get the urge to stop drinking it.  Since I do about 99.9% of the grocery shopping, this means that when this urge hits, we don't have it in the house anymore.  We were down to our last 12pk of Diet Mt Dew so this seemed like a good time to give it up.  In addition, I was trying to drink more water in prep for my race this weekend and when I have pop in the house I'll almost always choose that over water.  This was our last Mt. Dew - I really tried to savor it!  Now let's see how long I can go without buying more. 

Last week, Haden's school held it's annual Fun Fair.   They kids both look forward to this event.  We buy tickets and then they get to play a bunch of carnival-style games and win little trinkets.  This year, Haden was obsessed with the Pop bottle ring toss game.  He REALLY wanted to win a 2L of pop.  For some reason he believed if he won it then he would get to drink the whole bottle himself.  Pop is a big deal to him because we don't usually allow him to drink any, and on the rare occasion that he does get some it has always been caffiene-free.  I think the pop game had the longest line out of all the games.  He waited patiently and then was lucky enough to win a bottle.  He was so proud and carried it around the rest of the night.

 

James has some fun this week helping Kye work on the van.  They worked together to put on new back brakes.   Both kids really enjoy helping Kye with mechanical jobs.

 

Here is a picture of one of James's favorite birthday gifts from me and Kye - fake smile included!

And I thought I'd include a video showing Beyblades.  Many people have asked me what they are and how they work.  It's not a great video because I had to balance the camera on my knee as I "ripped" my bey, but you'll get the idea.  Two, or more, people rip their beys at the same time.  They bounce into each other and the last bey left spinning if the victor!

Pumpkin Patch

This past week we visited the local pumpkin patch twice - once to pick pumpkins and then a second time for the corn maze.  We used to drive to Bloomsbury Farm each fall and spend a few hours exploring all of their fun fall activities, but this year we had just as much fun right here in North Liberty.  The Colony pumpkin patch is in the middle of town, just north of Haden's school.  There slogan is "a little country... in the city." 

On our first visit, the kids and I picked out some "unique" pumpkins to decorate the area by our front door.  We had already purchased two large carving pumpkins from Costco so we were looking for green, white, or just plain "odd" looking pumpkins.  The boys thought it was really cool that they got to carry around the long snipper tools to cut the pumpkins from the vine.  And Haden took his job as wagon driver very seriously! 

James found a yellow pumpkin

Haden cutting out a white pumpkin

Our wagon of "unique" colors/sizes

A few days after our initial voyage to the pumpkin patch, we returned as a family to check out the corn maze.  The maze had 9 checkpoints where you could hole punch your map.  After finding all the checkpoints, you could turn your map in for a chance to win a prize.  The map said the maze was about 2 miles long and would take around an hour.  I guess we must be expert corn-mazers because according to my Fitbit, we only walked about 0.75miles and it only took about 20 minutes.  The boys just wanted to wander the maze, but we were a bit time crunched so Kye led the way for most of it and then Haden took over for the last few checkpoints.  He really enjoys reading maps and giving directions.

 

So, you'll see a trend with sunglasses in our family.  Kye, Haden, and I always wear sunglasses if it's even the least bit sunny - must be something to do with all having blue eyes.  James chose to wear glasses this day too!

 

After finishing the corn maze, the kids checked out the kid zone.  It had duck races, a spider-web to climb on, a bounce house, a slide, a couple of tractors, and a barrel train. The kids had a great time and the weather couldn't have been better.  We're so lucky to have such a great family place to visit right in town!

 

James's birthday party

I really can't believe it, but my little man turns 5 in two days.  He had a party this weekend and it felt so strange to put a number 5 candle on the cake.  For some reason, five sounds so old to me.  He's growing up way too fast, with help from big brother.  My baby James used to love to hold my hand whenever we were walking together, but sometime during this past year he decided he doesn't need that hand anymore. 

James really wanted a Beyblade-themed party but I just couldn't come up with any ideas for that besides the obvious beyblade battle tournament.  I was stressing out about what to do for his birthday until one day while I was on a long run (and had alot of time to let my mind wa

nder) I came up with the idea of a fall themed party.  We ended up having 8 kids and it was a beautiful fall day so we spent the entire party outside (although nobody got to see how much effort I put into cleaning the house)!

We started with pumpkin painting.  They could use paints, paint pens, markers, and glitter to decorate their small pumpkins.

 

Next, we did apple bobbing.  I don't think I've ever actually done this myself so I'm not sure why I thought the kids could do it, but it was a blast to watch them try.  I think everyone who tried got one eventually.

GOT IT!

 

Face painting was up next.  It was awesome to see what our family artists (Kalee & Barb) created on the kids faces.  There were some amazing butterflies, a tiger, a spiderman (minus the webbing), Vikings logo, and Jake the pirate.

 

James chose a chocolate chip cookie cake this year.  This is what I came up with:

We played some other miscellaneous games and then ended the party with a Beyblade tournament.  I should have realized that kids this young wouldn't understand the rules of a single elimination tournament bracket.  There were tears shed and James didn't even compete because he wanted to be in every battle and that's just not how it works!

And the winner of the tournament was Haden.  (He may have had an unfair advantage by choosing the best Beyblade and then not allowing anyone else to use it!)

FYI - Haden's costume is Gingka (a beyblade character)

James was very excited to see that he received some new beyblades as gifts from his party.  His aunt and uncle bought him the "heaviest Bey they could find" in hopes that James would finally have a Bey that can take down Haden's Pegasus.

Our new yellow belt

Wow, it's been almost a year since I wrote a blog post.  Where does the time go?  Rather than write up a really long post about what we've been up to lately, I'll try to make them shorter and more frequent.  Let's start with a highlight from last week...

Haden started taekwondo a little over a year ago.  He spent many months as a Tiny Tiger although he was old enough to move up the the Basic class.  It was really nice to have both boys in the same class so we were only attending one time slot.  During the summer Haden didn't want to do taekwondo.  I wasn't sure if he was done for good or just needed a break after a busy school year.  Each month I would ask if he was ready to start again and he kept saying no.  Finally, in August, he wanted to re-join but in the Basic class - he was done being a Tiger.  The only catch was that he wanted Kye to attend class too.  At our studio, adults can join for free with a child so it would only require buying Kye a uniform.  Anyways, they both started in August.  Haden has done great in the older class and is learning so much more than he did as a Tiger.  Kye needs a bit more practice, but he'll get there.  So, last Friday night Haden was ready to test for his yellow belt.  Here is a video of him testing: