I survived my first post baby race!

The tale of the race starts the night before. The race was at 7 am (yuck!) so the kids and I spent the night at my parent's house so my mom could watch ( hopefully) sleeping kids while Dad and I raced. I slept in the spare room with Bryson. He has not slept in our room in months and apparently he is quite the night owl. He woke up 2-3 times and just sat in his bed talking and cooing and giggling to himself then went back to sleep. The first time, it freaked the crap out of me because I just woke up to these little noises. 

Needless to say, I did not sleep well and waking up at 5:45 was extremely difficult. Whose glorious idea was this again? Oh yeah, mine because it was free and would be a good race to start with post baby. At least, in my head; the reality on the morning of looked more like this: 

if that isn't the picture of alertness I don't know anything( voice dripping sarcasm)

Alianna, my early bird was, of course, up and wanted to take a picture of us and we were off. 

We're soo hot right now

Obviously, this was a Halloween race and they said come in costume so I was Aurora. We show up and there are about 25 people milling around...no costumes. There is one guy that I believe is some sort of 80s obscure character with a mustache and fro, but I'm not cool enough to even know what he's going for. Now I am getting nervous because I will stand out not only because I am slow as molasses and this is all air force people who will blow past me, but I will also be that slow as molasses girl in the weird pink sparkly skirt.  Luckily some other characters arrived just before the race so I was less nervous including Minnie Mouse, Jesus, Superman and Wonder woman (they become important later on).

The race starts and my dad says don't wait for him. I thought, "don't wait for you? I just had a baby 3 1/2 months ago, don't wait for me" But he has a bad knee from an injury years ago so I actually did pass him fairly quickly. 

The one thing I always have when running is headphones. I know that's lame and "real runners" just follow their bodies instincts, but I never claimed to be a real runner. ON long runs, I like books on tape, on short ones I pump up music in an effort to make me faster. I think all it really does is drown out the sound of my labored breathing so I don't think about how I am slowing dying : ) So of course, on my first race, I forgot my arm band and headphones. I still held my phone and about half a mile in I couldn't take it anymore and turned on my music anyways. Everyone else would just have to hear my music too. Maybe it was a good warning for them, " Oh crap, I hear music coming up behind me, it's that weird girl in the sparkly skirt. " Like my own Jaws theme...

So the run was out a mile and a half then turn around and come right back.  At the turnaround, there was a water station. I got some water and realized how good I was feeling. Maybe it was just that there were no hills( like around my neighborhood) or adrenaline from the race atmosphere, but I was rockin. So I picked back up and blew past Wonder Woman and Superman ( who was 6'4" and built like superman) Score! I don't suck too bad if I am passing half the Justice League. 

This is also when I started getting really nervous because I wasn't seeing my Dad. This was out and back and curved around the flight line so I could see everyone still coming and I didn't spot him. If you remember, he sorta stuck out: 

gotta love him

About half a mile before the end, Superman blows past me. Apparently he had been holding back, and try as I might I couldn't keep up with those ten mile legs. I almost started walking, but this was where all the superfit humans who finished long before were standing and watching us lesser beings cross the finish line and my pride wouldn't let me walk by them. To be fair to the superhumans, they were all super nice and cheering me on, which also helped.

I heard my Dad's voice yell " Pass her Maggie!" ( there was a girl just 10 feet in front of me) My first thought was " OH good you're not dead" the second was " Are you freaking kidding? I'm doing good to not walk!" Apparently, he had tweaked his bad knee like a 1/2 mile into it. Lame.

Gack! Scary but super happy!

I finished in 28:40. The only other 5k I ran was last 4th of July with ArJay and I finished in like 31 minutes, so I was just aiming for under 30 minutes. I was thrilled that I was almost 3 minutes faster. I also had negative splits ( that means each mile was faster than the one before, which is what you aim for). It was a lot of fun and you can't beat a free race. They do it every month, so I'll be back and maybe I'll beat Superman next time. Although there might be some truth to the Clark Kent thing, I Don't think I'd recognize him without his cape.....

Saturday with the Gamble's

IT is always fun filled and crazy when we do stuff with the Gamble's( ArJay's parents).

This time we started with pictures of all the grandkids.  It probably would have gone a little smoother if we started on time at 11:20, but the studio was running late and we didn't start til an hour later. Tired, hungry, bored children do not equal the best picture. Add in the fact that is was just grandkids shots with no adults to hold down the 6 under 4 year old and it was like herding cats. If only we could have velcroed them to the floor...<iframe src="https://www.facebook.com/video/embed?

Here's a short clip of the group debacle <iframe src="https://www.facebook.com/video/embed?

Hilarious. I nearly peed myself. After we got each family shots and individual shots of most of the 8 grandkids, I was ready to start drinking. And it wasn't even 2 o clock yet. :) They picked up kids meals from the food court and we were off to Buckelew farms to pick pumpkins.

We have never gone to Buckelew, always to Apple Annie's, so I didn't know what to expect. It was actually very nice. In fact I think we'll go there instead of Apple Annie's from now on. I hadn't gone before because you had to pay a $4 admission fee, but they have so much more.

ArJay and Bryson ready to go

They had a cute little craft fair. Kendall was in heaven surrounded by so much dirt and mud. For some reason the tent offended him and he tried to take the stakes out himself.

just need a little leverage

pull sooo hard

Never mind I'll just sit here

They also had a petting zoo. The animals were actually VERY well behaved and friendly. They had goats, ducks, a baby cow, rabbits and turtles.

soo exciting

petting the goat

she was very precise and careful

I think everyone's favorite was the wagon ride out to the pumpkins

Bryson was not so impressed, he fell asleep

Good thing it was a big open field because the kids scattered once we were in the field.

haha, she was a little tired

Kendall was jumping over all the ditches

Kendall was more impressed with the rock he found then the pumpkins

After this we still had to go to the store for last minute dinner stuff. I think we ate dinner at like 7:30 pm. Oh and my poor nephew Tyson got a migraine or dehydrated or something and threw up. Time with the Gamble's and cousins is never boring.

Disney on Ice

I found cheap tickets for Disney on Ice and thought it would be a fun surprise for the kids during fall break. They all ended up super sick so it was the only fun  thing we ended up doing and Alianna acted like that was all she was living for while sick with an ear infection. You would have thought she had the plague. She even prayed that she would get better " just so I can see the surprise". Luckily no one was seriously maimed by ear infections and we headed over to my parents Thursday night to pick them up and head over. Having never gone to Disney on Ice before, I was slightly nervous that we had hyped up the "fun  surprise" too much and they would be disappointed. I shouldn't have worried as Disney delivered again.

I had looked up some blogs about what to bring  and expect and was glad I did. The best suggestions I got were to have the kids dressed up with warm clothes underneath and bring our own glow stuff. Since we have enough dress up clothes to clothe a small country, I just randomly grabbed Snow White and Buzz Lightyear. The only problem was that Snow White did not make an appearance in this production and Alianna kept asking when she was coming. Note to self: next time bring a princess who actually performs.

I was also extremely grateful I hit up the dollar store for glow stuff and some cute little fake necklace and figurines. The prices there were obscene. The spinning light up thing was $25. My parents were there so of course we ended up with one souvenir, but I convinced them to go for the sno cone cups so they could have a treat a take something home. It was a real steal at $12 a pop. Yikes.

But the show itself was amazing. Alianna's face was pure joy the whole time. I think she actually squealed when Rapunzel popped out of the box.She says her favorite parts were Minnie, Ariel, Rapunzel, and Merida. SO...pretty much everything except Belle.

Kendall loved the horse in the Rapunzel scene and asked LOUDLY and repeatedly where the horse was during the beautiful couples dance skate. Apparently, he's not one for Romance. But his favorite part was the Beast. He had his glow sword and kept standing up and brandishing it while yelling " I Sword you! I sword you!"

I didn't get any shots during the actual performance because I was enjoying watching the kids so much. As soon as it was over Alianna asked " Can we come to this again tomorrow?" I'd call that a win.

Loving the glow sword

Concentrating on vanquishing evil

couldn't even look away from the ice for a picture when nothing was happening

She's holding up her little figurine, she didn't let go of it all night