My Iron Man

 Have you seen this picture of the Iron Man:  

                            

 That is pretty cool, but this is how I picture 

MY Iron Man:

 He doesn't need all those extra shields, gadgets and such.  

All he needs are his own muscles, determination and hours and hours of training.

We traveled 9 hours in the car to:

St. George, UTAH

 We spent a week enjoying the scenery, climbing the rocks, hiking the trails:

 

We stayed in a condo complete with bedrooms, family room, full kitchen, and balcony overlooking swimming pools and basketball court.

Before Andrew's race he would scout out his bike and run courses. 

While he did that we played in the water as much as possible...(I say we but I mean the kids)...I tried to survive my ever so stubborn headaches by hiding in the shade reading. 

RACE DAY started for Andrew at 4:30am.  

The kids and I got up at 5:30am.  We had to drive 1/2 hour where we then we took a bus, with the hundreds of other spectators, to the swim start.

I didn't think we'd find Andrew before the race began (with so many racers), but we did!  

I snapped a quick picture and gave him a big kiss.

 We climbed on some rocks that were a little bit out into the lake.  

It was a GREAT spot to watch and a FUN place for the kids to play.

Andrew swam the 2. mile swim in 1 hour 9 minutes.  Right on his target time.

Then while Andrew biked the 115 miles in an amazing 5 hours we made our way back to our condo and rested.

We headed over to the finish line around 1pm and tried hard to spot Andrew transitioning from the bike to the run.   But somehow we missed him.  It was such a bummer because it was BLAZING HOT and no shade to hide in.  It took every ounce of endurance I had in me to hang in there until the end.  

(12 hours of standing & cheering, traveling to each transition, keeping the kids occupied & coping with heat exhaustion took it's toll).  

Here I am talking as if I'm the the one racing!!!  I had to keep reminding myself that all the people racing were enduring much more pain than I was and that I shouldn't think of complaining.

Andrew completed the full marathon (26 miles) in 4 hours 45 minutes.  His record marathon time was 3 hours 11 min. but the intense hills made it painful and difficult to run as fast as he would've liked.  In spite of it all he was very pleased with his time overall....especially since this was his first ever ironman.

Andrew's Total Race Time was 
11 hours 40 minutes.

Prep for Easter Idea #1

How are you preparing for Easter?

Today we have started our preperation by popping in our first CD of

The Story of the Messiah

a 6 CD set by Sine Ministries

http://www.messiahstory.com/

It takes the 4 Gospels and puts them together chronologically in a dramatic audio presentation.  My Mom gave it to us a couple years ago and we loved how it painted full picture of Christ's coming, death and resurrection.  It was easier when we homeschooled because we would listen to it whenever we were in the car.  Now that they are in school all day those moments are less.  But we're going to give it a try... maybe we'll have to listen to it before bed a couple times also.

Please leave comments if you have any ideas or suggestions that you or your family have liked.

Easter prep

What do you do to prepare for Easter?

 We need some ideas.

Perching Dog

This is a post about Izzy.

She is a short-haired pointer - "bird dog".   

Everything small that moves catches her attention and calls out to her to chase it.  She will even follow dragon flies around the yard!  When stalking her "prey" she will sit, or lean, in her striking position for quite a few minutes.

Smart.  Determined.

Izzy, our 40 lb dog, perches on fences.  

You heard me right.  Perches on the fence.  Like a bird.

I know you wouldn't believe me unless I showed you pictures so here they are:

This squirrel is sitting in the tree taunting Izzy.

So far she's never jumped all the way up and over the fence.  The day she does we'll have to raise the fence.  :)

She will jump up and "perch" at least 20 times a day, especially in the early morning when the squirrels and birds are more active.

ice cream cones

Summer Days

SUMMER??

The calendar says it's winter 

but the weather says it's summer!

When I'm not feeling too well, and I need the kids to play outside, what better way than to hand out ice cream cones!!

sleep exhaustion

Am I sleeping TOO much?

A couple weeks ago I took a sleep test, digging deep into the way my body sleeps.

The results are in.  I do not have sleep apnea.  I do not have narcolepsy.  I do not have restless leg syndrome.  My oxygen levels are great.

But...the graphs showed that I rarely went into deep sleep, sometimes I was in middle sleep, and most often I stayed in very light sleep...a recipe for exhaustion.

Since I did not have any specific diagnosis of why my brain is not going into deep sleep, the dr. went over suggestions for setting up my surroundings and my body to get good sleep.  (Because I've researched this many times in the past, I was already quite familiar to them and had adapted most into my routine).

One new suggestion she had was to limit my sleep (overall time laying down in bed).  Since my brain stays too much in light sleep we are going to try and break the cycle by making my body crave sleep more.   

I have to stay up later.  2 hours later.

It will take a good month to see any progress.

oh, the words he says!

Jeremy comes up with the funniest words!  

He is constantly talking and asking questions.  Often he doesn't think about it, he just talks. 
Like when we're right around the corner from our house:  "Are we almost home, Mom?"
Even when he was still in Haiti, as a 2 & 3 year old, we were told that he would talk and talk....to anyone who would (or wouldn't) listen!  :)

Today we went out grocery shopping.

As we were picking out meat for dinner I put some chicken in the cart. 
Jeremy asked, "Chicken comes from lions, right Mom?" 
Smiling, I said, "From lions?!"  "You asked if chickens, CHICK-ENS, come from lions?"
Jeremy: "They do?"
Then I asked very slowly stressing one word in particular,  "What do chi-ck-ens come from?"

"Meat?"  He asked. 

:)

Once finished, and getting into the car, Jeremy was clapping his hands and slapping his thighs. 
"Mom,"  he said,  "I'm playing poddy-cake."
Me:  "PODDY-cake?!" 

"Uhhhhh,   nooooooo, actually we call it PADDY-cake."

:)