thankful#121: puddles to stomp in

The girls and I went to Music Time at the new local toy store today. Our walk home took about three times as long as our walk there because both girls were on foot rather than in the stroller or the ergo. We stopped to watch the ducks in the canal, we stopped to pet a couple of dogs on walks with their people, we stopped to pick flowers and blow some wishes. The longest break, however, came when Kinsley discovered the "giant" puddle right next to the parking lot by the track. She and Dagny spent a good twenty to thirty minutes running, jumping, skipping, and dancing through it. I haven't heard Dagny giggle that hard and for that long in a while and she's generally a pretty happy kid.

They. were. soaked. The rest of the walk was a wet, muddy, squishy one. Kinsley could hardly keep her drenched pants from falling off and Dagny was having a hard time walking because the weight of her muddy pants and boots were so awkward for her. When we finally got home, I stripped them down at the front door. Kinsley was giggling hysterically as we pulled her boots off and she was hit by the wave of water that was stuck inside them. She couldn't even get her clothes off by herself because they were plastered to her body by the mud and water. And Dagny's pants will definitely not be getting passed along to any of the neighbor girls when she outgrows them. In fact, they may be taken directly to the cleaning rag pile.

thankful#120: megan b

I have a hard time putting into words why I am thankful for my friendship with Megan. And it's not because I have to stretch to find something, rather it's because I am thankful for every single aspect of her friendship. I could have a blog titled "thankful365 for Megan" and come up with hundreds of reasons and solid examples of why she's so amazing. She is, simply put, just a great great person. She is kind, honest, positive, funny, encouraging, supportive, trusting/trustworthy, morally sound and true, and on and on and on.

Megan is one of the people that I miss the most in Portland. I can't imagine a better coworker. She made days bearable that would otherwise have been very much not so. We commiserated about coaching-related things, school-related things, parent-related things, and students. Personally, she gave me the strength to get through times that I think I may have lost my mind in had she not been there. And after all that she knows about me, she doesn't judge me.

But she is not only amazing through hard times, she is someone who I very much enjoy simply hanging out with - one of the best running buddies around, super fun to play soccer with, and we even made a fun night out of chaperoning the Prom. 

I'm not even beginning to do justice to the amazing person that is Megan Bruce. She is an amazing friend, an amazing counselor, an amazing coworker, and an amazing person. I am so thankful for our friendship. Happy birthday, buddy!!!

thankful#119: a good day

We didn't do anything overly special today - just the normal school day for Kinsley, I got to hang out with Dagny, we ran some errands, played, danced, and read some books. I can't complain about a single thing that happened today ... just thankful for a good day.

thankful#118: barnes and noble

we had the busiest day ever today. kinsley had swimming then we immediately came home to pick up dagny and go to the new storytime at the new toy store in town. the girls were so in to it that kinsley asked to go to barnes and noble so we could keep reading books (love this kid). we spent two hours there. two hours! we would have been there longer but dagny hadn't napped at all and she was walking her drunk-tired walk and bouncing off of bookshelves in the store - i had to get her home. but we read that entire two hours. dagny played by herself at the little train table almost the entire time which allowed kinsley and i to read book after book after book. it was amazing. and when dagny decided she was done with the trains, she picked out some books and we read more. i love that these girls love to read so much. and i love that we have places like barnes and noble where we can spend an entire afternoon doing just that.

thankful#117: lighter evenings

Kevin didn't get home until almost 5 this evening but I was still able to head out for a run and have some daylight left. Just a couple of months ago if I hadn't left by about 4, I wouldn't get a run in at all. I refuse to run in the dark. But it's now still light even at 630/700 in the evening. I love the time of year when I can go out for a later evening run. We're almost there.

thankful#116: brunch this morning

Whitney stayed the night at Grandma Billie's so we headed up first thing in the morning for brunch. Kevin met us up there at the end of his run, which was nice. We brought up the Blendtec to make waffles on GMB's waffle iron and she had fruit and scrambled some eggs. It was simple, but so nice to get to hang out with Whit a little more before she headed back to Portland.

thankful#115: date night

Whitney came down tonight so that Kevin and I could go out for dinner and a movie. We so rarely get to go out like this that it makes it extra exciting when we do. We hang out just the two of us, but it's typically at 8 in the evening when the girls go to bed. We went to see Silver Linings Playbook and then went out to eat before heading back to hang out with Whit and the girls. It might have been the funnest date we've had in a long while.

thankful#114: more teeth

I swear I have been saying that Dagny "is teething" for months now. MONTHS. Like, the last TWELVE months. Since she was about 4 months old she has been one big drool fountain on and off, she has phases where she gnaws on her fist non-stop or rubs her face on my shoulder as hard as she can. But her poor little teeth seem to take forever to actually cut their way through. About two weeks ago or so she had another bout of what I was blaming on teething - her sleep was all messed up, she was inconsolable, she was jamming her fist in her mouth, and was just plain miserable. It lasted two or three nights and then slowly tapered off back to her normalcy. And tonight I noticed that she had TWO new teeth! What's a little odd to me is that she skipped the normal growth pattern - she had her top four and bottom front two, but then she skipped the top cuspids and went straight to the molars. On the bottom, she skipped the lateral inscisor and went straight to the cuspid. I'm hoping that those molars were what were giving her so much grief. She finally has something to show for all of that pain and misery and hopefully one of the toughest parts is over.

thankful#113: this moment from last night

thankful#112: new friends

today at the park kinsley made a new friend. lincoln is 3 years old and the two of them immediately took to each other. they played so well together for almost two hours at amazon park while i got to actually have a conversation with his mom, emma. we exchanged phone numbers so hopefully we'll get a chance to see them again!

thankful#111: easier evenings

kinsley was a bit of a pill all day today. nothing horrible, just a little feistier than normal, a little more stubborn than normal, and then super rambunctious on top of that. we had some great moments today, but we had some frustrating ones as well and i was exhausted by about 3pm. thankfully, our evening mellowed out and her and dagny got along great, which always makes things run more smoothly. they had some dinner then both excitedly got in the bath. and then there were these moments:

so happy

this might be my favorite

told them to stick their tongues out and this is what i got

such goofballs. i can't look at these pictures without getting a huge smile on my face.

thankful#110: raffi

We had to make the Portland to Eugene trip yet again this morning. Even though it's a short trip, the girls are becoming champion travelers. But it's also getting harder and harder for them to say good-bye to all of the grandparents so often. They don't have the concept of "we'll see them in a few weeks" - all they know is we're getting in the car and going back to our place where their grandparents are not. The last few trips Kinsley has been in tears when we drive away. It breaks my heart and makes me that much more excited for the day that we can move back (fingers crossed that happens).

Today the only thing that got Kinsley into the car was Raffi. Gramma told her that we could borrow the new CD and listen to it on the way home. And that's just what we did. We listened to it almost the entire trip home. Each of those songs is only a little over a minute, which means we listened to the entire CD multiple times ... I lost count at 5. At the end of each song, Dagny would yell, "mo? mo?" as she waited for the next one to start. Pretty cute. But it didn't last long before she was fast asleep.

Kinsley sang along the entire time and was super excited about it.

Raffi was MVP today.

thankful#109: natural ice cream that is actually natural

Safeway now carries a brand of ice cream that I will actually purchase - Open Nature. It's still not as guilt-free as making my own in the blendtec where I can substitute sugar for other sweet deliciousness, but sometimes we want ice cream last minute and I don't have the stuff for the blender (or the girls are already asleep and I don't want to wake them with it). But at least this stuff doesn't have all of the crap that is in typical brands. There's not synthetic chemicals of any kind or fake flavorings or coloring or preservatives. There aren't any ingredients that I can't pronounce and there aren't any that I don't know exactly what they are and where they came from. I simply won't buy that crap anymore - even if the cravings are hitting hard. I'm done with food coloring. I'm done with preservatives. I'm done with unnecessary toxic chemicals of any kind. They're just that: unnecessary. Period.

I still prefer the homemade stuff, but it's nice to have another option if I "need" one.

thankful#108: kevin's friends married rad ladies

I've always liked Kevin's friends - they have always welcomed me in their group, they've always been accepting, and I've always enjoyed being around them. But they have always been HIS group of friends. Our groups of friends never really crossed each other except when we were together. I wouldn't hang out with his friends unless I was with him and vice versa - we didn't really have many (if any?) mutual friends. That is until everyone started getting married. The guys all chose some pretty rad ladies to settle down with and I am so thankful to have them in my life. They aren't just gals who I can "tolerate" when we're at social gatherings. I truly enjoy spending time with them and we have, on multiple occasions, gotten together without the boys to hang out. We've taken the kids places together but we've also left the babies with the boys and had ladies' nights out. Then there are the weekends that we've spent together, all in one house, in Sunriver. Those have been such great memories and that's definitely a tradition that I hope we keep. I can't wait to be back up in Portland again so that I can see them regularly again.

thankful#107: yoga today

holy tight hips and sore legs for my run this morning. yoga this afternoon was exactly what i needed to loosen up a bit. i wasn't able to get the inner quiet this time - the music was a little too catchy and i found myself singing along rather than letting go - but that wasn't my goal today. thanks to kevin and baba for taking the girls so i could get my stretch on.

thankful#106: vitamin d days in february

it was such a beautiful day today that we spent the majority of it outside. dagny swam in the morning and while she was napping kinsley and i read books out on the sidewalk. when dagny woke up we played with althea and leotine before deciding to go to the sandy park. we spent 4 hours there! and even though it was still a little chilly the girls were able to bare some skin and soak up some vitamin d.

it definitely made me anxious for spring and some steady sunny days.

thankful#105: having my body back to myself

Don't get me wrong, I loved being pregnant. I loved feeling my babies move and grow. I loved knowing that I had a huge responsibility to do everything in my power to give my babies a healthy start on their lives. I love that being pregnant was one of the first steps in my becoming uber aware of a healthy lifestyle. I also loved nursing - almost everything about it. But it is pretty nice to have my body be just my body for the first time in roughly 4 years. For a long time there I was either growing a human or feeding said human or conscious that I would soon be preparing to grow and feed another human. There are times already that I miss those periods, but it is nice to have my body back to myself. It's nice to be able to wear what I want and not have to worry about whether or not my top will allow me to nurse a baby. It's nice to be able to really workout hard and only have to worry about how to replenish and recover for myself. I still have little humans climbing on me and pulling on me and hanging from me, which I love, and my body has physically changed in many ways, but other than that my body is back to being MY body.

thankful#104: dagny is a rockstar traveler

I was so nervous about how Dagny would do on this trip. But she amazed me and did absolutely fantastic. She slept the entire flight, both of them, on the way there. I had an entire diaper bag full of tricks and didn't even have to open it. On the way home she slept for the entire first flight. She was awake the entire second flight, but she did so great - she had some snacks, read some books, colored a bit, and played peek-a-boo with the guy behind us. She sat in my lap and giggled for the last 20 minutes of the flight. When we landed and were allowed to unbuckle, she stood in the aisle and flirted with everyone around us while hanging on to my leg. People were commenting on how well she had done. When we were walking through the corridor heading to the baggage claim we actually had two different people tell me that she was incredibly well-behaved and that she had done amazingly well.

I couldn't be more proud of her and it's so nice to know that she's capable of a trip of that length.

thankful#103: essential oils - flight anxiety mix

I hate flying. It gets worse every time I do it. My anxiety about this trip to Great Falls started the second I got off the phone with Catherine about booking my flight - it may have actually started while we were still talking about it. Thankfully, I was pretty preoccupied with my nerves about Dagny's flying capabilities, but that didn't completely erase my serious anxiety about the flight itself. However, I looked in my essential oils books and found a mix specifically for anxiety about flying. I put a drop of lavender and a drop of geranium on a cotton ball and put it in a ziplock bag. When my anxiety hit, I took opened the bag and inhaled as deeply as I could. It was absolutely amazed at how fast I felt like the aroma helped my situation. I immediately lost my anxiety! That was the first time in a long time that I have not felt overwhelmed with anxiety while flying ... there may be hope for my future travels.

thankful#102: catch up time with conway

Sunday evening, the kids were finally all asleep and Catherine and I finally got a chance to just hang out and catch up. I'm so thankful for the chance to have the conversation that we had. It spanned a lot of topics and a lot of time through our lives. I've known Conway for 16+ years now and I feel like this last conversation brought us even closer - we talked about things that we've never talked about; we talked about areas of our lives that we've never really gone deeply into; we laughed and we cried. I haven't stayed up that late in a long time, but I'm so thankful that we did. I'm so thankful for our chance to catch up and I'm so thankful for our friendship.

thankful#101: helpful people on our flights

We had so many helpful people on our flights to Great Falls. Matt Powell ended up being on our same flight to Salt Lake City and I couldn't be more thankful for his help getting there. I hadn't really given much thought to how I would actually get on to the plane and get settled - most of my energy had been focused on how I would keep Dagny occupied once we were actually in the air. But Matt helped me get our bag to the counter, helped us get checked in, helped us through security, filled Dagny's water bottle before getting on the plane, and made sure we were settled in our seats. He made the first part of our trip so smooth and he was so kind and I am so thankful that he was there. On our second flight, from Salt Lake to Great Falls, we were on a tiny connection flight. I was clearly nervous as we boarded but the people on all sides of us were so quick to calm my nerves. The gentleman that we initially sat next to immediately started talking to Dagny and reassuring me that it was completely fine if she was agitated during the flight. We ended up needing to switch seats to be on the right side of the plane because that's where the extra oxygen masks were. The woman that we sat next to also reassured me over and over that I didn't need to worry - she has children and grandchildren and she's been in my shoes and it doesn't matter if Dagny doesn't do well - it's a short flight.

I can't even explain how comforting and calming it was to have such kind people around me on those flights. I was so nervous to fly with a toddler - my toddler - and had so much anxiety built up. But they squashed it and made the trip to Great Falls so smooth for us ... and it didn't hurt that Dagny slept the entire flight - both times.

thankful#100: a delayed flight

Dagny and I were supposed to fly out at 4:40pm on Friday to head to Great Falls for Everett's baptism. Catherine called at 11 and said my flight had been delayed and we would miss our connection so we needed to rebook. We ended up getting put on a 6am flight Saturday morning. At first I was slightly stressed about the change. I didn't know how Dagny would do if I had to wake her up at 430 in the morning and put her straight into her carseat. But then I realized that because we weren't leaving that evening, we would have the chance to see Yaya. We got to spend the evening relaxing, eating pizza, watching a movie, and hanging out. We wouldn't have been able to do that if we had been on our original schedule.

thankful#99: kevin

pretty much everything about him.

thankful#98: impromptu bike rides requested by the girls

Dagny and I picked Kins up at school in the burley today because it was so nice out. When we pulled up to the apartment Dagny said "more? more?" I asked them if they wanted to ride longer and Kinsley said "yeah, but not TO anywhere. Let's just ride and look at neat houses." So we did. It was fantastic.

thankful#97: blackout shades

They make early bedtimes and sleeping in possible for the girls.

thankful#96: kinsley's attitude goes as fast as it comes

Kinsley had such a great start to her day today. She was sweet, she was cuddly, she was her spry little self. Dagny and I picked her up from school and she was bouncy and giddy and playful and happy. We went out to Target and loaded our cart with snacks for our upcoming road trip as well as a couple of other small things for the apartment. She was giving Dagny kisses, helping her in and out of the cart, and making her laugh. When we got to the checkout I realized I didn't have my wallet with me. We loaded back into the car and drove home. Not long into the trip home, Dagny fell asleep. When we pulled up to the apartment, Kinsley asked if she could stay in the car so she could keep dancing to the song on the radio. I love that kid. Dagny stayed sleeping, so on the way back out to Target, we stopped for a hot chocolate where Kinsley talked the ear off of the barista at the window. We hung out in the car for a while so that Dagny could get a decent little nap in. When she woke up, we ran in, grabbed our cart that was waiting by customer service, paid for our stuff, and climbed back into the car. Next we headed to JoAnn's to grab some yarn that I needed for a project. And it was there that she flipped her switch. Suddenly, my sweet, happy, bubbly little chick turned into a whiny, stubborn, defiant little gal. She was grabbing things from Dagny, screaming because she wanted to carry a puppy stuffed animal and not the giraffe that she had originally picked off the shelf (to CARRY, not buy), and when I told her it was time to go she sat down on a bench and held on with a death grip to the base forcing me to pry her wriggly self off of it. She was sassy the whole way home ... and for the rest of the evening. She was splashing like a mad woman in the bath and running like a crazy woman through the apartment when we told her it was time to start settling in. She even told me that the nice little girl that we knew "ran far far away and is never, ever, ever, ever, ever, ever .... ever coming back." Nice. At one point, I told Kevin I couldn't deal and I needed to step out before I lost my mind. I'm pretty sure those weren't the words I used, though, because Kinsley did ask "what does 'f*!@ing mind' mean?" oops.

Luckily, the attitude was just as quick to leave as it was to come. As she curled into bed, she put her arms around me and gave me a whole heap of kisses and said, "I love you, mommy. I'm sorry I'm a pill." As frustrated as I had been moments earlier, and as hot as my blood was getting, it only took those few seconds to all reverse. Let's hope that "the nice little girl we know" who "ran away and is never coming back" decides to come back and stick around for tomorrow. Because that kid is such a sweetheart.

thankful#95: hard work pays off

The first race I ran post-Dagny was the Zena Road Run in 2012 - she was 4 months old and I had just really started running again. My goal for that race was to run under 9-minute miles for the 6-miler. I ended up running 8:45's and was pretty happy with it. The course was a hard one with lots of really long and relatively steep hills.

One year later and I got the chance to run the same race again and really gauge where I'm at with a year's worth of training under my belt. Zena Road Run 2013 was today and I did the 6-miler again. My goal this year was to do around 7:30-minute miles. I remembered thinking that the course was hard last year and I remembered the hills being hard, but I have been training pretty hard and felt good going into the race. I've even run extra hill intervals just to get ready for these ones. But it's amazing how hard this course is. My pace ranged from 6:50's to 8:30's depending on where I was on the course. I think that I was secretly hoping for an even faster race, but once I was actually out there I quickly realized that it wasn't realistic - not on this course. I finished feeling pretty strong in 45:52 at 7:39-minute mile pace.

I'm feeling good about the hard work I've put in over the last year. This is the type of course that can only be compared to itself. I can't look at it and compare it to any other 10k race because it's just so unlike any other course I'll race. Even the top guys finishing the 15k race had looks of near defeat after finishing on the same last few miles that I did. If they're saying it's a tough course, I feel better about having the same feeling. I'll continue to run this race and only compare it to my other performances on this course. But it is a great feeling to have shaved more than a minute per mile off of my time from last year. Hard work does pay off.

thankful#94: early bedtime tonight

The last few nights have been horrendous in the sleep department... and it's beginning to catch up with all of us. The girls are getting whiney and bossy and irritable. Kevin and I are both tired and getting short. I am definitely irritable and can feel my energy turning negative, which I absolutely hate.

BUT Dagny went down at 6:15 and it is now 7:30 and Kinsley is also sound asleep. I will now be following suit. Here's to a much needed restful night ... fingers crossed.

thankful#93: mid-day lie downs

Dagny had a terrible night last night. I, consequently, barely slept a wink and I was so tired this morning that my face hurt. Kinsley was at school and while I was out running a few errands Dagny fell asleep on Kevin. He had told Kinsley that he would pick her up in the burley, so when I got home we made the Dagny transfer from Kevin to me. Because she was asleep on me and I didn't want to wake her up trying to transfer her to her bed, I laid down with her. I was able to keep her asleep for another 30 minutes or so until Kinsley got home. Even though I didn't fall asleep (she's a pretty heavy breather and I'm pretty sensitive to sound), it was so nice to just lay there and do absolutely nothing but relax. That never happens during the day so it was pretty glorious.