Kicking off December

Callie made sautéed peppers and onions for dinner. It was delicious!  Her grandfather taught her how while she was visiting and she was delighted to share her new talent.

We managed to find a place to put the tree and we set it up.  It doesn't look bad from afar, but it needs to be replaced.  Still smells a bit musty, and some sections of lights are out, and there is still rust on one side.  But it looks okay from here!

The girls needed a short video of their favorite Christmas tradition for YW.  Delaney was cute and did a 9 second clip on putting the "tree donut" on top of the tree.  Here is a picture of my cute kid.

Marian was willing to cooperate. I was an idiot and took a picture, not a video.  So here is a photo!  And then she had to re-do her thing while I recorded it for reals. 

Um... San Diego doesn't seem to have gotten the memo that it is December!

And this is my new favorite saying.  I'm going to frame it.

 

Wrapping up our AR time

The kids LOVE getting to ride on the trailer.  Grandpa indulges them when he can.

There was even an exciting trip to get some logs.

Look how much fun they are having!

Miranda left before we did, so we had to say goodbye to her family.  I like her a lot!  

Alex wasn't sure how to pose.  But Grandpa knows how!

The logs that were hauled in needed to be stacked.

And a lot of them needed to be chopped smaller. Many hands were excited to help with the chopping!  Andy was pretty good at it.

Marian was a little hesitant.

  

But her enthusiasm was strong.

Dan is better at baseball.

Even Delaney gave it a wack!

Rylee gave it a good shot.  But she needs a little more muscle.

Callie was a good overseer.

Anyway, we had a great time pulling the wood off the trailer, tossing it over the fence, and splitting and  stacking it.  It was quite invigorating!

We did stop by to visit Mom before we headed back to CA.  

The Monday after Thanksgiving, we left.  I was pretty impressed that Levi was able to fit on Callie's lap!  We did the return drive in 2 days again.  I kind of like it because it just gets it done.  And only one night in a hotel.    

Note to myself though..... do not start a long drive on a Monday.  I can't go out to get last minute items, or do all the shopping I suddenly decided I needed to do. 

Happy Thanksgiving

With the covid restrictions and panic, I didn't want to post anything on Facebook or brag that I got to spend Thanksgiving with my family, but I totally did!  We stayed in AR long enough to be able to gorge on Turkey with my favorite people.  Not ALL of them, but a bunch.

This little cutie helped make rolls.

And she was just too adorable!

The Thanksgiving selfie I took and sent to my oldest child, who had to eat turkey in Utah.... except vegans don't eat turkey......

I eat turkey and it is delicious. Dad carved it.

And we ate it!!

Marian, Callie and cousin Katie.

Of course there was pie!!  LOTS and lots of pie!

Huh.  I'm a little dismayed that this is the sum total of Thanksgiving Day photos.

Hanging out in AR

We spent the week after the race in R, hanging out with family.  It was most excellent.

The girls were thrilled to have a variety of weather.  This was a gray, misty morning that was pretty chilly.  Quite the departure from perpetually sunny and 70 inCA.

Marian found this tiny little lizard.  Once he warmed up he was a little less happy to be held.

Miranda brought her bird, who was vastly amusing.

Steven wore a cool shirt.

There was a drizzly day trip to Branson to shop.

And even though the race was over, we still needed to run at least a little.

Simon had a birthday and we got cake!

He is so cute.

Levi even got to go out and play disk golf.  Look how happy he is!

 

A Little Run in AR

So, the reason we made a random trip to Arkansas in the middle of November was for a race.  Yep.  A race.  The White River Marathon, Half Marathon and 5k, to be precise.  My dad has been running in this race for years and this year he invited us all to run it too.  Marian and I had been logging some decent miles and wanted to run.  I committed to the Half, and she decided she was going to go big.  So she signed up for the full marathon.  Dan decided he needed a good goal, so he also signed up to run the full marathon.  He flew out to AR to meet up with us right before the race.

The took Covid precautions, but the race went on!

A mask-less photo. Callie ran the 5k with the rest of the family, but she didn't want to sign up.  She ran without registering, so her time and placement are unknown.  But she was awesome!

Here is all the family that ran!  Dad, Dan M, Miranda, and their 3 boys, Deborah and Sara, and then the 4 of us.  It was so exciting!

Marian and I, waiting in or corral to go.  We were assigned to Corral "L" and didn't get started running till almost 30 minutes after the first group left.

Dad got a photo of Callie rounding the curve to the finish!  

Running Selfie!!  Marian looked like this through the whole race- calm, cool and like she could do this forever.

The race was an out and back.  Half marathoners only went out and back once.  The full marathoners did it twice.  So we passed Dan as we were finishing and he was going out for the second time.

My glorious finish!!  I had studied photos of past years finishers to see what they were wearing, and in the process, I realized I wanted a good photo finish. I didn't want to be looking at my watch, and I didn't want to look like I was dying.  So I am quite delighted with this!  My finishing time was 2:18:06, with a 10:33 pace.  I placed 159 out of a total of a field of 288 runners.  I was pretty pleased.

Marian and I had been putting in some pretty long runs.  So 13 miles was no big deal for me.  Marian had been consistently running over 20 miles on Mondays for a few weeks and I think her longest run was 24 miles before the race.  So we were both feeling pretty comfortable.  I could have pushed myself and run faster, but Marian didn't want to push it the first half and burn out in the second half, so she stayed at her happy pace and I stayed with her.  And it was an excellent race for us both!  

At the end of the first out-and-back, I went straight to finish, and she looped around to go out for her second lap.

I was touched that Dad and both of my sisters stayed to cheer me in. My little heart was all warm and fuzzy about that.  Dad headed home shortly after.  I ate some yummy food, changed into warm and dry clothes, and we headed back to the finish line to wait for Dan and Marian.

It was SO MUCH fun to hang out with my sisters!  We had a blast cheering in all the runners as they came down the final stretch.  We kept company with a lady waiting for her friend to finish and she took this photo for us.  Love these two ladies so much!

I had expected Dan to come in a lot sooner than he did.  He did text that he was shuffling along.  He had not had the time to run like Marian had, and I think his longest run was only 16 miles. And blisters were involved.  So he rocked the first half and struggled on the second.

This is his official race photo at the finish. He was DONE. But he did it!

And I turned around and saw this! My girl, dashing for the finish! I confess that my heart did swell with pride.

She was amazing, and had a great sprint to the end.

And look at her, still looking cool and comfortable and like she could do this all day.

Her finishing stats. Pretty dang impressive!

Happy to be done, and sporting their bling. 

It was a perfect day for the race, with glorious weather.  The race was flat, and it was just an amazing day. It is a really well done event and I would love to do it again!