H2C

Hood to Coast: An experience I swore I would never be a part of. But, dang it! I fell on the band wagon just like everyone else. I mostly did it to be with Jer and have something that we were training for together. We went with 2 other couples that we are friends with. I had been dreading it and all the work it took to leave for 4 days. We left on Luke's first day of school. My parents weren't able to get into town until after school got out- so I had to find "in-between" care for them as well. Anyway- to save all the details- my folks came and took such great care of them. We went and all fell into place. On the first night we stayed at my good friend, Melissa's house. Her and her husband were amazing hosts and it was SO great to get a good night's sleep before the race......especially since we would be up the following 38 hours! Hood to Coast is a 200 mile relay from Hood River to Seaside (the coast). There are teams of 12 runners split into 2 vans. Each runner has 3 legs of 4-7 miles each. One whole van does a set of legs and then the other whole van goes, so forth. It was fun. It was exhausting. It was challenging. It was good to get away.

The beach when we got finished.....(this doesn't show the MASSIVE amount of people behind me from the race. ) Traffic was so bad that it took us 3 hours to go 5 miles. Our last runner was waiting at the finish line for us for 2 hours. Poor girl!

At the coast

Our team. I didn't even try to get runner pics. I was just trying to be "present" in the moment...

And finally, the first day of school pictures. Of course Libby wanted to get in on it. This was actually the day she went to Miss Mel's (my old babysitter) when we were leaving
to go to Hood to Coast. She thinks she is so big. :)

Mr. Luke headin to Kindergarten. He was in high spirits when we dropped him off and it was such a surreal feeling watching them toddle off to the playground together. Luke seemed like a newcomer and stopped at a few various places that I think he thought he was supposed to go into since we had been to the Orientation the previous day. "Wait for him, Ian." I said aloud in the car. "He's going to get lost." Jer assured me he wouldn't. And he didn't. But I did get a phone call by 10:00 just as we were about to leave.....from the school nurse. She informed me that she had a cute little boy in her office that was very upset. He had fallen in a mud puddle and soaked his shorts. He was having a hard time calming down and agreeing to return to class. She asked if I would try and verbally calm him down and give him a little verbal TLC. He was bawling. My heart sank. I've never seen or heard him upset for so long over something like that. Apparently he really is self-conscious about others around him. We were afraid we were going to have to go talk with him in person because he still wasn't interested in returning to class. 40 minutes later the nurse finally called back and said he was okay now. He refused to return the shorts to the office the next day, in fear of everyone knowing "he fell in the mud". poor guy. But several school days later and it's all good. Sweet, sensitive guy.
cheesy smile:

Mr. Ian. lol. I don't know where to begin with this guy. He constantly surprises us with his big words used correctly in context. He asks the most complicated questions. (which I often respond with "We'll ask Papa Larry." since he thinks Papa knows everything. He jumped in the car after the first day and said, "Hey guys! Didya miss me?" He doesn't seem to realize that the constant daily redirection from his teacher, means.....he isn't completely on task. In his mind- nothing concrete happened to signify he got in trouble. After all, (in his mind) he wasn't deliberately doing something wrong. I hope he has a good year. He is growing up so much and so fast. He said to me last night, "Mom, thank you for being my mom." in the most sincere voice. He followed it up with a, "I'll love you .....no matter...where you go.....no matter where you are.....no matter what!" I told him I'd remind him of that when he was a teenager. which won't be that long......

I will try and do a better job of updating this. yet my hours seem just as restricted if not more so than before.....