Mother Racer

I had Joy School at my house again today. We worked in our books, had story time, snack time…

And then went on a Scavenger hunt…

I had the opportunity to hang out with a few friends of mine today. It was very nice!!! I had an hour without kids (Corom had the day off and took them on an errand).

I headed off to indoor track practice…

After their agilities and core, we split off into our groups. I took the distance runners and sent them on a 5 mile easy run. They finished off on the track.

They ran 3 laps around the track with using the straight aways to do their strides.

We had a mellow night hanging out with the kids and once they went to bed, Corom and I watched a movie. Good times!

I met with Amber and Mac at 5:30 this morning. It was a nice and easy run. I really enjoyed it! I ran for 1:03.11 and got about 8 miles in. The air quality was pretty bad today. It has been bad this past month but today is the 1st time I could actually feel it (taste it). Once it was light I took a picture of all the fog and smog we were running in…

This was the sun this morning…

I came home and did 20 push-ups, 50 sit-ups and 50 crunches. A good morning.

My day started off with taking the girls to school and then my 3rd to speech class…

I watched an extra little girl today from my kindergartener’s class. The kids had fun!
I then had scouts right after school. While we were waiting for all the boys to show up some of the boys got into a boxing match (with our boxing gloves on). Well of course one of the 10 year old boys came up crying… The other leader and I looked at each other and had no clue what to do!!! So I brought them all upstairs and sat them down.

We had a little “talk” with them explaining how important it is to be nice and not to gang up on each other and I can’t remember what else but it sure was something I am not used to! We did take the boys, my girls and Z (our foreign exchange student and A another foreign exchange student) out for ice cream.

It was quit the group. It took a little time to round all the boys up when we had to leave but other than that they were pretty good…

Z and A then watched the girls for me for about an hour today… I had a meeting with a family. I am part of a mentor (big sister/big brother) program. I take out the same child (that needs a friend) once a week for a 6 month period. We have fun with them and show them that they are loved! We have not had a need for it in our area for about 8 months now (which is always a good thing). We (another mentor and I) went to the house and ended up having to reschedule for another time. Back at the house, the girls were having a blast with Z and A…

We had a few friends stop by but other than that it was a pretty mellow evening.

We met up at 5:15 a.m. and went on a “HILLY” 10 mile loop. The 1st 2 miles was a flat and little downhill warmup. Then came the 1st hill. It was about a quarter of a mile long. I did a surge up that hill… It hurt. I turned back to my friends (I am so glad they go on these runs with me for support… I would do my speed up the hill, then turn back down and meet back up with them until the next hill…).

The next hill was a little less than a 1/2 mile. I did a surge (ran hard) up that hill. Then came Harry’s 1 mile steep up hill. I picked up my pace and began to drive my arms back and forth. Half way up my legs began to feel like jello. The 2 previous hill surges made it tough to go up this hill (mountain :))… Every ounce in my body wanted to give up and stop. My arms were so sore and going numb, my legs were burning and felt like jello…

But, it is amazing how your mental strength can out trump your physical strength … I knew I would regret it if I slowed my pace down or if I turned around and met up with the others. I reached the top and ran back to the last runner and came back up. The last hill was a killer steep quarter of a mile up (maybe a little more than that)… It wasn’t as bad because as I stated just a second ago… Mentally I knew it was my last hill before we headed back down to the cars… It hurt but I was excited to be done. We ran the few miles back down and ended up on the high school track. We ran a couple of laps around the track and threw in a couple of strides on the last lap. I did the 2×50 one leg hops before getting in my car… I ran a total of 1:23.25 (about 10 1/2 to 11 miles?)…

I came home a little before 7… Did 50 sit-ups and 50 crunches. I, then, did 15 push-ups…

I could only do 5 of the “guy” push-ups and then 10 the “girl” way with my knees on the ground. After I got the 2 older girls off to school, I went to South Valley Gym (my mother-in-law works there-my brother & sister in law built the gym) and my 2 younger girls hung out with grandma while I did my 3 x 10 lat pulls from behind and 2 x 10 lat pulls in the front (at 50 lbs again). I did the pull up machine and did 2 x 10 with the weight at 80 lbs. It only took 10 minutes to do this…

I am so looking forward to my easy day tomorrow. 😉

Was it real?… Last night I woke up around 2:30 a.m. Now I don’t know if it was a dream but I thought I heard our back door open and close (I heard the blinds hit against the door). My eyes shot open and I sat there in the dark, listening to the silence… I eventually got up (I didn’t want to wake Corom up just yet) and checked on all the kids and Z (our Foriegn exchange student). Everyone was sound asleep. My back door was unlocked so I locked it. I looked in on the dogs and the garage door was half way closed… I opened it up all the way and went back up to my room… That is when Kittie, our dog, started barking like crazy… She woke Corom up from all her barking. He caught me looking out the blinds from our window. Anyway… I told him what I heard but to this moment I still don’t know if I dreamt the noise or not. Corom did go calm Kittie down and eventually we fell back asleep. A little creepy…

I had Joy School at my house today…

This was a comment my youngest stated to the other kids…
My youngest to the other kids in Joy School: My dad died.
The kids: He did?
Me to intervene: No he didn’t. Don’t be making things up!
My youngest: Not that dad, my other dad…
My 1st thought: Shoot, where was the child support?
Joy School went well today. The kids weren’t to hyper, which is always good…

A few neighbors came over and hung out for a while (all on coincidence)… It was nice, so we just let the kids play. I, then, had to leave for in-door track practice. My girls and I loaded up and headed to practice. I sent the kids on a 1 1/2 mile warmup; then a hill workout of about 2 to 3 miles (some ran 2 miles worth and the others 3); with a 2 mile cool down.

They finished off with strides and 2 x 50 leg hops. Tough workout!
In the middle of practice I ran my 2 older daughters up to piano lessons… After dinner and homework, Corom went to scouts, then basketball practice and the girls went to bed (at 7:15). Later, later I went to my friend’s house to watch the Bachelor. 🙂