13.1 Because I'm Only HALF Crazy

Early mid life crisis?  Perhaps.  For some inexplicable reason, upon celebration of my 29th birthday, vowed to run a half marathon before my 30th.  Crazy?  Yes.  One short year ago I had diligently trained to run a 5k.  (For those who are metric-conversion challenged that's only 3.1 miles.)  Yet, somehow I had myself convinced I needed to run 13.1 miles?  Yup.  Crazy.

Someone once told me "A half marathon is only a 5k with a ten mile warm up."  Fiddlesticks!  That's a bunch of nonsense right there.  Training for a spring race proved to be quite the test of determination.  There is really nothing fun about running distance on a treadmill (or as Chanda calls it...the hamster wheel).  My hatred for the treadmill pushed me to running outside in all kinds of fun weather conditions.  Though we had an unusually mild winter, without fail we'd have amazingly gorgeous weather during the week and then craptasticly cold, wet, and snowy weekend weather.  Weekends were my "long" training runs.  Go figure.  

Little did I know how important this outdoor crappy weather training would turn out to be.  Friday packet pick up presented a gorgeous breezy 70+ degree day.  What a difference a day makes.  Race day was wet and cold.  So very very cold.  We got rained on and pelted with sleet.  Around mile 7 I calculated my time and distance in my head and determined my "goal" finish time was not likely to happen.  "Just keep running!"  I told myself.  I've been super spoiled by running the Akron Marathon relays.  The cheering and neighborhood support is fantastic.  Other than the occasional glare from disgruntled drivers, there were zero "neighborhood" folks along this course.  The "human cones" (race volunteers) would sometimes cheer halfheartedly.  (Though, who can blame them for their lack of enthusiasm when it was freaking COLD out!?!) 

Thankfully, I have an amazing husband.  (As does my running partner.)  Our men braved the dreary conditions to come cheer us on.  They endured three whole miles of trekking along the course to see us at three different locations (including the finish line.)  Three miles may not sound like much, but keep in mind they wore jeans, boots (work & cowboy respectively), and one even sported a cowboy hat.  Those of you who know our husbands can guess which of the two wore the cowboy apparel.  They sure do love us.

I crossed the finish line with a time of 2 hours 6 minutes and 46 seconds.  I finished at exactly the middle of the pack (over all, in my "gender" and in my age category.)  It was over my original goal time of finishing under two hours, but gosh darn it I finished.  At the advice of Nathan from one of his blog posts, I had armed myself with a "back up goal" of finishing with less than "ten minute mile" average pace.  I accomplished my "plan b" goal with an average pace of 9:41 minutes per mile.  I'll take it. 

My Dada

Ten months old and already a chatter box?  My youngest seems to be very verbal for such a little guy.  He's said "Mama" from VERY early on (though at the time we doubted that he knew what he was saying at first.)  It soon became clear that he did in fact know that saying "Mama" would get my attention. (Smart baby!)  Today he looked at the computer where my facebook page happened to be up.  He looked at my profile picture and said (quite clearly) "My Dada!" and got a big grin on his face.  Two word combo already?  Really? 

Take a Photo

My son is a magnet for Russian women.  Particularly enthusiastic grand-motherly Russian women. 

This fact is something that may come of little surprise to anyone who's seen my youngest son recently.  Suffice to say he's a big healthy bouncing baby boy who tips the scales for his age.  We seem to have a plethora of Russians living in our area and somehow they all manage to flock to my son.  His little cheeks have been pinched by several Russians who live in my mother's apartment complex.  (So often that now anytime my middle son hears a Russian accent he takes cover and hides behind my legs so he's not also victimized by the cheek-pinchers).  We often run into Russians at the local library as well.  And, again with the pinching.  (And you just thought he had naturally rosie cheeks! Ha!)

This afternoon I ventured out to the grocery store.  Levi was strapped securely in the seat of the cart and my older two were "helping" me gather groceries and putting them in the cart for me.  I turned to the side to snatch a bunch of bananas and hear the distinct sound of a Russian woman exclaiming about (as best as I can spell) shcheki.  Now, I'm not fluent in Russian, but by context I gather they're talking about his rather fat cheeks!  I turn around to see Levi arching his little back and straining backwards as best he can in his seat while this grandmother is inching closer to his cheeks.  I tried my best to step back over and rescue my little butter ball, but alas she has a box-out that would make most NBA players blush.  After much ooing and ahing she finally steps aside and I again regain the reigns of my cart.  She turns to me, grabs me by my shoulders and she tells me (insert deep Russian accent here) "Photo.  You must take photo.  You.  You go home, and you take photo.  Lots of photo.  He.  He is picture perfect.  You must take photo."

I nodded and smiled as politely as I could.  She then went around the cart and gathered Lydia into what I can only describe as a "bosom hug" (You know the kind, right?  Where they smush your face into their bosom and rock back and forth?)  Lydia looked taken aback for a moment but then just smiled and turned to me and said "Mommy, she's silly." :)  (Note that Boaz had already heard the tell-tale accent and was safely hiding behind my legs at this point.)

It was only after I had maneuvered to a different aisle of the store that I started to really ponder what this dear old woman said.  "Photo....Lots of photo."  He is pretty darn picture perfect.  So, I snapped a photo with my phone.  It will never win any amateur photo awards, but I will now forever have that photo to remember what my son looked like on a cold winter day of his ninth month of life.  Picture perfect.

We never know how long we have on Earth for only God knows the number of our days, but of this I can be sure:  My "littles" will only stay "little" for such a short while.  I look at my Lydia...so "grown up" already at nearly five years old.  I can fondly remember holding her and rocking her as she had terrible colic and reflux.  There were times when I felt like the night drug on forever and that this phase was never going to end.  Now I look at her and wish I could swaddle her in a receiving blanket and rock her to sleep on my chest.  I look at Boaz.  Such a "boy" he is.  Dinosaurs and trains.  Balls and dirt.  Lots of dirt.  It's hard to remember him as that little 6 pound 15 ounce peanut that made my heart melt when I first saw his tiny face.  Levi.  My strapping boy.  He always seems bigger than he should be.  He's so eager to reach that next milestone so he can keep up with his siblings.

Photos.  Lots of photos.  Lord help me to remember to take lots of photos so I can remember these precious moments.  Lord help me to never take for granted the blessings you've showered on me.  Lord when I'm tired from a night of no sleep, help me to remember to be thankful for the privilege of spending those late night or early morning moments with my "littles" because they won't be little for very long. 

I'm forever thankful to God Almighty, the Author of Life, who has- for now- blessed me with these.

Potty Training

Those two little words can strike fear into the best parents!  Yes, it's that time again: POTTY TRAINING!  It seems like just yesterday I was slipping Lydia M&M's for going potty.  Now it's Boaz's turn.  He's done really well considering.  Over this past Memorial Day weekend we started him in Pull-ups and he did a pretty good job of keeping them dry even while out and about at other peoples houses.  Now, pooping, that's a whole other story, but we'll get to that in a bit.

After successfully keeping his pants dry I thought it was time to give "Naked Potty Training" a try because while he was keeping his pull-ups dry, he wasn't really showing much initiative to go on his own (without our constant "go potty" prompts).  Day one was FABULOUS!  Not without accidents mind you, but all in all a very productive day.  I ended the day with a great sense of satisfaction and was quite proud of my "patience of Job" throughout the day.  Day two?  NOT SO MUCH!  I found myself in tears by mid-afternoon.  Not all of it directly potty-related, but indirectly my lovely GREEN monster (also known as Lydia) was ridiculously jealous of the attention being paid to Boaz and Levi had a TERRIBLE day at the doctor's office (three shots, an oral vaccine, and a corrective "procedure" to an adhesion in a place no "adhesion" should EVER be...poor little buddy!)  Suffice to say I no longer had the feeling of satisfaction but rather of near epic FAIL!

On to Day Three...now, add to the fun the fact that I was watching Wynnie, the beautiful six month old daughter of friends of ours.  Over all the morning went shockingly well.  This could be due, in part, to the fact that Lydia left mid morning to go pick strawberries with her grandpa.  Someone even asked how potty training was going and I dared to tentatively admit that so far so good: No accidents thus far today.  So, picture it, I've nursed Levi who is now happily snoozing securely in his boppy on the couch.  To allow him quiet to sleep, I take Boaz and Wynnie into Lyd's room so Bo can play while I feed Wynnie her bottle.  Suddenly I hear an "Uh oh!" and watch with horror as a little turd pops out of Boaz's naked butt.  I said, "Go potty quick!" and he runs to the potty leaving a trail of turds in his wake.  He peed in the potty but he'd pooped out all he had.  If it weren't so gross it'd be hilarious!

Got Sleep?

To the student who thinks they’re tired because they had to get up for the bus. For the teenager sleepy from cramming for the test last night. To the young adult complaining about working a double. To the adult who either never had children or who parented “littles” so long ago they’ve blissfully forgotten what it’s like. To all of you I have this to say: You may think you know what it is to be deprived of sleep, but you would be WRONG. Allow me to give you a small glimpse of what true, newborn-induced sleep deprivation looks like:

After victoriously settling Levi into his bassinet after his 1:30am feeding, I closed my eyes ever so briefly only to become keenly aware of his fussing again. I tried without success to settle him back to sleep. I tried patting, jiggling, shushing. All of this only served to further anger my little bundle of joy. Admitting defeat, I mustered up the strength and energy to sit up and save him from his “torture chamber” that is his bed. Through sleep blurred eyes I notice with great shock that the clock now reads 4:45am!!! Three HOURS had passed in what felt like merely three minutes. No wonder my little angel was up and fussing. His belly was hungry! After brushing off the initial feelings of epic fail as a parent of a newborn it occurs to me that THIS is what sleep deprivation feels like! When hours pass in what feels like seconds, you know you’re tired!