Married to the Army

My life is now complete because I have an ACU pattern apron. I am ready to be an Active Duty Army Chaplain's wife. (I hope you're seeing the humor in this too...) Actually, I've been wanting a new apron for a long while, like the last ~10 years, because the one I was using was a gift made by an ex-boyfriend's mom. It has an elephant appliqued on it and I was hoping to send it to Goodwill, but Benjamin is trying to lay claim on it. He actually said he wanted the new one and I told him it was kind of girly. He said,"I guess you're right. This [pointing to the purple ruffle] looks like a dress." 

I really appreciate Ryan and my mom humoring me by keeping the boys from getting underfoot while I was sewing over the last couple days because there's no way my sewing machine could have handled that ruffle. My mom has her old Singer from when she was in high school and it is a beast! Thanks also to FlirtyAprons.com for the inspiration.

Where is the best place to see Christmas lights?: Temple Square!

I don't know why we've never ridden the Trax in SLC before. I guess I hadn't realized it was free to ride w/in city center until a few months ago. Instead of going to the children's museum, the boys opted to take a ride. We originally were planning to go on Sat. to give Ryan a day with us away so he could focus on his end-of-semester school work, but Alexander was recovering from pink-eye and an ear infection so we had to delay our trip. 

 We only had to wait for ~5 minutes for the return trip, but to Benjamin it seemed like an eternity.

We finally got our chicken pot pies at the Nauvoo Cafe (they were all out the last time we were there) and they lived up to the recommendation we received. I had been bringing food (chicken/tuna salad w/ crackers to give beggars), but then I had a qualm of conscience about our tasty dinner, so the next beggar got a granola bar and a $5 bill... I'm not sure what this philanthropy is evolving into yet. Ryan met a guy in the hospital that took his kids with two crockpots of beans to homeless people every Sunday... It sounds like a good path to take.

We went to the Conference Center in an effort to look at the pulpit because the boys have a picture book about it, but it was hydraulically moved under the stage for Christmas. We didn't get to complete the tour because we're trying to teach the boys about obedience and they weren't following directions (understatement). We'll have to go back in the spring so we can go up on the roof too (I hadn't realized it was open for tours again).

 James enjoyed hitting the windows on the temple. (To him everything is tactile!) I hope the windows are sound proof, otherwise he was probably disturbing the people in the baptismal font.

Benjamin is holding "Gus the Rat". Gus is one of 3 stuffed animals the kindergarten kids take home to have adventures with and then draw and write about in the stuffed animal's journal. We didn't have Barry the Bear or Tommy Turtle over a weekend so Benjamin really wanted to take Gus to Temple Square. He's been with us for more than a week, but I need to wash him before we send him back b/c he's a) now a carrier of the (pink-eye) plague and b) been dropped in the dirt more times than I can count. Amazingly, Gus' tail hasn't been ripped off from how much Benjamin swings him around by it .

We finished our evening with a view of the lights from the top of the Joseph Smith Memorial building. 

On the way home, I picked up my order of raw (unpasteurized) California Almonds. I almost should have ordered the entire 50 lbs... wow, they're yummy. The boys fell asleep in the van and amazingly stayed asleep when we carried them to their beds.

Provo Santa Run 2011

If I had thought about it when we were registering, I should have signed Ryan up for the race and then volunteered to be at a water station where I would have gotten a shirt that said  "Santa's Helper" and an elf hat for free instead of paying to be sore.

This was the configuration we started out in. This photo was taken before Benjamin got a bloody nose at the starting line about 3 minutes before the race started. He had a tissue plug in his nostril for the first lap or two. After close to one lap, Benjamin wanted to ride in the stroller and James was getting fussy. James sat on Benjamin's lap for less than 1/2 a lap and then Ryan started carrying him. We should have brought the baby backpack along. Also, it is amazing how much of a difference Benjamin's 45 lbs makes in the ease, or lack there of, in pushing the jogging stroller.

I wish I had gotten video of James trying to eat a cookie while he was
on Ryan's shoulders. The bouncing running motion made it extremely difficult for him to connect with his mouth. Eventually, on the last 1/2 mile, James got tired of being on Ryan's shoulders and I started carrying him in the sling. I could only run about 10 yards with him and then had to walk until I got motivated to again try to catch up with Ryan. Ryan was keeping a good 15 min/mile pace for us, so I worked really hard to catch up with him when I started to lag behind. James fell asleep and we transferred him into the stroller so that Benjamin could finish the race running with Ryan and me.

I wish I would have gotten a photo of Ryan stopping to eat a cookie. (This is the only race I know of that offers milk, hot chocolate, and cookies at the water stations). Even with that, how many times Benjamin got in and out of the jogging stroller, and me carrying the baby in the sling for the last 1/2 mile we still made 3.1 miles in ~46 minutes... And that's with me being somewhat out-of-shape (although Ryan informed me that "round" is a shape... He was referring to himself). Running downhill 3/4 a mile to pick up Benjamin from school once a week isn't very good training. I came in 39/47 for my class and Ryan was 15... of 17. We were  269/294 and 144/155 overall. I told Ryan that we need to actually train for the next 5k and have a goal of under 30 minutes to give us a respectable finishing place. If it isn't clear, I am not a runner. Ryan probably could have run it in a lot less than 30 minutes this time if he hadn't wanted to "run as a family". (He ran his last 2 miles for the Army in ~15 minutes). My original plan was that he run it at his own pace, get a good time, find us and take over the stroller while I finished the race, but it was nice to be together through it all.

Alexander fell asleep on the first 1/2 mile and woke up after the race really grumpy. First of all, he was cold and this heater was a lifesaver. The weather had been really nice until the temperature dropped on Thursday (which was an especially blustery afternoon. I know, because I walked Benjamin home from school that day and had to carry James facing me on the last 2 legs to our apartment because the wind was blowing directly in our faces at about 30 kts.) It was in the mid-high 30's today. Alexander was also grumpy that he had missed the finish line. I took him back through it 20 minutes after we finished and our victory lap made him a little less grumpy. The after-race potato chips also helped his mood slightly.

We stayed around for the Parade of Lights. The boys were happy to have candy galore. (Alexander said he was thankful for candy and more candy at Thanksgiving). Alexander most definitely did NOT want to pet the llamas. I still haven't figured out what the point of caroling llamas is. After the parade, there were only a few of us Santa Suit klad runners left and our "Santa family" got quite a few waves on the way back to the car. I had sort of forgotten I was the "bearded woman" as Benjamin called me.