And the Winner Is...

Announcing the winner of
The First Annual Christmas Day
Scratch-Off Ornament Design Contest



Grand Prize goes to.....Sarah! (Her son/my nephew's name is Patrick)
There were several honorable mentions but I could only find three of them to scan in. I believe the featured artists were Lauren, Linda, and Carol.

Congratulations to all our entrants and I look forward to seeing your submissions next year.

Slacker finally gets a family holiday picture on the blog...

Happy Holidays!!

Just a sprain...

I've officially ditched the crutches. Now I'm focusing on iron levels. I attempted to give blood and once again fell short by just the slightest margin. I'm pounding the raisins and tuna sandwiches. ha!

I know of some important little ones who could use some O+ so...if you've got some to spare, I encourage you to give the greatest(and cheapest) gift of all this holiday. Hopefully you'll see me there.

Covered Lacing System

Aha! I just learned the hard way why a "covered lacing system" on a soccer shoe is so important. I figured I'd wear my sambas until the bottoms fell out.
My shoe laces were perpetually coming untied UNTIL the moment I really needed them to untie. My large adversary on the soccer field kept backing into me and eventually got her cleat tangled in my tied shoelaces. This tripped her and brought us both tumbling to the ground with my foot stuck in its original position pinned under us both.

Medic!

I'm now hobbling around on and off crutches while the Urgent Care center continues to ignore my repeated requests for the x-ray results. After telling me they were sending the x-rays to "radiology", they wrapped my ankle, gave me a set of crutches, told me not to play soccer for a month, and to call in 2 days if I didn't hear the results. It's now Day 4. Grrrr!!!

As soon as I can walk again...I'm picking up a pair of "covered lacing system" shoes and hiding my old, well-worn, stinky indoor shoes at an undisclosed location within the urgent care center.

Eat My Bubbles...

Congrats to Lauren and Lili! They both did a fantastic job at the swim meet over the weekend.

20th Reunion

Unfortunately, I did not do a good photo-journalism job covering my 20th high school reunion. Luckily, Anne came to the rescue and shared this picture of us (along with Meg and Mai) with me. Thanks Anne! Hard to believe we're old enough to drink. ha!

I had a great time catching up with everyone and dancing to some of our 80s favorites like "Da Butt", "Push It", etc. Obviously this photo was taken pre-running man.

Race for the Kids

Wow! I can't believe it's been a year since I started this blog. Who knew insomnia could be such a spring board?

So here we come full circle. It was Race for the Kids weekend again.

I did double running duty since Bill is still recovering from last week's soccer injury. Lauren moved up an age group and did the full 1 mile fun run this year. Kristen also moved up an age group and actually participated in the run this year. She ran about 1/3 of a mile and was cheered to the finish line by Alan Webb who then gave her a high five. And...as you may notice in the photos, I did manage to remove the hundred year old lift tickets from my jacket since last year's event.




After the races we stayed for the entire holiday parade. The parade consisted of your various girl and boy scout troops, large inflatables, classic cars, firetrucks, politicians, Santa, and the very disturbing...Urban Gypsies. If you ever find yourself near an "Urban Gypsies" belly-dancing demonstration, RUN far far away! Trust me, you do NOT want to witness this performance.

We made it through the parade but it took me several hours to feel warm again. Luckily, the drinks and subsequent "running man" at my high school 20th year reunion later that night helped thaw me out.

Happy Thanksgiving

Lisa and I started Thanksgiving day with the Turkey Trot. Bill was home with the girls while his soccer injury heals and Carol dogged us for a road trip to South Carolina...or so she says. ha! It was mighty cold but it was a beautiful morning and it was nice to chat for a little while before we parted ways for our respective Thanksgiving celebrations.

I enjoyed a wonderful meal at Bill's parents' house. Other than the minor head injury sustained by my nephew, everything went well. Hope you are feeling better Jack!

Here are the kids (Sam was still napping) prior to "the incident"...

A New Odyssey

www.odysseyofthemind.com
I decided to volunteer/coordinate the Odyssey of the Mind program at Lauren's school. I think it has sucked some time away from blogging but I'm confident that it will be worth every minute.

I'm coaching Lauren's team. The team will be "solving" the Candy Factory problem. The kids will create and perform a skit about a Candy Maker in a candy factory who makes candy with at least one healthy ingredient. The kids have to create the set, make the costumes, write the script, and act out the solution without grown-up interference. I'm allowed to help organize the team and be a go-fer for supplies.

I can't wait to see what they come up with.

My trip to NYC

This past weekend I enjoyed a Moms weekend away to NYC. I had a great time. Cathie did a FANTASTIC job with the itinerary and many thanks to Marlo for driving.

Some of the highlights include:


Running into Miley Cyrus at Madame Tussauds. What an airhead! I attempted to get her autograph but she just stood there frozen staring straight ahead like a deer in headlights. She didn't even seem to know what to do with a pen. Eventually I convinced her to come sightseeing with us.







Here we are on the Staten Island Ferry with the Statue of Liberty in the background. I thought she should bring a coat but hey... I'm not her mother. She did mention how much she liked my purse.




We headed back into the city and I bumped Bill Clinton. A fist-bump is all you're getting from me, buddy! He wasn't feeling chatty so I moved on.






I got lost a few times trying to get to Rockefeller Center but eventually rejoined the group and we made our way up to "Top of the Rock". We saw the Christmas tree right after it was delivered and thought it looked a bit sad. I'm sure the lights will help but all we saw was scaffolding.

We ate at Anthony Bourdain's home-base restaurant, Les Halles. I felt inspired to try something new so I had Confit de canard, pommes salardaise (crispy duck leg confit & truffle mashed potatoes). I think it would have been great if it turned out that I liked duck and truffles. I'm not sure which taste to associate with the duck and which taste was the truffles. Either way, pretty darn adventurous for me.

Hoopstars...

Lauren and Kristen tear up the court at their first basketball practices over the weekend.

They really enjoyed it but I've got to wonder, where are all the other girls?
Kristen's class male-female ratio -- 13:1
Lauren's class was slightly more balanced -- 12:2

Congratulations Frank Kratovil!

He won his congressional race. Congratulations Congressman-elect Kratovil.

Remember me from QAS? I was the one wearing the argyle socks with my basketball uniform. I'm pretty sure I have the record for longest "get ready to shoot" a free-throw too. ha!! Kim-you look great. Same as you did in high school!

Way to go!!

Last Game of the Season

Today was the final set of Fall '08 soccer games for Coach Nancy and Coach Bill.

Check out Bill's halftime speech to the Tigers...
http://vimeo.com/2191570

Here's Kristen showing off her moves last week...


I'm on fire with the video camera this week.
Lauren's video...
http://vimeo.com/2204832

Neither Lauren nor Kristen was feeling 100% but gutted it out to finish off the season. It wasn't until after the games that Bill and I realized that they weren't even 70%. Kristen fell asleep in a camp chair while watching Lauren's game. Not an easy thing to do. Lauren broke down in tears after her game, fell asleep on the car ride home, and then woke up briefly to barf a few times. We're such good parents. I'm a shoo-in for Mom of the Year.

Update 11/10: Lauren has strep throat on top of her cold.

Bingeing

The silence on the other end of the phone confirmed my suspicion. Obviously, my behavior has gotten out of control. I knew something wasn't right when I began to resist revealing just how many times a week I've been doing it. I know it seems excessive but the offers were just too tempting. It's only a temporary situation. In a couple of weeks I'll cut back.

I blame it all on triathlon training. I can't bring myself to hop on the stationary bike, go for a swim, or even jog around the block. I simply cannot make myself do it anymore. So...I'm soccer bingeing..Sunday morning coed, Sunday evening women's indoor, Wednesday morning mom's pickup, Friday evening coed. There, I've said it. I'm coming clean.

I know it can't be good for me. I'm getting too old for this. I could break a hip or something. It's only a matter of time before my ankle twists or my back goes out. It would be different if I had some talent, speed, or fitness. It's just not fair to my teammates!

I even bought One A Day - Energy vitamins today at Harris-Teeter.

Scary Weekend

We had an action packed weekend starting with Friday night Trick or Treating, Saturday soccer, and Sunday birthday celebrating. Happy Birthday, Bill!

One dollar

Last night I was driving home from my old-lady league soccer game at about 10pm. As I was driving along I was contemplating whether or not I should lead a fairly large volunteer project at Lauren's school. As I drove past the school I decided that I should do it. If I don't, no one will.

I had Bill's car and noticed the gas tank was nearly empty. I pulled into the gas station and stepped out of my car when a man across from me exclaimed, "I have got a GREAT deal for you!"

Apparently, he prepaid $40 for gas but he only used $36 of gas. He said he'd let me have the remaining $4 of gas if I gave him $1. This initially struck me as a little shady and I told him that I didn't think I had a dollar on me. I checked my wallet and discovered that I did have it so I thought...what the hell. I gave him the money and he set down the gas pump, ran in to tell the gas attendant, and pulled away. I drove over to his pump but decided to check with the gas attendant for myself just to be sure. The gas attendant shook his head, followed me out to my car and pumped the $4 of gas for me. Weird, but ok! Was I just scammed in some way or did I just take advantage of an opportunity? I still can't figure it out.

The only conclusion I can draw...I better follow through on the volunteering because the universe has already thanked me. You don't mess with the universe.

Blog Slacker

I've been a blog slacker this past week.
Here's the update...

Patrick's (my nephew's) baptism went well

our refridgerator died after a prolonged illness

while removing cabinets from above dead fridge, a stray piece of trim flew out and scratched Bill's cornea

Bill seeks medical help for eye injury from (coincidentally) one of my high school classmate's older brother. Small world.

new fridge purchased and delivered

perishable foods repurchased

Farm Fun

 

Our family Fall Farm Tour of 2008 commenced this weekend. We now have our pumpkins to carve and the girls enjoyed the rides, slides, and petting farms. Since we had taken the camera on day one of the tour, I decided to leave it home today.

Big Mistake!

Today, we witnessed a P-Rex devour several pumpkins. This was truly a marvel that only a kid can enjoy. I cannot possibly adequately describe the scene as this huge fake dinosaur was "fed" large pumpkins and then crushed them within its hydraulic jaws spewing pumpkin guts in all directions. I particularly enjoyed watching the master of ceremonies grab pumpkin scraps off the ground and toss them in the air when the papier-mache beast chomped down on the pumpkin so that it would seem more messy and dramatic. And, to top it all off...at the conclusion of the demonstration, the spectators were invited to pick up the pumpkin carnage and feed it to the pig.

Brilliant!

Doggone! Double Digits

No, it's not a Sarah Palin quote.

It pains me to report that I was unable to keep the Astro escapes down in the single digits this year. Over the weekend, he once again eluded all of our methods of containment and went for a 5 minute walkabout (at high speed) around the neighborhood.

He immediately sat down when Bill motioned as if to tackle him. I guess he was ready to come home and lounge on the furniture.

Happy Howl-o-ween!

The girls and I thought the dogs needed a costume for Halloween. Since I was feeling guilty about the lack of Ursa coverage on the blog, I thought I'd take a picture of our furry friends. Easier said then done. Astro is very afraid of Ursa because Ursa employs a strategy of random mauling whenever Astro is in close proximity. Since Astro is faster, heavier, younger, and far more coordinated I must conclude that the canine world has a much greater respect for age. Or, Ursa's unbelievably thick, long coat is impenetrable and attacking it only leads to a mouthful of fur which must taste pretty bad because Astro is part goat and will eat anything. For example, he recently raided my purse and ate an entire pack of gum..wrappers and all. I know that he ate the wrappers because I "scoop the poop". That was an exciting discovery. Yuck!

As a side note...Costume bonus...Astro's costume glows in the dark. How cool.

Yahoo! Cindy Lou Who

Kristen scored 2 goals in her very first U4/U5 soccer match today. She was the only female player on the field at the time. You Go Girl!!!

B.T. no more...

"The cougar of the week is awarded to the individual student that meets all of our cougar characteristics in P.E. consistently. Those characteristics are: Courteous, Outstanding behavior, Undivided attention to adult when speaking, Great effort, Awesome attitude and Respect for all. Those first letters spell COUGAR!! The cougar of the week wins a certificate, coupon for a free sub at Subway, and gets to wear a t-shirt on spirit day! Winners are presented with their awards on the Cougar News morning show! Photos are taken and posted on the bulletin board outside the gym."

Lauren was awarded the Cougar of the Week today. Only one student in the school of 608 students receives this award each week. I guess all the patience with B.T. in P.E. paid off.

Astro sees The Light...

Ding-dong! Loud barking, kids screaming half-dressed. (They were trying on winter clothes to decide what still fits)

I walk down to see who's at the door. Jehovah's Witnesses. Suddenly Lauren has tripped on something and begins screaming, "MOM!"

I'm in the process of telling the troops of their faith that this is not a good time, when suddenly Astro decides that this is a good time...for an escape. I'm not exactly sure how he nosed open the front screen door but away he went. The two boys at the door saved my vase that began to topple as Astro bolted out the door and offered to help chase him down. "That's ok. He'll come back eventually." They quickly moved on.

The girls and I went outside and immediately spotted Astro doing laps around all the neighbors' homes. A man walking a bug dog (not sure of the breed but looks like a bug on a leash to me) came up the street. I held my breath and started to calmly run down the street toward them yelling back at the girls to stay put. Of course Astro wanted to investigate this odd creature. First he sniffed it, then hopped around it like he does when he finds a grasshopper. Just when he decided he wanted to "play" with it, he saw me with a fistful of treats. I guess the treats looked tastier then the bug dog.

Somebody was saved today.

Nancy the Firefighter

Sunday 9:20pm
As I was cutting across a near-empty parking lot on my way home from the grocery store I spotted a 4 foot wide area of smoking mulch on one of the parking lot tree islands. I doubled back for a better look and noticed the smoke plume growing. I also noticed the only other cars in the lot were now swiftly exiting the area. I didn't think it warranted a call to 911, it was just a pile of smoking mulch but what if it really starts to blaze? As I leaned over to get my cell phone, I saw an almost full bottle of water in the car. I dashed over to the suspicious mulch and dumped the contents of my water bottle on the mulch. It seemed to make a difference but I wasn't sure it was completely extinguished. Since I didn't have any additional firefighting gear, I raced home and called the non-emergency sheriff's number. He immediately transferred me to 911. I guess that answers that question.

Diamond in the Rough

I'm not a big jewelry person but I usually wear my wedding ring and my diamond studs that Bill got me for our anniversary a few years back. This is my jewelry "uniform" day and night and I rarely remove them. However, on Sunday, I took off the earrings to play soccer. I thought this was a smart move considering my history with playing soccer and wearing earrings. I still haven't forgiven myself for losing an earring that Bill gave me on our wedding day at a soccer game.

Since I'm not in the habit of changing earrings, I forgot to put them back on until yesterday. I reached up on the shelf and quickly found one earring but then couldn't find the other. Where could it be? I took everything down from the shelf and frantically searched through it all and still couldn't find it. Maybe it fell off the shelf? Suddenly I remembered stumbling to the bathroom in the middle of the night on Monday and stepping on something sharp. I spent a few moments trying to determine what had poked me and then decided I cared more about getting back to sleep. Now I hypothesized that I must have stepped on the missing earring. Aha!

Aha! quickly turned to Oh No!
My heart sank because I remembered that Bill had vacuumed this area just last night. Fortunately, I'm usually so happy that the rug is vacuumed and I didn't have to do it that I don't nag about emptying the "dirt cup" on the vacuum. As luck would have it, after sifting through a very full load of the "rough" in the dirt cup, I recovered the missing earring.

I also discovered that Lauren would make a great archaeologist because she rolled up her sleeves and seemed to thoroughly enjoy the treasure hunt. Don't worry, we were both eager to "scrub up" after the hunt.

Kristen watched from a safe distance and wondered why I didn't just buy a new earring at Claire's.

Coach "Sweat Ball" Nancy

I survived my coaching debut!

I signed up to coach Kristen's U4/U5 soccer team this fall. We had a rainout the first week so there was even more pressure to be great this week. I'm no "F" certified coach like Bill but I think I held my own. If a coach can be measured by sweat alone, I rule.

Only one child was crying (because of the heat...not me)
Only one child was too afraid to join in

"Shoot the Aliens" was the stand-out winner of the drills/games I picked(stole) from other coaches.

My nametag plan was a total flop. Who knew the adhesive wouldn't work on polyester? There were nametags strewn about the entire 7A field. I guess I'll have to learn everyone's name the old fashioned way.

I'm still working on my transitions from game to game. There are only so many "water breaks" before it starts to look ridiculous. ha!

Operation Iron Up

I feel so inadequate! I went to give blood today and for the first time EVER...my iron level was too low. I've given blood at least 15 times and this has never happened to me before. Normally, the technician comments about how iron-rich it is. Sure, I've fainted twice..once during, once after but at least I wasn't rejected.

Yesterday, I had a hard-boiled egg for breakfast, a hamburger for lunch and chicken for dinner. I can only conclude that McDonald's hamburgers must not have any actual meat in them.

I'm eating a big tuna sandwich on iron-fortified whole-wheat bread tonight and trying again tomorrow.

Don't they know I'm an Iron Girl!?!?!

Back To School

Yesterday was Lauren's first day back to school. First grade brings lots of new classes like Art, Music, PE, and Spanish. I told her she would love PE because you get to have a great time playing lots of games and running around and having fun. The first two days of PE have not lived up to expectations. She thinks it should be re-named "BT-Boring Time" because she had to sit and listen to a list of rules both days. We're hoping tomorrow brings more "physical" to physical education.

Other than that, she is adjusting well. I just need to keep my big mouth shut.

Brookside Garden Fantasy

Adventures of the IronGirl...

On Sunday at appoximately 9:50am, I was awarded the new title of IronGirl. I felt much more like "JelloGirl About to Pass Out and Vomit" but that's too long to fit on the T-shirt.

I swam 0.62 miles in a lake then biked a very hilly 17.5 miles and then ran 3.4 miles. In the spirit of the Olympics, I decided to leave room for future personal bests(P.B.). Ok, so Usain Bolt was leaving room for future World Records, but you get the picture. I finished in 2 hours and 48 minutes (a "good" time would be closer to 2 hours).


My fans "eagerly" awaited my arrival at the finish line. You can really see the joy in Kristen's face.

But, the award for "Most excited about my participation in the IronGirl" goes to....the individual who broke into my car and stole all my cash, my bank card and PIN number, and credit cards while I was dropping off my bike at the Pre-Race Mandatory Racking the previous evening.

Stay tuned to find out if the cops have a picture of this award winner withdrawing money with my ATM card...

Houdini Dog...

I suspected that Astro could open screen doors but was never sure it wasn't one of the kids. Today I witnessed this trick. Fortunately, the screen door leads in and out of the backyard so no neighborhood escape resulted until...

the next day. (Completely unrelated to the screen door) My doorbell rang and the dogs were distracted in the basement so there was no barking and commotion and I let my guard down. BAM! He came slinking up from the basement and out the front door he flew.

After his recapture, bath, and exile to the back deck for some drying time, he promptly opened the screen door and let himself back in.

Adrienne and Patrick sitting in a tree...

K-I-S-S-I-N-G


It was a beautiful day for a wedding. Adrienne looked gorgeous, Pat looked handsome and neither one seemed nervous at all. I thoroughly enjoyed myself and was thrilled to be there and catch up with many folks I hadn't seen in years.

Special thanks to Pat, Adrienne and their families for throwing a great party.

P.S. What's up with the image??
I wanted to make a special picture. I'll keep practicing and maybe I'll come up with a cool layout by their 10th anniversary.

Take That! You Evil Knot Fairy!!

It's official! We've banished the Evil Knot Fairy from our kingdom. Lauren woke up on day 2 of short hair and was able to brush her hair without tears, help, or even de-tangler. And just to stick it to that E.K.F., Lauren donated her ponytail to Locks of Love.



Kristen, a long-time champion of the cause, continues her dominant reign as Queen of the Tangle Fighters.

She swam, she biked, she ran...

Lauren competed in the "Kids Tri Too" race on Saturday. She did a fantastic job, never lost her positive attitude, and really enjoyed speeding down the road.

Kristen was a great cheerleader and was genuinely supportive of her big sis.

Go 123!!!

Tooth Fairy Alert!

Attention Tooth Fairy,

Lauren has lost her first tooth tonight and is looking forward to your visit.
You will find the tooth under her pillow.

Thanks!

P.S. No one fainted this time. I guess it skips a generation.

Where's a bat when you need one??

We traveled to Assateague National Seashore over the weekend. It was our first official family camping trip. All the stars aligned to make this a wonderful experience. The weather was fantastic. The camp site was amazing (thanks Ed!!) --essentially oceanfront. The wild ponies visited us often and were very polite. Even Bambi wanted to meet us but Mom wouldn't allow this until after he finished his breakfast. As a concession, she allowed us to watch from about 6 feet away which was very exciting for the girls. We had a beautiful beach to ourselves and we attended a park service program on crabbing so the girls got to try that out for awhile too.

And when all this nature got dull and the crabs weren't biting, we piled into the car and headed to the OC boardwalk for a quick dose of high intensity commercialism.

We are still working out the kinks on the restful night sleep and though the cold shower was teeth-grindingly refreshing, a warm shower would have been nice. And, I have to admit, I was missing that crazy bat as I swatted away the mosquitoes. All in all I give it two thumbs up. :)

Our budding artist...

If you participated in the Barnyard BBQ of 2002, give yourself a pat on the back!!


Surrounding Lauren with art at an early age has paid off....

I was browsing through the Washington Post today and came across my daughter's name! She entered a logo contest a few months back and apparently she was the runner-up. We were never notified so you can imagine my surprise at seeing the news in the paper. We were all very excited and now her entry can be seen on the Special Olympics Bus Pull page...
http://www.dullesday.com/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=74&Itemid=119

Lauren's entry has an "Honorable Mention" stamp.

Here's the newspaper article...
http://loudounextra.washingtonpost.com/news/2008/jul/24/loudoun-news-briefs/?local

Congrats Lauren!

Goin' Batty...

I like bats...theoretically. I know they eat tons of mosquitoes - that sounds good to me. But, when I find myself face to face with a real live bat, my heart rate quickens, I start making weird high pitch "G" noises and I bust out in a cold sweat. My first encounter occurred at age 14. I was trapped in a high school gymnasium with the exit blocked by a bat as it flip-flopped and fluttered around on the floor like a fish moving in my direction. I shrank behind a water fountain as it got closer and closer. I think someone eventually came to my rescue and chased the bat away with a baton or something.

Yesterday evening was another such encounter. I was walking the dogs when suddenly a creature flew up from the ground to about chest level approximately 2 feet from my face. Unfortunately, it was semi-trapped between me, the two leashes and the two dogs. It just kept bobbing around between my feet and chest. I pulled very hard on the dogs leashes to flee the scene but the dogs were totally not on board with my plan. After being jerked backward they started to fight with each other and further tangle the leashes and drag me back toward the crazy bat (which I had begun to believe was not all together well)

You may have noticed the Astro Escape-O-Meter has been incremented by one. You might think I weighed the options of getting bit by a rabid bat versus chasing Astro around the neighborhood and then giving him a bath.

You would be giving me too much credit.

I gripped hard on those leashes and dragged 120 lbs of canine with all my might until finally the bat moved on.

So why did I up the escape-o-meter?
Astro escaped the day before when the girls opened the door to greet a friend and the friend had opened the screen door to greet the girls. Astro saw his opening and headed for the hills. Bill recaptured him in under 5 minutes. I guess Astro was having a "senior moment".

The dirtiest week of my life...

Muddy Buddy Richmond 2008 --photo by brightroom.com.
This past week I definitely earned my "Earth Mother" nickname.
I finished the week teamed up with Bill at the Muddy Buddy race in Richmond. We had a great time mountain biking and running the 6 mile course and then slithering through the mud pit. We even had a decent finish time placing us almost in the middle of our age group. Special thanks to Grandma Linda for watching the girls and to our biggest fans...Steph, Casey, and Griffin for braving the sun, mud, traffic, and sweat to attempt to see us finish.

Earlier that week, I volunteered as a full time Unit co-leader for Camp Claude Moore. This was a week long, all-day girl scout camp held exclusively outdoors (rain or shine---and of course there was rain) The "plan" called for Kristen to join the Tag-a-longs unit and play blissfully all day with other volunteers' children who weren't old enough to join the other units. Lauren would be in a unit that I was not involved in leading. My unit leader would have everything under control and would just need support moving gear, setting things up, refilling the water jug, etc. She and I would take our eager campers to exciting centers and return 45 minutes later to help get the group to the next center. Ahhhh.

This is how it really went...
Shortly after dropping off my children at the area designated for volunteer's kids on the opposite end of the park, I joined my unit and forty minutes later we joined all the campers at morning flag. The first order of business at flag was the auctioning off of Lauren (and only Lauren) in front of the 300+ campers because her unit leader never came to claim her. Not the most auspicious start to the week. After flag we took our unit to a center and my unit leader, aka The Invisible Woman, asked if I would mind if she ran back to her car. This would be the first in a long line of requests to part company. Shortly after she disappeared, I heard over the the walkie talkie that Kristen was crying and the tag-a-long leader was trying to locate me. @$%#$%@#%#$!!! I tried in vain to communicate via the walkie-talkie and finally made the decision to run over and check on her. I handed over all the allergy medicines and Epi-pens for the unit to another adult on the scene and promised to return shortly. I sprinted about a half mile to the tag-a-long area to discover that Kristen had been moved to another area to talk to the "head honcho" of the camp. I continued my sprint to that area moving even further from my unit. I finally located her and was told that they were trying not to involve me and attempting to get it worked out. Well, TooOOooOOooo LATE!! Kristen and I negotiated a return to her unit which involved a frozen treat. Back I sprinted to my unit.
20 minutes later...repeat.
20 minutes later...repeat,
except that I decided to bring her back to my unit and she could be a REAL tag-a-long. I later discovered that she needed to go to the bathroom and no one was going to convince her to use the porta-potty. Once we located an acceptable spot in the woods, things improved markedly. Several of the campers in my unit LOVED carrying Kristen around and Kristen loved all the attention. I flicked two deer ticks off my leg, wiped the sweat from my brow, visited the hot and stinky porta-john and thought to myself...isn't this grand? Things were looking up.

The week continued and brought torrential downpours with no cover in sight, campers' parents coming 40 minutes after camp was over, multiple bug bites covering my limbs, complaining campers, center leaders chastising me for not having "control" of my unit, Kristen hanging all over me and refusing to cooperate, blah blah, blah. I capped off the week by thoroughly embarrassing myself performing the Cotton Eye Joe-Cupid Shuffle-Macarena-Electric Slide medley alongside my campers in front of all the parents. If you have no idea what I'm talking about...you need to spend some time with 5th and 6th grade girls.

I can't wait to sign up for next year.

Sweet Sixteen

OBX 2008

Lauren sticks the landing...

Here you see Lauren sticking the landing after a triple twisting, hurkey-durkey, blind, flipping maneuver never before seen in competition.

After scoring a perfect 10 in the makeup application event, Kristen marches on to her next challenge.

Mini-Olympics 2008, we salute you!

Aunt Carol and Patrick

Aunt Carol with our youngest nephew, Patrick. Still alive after almost 6 months of living with Billy. Kidding!!! Happy 1st Father's Day, Billy.

Psst...Hey Carol, how do you like the towel? I couldn't make the stick work.

Astro Escapes Again....

I can only blame myself on this one. He went right out the front door when I tried to slip out to talk to my neighbor. On the positive side, we are improving out recapture times. I yelled my usual "Astro Come!" to no avail then a few minutes later I saw Bill coming down the street carrying a repentant looking Astro in his arms. Astro is about 60 lbs so this was somewhat impressive.

Added bonus: He didn't have time to get muddy and gross so no bath was required.

Added, added bonus: I've discovered that another neighbor does not seem to be too bothered by the loose dog. She sympathized with his need for speed. ha!

Homemade 5K

Last year the family participated in a cross-country 5K, A Day At the Races, at Morven Park. We all had a great time and decided we would definitely do it again this year. Unfortunately, it conflicted with a number of other committments. So, we decided to host our own 5K that day. Lauren and I had experience setting up and breaking down the water station so we assigned ourselves that task. Kristen had experience with chalk drawing so she was assigned Finish Line designation. Bill was the most motivated to run the 5K so he was our race participant.

I remembered how excited I was to run past a car blasting the Rocky theme during my last race so I got the car stereo turned up but could only manage to find a Wiggles cd so Bill crossed the finish to the tune of "Fruit Salad, Yummy Yummy".
And First Place goes to...Daddy!


Just to be authentic, after crossing the finish, Bill grabbed a cup from the water station, gulped it down, and tossed it to the ground.
YTD race cup pickup count = 5002

U6 Girls soccer team swim like Dolphins

The U6 girls Spring Soccer season came to end with a bang this year. The Dolphins were undefeated (as was every team since keeping score is a no-no at this level).

Check out this cool cake one of her teammates brought to the party.




Another teammate's family generously offered the use of their pool and beautiful backyard for the end of season party. Here's Lauren enjoying the spa area that cascaded into the main pool area which cascaded down a 10 foot drop as a waterfall on the lowest level. My description doesn't do it justice but let's just say this was an MTV Cribs-worthy pool.

Kristen had a blast too.

Bill handed out all the trophies and patches to the team and a good time was had by all.