Super Fun Fall Saturday Night!

We've had the major task looming over us to clear out the garden area in the back yard to get it ready for a REAL garden next spring. Its been the dumping ground for yard clippings, fall leaves, and chopped down trees for years at Shaun's house. On Saturday the weather was phenomenal! In fact, I dare say it was the best weather of all time in the State of Utah that day. BEAUTIFUL! We took the kids to Chubbys to have a cheeseburger, and then came home to clear the garden! We did it in a jiffy with everyone working together. Afterwards, I took the girls to Hula class and came back to Kai and Shaun using axes and saws chopping down trees! They were both in hog heaven. We decided to have a little fire pit to burn some of the massive pile of leaves that we had and some of the dead wood that night. It turned out to be one of the funnest nights we've had!



Camping in the backyard!



The girls were SO sophisticated at our campfire with their fancy fans

Skip the hot dogs...Went right for the marshmallows!

Awe! How Sweet:)

Why use a stick when you can use a 6 hot dog cooker thinger

Sheez I Love this girl!

Shaun and his impression of Tom Hanks in Castaway ....FIRE!!

Give me a kiss Kaibo!

And even more yummy sugar!

To quote Kai..."Shaun is connecting with the spirits"



It was only a matter of time before the shirts came off...crazy boys!
Kai was on LEAF DUTY, which meant that he had to add a hand full of leaves from the pile to the fire every so often so that we could start burning through the HUGE pile that we made.
Shaun had to finally say, lay off of Leaf duty for a minute Kaibo...we're smoking out the neighborhood!

 

Shaun's version of "Put another log on the fire"

And another...

Kai and Shaun SO proud of their fire and their awesome work of chopping trees down

LULU! You are so crazy cute!

Lucy bailed on the fire to jump on the tramp



Time to put out the fire...Kai is pretty worried about the amount smoke billowing over the fence and into the neighborhood...It was a flippin miracle that we didn't get the fire dept called with the amount of smoke that was looming across the street. Woopsie!
What  a fun night of fire, Shaun and Lulu Hula dancing around the fire, eating amazing hot dogs,
my kids making me smores left and right.
And just enjoying being together:)



I feel brainwashed!

If you know anything about my girls and I...we LOVE a good musical. Mama Mia...Hairspray...my latest fave Burlesque. Somewhere in my deep dark desires...I think I should have been a singer dancer performer gal...but I got jipped on the singer part...oh and the dancer part too. Bummer!

Oh well... So Shaun knows this about me and the girls and although he may not admit it openly, (that's my job to out him on my blog!) he quite enjoys a good musical as well:) Hairspray is playing at the Hale Center Theater and Shaun got us hooked up with some tickets! What a guy:)

We'd been looking forward to this for a while and the girls couldnt WAIT! We'd been listening to the music in the car for the whole past week to get ready...ya know, in case they needed us to join in the singing and stuff:) We all went on Saturday and holy cow it was good. I was very surprised at the quality of voices and how much they can do on that little stage. My girls were singing along and loving it. Lucy was commentating at every little difference betweeen the play and the movie. She loved Penny the best. 

When it came to the final song..."You cant stop the beat" I could barely contain myself. It took everything inside me to not start belting out the words singing along and stand up and dance like a crazy woman!
The girls of course loved it beyond belief, Kai...questionable. So on the way home Shaun asked, "So Kai, how did you like it?"
In a pretty somber monotone way only Kai can say, he replys.... "I feel brainwashed"

I had to laugh! What a character that boy is! I guess I need to take him to more mentally stimulating events to counteract the girls and I and our flamboyant taste in entertainment! And that's why I love Kai so much!

50 Miles? Are you Serious?

I'm training for the Squaw Peak 50 miler in June and the training is coming along slowly but surely. I just wish I could get up on the trails and get my climbing legs built. I've spent a bunch of time on the stair climber, but it just isnt the same. I did have a great run up on a trail in the snow which was strait up and strait down...that felt great to get out off the dreadmill! That was only 9 miles...so 41 to go? Oh boy oh boy! I've got some work to do.

 I can't believe that I'm going to attempt this...it seem so much bigger than me. But I'm confident I can finish. Just how long its going to take me will be the big question. When I've been at the finish line in the past, Ive been there and watched all the folks coming in around 10-12 hours...I will be more in the mid teens range! YOWZERZ! I've asked my die hard buddy Brandi to pace me the last bit. She has that crazy do or die attitude that no matter if her leg is chopped off, or mine for that matter, she'd get me to the finish line. Come to think about it...why isn't SHE doing this race?

I've got a great race line up to get me ready for this one. I've got a 18 or so mile trail race on Antelope Island in March, as well as a half marathon in Moab sometime around there too. Then in May the Timp Trail Marathon, which is 2 weeks prior and will be a GREAT indication of how I will be on Squaw Peak.

Can't wait to feel ready and have it here. Just need to get those miles logged weekly! NO EXCUSES!

St George Weekend

Since Shaun is in full blown "training mode" for the St George Ironman, we've been making a few little trips down to St George to get him on the course to train. We brought the kiddos this last time and you would have thought that we took them to Disneyland with how much they loved it.

I drove down seperately from Shaun with the kiddos in the car...they were PERFECT little angels the whole way down. I got them a happy meal...put on a movie...and all was well!

Even though it was January, it got up to 65 degrees and was beautiful! Shaun got up Saturday morning and I drove him to the starting line of the Painters Half marathon... Which was my first half marathon 4 dang years ago! I wish that I had registered and ran it since the weather was just perfect it seemed. I did have a raging case of race envy that day, but got over it:) Shaun did great of course.. came in about 10-15 minutes before he told me he would so me and Lulu missed him at the finish line.

The rest of the trip consisted of a few dips in the cold but refreshing swimming pool and some outdoor adventures! Shaun wanted to take the kids on a hike so we headed up Snow Canyon...We were directed to some Lava Tubes...so we started our hike... but since we were with Shaun, it ended up a trail run which the kids LOVED! The views were amazing and it was a beautiful sunny St George Day...was SO happy to get out of the freezing cold for a moment to thaw out.