Ready to Run

About three weeks ago Peter handed me a small slip of paper he'd gotten from school. It was a notice for a race that the BYU track team was hosting for elementary school aged kids in the area. He told me he wanted to do the race and asked if I would please sign him up.

Peter's running has been well documented on this blog, but he'd never run in a race before. His running was always more of the escape variety. I took the paper and said I would look into it.

Then I lost the paper.

The night before the race I remembered that I said I would check it out. And within a minute of looking I found the paper. Now, I'm kind of flaky, so the fact that I remembered AND found the paper was quite remarkable. I took it as a sign and added his name to the nearly sixty first grade boys that were already signed up.

The next day after Cooper finished soccer (we're sounding downright sporty) we drove to BYU. Peter started saying he didn't want to run, but his stage-fright likes to pop up sometimes, so I reassured him that it would be fun and we continued heading to the field.

This was my first race too, so I wasn't sure where to go or what to do. Thankfully we ran into a friend who had grown-up running track and she guided us. Peter got to wear an official race number on his shirt, which added to both the awesomeness and the scariness of the event for him.

The course was a mile long, cross country style. The starting line was way over on one side of the field and the finishing line was on the track. Peter warmed-up with my friend's son and was given a few words of coaching in the process. Here he is, lined up with his peers, ready to run.

As soon as the race started Cooper and Phoebe (both strapped into the double stroller) and I ran our own little race over to the finish line. We paused partway to film Peter as the course came near the spectators, but for some reason I'm having trouble loading that. So you'll just have to trust that he ran and we watched. Also, a bee tried to sting me during one movie, so maybe it's better that I can't put that on the blog since I'm sure my camera-flailing would make some people motion sick.

Bryan and I were both a touch afraid that Peter would run out of steam and not finish the race. So as we were heading over before the race began, I told Peter that the important part wasn't winning, it was finishing. And he did. We cheered as he crossed the finish line.

Here are his results. I've removed our last name (since I don't do last names on the blog) and the name of his school (cause that's a little too much personal information for the internet). Like I said, there were at least sixty boys in his race, and probably more since the registration was open for several more hours after I signed Peter up.

Considering the only training he'd done was running away from me, I think he did a great job on his first race. He was so proud of himself when he finished. I foresee more track time in our future.

Dance Dance Revolution

Cooper and Phoebe are taking a dance class. It's free through MBASA and will last for five weeks. Their first session was last Saturday. And you can guess from yesterday's post that Phoebe probably considers this part of her princess training. 

The day before the class started Phoebe, Cooper, and I watched YouTube clips of several forms of dance. Warning: if you're planning on watching YouTube movies of dance with your children, you might want to stick with BYU dance companies. We didn't see anything inappropriate  mostly because I saw the thumbnails and read descriptions enough to avoid the unsavory.

As we drove to the class on Saturday morning Cooper announced, "Mom, I've decided I'm going to do Jazz." Good choice. Unfortunately, this week they focused on tumbling and ballet. Maybe next week, Cooper.

The class is split into a younger group and an older group. Phoebe is the youngest person in the whole class. I actually had to get special permission to bring her. Here she is getting ready to learn how to do a summersault,. And playing with her name tag.

This is the older group doing a ballet warm-up. Cooper is in the darker blue shirt on the far left.

Phoebe loved the tumbling, but kind of lost interest by the time the class switched and she had to do ballet. As long as she was focused she did a pretty good job of following directions. And she nailed the required "Ta-Da!" that followed every summersault. Here's a movie of her trying to do a bridge.

As soon as we got in the car after class Phoebe informed me that she wanted to "do another dance class." And Cooper has been practicing the mini-routine they learned. I think that's a stamp of approval from both.

Pretty Pretty Princess

During the unpacking (how is it possible I'm not done yet?!) Phoebe found a towel wrap a friend of mine made for her. It was a gift at Phoebe's baby shower and was much too big at the time we received it. But now? It fits just like it was meant to. She added it to her stash of dress-up clothes.

One day I walked into the front room and discovered that Phoebe was wearing her towel over her clothes. She grinned up at me and announced, "Mommy, I'm a princess!"

I adore having a girl. She is a lovely gift after two bounce-off-the-wall-boys. But I have never called her a princess. Beautiful girl? Yes. Sweet girl? Daily. Good girl? Yup. Princess? I can't. It smacks of entitlement. Yes, I recognize my issues. Sometimes I bend a bit too much toward my feminist (stay-at-home-mom feminist, but that's a topic for another post) leanings. And I've wondered if I'm depriving her of something that other little girls get.

So I have not taught her about princesses. She has seen Disney movies though. And honestly, that was the only kind of princess I ever wanted to be. I was nine when The Little Mermaid came out and I decided then that I wanted to be the voice of a Disney princess. I've made other choices (to not pursue acting professionally, to be a mom), but there is a little part of me that still dreams of voicing whatever princess Disney hasn't already brought to life. I know I'm a touch too old, but maybe they're working on a thirty-something princess story and just haven't found the right voice yet. Everyone needs a daydream, eh?

Back to Miss Phoebe. Without being taught directly about princesses, she knew. And when she claimed her title I was curious. What did that mean to her? So I asked. "Phoebe, what does a princess do?"

I watched her ruminate. She looked at her towel-dress, then she grabbed the hem and swished it a bit. The light of a two-year-old's epiphany spread across her face and she said enthusiastically, "Dance!"

Tomorrow and Tomorrow and Tomorrow

The night before her birthday I asked Phoebe a few questions. She answered some of them, and then got sidetracked talking about riding a donkey. Oh, there's a part when I can't understand what her favorite food is. I realized later that it's candy. Apparently candy and donkey sound similar in Phoebe speak.

Tickled Pink

Miss Phoebe (as we often call her) hit a big milestone recently. She turned the big 0-2. And while I remember the boys opening gifts and being willing to eat cake when they turned two, I don't think they really had a grasp of what the day was. Phoebe, on the other hand, knew.

Her birthday was all about her.

And it was all pink.

Yes, Phoebe loves anything and everything pink. And she wanted a pink birthday. Given my tenuous relationship with the color pink, this was not easy. But I did it. And I think that shows that at least I'm trying to be a good mom.

She started the day by eating pink cereal.

She does have a spoon, she's just not using it. And that's surprising because she's usually my neatest eater.

She wore pink.

Those two-year-olds are hard to pin down for a picture.

She used pink dishes at lunch.

Notice the decorative ribbon? Yeah, I got crazy.

Her presents were wrapped in all the pink bags we had in our stash.

Why yes, we are still moving in, why do you ask?

Her gifts were pink.

These were free to us. I got them in April and tucked them away for her birthday.

Cooper picked the color book and the Minnie Mouse book from the cheap bins at Target. The Pride and Prejudice book was my Amazon splurge. It's delightful.

I had to go to a handful of stores to find this. Apparently there's been a run on baby doll strollers in the last month. Who knew?

And so was her cake.

She requested a pink princess cake. This is how I obliged. No, cake decorating is not one of my talents.

She loved her birthday. Let me more accurately represent that. She LOVED her birthday!

On the Way Home, part 2

I opted to travel back from Wisconsin a different way than we had come. Instead of going through Iowa, Nebraska, and Wyoming, we returned via Wisconsin, Minnesota, South Dakota, and Wyoming. I had never been in either Minnesota or South Dakota, so I happily added them to my list of states I've visited. And South Dakota had a pretty awesome bonus feature.

No one in our little traveling party had ever been to Mount Rushmore before. It was worth the extra hour that it tacked on to our trip.

 This is the entrance to the monument. It's also the best picture I got of my Dad and the kids that day.

Proof that Peter was there.

 Proof that I was there. Also proof that the camera on the front of my phone is not nearly as awesome as the camera on the back of my phone.

And this is the best picture I got of my Dad and the kids in front of the monument itself. No really, Mount Rushmore is there. See Roosevelt and Lincoln peaking from the top of the picture?

Chi-Town

During one of our last weekends in the Midwest we took a jaunt down to the Windy City. Bryan had to do some work in Chicago so we tagged along. We had a little excitement on the drive down. A rock hit our windshield and cracked it. The crack is visible in one of the pictures below. Peter was adamant that we turn around and go back to Wisconsin so we could have it repaired, but we kept going.

We rolled in around dinnertime, so we made our first stop at a place that came highly recommended: Giordano's. It was amazing. (Excellent suggestion, Beth!) I've now had New York style pizza in Manhattan and Chicago deep dish pizza in Chicago.

Chicago wins.

The next morning we went to see the Chicago Temple.

Afterward we tried to see downtown Chicago. All day we had watched as massive gray clouds inched toward us. As we drove up to Navy Pier, they caught us. I've never been in a storm like this one. It felt apocalyptic. Lake Michigan was churning and crashing. The rain was so thick we could barely see the front of our car. The sky looked like it was eight at night rather than three in the afternoon. Peter spent our entire time in the city in hysterics. He is not a fan of storms.

We had to be back in Appleton that night, so I'm afraid we only saw downtown Chicago from inside our car. During the storm we tried to make our way out of the city. When the rain let up we stopped at a McDonald's for a bathroom break. Bryan asked us to wait in the car while he looked inside. He came back out quickly and announced that no one else would be getting out of the car. Turns out the employees were all encased in bullet-proof glass. Awesome. We didn't get out of the car until we were back up near the Temple.

While I'm sad we didn't get to explore more of Chicago, I did enjoy what we saw.

On the Way Home, part 1

About a week into our Wisconsin adventure I got online and looked up the school schedule for Peter's upcoming year. I'm not sure why I didn't do this sooner, maybe the packing/cleaning/moving across the country thing distracted me. When I looked at the starting date I was surprised: Peter needed to start school in Utah before Bryan was done with his internship in Wisconsin.

We talked about our options: we could just bring Peter a week late and stay with Bryan while he finished up, or the kids and I could drive back without Bryan, move into a new house, and get Peter started while Bryan did the rest of his internship and joined us almost two weeks later.

We chose option B.

Peter doesn't deal very well with change, and I was afraid that moving into a new house and starting at a new school, a few days after everyone else for that matter, would be too much for him. And I thought I should give his teacher a heads-up before Peter wandered into her classroom. I hoped that maybe having a few days to get used to a new home, then starting at the same time as everyone else would be the best plan for Peter.

When we told our parents that I would be driving almost fifteen hundred miles with the children (and without Bryan) I think they went into panic mode. Both sets offered to help me drive out and plans went into motion. In the end, my Dad flew from San Diego out to Appleton, Wisconsin so that I wouldn't have to make the trip alone.

And I'm so thankful he did.

Even with his help, it was a rough trip. I can't imagine how insane it would have been on my own. Just getting the kids from the car into the hotel room each night was a two person job. And Phoebe decided somewhere along the way that she was ready to potty-train. How on earth would I have done bathroom breaks with all three of them? I know other moms do this all the time, but Peter has recently taken to climbing on toilet paper dispensers or toilet seats and looking into other stalls whilst in public restrooms, so just taking him is fairly all-consuming.

But I didn't have to. And that was a lovely thing.