John Wayne Bday Festival

It has been a LONG time since I posted, and hopefully one of these days I'll have time to catch you (yes you, all three people that read this!) of all that's been going on. The Sellers have been doing well, kids got through the end of the school year, Gavin and Chad are having amazing racing seasons, and we are exploring some exciting opportunities on the career / job fronts. I'm so grateful for our health and all the good things in our lives, because there are others I know that are fighting job loss, cancer, and other life altering events. Count your blessings people!

Sam went to grandma Betsy's for the weekend, so Chad and I went out to Winterset to run a small 5k that was part of a line up of events for the John Wayne celebration. Gavin came with us to cheer us on. The fitness sports website had 9:30 start time listed, so we went out there, registered by 8:30 and thought we had plenty of time to warm up. I went one way to warm up a couple miles and hit the restroom, Chad went another.

I got back to the van at 9:11 and Gavin told me the website was wrong, the race started at 9, and dad had been able to jump in the race. I have to admit I was really, really bummed. I was looking forward to it, my training has been going well, and with a small field I had a chance of taking the win for the women. But then I tried to remember the big picture and that this was not that big of deal. Stuff happens. Gav and I jogged up to watch the finishers come in and yell for Chad.

After the race, Chad was going to cool down with the guy that won, and another guy from Pioneer that came out and ran the race. He told me to join them, and it could at least be a decent tempo (close to race pace) run for me. Ha! Yes, Chad's easy cool down pace is my race pace. I kept up with them a good mile and a half and started fading. So we eased up a little, but still got a couple good faster (for me) miles in. Then we did another couple miles at my cool down pace. So, I didn't race, but I got in some good miles and ran with the Hubs.

Gavin really wanted to stay for the pie tasting, but it didn't start til 12:30 (it was 10 am still!). Our Pioneer friend hopped in our van and we took off to see the covered bridges. Along the way we passed a winery, with the tasting room open at 11, so after seeing a couple bridges, we stopped in the tasting room. Gavin drank a sprite while I sampled all their wines and the guys sampled the beer. Iowa wine has sure come a long way from the sickly sweet stuff they used to be!

Finally we made it back to Winterset for pie time. We also stopped into Mi Pueblito for lunch and it was amazing mexican food! They had this smoky, tasty hot sauce that I am now regretting not asking to buy a big cup of to bring home. If you happen to be in / near / driving through Winterset, you can not go wrong there, especially with their lunch specials ~ $5 a plate for a ton of food.

And now we are relaxing at home, we head to Cedar Rapids for a track meet tomorrow.

Ski Trip 2013 - 1st ski day

First day of skiing done and I am EXHAUSTED!!

The drive yesterday went very well, we made awesome time and the kids were as well behaved as could be expected. As soon as we hit the mountain we got into some weather, again, to be expected. Rain turned to snow turned to icy roads. But I'll take an hour of stressed out driving because it meant fresh powder!

We are staying at Cirque Lodge at Copper Mountain, on recommendation from a friend. It happened to be a fairly good deal too. We are in a two bedroom condo and it has an awesome deck, nice features, and we have a ski locker, gym, pool, hot tubs at our disposal. It's a bit of a walk to get to the lifts, certainly not bad if it were just me, but far for little kids. Copper Mountain does have these carts all over the place though, that you can use to haul your equipment (and children) around. Remind me to tell you how fun it is to pull a cart + 40 lb preschooler, plus our skis through fresh powder after a long day of skiing. Partially uphill. At least I am getting a full body workout.

View from our deck

Someone was excited to get here

Sam was signed up for ski and Gav and I skied together. Everything went very smooth at ski school drop off and Sam wasn't nervous at all. Gav and I headed for the ski lift - which wasn't very busy! I don't know if it's just like this on Sundays in general, but we were never waiting in lines.

Dropping Sam off

We sailed down some green runs and Gavin had no problem remembering how to ski. It was snowing pretty hard the first hour or so, and then the rest of the day it snowed on and off. It was nice at the base of the mountain, but really cold when we approached the top of a couple of the lifts.

We progressed to some blue runs and then tried to plan out a black. I do find the signage at Copper a little hard to follow. We had a hard time sticking to our planned route due to a trail cutting across a mountain and not being able to make it over there. In the end we only hit one or two black trails, they were really hard! And Gavin does not ski easy - he is really cautious and doesn't get out of control but he also doesn't stop til he gets all the way to the bottom. I love how cautious he is, but that means more turning (more work for the quads) and then not getting a rest break (Copper has really nice, long runs) was making me cramp up a bit. I was also diagnosed with iron deficiency Friday, so the fact that my muscles are not getting / storing / using oxygen as they should doesn't help. Constant lactic acid pain is not the most fun thing.

Last picture, he was getting tired, cold and kinda over it

Around 2:15 we headed back to the lodge where I would have to pick up Sam at 3. Gavin was done skiing, so I set him up with some hot chocolate while I carried his ski's back to our condo and got the ski harness for Sam in case he wanted to ski more.

I picked up Sam from ski school, and was a bit bummed with the results. He couldn't stop, could barely snow plow and could only turn right. Oof. We went into the lodge and met up with Gav and Chad and Sam promptly started melting down while simultaneously insisting he was ok to come on the ski lift and down the hill with me. Against my better judgment, we took off. He cheered up once he got the ski's back on.

We made it on and off the lift without consequence. Woohoo!

I started out trying the harness and he just fell backwards. We then did the Sam skiing between my legs while holding on to my poles, and it worked as long as it wasn't too steep. He was pretty tired by this point and just getting him to put his weight on his own legs (instead of leaning back on me) was nearly impossible. I think it took us about 45 minutes to make it down the run (remember what I said about the nice long runs? I take that back) and not only were my quads on fire but my lower back as well.

So I'm trying (unsuccessfully) to talk him into another ski lesson tomorrow, but I have reservations because I'm not sure he got a lot out of it today. I've heard good things about the harness, so I am now off to google You Tube videos on how to teach a 4 yr old to ski using one.

Wish me luck. And strong muscles. And patience.

Oh and the hubs? He dropped Sam off with us at ski school, helped Gav and I get our gear on, checked out the village, and did some snow shoeing!

I'll Love You For A Million and 71 Days

~ quote by Samson Sellers

Sam, as many 4 yr olds are, is a complete split personality.

On one hand, he is loving, sweet, sensitive and attentive.

The other side is devious, trouble making, mouthy, and temper tantrum-y.

Both happen in the extreme.

When he is in a loving mood, I get showered with lots of "I love you's" and smooches. He'll usually say something like "I love you for the WHOLE weekend, mama!"

A weekend seems like a pretty long time for a little kid after all! As we went back and forth with how long we'd love each other, he topped out at a million and seventy one days. Good enough for this mama.

Another great example of his caring spirit - my fellow preemie mom friend's daughter Daphne just had a kidney transplant last week. She's four, and recovery has been tough. She needs to start moving around more to aid in recovery, so I thought making some video of Sam dancing around would inspire her to move, shimmy and shake a bit, if nothing else, it might cheer her up. We made one Saturday and the next day he woke up and asked how "Daph-a-nee" was doing and if she was still in the hospital. When I told her that she was, he wanted to record another video for her. I have linked them below if you want to check out his moves!

A Boy and His Cat

Gavin loves this cat so much! For those that don't know the story, we picked out Meatball from the rescue league in January of 2007. He was already named Meatball. We knew he was the cat for us, and for Gavin as a pesky-to-animals two yr old when Gavin reached into his cage, picked up a little ball and chucked it right at the cat's head.

Meatball didn't even flinch, bite, or meow.

Ever since then it has been true love. 

Meatball really loves this. I promise.

Sam Has Big Goals

Saturday morning, Sam bounced out of the bathroom and announced:

"I'm going to wear my skeleton underwear ALL weekend!"

Shoot for the stars, kid  :)

Gavin can Hold a Ten Minute Plank

You are going to be getting some really random posts. I have lost the cord for my camera, so I can't get the pictures off of it until I get a new one. In the meantime, enjoy the randomness and camera pics.

One of the exercises we do during our core work out at track practice is the plank. We usually hold it for a minute, kids whining and complaining the whole way through.

The kids all seem to have abs and six packs on the brain, so they are starting to challenge each other. First, Gavin held the plank for 2 minutes.

Then a few days later he held it for 3 minutes.

Saturday morning after practice he held it for 3 min 10 sec.

Last night he held it for TEN minutes. He wasn't worn out from running before hand, but still. That is super ridiculous.

Sam's 4th Birthday Party!

Sam was supposed to celebrate his birthday last weekend, but an icy winter storm led to cancellation. We just didn't want to risk people getting hurt on the roads. So we picked up his Batman birthday cake and took it to Grandma Janet's.

The nice people at Monkey Joe's allowed us to reschedule at the last minute, so yesterday we were at Monkey Joe's with eight wild four year olds. The only casualty was a busted lip (Sam's).

I always hear about all these boys that Sam is friends with at school. His class is pretty much all boys except for one girl who is now his "girlfriend". Every day I hear the tales of their adventures playing Avengers. When I pick him up at school he is always playing and happy, but I have never really seen them in action.

Oh.my.goodness.

It is such a joy to see Sam with his buddies. They are a great little group of kids, and they just ran around the play place in a pack, switching off which kids were buddying up for different bounce houses. They were all just so happy and delighted and excited to be there together. I so much appreciated the sheer childish delight that I saw. It makes me so happy knowing that every day he goes to school he is spending time with kids he really enjoys. And a lot of them will be going to his same elementary school!

We made it through the party without incident. Only upset moment was when his friend who is our neighbor burst into tears. He was at a disadvantage not knowing the other kids besides Sam, so they turned on him as the "bad guy". After trying to get Sam to tell everyone he wasn't the bad guy (at that moment Sam was in tears about his busted lip) poor F broke down crying. I quickly made all the kids at the table tell him he wasn't the bad guy and the tears subsided. Whew. Crisis averted.

Happy Birthday, my Sam. You are such a crazy ray of sunshine, happiness and optimism. You balance out the rest of us in the family that may have a tendency to be a little darker, sensitive and dramatic. You live your life with a constant mischievous twinkle in your eye - and while this is sometimes leading to trouble, I wouldn't change you for anything!