Thursday, November 24, 2011

Postcards from TN part three- Thanksgiving

Have a happy and blessed Thanksgiving.
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Wednesday, November 23, 2011

Postcards from TN part two

We spent Wednesday 11/23 with my Dad and his partner Margarita. We had lunch together and then went to the East TN Discovery Center Museum.

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Some of the highlights were a space shuttle module with a black light. Kylie had fun working the controls and blasting into space.
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There were whisper dishes set up on either side of the museum.
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The museum had a very nice kids play area. There were only a few other people there so we were able to visit together quietly which was lovely.
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We stayed for the 30-minute planetarium show. Kylie loved seeing the stars but then she got really sleepy. She took a nap in the car on the way home. And played with her cousins for the rest of the evening.
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Tuesday, November 22, 2011

Postcards from Tennessee part one

Kylie and I stayed at the same hotel in Columbia SC that we stayed at last winter when we went to TN. Kylie brought her favorite two stuffed animals for the trip. Her best quote from the journey was on Friday when we had been on the road for about four hours and had stopped to eat dinner. Kylie said, "You know Mommy, if we had flown we would have been there by now". My little traveler loves flying.
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We arrived Saturday afternoon and Kylie got lots of love from her Nana.
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On Sunday, we were letting Kylie run around the nearby track. Her Aunt Amy and cousin Emily found us there. It was so fun to see the girls running towards one another with their arms opened wide. And I loved their full-body tackling hug.
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Hanging around the house on Monday. Kylie loves to accessorize.
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On Tuesday, my Mom made us a wonderful pre-Thankgsiving lunch at her house. Afterwards we went out for a walk. We don't have much of a Fall in Florida. As we drove through the North Carolina mountains on our way to TN, Kylie kept saying, "These Fall leaves are so beautiful!" So I wasn't surprised that she wanted to play with them.
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Kylie's leaf enthusiasm was catching.
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I woke up with a bit of a head cold on Monday which shows a bit around my eyes.
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It's lovely to get my picture made with my darling Karen. We don't get much of an opportunity when we are away from our photo-happy family.
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And later in the day, we saw Happy Feet 2.
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More family pictures to come! I hope you are enjoying this Thanksgiving week with your family!

Sunday, November 20, 2011

Half Marathon

Karen and I are in Tennessee this week to visit with our family and to celebrate Thanksgiving with them. I knew with the distractions of family that I would be tempted to slack off on my marathon training. So I was tickled to find the Secret City Half Marathon.

I ran it this morning. 13.1 miles and my unofficial time is 1:55. Today was simply fantastic because my Mom, Dad and Karen all came to root me on.

Here are a ton of pictures!

Sunrise at the start of the course.
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It was 55 degrees which is a perfect temperature for running for me. But it felt quite chilly before we started moving.
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Waiting to start.
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And we are off! My family was cheering and waving at the start line.
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The race was a loop that we ran twice. So it was easy for everyone to cheer us on as we ran by at the half-way mark. Seeing Karen, Mom and Dad jumping up and down, waving and shouting encouragement to me was priceless. It was a moment I'll treasure forever.
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And here I am nearing the finish line.
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They called my name and I threw my hands in the air and whooped it up.
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After the race, I was so happy. Here I'm celebrating with my Mom. We were talking about the fact that my first half-mararthon race was held last year around Thankgsiving, and that I ran it in 2:11. I was elated with my new time and shouting out 1:55! with my Mom. I had to hug and kiss everyone. I kissed Karen and my mom...
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Here I'm kissing my Dad.
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And kissing my medal.
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What started out as a long, training run became a personal-best run filled with some awesome moments.
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Thursday, November 17, 2011

Weekly round-up

It looks like a post-it note tornado has hit our home. In taking time to consolidate all my little notes into a workable "to do" list, I found the following notes about Kylie that I thought I would share. Nothing earth shattering...just little bits about her.

She wanted frozen waffles every morning for breakfast. And this week, she started eating two waffles instead of her usual one.

She started making her own bed in the mornings. I'm a bit surprised because I've never asked her to do this. It's difficult bed to make up because it's pushed against the wall. But Kylie is giving it her best effort.

She learned the "Rock, Paper, Scissors" game from the movie "Rio". She loves to play at it.

She leaned out the window of our car every morning during drop-off. One morning she shouted to a friend, "You aren't the boss of me! My Mommy is the boss of me." Yeesh. I don't know where she learned that phrase but we had a long talk about it. Here she is showing her friends her silly scarf and Harvey.
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Kylie brought home this finished piece of school work. I had to look up the bottom word "plastron". I knew at some point Kylie's school work would show me something I didn't know. I didn't think it would happen before kindergarden.
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Kiddo had a haircut-just a trim. The folks where we take her love to dress her hair up. I wish I could do this for her at home...
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...especially when I saw her school picture. Check out Kylie's really boofy hair!
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Have a great weekend everyone!

Skin tone

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Kylie has been interested in skin tone recently. She wanted to know "why some people are peach, some people are light brown, medium brown or dark brown?"

Karen and I really got into our reply. We talked about your family of origin and which continent that family was from. We got out the globe and pointed to different continents and skin tones of people there. Mostly our explanation went way over her head.

Later that day, she asked me the same question again.

I borrowed a line from a movie and answered, "Because God loves wondrous variety." (Extra credit if you can name that movie in the comments.)

Here is some artwork that reflects how Kylie is trying to work out this question of skin tones with her art. I just love her rainbow people!

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Friday, November 11, 2011

That's new!

Kylie did THIS at the park on Thursday. This is the first time I've seen her complete this move. Hurray!
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We were both happy as clams. She was playing with everything the park provided and I was standing back shooting happily away with the camera. I'm tickled I made myself go with her to the park-- after that l-o-n-g run I really just wanted to sit down. I was tempted to plop her in front of the tv. But then I would have missed these fun pictures and hearing the kiddo squeal on the tire swing. When we came home, Momma Karen took over so that I could kick back on the couch and ice my right heel.
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Have a great weekend everyone!

Thursday, November 10, 2011

16 MILES!

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