Winthrop part 2

Journal entry from Friday, December 27, 2019:
Whew, we are home sweet home in Sunnyside again. We had planned on spending two nights in Winthrop, but our Airbnb had such uncomfortable beds that we had a very patchy not-good night of sleep last night. Our full sized bed had a twin sized comforter on it, so every time one of us rolled over, the covers were yanked off of the other person. That combined with the horrific-ly uncomfy "mattress" made for very minimal sleeping. Lying in bed aching with lack of sleep and irritated pressure points this morning around 6am, Jeff and I held a nose-to-nose whispered conference wherein we decided to sled, eat lunch, and ice skate in Winthrop today, then drive home in the afternoon/evening. Then we executed that plan. It was a relief not having the dark, impatient prospect of another wild evening cooped up with the kids, followed by another restless painful night of non-sleep ahead of us. We were able to enjoy our day and head home at the end of it satisfied.

Winthrop part 1

A few years ago I came across the surprisingly nice website for a tiny town in north central Washington. The website boasted gorgeous scenery, winter sports, summer trails, a western-themed main street, and the possibility of viewing the Northern Lights. I kept my eye on that website and finally scheduled a visit the day after Christmas. So I booked us two nights in a "bungalow" on Airbnb and we packed our snow gear. Two journal entries tell the tale:

Thursday, December 26, 2019: Today we drove 4 hours north of Sunnyside to the tiny town of Winthrop, WA. We packed up and left home at 10am. The drive felt somewhat lengthy and not especially thrilling. In the car, we listened to Ramona on audiobook as well as some Christmas music, and arrived in Winthrop at 2pm.

Christmas

A touched-up-so-it-makes-sense Christmas journal entry:

Wednesday, December 25, 2019: Merry Christmas! Today was fun, although if I'm being honest, it wasn't glowy and perfect. Kids still disagreed and whined. Why do I expect that behavior to be held back on Christmas? Over-eager optimism? Hah. This morning the kids didn't come out of Jay's room on their own at all; I ended up going to get them once we were all ready at 6:45am! I thought for sure our lack of pre-designated wake-up time would ignite a 5:00am parade! I made them all use the bathroom before we started Christmas-ing. 

Rose couldn't remember what we usually do to signal them to run out to their stockings, and tried walking out to the family room while someone else was in the bathroom. I had to remind her that she had to wait and listen till we turned on Jingle Bells. Then she came running but Amber and Jay were still in his room lying in bed. Rose pulled a few things out of her stocking, then called back to Jay and Amber to come. It was so disjointed and slightly anticlimactic! But eventually we got down to business and had a grand time opening stockings and gifts. 

Christmas Eve Eve and Christmas Eve

Two journal entries leading up to Christmas, interspersed with pictures:

Monday, December 23, 2019 (or, as the kids call it, Christmas Eve-Eve)
I ran 9 miles this morning. I don't know why, probably just because I could. It was nice not to be confined to the boring driveway loops. This afternoon after Jay and I went on a library date, Jeff and I ran errands together. We got tamales and salad for our Christmas food. Tonight Jeff dressed up as Santa Claus. It was hilarious as always. He had me dress up as Rudolph, and we all ran next door and saying we wish You a Merry Christmas to the Andersons. It was silly. I wrote this with voice to text on my phone because I'm too tired to try typing it.

Christmas Sunday

Merry Christmas Sunday! Going to church at Christmastime is my absolute favorite. I stand all amazed and joy to the world! We sang both of those hymns at church on the same Sunday, and it all goes together so well. Sunday morning we had to leave home by 7:50am to get to church for one last choir/ensemble rehearsal. It was rather intense getting everyone presentable and out the door on time. I gave Jay a much-needed, too-long-delayed haircut and Jeff bathed Amber. I did both girls' hair and helped squeeze Amber's still-damp legs into her tights (no easy feat! --pun intended). Somehow we all tumbled out the door and into the car, arriving in the church parking lot right in front of the choir director, right before 8am as planned.

Who knows what the kids did for the 45 minutes we rehearsed. Amber was missing when we finished, but Jeff hunted her down and we never found any major messes or damage in the church building. I was pretty nervous about playing violin in front of people for the first time since college (aka first time in 12 years), and spent a good amount of time giving myself mental pep talks and doing some controlled box breathing. In between my minor freak-outs, I managed to listen to the three wonderful speakers and choir music and wrangle Amber.

December Daily

Here's an everyday photo-and-journal album from last week, December 16-21. It was the final week before Christmas break, and everyone was ready for time off from the school routine by the end! Or, in Jay's case, he was ready for Christmas break at the beginning of the week! He laboriously counted down the days until school let out for Christmas on Friday.

Journal excerpts from the week, because why reinvent the wheel?

Monday, December 16, 2019. It was another sunless COLD gray day. The trees never lost their coating of fuzzy white frost today. I spent most of the morning working on Christmas cards with Amber. After dropping her off at preschool, I planned to mail a few packages and buy stamps at the post office, then go on a run. When I entered the post office, I became the fifteenth person in line! Right in front of me was a very kind, very loquacious, very rotund man. He chatted off and on about lots of topics and in spite of his kindness, I was feeling overwhelmed and not prepared to make small talk with a stranger for half an hour. I did not ask any follow-up questions, which inattention caused his conversation lulled a few times, giving me much needed breaks.

Two mountains

Journal clips from Wednesday, December 18th: I visited two beautiful, peaceful mountains in one day: the temple and Badger Mountain. Today was a study in contrasts, and the more I think about it, the more profound it seems: light vs. dark, sunshine vs. shadow, clear vs. fog, warm vs. cold, temple peace vs. Costco bustle.

Today was such a pleasant pocket tucked into the middle of a busy dark week. I dropped Amber off at a friend's house at 9am for our temple babysitting trade, and the next six hours were MINE, because our friends took Amber to preschool at 12:30 and I didn't have to be back to pick her up until 3pm. What a weekday treasure!

Whites in the dark

The sun is gone. In the past ten days, we have seen the sun once. The endless thick freezing fogs and/or heavy low gray clouds of winter have descended, effectively snuffing out the influence of the happy yellow sunshine. I am starting to feel like a fraud whenever I tell anyone that my address is in Sunnyside, WA.

We have to make our own light right now.

Or be a light.

Seek light.

Find light.

Light is vital!

I am thankful for our Christmas tree. It makes a difference on these short dark wintry days. Somehow life keeps going in the dark winter. Even when we'd all rather be hibernating, there are still school music programs to see, church activities to attend, puzzles to do, costumes to wear, pictures to draw, music to practice, books to read, laps to run, and projects to do. So we keep on clawing our way through this dark cold winter and capture little pinpricks of light wherever we can:

Long weekend

Right after the five-day Thanksgiving weekend, we had three days of school and then rolled into another long weekend, four days this time. The kids were out of school on Thursday and Friday (Dec. 5-6) for elementary school parent teacher conferences. Usually the first parent teacher conferences of the year are at the beginning of November, but for some reason they were delayed to the beginning of December this school year. It was strange having back-to-back long weekends. Our house had barely recovered from the last prolonged family-at-home-time when it was hit with another 96 hour bout! 

Amb-antics

What is it about Mondays that inspire moody blog posts? Dec 2nd was an exceptionally gray colorless Monday, with Sunday's snow only a quarter melted and refrozen underneath thick iron gray clouds. It was getting dark by 3pm under that gloomy sky. For my journal entry Monday night, I wrote a list of Amb-antics, or mischief Amber made that day:

Things Amber did today-- Monday, December 2, 2019

First snowfall

The snow must have followed us home from the mountains after we cut our Christmas tree on Saturday, because we woke up on Sunday morning to a white world outside. It was barely an inch, but that was enough to transform the gray-brownness outside to white.

This was technically our second snowfall, but the light dusting we had on Thanksgiving doesn't really count. I usually love the cozy feeling of the first snowfall of the winter, but on Sunday it felt bleak and cold and threatening. Jeff had to be at church early so I had to drive in the snow. Sunnyside doesn't plow its roads and my Tennessee-raised self has major winter weather driving anxiety. Jeff offered to come home and pick us up before church, but I didn't want to be too pathetic for this mere inch of snow, so I declined his offer and inched my way to church at 15-20 mph the whole drive. We made it!

Christmas tree time

To the mountains we go! Saturday, November 30th was Christmas tree time. This year our friends the Kannely family came along so we could show them the best tree-cutting spots. They followed us on the 70 minute drive to the national forest. It was fun to have friends with us to share the magic! The mountains near White Pass were loaded in thick puffy snow. We never know if we will find snow or not when we go to cut our Christmas tree, and this year there was well over 6 inches of snow carpeting the ground. As the white scenery flashed past our car windows, I began to regret putting off buying Jay and Rose snow boots this year. At least everyone's snow suits still fit, and I did get all three kids new coats. Thank goodness for the coats and snow pants, because it was COLD, with the temp in the 20's. I wore my new [frumpy] fleece-lined jeans and even though they aren't waterproof, they did their job and kept my legs warm.

Thanksgiving

Thanksgiving felt so late this year! We decided to start the feasting early, so I made our turkey on Monday (Nov. 25th), four days before Thanksgiving. It was weird doing all of the turkey prepping on my own while Jeff was at work. I realized when I unwrapped the bird that Jeff usually does the turkey, and I was very inexperienced! Google to the rescue. I managed to successfully spatchcock our turkey, just like Jeff did last year. Spatchcocking involves cutting out the backbone and splaying the turkey out wide on a cookie sheet so it cooks more quickly and evenly. Hacking through the bones with my biggest knife was almost too much for my sensibilities and I was seriously reconsidering my status as an omnivore by the time I had hacked that spine out of the raw turkey carcass. Amber helpfully stood on a stool and said "eeew! gross! YUCK!" on repeat the entire time I sawed at the bones. But the turkey cooked to juicy crisp perfection in a mere 90 minutes so it worked! All I did was spread some oil on the outside and pop it into the oven. Boom.

Ice skating!

Wednesday (Nov. 27th) was the first day off of school for Thanksgiving break. Sunnyside rewarded us with the biggest, wildest windstorm I've ever experienced. Winds reached a constant 35 mph and held that speed, with 45 mph gusts all day and all night. It was misery trying to get exercise out in that weather! I nearly got blown into the canal on my brief jog that morning!

To have fun inside on Wednesday, we went ice skating with the cousins. We had to drive 50 minutes in the wind to the Toyota Center ice rink in the tri cities, but we survived. It had been at least 13 years since Jeff and I last wore ice skates, and it was our kids' first time ice skating. It was a very strange situation to find myself re-learning how to ice skate while teaching my kids how to do it as well. They were all very wobbly and slippy at first, but all three made huge improvements during the hour we were at the rink, although they did not advance to skating unassisted during this first time ice skating.

Colchuck Lake

After a solid week cooped up taking care of sick kids, I was going stir crazy. It was time for another Shaina "vision-quest" as I jokingly call my mountain journeys. So I planned myself a Saturday adventure, carefully researching various trails and forests before selecting the perfect place for optimal rejuvenation: Colchuck Lake.

Sick week

This week does not need to be relived in detail. Here are the facts: Kids: flu. Mom: cabin fever. I was forced to employ all known mom-survival techniques, and I still barely survived. Somehow, Jeff, Jay, and I have not caught the dread illness as of today (Sunday, November 24th). Amber is still in recovery. Rose is finally closer to her normal self, a solid 7 days after her first fever. It seems too early in the wintry season for this much sickness! Here are a few journal entries so I don't have to relive this week anymore:

Piano, primary, prayer, and pictures

I. Piano
Since the beginning, Jay and Rose have gone to Rebecca Cook in Prosser for their piano lessons. We love her so much, both as a human being, friend, and extremely thorough piano teacher. We stuck with her even after we moved to Sunnyside, driving the 30 minutes to her house before school once a week. In the thick of cross country season this year, however, everything started feeling hard. Getting the kids out the door on Tuesday mornings by 7am was a massive heavy burden. After much thought and consultation, we decided to switch to a local piano teacher to ease up the burden. It was such a hard heartbreaking decision to leave our beloved Sister Cook!

Eve

We have always planned on acquiring a second vehicle by the time Jay starts middle school, or fall of 2020. We have always planned on saving up for the car and then buying it outright. We thought we'd be happy to wait until summer of 2020 to get the second car, but then a few months ago Jeff got a church calling that requires him to stay after church on Sundays (financial clerk). Bumming rides off of people (no matter how kind and willing they are) gets old really fast as an adult. So we moved up the timetable, buckled down on our savings, and decided to get the car in December. Jeff has been researching electric cars for the past year, so he knew exactly what he wanted. A few weeks ago in preparation for our December car purchase, he reached out to a dealership in the tri cities, letting them know what he was looking for. Things were moving along right on schedule.

XC State

Cross country season has been officially done for over a week now and it is time to round out the story of our season with a few final thoughts. Here's what I wrote the day after our district meet: Coaching is such a rollercoaster. It's like suddenly having 50 kids when I am barely figuring out how to bet here for my three kids at home. What do I say? What do I do? What do they need? This team was so silly, goofing off before practice that I was laughing every day...then someone threw a punch and I felt terrified...then too many people slacked/skipped practice and I felt annoyed...and then they raced their hardest and I got weepy all over again.  guess I'll stick around, Sunnyside cross country. You're a worthwhile rollercoaster. 2 years of coaching done, 30+ to go! 

Laurs

She came! My former college roommate, teammate, and best friend Lauren (aka Laurs) visited last weekend, on November 9th-12th. I was a bit concerned about being a good hostess and remembering to get things like enough towels and water and blankets all while figuring out how to squeeze her into our small space, but the good thing about best friends and old roommates is we are comfortable living in close quarters. It felt like the most normal thing in the world to have her stay at our house. We talked and talked and talked for four days straight--it was lovely to have so much time together! 

Laurs brought her 3 year old son, Lukas, along while her excellent husband kept their two older daughters at home. The first order of business when they arrived at our house was a backyard ramble. Then we loaded up into the van and drove an hour to Pasco for the state cross country meet. Jeff drove a school van with our single state qualifier as well as six of his supportive teammates, and we met them there. It was fun to be back at a cross country meet with my dear ole teammate Laurs. The race was quick and afterwards we went out to dinner at Red Robin with the team. After that, it was go time for whatever we wanted to do together for the rest of Laurs' stay. We walked and talked a LOT. My legs were sore from all of the walking we did! It was awesome.

Birthday Birthday

To tell the story of our double birthday week, I'm turning to journal excerpts, because why reinvent the wheel?

Sunday, November 3rd: We had Amber's birthday dinner tonight with the full White family coming over. We set up a folding table in our family room, end to end with our kitchen table in the kitchen, and everyone actually fit! We couldn't use the front door (everyone had to come in through the kitchen door), but it worked great. Amber was so happy and excited. We had mac and cheese, apples, white store bread, and oven roasted kielbasa, cauliflower, and yams. (Amber didn't eat that last dish, haha, that was for my dairy-free needs). The Gibbons and Whites stayed for one hour. The pink strawberry cake (mix) with unicorn star sprinkles (and canned frosting) on top that I made for Amb actually turned out! It was a relief because I have been struggling to get my 9x13 pan items to bake all the way through the center. I wish I could have managed to take a few more pictures of the gathering, but I did get one of Amber with her cake.

Fall fun

Colorful leaves. Apple cider. Kids in costumes. Pumpkin carving. Witch fingers. Cross country meets. The Great Pumpkin. The Were-rabbit. Hocus Pocus. Donuts. As usual, we crammed in all of our favorite October traditions during the last week of the month. The temperature suddenly dropped and the wind howled all night on Sunday night (Oct. 27th), blowing most of the leaves off the trees and freezing the world at a rock solid 12 degrees. Fall left in a hurry! Here are some pretty pre-freeze pictures of our truncated fall fun.

Mulish Monday

Journal entry from Monday, October 21, 2019, edited for grammar and readability: This morning I barely had time to read 2 verses of Thessalonians before Amber and Rose had their first argument of the day. Right afterwards, Rose had her first meltdown of the day, over her socks not fitting perfectly as usual. I used to accept effort over duration with scripture study, but now with Come Follow Me, that feels like failure and slacking. I did read one paragraph of a conference talk too--the one by Elder Peter M. Johnson about the power to overcome the devil's three D's (deception, distraction, discouragement). He said that we need to do the everyday spiritual work so we can "resist the discouragement that diminishes our capacity to feel the love of our Heavenly Father and His Son." I need to read that part every day! While I am rather resilient to the other "wiles of the devil," I get discouraged too easily.

And yet right after reading that, I got discouraged again. Ugh. Monday. Cloudy, cold, and gray all day.

My Mom

My dear Mom visited on Friday! She drove down from Seattle and stayed for 5-6 hours before driving home. While she was here, I tried my best not to think about how sad it was that this was her last drive-down from Seattle, since she and my Dad are moving to Denver in a few weeks. She brought me pretty flowers, a homemade birthday cheesecake threee weeks early (since she will be in Denver on my actual birthday), and lots of other yummy foods. She's a genius at feeding my weird stomach. It was SO nice to have my mom visit, especially without all of my children stealing her attention the whole time. I must be a rather selfish second child, because I treasure alone time with my Mom so much!

Max Jensen 2019

On Saturday, October 12th, we went to the Max Jensen Invitational in Richland, WA. This meet has become a family tradition since Jeff started coaching. Saturday was the fourth consecutive year that we have gone to the Max Jensen meet! Since Richland is only 45 minutes away, we did not have to be at the high school until a luxurious 7am on Saturday, so that was a lovely change after the past 7 weeks of early early Saturday mornings. It was FREEZING for the first few hours we were out and about, so I wore several quality layers. I worked up quite the sweat in all of those layers while I filled and lugged water jugs and other team equipment out of the toasty-warm high school. I was thankful for my layers when we were outside at the meet, but before we left I was roasting! Once everything was loaded into the bus and attendance was taken, we hit the road.

Weekly Album

Another week (and a half) has sped by, and I am barely keeping my head above water without blogging! But I still value tracking life in our corner of the world, so in place of a thoughtful witty wordy post, here's an album of everyday pictures which provide a sliver of a peek into the past ten days:

Apples and donuts

Journal clips from last week, interspersed with relevant pictures:

Sunday, September 29: Sacrament meeting was just awful today. I could barely sing or listen thanks to my children--all 3 of them-- misbehaving. Jay and Rose were squabbling and poking and fighting. Amber was being extra stubborn and kick-y climb-y. She pouted through the sacrament because I wouldn't let her draw, and I had to threaten to take away computer time later if she didn't sit down quietly and reverently during the sacrament. It took me the entire sacrament hymn to get her to sit down and stop attacking Jeff, who had hidden her notebook behind his back. The whole meeting was draining in a way that I haven't been drained in a while. I think it tapped out my patience reserves and made the rest of the day harder as a result. Anyways, sacrament meeting was a trial. We survived. Barely.

This evening Rose and I made an apple cake that did not cook all the way through (of course we didn't realize that until the cake was cooled). While we were making whipped cream for it, I tried to help Rose position the beater more centrally and ended up causing it to spin out of control, spraying our clothes and the entire kitchen vicinity in whipped cream. It was a huge mess. It took a while to clean up. I was even more drained afterwards. I felt like all I was doing was failing and things that are supposed to be simple. Ugh.

The Pee-ple

Jay has started a new nightly routine which is true to his sweet self. Most nights after a little computer time, he reads his scriptures (currently he reads one chapter in the Book of Mormon per night--he says it is SO much easier to understand after trying to read the Bible for so long, haha). Then he comes into my room, sits next to me, and just talks. He is so cute and clever and interested in weird fantasy books with dragons and epic battles, which he describes at length. I do my best to keep up and make relevant comments.

September's end

Well September sure sped by! Here are pictures from the last week of September. I may add more words to this post later, but I really wanted its publishing date to be in September so I'm posting it unfinished at the very end of the very last day of the month. September was so busy!

Balloons at sunrise

On Friday morning, it took me nearly 20 minutes to peel myself out of bed. "What is happening today?" I asked myself groggily as I checked my calendar. The only thing on the Friday square besides preschool and xc practice was the Prosser Balloon Rally. "Rats!" I thought to myself. It's already 6:30am and we probably missed it. Quickly I checked the balloon rally's Facebook page. They were still in a pilot's meeting! Hope was restored! I weighed options back and forth for a few minutes, then committed. I gave Jay and Rose the option to stay home and practice piano or hurry up, get ready, and go to see if the balloons would launch. They have hardly ever gotten ready so fast.

Blog blender

Another week has flown past, leaving me limp, wimpy, and exhausted in its wake. It seems like cross country season is slowly chopping away at my (admittedly small) tree of reserved energy, leaving a shorter stump every week. Yet I still like it! Jeff and I are exhausted but we are still doing more for the team than we are required to do. We care about these big kids too much not to "go the extra mile." We are worn out yet excited about our runners' progress. Our bodies are stiff and beaten after logging a shocking cumulative 17 hours crammed into tiny school bus benches over the past 8 days. But our spirits are somehow high! Jeff has been running regularly for the past two weeks (his ribs are finally allowing real running again) so his mental health is solid, even if his trick knee is aching. I am slowly coming around to the understanding that even though I can't talk loudly and herds of teenagers terrify me, I am still a valuable contributor to our dynamic coaching duo. There is more than one way to lead. Even though most people lead with vocal volume and big-group charisma, I can still be an effective leader with my quiet voice and individual connections. I'm not always sure how to be a quiet coach, but I am learning.

Stretch week

This week stretched me in all kinds of ways. Saying "I'm tired" seems redundant because when is a parent/responsible adult not tired? But my tiredness is the starting point for this post. I started trying to do separate posts with my thoughts about cross country this week as well as our family's weekly comings and goings, but everything is so tangled together that my tired brain can't seem to unravel cross country from my family. What it comes down to is that the cross country team becomes part of my family for two and a half months each year, taking up large quantities of time and energy, both mental and emotional. Hence the difficulty in separating the two--it's too tiring! My thoughts on both of them are all so interrelated that I am just going to have to resort to dumping it all together into the ole blog-blender, flip the switch, and see what happens.

Ultimook 2019

This weekend was our first cross country meet of the season! We like to start big, so we signed the team (and ourselves) up for the Ultimook Cross Country Challenge in Tillamook, Oregon for the second year in a row. Since all high school athletes have to attend ten practices before competing, we only took 16 out of our 56 total runners to this meet. As much as we'd like all of our runners to have this rugged cross country experience and team-building opportunity, Jeff and I were fine with having a bit less crowd control to do at our first meet of the season. It all began on Friday, September 6th. Jeff and I spent the morning making preparations: packing our gear, collecting meal money from the school district, purchasing PBJ supplies, and assembling the team gear. Jay and Rose went to school for one hour, and I picked them up at 10am. At 10:20am, the school bus pulled into the high school and we all loaded its belly to the brim with tents, coolers, bags, and bins. After a final roll call, the bus rolled out at 10:40am. Tillamook, here we come!

First days

Jeff is the head coach, I am his assistant, and it has begun: the first day of high school cross country practice was Monday, August 26th. This is Jeff's third season as head coach, and my second season as his assistant. Compared to last year, we had TRIPLE the runners show up at practice on day one. TRIPLE. Our team roster kept growing all week until it reached 50. Fifty runners, and only a dozen of them are girls. Thank goodness for Jeff's excellent classroom management skills and strong loud voice! I spent much of the week feeling rather inadequate to the challenge of such a large team. Coaching running is a tricky blend of patience, teaching, and humor. I have had a few moments where it felt like I was doing things right and helping people in the best way, so it's not all anxiety! My feeling of inadequacy hasn't completely left, but I gave myself a pep talk and reminded myself that I am doing my best and Jeff is doing his best and together we will make this work! It helps immensely that the runners who joined the team this year are quality humans and the overall team spirit has been so happy and positive, even on the 95 degree blazing sunny afternoon runs we've gone on. So in spite of my personal qualms and inadequacies, I really enjoyed the first week of the cross country season.

France reflections

As if the 31 blog posts that I have written about our family trip to France this summer weren't enough, I'm writing some final France reflections to round it out to a nice even 32 posts. I broke this France roundup into five categories:

1. Observations about international and long-term family travel. 
2. Final cost of our 30 day trip: how my original budget held up. (spoiler: it did!)
3. The kids' favorite parts of the trip.
4. Our top 60 photos of the trip--a real challenge because I have about 500 favorites.
5. An index with links to all 32 blog posts from our trip.

Somehow listing everything I'm going to say makes me feel less disorganized for cramming five random topics into one heap here. Behold the power of the list! I tip my hat to it.

Journeying home

Journal entry from Tuesday, August 13, 2019:
3:32pm, sitting on the Eurostar train between Paris and London: Au revoir, belle France! This morning as we were leaving, I think I passed two unofficial language tests: at the gas station outside of Paris, the cashier asked me (in French) if I had turned off the lights in the bathroom, and I understood her! (I went back and turned off the lights.) Then while my family waited at the train station, I went out into Paris to two restaurants and ordered lunch-to-go for all six of us by myself, all in French. I'm not anywhere near fluent, but it felt good to test my wings a bit!

Jeff says he feels like he passed a big test too-- his driving in France test. Stick shift: check. Narrow roads: check. Impossible parking: check. Massive traffic circles with unmarked cobblestones and random cars crammed in all directions: check. Our route to the car rental place aslo took us past the Eiffel Tower, right along the Seine. It was the most pleasant part of our in-Paris driving. Outside Paris, earlier this morning when we left our Civray-de Touraine Airbnb house at 7am, the lush rolling fields of the Loire Valley were bathed in golden early morning sunlight, mist hovering over the rivers and clinging to the plants. It was an ethereal and fairytale-ific landscape to say farewell to.

Chenonceau

We coasted through our last two days in France. We felt satisfied with our trip and mentally full to the brim with all of the interesting, beautiful, historic, surprising, nifty sights we saw. Long term travel and tourism can get a tad overstimulating by the end. I think our ability to be awed by beauty or impressed by grandeur had diminished by the last couple of days of our trip, but it was fine because we had seen everything we really wanted to see and more! We just had one activity left: canoeing on the River Cher.

Le Château du Brézé

Journal entry from August 10th, continued:
From Saumur, we drove 10 minutes out to Brézé, where the majestic chateau was settled in beautiful rolling vineyards. We got tickets and went inside the Chateau du Brézé. It has the deepest dry moat in Europe--I had never heard of a dry moat before visiting Brézé! The entire moat was riddled with a labyrinth of caves and troglodyte dwellings. It was such an interesting mix of grand chateau and rustic caves. We scuttled through all kinds of dark low tunnels, exploring everything from bedchambers to underground stables to kitchens to wine pressing rooms to silk worm farms--all tucked away behind the tall tall walls of the canyon-like moat. We saw so much and only a small fraction of the underground labyrinth was open to the public! It was so cool. The whole time I was baffled at why our DK Eyewitness Travel Guide for the region of the Loire Valley did NOT mention Brézé at all! What!? This amazing place was mentioned as an afterthought in one tiny sentence in our Family France travel guidebook. It pays to read the fine print!

Saumur

Journal entry from Saturday, August 10, 2019
Today was full to bursting! We left home a little after 10am and drove an hour to Saumur, which is a darling village with a massive fortress-castle up on a high rocky hill looming above town. We arrived just in time for lunch, and strolled the Saturday outdoor marche (pronounced "mar-shay") in search of something tasty. We ended up defaulting to a kebab shop and sat outside enjoying the small-town-market-day ambiance while eating our lunch. Since Amber doesn't eat kebabs or hamburgers, I purchased a container of fresh plump blueberries from the nearby market stall and a baguette from the boulangerie across the square for her lunch. She was quite content, gnawing on the stiff baguette and following us around town.

The enchanted forest

During our stay in Civray-de-Touraine in the Loire Valley, I ran four times. Our Airbnb house was almost exactly two miles from Le Chateau de Chenonceau, the most graceful castle of them all. Its white arches are mirrored in the lazy River Cher and the sight took my breath away every single time I ran past. Our side of the river had a perfect riverside trail that led straight to the castle and beyond, through beautiful trees. I found myself calling it the Enchanted Forest. It was completely idyllic with the sunlight filtering through the branches and glinting off of the glassy river, presided over by the majestic river chateau suddenly appearing around the bend. The entire place was magical and I was transported into both history and fairy tales as I ran that trail over and over.

Since I ran on the Chenonceau trail four times and took the same irresistible pictures every time, I consolidated my joy (and photos) into one post. We may or may not have chosen our lodgings based on the excellent running possibilities nearby.

Puy du Fou

When Jeff and I were backpacking through Europe back in 2008, we saw ads for an intense historic theme park and vowed to check it out someday. August 8th was the day! We drove 2.5 hours from our Airbnb house in Civray alllll the way down to the park. Rose got carsick and thankfully I had saved my unused seasick barf bag from the Guernsey ferry, because Rose needed it. This was the second time that girl threw up from carsickness on this trip! Jerky stick shift driving plus windy narrow country roads and later stop-and-go traffic did a number on her poor equilibrium. It wasn't all peaches and cream for the rest of us either, sitting in that tiny car while Rose retched repeatedly into the tiny bag. We managed to pull over not too long after the puking ended, and I managed to double bag the nasty used barf bag. We arrived at Puy du Fou ten minutes later and disposed of the nasty vomit in the nearest trash can. There's my retrospective intro. Now on to my journal from the day:

Troglodytes

Journal entry from August 7th, continued:
After a morning at Villandry, we drove on to Chinon (15-20 minutes) to eat lunch in a new town. None of us had ever seen Chinon, with its towering fortress-castle on the hill above the cute narrow streets. We had tasty kebabs for lunch (Jay and Rose had hamburgers and Amber had chicken nuggets--bless that kebab shop/sandwicherie for its kid-friendly menu).

After lunch, we rode the complimentary elevator up to the top of the big hill to check out the Chinon Chateau. We didn't feel like paying 50 euros for all of us to go inside, especially since a big chunk of the castle was in ruins, so we looked at it through the gate, admired the view from the top of the hill, and then rode the elevator back down again and drove to our last sight of the day: Valle Troglodytique des Goupilleres: the restored troglodyte cave houses. We learned that the peasants who worked in the quarry cutting that beautiful white limestone that was used to build the many chateaux, LIVED in the holes/caves that they created when they removed the stone! It was absolutely fascinating to see the "other end of the spectrum" after viewing the grandeur and glory of the big fancy castles. There was this whole awesome rustic farm recreated outside the original cave dwellings, and the effect was excellent. We got to walk through several troglodyte homes and get a feel for that life. We loved it!

Villandry

Journal entry from Wednesday, August 7, 2019:
Today was Rose's half birthday. My second child is 8.5 years old!

We left the house at 8:20am today (no morning run) and drove to Villandry, abour 30 minutes away. It was a good move: we beat the crowds to the chateau like pros. We didn't even go inside the castle ; we just got tickets to the gardens (the kids can only handle so much look-but-don't-touch per day and we wanted to save it all for the flowers). Wow, were they beautiful! Villandry's gorgeously groomed, meticulously trimmed, perfectly aligned gardens were stunning. When Jeff and I visited Villandry 11 years ago, it was early spring so the flowers weren't all the way out yet. But today they were in full bloom everywhere. We enjoyed the most beautiful vegetable and herb gardens I've ever seen, then moved on to admire a wilder-looking garden and a labyrinth made from bushes. The kids loved running around in the maze. Eventually we made our way up to the woods to walk down a trail in the beautiful sunlit trees. (Leslie waited for us on a bench). Rose and Amber dashed off ahead and soon were out of sight. Jeff and I followed them, me trying not to stress about what damage they might inflict on the flowers if unsupervised for too long. Thankfully we found them soon and I told Rose sternly not to run away like that.

Chambord

Journal entry from Tuesday, August 6, 2019:
We got in the car bright and early at 8am this morning and drove an hour to Le Chateau de Chambord, arriving 2 minutes after it opened. AT LAST, we played the tourist crowds right! There were only a handful of cars in the parking lot and we endured just a short ticket line before entering the castle. I love Chambord because it's tall and fancy and they let tourists wander all over the inside on all four floors. In Versailles (which is much bigger), there is a prescribed route and traffic flow through the palace. But at Chambord, it is open season--go where you want to, when you want to--our kind of place!

Clos Luce

Journal entry from Monday, August 5, 2019:
Today we drove 20 minutes to Clos Luce, and saw Leonardo da Vinci's house. This was the "castle" that the kids were most excited to see--they voted to go there first-- because in the grounds are models of several of Leonardo's inventions, and visitors can play with them. The tank and the helicopter were favorites. Thankfully we arrived early enough that the crowds were not large, and we enjoyed the house and grounds thoroughly without too much traffic. Before we left, we recreated the picture that Jeff and I took the last time we visited Clos Luce, 11 years ago (2008), in the same spot but with our 3 kids standing by us too. It was fun.

From Vannes to the Loire Valley

Journal entry from Saturday, August 3, 2019:
Travel day. We are in the Loire Valley, the final destination of our four weeks in France, just outside a tiny town called Civray de Touraine. This morning we packed up, checked out of our apartment airbnb in Vannes, and hit the road. Jeff was relieved to pull that car out of the tiny sublevel -2 parking garage for the last time. We drove and drove and drove. Google maps told us that our destination was only 3 hours away, but we ended up getting stuck in traffic outside of Nantes and then taking smaller roads to avoid endless expensive tolls and to see the scenery, so it took us much longer. We stopped a few times to break up the drive, get wiggles out, and obtain nourishment.

Plage de la Mine d'Or

Journal entry, continued from August 1, 2019:
After a lovely lunchtime in Rochefort-en-Terre, we drove 40 minutes to La Plage de Mine D'Or (the gold mine beach). We finished listening to HP7 during the drive. When we arrived at the beach, Jeff and the kids changed into their bathing suits and we all walked down to the water. The sand was COVERED in shells, prompting the kids and I to indulge in a bit of seashell collecting.  The ocean water was a tad brown with swirling clumps of seaweed, but we didn't care because it was so warm! Ten points to the toasty Atlantic! The kids couldn't believe how warm the water was. Even Rose was happy to splash around in it without shivering. We enjoyed the warm water (I waded up to my knees, not in the mood to swim) and played in the sand for just over an hour before the lightning fast tide shooed us away. We measured the tide speed with carefully placed rocks, and it was coming in, covering the sand at about a foot per minute!

Rochefort-en-terre

Journal entry from Thursday, August 1, 2019:

How is it August already? Wow. School starts this month. But I'm going to choose not to think about that because we are still in the middle of our glorious travels! We took it easy this morning, and by "easy," I mean Jeff and I ran six miles each before heading out to view another beautiful sight. We didn't pull out of the parking garage in Vannes until 10:45am. Our destination was Rochefort-en-Terre, a 30 minute drive from our apartment in Vannes. In 2016 Rochefort-en-Terre was voted one of the most beautiful villages in France by the French people. It had a sign near the entrance proclaiming that it was a five flower town and "une ville préférée de France." (one of France's favorite villages)

Back to France: Jersey to Mont Saint-Michel

On Wednesday, July 31st, Leslie and I woke up early, had a light breakfast in our Jersey guest house, walked the mile back to the ferry terminal and rode our final ferry back to Saint Malo. The ferry was blessedly not too rough and I managed to doze a bit during the 90 minute journey. My phone had 4% battery power left but it had enough juice for me to answer a call from Jeff when he and the kids arrived in Saint Malo to pick us up. I charged my phone in the car. We had lunch at McDonald's (blah) and then drove the hour from Saint Malo to Mont Saint Michel, all six of us together again. Time for an adventure in Normandy!

Guernsey part 3

Tuesday, July 30th continued: After my Cliff Path run, a shower, and a hotel breakfast (with orangish creamy Guernsey butter--so rich), Leslie and I caught a bus to the German Occupation museum. They only accepted cash for the entry fee in the darling homestyle cottage museum, so we walked half a mile in the windy drizzle to the Guernsey Airport to withdraw some pounds from the ATM. Then we walked back to the museum and entered. The museum had an absolutely fascinating hodge podge collection of items from the occupation, with interesting stories and primary source letters, posters, and announcements. I read and read and looked and immersed myself in another era. The accounts of the German Occupation during World War II were equally fascinating and sobering.

Guernsey part 2: Cliff Path run

When we woke up on Tuesday, July 30th, we had ten hours left on Guernsey. I intended to make the absolute most of it. In fact, I did so well at "making the most of it" that I traveled 30,000 steps on foot and was so tired at the end of the day that my journal entry was weak and brief, with a scant three lines about each activity of the day. The day was so full that I broke it down into two posts. Here's my feeble journal entry about my exhilarating morning run:

July 30th, 2019. I went on an exciting wet windy rough run on the Guernsey cliff path this morning, from St. Peter Port all the way down to Jerbourg Point and then back on the roads. It was SO WINDY! First came rain, then came WIND. It was tons of fun though and so beautiful with the green all around me and the roaring ocean down below. 

That is not nearly enough to do justice to the 90 minutes I spent exploring the Cliff Path. Time for a supplementary retrospective recounting:

Guernsey part 1

Journal entry from Monday, July 29, 2019:
Hello from Guernsey!! Leslie and I are on our much anticipated 2 day getaway to Guernsey in the English Channel. This morning we left our apartment in Vannes at 7:20am and walked to the train station (about half a mile). We found the right platform and boarded our train. When the ticket inspector came to check our tickets, however, we learned that we did not validate them in the yellow machines in the station like we should have. Thankfully the ticket inspector lady was merciful to our inexperience and didn't charge us the 20 euro penalty per ticket. Also thankfully she could speak a little English to help my utter confusion at her fast French. That was our main fumble of the day. The rest of our travels went quite smoothly, thankfully--I was a bit nervous about the trip before we left.

La Branche de Tours

Wow, it is hard to keep up with this blog while we're still traveling! Every day I add a couple dozen more pictures (some days a couple hundred, to be honest) to my folders. I have at least seven posts to do in the timeline leading up to today, but I felt most like sharing about today At the expense of going completely annoyingly out of chronological order, here's what happened TODAY, Sunday, August 4th:

We attended church at the Tours, France branch today, half an hour away from our latest house. Apparently there were several families out of town, and there were less than 50 people in sacrament meeting. When we had arrived and settled into a row of chairs in the chapel, Jeff started reminiscing about how he was asked to be the pianist in this branch 16 years ago while he was on his mission, even though he could only play one hand at a time on the piano. Under his breath, half-jokingly, he chanted "please don't ask me to play the piano, please don't ask me to play the piano!" I chuckled and said he was probably quite safe today. Immediately after that exchange, the priesthood leader in charge (Branch president? Counselor? He was the only one there, so it was uncertain) came over and asked our clump of chairs if there was anyone who could play the piano. Jeff pointed to me and grinned.

Vannes day 1: old town

Journal entry from Saturday, July 27, 2019: Vannes, Brittany, France. It was a 20,000 step day. We all slept in. I was the first one awake at 7:50am. Jeff and I went running (separately) soon after. We only had eggs and yogurt in our food supply, so I didn't get to eat anything before running five miles. And I didn't eat enough yesterday either on our journey to Vannes, so I felt a tad wispy and hungry during my run. But I enjoyed views of Vannes with its beautiful cobbled streets, half-timber buildings, and old stone walls. After that I ran down to the water--the bay. Briny fresh air and happy sunshine were a great way to start my day!

Menhirs and megaliths: Sunday in Brittany

Journal entry from Sunday, July 28, 2019: We went to church at the Vannes Branch of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints today, a 12 minute drive from our apartment in downtown Vannes to the business complex where the church rents a few rooms. We were greeted at the door by a nice elderly Frenchman with double cheek kisses for the women and handshakes for the men. Church was all in French, much to Jeff's delight. I followed along as best I could during sacrament meeting and understood about 25% of it. Close to half of the small congregation was made up of English-speaking visitors (all from the UK except us exotic unexpected Americans).

Paris to Vannes via Coutances

Journal entry from Friday, July 26, 2019:

Travel day. We made it to Brittany! In Paris this morning, Jeff went to pick up our rental car while the rest of us packed up in our apartment. I woke up SWEATY--every part of me that touched the mattress was sweaty. Yuck. Thankfully it did end up cooling off after 3am in Paris, so once I turned our fan around the cool air blew in and eased our sweaty suffering.

A little after 11am, we crammed our bags and knees into our European micro SUV and headed out: Jay sat wedged in the back with our bags, then Leslie, Amber, and Rose sat across the middle bench together, and Jeff and I were in the front. Jeff drove the stick shift through heavy scary Paris traffic like a pro. The large traffic circles with no lane lines were admittedly terrifying for all of us, and I had to look in our blind spot and tell Jeff when he was clear to exit the busy circle. But we survived and got out of Paris within half an hour or so. Then we were suddenly in the country, with rolling green hills, farmland, and trees. It was beautiful. Jeff and I decided we could happily retire to Normandy.

Paris day 7: heat wave and Gallerie de Lafayette

Journal entry from Thursday, July 25, 2019:
7:45pm. TIRED. Paris reached a new RECORD HIGH TEMPERATURE today: 107.6 degrees Fahrenheit! I did not run this morning because it was 90 degrees by 9am and it didn't even cool off too much last night. I woke up sweaty and never really cooled off all day. We took it easy this morning after our late night at the Trocadero last night and didn't leave our apartment until after 10am. We headed to the Catacombs, but the line was wrapping around the block in the hot sun and we didn't even think twice about skipping that site. Last time Jeff and I wanted to see the Catacombs 2 years ago, they were closed due to flooding. This time, it was too crowded.

Paris day 6: Place du Trocadero

Journal entry from Wednesday, July 24th:

This morning I ran to the Porte Saint-Denis (an arch that is the historic entrance to the city) this morning.  I forced myself to stop running every time I checked my map, and I didn't fall. Progress! The arch was satisfyingly ancient looking. I love finding old monuments plunked right in the middle of a bustling modern city. It's such an eclectic look.

We left our apartment around 9am and dropped Leslie off at the air conditioned Musee D'Orsay. Then Jeff, the kids, and I went to the Eiffel Tower for a family picture. The one picture I for sure wanted from our time in Paris was one of all of us in front of the Eiffel Tower--not a silly awkward selfie like we took before, but a good one. We got the kids ice cream as a reward for dealing with family pictures (even though we ended up taking better pictures after their ice cream because the sun was behind us, casting us into shadow at the Trocadero). We walked to the other side of the Eiffel Tower, the Champs de Mars, so the sun was shining on us instead of silhouetting us. We were melting hot and Amber was DONE with pictures before we even started round two. But we did our best and I'm getting better at being satisfied with whatever pictures our best efforts turn out.

Paris day 5: Versailles

Journal entry for Tuesday, July 23rd:

I am so grubby from sweating all day long! We went to Versailles today and it was a long one. We left our apartment at 7:20am (no run for me today, but I still got 16,600 steps). Metro to metro to train, then walk it in to the palace. We had our museum passes so we skipped the ticket line and went straight to the entrance line. It zigzagged up and down the courtyard three times when we got there, and it doubled while we stood in line. It took us an hour and a half to get through the line and enter the palace! What were we thinking? We sent Leslie over to sit in the shade to preserve her mood and energy. The rest of us suffered through the wait in the merciless sun. Thankfully we had sunscreen. The kids sat and played in the dirt/sand between the lumpy old cobbles in the courtyard. Amber got the dirtiest--she found half a discarded pistachio shell and played with it for a long time in the dirt. Jeff and I have been in the parenting game for long enough to know that there are worse toys than dirt and discarded pistachio shells.

Paris day 4: Eiffel et Invalides

Journal entry from Monday, July 22, 2019:

This morning I got up to my alarm at 6am and went on a run in the park. I was nervous about falling on my sore knees, so I stayed in the park and didn't look at my phone map once. We left our apartment at 8am, rode public transit for a solid 45 minutes and got off the last bus at the base of the Eiffel Tower.

Paris day 3: church, climbing, and a cave

Ok, so during our France trip I am doing my best to write in my journal every night so I can remember as much of our adventure as possible. My journal entries are not always quite as interesting or detailed as I'd like them to be. (travel with kids is tiring!) But there's only so much time and mental energy in the day, so I'm using my journal entries for blog posts, even if they aren't quite as carefully constructed as my usual posts.

Paris day 2: un arc, un jardin, et une chapelle

Journal entry from Saturday, July 20th, 2019

Nobody slept well last night. Stinking jet lag! We were all exhausted after our day yesterday, but our bodies were used to being awake at that time, so we were awake past 2am but too tired to enjoy it. Oh the vicious cycle! In spite of my fatigue this morning, I wanted to run at least 3.5 miles to get my weekly total up to 30 miles for the week. So I headed out towards Montmartre for a morning view.

At about 3/4 of a mile, as I was jogging along and checking Google maps on my phone, I tripped and fell on my hands and knees. Usually when I trip, there is a split second of arm-windmilling hope where I flail for balance and hope that I might not fall. This time I never even felt that fleeting hope. I fell fast and hard, right in front of an elderly Frenchman.

Paris day 1: Notre Dame and water lilies

Journal entry for Friday, July 19th, 2019:
Paris, day one! We didn't leave the apartment till after 11am because the kids slept in. We woke them up at 8:30am and had a nice slow start to our jet-lagged day. We are staying a fifth of a mile from the runner's haven of Paris: le Parc des Buttes-Chaumont, and Jeff and I joined the throngs of runners there this morning. It was lovely to run through the grotto and see the hilltop views without worrying about getting lost or dealing with loud city traffic.

London Loop

We were in London for 24 hours. During that time I slept for 4 hours and ran 15 miles. Priorities or jet lag? I ran 5 miles the afternoon we arrived, and another ten miles the next morning. After sitting in bed wide awake for four hours on Thursday morning (July 18th), I pulled on my running clothes and went out into the steady drizzle for a sightseeing run. I brought my phone for the Google maps to help me navigate to as many sights as I could find. Our hotel was two blocks from King's Cross Station and St. Pancras International Station (I chose it for that reason, since we were taking the train to France later that day). So my starting point was conveniently centrally located in London Town. It has been eleven years since I spent time in London outside of Heathrow, and it was fun to revisit all of the favorites.

The journey begins

*I wrote this at 3:05am somewhere over the north Atlantic, when we were 7 hours in to our 9.5 hour flight to London. Then I edited it at 4am London time (8pm Sunnyside time). I can't tell if it makes sense, but I wanted to get the tale of our first full-family international flight written down before the jet lag wears me out too much. At the time I edited this, it had been 37 hours since we left home, and I had slept less than six of those hours. So good luck.

We left home at 7am on Tuesday, July 16th. Dan (Jeff's dad) drove us 3 hrs to Seattle in our van, bless him. He stopped and went on a hike in the mountains on his way home so it wasn't all boring business for him. The Seattle airport was super crowded! We stood in line to check in for a while, and were alarmed to discover that our flight time had moved up 40 minutes, from 12:10 to 11:30am! I realized that I forgot to save the updated email with our flight time change waaaay back in like October. When we finally got our boarding passes, it was one hour till boarding began. "It'll be a close call," I thought, "but we'll make it ok." Then we rounded the corner and saw the massive fast-growing slow-moving security line. Nope, that was not going to work. We'd miss our flight! Desperation, determination, and deliberation set in. Jeff elected me to go seek assistance "because they'll be nicer to you."

France Finance

Time for an awkward topic: MONEY. We all need it. We all are able to choose what to do with the money we have. Ever since our first trip to France together eleven years ago, Jeff and I have dreamed about taking our kids there someday. During our early years of super-snug-budgeting, that day felt very far distant. Then stars started to align. We moved into an affordable rental house in Sunnyside and began adding nearly quadruple dollars to our savings each month than we previously had managed. A year later, our state passed legislation funding significant statewide teacher pay increases and our school district negotiated a whopping mega 17.5% raise for local teachers. Suddenly our dream family France trip was very possible and closer than ever before.

The Brown Villa Resort

We spent July 6-12th in Denver with my side of the family. My parents have always made it a priority to get all of their kids and grandkids together at least once a year by providing funds for travel and mountains of food for all 21 of us. Pasco, WA to Denver is a convenient 2 hour direct flight, and before we knew it, we were hugging and hello-ing a loud crowd of family members in Denver.

This was our first summer in five years gathering together in a new location. My parents sold their beloved beautiful lakehouse in Bonney Lake, WA and bought a bigger, more centrally-located house in Denver, CO, trading the backyard lake for a backyard pool. We went there for Christmas, but this was the first summer family time in Denver. I missed the beauty of the lake, but enjoyed the ease and endless kid water entertainment at the pool. Thankfully, family time is family time no matter where we meet up, and we enjoyed quality time together in the new location just fine.

Summertime in Sunnyside

We spent the first month of summer at home in Sunnyside, doing swim team and unofficial cross country summer practice. But something was wrong: I could NOT get a good night's sleep! Jeff was breathing more and more loudly. We called it snoring, but it wasn't really traditional snoring. It was super loud breathing. After throwing around idea after idea after idea and trying idea after idea after idea, (and losing newborn proportions of sleep on my part), we finally landed on the possibility that his snoring was allergy-related. Maybe he was allergic to something in our 70 year old dank damp basement bedroom. That very night, Jeff slept upstairs and felt AMAZING the next morning. We were sold. On Wednesday, July 3rd, we did the switcheroo, moving our bedroom upstairs to the playroom and the playroom downstairs to our former basement bedroom. Now we are sleeping in the large room above the garage, and Jeff has noticed such a difference. Since the room is not very well air conditioned, we sleep with a fan running. That plus Jeff's less-allergic quieter breathing has given us real sleep at last. And we love having a light airy large bedroom!

Snow Mountain Ranch Run

Our fridge was in need of Costco replenishment, and I was in need of a solo trail run, so yesterday (Saturday), I combined business with pleasure. I drove to Snow Mountain Ranch in Cowiche, WA (57 minutes away from home) and went on a run up to the top of the hill there. It was a bright sunny 76 degree clear day but the breeze kept me from getting too hot. The trail was much crispier and browner than it was when we hiked it six weeks ago in May. Most of the wildflowers were dead (and the wind rattled their dry leaves in a very creepy way), but as I climbed higher, I discovered a few hardy little blooms among the desert crust and sage brush.  For the first mile of the trail I was wondering why I had driven an entire hour to run somewhere that was browner and drier than the irrigated planted countryside at home. Thankfully the rest of the trail had enough variety in flora and fauna (however dry and muted it appeared) to feel different and worth the drive.

Swim-run-repeat

Last week was exceptionally busy, filled with all sorts of physical activity: swim team practice, cross country practice, track and field camp, and two swim meets. We are all worn out. No lazy summer days for us! Our daily breakdown for June 24-28th:

• 7:30-8:30am: Swim team practice for Jay and Rose, cross country summer practice for Jeff and/or Shaina, bike riding practice for Amber
• 10am-12pm Kids track and field camp for all five of us.
• 5:45pm-9pm Tuesday and Thursday: Swim meets for Jay and Rose.

We barely had time to catch our breath all week! When I wrote down our activities, they didn't look as tiring as they were in real time. But we are a family who prefers to take life slowly and minimize kids' commitments, so swim team plus track camp plus swim meets felt super busy for us! The longest days had Jay and Rose outside at events for nearly seven hours total! They handled it quite well. We made sure to have long relatively quiet afternoons with movies and computers to recover from the rigors of the day and rest up for the next activity. 

The Super and the Glue

Something that's been on my mind a lot lately is transition. Not the shockingly intense/freakishly painful phase of labor--just the normal type of transition where change comes. It feels like our family in the middle of a big transition between little kids and big kids. It's been almost a year since we bought diapers/pull-ups, and Amber is starting preschool this fall. (We are one year and 2 months away from kindergarten--woah. Jay only has one more year left in elementary school--double woah). I feel my own role and responsibilities as a mom shifting in response to my kids' growth. It's almost like a strange sort of mini-identity crisis! I keep thinking "now what!?"

Whites Ridge

Saturday (June 22nd) we decided to go on a family hike. But first we had family pancakes in Grandview with Grampa Dan. At 6:30 on Saturday morning, Jeff ran the ten miles to Grandview. Jay and Rose rode their bikes along with him for the entire distance. Amber and I drove to Grandview in time to travel back up the bike path and join them for the last mile of their ride/run. Amber rode her bike and I jogged with her. She managed to crash into a telephone pole right before we met up with Jeff and the big kids. When Jeff, Jay, and Rose appeared, Amber and I turned around and followed everyone to Grampa Dan's house.

The first week of summer

We settled into a routine surprisingly quickly during the first week of summer. Swim team practice was at 7:30-8:30am, and Jeff holds summer cross country daily runs during that time. So all five of us went to the pool in the mornings. Jeff and I switched off staying in the park with/chasing Amber while the other went running with whichever high schoolers showed up. Everyone got exercise at the beginning of the day. Jeff's decree for the kids this summer is that in order to play computer games each day, they have to either run a mile or bike four miles. So after swim team practice ended each day last week, Jay, Rose, and Ian from next door met in our yard and went on a run together. It was so cute and awesome and I tried not to feel bad for those diligent kids who had already swum for an hour. Jeff knows how to wield the power of screen time! It's all about finding the proper motivation.

An AmbEvening

Last night we were trying to get everyone together for family prayer. Ian (Jay's friend from next door) was at our house, and he always joins in when we have family prayer. We were all kneeling in a circle around the ottoman in the family room, waiting for Amber to kneel down when she suddenly sprinted off. I called after her but she ignored me as usual, so I got up and went to get her. I found her sitting in her bedroom wearing nothing but pink undies, clutching her new pajamas to her bare belly. The PJs were inside out, and she couldn't figure out how to turn them right side out to put them on. She was frustrated, but in her independent and stubbornly Amber way, she refused to let me help her.

Ahtanum State Forest

Jeff and I decided to surprise the kids with a camping trip on the last day of school. I spent most of the day Friday getting everything ready, and I had the van all loaded up by the time Jay and Rose got home on their last day of school. They knew that there would be a surprise, but they didn't know what it was until they walked in the door after school. Rose entered the house saying "I'm a third grader!" and Jay walked with a triumphant "I'm a fifth grader!" Then Jay asked "so where's this surprise?" and I told them that we were going camping for one night to celebrate the beginning of summer and the end of another school year. They were happy, but I swear the only time they are really ecstatic about anything is when I cook mac and cheese for dinner. Haha.

The end of school

Journal clips from the last two weeks of school, interspersed with relevant pictures:

Monday, June 3rd. Today was the first swim team practice for Jay and Rose, from 5:30-6:30pm, and I volunteered to drive them. SWEET BREAK FROM AMBER. I hung around for half an hour at the pool, watching the practice. Jay swam in the experienced group while Rose lined up with the beginners to take her swim test. One at a time the kids got in the pool with a lifeguard and attempted to swim across the pool and back short ways. At least three kids couldn't even make it across once, and the lifeguard glided over and helped them out of the pool, where their parents waited to take them home. I was nervous for Rose, but she doggy paddled back and forth with surprising speed and confidence.

Kalchess Ridge

The mountains were calling me, and I finally answered the call on Saturday morning. Jeff stayed home with the kids while I adventured. It was a 1 hour 46 minute drive to the trail of my choice at Kalchess Ridge, another gem plucked from the treasure chest that is the All Trails app. The Kalchess Ridge Trail is an out and back trail: 6.4 miles out, 6.4 miles back. I ran 12 miles and walked the rest in to finish. It took me 3 hours to cover that distance due to the veritable natural obstacle course on the trail. Here are the rest of the numbers. The trail had:

The battle of Monday

Monday was a BATTLE: against messes and mischief, against what I wanted vs. what Amber wanted. In short, Monday was a long drawn out battle of wills.

On Monday morning after Jay and Rose left on the bus, Amber asked me to turn on music for her in the playroom while I did a little sewing in the basement, so I sent some Tinkerbell music up on Alexa. Amber often happily plays in the playroom when the right music is on--earlier that same day, she had disappeared to play happily with Barbies for 20 minutes. I thought we were on a roll for a smooth peaceful morning.

Ambike

On Tuesday, June 4, 2019, I took Amber to the church parking lot to try out her bike without training wheels. At the church, I only had to run with Amber for a few minutes before she was pedaling all over the parking lot, weaving a lot, but upright. It was so exciting! Then she started getting frustrated when she tipped every time she slowed down. I told her that before, her bike helped her, but now she had to help her bike. She thought about that for a few seconds and then asked for her training wheels back.

Jeff-day

Jeff's birthday was on Saturday, June 1st. We kicked off celebrating his 37 years a day early during our weekly family movie night with his beloved birthday pizza: homemade bacon mushroom cream pizza with brownies for dessert.

CFM, Cowiche Canyon, and Cousins

Adapting the church's Come Follow Me scripture study plan to our family is an ever-changing ever-challenging adventure. Last week we had a wide range of lessons, but we actually managed FOUR whole evenings of CFM-ing so it was a successful week. I like tracking what we do for our lessons because it's an interesting window into a small daily routine.

May details

May is done; June has begun. Here are a few tidbit de-tales to round out our May, so I can move on and embrace JUNE:

1. AmBiking
2. ParQuest A
3. ParQuest B
4. Registering 
5. Rose baking 
6. Temple-ing 
7. AmBefriending
8. Star Trekking

Haircuts

The month of May was haircut central in our family. Rose started us off at the beginning of May with a darling summer bob, and she inspired Amber to follow in her footsteps a few days later. Next Jeff went under the clippers, taking up my offer to trim his wild winter hair over the weekend. Yesterday I went to a new salon and had a few inches snipped off, and this morning I cornered Jay and buzzed his head before school. We are all trimmed up and ready for summer! Now we just have to wait two more weeks for school to finish up so we can begin summer officially.

Memorial Day

Memorial Day 2019 was everything a "second Saturday" should be. Long weekends are so luxurious! We all needed some down time to continue recovering from track season, so my wildest dreams for the day were to run somewhere interesting and spend time close to home with family. We ended up having a well-balanced day, with satisfying exercise in the morning and a long lazy afternoon with the cousins.

Jay turns ten

Happy birthday to our sweet Jay! He is an entire decade old, which means I am ten years old as a mother. I love Jay so much. He is 4'10 & 1/4 inches tall. He is so tender and loves hugging me, always patting my back gently for the entire hug. On Sunday during church, Jay put his arm around me and gently patted my upper arm/shoulder for a few minutes. His simple affection warmed my motherly soul. I love my gentle soft-hearted boy. I love his goodness, his patience, his quick wit, his faith, his voracious reading, and his freckle cheeked grin.

A picnic, a swim, and a recital

Saturday, May 18th was full to bursting with activities. I got up early to run eight miles before Jeff left for the district track meet. Once he was gone, the kids and I got ready for our ward's annual walk and picnic. It is a simple fun ward family gathering where we get together, go on a walk, and then have a picnic together afterwards. The Sunday school is in charge of the picnic, and they grilled hot dogs for everyone. I love low-key unstructured church activities. No pressure, no weirdness, just good old fashioned sitting in the grass and chatting with the nearest person. I had a few husband-pangs when I saw all of the happy families with both spouses enjoying the picnic, but Jeff was at the very last track meet and the end was in sight. With my husband gone for the day, I felt extra grateful for my church friends and the adult company and family feel they provided.

Mother's Day: a new perspective

I.
For the past couple of years, I have struggled with mother's day. Selfishly (and in spite of my best efforts not to care), I expected my family to make the day amazing for me, pridefully reasoning that I do so much for them every day, I deserve a day where they make an extra effort to help me out and share my load. Yet somehow I never came close to having an amazing mother's day. I finally "got over it" this year though. It all started when I realized two things:

Snow Mountain Ranch

One of my favorite springtime family traditions is going on a yearly springtime hike to search out wildflowers with my mom. Southern central Washington has a surprisingly beautiful selection of wildflowers in May, and this year we found the best floral array we've ever seen on our dry side of the state. I recently downloaded the All Trails app, and it is a gold mine for helping locate trailheads. Gone are the days of driving aimlessly around bumpy gravel roads trying to follow decades-old guidebook directions and hoping for derelict trail head signposts. Now I just select a trail in the app and tap "directions." It takes me straight to Google Maps and calculates an accurate route. Yes!

A field trip, a haircut, and a kite

Last week the kids had lots of different unrelated activities, so here's one paragraph for each kid, in no particular order.

JAY: I dropped Jay off at the school at 5:45am Friday morning (May 10th) so he could go on his field trip to the zoo in Seattle. He was gone for 12 hours! He had a good time, but he was extra fatigued from the social strain of spending all that time with his classmates. The boy is clearly related to Jeff and me. He dreamily outlined an ideal day, snuggled up in his room alone with the iPad, Nintendo, his Kindle full of books, and some food. I assured him that he would recover and enjoy spending time with friends again soon.

Shouting

After school yesterday, Rose went on her one mile run around and around our driveway loop. (Jay's lastest ankle injury is still preventing him from running--that boy twists his ankles so often!) Looking out the window, I noticed that Amber had joined Rose and was merrily biking alongside her favorite sister, training wheels a-rattling. When they reached the slight uphill rise one one side of the driveway loop, Rose circled around behind and pushed Amber up. It was so sweet, I went outside and took a picture.

Star kids

This post is reserved for Jay and Rose, the star school-kids of our family, who are not home with Amber and me during the day and therefore have far less photographic representation than the Amb-monster. Jay and Rose are also not quite as mischievous as Amber, so I have less ranting/therapeutic writing to siphon off in regards to them. Rose and especially Jay are also getting old enough to tell their own stories, so it's beginning to feel more... invasive to tell stories about their experiences on my blog. I am determined to keep them in this narrative somehow, though! Yesterday (Sunday), Jay and Rose were both bright shining stars at church and they set my mom-heart a-glowing.

Weekly

It was another long week, but long isn't always necessarily negative. Long weeks are tiring, though. I just glanced through my journal entries for the week and I saw lots of positives mixed in the negatives. That's encouraging! Jeff had two moderately late nights of parent teacher conferences and two very late night track meets, so he was only home during the wild witching hour (before 8pm) one weeknight this week. We were/are both exhausted from it! Track season ends in two weeks. The story in John chapter 9 about the blind man receiving his sight really seems to describe my week...

Mt. Si

Yesterday (Saturday, April 27th), Jeff stayed home with the kids all day while I ventured forth for a Day of Shaina to recover my sanity, balance my inner zen, and brace myself for the upcoming week of Jeff-less-ness (two nights of parent teacher conferences plus two track meets). I looked forward to my Shaina-Day all week long. The anticipation sustained me through various challenges. Time is the best gift. The knowledge that I would have an entire 12 hours to myself to do my own thing was exceedingly inspiring. At last the day came. I packed my backpack full of supplies, kissed my husband goodbye, and was driving westward by 7:10am. My destination: MOUNTAINS! TREES! TRAILS! PARENTS!

Upland Girls

After spending last week being pummeled and pestered by a bored Amber, I decided to make a daily effort to siphon off as much of Amber's boundless energy as possible. Usually I make sure to do something specific with her each day, but reading stories or pushing her on the rope swing don't even come close to tapping into her vast energy reserves. So on Monday morning after Jay and Rose got on the school bus, I quickly finished some housework, packed a picnic lunch (with much rejoicing from Amber), and headed for the hills. Using the All Trails app, I found a nice set of trails located a gentle 50 minute drive from our house: the Cowiche Uplands.  We've hiked the Cowiche Canyon before, but the trails up above the canyon were new territory for us: just the kind of adventure we were looking for.

Sunday will come

Last week Jeff had four track meets. It was exhausting for both of us, and I'm not even coaching! Jeff got home late on his track meet nights (between 7pm-10:30pm) so our evenings were in flux and I didn't sleep as much as I needed. I was able to run at sunrise on three of the mornings before Jeff left for work, which was peaceful and restorative, but also exhausting to be up and running that early. Maintaining our household and balancing other responsibilities in the midst of Jeff's absence and my fatigue made the week feel LONG. I sat down to write this post at least four times before actually accomplishing anything because the thought of reliving last week was just so exhausting I couldn't bring myself to write about it.

Amboots

In early April, I ordered Amber some new pink boots. They were the exact same color and brand (pink Crocs) as her last pair, but two sizes bigger. I had my eye on the adult version of those Croc brand boots because Crocs fit my picky feet nicely, but I didn't want to spend $50 on a pair of rubber boots. Suddenly the price conveniently dropped so I ordered myself a pair for the same price as Amber's boots. Wahoo! I have tried to put Amber in sneakers or even Keen sandals, but she always goes back to her pink boots. Even if they are a little hot in the summer, she loves them because no dirt, rocks, water, or mud get in when she's adventuring. I have struggled to keep my feet clean and my shoes dry on our various walks together for years, and I finally realized if you can't beat 'em, join 'em! Rubber boots for the win!

Lemonade

Sometimes I can be a lazy grocery shopper. While pushing my two ton cart around Costco at the beginning of April, I decided to skip going to WinCo and just get those items at Costco instead. That resulted in the purchase of a supersized bag of twenty large lemons when I only needed one. It was completely worth the extra $6. Fast forward a few days...

Hope after fire

My beloved, very most favorite cathedral Notre Dame de Paris caught fire on Monday (April 15th). Jeff sent me a text about it around mid-morning, and I was glued to the online news updates for most of that afternoon. I didn't even check the results of the Boston Marathon until Monday night! It was an accidental fire turning 2/3 of the oak roof and most of the interior below that into black rubble. I went through a rainbow of emotions as I watched the story unfold half a world away. I felt as though one of my closest friends had just been diagnosed with a terminal illness! After fifteen hours, les pompiers had finally doused the fire and saved the iconic front bell towers and rose windows. Before the flames were even completely quenched, donors had pledged millions of euros to rebuild what was lost. I have so many thoughts and feelings about this heart-wrenching event, and every time I have tried to write about it, I have felt incoherent and inadequate to even begin. But starting where I am is all I can do, even if it's not where I want to be.

Worth the wait

Two months late but worth the wait: at long last, after a two month and five day delay (Rose informed me of the exact lateness), we had Rose's birthday party on Friday night (April 12th). Rose chose the three P's for her party: pizza, pinata, and playtime. We decided that Friday evening was ideal for a kid party: low-key, easy and not taking away from people's Saturday plans. Plus, Jeff would be home to help police the pinata--we've done pinatas twice in the past, and Jeff is very helpful. So I texted all of the moms of the kids in Rose's church class: party, our house, Friday from 5:30-7pm.

The Talk

Saturday, April 13, 2019 journal: Jay, Rose, Amber, and I happened to all be sitting at the table eating lunch together today (Jeff was out running), so I took the opportunity to slip in our almost-daily Come Follow Me mini lesson. Teaching always works best in our family when it feels natural and is not forced or contrived. This time I was super sneaky and didn't even look at the book. I had already looked it over earlier this morning, so I was ready to teach gospel principles on the sly. Muahahahaa!

St. Louis Arch

Our last big outing during our spring break visit to Missouri was in to St. Louis. Washington, MO, where my sister and her family live, is about an hour from downtown St. Louis. We've visited downtown St. Louis several times in the past, but the kids were finally old enough to make a trip up the arch worthwhile. The museum at the base of the arch had just been rebuilt and reopened last year, and it was all new to me and very well done.

St. Louis Zoo

Friday morning (March 29th), we went to the St. Louis Zoo. It was fun, but kids always get so tired so fast! Amber didn't seem to slow down when she got tired though. Somehow she became more of a miscreant, running farther away and ignoring me more blatantly the more tired she got. But for most of the time, she was great and enjoyed seeing the animals.

MO'stalgia

I. Castle and mint brownies
In between our modest handful of outings during our Missouri visit, we stayed close to home. Em made delicious desserts and we watched lots of episodes of Castle while the kids played outside or Minecraft. Full disclosure: we finished off 1.9 pans of mint brownies and nearly half a lemon cake on our own, just the two of us. We bought some Oreos for the kids so we wouldn't have to share our homemade treats. Yep. I joke that the real reason I am able to maintain my body weight is due to our annual sister get together in springtime and our family reunion in the summer. I get most of my yearly calories in two weeks! Haha, and I enjoy it immensely. We also sped through FORTY episodes of Castle. We had to pause it regularly (the trick to pausing the show if a kid came into the room was not to pause it on a murder scene or any other less-G-rated shot).

Shaw Nature Reserve

Our first outing during our week in Missouri was to our favorite Shaw Nature Reserve, which is only ten minutes from my sister's house. We had a leisurely morning talking and hanging out (with a run for me), and ended up eating lunch before heading over to Shaw. Missouri is moody in the springtime, but we did not let that stop us!

MO travels

For spring break, the kids and I flew to Missouri to visit my sister Em and her family. We didn't think we were going to be able to get together this spring because I was not up for a 4,000 mile round trip drive alone with the kids (my sense of adventure seems to be waning as I progress through my 30's), and airplanes are so expensive. One day at the end of January, Em and I were talking/plotting on the phone and we hatched the plan to split the airfare between the two of us. I checked flight prices and ended up finding a smoking deal out of Pasco (only one hour from our house as opposed to the three hour drive to Seattle). We quickly made sure both of our husbands were on board with the arrangement, and then I booked four tickets. Em and I each paid $550. WORTH IT.

Dancing in the kitchen

Spring is the time for front-porch-sitting, sunshine-soaking, and idyllic photography. It's so easy to be happy during springtime!

Journal excerpt from Thursday, March 21, 2019:

Amber and I danced around the kitchen while eating PBJ today, because crumbs are going to scatter whether we dance or not, so we may as well dance. That was my Instagram caption-turned profound thought for the day. It's fascinating how sometimes new thoughts flow through my fingers before I even realize that I'm thinking them.

Biking, burning, and bovines

Excerpt from my journal on March 19, 2019:
It was another beautiful afternoon today, sunny and 55 degrees. Amber went for a bike ride while I walked next to her. She rode down the dirt hill out back several times before hitting a rut the wrong way, toppling over at the bottom, and deciding she was done. It was so pleasant outside and Amber was so happy, I started feeling sad about a year and a half from now when she's in school. Who will I go on walks with then? I won't have a companion anymore to force me to stop and take time to wander in the sunshine.

Subbing

Jeff stayed home from work to aid his mental health recovery on Monday, March 18th. He asked if I would sub for him at track practice that afternoon. Since I am already a district employee via my job as assistant cross country coach, I am a perfectly legal fingerprinted, security screened adult person to help out with track practice last minute. After careful thought (aka mentally bracing myself for hours of stress and agonizing), I agreed to sub. I was a nervous wreck and had to give myself mental pep talks all day. I could not think about it while I was eating because being nervous makes my appetite flee. I kept telling myself things like "it's ridiculous that you're even nervous--you know half of the track team's distance crew from cross country!" and "You've solo-coached a group of high schoolers twice this size more than once. You can do this."

Not Guilty

Note: I wrote this post ten days ago while I was sorting my thoughts and feelings. At the time, everything felt too close to share. Time has reduced the vulnerability (slightly) and I keep thinking that these are good things to share, so I'm sharing:

Mental illness comes in all shapes, strengths, ages, and sizes. Some people, like a sweet longtime friend of mine, have incredibly severe, often debilitating mental illnesses to cope with. Others, like my husband, have a relatively mild case that is much more intermittent and comparatively easily managed (for the most part). Still others fall in between the two extremes on the spectrum, like another good friend, who battles anxiety with a touch of depression in the mix, while her husband faces a more intense case of depression. Another loved one has depression that slams into him unexpectedly one day, then lifts a few days later just as suddenly. Then there are people like me, who don't have a mental illness of their own, but who love people with mental illnesses.

Bike ride picnic

On Saturday, I dusted off my fun-mom skills and took the kids on an adventure. It was the first track meet of the season, and Jeff left for the high school on his bike at 5:55am (I was barely conscious). Whenever Jeff is gone for long periods of time, my usual homebody-ness flees and suddenly I become adventurous go-go-go, do-do-do Shaina. Last summer when Jeff spent four days at an education conference in California, I took the kids on a three day two night camping trip at the beach, all by myself. It was awesome and I loved it. That same wanderlust bug bit me again during Jeff's 14 hour absence on Saturday. When the track meets are within an hour of our house, we usually like to visit Jeff at the meet and watch a few races, but this weekend's meet was way out in Euphrata, WA and the kids begged not to go. So we stayed home and planned an adventure of our own.

Soul-care

Piano "retirement" is treating me kindly. I have not touched the Children's Songbook since the day I was released from the responsibility to play for kids' singing time at church (two months and one day ago). In fact, I didn't touch the piano at all for a solid two weeks after that bittersweet Sunday in January. Then the desire to play slowly crept back into my fingers. I took it easy, only playing when I wanted to. The healing process cannot be rushed, and I was healing from a year and three months of major musical pressure.

Reading in the dark

Most nights I like to lie in bed and read for a little while before going to sleep. Last night Jeff was busy falling asleep while I stayed up a little longer to finish reading a book on my Kindle. The room was quiet except for Jeff's breathing. The room was dark except for the soft glow of my Kindle. I was on my back snuggled all the way under the covers, my head propped up on a pillow, with just one arm out to hold the Kindle. My long hair kept tickling my neck. It's been nearly ten months since my last haircut, and something needs to be done. I just don't know what, so I keep putting off the inevitably risky haircut. Anyways, last night my hair was bugging me while I laid on my back trying to read. I lifted all of my hair up and fanned it out on the pillow behind me so it was off of my neck. Then I went back to my book. In the faint light reflected off my Kindle screen, the shadows on the bedspread started playing tricks on my eyes. Twice I thought I saw something move. I forced myself not to think about it and finished reading my book. Suddenly, there was no mistaking that scuttly movement, even in the dark out of the corner of my eye.

The Amb-monster strikes back

Amber is the star of more than her fair share of my posts, but the girl is a force of nature and one of my best coping mechanisms for that kind of intensity is writing it out. Today's topic: errands with Amby.

The child is a MONSTER of a shopping companion. That's all I really need to say, but I'll illustrate the statement with a florid saga of our most recent errands together.

Bitter

Tuesday, March 12, 2019

Dear Winter,

It has been a long time. I can't help but notice that you seem more bitter than usual, inexplicably holding on to iciness and pain when it's time for softening and joy. You have overstayed your yearly visit, and every time I ask you to leave, you lash out with another bitter storm. Please know that bitterness is not the answer. Yes, it is in your nature to be cold, but you are choosing to be bitter. You can be cold without being bitter--you've done it before!

Amb-Reading

Reading to kids is such an easy low-key way to spend positive quality time together. My mom read so many books to me for my entire childhood and beyond--she still reads books to me even now. (well... she reads books to her grandkids and I listen in...) Reading has always been a huge part of my life. I love books!

France by the dozen

It has been 15 days since Jeff and I got home from our trip to France, and I have just finished writing all of the stories of our adventures. The freezing winter weather, ice, and snow lingering into March has not been good for much, but it has been great for writing. In fact, I think the bad weather at home was a major reason that I wrote so much about our trip. I needed that escape. Curling up under my warm laptop, swathed in blankets while reliving our travels was a delightful escape. I went to France twice during February: once in person, and once in my mind while I wrote about it. Now I am officially officially home from France. No more escaping to write about another adventure during Amber's afternoon cartoon time. Sniff.

From Paris to Sunnyside

Our flight home wasn't until 1pm on Monday, February 18th, so we had time for one last six mile run through Paris. This time we headed up to Montmartre to see what sunrise looked like from the vantage point of Sacre Coeur Basilica.

Dimanche dans Paris

Sunday, February 17th was the last full day of our blissful week-long sojourn in France. I was sad about it, but also starting to feel quite tired from all of the intensity of the week. My fatigue didn't stop me from taking another soul-lifting stroll along the Seine to Notre Dame before church. The novelty of experiencing actual sunshine and blue skies on a trip in February never got old. I strolled around the peaceful Sunday morning streets, took a few pictures, listened to the bells of Notre Dame ring, and then walked back to our apartment to finish getting ready for church.

Saturday in Paris

When Jeff and I travel together, Jeff marvels that I have so much extra energy. He says "You suddenly have this superhuman boundless energy! You go on three extra walks per day, even though we already ran seven miles and walked eight miles." I laugh in response, because it's true. I find being in an exciting new place invigorating and I MUST explore! My reasoning is that resting is wasted time, and I can rest when we get home.

Notre Dame in the morning

After a quick breakfast on our first morning in Paris (Saturday, Feb 16th), I slipped out of our silent apartment and went for a slow solo stroll around Ile Saint-Louis along the Seine at sunrise. Jeff needed more rest at home, so I embarked on my own. It was pleasant to amble around without a destination, absorbing the sleepy morning ambiance of downtown Paris. When Jeff and I walk together, we usually have a destination in mind and we walk briskly. On my own, I was free to wander slowly, pausing often to drink deeply from the calm that is unique to early morning, even in an enormous city. In my three previous visits to Paris, I had never stayed so deep downtown, and it was a delightful treat to be able to walk two blocks from our door and be standing on a bridge over the Seine, looking across the calm water at the spire of Notre Dame Cathedral.

A Perfect Storm

Monday (Feb 25th) marked one week since we got home from our week in France. The jet lag was no longer debilitating, but I still felt a healthy portion of lingering fatigue. The river of life pulled me along in its strong current, always slightly faster and deeper than I wanted to swim. I wanted time to lie on my back and float gently in the calm water, but instead found myself navigating rocky rapids on an empty tank.

Marseille to Paris

On Friday morning (February 15th), we packed up, cleaned up, dropped our keys in the box, and walked up, the sizable hill to the Gare Saint Charles. It was a crisp morning, but I got quite warm climbing the endless stairs up to the hilltop train station. We caught a TGV train from Marseille to Paris at 9:35am. TGV stands for train à grande vitesse, or high-speed train. I Googled it.

Canebière crise

Aka: cannabis crisis
After a late lunch and some rest on Valentine's Day, we went on a walk to check out Marseille's Rue Julien street art area. Even though I knew street art basically means graffiti, it was more... graffiti-ish than I expected, haha. It looked cool, but I hope I didn't take pictures of any bad stuff!

Valentine Run

We woke up on Valentine's Day feeling tired and sore from our evening calanque scramble the night before, but February 14th was our last full day in Marseille and we still wanted to see more of the beautiful Calanques National Park. After a leisurely breakfast in our apartment, we donned our [slightly smelly] running clothes again and caught the 9:45 B1 bus out to les calanques and found a new trail to run, once again using Jeff's incomprehensible internal compass.

The Calanque Scramble

The Calanque Scramble, also tagged in my memory as The Hot Mess Hike.

Les Letres de Marseille

After our morning walk and lunch on our second day in Marseille (Wednesday, February 13th), Jeff was feeling a major jet lag slump. I was a little tired, but it seemed like a waste of time to sit in our apartment at high noon in a new city! With promises to do as little walking as possible, I coerced my lethargic husband into an excursion to find the Hollywood-style sign up in the hills, les letres de Marseille.

Marseille in the morning

Day two of our Marseille stay began with another early morning walk. This time we strolled around Vieux Port (old port) with all of the boats moored in the smooth harbor, looped past the Porte d'Aix (a decorative arch) and through Noailles with its daily outdoor market. Once again, Jeff's internal compass wound us on a near-perfect loop around town.

Marseille, Day 1

The morning after our arrival in Marseille, jet lag woke us up dark and early. I was awake at a ridiculous 1:20am after less than 4 hours of sleep (that's 4:20pm Pacific time). Jet lag is so weird! I laid there trying to fall asleep for an hour before giving up and pulling out my Kindle to read. Jeff woke up around 3:30 and somehow we managed to wait till 5am to eat breakfast. I was ravenous! It was so hard to wait that long. But at last we were crunching into heavenly bowls of Kellog’s Extra granola (with dark chocolate chunks and toasted hazelnuts) with strawberry Yop yogurt poured on top. It hit the spot. I look forward to eating Extra every time we go to France.

Rose's Baptism

Our Rose-girl was so excited to be baptized! I wanted to make sure she wanted to get baptized and wasn't just going along with it, so a few weeks ago I asked her. She looked at me like I was crazy and barely deigned to answer. You keep using that gritty determination to stick to the right path, daughter.

Celebrating Rose

Rose turned eight on February 7th, 2019. We love our Rose girl so much. She is intense, vivacious, vibrant, and joyful. She feels every single emotion with her entire soul and body.

Travel time

Jeff and I went on our "yearly date" last week! The jet lag is finally fading enough for coherent writing. We visited France's two biggest cities: Marseille and Paris. It was our best date trip yet. The more we travel, the more we discover how we like to travel, from packing light (one simple backpack apiece) to methods of exploration (minimal museums, maximum running). We love discovering new places and visiting old favorites together while developing our very own travel style.