Rose and Amber, being silly during family scripture time one night.
This week all I've got in me is a collection of pictures and captions.
During his daily screentime, Jay can often be seen in various parts of the house with his VR headset on, playing a game or watching a show. For some reason it makes me laugh.
On Tuesday I rerouted my run due to a long train blocking an intersection. I turned around and ran back to the previous intersection to cross the tracks, and it ended up adding a solid 2+ miles to my run in the heat. My sore hip was aching and I was so thirsty! It was a total sweat-fest of a run-slog. When I finally got back to the park, all of the cross country kids were long gone, including Jeff, who has been coaching speed work and plyometrics at the track 3 days per week after xc practice this summer.
We had solar panels installed on the south side of our barn roof this week! It was intense, with guys practically rappelling off the side of the barn for 3 days straight. The solar panels will power our house and barn. The solar panels are the grand finale of this big beautiful home-gift from my parents.
Rose and Amber played many card games after swim practice and cross country practice this week. Their current favorite games are Loot (a pirate card game where you collect gold coin cards) and Cover Your Assets (a game where you steal cards from other players while protecting your own card stash).
This picture feels like a quintessential teenage Jay moment in time: eating two hot pockets while wearing his VR headset. With noise cancelling headphones, of course.
Swim Meet
Tuesday, July 16th at the Sunnyside Pool.
Tuesday night swim meet! From 5:45pm-11pm. It was 105 degrees. I confess that I hated going. Jeff had an allergic reaction to some stupid marijuana smoke that he walked through right when we arrived at the park, so he had to go home and I had to fill our family's required volunteer slot and work the meet in his place. It was sweaty and long and I was so exhausted by the end with no husband to tag team the workload.
But kids in swim caps!!!!! Rose was cracking herself up by pulling her eyebrows up with the tight swim cap and giving herself a permanently distressed look.
Spunky sisters, calm brother.
There is one week left of summer swim season and I hardly have any pictures of it, so I took these pictures in the kitchen before the meet on Tuesday night.
Go Amber! Working at the swim meet isn't as bad once the sun goes down and if one of my own kids swims in the lane I'm timing. That happened like 3 times.
Amber!
Rose looks so graceful when she swims. She swam every event. This was only her second swim meet of the summer since she missed a week due to a toe dislocation, then another 2 weeks due to our family reunion and girls' camp. She was happy to be back at a swim meet!
Rose!
Finally heading to the car at the end of the swim meet: Jay swam the last race of the night, the combined boys' 15-16 year old and 17-18 year old 200 meter individual medley. We got home at 11:01pm. I checked.
Kachess Lake day with the White family:
On Thursday, July 18th, we drove the two hours to the lake and arrived at noon. We spent five hours at the lake and had dinner at Costco in Yakima on the way home.
It was Grama Leslie's birthday, so at noon when we first arrived at the lake, we sang to her and she blew out candles on a cake that Layne (my niece) made. Then we ate a quick picnic lunch and the kids scampered off to the lake.
The Gibbons' famous water carpet was a hit once again! The weather was beautiful: 80 degrees and sunny (which felt positively cool coming from 107 degree Sunnyside), and the lake was refreshing. We stayed there for five hours.
The lake water was very low due to drought conditions, so an extra 20+ feet of the shore was exposed and the water was shallow pretty far out into the lake.
[Pictured left to right: Tate, Grayce, Amber, Jay, and Rose.]
Grayce and Amber, rolling up in the water carpet.
Jay enjoyed a long peaceful paddle in the kayak. For the first few hours at the lake, it was quite windy and the water was super choppy, which made our bobbly little kayak rather difficult to maneuver.
The kids caught nine tiny frogs.
Amber and I took a turn on the kayak, squeezing in tight and snug together in the one-person boat. We only were able to bring one kayak and one paddleboard because the roof rack we ordered for our van didn't arrive in time for our planned lake day. It arrived the day after. The Gibbons could only fit one kayak on their roof and Grampa Dan manage to squeeze one paddle board on top of his windsurfing board on the roof of his vehicle.
It was a very tight squeeze with Amber in the kayak, haha. My legs and glutes were screaming by the end of our voyage.
Strong Amber, pulling me out to the deeper water.
Excuse the finger I somehow got in this picture, but Amber's cute sunshine smile and windblown curls made me happy.
Cole, Layne, Rose, and Tate explored a long stretch of the lakeshore. The low water made a brand new peninsula that was covered in rocks and stumps.
Jeff showed off his superior balance skills by paddle boarding on the super rough water. I did not have the courage to attempt paddle boarding because I did not want to fall in the lake--I don't like getting wet above the knee if I can help it.
The water did calm down a bit after a few hours, and Amber went for a paddle board journey of her own. That girl has more balance and strength at age 9 than I think I've ever had in my whole life!
Lake shore scene: on the far left is Layne and Rose. They swamped the kayak together and had to swim it back to shore. In the middle is Amber on the paddle board.
Amber and Grayce worked endlessly on this sand-dirt castle. The lake shore wasn't pure sand, and it wasn't pure dirt. It was kind of like sandy dirt...dirty sand? Sandirt! They made it work, whatever it was.
7 kids at Kachess Lake: Cole (7), Jay (15), Amber (9), Tate (10), Grayce (8), Layne (11), and Rose (13).
Tate, Layne, and Rose got in on the sandirt castle building.
It is fascinating to me how industrious kids are when they are playing.
A scene from a summer morning at home: Jay, eating with his VR headset on while Rose and Amber share a Calvin and Hobbes comic book.
The Shoreline Run:
The Shoreline 2 mile and 10k is an out and back race on the paved pathway along the Columbia River at Howard Amon Park in Richland, WA, 45 minutes from our house. We left home at 6am on Saturday morning to get there in time to warm up for the 7:30am race start time. I needed that whole warmup time--my posterior chain was suffering from an intense leg lifting workout that I did on Wednesday. Thankfully I managed to warm up sufficiently to run a respectable race. Jeff, Jay, and I ran the 10k, and Rose and Amber ran the 2 mile race. White family results: Jeff--2nd place overall in 37:52, Jay finished his first 10k race in 42:52, Shaina--3rd place overall woman in 46:55, Rose ran 2 miles in 15:30, and Amber ran 2 miles in 21:10.
Starting line picture! It was too hot to bother with even my tank top, so I pinned my race number to my sports bra for the first time. It was liberating, although I felt a bit like a poser because I have only ever seen elite athletes race like this, haha. I don't know how Jay ran in a black t-shirt.
Post-race picture, by the Columbia River.
Jeff and I first did the Shoreline 10k twelve years ago back when baby Rose was 17 months old. A little research revealed that I ran the same exact time this year at age 37 as I did at age 25 twelve years ago during the 2012 Shoreline 10k. But during the 2012 race I was 6 weeks pregnant (with an eventual miscarriage). 37 year old Shaina is as fast as pregnant 25 year old Shaina. Hmmmm...not sure if I like that, haha. No, the truth is 37 year old Shaina is so much stronger than 25 year old Shaina--back in my 20's I got by on sheer youthful energy and muscle memory from college workouts. Now I have to dig deeper and build strength deeper to keep functioning close to that level!
Rose and Amber with their finisher's dog tag medals.
The 10k finishers. Jeff and I received beer glasses and medals. Jay received a dog tag and a bout of patella tendonitis. We stopped at Target on the way home and got him knee straps to help with the pain.
We also stopped at Krispy Kreme for some donut treats after our hard race! We got a dozen donuts and let everyone eat two right there in the store. Jeff ate three and Jay and Rose divided the 12th. My stomach felt so heavy but donuts taste SO GOOD after a hard run.
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