Melissa, Ryan, Keira and Soren

This week was pretty much a standard week for us. The weekend was pretty fun, because Ryan had the Ride the Charx century ride and my mom came through town for the start of my dad and brother's West Shoreline bike tour.

On Monday, we had a busy day. We started off at the gym, and then went to the library for one of the last storytimes of the summer. As always, Keira and Soren had a blast.

We also noticed this sign at the civic center (next to the library). I think it is pretty cool that my hometown and current town are sister cities. Officials from Westerville were touring Novi today.

We did some errands, and Keira and Soren got balloons, which are always a hit.

That evening, once Ryan got home, we went to Maybury. I couldn't run still, so Keira got to bike. Soren didn't want out of the stroller because they were mowing.

On Tuesday, we really didn't do much at all today. It was nice to relax after such a busy day yesterday.

I did take Keira and Soren to the pool this evening while Ryan was at scouts.

Keira fell on the sidewalk coming home from the pool, and insisted that she wear a "jammy suit" to cover all of her scratches (which were very minor). Since she had a wet head and was pretty sad, I obliged, and she and Soren both wore squeezed into their snowmen pjs from last year and enjoyed singing the snowman song before bed. It really cheered her up.

On Wednesday, we went to the gym in the morning, and then played at home for a bit.

That night, I went out to Island Lake for TIA training. I rode 26 miles but did not run to rest my ankle.

On Thursday, I was fed up with my ankle bothering me. I was able to get in to the Dr for an 8:30 appointment, which was great. The doctor checked me out, and wasn't able to give me much new info other than rest, ice, and take more motrin. The big thing I did get was a prescription for physical therapy. I was very disappointed that I am not able to get it scheduled for several weeks, though. Hopefully I will be a lot better on my own by then, but it will still be helpful I am sure. After the appointment, I took Keira and Soren to the Sports Park, and we played there until lunchtime.

On Friday, we went to Kindermusik.

Afterwards, I went to the gym and then came home to see Ryan before he left to go up to Petosky for his ride. We got pizza for dinner tonight, and Keira and Soren helped me pick it up. They love carrying the boxes.

On Saturday, Ryan did his 105 mile ride. It was two loops, the first was very hilly and made a metric century (100K), and the second was another 42 miles or so. It had several very steep hills, including "the wall", which is 18% grade. I had made arrangements for Emma to watch Keira and Soren so I could run, but since that was not an option, I opted to bike instead. Emma lives right by Maybury, so it worked out great that I was able to take the kids over to her house. It was a bit tricky getting my mountain bike in the car, but I got it to work. I rode 2 laps of Maybury, which is something I have never done before. It felt pretty decent, and was a lot easier than the 17 miles of running that I had hoped to do. I am hoping that the two laps will help me for the upcoming Maybury TT in a few weeks.
My Team Marathon tattoos cames, and Keira and Soren modeled them for me:

We were hoping that my mom would arrive this evening before the kids had to go to sleep, but that would not be the case. They were pretty sad that they did not get to see either their Nana or Grandma today, so we went to Dairy Queen for some ice cream instead.

My mom and Ryan did arrive about an hour after Keira and Soren went to bed.

On Sunday, Keira and Soren were very happy that there dad and Grandma were both here. We all went to church, and I was able to have Cody, my visiting teacher's orthopaedic husband, check out my ankle. He felt that it was tendinitis, and identified the tendons affected. He said that rest was what it needed, but that I could go ahead and race my final tri without risking further injury. It may take a bit longer to heal, but it should be fine. Afterwards, we went over to Kris and Linda's for dinner. It was Linda's birthday on Friday, so we were able to celebrate with her with this meal. It was a great way to end the weekend.

This week was another fun week, full of summer activities. We started the week at another installment of Puppets in the Park and ended going to Greenfield Village, plus our usual activities.

On Monday, we attended storytime at the library. This week's theme was animals, and Keira and Soren had a blast. Keira did get a little self conscious when holding a letter for the song "Bingo". Soren on the other hand, loved it. One side of the paper had a letter and the other side said "clap" to help everyone keep track.

We had a little bit of fun at home too. Keira played with her numerous princess birthday cards, and we refitted Keira's train hat to fit Soren. He loved it.

We also went to Maybury that evening, and I did a light run with the kids while Ryan rode. There was some sort of party going on, so we didn't stay much longer than our workouts.

On Tuesday, we attended Puppets in the Park. We were hoping to meet up with Valerie, Katie, and Luke there, but due to a miscommunication and odd starting time, they missed the actual show. We did see my visiting teachers, Amber and Michelle, with their children at the show. They performed a play, "The Fisherman's Wife", and the kids enjoyed it.

It was pretty hot out, though, so we were anxious to get out of the sun. We did meet up with Valerie later, but for some indoor fun. Ryan took his scouts to Maybury today to do a hike with them, and got in a lap first. We stayed home and hit the pool instead.

On Wednesday, we went to the gym and then did errands. The kids looked so cute playing in the igloo tent at the gym.

After that, we stopped into Costco and Trader Joe. Keira had a rough time. There were no mini shopping carts available when we arrived, so she cried about that. Also, immediately upon returning home, her balloon was popped in the house. I had put them safely in the kitchen, and Soren brought it to her at the front door. Either he let it go or she didn't take it from him (or let it go herself), but it popped and we had more tears.
We spent the rest of the day hanging out at home, and then I worked out with Cristina and Julie at Island Lake. It was a light workout for everyone due to the upcoming half Ironman that everyone but me was attending this Sat. I probably should have stuck to biking only, but went on a short run afterwords despite some slight swelling in my ankle from last Saturdays race. It didn't feel bad while I was running, but the swelling has still not gone down and I have more pain as I write this.

On Thursday, we went to Greenfield Village with Nana, Ellyn, Bryn, and Lleyton while Bailey and Avery were at drama camp. We had a great time. The highlights of the trip were the carousel and the train ride. The kids loved both of them. Ellyn remembered that this carousel was unique in that it has a frog on it. The operator confirmed that the frog was one of only 5 made by this manufacturer, and this carousel contained all the original animals. Lleyton wasn't super excited about the ride, so Soren took the frog, and Keira and Bryn took horses. Everyone also enjoyed the ride on the train. Soren loves everything to do with trains, and just had a blast. We can't wait to go again!

That night, I had to take the day off of running for my ankle. It was at its worst from walking around in flip flops all day in the heat. I am hoping it won't jeopardize my fall marathon plans, but I will just have to rest, and I'll and wait and see.

On Friday, I had a nice easy swim at the gym, and the got showered off and put on a dry bathing suit so I could take Keira and Soren over to our cub scout's swimming activity. The families of the cubs were invited, so I knew Keira would have friends there to play with. It was at her friend Lizzie's neighborhood pool, and we had a pretty good time. Soren got a bit more water in his face than he would have liked (partially due to me), as well as had a mushy Popsicle taken from him (also by me), so he was pretty unhappy towards the end and ready to go home. I think he was mostly tired, since he looked like he was going to fall asleep in the pool and did fall asleep on the way home.

I was thoroughly amazed that the purple Popsicle drips just rinsed right off Soren's yellow life jacket. Had I realized it would clean up perfectly, I probably wouldn't have taken it away as quickly as I did (shortly after Keira got tired of hers). I am sure the chlorine from the pool helped with the clean up.

On Saturday, I took the kids to the gym so that I could ride the spin bike while Ryan rode. Ryan averaged 20mph for 64 miles, and had a bit more excitement than he wanted. A rider forgot his shoes and decided to meet up with the group en-route. He was about to catch up with them when going through a construction zone and the road was in pretty rough condition. He had a bad crash that resulted in a concussion. EMS was called, and since Kent said "biker" they assumed motorcyclist and not cyclist, so they had quite turnout of emergency vehicles. Fortunately, the man did go to the ER and checked out to be fine. His helmet was in bad shape, so it did its job.

That afternoon, I was able to do some open water swimming that Barb had set up with the Casper's in their neighborhood's private lake. The Casper's neighborhood is pretty insane (as in way nice), so it did feel pretty funny wading into the lake in my wetsuit with goggles and swim cap while people were out for leisurely strolls with their families. Barb spotted us in a kayak, while her husband, Scott, and Jennifer and Will swam with me. We did about a half mile, which went around 2 decorative fountains in the lake, and came back. The air temps were pretty cool (and it had rained just prior to our start), but the water was warm. I really didn't need my wetsuit from a temperature standpoint, but it was nice since our course had us swimming essentially out into the middle and back, and not across with a break, and then along the shore like my other OW swim course. I was a bit nervous about that, and thankful that Barb was out there keeping an eye on us and available if I needed a break, which I didn't.
Once I got back, we went out to dinner at Bagger Dave's. The kids really wanted to go to McDonald's, but were easily convinced that Bagger Dave's would be OK because it had a train inside. Soren was very funny, constantly pointing to the train, never getting tired of watching it go around the ceiling. Amazingly, the kids ate all their food too, even with the distraction of the train.

On Sunday, I had Sharing time at church. This month is going to be a bit tough in terms of staffing, but we will get through it I am sure. It will just be a lot of work for me because I have a new counselor who will only be here 2 weeks, my other counselor is gone all month, and we have no secretary. Thankfully, I have gotten Sunday subs for my counselors, so we should hopefully be OK.

After church, we went to Kris and Linda's house to have dinner with Greg and Ellyn's family. Soren was so cute, he asked if Lleyton would be there while we were on our way. It is so sweet how well they get along together with their cousins.