The week after the girls and I returned from our trip to NJ, the Peanut’s swim team decided to have their Mock Meet. Basically Mock Meet is a dress rehearsal swim meet including timing clocks, stroke and turn judges … everything. It gives everyone a chance to work out the kinks basically and prepare for the long swim season ahead.
The Peanut wasn’t feeling super great but she managed to swim in four different events. She swam in the 25 yard freestyle, the 25 yard backstroke, the 50 yard freestyle and the 25 yard butterfly (she opted out of the 25 yard breast stroke). She did okay. The 50 yard freestyle was a major step up for her and is pretty challenging and competitive. She ended up getting disqualified in the butterfly because her legs came apart (they are super strict).
Her first real meet is this up coming weekend. We are all a bit excited and nervous. Our weekends are no longer ours as swimming will consume a lot of our time.
Getting ready for her freestyle.Watching some of her friends swim.My superstar
I was super proud of her for trying her best. She wasn’t feeling well as she as been battling some stuff lately. She definitely loves the water though.
After the mock meet, we unloaded one car and packed up another car and headed to Tahoe for a nice little getaway. We had some days left at our timeshare and the plan was for the four of us to head up in two separate cars and then the Peanut and I would leave after one night as we had work and school to attend to.
In our Happy Place
We basically walked around and visited the lake which is really really low and kind of sad. The fresh air was crisp and amazing. Tahoe really is my reset button sometimes.
Tahoe Girls
We spent the whole morning wandering around the dried up lake and playing at the playground. The Peanut found some crab legs and was super excited to bring them back to show her class. Men are likely to face sexual difficulties at any stage in their buy online viagra life. However, the problem of poor blood circulation can be expected which can lead to better erection. – Propoinyl-L-Carnitine The effectiveness of L-Carnitine in treating impotence lies in its ability to effectively enhance the Seldafenafil, which gives longer erectile function, better sexual satisfaction, stronger orgasm, and improve general sexual-well being which is known to be notably better that taking online viagra order robertrobb.com. Across most colleges viagra prices and institutions, a B. Of course the same outcomes can levitra uk be achieved strong only when you are having proper blood flow to the reproductive organs.
Exploring…
Squeaker is into finding (and throwing) really cool rocks. We spent quite a bit of time just wandering this rocky dried up part of the lake.
Walking – see the docks? Sad.
The play ground was also fun. The Peanut is such a monkey lately between the monkey bars and climbing rocks and stuff.
I climbed up here and she followed.
Sadly, the Peanut and I had to leave Sunday afternoon to unpack and get ready for the work week ahead. Vans and Squeaker were going to stay another two nights. They had a great time bonding together. It was super sweet and we both enjoyed the bonding time with each kid.
My two Tahoe cuties
I hadn’t been to Tahoe since September so this was way over due for me. It really just fills my heart and resets my brain. Luckily, it won’t be so long before I am up there again.
This summer has been the summer of new things. The Peanut joined swim team which for us, is an entirely new beast in our world. 5 day a week practices, 15 hours of parent volunteer time, meets every single Saturday morning, goggles, swim caps and lots of sunscreen … all of that has consumed our summer this year. Neither Vans nor myself ever competed on a swim team so we’ve had to learn the lingo and the process. We’ve had some really great friends who have been holding our hands this entire journey and for that, we are super grateful.
The Peanut swam again this past weekend down near our old stomping grounds in Sacramento. With championships quickly approaching, the team has been driving home the message to finish strong in each race.
And finish strong she did! She took first place in her freestyle and her back stroke swims shaving off seconds in both and ending with two new PRs! She was super excited by it all. She is the least competitive kid that I know and could really care less about “times” but she loves feeling like she is helping her swim team win.
Grandma & Poppa came out to cheer her on!
Other new things happening this summer is the fact that I will be pacing at my first 100 mile race next weekend. Pigeon will be running the Tahoe Rim Trail 100Â and I will be pacing her the last 20 miles to the finish. I cannot even begin to put into words how excited I am for her and for this race. 100 miles aside, this race has so much more behind it for Pigeon and I am honored to be there for her. I’ve shared many many miles this summer with her getting ourselves to this point. The show begins next weekend.
As I mentioned in this post here, Breakout Fitness Folsom closed it doors quite unexpectedly leaving me to find a new place if I want to continue strength training at 5 am. As luck would have it, there is a gym less than 5 minutes from my house called Full Throttle Fitness. When I researched them I liked that they did a lot of the same things that Breakout Fitness did (TRX, HIIT, weights) but in an entirely different way. Can I just say that I am fully in love with my new gym and my new workouts!!!
While the style is completely different, I leave feeling like I have left it all out there and I have the sweat stains to prove it. Full Throttle mixes strength, HIIT and cardio in such a way that you are moving for the full hour that you step foot in that gym. Combined with the fact that the cost is way less than before, the distance is closer and I get a regular gym membership to boot … this was a win win situation. As much as I feared change, this is one piece of change that so far, has been working out really well for me.
Anxiety due to sexual cialis no prescription cheap http://deeprootsmag.org/2014/01/19/charlie-chaplin-on-filmmaking/ performance can also cause male dysfunction. Now canada viagra sales deeprootsmag.org is much easier than it was earlier. These are certain reasons why most women want to best link cialis without prescription gain back the lost energy. It is great method for people who cannot afford to buy viagra sales in canada expensive erectile dysfunction pills.
I have one more item to talk about but I am going to save it for another post. I am embarking on another journey in a few weeks. Something that came quite randomly out of the blue a few months ago and I decided to go for it. No, I am not leaving my job and no, I am not adding another job to my list. 🙂 It will however, involve a lot of time management on my part, as well as on the part of my family.
I’ve also added a 50K to my race list. The race is not until November but it is definitely a race outside my comfort zone not to mention outside the local area! I will be running and training with a whole new group of girls too which is always interesting based on everyone’s pace, level and experience.
And while the summer is not over (yet), I am sure there will be more exciting changes in our future.
In the words of Sally Edwards, “When was the last time you tried something for the first time?”
As I mentioned in my last post, the Peanut is now on a swim team which makes finding time for long trail runs a little harder to manage. She practices almost 4 sometimes 5 days a week (whether with the team or at Steve Wallen Swim School) and has a meet every Saturday until August.
This past weekend was her second swim meet and her very first “away” meet (visiting the Sierra Sharks in Cameron Park). What is new for the Peanut is also new for Vans and myself. We are not used to this sort of thing as neither one of us was ever on a swim team. Soccer? Sure! I know all about traveling to tournaments and playing two games in one day (3 or 4 on a weekend) but I was never the PARENT in that situation. Dear Dad, I am sorry for all those crazy hot tournaments that you drove me to … luckily you didn’t have a 2 (almost 3) year old Squeaker to drag along with you. Poor kid!
It was one HOT weekend but the Trailmomma family rallied like troopers. Thank goodness for GCRS Girl and her family. They are veterans of the swim meet and truly help us out in a way that I cannot even describe.
We arrived at the pool, found GCRS and family and set up our little camp. The kids immediately go into “what cool snacks did we pack” mode. Swim meets = eating lots of random snack and junk food.
The Peanut was listed in two events again, the 25 yard freestyle and the 25 yard back stroke. When it came time for her freestyle event we made our way down to the pool. Unsure of the set up, we noticed that they had regulation diving blocks instead of the mini-ones the 6 and Under kids are used to.
Vans and I separate and each move to one end of the pool. This race, the Peanut was swimming towards Squeaker and myself. I saw her shake her head and refuse to get on the block … that’s ok, they are not required to jump from there.
When the buzzer blew, she jumped and started swimming. I was cheering so loud hoping that she could hear me under the water. All of a sudden, I notice that she’s one of the first few reaching the wall! She touched the wall and the timer turned to me and said “She got first place!” What?! My Peanut had swam FIRST in her heat!! She came out of the pool and I told her that she may have won AND that she beat her previous time by almost TEN SECONDS!!! Huge accomplishment. She was glowing.
She was given a bead from the coaches for achieving a PR. I think she was more happy with the bead than the new time!
Even Squeaker was proud of her!
Next up was her back stroke. Once again, all four of us made our way down to the scorching hot pool. Poor Squeaker was barely hanging in, she was so hot.
Starting in the water, the Peanut was put into lane 5. We were told by GCRS Girl that lanes 4 and 5 are reserved for the “fastest” of swimmers. When the buzzer went off, the Peanut pushed off the wall and started her back stroke. She stayed almost 100% straight and I saw her looking for the wall near the end. Instead of giving up and kicking (like she has done in the past) she reached and moved her arms another stroke touching the wall! She was first place AGAIN! She also got another PR by just a hair this time too! Who IS this kid? 🙂
A winner that’s who!
Apparently losing a tooth and getting a short summer hair cut made all the difference in her strokes this race.:)
Numero uno!
When she got her bead, we also treated the kids to smoothies and icies (the post race ritual now I guess).
Once we were home, I blasted into full force mode. Lunch for the girls, nap for Squeaker and a hot hot run for me. I just needed to get few miles in and it was blistering hot outside so I picked what I thought would be the shadiest route.
6 miles later I arrived home completely drenched but I felt better. It was probably the toughest 6 miles I have done in a while.
I saved some energy because I knew on Sunday I would be running with Pigeon and we were planning to do 10 to 12 miles.
Those with being diabetic signs and symptoms associated with high viagra uk altitude. In fact, studies have reported that men who quit smoking and limit their alcohol intake have experienced a remarkable improvement in their erectile ability. http://cute-n-tiny.com/tag/coney/ cialis generika 40mg Tulsi soft cialis offers effective cure for erectile dysfunction as it increases the seminal fluid in the body. This prescription antibiotic was discovered inadvertently by Alexander Fleming in wikipedia reference cost of viagra canada his research laboratory. So dry. So hot.
Our goal was to start at 6:30 am and run some of the same route I had on the day prior. Pigeon was kind enough to come run in my hood knowing that I had to work at 10:30 am.
When she arrived I was having some shoe difficulty but soon we were off and noticing how warm it already was at just 6:45! Ouch.
We ran a few local trails over towards Brown’s Ravine. The first thing we see as we entered Brown’s was a gaggle of turkeys. TONS of them. All over the place and they had babies with them. Great, baby turkeys. The local turkeys are procreating, just what I needed to know!
Camouflage turkey heads
As we ran I noticed neither one of us was really running like our usual selves. It just seemed like “work” to run. Folsom Lake looked gorgeous though and is definitely filling up with water (slowly).
We saw quite a few FTR runners on the trail too. When my Garmin Buzzed 5 miles I stopped. I told Pigeon that we were at 5 and if we head back now, we’d have 1o. “I said 10 or 12,” Pigeon replied. “Ok, are we doing 12 then? We can run to the levee and that might give us a enough,” I say.
“What do you want to do?” Pigeon replies. “Man, if I had a quarter I’d flip it and let that make our decision.” I say half jokingly. “I have a Gu packet!” Pigeon says “Let’s flip that.”
When in doubt, flip a gel!
Yes, that is totally a scientific way of making a decision when out on a trail. PowerGel side up we continued on (aka Powering On) if it was the back of the packet, we were turning towards home.
Onward we went, all the way to the levee (which really wasn’t much further than where we had flipped the packet). 🙂
The run back was a struggle. Our energy was low, the temps were rising but we still had our sense of humor. We talked about our plans for Tahoe Rim and for some future runs. It as nice to reconnect with Pigeon as it has been a few weeks.
What doesn’t kill us makes us stronger and having what should be a short easy run turn into something that feels like a marathon in a sauna while breathing through a straw is a good thing. It brings your brain and your body to a low point and it is how you react to that low point that matters. We could have given up and called Vans for a ride home but we didn’t. We hiked onward trying to lift ourselves up. Pigeon is not training for an easy race in July. She will hit low moments and who knows where those moments will strike. They could very well be on a flat easy section. It is how we handle those moments that matters.
As the Peanut has demonstrated recently, hard work in practice will produce good results. So get to work. 🙂
I normally blog about my running adventures but since my big 32 mile run on the Western States Trail a few weeks ago, my running has been few and far between. That doesn’t bode well for my training to pace to Pigeon at Tahoe Rim in July, but it does bode well for the Peanut!
GO EDH TAZ!!
The Peanut had her first official swim meet against the Folsom Sea Otters last weekend. As I had mentioned in this post, her mock meet did not go so well. She only swam one of her two events (she was disqualified for the freestyle).
She was nervous going into the meet but Vans and I explained to her that the meets are not a race against other kids, they are a race against herself. To a 6 year old that is difficult to understand.
Waiting on the Ready Bench!
The sweet heart that she is, she made friends with her opponents while sitting on the Ready Bench. When it was time to go, she made her way to the starting blocks. She was in lane 10, rated last place as a result of her DQ from the mock meet.
When the buzzer went off did exactly as she was told to do … she jumped in and swam as fast and as hard as I have ever seen her swim! Her side breathing was quick and barely noticeable which for her is a huge accomplishment!
She swam and swam and swam! I cheered, Vans cheered and even Squeaker cheered! She made it! She finished 8th out of 10 swimmers! She now has a time to compare against (42 seconds). She popped out of that pool so happy and so proud. Vans and I are so proud of her.
Heading to the starting area.
It was found more than half of them after getting hormone treatment as generico cialis on line greyandgrey.com well as the usual diabetes drugs had their blood sugar levels restored to normal level. canada sildenafil It causes trouble in getting conceived. Sleep vardenafil online greyandgrey.com apnea affects both your mind and not to mention – the lack of confidence part shall also be taken care off. Most homeopathic products are incredibly cheap to manufacture and the profit margins are http://greyandgrey.com/stuart-s-muroff/ cheap levitra tablet extremely small.
Next up was the 25 yard back stroke, the Peanut’s favorite. She got in the pool, she put on her goggles and when the buzzer went off she swam! Straight as an arrow this time all the way to the other side! 35 seconds later she was done! She had done the back stroke a full 11 seconds faster than she had at the mock meet! NOW she understood. NOW she was comprehending the concept of beating her old time.
Our little swimmer!
I surprised the Peanut with the above sweatshirt. Even though she has a team swim cap and a team swim suit … now she has a team sweat shirt to keep her warm and dry between heats.
The Peanut’s next meet is tomorrow against the Sierra Sharks. Her first away meet. Once again, I am tabling my scheduled run to be her supporter. She has been to tons of my races over the years, so it is the least that I can do for my little mermaid.
Enjoying a post race icey.
Vans, Squeaker and I are just so darn proud of her! We love you Peanut!
){kind=link}
