half-marathon and instagram

I ran in another half-marathon this weekend. It was a different experience than all my others because I signed up with three of my other "mom" friends. They had not done a half-marathon before and I was the one who convinced them they were capable of running one. I knew that my pace was vastly different than theirs, but knew that the race was about helping them to finish. We stayed together the entire race and I finished about 50 minutes slower than all my other races I had done. However, it was a really wonderful day with friends. 

Will woke the girls up early and pulled them in the bike trailer to meet me different places in the race. It was so much fun to see Madison eagerly waiting for me. The picture above is right at the beginning. She had run full blast into my arms, like I was the best thing she had ever seen. 

We had brunch reservations for our rowdy bunch afterwards. Luckily, the manager decided to give us a private section of the restaurant and we could enjoy our meal. We have seven kids between us and they are all a bit wild. These are the moms I first met when I moved to Denver. We all started off with just one child about the same age and the past three years we have added children, changed jobs, and moved houses. I am thankful that we have been able to watch each other grow as mothers and have some time to enjoy things that do not directly involve our children. 

I feel myself getting an itch to do another marathon, but I think that might be too much crazy to add to our life. 

I also decided that I would attempt to take part in instagram. My phone is taking progressively worse photos, but I might as well give it a try. I am pretty convinced I will not figure out or use hashtags, but at least I will have a way to organize some of my iphone photos in a way that is easy to share. But lets be honest, my instagram will be less than interesting with my constant photos of the girls, but I know that the grandparents might like it. So I added a link to the account to the side of this page. I have no idea how to properly search for people, so please add me. For example, just a random example, if I search "Claire Lester," I get results that are not exactly what I am looking for... 

I officially spend all my free time today updating my blog a bit, writing two blogs posts, putting pictures on the computer, and figuring out a username for instagram. Little things like that take so much time now and the window to accomplish them is so small. Oh children! 

eleven months

Here we are, one month from Eliza turning a year old. I am not in quite as much disbelief as I was with Madison, but it is still crazy how fast a year truly does go by. 

At eleven months Eliza is:

- Still sick. I really wish I knew what to do for her. She has had some sort of ailment since March. She has even been on antibiotics, but the runny nose and cough persist. She just seems so uncomfortable most of the time. The doctors do not offer any help either, I guess we just have to wait it out. 

- She is cutting about three teeth right now. This might have something to do with her fussiness. She is getting two on top and one on bottom. The teeth are not coming in proportionally so she will have quite the crooked smile for a while. 

- She is pulling up to stand on everything now. I have even caught her pushing offing and trying to stand unassisted. I think she may take a while to start walking based on how long it took her to finally crawl, but she is getting stronger on those legs. 

- She eats constantly. I thought that Madison was an eater, but now Eliza has shown me how much a kid can actually eat. We are really feeling the increase of food consumption in our grocery trips, as in, we have to go every other day. Where all the food is going, I am not quite sure. 

- She is vocal. Whether she is crying, or whining, or singing, she is usually make some noise. She screeches in opposition when Madison takes a toy from her and if she thinks she may never be fed again. She also says, "ma, ma" "da,da" and "mmmm," like she is starting to sing an Hanson song. 

- She is still sleeping decently well. With all her sickness there have been a couple of rough nights, but she is still waking up about once a night. I think this helps me to deal with her constant day-time fussiness. She is also still adamantly against sleeping in the same room as Madison. We tried yet again, only to be met with screams of terror. Maybe some day Eliza will no longer demand an entire master suite to herself, but today is not that day. Which also means that we are still banished to the guest room. 

- She seems so much like a baby still. It is as if she is frozen in time a bit. I have gotten several people asking if she is six months old at the park. She just lacks that, " I am on the verge of toddlerhood" look. I think it is nice to have her stay a baby for a little while longer though. 

Despite her ever present fussiness, she is turning into a perfect piece to our puzzle. We have had several meals this month where we have all sat together at the table and ate independently (you know, since I am usually having to spoon feed Will). There are several areas of our life that are getting easier with every passing day. Sure, we have another year before Eliza screams bloody murder in the car, but we are getting there slowly but surely. I feel very hopeful for the summer and all the rest of the adventures this year has in store as a family of four. 

See you next month, my big one year old! 

mother's day

Here are me and my girls yesterday after breakfast. It was quite the snowy Mother's day, but it was still a wonderful day. Breakfast was delicious and both girls are very cooperative as long as there is food in front of them. I then went to the mall by myself for several hours. While Will took the girls to the grocery store. Then we topped the night off with chocolate covered strawberries and a movie. The movie we watched was, About Time, it was fantastic! So many parts of the film moved me and provoked a lot of thought, even Will said he thought it was good. Oh, and Will bought me a pair of Birkenstocks. I totally had a pair from high school up until last summer. Since they are back in style, Will bought me an updated version, they are red! He says he wanted to make sure I was the cool mom at the park, so very thoughtful. 

Other highlights from our weekend included: 

- Me running ten miles with the girls on Friday. I stopped at a park every thirty minutes to let them out and play, but it was still really difficult. The half-marathon I am running is next weekend, so this was the last long run. I kind of enjoyed touring around the neighborhood with the girls, I like the freedom of just putting them in the stroller and going. My goal for this summer is to get confident in pulling them in the bike trailer and spend our summer commuting that way. 

- Heading up to Estes Park Friday night. We have friends that are starting an open air adventure park in downtown and they needed some extra help to put the finishing touches on the property. Will did manual labor all day on Saturday while our kids played together. It was a bit of a stressful trip because Eliza screamed the entire car ride and was up all night, but the change of scenery was still beneficial. 

Today we are snowed in still. I have some school work to do for a class that started last week and maybe I can convince Will to finish our kitchen. The whole snow in May part of living in the mountains really gets to me. I am just so anxious for continuous warmth.